The White Ladies of Worcester A Romance of the Twelfth Century

CHAPTER XLII

THE WARN­ING

Alert, de­ter­mined, all trace of las­si­tude de­part­ed, the Bish­op re­turned to the li­brary, laid the stone up­on the deed chest, sat down at a ta­ble and wrote a let­ter. He had made up his mind as to what must be said, and not once did he pause or hes­itate over a word.

While still writ­ing, he lift­ed his left hand and struck up­on a sil­ver gong.

When his ser­vant en­tered, the Bish­op spoke with­out rais­ing his eyes from the ta­ble.

“Re­quest Broth­er Philip to come here, with­out loss of time.”

When the Bish­op, hav­ing signed his let­ter, laid down the pen, and looked up, Broth­er Philip stood be­fore him.

“Philip,” said the Bish­op, “se­lect a trust­wor­thy mes­sen­ger from among the sta­ble men, one pos­sessed of wits as well as mus­cle; mount him on a good beast, sup­ply him with what­so­ev­er he may need for a pos­si­ble six days' jour­ney. Bring him to me so soon as he is ready to set forth. He must bear a let­ter, of much im­por­tance, to Sir Hugh d'Ar­gent; and, see­ing that I know on­ly the Knight's route and stop­ping places, on his north­ward ride, but not his time of start­ing, which may have been yes­ter­day or may not be un­til to-​mor­row, my mes­sen­ger must ride first to War­wick, which if the Knight has left, he must then fol­low in his tracks un­til he over­take him.”

“My lord,” said Broth­er Philip, “the sun is set­ting and the day­light fades. The mes­sen­ger can­not now reach War­wick un­til long af­ter night­fall. Would it not be safer to have all in readi­ness, and let him start at dawn. He would then ar­rive ear­ly in the day, and could speed­ily over­take the most wor­ship­ful Knight who, rid­ing with his la­dy, will do the jour­ney by short stages.”

“Nay,” said the Bish­op, “the mat­ter al­lows of no de­lay. Mount him so well, that he shall out­dis­tance all dan­gers. He must start with­in half an hour.”

Broth­er Philip, bow­ing low, with­drew.

The Bish­op bent again over the ta­ble, and read what he had writ­ten. Glanc­ing quick­ly through the open­ing greet­ings, he con­sid­ered care­ful­ly what fol­lowed.

_"This comes to you, my son, by mes­sen­ger, rid­ing in ur­gent haste, be­cause the ad­vice here­in con­tained is of ex­treme im­por­tance.

"On no ac­count let Mo­ra know that which I told you here, four days since, as we paced the lawn; name­ly: that the old lay-​sis­ter, Mary Antony, was aware of your vis­it to the Con­vent, and had, from some place of con­ceal­ment, seen and heard much of what passed in Mo­ra's cell. How far you re­alised this, when I made men­tion of it, I know not. You made no com­ment. It mat­tered lit­tle, then; but has now be­come a thing of ex­treme im­por­tance.

"On that morn­ing, find­ing the old lay-​sis­ter knew more than any sup­posed, and was whol­ly de­vot­ed to the Pri­oress, I had chanced to re­mark to her as I rode out of the court­yard that the Rev­erend Moth­er would thrust hap­pi­ness from her with both hands un­less our La­dy her­self of­fered it, by vi­sion or rev­ela­tion.

"Where­upon, my dear Knight, that faith­ful old heart us­ing wits she had prayed our La­dy to sharp­en, con­trived a vi­sion of her own de­vis­ing, so won­drous­ly con­trived, so ex­cel­lent­ly de­vised, that Mo­ra--not dream­ing of old Antony's se­cret knowl­edge--could not fail to be­lieve it true. In fact, my son, you may praise heav­en for an old wom­an's wits, for, as you will doubt­less some day hear from Mo­ra her­self, they gave you your wife!

"But be­ware lest any chance words of yours lead Mo­ra to sus­pect the gen­uine­ness of the vi­sion. It would cost HER her peace of mind. It might cost YOU her pres­ence.

