The Greatest Novels of Charles Reade. Charles Reade Reade

The parliament of Dijon hath since sifted the matter, and found they were no sorcerers, but good and peaceful citizens; and but last week did order masses to be said for their souls, and expiatory farces and mysteries to be played for them in seven towns of Burgundy; all which will not of those cinders make men and women again. Now 'tis our custom in this land, when we have slain the innocent by hearkening false knaves like thee, not to blame our credulous ears, but the false tongue that gulled them. Therefore bethink thee that, at a word from me to my lord bishop, thou wilt smell burning pine nearer than e'er knave smelt it and lived, and wilt travel on a smoky cloud to him whose heart thou bearest (for the word devil in the Latin it meaneth 'false accuser'), and whose livery thou wearest.”

      And the cure pointed at Mangis with his staff.

      “That is true i'fegs,” said the alderman, “for red and black be the foul fiendys colours.”

      By this time the white sorcerer's cheek was as colourless as his dress was fiery. Indeed the contrast amounted to pictorial. He stammered out, “I respect Holy Church and her will; he shall fire the churchyard, and all in it, for me: I do withdraw the plaint.”

      “Then withdraw thyself,” said the vice-bailiff.

      The moment he was gone the cure took the conversational tone, and told the alderman courteously that the accused had received the chemical substance from Holy Church, and had restored it her, by giving it all to him.

      “Then 'tis in good hands,” was the reply; “young man, you are free. Let me have your reverence's prayers.”

      “Doubt it not! Humph! Vice-baillie, the town owes me four silver franks, this three months and more.”

      “They shall be paid, cure, ay, ere the week be out.”

      On this good understanding Church and State parted. As soon as he was in the street Gerard caught the priest's hand, and kissed it.

      “Oh, sir! Oh, your reverence. You have saved me from the fiery stake. What can I say, what do? what?”

      “Nought, foolish lad. Bounty rewards itself. Natheless—Humph?—I wish I had done't without leasing. It ill becomes my function to utter falsehoods.”

      “Falsehood, sir?” Gerard was mystified.

      “Didst not hear me say thou hadst given me that same phosphorus? 'Twill cost me a fortnight's penance, that light word.” The cure sighed, and his eye twinkled cunningly.

      “Nay, nay,” cried Gerard eagerly. “Now Heaven forbid! That was no falsehood, father: well you knew the phosphorus was yours, is yours.” And he thrust the bottle into the cure's hand. “But alas, 'tis too poor a gift: will you not take from my purse somewhat for Holy Church?” and now he held out his purse with glistening eyes.

      “Nay,” said the other brusquely, and put his hands quickly behind him; “not a doit. Fie! fie! art pauper et exul. Come thou rather each day at noon and take thy diet with me; for my heart warms to thee;” and he went off very abruptly with his hands behind him.

      They itched.

      But they itched in vain.

      Where there's a heart there's a Rubicon.

      Gerard went hastily to the inn to relieve Denys of the anxiety so long and mysterious an absence must have caused him. He found him seated at his ease, playing dice with two young ladies whose manners were unreserved, and complexion high.

      Gerard was hurt. “N'oubliez point la Jeanneton!” said he, colouring up.

      “What of her?” said Denys, gaily rattling the dice.

      “She said, 'Le peu que sont les femmes.'”

      “Oh, did she? And what say you to that, mesdemoiselles?”

      “We say that none run women down, but such as are too old, or too ill-favoured, or too witless to please them.”

      “Witless, quotha? Wise men have not folly enough to please them, nor madness enough to desire to please them,” said Gerard loftily; “but 'tis to my comrade I speak, not to you, you brazen toads, that make so free with a man at first sight.”

      “Preach away, comrade. Fling a byword or two at our heads. Know, girls, that he is a very Solomon for bywords. Methinks he was brought up by hand on 'em.”

      “Be thy friendship a byword!” retorted Gerard. “The friendship that melts to nought at sight of a farthingale.”

      “Malheureux!” cried Denys, “I speak but pellets, and thou answerest daggers.”

      “Would I could,” was the reply. “Adieu.”

      “What a little savage!” said one of the girls.

      Gerard opened the door and put in his head. “I have thought of a byword,” said he spitefully—

      “Qui hante femmes et dez

      Il mourra en pauvretez.

      “There.” And having delivered this thunderbolt of antique wisdom, he slammed the door viciously ere any of them could retort.

      And now, being somewhat exhausted by his anxieties, he went to the bar for a morsel of bread and a cup of wine. The landlord would sell nothing less than a pint bottle. Well then he would have a bottle; but when he came to compare the contents of the bottle with its size, great was the discrepancy: on this he examined the bottle keenly, and found that the glass was thin where the bottle tapered, but towards the bottom unnaturally thick. He pointed this out at once.

      The landlord answered superciliously that he did not make bottles: and was nowise accountable for their shape.

      “That we will see presently,” said Gerard. “I will take this thy pint to the vice-bailiff.”

      “Nay, nay, for Heaven's sake,” cried the landlord, changing his tone at once. “I love to content my customers. If by chance this pint be short, we will charge it and its fellow three sous insteads of two sous each.”

      “So be it. But much I admire that you, the host of so fair an inn, should practise thus. The wine, too, smacketh strongly of spring water.”

      “Young sir,” said the landlord, “we cut no travellers' throats at this inn, as they do at most. However, you know all about that, 'The White Hart' is no lion, nor bear. Whatever masterful robbery is done here, is done upon the poor host. How then could he live at all if he dealt not a little crooked with the few who pay?”

      Gerard objected to this system root and branch. Honest trade was small profits, quick returns; and neither to cheat nor be cheated.

      The landlord sighed at this picture. “So might one keep an inn in heaven, but not in Burgundy. When foot soldiers going to the wars are quartered on me, how can I but lose by their custom? Two sous per day is their pay, and they eat two sous' worth, and drink into the bargain. The pardoners are my good friends, but palmers and pilgrims, what think you I gain by them? marry, a loss. Minstrels and jongleurs draw custom and so claim to pay no score, except for liquor. By the secular monks I neither gain nor lose, but the black and grey friars have made vow of poverty, but not of famine; eat like wolves and give the poor host nought but their prayers; and mayhap not them: how can he tell? In my father's day we had the weddings; but now the great gentry let their houses and their plates, their mugs and their spoons to any honest couple that want to wed, and thither the very mechanics go with their brides and bridal train. They come not to us: indeed we could not find seats and vessels for such a crowd as eat and drink and dance the week out at the homeliest wedding now. In my father's day the great gentry sold wine by the barrel only; but now they have leave to cry it, and sell it by the galopin, in the very market-place. How can we vie with them? They grow it. We buy it of the grower. The coroner's quests we have still, and these would bring goodly profit, but the meat is aye gone ere the mouths be full.”

      “You should make better provision,” suggested his hearer.

      “The law will not let us. We are forbidden to go into the market for the first hour.