XLIIIUnder the starry pall of night, the last cry of the clarion of tragedy sounded over wood and meadow. Gilderoy, proud city of the south, had closed her gates against the royal host, wise at the eleventh hour as to the measure of the King's mercy. The wreckage from the battle in the valley had washed on Tamar's bosom past the walls, corpses jostling each other in the stream of death. Vultures had hovered in the azure sky. There was no doom for Gilderoy save the doom of the sword.The moon rose red amid a whorl of dusky clouds, veiled as with scarlet for the last orgies of war. Gilderoy had been carried by assault. Morolt's barbarians were pouring through the streets; the gates yawned towards the night; bells boomed and clashed. The townsfolk were scurrying like rats for the great square where the remnant of the garrison had barricaded the entries, gathering for a death-struggle under the umbrage of the cathedral towers.Richard the King had ridden into Gilderoy by the northern gate with Sir Simon of Imbrecour and a strong guard of knights and men-at-arms. Fulviac's head danced on a spear beside the Golden Banner of Lauretia. The citadel had opened its gates to Sire Julian of Layonne. In the square before the ruined abbey of the Benedictines the King and his nobles gathered to await the judgment of the hour.A great bell boomed through the night, a deep panting sound in the warm gloom. Torrents of steel clashed through the narrow streets, gleaming under the torch flare, bubbling towards the last rampart of revolt. From the cathedral square arose a wild, whimpering outcry, the wailing of women mingling with the hoarse clamour of the last assault.Word was brought to the King by one of Morolt's esquires, that the townsfolk were holding the great square behind their barricades, and pouring a hot fire from the houses upon his troops. Morolt desired the King's ring and his commands before taking to the resource of the sword. Richard of the Iron Hand was in no mood for mercy. His decree went forth from before the gate of the ruined abbey."Consider no church as a sanctuary. Fire the houses about the square. Gilderoy shall burn."The city's doom was sealed by those iron words. The torch took up the handiwork of the sword. A gradual glow began to rise above the house-tops; smoke billowed up, black and voluminous, dusted with a myriad ruddy stars. Flames rose from casement and from gable, from chimney, spirelet, roof, and tower. The houses were faced with wood, dry as tinder, crisp for the torch as a summer-bleached prairie. The flames ran like a red flood from roof to roof, with a roar as from huge reptiles battling in a burning pit. The great square, with the glittering pinnacles of its cathedral, was girded in with fire and sword.Men were stabbing and hewing upon the barricades where Morolt's feudatories had stormed up from the gloom of the streets. Beneath the light of the burning houses, swords were tossed, the dead forgotten and trodden under foot. It was not long before the barriers were carried by assault and the avengers of Belle Forêt poured pitiless into the great square.The citizens of Gilderoy had packed their women and children into the sanctuary of the cathedral choir. They were penned there amid the gorgeous gildings of the place, a shivering flock swarming in the frescoed chapels, huddled beneath the painted figures of the saints. The glow of the burning city beat in through the jewelled glass, building the huge aisles in a glittering cavern windowed with living gems. Darkness and dawn struggled and fought under the thundering vaults. From without came the wild babel, the hoarse death-moan of a people.In the great square the fight went on, a ruthless mêlée, strong and terrible. Gilderoy had slaughtered her noblesse. She made expiation for the deed that night with the heart's blood of her children. Vengeance and despair grappled and swayed in that great pit of death. The blazing streets walled in a red inferno, where passions ran like Satanic wine. Gilderoy, proud city of the south, quivered and expired beneath the iron gauntlet of the King.Modred of Gambrevault moved through the press with Morolt of the North fighting at his side. They had a common quest that night, a common watchword, chastening the vengeance of their men."Seek the Saint. Save Yeoland of Gambrevault."It was as a hoarse shout, feeble and futile amid the bluster of a storm. What hope was there for this pale-faced Madonna amid the burning wreck of Gilderoy? She was as a lily in a flaming forest. Modred sought for her with voice and sword, thinking of Flavian and the vow upon the cliff. Though the city lightened, black Modred's heart was steeped in gloom. Death and despair seemed armed against his hope.On the eastern quarter a little court stood back from the great square. A fountain played in the centre, the water-jet, thrown from a mermaid's bosom, sparkling like a plume of gems. The walls of the court were streaked with flame, its casements tawny with yellow light. The breath of the place was as the breath of a furnace; a quaking crowd filled it, driven to bay by the swords shining in the square.Modred was a tall man, a pine standing amid hollies. Staring into the murk of the court wreathed round with a garland of fire, he saw, above the heads of the crowd, a woman standing on the steps of the fountain, leaning against the brim of the basin. Her