"Mean­while the agèd lay-​sis­ter died yes­ter­day, af­ter hav­ing mys­ti­fied the en­tire Com­mu­ni­ty by lock­ing her­self in­to the Pri­oress's cell, and re­main­ing there, from the time she found it emp­ty when the nuns re­turned from Ves­pers, un­til I ar­rived on the fol­low­ing af­ter­noon. She thus pre­vent­ed any ques­tion­ings con­cern­ing Mo­ra's flight, and avert­ed pos­si­ble scan­dal. But the twen­ty-​four hours with­out food or drink cost the old wom­an her life. A faith­ful heart in­deed, and a most shrewd wit!

"Some day, if oc­ca­sion per­mit, I will re­count to you the full sto­ry of Mary Antony's strat­egy. It is well worth the hear­ing.

"I trust your hap­pi­ness is com­plete; and hers, Hugh, hers!

"But we must take no risks; and nev­er must we for­get that, in deal­ing with Mo­ra, we are deal­ing with the heart of a nun.

“There­fore, my son, be wary. Heav­en grant this may reach you with­out de­lay, and in time to pre­vent mis­chief.”_

When the mes­sen­ger, ful­ly equipped for his jour­ney, was brought be­fore the Bish­op by Broth­er Philip, this let­ter lay ready, sealed, and ad­dressed to Sir Hugh d'Ar­gent, at War­wick Cas­tle in the first place, but fail­ing there, to each suc­ces­sive stop­ping place up­on the north­ward road, in­clud­ing Cas­tle Norelle, which, the Bish­op had gath­ered, was to be reached on the sev­enth day af­ter leav­ing War­wick.

So present­ly the mes­sen­ger swung in­to the sad­dle, and rode out through the great gates. In a leath­ern wal­let at his belt, was the let­ter, and a good sum of mon­ey for his needs on the jour­ney; and in his some­what stol­id mind, the Bish­op's very sim­ple in­struc­tions--sim­ple, yet giv­en with so keen a look, trans­fix­ing the man, that it seemed to the hon­est fel­low he had re­ceived them from the point of a blue steel blade.

He was to ride to War­wick, with­out draw­ing rein; to wake the porter at the gate, and the seneschal with­in, no mat­ter at what hour he ar­rived. If the Knight were still at the Cas­tle, the let­ter must be placed in his hands so soon as he left his cham­ber in the morn­ing. But had he al­ready gone from War­wick, the mes­sen­ger, af­ter food and rest for him­self and his horse, was to ride on to the next stage and, if need­ful, to the next, un­til he over­took Sir Hugh and de­liv­ered in­to his own hands, with as much se­cre­cy as pos­si­ble, the let­ter.

The Bish­op passed along the gallery, af­ter the mes­sen­ger had left the li­brary, mount­ed to the ban­quet­ing hall and watched him ride away, from that case­ment, over­look­ing the court­yard, from which Hugh had looked down up­on the ar­rival of Roger de Berchelai, bring­ing the let­ter from Rome.

A great re­lief filled the mind of the Bish­op as he heard the clat­ter­ing hoofs of the fastest nag in his sta­bles, ring on the paving stones with­out, and die away in the dis­tance.

A se­ri­ous dan­ger would be avert­ed, if the Knight were warned in time.

The Bish­op prayed that his let­ter might reach Hugh's hands be­fore Mo­ra was moved to speak to him of Mary Antony's vi­sion.

He blamed him­self bit­ter­ly for not hav­ing soon­er re­called that con­ver­sa­tion on the lawn. How easy it would have been, af­ter hear­ing Mo­ra's sto­ry in the ar­bour, to have giv­en Hugh a word of cau­tion be­fore leav­ing War­wick.

Just af­ter sun­set, one of the Bish­op's men, who had re­mained be­hind at War­wick, reached the Palace, bring­ing news that the Knight, his La­dy, and their en­tire ret­inue, had rid­den out from War­wick in the af­ter­noon of the pre­vi­ous day.

The Bish­op chafed at the de­lay this must in­volve, yet re­joiced at the prompt be­gin­ning of the home­ward jour­ney, hav­ing se­cret­ly feared lest Hugh should find some dif­fi­cul­ty in per­suad­ing his bride to set forth with him.

Af­ter all, they were but two days ahead of the mes­sen­ger who, by fast rid­ing, might over­take them on the mor­row. Mis­tress Deb­orah, even on a pil­lion, should prove a sub­stan­tial im­ped­iment to rapid progress.

But, alas, be­fore noon on the day fol­low­ing, Broth­er Philip ap­peared in haste, with an anx­ious coun­te­nance.

