The Cloister and the Hearth: A Tale of the Middle Ages. Charles Reade Reade

God bless the good lady and bless the Dame Van Eyck! A benefice? our son! My cares are at an end. Eli, my good friend and master, now we two can die happy whenever our time comes. This dear boy will take our place, and none of these loved ones will want a home or a friend."

      From that hour Gerard was looked upon as the stay of the family. He was a son apart, but in another sense. He was always in the right, and nothing was too good for him. Cornelis and Sybrandt became more and more jealous of him, and longed for the day he should go to his benefice: they would get rid of the favourite, and his reverence's purse would be open to them. With these views he co-operated. The wound love had given him, throbbed duller and duller. His success and the affection and admiration of his parents, made him think more highly of himself, and resent with more spirit Margaret's ingratitude and discourtesy. For all that, she had power to cool him towards the rest of her sex, and now for every reason he wished to be ordained priest as soon as he could pass the intermediate orders. He knew the Vulgate already better than most of the clergy, and studied the rubric and the dogmas of the Church with his friends the monks; and, the first time the bishop came that way, he applied to be admitted "exorcist," the third step in holy orders. The bishop questioned him, and ordained him at once. He had to kneel, and after a short prayer, the bishop delivered to him a little MS. full of exorcisms, and said: "Take this, Gerard, and have power to lay hands on the possessed, whether baptized or catechumens!" and he took it reverently, and went home invested by the Church with power to cast out demons.

      Returning home from the church, he was met by little Kate on her crutches.

      "Oh, Gerard! who think you, hath sent to our house seeking you?—the burgomaster himself."

      "Ghysbrecht Van Swieten? What would he with me?"

      "Nay, Gerard, I know not. But he seems urgent to see you. You are to go to his house on the instant."

      "Well, he is the burgomaster: I will go: but it likes me not. Kate, I have seen him cast such a look on me as no friend casts. No matter; such looks forewarn the wise. To be sure, he knows—"

      "Knows what, Gerard?"

      "Nothing."

      "Nothing?"

      "Kate, I'll go."

CHAPTER V

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      GHYSBRECHT VAN SWIETEN was an artful man. He opened on the novice with something quite wide of the mark he was really aiming at. "The town records," said he, "are crabbedly written, and the ink rusty with age." He offered Gerard the honour of transcribing them fair.

      Gerard inquired what he was to be paid.

      Ghysbrecht offered a sum that would have just purchased the pens, ink, and parchment.

      "But, burgomaster, my labour? Here is a year's work."

      "Your labour? Call you marking parchment labour? Little sweat goes to that, I trow."

      "'Tis labour, and skilled labour to boot: and that is better paid in all crafts than rude labour, sweat or no sweat. Beside, there's my time."

      "Your time? Why what is time to you, at two-and-twenty?" Then fixing his eyes keenly on Gerard, to mark the effect of his words, he said: "Say rather, you are idle grown. You are in love. Your body is with these chanting monks, but your heart is with Peter Brandt and his red-haired girl."

      "I know no Peter Brandt."

      "This denial confirmed Ghysbrecht's suspicion that the caster-out of demons was playing a deep game.

      "Ye lie!" he shouted. "Did I not find you at her elbow, on the road to Rotterdam?"

      "Ah!"

      "Ah. And you were seen at Sevenbergen but t'other day."

      "Was I?"

      "Ay; and at Peter's house."

      "At Sevenbergen?"

      "Ay, at Sevenbergen."

      Now, this was what in modern days is called a draw. It was a guess, put boldly forth as fact, to elicit by the young man's answer, whether he had been there lately or not.

      The result of the artifice surprised the crafty one. Gerard started up in a strange state of nervous excitement.

      "Burgomaster," said he, with trembling voice, "I have not been at Sevenbergen this three years, and I knew not the name of those you saw me with, nor where they dwelt; but as my time is precious, though you value it not, give you good day." And he darted out with his eyes sparkling.

      Ghysbrecht started up in huge ire; but he sank into his chair again.

      "He fears me not. He knows something if not all."

      Then he called hastily to his trusty servant, and almost dragged him to a window.

      "See you yon man?" he cried. "Haste! Follow him! But let him not see you. He is young, but old in craft. Keep him in sight all day. Let me know whither he goes and what he does."

      It was night when the servant returned.

      "Well? well?" cried Van Swieten, eagerly.

      "Master, the young man went from you to Sevenbergen."

      Ghysbrecht groaned.

      "To the house of Peter the Magician."

CHAPTER VI

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      "LOOK into your own heart and write!" said Herr Cant; and earth's cuckoos echoed the cry. Look into the Rhine where it is deepest, and the Thames where it is thickest, and paint the bottom. Lower a bucket into a well of self-deception, and what comes up must be immortal truth, mustn't it? Now, in the first place no son of Adam ever reads his own heart at all, except by the habit acquired, and the light gained, from some years' perusal of other hearts; and even then, with his acquired sagacity and reflected light, he can but spell and decipher his own heart, not read it fluently. Half way to Sevenbergen Gerard looked into his own heart, and asked it why he was going to Sevenbergen. His heart replied without a moment's hesitation. "We are going out of curiosity, to know why she jilted us, and to show her it has not broken our hearts, and that we are quite content with our honours and our benefice in prospectu, and don't want her nor any of her fickle sex."

      He soon found out Peter Brandt's cottage; and there sat a girl in the doorway, plying her needle, and a stalwart figure leaned on a long bow and talked to her. Gerard felt an unaccountable pang at the sight of him. However, the man turned out to be past fifty years of age, an old soldier, whom Gerard remembered to have seen shoot at the butts with admirable force and skill. Another minute and the youth stood before them. Margaret looked up and dropped her work, and uttered a faint cry, and was white and red by turns. But these signs of emotion were swiftly dismissed, and she turned far more chill and indifferent than she would if she had not betrayed this agitation.

      "What! is it you, Master Gerard? What on earth brings you here, I wonder?"

      "I was passing by and saw you; so I thought I would give you good day and ask after your father."

      "My father is well. He will be here anon."

      "Then I may as well stay till he comes."

      "As you will. Good Martin, step into the village and tell my father here is a friend of his."

      "And not of yours?"

      "My father's friends are mine."

      "That is doubtful. It was not like a friend to promise to wait for me, and then make off the moment my back was turned. Cruel Margaret! you little know how I searched the town for you; how for want of you nothing was pleasant to me."