hair blew loose from under her open bassinet; her white face like a flower was turned mutely to the night. A cuirass glimmered under her cloud of hair. Modred, when he saw her, sent up a shout like that of a wrecked mariner sighting a sail over tumbling waves. He tossed his sword, charged forward into the court, began to buffet his way towards the figure by the fountain.A knot of soldiery, taking his shout as a rallying cry, stormed after him into the court. There was a great crush in the entry, men tumbling in, and using their swords as poniards. The townsfolk were scattered like blown leaves towards the burning houses. In the hot turmoil of the moment the girl was swept from the fountain steps, and carried by a struggling bunch of figures towards a corner of the court. Modred lost sight of her for the moment, as he ploughed forward through the press.Flames were rushing from casement and from roof; the breath of the place was as the breath of a burning desert. The Gilderoy rebels pent in the court were being put to the sword. Through the swirl of the struggle Yeoland's bassinet shone out again. Modred saw her standing alone, shading her face with her hands like some wild, desperate thing, knowing not whither to escape. He pushed on, calling her by name. Before he could reach her the gabled front of a house undermined by the fire lurched forward, tottered, and came down with a roar.A blazing brand struck Modred on the helmet. He staggered, beheld a shower of sparks, felt a scorching wind upon his face. The stones were littered with crackling woodwork, glowing timber, reeking tiles. He was stunned for a moment as by the blow of a mace. Flames were leaping heavenwards from the houses, wiping out the mild faces of the stars with their ruthless hands.With a great cry Modred had started forward like a charging bull. He dragged aside the smouldering wreckage of gable and roof, tore the rafters aside, nor heeded the heat, for his harness helped him. His great body quivered as he drew the girl out and lifted her from the stones. Her green kirtle was alight, and with the strong instinct of the moment he ran with her to the fountain and plunged her bodily in the broad basin.Panting, he bore her across the great square in his arms. Yeoland was making a little moaning whimper, but for all else lay quiet as a half-dead bird. Modred dared not look into her face; the scent of her scorched hair beat up into his nostrils. He ground his teeth and cursed Fate as he ran. Was it for this that they had bulwarked Gambrevault?XLIVAutumn had cast her scarlet girdle about Avalon; the woods were aflame with the splendours of the dying year. The oaks stood pavilions of green and gold; the beeches domes of burnished bronze; from their silver stems, birches fountained forth showers of amber. It was a season of crystal skies, of cloud galleons, bulwarked with gold, sailing the wine-red west. Wild Autumn wandered in the ruined woods, her long hair streaking the gilded gloom, her voice elfin under the stars. Even as she passed, the crisp leaves swirled and fell, a pall for the dying year.Avalon slumbered amid her lilies and the painted woods, gorgeous as rare tapestries, curtaining her meadows. Her mere laughed and glimmered amid the flags and lily leaves, and lapped at the lichened bases of her towers. Avalon had arisen from her desolation. No longer were her chambers void, her gates broken, her courts the haunt of death. The bat and the screech-owl had fled from her towers. She had lifted up her face to the dawn, like a mourner who turns from the grave to gaze again upon the golden face of joy.Time with his scythe of silver rested on the hills. The black dragon of war had crawled sated to the labyrinths of the past; the red throne of ambition had been consumed by fire. Peace came forth with her white-faced choir, swinging their golden censers, shedding a purple perfume of hope over the blackened land. The death wolves had slunk to the wilds, the vultures had soared from the fields. A splendid calm had descended upon the land, a silence as of heaven after the hideous masque of war. The cloud-wrack and thunder had passed from the sky. Men heard again the voice of God.Six weeks had gone since the sacking of Gilderoy, and dead Duessa's bower in Avalon had been garnished for a second mistress. A white rose lurked in a whorl of green. The oriel, with its re-jewelled glass, looked out upon the transient splendours of the woods. Tapestry clothed the walls, showing knights and maidens wandering through flowering meads. Rare furniture had been taken from the wrecked palaces of Gilderoy and given to the Lord Flavian by the King.That autumntide Modred played seneschal in Avalon. He had cleansed and regarnished the castle by his lord's command, and garrisoned it with men taken from the King's own guard. Moreover, in Gilderoy he had found an old man groping miserlike amid the ruins, filthy and querulous. The pantaloon when challenged had confessed to the name of Aurelius, and the profession of Medicine by royal patent in that city. The townsfolk had spared his pompous neck for the sake of the benefits of his craft. From the fat, proud, prosperous worthy he had cringed into a wrinkled, flap-cheeked beggar. Him Modred had caught like a veritable pearl from the gutter, and brought with other household perquisites into Avalon.In this rich refuge Aurelius