The White Ladies of Worcester A Romance of the Twelfth Century

CHAPTER VIII

ON THE WINGS OF THE STORM

In the af­ter­noon of that day, Mary Antony await­ed, in the clois­ters, the re­turn of the White Ladies from Ves­pers. Twen­ty on­ly, had gone; and, fear­ful lest she should make mis­take with the un­usu­al num­ber, the old lay-​sis­ter spent the time of wait­ing in count­ing the twen­ty peas afresh, pass­ing them back and forth from one hand to the oth­er.

Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress was still un­able to leave her bed.

Sis­ter Mary Au­gus­tine stayed to tend her.

Sis­ter Tere­sa was in less pain, but fevered still, and strange­ly weak. The Rev­erend Moth­er for­bade her to rise.

Short­ly be­fore the bell rang call­ing the nuns to form pro­ces­sion in the clois­ters, Sis­ter Seraphine de­clared her­self un­able for the walk, and begged to be al­lowed to re­main be­hind. The Pri­oress found her­self mis­doubt­ing this sud­den in­dis­po­si­tion of Sis­ter Seraphine who, though flushed and ex­cit­ed, shewed none of the usu­al signs of sick­ness.

Not wish­ing, how­ev­er, to risk hav­ing a third pa­tient up­on her hands, the Rev­erend Moth­er gave leave for her to stay, but al­so elect­ed to re­main be­hind, her­self; let­ting Sis­ter Mary Re­bec­ca, who had re­cov­ered from her in­dis­po­si­tion, lead the pro­ces­sion.

Thus the Rev­erend Moth­er con­trived to keep Sis­ter Seraphine with her dur­ing the ab­sence of the oth­er nuns, giv­ing her trans­la­tions from the Sacra­men­taries to copy up­on strips of vel­lum, un­til short­ly be­fore the hour when the White Ladies would re­turn from Ves­pers, when she sent her to her cell for the time of prayer and med­ita­tion.

Left alone, the Pri­oress ex­am­ined the copies, fair­ly leg­ible, but sad­ly un­like her own beau­ti­ful work. She sighed and, putting them away, rose and paced the room, ques­tion­ing how best to deal with the pret­ty but way­ward young nun.

Two def­inite caus­es led the Pri­oress to mis­trust Sis­ter Seraphine: one, that she had called up­on “Wil­fred” to come and save her, and had ad­mit­ted hav­ing ex­pect­ed him to ap­pear and car­ry her off be­fore she made her fi­nal pro­fes­sion; the oth­er, that she had tried to start an evil re­port con­cern­ing the old lay-​sis­ter, Mary Antony. The Pri­oress pon­dered what means to take in or­der to bring Sis­ter Seraphine to a bet­ter mind.

As the Pri­oress walked to and fro, un­con­scious­ly miss­ing the dai­ly ex­er­cise of the pas­sage to the Cathe­dral, she not­ed a sud­den dark­en­ing of her cham­ber. Go­ing to the win­dow, she saw the sky grown black with thun­der clouds. So quick­ly the storm gath­ered, that the bright sum­mer world with­out seemed sud­den­ly hung over with a deep pur­ple pall.

Birds screamed and dart­ed by, on hur­ried wing; then, reach­ing home, fell silent. All na­ture seemed to hold its breath, await­ing the first flash, and the first roll of thun­der.

Still stand­ing at her win­dow, the Pri­oress ques­tioned whether the nuns were re­turned, and safe­ly in their cells. While un­der­ground they would know noth­ing of it; but they loved not pass­ing along the clois­ters in a storm.

The Pri­oress won­dered why she had not heard the bell an­nounc­ing their re­turn, and call­ing to the hour of prayer and si­lence. Al­so why Mary Antony had not brought in the key and her re­port.

