The White Lady of Hazelwood Part 9

"That is it I would fain know," said Amphillis.

"In good sooth, I see not how it may be," resumed Agatha. "He has never a penny to his patrimony. I heard him to say once to Master G.o.dfrey that all he had of his father was horse, and arms, and raiment. Nor hath he any childless old uncle, or such, that might take to him, and make his fortune. He lives of his wits, belike. Now, I am an only daughter, and have never a brother to come betwixt me and the inheritance; I shall have a pretty penny when my father dies. So I have some right to be jolly. Ay, and jolly I'll be when I am mine own mistress, I warrant you! I've no mother, so there is none to oversee me, and rule me, and pluck me by the sleeve when I would go hither and thither, so soon as I can be quit of my Lady yonder. Oh, there's a jolly life afore _me_."

It was Amphillis's turn to be astonished.

"Dear heart!" she said. "Why, I have no kindred nearer than uncle and cousins, but I have ever reckoned it a sore trouble to lose my mother, and no blessing."

"Very like it was to you!" said Agatha. "You'd make no bones if you were ruled like an antiphonarium [music-book for anthems and chants], I'll be bound, I'm none so fond of being driven in harness. I love my own way, and I'll have it, too, one of these days."

"But then you have none to love you! That is one of the worst sorrows in the world, I take it."

"Love! bless you, I shall have lovers enough! I've three hundred a year to my fortune."

Three hundred pounds in 1372 was equal to nearly five thousand now.

"But what good should it do you that people wanted your money?" asked Amphillis. "That isn't loving _you_."

"Amphillis, I do believe you were born a hundred years old! or else in some other world, where their notions are quite diverse from this," said Agatha, taking a candied orange from the sewer. "I never heard such things as you say."

"But lovers who only want your money seem to me very unsatisfying folks," replied Amphillis. "Will they smooth your pillows when you are sick? or comfort you when your heart is woeful?"

"I don't mean my heart to be woeful, and as to pillows, there be thousands will smooth them for wages."

"They are smoother when 'tis done for love," was the answer.

Agatha devoted herself to her orange, and in a few minutes Lady Foljambe gave the signal to rise from table. The young ladies followed her to her private sitting-room, where Agatha received a stern reprimand for the crime of laughing too loud, and was told she was no better than a silly giglot, who would probably bring herself some day to dire disgrace. Lady Foljambe then motioned her to the spindle, and desired her not to leave it till the bell rang for evening prayers in the chapel, just before bed-time. Agatha pulled a face behind Lady Foljambe's back, but she did not dare to disobey.

Note 1. It seems very strange to us that the Count de Montfort should have imagined himself to have a better claim to the crown than his niece; but the principle under which he claimed was the law of non-representation, which forbade the child of a deceased son or brother to inherit; and this, little as it is now allowed or even understood, was not only the custom of some Continental states, but was the law of succession in England, itself until 1377. The struggle between Stephen and the Empress Maud, and that between King John and his nephew Arthur, were fought upon this principle.

Note 2. The Louvre, then considered _near_ Paris, was usually mentioned without the article.

CHAPTER SIX.

A THANKLESS CHILD.

"We will not come to Thee Till Thou hast nailed us to some bitter cross And made us look on Thee."

"B.M."

Amphillis took her own spindle, and sat down beside Marabel, who was just beginning to spin.

"What was it so diverted Agatha at supper?" inquired Marabel.

"She laughs full easily," answered Amphillis; and told her what had been the subject of discourse.

"She is a light-minded maid," said Marabel. "So you thought Master Norman had a satisfied look, trow? Well, I count you had the right."

"Agatha said she knew not of nought in this world that should satisfy him."

Marabel smiled. "I mis...o...b.. if that which satisfieth him ever came out of this world. Amphillis, whenas you dwelt in London town, heard you at all preach one of the poor priests?"

"What manner of folks be they?"

"You shall know them by their raiment, for they mostly go clad of a frieze coat, bound by a girdle of unwrought leather."

"Oh, ay? I heard once a friar so clad; and I marvelled much to what Order he belonged. But it was some while gone."

"What said he?"

"Truly, that cannot I tell you, for I took not but little note. I was but a maidling, scarce past my childhood. My mother was well pleased therewith. I mind her to have said, divers times, when she lay of her last sickness, that she would fain have shriven her of the friar in the frieze habit. Wherefore, cannot I say."

"Then perchance I can say it for you:--for I reckon it was because he brought her gladder tidings than she had heard of other."

Amphillis looked surprised. "Why, whatso? Sermons be all alike, so far as ever I could tell."

"Be they so? No, verily, Amphillis. Is there no difference betwixt preaching of the law--'Do this, and thou shalt live,' and preaching of the glad gospel of the grace of G.o.d--'I give unto them everlasting life?'"

"But we must merit Heaven!" exclaimed Amphillis.

"Our Lord, then, paid not the full price, but left at the least a few marks over for us to pay? Nay, He bought Heaven for us, Amphillis: and only He could do it. We have nothing to pay; and if we had, how should our poor hands reach to such a purchase as that? It took G.o.d to save the world. Ay, and it took G.o.d, too, to love the world enough to save it."

"Why, but if so be, we are saved--not shall be."

"We are, if we ever shall be."

"But is that true Catholic doctrine?"

"It is the true doctrine of G.o.d's love. Either, therefore, it is Catholic doctrine, or Catholic doctrine hath erred from it."

"But the Church cannot err!"

"Truth, so long as she keep her true to G.o.d's law. The Church is men, not G.o.d! and G.o.d must be above the Church. But what is the Church? Is it this priest or that bishop? Nay, verily; it is the congregation of all the faithful elect that follow Christ, and do after His commandments. So long, therefore, as they do after His commands, and follow Him, they be little like to err. 'He that believeth in the Son _hath_ everlasting life.'"

"But we all believe in our Lord!" said Amphillis, feeling as if so many new ideas had never entered her head all at once before.

"Believe what?" said Marabel, and she smiled.

"Why, we believe that He came down from Heaven, and died, and rose again, and ascended, and such-like."

"Wherefore?"

"Wherefore came He? Truly, that know I not. By reason that it liked Him, I count."

"Ay, that was the cause," said Marabel, softly. "He came because--shall we say?--He so loved Amphillis Neville, that He could not do without her in Heaven: and as she could win there none other way than by the laying down of His life, He came and laid it down."