Earl Hubert's Daughter Part 14

n.o.body enjoyed the spring of the year 1236. Rain poured down, day after day, as if it were the prelude to a second Deluge. The Thames overflowed its banks to such an extent that the lawyers had to return home in boats, floated by the tide into Westminster Hall. There was no progress, except by boat or horse, through the streets of the royal borough.

Perhaps the physical atmosphere slightly affected the moral and political, for men's minds were much unsettled, and their tempers very captious. The King, with his usual fickleness and love of novelty, had thrown himself completely into the arms of the horde of poor relations whom the new Queen brought over with her, particularly of her uncle, Guglielmo of Savoy, the Bishop of Valentia, whom he const.i.tuted his prime minister. By his advice new laws were promulgated which extremely angered the English n.o.bles, who complained that they were held of no account in the royal councils. The storms were especially violent in the North, and there people took to seeing prophetic visions of dreadful import. Beside all this, France was in a very disturbed state, which boded ill to the English provinces across the sea. The Counts of Champagne, Bretagne, and La Marche, used strong language concerning the disgraceful fact that "France, the kingdom of kingdoms, was governed by a woman," Queen Blanche of Castilla being Regent during the minority of her son, Saint Louis. It is a singular fact that while the name of Blanche has descended to posterity as that of a woman of remarkable wisdom, discretion, and propriety of life, the popular estimate of her during her regency was almost exactly the reverse.

Meanwhile, the royal marriage festivities went on uproariously at Canterbury. There was not a peac.o.c.k-pie the less on account either of the black looks of the English n.o.bles, or of the very shallow condition of the royal treasury. To King Henry, who had no intention of paying any bills that he could help, what did it signify how much things cost, or whether the sum total were twenty pence or twenty thousand pounds?

The feasts having at last come to an end, King Henry left Canterbury for Merton Abbey, and Earl Hubert accompanied him. What became of the Queen is not stated: nor are we told whether His Majesty thus went "into retreat" to seek absolution for his past transgressions, or from the lamentable necessity of paying his debts.

On the 20th of January, the royal penitent emerged from his retreat, to be crowned with his bride at Westminster. Earl Hubert of course was present; and the Countess thought proper to feel well enough to join him for the occasion. The ceremony was a most splendid one,--very different from that first hurried coronation of the young Henry on his father's death, when, all the regalia having been lost in fording the Wash, he was crowned with a gold collar belonging to his mother. The Archbishop of Canterbury was the officiating priest. The citizens of London, hereditary Butlers of England, presented three hundred and sixty cups of gold and silver, at which the eyes of the royal and acquisitive pair doubtless glistened, and which, in all probability, were melted down in a month to pay for the coronation banquet. King Henry paid a bill just often enough to prevent his credit from falling into a hopelessly disreputable condition. The Earl of Chester--one of Earl Hubert's two great enemies--bore Curtana, "the sword of Saint Edward," says the monk of Saint Albans, "to show that he is Earl of the Palace, and has by right the power of restraining the King if he should commit an error."

Either Earl Ranulph de Blundeville was very neglectful of his office, or else he must have found it anything but a sinecure. The Constable of Chester attended the Earl; his office was to restrain not the King, but the people, by keeping them off with his wand when they pressed too close. The Earl of Pembroke, husband of Princess Marjory of Scotland, carried a wand before the King, cleared the way, superintended the banquet, and arranged the guests. The basin was presented by a handsome young foreigner, Simon de Montfort, youngest son of the Count de Montfort, and cousin of the Earl of Chester, to whose good offices in the first instance he probably owed his English preferment. He had not yet become the most powerful man in the kingdom, the darling of the English people, the husband of the King's sister, the man whom, on his own testimony,--much as he feared a thunderstorm,--Henry feared "more than all the thunder and lightning in the world!" The Earl of Arundel should have been the cup-bearer; but being too young to discharge the office, his kinsman the Earl of Surrey officiated for him. The citizens of Winchester were privileged to cook the banquet; and the Abbot of Westminster kept every thing straight by sprinkling holy water.

Once more, the banquet over, the King returned into retreat at Merton to get rid of his additional shortcomings. Never was man so pious as this Monarch,--if piety consisted of t.i.thing mint, anise, and c.u.mmin, and of neglecting the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith.

It was a sharp frosty morning in February. Margaret, Doucebelle, and Belasez were at work in the bower, while Father Nicholas was hearing Marie read Latin in the ante-chamber. The other chaplains were also present,--Father Warner, who, with Nicholas, belonged to the Earl; and Father Bruno, the chaplain of the Countess. Also present was Master Aristoteles, the reverend physician of the household. Fortunately for herself, Marie was by no means shy, and she feared the face of no human creature unless it were Father Warner, who, Margaret used to say, had eyes in the back of his head, and could hear what the cows were thinking about in the meadow. He was an extremely strict disciplinarian when on duty, but he never interfered with the proceedings of a brother tutor.

Father Bruno was a new inmate of the household. He had come from Lincoln, with a recommendation from the recently-appointed Bishop, but had been there too short a time to show his character, since he was a silent man, who appeared to see everything and to say nothing.

