The man's life had been a transmigration. In his younger days the world had banqueted him; new poignancies had bubbled against his lips in the cup of pleasure. Later had come that inevitable3 weariness, that distaste of pomp, the mood that discovers vanity in all things. Finally he had set his heart upon a woman, a broken reed indeed, and had discovered her a hypocrite, according to the measure of her passions. There had been one brief burst of blasphemy4. He had used his dagger5 and had disappeared. There had been much stir at the time. A ruby6 had fallen from the King's crown. Some spoke7 of Palestine, others of a monastery8, others of a cubit of keen steel.
Fulviac had begun life over again. He had fallen back upon elemental interests--had gone hungry, fought for his supper, slept many a storm out under a tree. The breath of the wilderness9 had winnowed10 out luxury; rain had scourged11 him into philosophic12 hardihood. He had learnt in measure that nothing pleases and endures like simplicity13. Even his ambition was simple in its audacious grandeur14.
Now the eyes of the daughter of Rual were like the eyes of a Madonna, and she stood in a circle of white lilies like the spirit of purity. Fulviac had begun to believe in her a little, to love her a little. She stood above all other women he had known. The ladies of the court were superb and comely15, and marvellously kind, but they loved colour and contemned16 the robe of white. They were like a rich posy for a man to choose from, scarlet17 and gold, azure18, damask or purple. You could love their bodies, but you could not trust their souls.
As for the girl Yeoland, she was very devout19, very enthusiastic, but no Agnes. Her rosary had little rest, and with the suspicions of one not utterly20 sure of herself, she had striven to make religion and its results satisfy her soul. In some measure she had succeeded. Yet there is ever that psychic21 echo, that one mysterious being, subtle as the stars, that may come before Christ in the heart. Transcendent spirit of idolatry! And yet it is often heaven-sent, seeing that it leads many a soul to God.
It had become Yeoland's custom to walk daily in the pine wood at the foot of the stairway leading from the northern room. She had discovered a quaint22 nook, a mile or more from the cliff, a nook where trees stood gathered in a dense23 circle about a grassy24 mound25 capped by a square of mouldering26 stone. It was a grave, nameless and without legend. Perhaps a hermit27 had crumbled28 away there under the sods, or the bones of some old warrior29 slept within rusty30 harness. None knew, none cared greatly. Fulviac's men had hinted at treasure, yet even they were kept from desecrating31 the place by a crude and superstitious32 veneration33 for the dead.
She had wandered here one day and had settled herself on the grassy slope of the grave. The ribbon of her lute34 lay over her shoulder. A breeze sang fitfully through the branches, and a golden haze35 shimmered36 down as from the clerestory windows of a cathedral. Her lute seemed sad when it made answer to her fingers. Thought was plaintive37 and not devotional, if one might judge by the mood of the music, and the notes were wayward and pathetically void of discipline.
It was while the girl thrummed idly at the strings38 that a vague sound floated down to her with the momentary39 emphasis born of a fickle40 wind. It was foreign to the forest, or it would not have roused her as it did. As she listened the sound came again from the west. It was neither the distant bay of a hound nor a horn's solitary41 note. There was something metallic42 about it, something musical. When it disappeared, she listened for its recurrence43; when she heard it again, she puzzled over its nature.
The sound grew clearer at gradual intervals44, and then ceased utterly. The girl listened for a long while to no purpose, and then prepared to forget the incident. The decision was premature45. She was startled anon by the sound breaking out at no great distance. There was no doubt as to its nature: it was the clanging of a bell.
Yeoland wondered who could be carrying such a thing in such a place. Possibly some of Fulviac's men were coming home with stolen cattle, and an old bell-wether from some wild moorland with them.
The sound of the bell came very near; it seemed close amid the circling ranks of pines. Twigs46 were cracking too, and she heard the beat of approaching footsteps. Then her glance caught something visible, a streak47 of white in the shadows, moving like a ghost. The thing went amid the trees with the bell mute. The girl's doubts were soon set at rest as to whether she had been seen or no. The figure in grey slipped between the pines, and came out into the grass circle about the grave, cowled, masked, bell at girdle, a leper.
The girl stared at it with a cold flutter at her heart. The thing stood under the boughs48 motionless as stone. The bell gave never a tinkle49; a white chin poked50 forward from under the hood2; the masked face was in shadow. Then the bell jangled, and a gruff voice came from the cowl.
"Unclean, unclean!" it said; "avoid the white death, and give alms."
Yeoland obeyed readily enough, put a portion of the grave betwixt herself and the leper, fumbled51 in her pouch52 and threw the man a piece of silver. He came forward suddenly into the light, fell on his knees, put his hood back, plucked off the mask.