awoke as from an unsavoury and penurious dream. He regained some of his plump, sage swagger, his rotund phraseology, his autocratic dogmatism in matters Æsculapian. The atmosphere of Avalon agreed with his gullet. Above all things, he was held to be a man of tact.In dead Duessa's bower there still hung her mirror of steel, whose sheeny surface had often answered to her languorous eyes and moon-white face. Duessa's hair had glimmered before this good friend's flattery. Gems, necklet, broideries, and tiars had sunk deep into its magic memory. The mirror could have told truths and expounded philosophies, had there been some Merlin to conjure with the past.Aurelius of Gilderoy played the necromancer under more rational auspices. He was a benignant soul, subtle, sympathetic to the brink of dotage. His professional hint was that dead Duessa's mirror should be exiled from the bower of Avalon. The oracle spoke with much beneficence as to the delusions of the sick, and the demoniac influence of melancholy upon the brain. Yet his wisdom was withstood in the very quarter where he had trusted to find obedience and understanding. Dead Duessa's mirror still hung in the Lady Yeoland's bower.One calm evening, when the west stood a great arch of ruddy gold, a slim girl knelt in the oriel with her face buried in her hands. She was clad in a gown of peacock blue, fitting close to her slight figure, and girded about the hips with a girdle of green leather. Her black hair poured upon her shoulders, clouding her face, yet leaving bare the base of her white neck where it curved from her pearly shoulders. She drooped her head as she knelt before the casement, where the light entered to her, azure and green, vermilion and purple, silver and rose.Anon she rose softly, turned towards the mirror hanging on the wall, gazed into its depths with a species of bewitched fear. One glance given, she turned away with a shudder, hid her face in her hands, walked the room in a mute frenzy of self-horror. Presently she knelt again before the window-seat, struggled in prayer, turning her face piteously to an open casement where the golden woods stood under the red wand of the west. The light waned a little. She rose up again from her knees, shook her hair forward so that it bathed her face, trod slowly towards the mirror, stared at herself therein.The crystal bowl was broken, the ivory throne dishonoured! The blush of the rose had faded, the gleam of the opal fallen to dust. Youth and its sapphire shield had passed into the gloom of dreams. The stars and the moon were magical no more.She wavered away from the window to a dark corner, hid her face in the arras. The same wild cry rang like a piteous requiem through her brain. The man lived and loved her, and she had come to this! Burning Gilderoy had stolen her beauty, made her a mockery of her very self. God, that Fate should compel her to lift her scars to the eyes of love!In the gathering dusk, she went again to the mirror, peered therein, with strained eyes and a tremor of the lip. The twilight softened somewhat the bitterness of truth. She shook her hair forward, saw her eyes gleam, fingered her white throat, and smiled a little. Presently she lit a taper, held it with wavering hand, peered at the steel panel once again. She cried out, jerked away, and crushed the frail light under her foot.Darkness increased, seeming to clothe her misery. She wandered through the room, twisting her black hair about her wrist, moaning and darting piteous glances into the gloom. Once she took a poniard from a table, fingered the point, pressed her hand over her heart, threw the knife away with a gesture of despair. On the morrow the man would come to her. What would she see in those grey eyes of his? Horror and loathing, ah God, not that!Anon she grew calmer and less distressed, prayed awhile, lit a lamp, delved in an ambry built in the wall. That night her hands worked zealously, while the moon shimmered on the mere, setting silver wrinkles on its agate face. The woods were still and solemn as death, deep with the voiceless sympathy of the hour. Black lace hung upon Yeoland's hands; the sable thread ran through and through; her white fingers quivered in the light of the lamp.Her few hours of sleep that night were wild and feverish, smitten through with piteous dreams. On the morrow she bound a black fillet about her brows, and let the dusky mask of lace fall over face and bosom. She prayed a long while before her crucifix, but she did not gaze again into dead Duessa's mirror.That same evening Modred the seneschal blasphemed Aurelius in the garden of Avalon. The man of the sword was in no easy humour; his convictions emerged from his hairy mouth with a vigour that was not considerate."Dotard, you have no more wit than a pelican.""My lord, I embrace truth.""Damn truth; what eyes have you for a goodly close!"Aurelius spread his hands with the air of a martyr."The physician, my lord," he said, "should ever deserve the confidence of his patron."For retort, Modred shouldered him into the thick of a rose bush."Pedant," quoth he, "crab-apple, say a word on this matter, and I will drown you in the moat."Aurelius gathered his robes and still ruffled it like an autocrat."Barbarity, sir, is the argument of fools.""Bag of bones, rot in your wrinkled hide, keep your froth for sick children.""Sir!""You have as much soul as a rat in a