The White Ladies of Worcester A Romance of the Twelfth Century

CHAPTER XXXVIII

THE BISH­OP KEEPS VIG­IL

Old Mary Antony lay dy­ing.

The Bish­op had not al­lowed her to be car­ried from the cell of the Pri­oress, to her own.

He had com­mand­ed that the Rev­erend Moth­er's couch be moved from the in­ner room and placed be­fore the shrine of the Vir­gin. On this lay Mary Antony, while the Bish­op him­self kept watch be­side her.

The evening light came in through the open case­ment, il­lu­min­ing the calm old face, from which the sooth­ing hand of death was al­ready smooth­ing the wrin­kles.

Five hours had passed since they found her.

It had tak­en long to re­store her to con­scious­ness; and so soon as she awoke to her sur­round­ings, and recog­nised Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress, and the many faces around her, she re­lapsed in­to si­lence, re­fus­ing to an­swer any ques­tions, yet keep­ing her eyes anx­ious­ly fixed up­on the door.

See­ing which, Sis­ter Tere­sa slipped from the room and ran se­cret­ly to tell the Lord Bish­op, who had paid but a brief vis­it to the Palace and was now pac­ing the lawn be­low the clois­ters.

The Bish­op came at once; when, see­ing him en­ter, Mary Antony gave a cry, striv­ing to raise her­self from the pil­lows.

Mov­ing to the bed­side, the Bish­op laid his hand up­on the shak­ing hands, which had been clasped at sight of him.

An ea­ger ques­tion was in the eyes lift­ed to his.

The Bish­op bent over the couch.

“Yes,” he said, and smiled.

The anx­ious look fad­ed. The eyes closed. A tri­umphant smile il­lu­mined the dy­ing face.

Turn­ing, the Bish­op asked a few whis­pered ques­tions of the Sub-​Pri­oress.

Mary Antony had tak­en a sip of wine, but seemed to find it im­pos­si­ble to par­take of food. She had been so long with­out, that now na­ture re­fused it.

“Un­doubt­ed­ly she is dy­ing,” said Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress, not un­kind­ly, but in the mat­ter-​of-​fact tone of one to whom the hard out­line of a fact is un­soft­ened by the at­mo­sphere of imag­ina­tion or of sym­pa­thy.

“I know it,” said the Bish­op, in low tones. “There­fore am I come to con­fess our sis­ter and to ad­min­is­ter the fi­nal rites and con­so­la­tions of the Church. I have with me all that is need­ed. You may now with­draw, and leave me to watch alone be­side Sis­ter Mary Antony.”

“We sent for Fa­ther Pe­ter,” be­gan Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress, “but she paid no heed to any of his ques­tions, nei­ther would she”----

The Bish­op took one step to­ward Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress, with up­lift­ed hand, point­ing to the door.

Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress has­tened out.

The Bish­op fol­lowed her in­to the pas­sage, where a wait­ing crowd of nuns cre­at­ed that at­mo­sphere of ex­cit­ed ten­sion, which seizes cer­tain minds at the near ap­proach of death.

“I bid you all to go to your cells,” said the Bish­op, “there to spend the next hour in earnest prayer for the pass­ing soul of this aged nun who, dur­ing so long a time, has lived and worked in this Con­vent. Let ev­ery door be closed. I keep the fi­nal vig­il alone. When I need help I shall ring the Con­vent bell.”

Im­mov­able in the pas­sage stood the Bish­op, un­til ev­ery fig­ure had van­ished; ev­ery door had closed.

Then he re-​en­tered the Pri­oress's cell, and shut the door.

He placed the holy oil on the step, be­fore the shrine of the Madon­na, just where old Antony had knelt when she had prayed our blessèd La­dy to be pleased to sharp­en her old wits.

Then he drew forth a tiny flask of rare Ital­ian work­man­ship, let fall a few drops from it in­to a spoon­ful of wine, and firm­ly poured the liq­uid be­tween the old lay-​sis­ter's part­ed lips.

One anx­ious mo­ment; then he heard her swal­low.

At that, the Bish­op drew the Pri­oress's chair to the side of the couch, and sat down to await events.

In a few mo­ments the ster­torous breath­ing ceased, the open mouth closed. Mary Antony sighed thrice, as a lit­tle child that has wept be­fore sleep­ing sighs in its sleep.

