The Greatest Novels of Charles Reade. Charles Reade Reade

began to quake a bit; for mind ye, she can doff freedom and don dignity quicker than she can slip out of her dressing-gown into kirtle of state. But I made my voice so soft as honey (wherefore smilest?), and I said 'Madam, one evening, a matter of five years agone, as ye sat with your mother, the Countess of Charolois, who is now in heaven, worse luck, you wi' your lute, and she wi' her tapestry, or the like, do ye mind there came came into ye a fair youth with a letter from a painter body, one Margaret Van Eyck?”

      “She said she thought she did, 'Was it not a tall youth, exceeding comely?'

      “'Ay, madam,' said I; 'he was my brother.'

      “'Your brother?' said she, and did eye me like all over, (What dost smile at?”)

      “So I told her all that passed between her and Gerard, and how she was for giving him a bishopric; but the good countess said, 'Gently, Marie! he is too young; and with that they did both promise him a living: 'Yet,' said I, 'he hath been a priest a long while, and no living. Hence my bile.'

      “'Alas!' said she, ''tis not by my good will; for all this thou hast said is sooth, and more. I do remember my dear mother said to me, “See thou to it if I be not here.”' So then she cried out, 'Ay, dear mother, no word of thine shall ever fall to the ground.'

      “I, seeing her so ripe, said quickly, 'Madam, the Vicar of Gouda died last week.' (For when ye seek favours of the great, behoves ye know the very thing ye aim at.)

      “'Then thy brother is vicar of Gouda,' quo' she, 'so sure as I am heiress of Burgundy and the Netherlands. Nay, thank me not, good Giles,' quo' she, 'but my good mother. And I do thank thee for giving of me somewhat to do for her memory. And doesn't she fall a weeping for her mother? And doesn't that set me off a-snivelling for my good brother that I love so dear, and to think that a poor little elf like me could yet speak in the ear of princes, and make my beautiful brother vicar of Gouda; eh, lass, it is a bonny place, and a bonny manse, and hawthorn in every bush at spring-tide, and dog-roses and eglantine in every summer hedge. I know what the poor fool affects, leave that to me.”

      The dwarf began his narrative strutting to and fro before Margaret, but he ended it in her arms; for she could not contain herself, but caught him, and embraced him warmly. “Oh, Giles,” she said, blushing, and kissing him, “I cannot keep my hands off thee, thy body it is so little, and thy heart so great. Thou art his true friend. Bless thee! bless thee! bless thee! Now we shall see him again. We have not set eyes on him since that terrible day.”

      “Gramercy, but that is strange,” said Giles. “Maybe he is ashamed of having cursed those two vagabones, being our own flesh and blood, worse luck.”

      “Think you that is why he hides?” said Margaret eagerly;

      “Ay, if he is hiding at all. However, I'll cry him by bellman.

      “Nay, that might much offend him.”

      “What care I? Is Gouda to go vicarless and the manse in nettles?”

      And to Margaret's secret satisfaction, Giles had the new vicar cried in Rotterdam and the neighbouring towns. He easily persuaded Margaret that in a day or two Gerard would be sure to hear, and come to his benefice. She went to look at his manse, and thought how comfortable it might be made for him, and how dearly she should love to do it.

      But the days rolled on, and Gerard came neither to Rotterdam nor Gouda. Giles was mortified, Margaret indignant, and very wretched. She said to herself, “Thinking me dead, he comes home, and now, because I am alive, he goes back to Italy, for that is where he has gone.”

      Joan advised her to consult the hermit of Gouda.

      “Why, sure he is dead by this time.”

      “Yon one, belike. But the cave is never long void; Gouda ne'er wants a hermit.”

      But Margaret declined to go again to Gouda on such an errand, “What can he know, shut up in a cave? less than I, belike. Gerard hath gone back t' Italy. He hates me for not being dead.”

      Presently a Tergovian came in with a word from Catherine that Ghysbrecht Van Swieten had seen Gerard later than any one else. On this Margaret determined to go and see the house and goods that had been left her, and take Reicht Heynes home to Rotterdam. And as may be supposed, her steps took her first to Ghysbrecht's house. She found him in his garden, seated in a chair with wheels. He greeted her with a feeble voice, but cordially; and when she asked him whether it was true he had seen Gerard since the fifth of August, he replied, “Gerard no more, but Friar Clement. Ay, I saw him; and blessed be the day he entered my house.”

      He then related in his own words his interview with Clement.

      He told her, moreover, that the friar had afterwards acknowledged he came to Tergou with the missing deed in his bosom on purpose to make him disgorge her land; but that finding him disposed towards penitence, he had gone to work the other way.

      “Was not this a saint; who came to right thee, but must needs save his enemy's soul in the doing it?”

      To her question, whether he had recognized him, he said, “I ne'er suspected such a thing. 'Twas only when he had been three days with me that he revealed himself, Listen while I speak my shame and his praise.

      “I said to him, 'The land is gone home, and my stomach feels lighter; but there is another fault that clingeth to me still;' then told I him of the letter I had writ at request of his brethren, I whose place it was to check them. Said I, 'Yon letter was writ to part two lovers, and the devil aiding, it hath done the foul work. Land and houses I can give back, but yon mischief is done for ever.' 'Nay,' quoth he, 'not for ever, but for life. Repent it then while thou livest.' 'I shall,' said I, 'but how can God forgive it? I would not,' said I, 'were I He.'

      “'Yet will He certainly forgive it,' quoth he; 'for He is ten times more forgiving than I am, and I forgive thee.' I stared at him; and then he said softly, but quavering like, 'Ghysbrecht, look at me closer. I am Gerard, the son of Eli.' And I looked, and looked, and at last, lo! it was Gerard. Verily I had fallen at his feet with shame and contrition, but he would not suffer me. 'That became not mine years and his, for a particular fault. I say not I forgive thee without a struggle,' said he, 'not being a saint. But these three days thou hast spent in penitence, I have worn under thy roof in prayer; and I do forgive thee.' Those were his very words.”

      Margaret's tears began to flow, for it was in a broken and contrite voice the old man told her this unexpected trait in her Gerard. He continued, “And even with that he bade me farewell.

      “'My work here is done now,' said he. I had not the heart to stay him; for let him forgive me ever so, the sight of me must be wormwood to him. He left me in peace, and may a dying man's blessing wait on him, go where he will. Oh, girl, when I think of his wrongs, and thine, and how he hath avenged himself by saving this stained soul of mine, my heart is broken with remorse, and these old eyes shed tears by night and day.”

      “Ghysbrecht,” said Margaret, weeping, “since he hath forgiven thee, I forgive thee too: what is done, is done; and thou hast let me know this day that which I had walked the world to hear. But oh, burgomaster, thou art an understanding man, now help a poor woman, which hath forgiven thee her misery.”

      She then told him all that had befallen, “And,” said she, “they will not keep the living for him for ever. He bids fair to lose that, as well as break all our hearts.”

      “Call my servant,” cried the burgomaster, with sudden vigour.

      He sent him for a table and writing materials, and dictated letters to the burgomasters in all the principal towns in Holland, and one to a Prussian authority, his friend. His clerk and Margaret wrote them, and he signed them. “There,” said he, “the matter shall be despatched throughout Holland by trusty couriers, and as far as Basle in Switzerland; and fear not, but we will soon have the vicar of Gouda to his village.”

      She went home animated with fresh hopes, and accusing herself of ingratitude to Gerard. “I value my wealth now,” said she.

      She also made a resolution