sewer. Come, list to me, breathe a word of this, and I'll starve you in our topmost turret. Leave truth alone, gaffer, with your rheumy, broken-kneed wisdom. You have no wit in these matters, no, not a crust. Blurt a word, and I pack you off to grovel in Gilderoy."The man of physic shrugged his shoulders, seemed grieved and incredulous, prepared to wash his hands of the whole business."Have your way, my lord; you are too hot-blooded for me; I will meddle no further.""Ha, Master Gallipot, you shall acknowledge anon that I have a soul."XLVTrumpets were blowing in Avalon of the Twelve Towers, echoing through the valley where the sun shone upon the woods, the sere leaves glittering like golden byzants as they fell. The sky was a clear canopy, drawn as blue silk from height to height, tenting the green meadows. Avalon's towers rose black and strong above the sheen of her quiet waters.From Gambrevault came the Lord Flavian to claim his wife once more. Through the brief days of autumn Aurelius of Gilderoy had decreed him an exile from the Isle of Orchards, pleading for the girl's frail breath and her lily soul that might fade if set too soon in the noon of love. In Gambrevault the Lord Flavian had moped like a prisoned falcon, listening to the far cry of the war, hungry for the touch of a woman's hand. Modred had snatched the Madonna of the Pine Forest from burning Gilderoy. She had been throned at last above the tides of violence and wrong.That day the Lord Flavian rode in state for Avalon, even as an Arthurian, prince coming with splendour from some high-souled quest. The woods had blazoned their banners for his march. Trumpets hailed him from the towers and battlements. The sun, like a great patriarch, smoothed his gold beard and beamed upon the world.Over the bridge and beneath the gate, Modred led his master's horse. The garrison had gathered in the central court; they tossed their swords, and cheered for Gambrevault. Trumpets set the wild woods wailing. Bombards thundered from the towers.In the court, amid the panoply of arms, Flavian dismounted, took Modred's hand, leant upon the great man's shoulder."Old friend, is she well?""Ah, sire, youth turns to youth.""Let my minstrels play below the stair some old song of Tristan and Iseult. And now I go to her. Lead on."In dead Duessa's bower a drooping figure knelt before a crucifix in prayer. Foreshadowings of misery and woe were stirring in the woman's heart. She had heard the bray of trumpets on the towers, the thunder of cannon, the shouts of strong men cheering in the court. She heard lute, viol, and flute strike up from afar a mournful melody sweet with an antique woe.Time seemed to crawl like a wounded snake in the grass. The figures on the arras gestured and grimaced; the jewelled glass in the oriel burnt in through the dark lattice of her veil. She heard footsteps on the stairs; Modred's deep voice, joyous and strangely tender. A hand fumbled at the latch. Starting up, she ran towards the shadows, and hid her face in the folds of the arras.The door had closed and all was silent."Yeoland."The cry smote through her like joy barbed with bitterness. She shuddered and caught her breath, swayed as she stood with the arras hiding her face."Wife, wife."With sudden strength, compelling herself, she peered round, and saw a figure standing in the shadow, a man with white face turned towards the light, his hands stretched out like a little child's. She stood motionless, breathing fast with short, convulsive breaths, her lips quivering beneath her veil."I am here," she said to him, husky, tremulous, and faint."Yeoland.""Ah!""I hear your voice; come near to me."She wavered forward three steps into the room, stood staring strangely at the figure by the door."Yeoland, are you near?""My God!""I give myself to you, a broken man. Ah, where are your hands?"Sudden comprehension seized her; she went very near to him, gazing in his face."Speak.""Wife, I shall never see the sky again, nor watch the stars at night, nor the moon, nor the sea. I shall never look on Avalon, her green woods and her lilies, and her sleeping mere. I shall never behold your face again. I am blind, I am blind."She gave a great cry, tore the veil from her face, and cast it far from her."Husband, I come to you."His hands were groping in the dark, groping like souls that sought the light. She went near him, weeping, caught his fingers, kissed them with her lips. The man's arms circled her; she hung therein, and buried her head in his bosom.[image]"HIS HANDS WERE GROPING IN THE DARK.""My love, my own.""I am blind; your hair bathes my face.""Ah, you are blind, mine eyes are yours, and I your wife will be your sun. No more pain shall compass you; there shall be no more grieving, no more tears.""Yeoland.""Husband.""God in heaven, I give Thee thanks for this."*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOKLOVE AMONG THE RUINS***
XLIII
Under the starry pall of night, the last cry of the clarion of tragedy sounded over wood and meadow. Gilderoy, proud city of the south, had closed her gates against the royal host, wise at the eleventh hour as to the measure of the King's mercy. The wreckage from the battle in the valley had washed on Tamar's bosom past the walls, corpses jostling each other in the stream of death. Vultures had hovered in the azure sky. There was no doom for Gilderoy save the doom of the sword.