Then she opened her eyes, and fixed them on the Bish­op.

“Rev­erend Fa­ther”--she be­gan, then chuck­led, glee­ful­ly. Her voice had come back, and with it a great ac­tiv­ity of brain, though the hands up­on the cov­er­let seemed to be­long to some­one else, and she hoped they would not rise up and strike her. Her feet, she could not feel at all; but, see­ing that she was most com­fort­ably ly­ing there where she best loved to be, why should she re­quire feet? Feet are such tired things. One rests bet­ter with­out them.

“Speak low,” said the Bish­op, bend­ing for­ward. “Speak low, dear Sis­ter Antony; part­ly to spare thy strength; and part­ly be­cause, though I have sent all the White Ladies to their cells, our good Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress, in her nat­ural anx­iety for thy wel­fare, may be out­side the door, even now.”

Mary Antony chuck­led.

“If we could but thrust a nail through in­to her ear,” she whis­pered. Then sud­den­ly se­ri­ous, she put the ques­tion which al­ready her eyes had asked: “Did I suc­ceed in keep­ing from them the flight of the Rev­erend Moth­er, un­til you ar­rived, Rev­erend Fa­ther?”

“Yes, faith­ful heart, wise be­yond all ex­pec­ta­tion, you did.”

Again Mary Antony chuck­led.

“I locked them out,” she said, with a know­ing wink, “but I al­so took them in. Yea, ver­ily, I took them in! Scores of times they called me 'Rev­erend Moth­er.' 'Open the door, I humbly pray you, Rev­erend Moth­er,' plead­ed Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress at the key­hole. '_Dixi: Cus­to­di­am vias meas_,' chant­ed Mary Antony, in a beau­teous voice! . . . 'Open, open, Rev­erend Moth­er!' be­sought a mul­ti­tude with­out. '_Quid mul­ti­pli­cati sunt gui tribu­lant me_!' in­toned Mary Antony, with­in. . . . 'Most dear and Rev­erend Moth­er,' crooned Sis­ter Mary Re­bec­ca, at mid­night, 'I have some­thing of deep­est im­por­tance to say'--'_Dix­it in­sip­iens_,' was Mary Antony's ap­pro­pri­ate re­sponse. Eh, and Sis­ter Mary Re­bec­ca, think­ing none could ob­serve her, had al­ready been round, in the moon­light, and at­tempt­ed to climb a tree. All the Rev­erend Moth­er's win­dows were close­ly cur­tained; but old Antony had her eye to a crack, and the sight of Sis­ter Mary Re­bec­ca climb­ing, made all the oth­er trees to shake with laugh­ter, but is not a sight to be de­scribed to the great Lord Bish­op. . . . Nay, then!”--with a star­tled cry--“Why doth this knot­ted fin­ger rise up and shake it­self at me?”

The Bish­op took the worn old hand, now stone cold, laid it back up­on the quilt, and cov­ered it with his own.

The drug he had ad­min­is­tered had in­deed re­vived the pow­ers, but the over-​ex­cit­ed brain was in­clined to wan­der.

He re­called it with a name which he knew would act as a po­tent spell.

“Would you have news of the Pri­oress, Sis­ter Antony?”

In­stant­ly the eyes grew ea­ger.

“Is she safe, Rev­erend Fa­ther? Is she well? Hath she tak­en hap­pi­ness to her with both hands, not thrust­ing it away?”

“Hap­pi­ness hath tak­en her by both hands,” said the Bish­op. “This morn­ing I blest her union with a no­ble knight to whom she was be­trothed be­fore she came hith­er.”

“_I_ know,” whis­pered old Antony ec­stat­ical­ly. “I heard it all, I and my meat chop­per, hid­den in there; I and my meat chop­per--not will­ing to let the Rev­erend Moth­er face dan­ger alone. And I did thrust the han­dle of the chop­per be­tween my gums, that I might not cry 'Brave­ly done!' when the no­ble Knight and his men-​at-​arms flung a rope over a strong bough, and hanged that clerk­ly fel­low--some­what lean and out at el­bows. Oh, ah? It was brave­ly done! I heard it all! I saw it all!”

Then the joy fad­ed; a look of shame and grief came in­to the old face.