Think­ing to in­quire in­to this, she turned from the win­dow, just as a dart­ing snake of fire cleft the sky. A crash of thun­der fol­lowed; and, at that mo­ment, the door of the cham­ber burst­ing open, old Mary Antony, breath­less, stum­bled in, for­get­ting to knock, omit­ting to kneel, not wait­ing leave to speak, both hands out­stretched, one tight­ly clenched, the oth­er hold­ing the great key: “Oh, Rev­erend Moth­er!” she gasped. Then the stern dis­plea­sure on that loved face si­lenced her. She dropped up­on her knees, ashen and trem­bling.

Now the Pri­oress held per­son­al fear in high scorn; and if, af­ter nine­ty years' ex­pe­ri­ence of light­ning and thun­der, Mary Antony was not bet­ter proof against their ter­rors, the Pri­oress felt scant pa­tience with her. She spoke stern­ly.

“How now, Mary Antony! Why this un­seem­ly haste? Why this rush in­to my pres­ence; no knock; no pause un­til I bid thee en­ter? Is the storm-​fiend at thy heels? Now shame up­on thee!”

For on­ly an­swer, Mary Antony opened her clenched hand: where­upon twen­ty peas fell pat­ter­ing to the floor, chas­ing one an­oth­er across the Rev­erend Moth­er's cell.

The Pri­oress frowned, grow­ing sud­den­ly weary of these games with peas.

“Have the Ladies re­turned?” she asked.

Mary Antony grov­elled near­er, let fall the key, and seized the robe of the Pri­oress with both hands, not to car­ry it to her lips, but to cling to it as if for pro­tec­tion.

With the clang of the key on the flags, a twist­ed blade of fire rent the sky.

As the roar which fol­lowed rolled away, echoed and re-​echoed by dis­tant hills, the old lay-​sis­ter lift­ed her face.

Her lips moved, her gums rat­tled; the ter­ror in her eyes plead­ed for help.

This was the mo­ment when it dawned on the Pri­oress that there was more here than fear of a storm.

Stoop­ing she laid her hands firm­ly, yet with kind­ness in their strength, on the shak­ing shoul­ders.

“What is it, dear Antony?” she said.

“Twen­ty White Ladies went,” whis­pered the old lay-​sis­ter. “I count­ed them. Twen­ty White Ladies went; but----”

“Well?”

“_Twen­ty-​one_ re­turned,” chat­tered Mary Antony, and hid her face in the Rev­erend Moth­er's robe.

Two flash­es, with their ac­com­pa­ny­ing peals of thun­der passed, be­fore the Pri­oress moved or spoke. Then rais­ing Mary Antony she placed her in a chair, dis­en­gaged her robe from the shak­ing hands, passed out in­to the cell pas­sage, and her­self sound­ed the call to si­lence and prayer.

Re­turn­ing to her cell she shut the door, poured out a cor­dial and put it to the trem­bling lips of Mary Antony. Then tak­ing a seat just op­po­site, she looked with calm eyes at the lay-​sis­ter.

“What means this sto­ry?” said the Pri­oress.

“Rev­erend Moth­er, twen­ty holy Ladies went----”

“I know. And twen­ty re­turned.”

“Aye,” said the old wom­an more firm­ly, net­tled out of her speech­less­ness; "twen­ty re­turned; and twen­ty peas I dropped from hand to hand. Then--when no pea re­mained--yet an­oth­er White La­dy glid­ed by; and with her went an icy wind, and around her came the black­ness of the storm.

“Down the steps I fled, locked the door, and took the key. How I mount­ed again, I know not. As I drew lev­el with the clois­ters, I saw that twen­ty-​first White La­dy, for whom--Saint Pe­ter knows--I held no pea, pass­ing from the clois­ters in­to the cell pas­sage. As I has­tened on, fain to see whith­er she went, a blind­ing flash, like an evil twist­ing snake, shot be­twixt her and me. When I could see again, she was gone. I fled to the Rev­erend Moth­er, and ran in on the roar of the thun­der.”

“Saw you her face, Mary Antony?”

“Nay, Rev­erend Moth­er. But, of late, the holy Ladies most­ly walk by with their faces shroud­ed.”

“I know. Now, see here, dear Antony. Two peas dropped to­geth­er, the while you count­ed one.”