The moon rose red amid a whorl of dusky clouds, veiled as with scarlet for the last orgies of war. Gilderoy had been carried by assault. Morolt's barbarians were pouring through the streets; the gates yawned towards the night; bells boomed and clashed. The townsfolk were scurrying like rats for the great square where the remnant of the garrison had barricaded the entries, gathering for a death-struggle under the umbrage of the cathedral towers.
Richard the King had ridden into Gilderoy by the northern gate with Sir Simon of Imbrecour and a strong guard of knights and men-at-arms. Fulviac's head danced on a spear beside the Golden Banner of Lauretia. The citadel had opened its gates to Sire Julian of Layonne. In the square before the ruined abbey of the Benedictines the King and his nobles gathered to await the judgment of the hour.
A great bell boomed through the night, a deep panting sound in the warm gloom. Torrents of steel clashed through the narrow streets, gleaming under the torch flare, bubbling towards the last rampart of revolt. From the cathedral square arose a wild, whimpering outcry, the wailing of women mingling with the hoarse clamour of the last assault.
Word was brought to the King by one of Morolt's esquires, that the townsfolk were holding the great square behind their barricades, and pouring a hot fire from the houses upon his troops. Morolt desired the King's ring and his commands before taking to the resource of the sword. Richard of the Iron Hand was in no mood for mercy. His decree went forth from before the gate of the ruined abbey.
"Consider no church as a sanctuary. Fire the houses about the square. Gilderoy shall burn."
The city's doom was sealed by those iron words. The torch took up the handiwork of the sword. A gradual glow began to rise above the house-tops; smoke billowed up, black and voluminous, dusted with a myriad ruddy stars. Flames rose from casement and from gable, from chimney, spirelet, roof, and tower. The houses were faced with wood, dry as tinder, crisp for the torch as a summer-bleached prairie. The flames ran like a red flood from roof to roof, with a roar as from huge reptiles battling in a burning pit. The great square, with the glittering pinnacles of its cathedral, was girded in with fire and sword.
Men were stabbing and hewing upon the barricades where Morolt's feudatories had stormed up from the gloom of the streets. Beneath the light of the burning houses, swords were tossed, the dead forgotten and trodden under foot. It was not long before the barriers were carried by assault and the avengers of Belle Forêt poured pitiless into the great square.
The citizens of Gilderoy had packed their women and children into the sanctuary of the cathedral choir. They were penned there amid the gorgeous gildings of the place, a shivering flock swarming in the frescoed chapels, huddled beneath the painted figures of the saints. The glow of the burning city beat in through the jewelled glass, building the huge aisles in a glittering cavern windowed with living gems. Darkness and dawn struggled and fought under the thundering vaults. From without came the wild babel, the hoarse death-moan of a people.
In the great square the fight went on, a ruthless mêlée, strong and terrible. Gilderoy had slaughtered her noblesse. She made expiation for the deed that night with the heart's blood of her children. Vengeance and despair grappled and swayed in that great pit of death. The blazing streets walled in a red inferno, where passions ran like Satanic wine. Gilderoy, proud city of the south, quivered and expired beneath the iron gauntlet of the King.
Modred of Gambrevault moved through the press with Morolt of the North fighting at his side. They had a common quest that night, a common watchword, chastening the vengeance of their men.
"Seek the Saint. Save Yeoland of Gambrevault."
It was as a hoarse shout, feeble and futile amid the bluster of a storm. What hope was there for this pale-faced Madonna amid the burning wreck of Gilderoy? She was as a lily in a flaming forest. Modred sought for her with voice and sword, thinking of Flavian and the vow upon the cliff. Though the city lightened, black Modred's heart was steeped in gloom. Death and despair seemed armed against his hope.
On the eastern quarter a little court stood back from the great square. A fountain played in the centre, the water-jet, thrown from a mermaid's bosom, sparkling like a plume of gems. The walls of the court were streaked with flame, its casements tawny with yellow light. The breath of the place was as the breath of a furnace; a quaking crowd filled it, driven to bay by the swords shining in the square.
Modred was a tall man, a pine standing amid hollies. Staring into the murk of the court wreathed round with a garland of fire, he saw, above the heads of the crowd, a woman standing on the steps of the fountain, leaning against the brim of the basin. Her hair blew loose from under her open bassinet; her white face like a flower was turned mutely to the night. A cuirass glimmered under her cloud of hair. Modred, when he saw her, sent up a shout like that of a wrecked mariner sighting a sail over tumbling waves. He tossed his sword, charged forward into the court, began to buffet his way towards the figure by the fountain.