The mes­sen­ger had re­turned, foot­sore and ex­haust­ed, bruised and wound­ed, with scarce a rag to his back.

In the for­est, while still ten miles from War­wick, over­tak­en by the dark­ness, he had met a band of rob­bers, who had tak­en his horse and all he pos­sessed, leav­ing him for dead, in a ditch by the way­side. Be­ing but stunned and bad­ly bruised, when he came to him­self he thought it best to make his way back to Worces­ter and there re­port his mis­ad­ven­ture.

The Bish­op lis­tened to this luck­less tale in si­lence.

When it was fin­ished he said, gen­tly: “My good Philip, thou art proved right, and I, wrong. Had I been guid­ed by thee, I should not have lost a good horse, nor--which is of greater im­por­tance at this junc­ture--twen­ty-​four hours of most pre­cious time.”

Broth­er Philip made a pro­found obei­sance, look­ing deeply ashamed of his own su­pe­ri­or fore­sight and wis­dom, and mis­er­ably wish­ful that the Rev­erend Fa­ther had been right, and he, wrong.

“How­ev­er,” con­tin­ued the Bish­op, af­ter a mo­ment of rapid thought, "I must for­go the melan­choly lux­ury of med­itat­ing up­on my fol­ly, un­til af­ter we have tak­en prompt mea­sures, so far as may be, to put right the mis­chief it has wrought.

"This time, my good Philip, you shall be the bear­er of my let­ter. Take with you, as es­cort, two of our men--more, if you think need­ful. Ride straight from here, by the most di­rect route to Cas­tle Norelle, the home of the no­ble Count­ess, late­ly wed­ded to Sir Hugh. I will make you a plan of the road.

"If, when you reach the place, Sir Hugh and his bride have ar­rived, ask to have speech with the Knight alone, and put the let­ter in­to his own hands. But if they are yet on the way, ride to meet them, by a road I will clear­ly in­di­cate. On­ly be care­ful to keep out of sight of all save the Knight or his body-​ser­vant, Mar­tin Good­fel­low.

“The let­ter de­liv­ered, and the an­swer in thy hands, re­turn, to me as speed­ily as may be, with­out over­press­ing men or steeds. How soon canst thou set forth?”

“With­in the hour, my lord,” said Broth­er Philip, joy­ful­ly, cured of his shame by this call to im­me­di­ate ser­vice; “with an es­cort of three, that we may ride by night as well as by day.”

“Good,” said the Bish­op; and, as the lay-​broth­er, bow­ing low, has­tened from the cham­ber, Symon of Worces­ter drew to­ward him writ­ing ma­te­ri­als, and penned afresh his warn­ing to the Knight; not at such length as in the for­mer mis­sive, but mak­ing very clear the need for si­lence con­cern­ing Mary Antony's pre­vi­ous knowl­edge of his vis­it to the Nun­nery, lest Mo­ra should come to doubt the gen­uine­ness of the vi­sion which had brought her to her great de­ci­sion, and which in very truth had been whol­ly con­trived by the lov­ing heart and nim­ble wits of Mary Antony.

So once again the Bish­op stood at the case­ment in the ban­quet­ing hall; and, look­ing down in­to the court­yard, saw faith­ful Philip, with an es­cort ful­ly armed, ride out at the Palace gates.

No time had been lost in re­pair­ing the mis­take. Yet there was heavy fore­bod­ing at the Bish­op's heart, as he paced slow­ly down the hall.

Great­ly he feared lest this twen­ty-​four hours' de­lay should mean mis­chief wrought, which could nev­er be un­done.

Pass­ing in­to the chapel, he kneeled long be­fore the shrine of Saint Joseph pray­ing, with an in­tense fer­vour of pe­ti­tion, that his warn­ing might reach the Knight be­fore any word had passed his lips which could shake Mo­ra's be­lief in that which was to her the sole jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for the im­por­tant step she had tak­en.

The Bish­op prayed and fast­ed; fast­ed, prayed, and kept vig­il. And all the night through, in thought, he fol­lowed Broth­er Philip and his es­cort as they rode north­ward, through the forests, up the glens, and over the moors, mak­ing di­rect for Mo­ra's home, to which she and Hugh were trav­el­ling by a more round­about way.