“But hav­ing thus seen and heard has led me in­to grievous sin, Rev­erend Fa­ther. Alas, I have lied about holy things, sin­ning, I fear me, be­yond for­give­ness, though in­deed I did it, mean­ing to do well. May I tell you all, Rev­erend Fa­ther, that you may judge whether in that which I did, I act­ed ac­cord­ing to our blessèd La­dy's will and in­ten­tion, or whether the de­ceit­ful­ness of mine own heart has led me in­to mor­tal sin?”

The Bish­op looked anx­ious­ly at the sun dip­ping slow­ly in the west. The ef­fect of the drug he had giv­en should last an hour, if care were tak­en of this spu­ri­ous strength. He judged a quar­ter of that time to have al­ready sped.

“Tell me from the be­gin­ning, with­out re­serve, dear Antony,” he said. “But speak low, for my ear on­ly. Re­mem­ber pos­si­ble lis­ten­ers out­side the door.”

So present­ly the whole tale was told, with many a quaint twist of old Antony's. And the Bish­op's heart melt­ed to ten­der­ness as she whis­pered the sto­ry, and he re­alised the great­ness of the de­vo­tion which had gone for­ward, with­out a thought of self, in the bold en­deav­our to bring hap­pi­ness to the Pri­oress she loved, yet the anx­ious con­science, which now trem­bled at the thought of that which the fear­less heart had done.

“I lied about holy things; I put words in­to our blessèd La­dy's mouth; I said she moved her hand. But you did tell me, Rev­erend Fa­ther, that the Rev­erend Moth­er was so made that un­less there was a vi­sion or rev­ela­tion from our La­dy, she would thrust away her hap­pi­ness with both hands. And there would not have been a vi­sion if old Antony had not con­trived one. Yet I fear me, for the sin of that con­triv­ing, I shall nev­er find for­give­ness; my soul must ev­er stay in tor­ment.”

Tears coursed down the wrin­kled cheeks.

The Bish­op kneeled be­side the bed.

“Dear Antony,” he said. “Lis­ten to me. 'Per­fect love casteth out fear, be­cause fear hath tor­ment.' You have loved with a per­fect love. You need have no fear. Trust in the love of God, in the pre­cious blood of the Re­deemer, which cleanseth from all sin, in the un­der­stand­ing ten­der­ness of our La­dy, who knoweth a wom­an's heart. You meant to do right; and if, hon­est­ly in­tend­ing to do well, you used the wrong means, Di­vine love, judg­ing you by your in­ten­tion, will par­don the mis­take. 'If we con­fess our sins, He is faith­ful and just to for­give us our sins, and to cleanse us from all un­righ­teous­ness.' Think no more of your­self, in this. Dwell sole­ly on our Lord. Si­lence your own fears, by re­peat­ing: 'He is faith­ful and just.'”

“Think you, Rev­erend Fa­ther,” qua­vered the pa­thet­ic voice, “that They will some­times let old Antony out of hell for an hour, to sit on her jasper seat and see the Rev­erend Moth­er walk up the gold­en stairs, with the splen­did Knight on one side and the great Lord Bish­op on the oth­er?”

“Sis­ter Mary Antony,” said the Bish­op, clear­ly and solemn­ly, “there is no place in hell for so faith­ful and so lov­ing a heart. You shall go straight to your jasper seat; and be­cause, with the Lord, one day is as a thou­sand years, and a thou­sand years as one day, your eyes will scarce have time to grow used to the great glo­ry, be­fore you see the Rev­erend Moth­er com­ing, walk­ing be­tween the two who have faith­ful­ly loved her; and you, who have al­so loved her faith­ful­ly, will al­so mount the gold­en stair, and to­geth­er we all shall kneel be­fore the throne of God, and un­der­stand at last the full mean­ing of those words of won­der: GOD IS LOVE.”

A look of in­ef­fa­ble joy lit up the dy­ing face.

“Straight to my jasper seat,” she said, “to watch--to wait”----

Then came the sud­den fad­ing of the spu­ri­ous strength. The Bish­op put out his hand and reached for the holy oil.

* * * * * *

The gold­en sun­set light flood­ed the cham­ber with ra­di­ance.

The Bish­op still watched be­side the couch.

Hav­ing ral­lied suf­fi­cient­ly to make her last con­fes­sion, short and sim­ple as a child's; hav­ing re­ceived ab­so­lu­tion and the last sa­cred rites of the Church, Mary Antony had slipped in­to a peace­ful slum­ber.