A knot of soldiery, taking his shout as a rallying cry, stormed after him into the court. There was a great crush in the entry, men tumbling in, and using their swords as poniards. The townsfolk were scattered like blown leaves towards the burning houses. In the hot turmoil of the moment the girl was swept from the fountain steps, and carried by a struggling bunch of figures towards a corner of the court. Modred lost sight of her for the moment, as he ploughed forward through the press.
Flames were rushing from casement and from roof; the breath of the place was as the breath of a burning desert. The Gilderoy rebels pent in the court were being put to the sword. Through the swirl of the struggle Yeoland's bassinet shone out again. Modred saw her standing alone, shading her face with her hands like some wild, desperate thing, knowing not whither to escape. He pushed on, calling her by name. Before he could reach her the gabled front of a house undermined by the fire lurched forward, tottered, and came down with a roar.
A blazing brand struck Modred on the helmet. He staggered, beheld a shower of sparks, felt a scorching wind upon his face. The stones were littered with crackling woodwork, glowing timber, reeking tiles. He was stunned for a moment as by the blow of a mace. Flames were leaping heavenwards from the houses, wiping out the mild faces of the stars with their ruthless hands.
With a great cry Modred had started forward like a charging bull. He dragged aside the smouldering wreckage of gable and roof, tore the rafters aside, nor heeded the heat, for his harness helped him. His great body quivered as he drew the girl out and lifted her from the stones. Her green kirtle was alight, and with the strong instinct of the moment he ran with her to the fountain and plunged her bodily in the broad basin.
Panting, he bore her across the great square in his arms. Yeoland was making a little moaning whimper, but for all else lay quiet as a half-dead bird. Modred dared not look into her face; the scent of her scorched hair beat up into his nostrils. He ground his teeth and cursed Fate as he ran. Was it for this that they had bulwarked Gambrevault?
XLIV
Autumn had cast her scarlet girdle about Avalon; the woods were aflame with the splendours of the dying year. The oaks stood pavilions of green and gold; the beeches domes of burnished bronze; from their silver stems, birches fountained forth showers of amber. It was a season of crystal skies, of cloud galleons, bulwarked with gold, sailing the wine-red west. Wild Autumn wandered in the ruined woods, her long hair streaking the gilded gloom, her voice elfin under the stars. Even as she passed, the crisp leaves swirled and fell, a pall for the dying year.
Avalon slumbered amid her lilies and the painted woods, gorgeous as rare tapestries, curtaining her meadows. Her mere laughed and glimmered amid the flags and lily leaves, and lapped at the lichened bases of her towers. Avalon had arisen from her desolation. No longer were her chambers void, her gates broken, her courts the haunt of death. The bat and the screech-owl had fled from her towers. She had lifted up her face to the dawn, like a mourner who turns from the grave to gaze again upon the golden face of joy.
Time with his scythe of silver rested on the hills. The black dragon of war had crawled sated to the labyrinths of the past; the red throne of ambition had been consumed by fire. Peace came forth with her white-faced choir, swinging their golden censers, shedding a purple perfume of hope over the blackened land. The death wolves had slunk to the wilds, the vultures had soared from the fields. A splendid calm had descended upon the land, a silence as of heaven after the hideous masque of war. The cloud-wrack and thunder had passed from the sky. Men heard again the voice of God.
Six weeks had gone since the sacking of Gilderoy, and dead Duessa's bower in Avalon had been garnished for a second mistress. A white rose lurked in a whorl of green. The oriel, with its re-jewelled glass, looked out upon the transient splendours of the woods. Tapestry clothed the walls, showing knights and maidens wandering through flowering meads. Rare furniture had been taken from the wrecked palaces of Gilderoy and given to the Lord Flavian by the King.
That autumntide Modred played seneschal in Avalon. He had cleansed and regarnished the castle by his lord's command, and garrisoned it with men taken from the King's own guard. Moreover, in Gilderoy he had found an old man groping miserlike amid the ruins, filthy and querulous. The pantaloon when challenged had confessed to the name of Aurelius, and the profession of Medicine by royal patent in that city. The townsfolk had spared his pompous neck for the sake of the benefits of his craft. From the fat, proud, prosperous worthy he had cringed into a wrinkled, flap-cheeked beggar. Him Modred had caught like a veritable pearl from the gutter, and brought with other household perquisites into Avalon.