It was the face of the Lord Flavian of Gambrevault.
The girl stood and stared at him with unstinted astonishment53.
"You," she said, "you?"
"Madame, I said that you should see my face again."
She conceived a sudden impetuous desire to turn and leave him on his knees, but some inner potency54 of instinct restrained her. She looked down at the man, with no kindling55 kindness upon her face. She did not know what to say to him, how to tune56 her mood. The first thought that rushed into her mind was seized upon and pressed into service, discretion57 or no discretion.
"Madman, they will kill you if they find you here."
"No woman ever loved a coward."
"For Heaven's sake, go away."
He rose from his knees and lifted up his frock. The girl saw harness and a sword beneath it. This young leopard58 of the southern shores had fettle enough, and spirit. He was a mixture of imperturbable59 determination and sanguine60 Quixotism, as he faced her under the trees.
"This dress is privileged; my bell warns folk away; who would fall foul61 of a miserable62 leper? If this frock fails me, I have my sword."
She looked at him with the solemnity of a child, hand folded in hand.
"I cannot understand you," she said.
"Not yet."
"Are you the man whose life I saved? That breath of death on your brow, messire, should have made you thoughtful of your soul."
"Let me plead a moment."
"For what?"
"My honour."
"Why your honour?"
"Because I want you to believe that I have a soul."
He was vastly earnest, and his eyes followed her, as though she were some being out of heaven. She had never seen such a look in a man's eyes before; it troubled her. She questioned her own heart, laughed emptily, and gave in to him.
"We are both mad," she said, "but go on. I will listen for one minute. Keep watch lest any one should come upon us suddenly."
She sat down on the grass bank, while he stood before her, holding his lazar bell by the clapper.
"Look at this dress," he said.
"Yes?"
"It is how I feel in soul when I look at you."
She frowned visibly.
"If you wax personal, messire, I shall leave you."
"No, no, I will keep to my own carcase, and play the egotist. Well, I will be brief. Look at me, I am the first lord in the south, master of an army, one of the twelve knights63 of the Order of the Rose."
"Go on."
"When I was twenty years old, certain clever people found me a wife, a woman five years my senior in time, twenty years my superior in knowledge of the world. Well, six months had not passed before I hated her, hated her with my whole soul. My God, what a thing for a boy to begin life with a woman who made him half the bounden vassal64 of the devil!"
"You seem generous. The faults were all on her side."
"Madame, I say nothing against the woman, only that she had no soul. We were incompatible65 as day and night, fire and water. The thing crushed the youth out of me, made me desperate, and worse, made me old beyond my years. I have done my best. I have groped along like a man in the dark, knowing nothing, understanding nothing, save that I had a warm heart in me, and that life seemed one grim jest. The future had no fire for me; I drank the wine of the present, strove to please my senses, plunged66 into the abysses of the world. Sometimes I tried to pray. Sometimes I played the cynic. The eternal beacon67 of love had gone out of my life. I had no sun, no inspiration for my soul."
She sprang up suddenly, breathing fast like one who is near tears.
"Why do you speak to me of this?"
"God knows."
His voice was utterly lonely.
"What am I to you? You have hardly seen me three hours in your life. Why do you speak to me of this?"
He put a hand to his throat, and did not look at her.
"Madame, there are people who come near our hearts in one short hour, people who are winter to us to eternity68. Do not ask me to explain this truth; as Christ's death, I know it to be true. I trust you. All the logicians of the world could not tell me why. I do not know that I could bring forward one single reason out of my own soul, save that you showed me great mercy once. And now--and now----"
He broke down suddenly, and could not speak. Yeoland appealed to him out of the quickness of her fear.
"Messire, messire, your promise."
"Go, for God's sake, go!"
He flung his hands towards her with a great outburst of passion.
"Heaven and God's throne, you shall hear me to the end. Woman, woman, my soul flows to you as the sea ebbs70 to the moon; deep in the sky a new sun burns; the stars are dust, dust blown from the coffins71 of the dead who loved. Life leaps in me like another chaos72. All my heart glows like an autumn orchard73, and I burn. The world is red with a myriad74 roses. God's in the heaven, Christ bleeds on quaking Calvary."
She ran to him suddenly and seized his wrist.
"GO----!"
"I cannot."
"Men are coming, I hear them in the woods, they will kill you!"
"I hear them too."
"Go, go, for my sake and for God's."
He kissed her sleeve, pulled his cowl down, and fled away into the woods.