"Very well, my daughter. Thou hast been a good, attentive maiden this morning," said Father Nicholas, when the reading was finished.

"Then, Father, will you let me off my sums?" was Marie's quick response.

Marie hated arithmetic, which was Doucebelle's favourite study.

"Nay, my child," said Father Nicholas, in an amused tone; "that is not my business. Thou must ask Father Warner."

"Please, Father Warner, will you let me off my sums?" pleaded Marie, but in a more humble style.

"Certainly not, daughter. Fetch them at once."

Marie left the room with a grieved face.

"No news abroad, I suppose, my brethren?" suggested Master Aristoteles, in his brisk, simple, innocent manner.

"Nay, none but what we all knew before," said Father Nicholas.

"Methinks the world wags but slowly," said Master Aristoteles.

"Much too fast," was the oracular reply of Father Warner.

"The pace of the world depends mainly on our own wishes, I take it,"

said Father Nicholas. "He who would fain walk thinks the world is at a gallop; while he who desires to gallop reckons the world but jogging at a market-trot."

"There has been a great ma.s.sacre of Jews in Spain," said Father Bruno, speaking for the first time.

All the conversation was plainly audible to the girls in the next room.

When Father Bruno spoke, Belasez's head went up suddenly, and her work stood still.

"Amen and Alleluia!" said Father Warner, who probably little suspected that he was using Hebrew words to express his abhorrence of the Hebrews.

"Nay, my brother!" answered Father Bruno, gravely. "Shall we thank G.o.d for the perdition of human souls?"

"Of course not,--of course not!" interposed Father Nicholas, quickly.

"I am sure our Brother Warner thanked G.o.d for the vindication of the Divine honour."

"And is not the Divine honour more fully vindicated by far," demanded Father Bruno, "when a soul is saved from destruction, than when it is plunged therein?"

"Yes, yes, no doubt, no doubt!" eagerly a.s.sented Father Nicholas, who seemed afraid of a _fracas_.

"Curs!" said Father Warner, contemptuously. "They all belong to their father the Devil, and to him let them go. I would not give a farthing for a Jew's soul in the market."

Belasez's eyes were like stars.

"Brother," said Father Bruno, so gravely that it was almost sadly, "our Master was not of your way of thinking. He bade His apostles to begin at Jerusalem when they preached the good tidings of His kingdom. Have we done it?"

Master Aristoteles' "Ah!" might mean anything, as the hearer chose to take it.

"Of course they did so. The Church was first at Jerusalem, before Saint Peter transferred it to Rome," snapped Father Warner.

"Pardon me, my brother. I did not ask, Did they do so? I said, Have we done so?" explained Bruno.

"How could we?" responded Father Nicholas in a perplexed tone. "I never came across any of the evil race--holy Mary be my guard!--and if I had done, I should have crossed over the road, lest they should cast a spell on me."

Belasez's smile was one of contemptuous amus.e.m.e.nt.

"_Pure foy_! If I ever came across one, I should spit in his face!"

cried Warner.

"Two might play at that game," was the cool observation of Bruno.

"I'd have him hung on the new machine if he did!" exclaimed Warner.

The new machine was the gibbet, first set up in England in this year.

"Brethren," said Bruno, "we are verily guilty, one and all. For weeks this winter, and I hear also last summer, there has been in this house a maiden of the Hebrew race, who has never learned the faith of Christ the Lord, has probably never heard His name except in blasphemy. Which of us four of His servants shall answer to G.o.d for that child's soul?"

Margaret expected Belasez's eyes to flash, and her lip to curl in scorn.

To her great surprise, the girl caught up her work and went on with it hastily. Doucebelle, watching her with deep yet concealed interest, fancied she saw tears glistening on the samite.

"Really, I never--you put it so seriously, Brother Bruno!--I never looked at the matter in that way. I did not think--" and Father Nicholas came to a full stop. "You see, I have been so very busy illuminating that missal for the Lady. I really never never considered the thing so seriously."

"Brother Nicholas," answered Bruno, "the Devil was serious enough when he tempted our mother Eva. And Christ was serious when He bore away your sins and mine, and nailed them to His cross. And the angels of G.o.d are serious, when they look down and see us fighting with sin in the dark and weary day. What! G.o.d is serious, and Satan is serious, and the holy angels are serious,--and can we not be serious? Will the great Judge take that answer, think you? 'Lord, I was so busy illuminating and writing, that I let the maiden slip into perdition, and Thou wilt find her there.'"

Belasez's head was bowed lower than before.

"Brother Bruno! You are unreasonable," interposed Warner. "We all have our duties to our Lord and Lady. And as to that contemptible insect in the Lady's chamber,--well, I do not know what you think, but I would not scorch my fingers pulling her out of Erebus."

The dark brows of the young Jewess were drawn close together.

"Ah, Brother Warner!" said Bruno. "Christ my Master scorched His fingers so much with me, that I cannot hesitate to burn mine in His service."