In this rich refuge Aurelius awoke as from an unsavoury and penurious dream. He regained some of his plump, sage swagger, his rotund phraseology, his autocratic dogmatism in matters Æsculapian. The atmosphere of Avalon agreed with his gullet. Above all things, he was held to be a man of tact.
In dead Duessa's bower there still hung her mirror of steel, whose sheeny surface had often answered to her languorous eyes and moon-white face. Duessa's hair had glimmered before this good friend's flattery. Gems, necklet, broideries, and tiars had sunk deep into its magic memory. The mirror could have told truths and expounded philosophies, had there been some Merlin to conjure with the past.
Aurelius of Gilderoy played the necromancer under more rational auspices. He was a benignant soul, subtle, sympathetic to the brink of dotage. His professional hint was that dead Duessa's mirror should be exiled from the bower of Avalon. The oracle spoke with much beneficence as to the delusions of the sick, and the demoniac influence of melancholy upon the brain. Yet his wisdom was withstood in the very quarter where he had trusted to find obedience and understanding. Dead Duessa's mirror still hung in the Lady Yeoland's bower.
One calm evening, when the west stood a great arch of ruddy gold, a slim girl knelt in the oriel with her face buried in her hands. She was clad in a gown of peacock blue, fitting close to her slight figure, and girded about the hips with a girdle of green leather. Her black hair poured upon her shoulders, clouding her face, yet leaving bare the base of her white neck where it curved from her pearly shoulders. She drooped her head as she knelt before the casement, where the light entered to her, azure and green, vermilion and purple, silver and rose.
Anon she rose softly, turned towards the mirror hanging on the wall, gazed into its depths with a species of bewitched fear. One glance given, she turned away with a shudder, hid her face in her hands, walked the room in a mute frenzy of self-horror. Presently she knelt again before the window-seat, struggled in prayer, turning her face piteously to an open casement where the golden woods stood under the red wand of the west. The light waned a little. She rose up again from her knees, shook her hair forward so that it bathed her face, trod slowly towards the mirror, stared at herself therein.
The crystal bowl was broken, the ivory throne dishonoured! The blush of the rose had faded, the gleam of the opal fallen to dust. Youth and its sapphire shield had passed into the gloom of dreams. The stars and the moon were magical no more.
She wavered away from the window to a dark corner, hid her face in the arras. The same wild cry rang like a piteous requiem through her brain. The man lived and loved her, and she had come to this! Burning Gilderoy had stolen her beauty, made her a mockery of her very self. God, that Fate should compel her to lift her scars to the eyes of love!
In the gathering dusk, she went again to the mirror, peered therein, with strained eyes and a tremor of the lip. The twilight softened somewhat the bitterness of truth. She shook her hair forward, saw her eyes gleam, fingered her white throat, and smiled a little. Presently she lit a taper, held it with wavering hand, peered at the steel panel once again. She cried out, jerked away, and crushed the frail light under her foot.
Darkness increased, seeming to clothe her misery. She wandered through the room, twisting her black hair about her wrist, moaning and darting piteous glances into the gloom. Once she took a poniard from a table, fingered the point, pressed her hand over her heart, threw the knife away with a gesture of despair. On the morrow the man would come to her. What would she see in those grey eyes of his? Horror and loathing, ah God, not that!
Anon she grew calmer and less distressed, prayed awhile, lit a lamp, delved in an ambry built in the wall. That night her hands worked zealously, while the moon shimmered on the mere, setting silver wrinkles on its agate face. The woods were still and solemn as death, deep with the voiceless sympathy of the hour. Black lace hung upon Yeoland's hands; the sable thread ran through and through; her white fingers quivered in the light of the lamp.
Her few hours of sleep that night were wild and feverish, smitten through with piteous dreams. On the morrow she bound a black fillet about her brows, and let the dusky mask of lace fall over face and bosom. She prayed a long while before her crucifix, but she did not gaze again into dead Duessa's mirror.
That same evening Modred the seneschal blasphemed Aurelius in the garden of Avalon. The man of the sword was in no easy humour; his convictions emerged from his hairy mouth with a vigour that was not considerate.
"Dotard, you have no more wit than a pelican."
"My lord, I embrace truth."
"Damn truth; what eyes have you for a goodly close!"
Aurelius spread his hands with the air of a martyr.
"The physician, my lord," he said, "should ever deserve the confidence of his patron."
For retort, Modred shouldered him into the thick of a rose bush.
"Pedant," quoth he, "crab-apple, say a word on this matter, and I will drown you in the moat."
Aurelius gathered his robes and still ruffled it like an autocrat.
"Barbarity, sir, is the argument of fools."
"Bag of bones, rot in your wrinkled hide, keep your froth for sick children."
"Sir!"