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1
faceted
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| adj. 有小面的，分成块面的 | |
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hood
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| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
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3
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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blasphemy
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| n.亵渎，渎神 | |
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dagger
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| n.匕首，短剑，剑号 | |
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ruby
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| n.红宝石，红宝石色 | |
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7
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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8
monastery
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| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
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wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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10
winnowed
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| adj.扬净的，风选的v.扬( winnow的过去式和过去分词 )；辨别；选择；除去 | |
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scourged
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| 鞭打( scourge的过去式和过去分词 )； 惩罚，压迫 | |
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12
philosophic
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| adj.哲学的，贤明的 | |
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13
simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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14
grandeur
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| n.伟大，崇高，宏伟，庄严，豪华 | |
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15
comely
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| adj.漂亮的，合宜的 | |
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contemned
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| v.侮辱，蔑视( contemn的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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17
scarlet
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| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
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18
azure
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| adj.天蓝色的，蔚蓝色的 | |
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19
devout
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| adj.虔诚的，虔敬的，衷心的 (n.devoutness) | |
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20
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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21
psychic
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| n.对超自然力敏感的人；adj.有超自然力的 | |
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22
quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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23
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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24
grassy
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| adj.盖满草的；长满草的 | |
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25
mound
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| n.土墩，堤，小山；v.筑堤，用土堆防卫 | |
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26
mouldering
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| v.腐朽( moulder的现在分词 )；腐烂，崩塌 | |
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27
hermit
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| n.隐士，修道者；隐居 | |
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28
crumbled
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| （把…）弄碎， （使）碎成细屑( crumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 衰落； 坍塌； 损坏 | |
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29
warrior
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| n.勇士，武士，斗士 | |
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30
rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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31
desecrating
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| 毁坏或亵渎( desecrate的现在分词 ) | |
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32
superstitious
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| adj.迷信的 | |
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33
veneration
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| n.尊敬，崇拜 | |
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34
lute
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| n.琵琶，鲁特琴 | |
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35
haze
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| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
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36
shimmered
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| v.闪闪发光，发微光( shimmer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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37
plaintive
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| adj.可怜的，伤心的 | |
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38
strings
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| n.弦 | |
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39
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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40
fickle
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| adj.(爱情或友谊上)易变的，不坚定的 | |
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41
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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42
metallic
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| adj.金属的；金属制的；含金属的；产金属的；像金属的 | |
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43
recurrence
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| n.复发，反复，重现 | |
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44
intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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45
premature
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| adj.比预期时间早的；不成熟的，仓促的 | |
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46
twigs
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| 细枝，嫩枝( twig的名词复数 ) | |
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47
streak
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| n.条理，斑纹，倾向，少许，痕迹；v.加条纹，变成条纹，奔驰，快速移动 | |
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48
boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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49
tinkle
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| vi.叮当作响；n.叮当声 | |
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50
poked
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| v.伸出( poke的过去式和过去分词 )；戳出；拨弄；与（某人）性交 | |
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51
fumbled
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| （笨拙地）摸索或处理（某事物）( fumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 乱摸，笨拙地弄； 使落下 | |
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52
pouch
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| n.小袋，小包，囊状袋；vt.装...入袋中，用袋运输；vi.用袋送信件 | |
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53
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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54
potency
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| n. 效力，潜能 | |
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55
kindling
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| n. 点火, 可燃物 动词kindle的现在分词形式 | |
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56
tune
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| n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整 | |
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57
discretion
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| n.谨慎；随意处理 | |
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58
leopard
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| n.豹 | |
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59
imperturbable
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| adj.镇静的 | |
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60
sanguine
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| adj.充满希望的，乐观的，血红色的 | |
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61
foul
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| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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62
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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63
knights
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| 骑士； （中古时代的）武士( knight的名词复数 )； 骑士； 爵士； （国际象棋中）马 | |
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64
vassal
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| n.附庸的；属下；adj.奴仆的 | |
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65
incompatible
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| adj.不相容的，不协调的，不相配的 | |
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66
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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67
beacon
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| n.烽火，（警告用的）闪火灯，灯塔 | |
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68
eternity
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| n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷 | |
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69
stifle
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| vt.使窒息；闷死；扼杀；抑止，阻止 | |
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70
ebbs
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| 退潮( ebb的名词复数 )； 落潮； 衰退 | |
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71
coffins
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| n.棺材( coffin的名词复数 )；使某人早亡[死，完蛋，垮台等]之物 | |
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72
chaos
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| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
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73
orchard
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| n.果园，果园里的全部果树，(美俚)棒球场 | |
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74
myriad
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| adj.无数的；n.无数，极大数量 | |
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