“Nay, Rev­erend Moth­er. Twen­ty peas dropped one by one; al­so I count­ed twen­ty White Ladies. And, af­ter I had count­ed twen­ty, yet an­oth­er passed.”

“But how could that be?” ob­ject­ed the Pri­oress. “If twen­ty went, but twen­ty could re­turn. Who should be the twen­ty-​first?”

Then old Mary Antony leaned for­ward, cross­ing her­self.

“Sis­ter Agatha,” she whis­pered, tremu­lous­ly. “Poor Sis­ter Agatha re­turned to us again.”

But, even as she said it, swift came a name to the mind of the Pri­oress, an­swer­ing her own ques­tion, and fill­ing her with con­ster­na­tion and a great anger. “Wil­fred! Wil­fred, are you come to save me?” fool­ish lit­tle Seraphine had said. Was such sac­ri­lege pos­si­ble? Could one from the out­side world have dared to in­trude in­to their holy Sanc­tu­ary?

Yet old Antony's tale car­ried con­vic­tion. Her ab­ject fear was now ex­plained.

That the Dead should come again, and walk and move among the haunts of men, seek­ing out the sur­round­ings they have loved and left, seems al­ways to hold ter­ror for the un­tu­tored mind, which knows not that the Dead are more alive than the liv­ing; and that there is no death, sav­ing the death of sin.

But to the Rev­erend Moth­er, guard­ing her flock from sin or shame, a vis­itor from the Un­seen World held less of hor­ror than a pos­si­ble in­trud­er from the Seen.

A rapid glance as she sound­ed the bell, had shown her that the pas­sage was emp­ty.

Which cell now shel­tered two, where there should be but one?

The Pri­oress walked across to a re­cess near the south win­dow, touched a spring, and slid back a por­tion of the oak pan­elling. Pass­ing her hand in­to a se­cret hid­ing place in the wall, she drew forth a beau­ti­ful­ly fash­ioned dag­ger, with carved ivory han­dle, crossed met­al thumb-​guard, blade of bev­elled steel, pol­ished and nar­row­ing to a sharp nee­dle point. She test­ed the point, then slipped the weapon in­to her belt, be­neath her scapu­lary. As she closed the pan­el, and turned back in­to the cham­ber, a light of high re­solve was in her eyes. Her whole bear­ing be­to­kened so fine a fear­less­ness, such no­ble fix­ity of pur­pose that, look­ing on her, Mary Antony felt her own fears van­ish­ing.

“Now lis­ten, dear Antony,” said the Pri­oress, hold­ing the old wom­an with her look. "I must make sure that this twen­ty-​first White La­dy of thine is but a trick played on thee by thy peas. Should she be any­where in the Con­vent I shall most cer­tain­ly have speech with her.

"Mean­while, go thou to thy kitchens, and give thy mind to the prepar­ing of the evening meal. But ring not the Re­fec­to­ry bell un­til I bid thee. Nay, I my­self will sound it this evening. It may suit me to keep the nuns some­what longer at their de­vo­tions.

“Should I sound the alarm bell, let all thy helpers run up here; but go thou to the cell of Moth­er Sub-​Pri­oress and per­suade her not to rise. If need­ful say that it is my com­mand that she keep her bed. . . . Great heav­ens! What a crash! May our La­dy de­fend us! The light­ning in­clines to strike. I shall pass to each cell and make sure that none are too great­ly alarmed.”

“Now, haste thee, Antony; and not a word con­cern­ing thy fears must pass thy lips to any; no men­tion of a twen­ty-​first White La­dy nor”--the Pri­oress crossed her­self--“of Sis­ter Agatha, to whom may our Lord grant ev­er­last­ing rest.”

Mary Antony, kneel­ing, kissed the hem of the Pri­oress's robe. Then, ris­ing, she said--with un­wont­ed solem­ni­ty and re­straint: “The Lord de­fend you, Rev­erend Moth­er, from foes, seen and un­seen,” and, fol­lowed by an­oth­er blind­ing flash of light­ning, she left the cell.