The Lady of Blossholme. H. Rider Haggard

summoned from the vicarage. “I thought that fool of a messenger must be drunk. What can have chanced, Father?”

      “Death, I think, my son, for sure naught else would bring the Lady Cicely here unaccompanied save by a waiting-woman. The question is—what will happen now?” and he glanced sideways at him.

      “I know well if I can get my way,” answered Christopher, with a merry laugh. “Say now, Father, if it should so be that this lady were willing, could you marry us?”

      “Without a doubt, my son, with the consent of the parents;” and again he looked at him.

      “And if there were no parents?”

      “Then with the consent of the guardian, the bride being under age.”

      “And if no guardian had been declared or admitted?”

      “Then such a marriage duly solemnized, being a sacrament of the Church, would hold fast until the crack of doom unless the Pope annulled it, and, as you know, the Pope is out of favour in this realm on this very matter of marriage. Let me explain the law to you, ecclesiastic and civil——”

      But Christopher was already running towards the gate, so the old parson’s lecture remained undelivered.

      The two met in the snow, Emlyn Stower riding on ahead and leaving them together.

      “What is it, sweetest?” he asked. “What is it?”

      “Oh! Christopher,” she answered, weeping, “my poor father is dead—murdered, or so says Emlyn.”

      “Murdered! By whom?”

      “By the Abbot of Blossholme’s soldiers—so says Emlyn, yonder in the forest last eve. And the Abbot is coming to Shefton to declare me his ward and thrust me into the Nunnery—that was Emlyn’s tale. And so, although it is a strange thing to do, having none to protect me, I have fled to you—because Emlyn said I ought.”

      “She is a wise woman, Emlyn,” broke in Christopher; “I always thought well of her judgment. But did you only come to me because Emlyn told you?”

      “Not altogether, Christopher. I came because I am distraught, and you are a better friend than none at all, and—where else should I go? Also my poor father with his last words to me, although he was so angry with you, bade me seek your help if there were need—and—oh! Christopher, I came because you swore you loved me, and, therefore, it seemed right. If I had gone to the Nunnery, although the Prioress, Mother Matilda, is good, and my friend, who knows, she might not have let me out again, for the Abbot is her master, and not my friend. It is our lands he loves, and the famous jewels—Emlyn has them with her.”

      By now they were across the moat and at the steps of the house, so, without answering, Christopher lifted her tenderly from the saddle, pressing her to his breast as he did so, for that seemed his best answer. A groom came to lead away the horses, touching his bonnet, and staring at them curiously; and, leaning on her lover’s shoulder, Cicely passed through the arched doorway of Cranwell Towers into the hall, where a great fire burned. Before this fire, warming his thin hands, stood Father Necton, engaged in eager conversation with Emlyn Stower. As the pair advanced this talk ceased, evidently because it was of them.

      “Mistress Cicely,” said the kindly-faced old man, speaking in a nervous fashion, “I fear that you visit us in sad case,” and he paused, not knowing what to add.

      “Yes, indeed,” she answered, “if all I hear is true. They say that my father is killed by cruel men—I know not for certain why or by whom—and that the Abbot of Blossholme comes to claim me as his ward and immure me in Blossholme Priory, whither I would not go. I have fled here to escape him, having no other refuge, though you may think ill of me for this deed.”

      “Not I, my child. I should not speak against yonder Abbot, for he is my superior in the Church, though, mind you, I owe him no allegiance, since this benefice is not in his gift, nor am I a Benedictine. Therefore I will tell you the truth. I hold the man not honest. All is provender that comes to his maw; moreover, he is no Englishman, but a Spaniard, one sent here to work against the welfare of this realm; to suck its wealth, stir up rebellion, and make report of all that passes in it, for the benefit of England’s enemies.”

      “Yet he has friends at Court, or so said my father.”

      “Aye, aye, such folks have ever friends—their money buys them; though mayhap an ill day is at hand for him and his likes. Well, your poor father is gone, God knows how, though I thought for long that would be his end, who ever spoke his mind, or more; and you with your wealth are the morsel that tempts Maldon’s appetite. And now what is to be done? This is a hard case. Would you refuge in some other Nunnery?”

      “Nay,” answered Cicely, glancing sideways at her lover.

      “Then what’s to be done?”

      “Oh! I know not,” she said, bursting into a fit of weeping. “How can I tell you, who am mazed with grief and doubt? I had but a single friend—my father, though at times he was a rough one. Yet he loved me in his way, and I have obeyed his last counsel;” and, all her courage gone, she sank into a chair and rocked herself to and fro, her head resting on her hands.

      “That is not true,” said Emlyn in her bold voice. “Am I who suckled you no friend, and is Father Necton here no friend, and is Sir Christopher no friend? Well, if you have lost your judgment, I have kept mine, and here it is. Yonder, not two bowshots away, stands a church, and before me I see a priest and a pair who would serve for bride and bridegroom. Also we can rake up witnesses and a cup of wine to drink your health; and after that let the Abbot of Blossholme do his worst. What say you, Sir Christopher?”

      “You know my mind, Nurse Emlyn; but what says Cicely? Oh! Cicely, what say you?” and he bent over her.

      She raised herself, still weeping, and, throwing her arms about his neck, laid her head upon his shoulder.

      “I think it is the will of God,” she whispered, “and why should I fight against it, who am His servant?—and yours, Chris.”

      “And now, Father, what say you?” asked Emlyn, pointing to the pair.

      “I do not think there is much to say,” answered the old clergyman, turning his head aside, “save that if it should please you to come to the church in ten minutes’ time you will find a candle on the altar, and a priest within the rails, and a clerk to hold the book. More we cannot do at such short notice.”

      Then he paused for a while, and, hearing no dissent, walked down the hall and out of the door.

      Emlyn took Cicely by the hand, led her to a room that was shown to them, and there made her ready for her bridal as best she might. She had no fine dress in which to clothe her, nor, indeed, would there have been time to don it. But she combed out her beautiful brown hair, and, opening that box of Eastern jewels which were the great pride of the Foterells—being the rarest and the most ancient in all the countryside—she decked her with them. On her broad brow she set a circlet from which hung sparkling diamonds that had been brought, the story said, by her mother’s ancestor, a Carfax, from the Holy Land, where once they were the peculiar treasure of a paynim queen, and upon her bosom a necklet of large pearls. Brooches and rings also she found for her breast and fingers, and for her waist a jewelled girdle with a golden clasp, while to her ears she hung the finest gems of all—two great pearls pink like the hawthorn-bloom when it begins to turn. Lastly she flung over her head a veil of lace most curiously wrought, and stood back with pride to look at her.

      Now Cicely, who all this while had been silent and unresisting, spoke for the first time, saying—

      “How came this here, Nurse?”

      “Your mother wore it at her bridal, and her mother too, so I have been told. Also once before I wrapped it about you—when you were christened, sweet.”

      “Mayhap; but how came it here?”

      “In the