The Bish­op had to bend over and lis­ten, to make sure that she still breathed.

Sud­den­ly she opened her eyes and looked full in­to his.

“Did you wed the Rev­erend Moth­er to the splen­did Knight?” she asked, and her voice was strong again and nat­ural, with the lit­tle chuck­le of cu­rios­ity and hu­mour in it, as of old.

“This morn­ing,” an­swered the Bish­op, “I wed­ded them.”

“Did he kiss her?” asked old Antony, with an in­de­scrib­able twin­kle of glee­ful en­joy­ment, though those twin­kling eyes seemed the on­ly liv­ing thing in the old face.

“Nay,” said the Bish­op. “They who tru­ly kiss, kiss not in pub­lic.”

“Ah,” whis­pered Mary Antony. “Yea, ver­ily! I know that to be true.”

She lift­ed wan­der­ing fin­gers and, af­ter much grop­ing, touched her fore­head, with a hap­py smile.

Not know­ing what else the ac­tion could mean, the Bish­op leaned for­ward and made the sign of the cross on her brow.

Mary Antony gave that pe­cu­liar lit­tle chuck­le of en­joy­ment, which had al­ways marked her plea­sure when the very learned made mis­takes. It gave her so great a sense of clev­er­ness.

Af­ter this the light fad­ed from the old eyes, and the Bish­op had be­gun to think they would not again open up­on this world, when a strange thing hap­pened.

There was a flick of wings, and in, through the open win­dow, flew the robin.

First he perched on the mar­ble hand of the Madon­na. Then, with a joy­ful chirp, dropped straight to the couch on which lay Mary Antony.

At sound of that chirp, Mary Antony opened her eyes, and saw her much loved lit­tle bird hop­ping gai­ly on the cov­er­let.

“Hey, thou lit­tle vain man!” she said. “Ah, naughty Mas­ter Pie­man! Art come to look up­on old Antony in her bed? The great Lord Bish­op will have thee hanged.”

The robin hopped near­er, and pecked gen­tly at the hand which so oft had fed him, now ly­ing help­less on the quilt.

A look of exquisite de­light came in­to the old wom­an's eyes.

“Ah, my lit­tle Knight of the Bloody Vest,” she whis­pered, “dost want thy cheese? Wait a minute, while old Antony search­es in her wal­let.”

She sat up sud­den­ly, as if to reach for some­thing.

Then a star­tled look came in­to her face. She stretched out ap­peal­ing hands to the Bish­op.

In­stant­ly he caught them in his.

“Fear not, dear Antony,” he said. “All is well.”

The robin, spread­ing his wings, flew out at the win­dow. And the lov­ing spir­it of Mary Antony went with him.

The Bish­op laid the worn-​out body gen­tly back up­on the couch, closed the eyes, and fold­ed the hands up­on the breast.

Then he walked over to the win­dow, and stood look­ing at the gold­en ram­parts of that sun­set city, glow­ing against the del­icate azure of the evening sky.

Great lone­li­ness of soul came to the Bish­op, stand­ing thus in the emp­ty cell.

The Pri­oress had gone; the robin had gone; Mary Antony had gone; and the Bish­op great­ly wished that he might go, al­so.

Present­ly he turned to the Pri­oress's ta­ble. She had sent to the Palace the copy she had made, and the copy she had mend­ed, of the Pope's man­date. But she had left up­on the ta­ble the strips of parch­ment up­on which she had in­scribed, on the night of her vig­il, copies and trans­la­tions of an­cient prayers from the Sacra­men­taries. The Bish­op gath­ered these up, read­ing them as he stood. Two he slipped in­to his sash, but the third he took to the couch and placed be­neath the fold­ed hands.

“Take this with thee to thy jasper seat, dear faith­ful heart,” he said; “for tru­ly it was giv­en un­to thee to per­ceive and know what things thou ought­est to do, and al­so to have grace and pow­er faith­ful­ly to ful­fil the same.”

The peace­ful face, grow­ing beau­ti­ful with that solemn look of eter­nal youth which death brings, even to the aged, seemed to smile, as the pre­cious parch­ment passed in­to the keep­ing of those fold­ed hands.

The Bish­op knelt long in prayer and thanks­giv­ing. At length, with up­lift­ed face, he said: “And grant, O my God, that I too may be faith­ful, un­to the very end.”

Then he rose, and rang the Con­vent bell.