"You have as much soul as a rat in a sewer. Come, list to me, breathe a word of this, and I'll starve you in our topmost turret. Leave truth alone, gaffer, with your rheumy, broken-kneed wisdom. You have no wit in these matters, no, not a crust. Blurt a word, and I pack you off to grovel in Gilderoy."
The man of physic shrugged his shoulders, seemed grieved and incredulous, prepared to wash his hands of the whole business.
"Have your way, my lord; you are too hot-blooded for me; I will meddle no further."
"Ha, Master Gallipot, you shall acknowledge anon that I have a soul."
XLV
Trumpets were blowing in Avalon of the Twelve Towers, echoing through the valley where the sun shone upon the woods, the sere leaves glittering like golden byzants as they fell. The sky was a clear canopy, drawn as blue silk from height to height, tenting the green meadows. Avalon's towers rose black and strong above the sheen of her quiet waters.
From Gambrevault came the Lord Flavian to claim his wife once more. Through the brief days of autumn Aurelius of Gilderoy had decreed him an exile from the Isle of Orchards, pleading for the girl's frail breath and her lily soul that might fade if set too soon in the noon of love. In Gambrevault the Lord Flavian had moped like a prisoned falcon, listening to the far cry of the war, hungry for the touch of a woman's hand. Modred had snatched the Madonna of the Pine Forest from burning Gilderoy. She had been throned at last above the tides of violence and wrong.
That day the Lord Flavian rode in state for Avalon, even as an Arthurian, prince coming with splendour from some high-souled quest. The woods had blazoned their banners for his march. Trumpets hailed him from the towers and battlements. The sun, like a great patriarch, smoothed his gold beard and beamed upon the world.
Over the bridge and beneath the gate, Modred led his master's horse. The garrison had gathered in the central court; they tossed their swords, and cheered for Gambrevault. Trumpets set the wild woods wailing. Bombards thundered from the towers.
In the court, amid the panoply of arms, Flavian dismounted, took Modred's hand, leant upon the great man's shoulder.
"Old friend, is she well?"
"Ah, sire, youth turns to youth."
"Let my minstrels play below the stair some old song of Tristan and Iseult. And now I go to her. Lead on."
In dead Duessa's bower a drooping figure knelt before a crucifix in prayer. Foreshadowings of misery and woe were stirring in the woman's heart. She had heard the bray of trumpets on the towers, the thunder of cannon, the shouts of strong men cheering in the court. She heard lute, viol, and flute strike up from afar a mournful melody sweet with an antique woe.
Time seemed to crawl like a wounded snake in the grass. The figures on the arras gestured and grimaced; the jewelled glass in the oriel burnt in through the dark lattice of her veil. She heard footsteps on the stairs; Modred's deep voice, joyous and strangely tender. A hand fumbled at the latch. Starting up, she ran towards the shadows, and hid her face in the folds of the arras.
The door had closed and all was silent.
"Yeoland."
The cry smote through her like joy barbed with bitterness. She shuddered and caught her breath, swayed as she stood with the arras hiding her face.
"Wife, wife."
With sudden strength, compelling herself, she peered round, and saw a figure standing in the shadow, a man with white face turned towards the light, his hands stretched out like a little child's. She stood motionless, breathing fast with short, convulsive breaths, her lips quivering beneath her veil.
"I am here," she said to him, husky, tremulous, and faint.
"Yeoland."
"Ah!"
"I hear your voice; come near to me."
She wavered forward three steps into the room, stood staring strangely at the figure by the door.
"Yeoland, are you near?"
"My God!"
"I give myself to you, a broken man. Ah, where are your hands?"
Sudden comprehension seized her; she went very near to him, gazing in his face.
"Speak."
"Wife, I shall never see the sky again, nor watch the stars at night, nor the moon, nor the sea. I shall never look on Avalon, her green woods and her lilies, and her sleeping mere. I shall never behold your face again. I am blind, I am blind."
She gave a great cry, tore the veil from her face, and cast it far from her.
"Husband, I come to you."
His hands were groping in the dark, groping like souls that sought the light. She went near him, weeping, caught his fingers, kissed them with her lips. The man's arms circled her; she hung therein, and buried her head in his bosom.
[image]"HIS HANDS WERE GROPING IN THE DARK."
[image]
[image]
"HIS HANDS WERE GROPING IN THE DARK."
"My love, my own."
"I am blind; your hair bathes my face."
"Ah, you are blind, mine eyes are yours, and I your wife will be your sun. No more pain shall compass you; there shall be no more grieving, no more tears."
"Yeoland."
"Husband."
"God in heaven, I give Thee thanks for this."
*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOKLOVE AMONG THE RUINS***