'Well, there, 'tis not I that can give the reason.'
'Can you think mine the only boat that goes without that garnish?'
'I swear the only one.'
Christian did not know how on his very account a prevalent custom had gained ground. He brought out a string of names.
'Why, most of those from this very tree have had takings. 'Tis an ill wind that blows nowhere; for I reckon now to get a good price off this timber—ay, to the last scrap, and 'tis you I owe some thanks for that. So, look you, I have a mind, after I have made my profit, to open out of your doing here with me and takethe laugh. Hey? Ah! it seems to me that some of your wits are left, so may be all I heard tell of was lies, when 'twas said you had had games with the Evil One, and had lost to him both wits and soul.'
Christian said slowly, 'You thought I had no soul?'
'Never thought at all; why should I? Let fools think; I see. You, I see, but now handle the rowan freely, and pass it to and fro, as never could you have done had your soul known unholy tampering.'
Christian stood stock-still, with an unseeing stare, till the old man called back to him, 'Come on, just to lend a hand up this pitch.' Then he ran after, and so eagerly bore, that one spoke he broke.
On the level he said, strangely breathless, 'Now I want payment.'
'What! A great hulking fellow can't go two steps out of his way and lift a hand for one with old age in his bones but he asks payment!'
'Yes,' said Christian, 'and for the love of God, give me the payment I shall ask.'
'No promise, but what's your asking?'
'Give me berries of the rowan.'
With his sour grin the old fellow muttered,'Well, well, no wits after all!' as he plucked some bunches and chucked them across.
'More! more! and oh! quick; I lose time. See, fill up my cap.'
'All you can't have. My brats have been promised their handfuls, and want you may.'
When all that entreaty could get he had, Christian parted at a run, and the way he took was home.
Rhoda wondered, seeing him pass the window. Presently, laying aside resentment, she went out to seek him in the linhay. The door resisted her hand.
'Christian,' she called, and after his answer, 'Come in. What are you about? Bring in your work; there is fire still.'
He said 'No' so forcibly, that she went away aggrieved, and a little curious.
All was very quiet; of Lois she heard and saw nothing, and Christian made no noise at all. She wondered if he too were engaged in prayer; she wondered if she ought also to be so devoted.
From the window she saw two figures on the road, and watched them idly. They neared, and from the opposite approach came two others. All four were known to her by sight, though hailing from some distance; they werekin to Philip; two were father and son, two were brothers. At the gate they stood, and turned in.
Rhoda's heart dropped as she guessed their errand. To her a word from Christian were enough; but what solemnest oath, what evidence short of Philip's self, would convince these?
They were knocking, while still her countenance was out of command; and when they asked for Christian, her wits were so troubled, that she said lamely, 'It is Christmas Eve; can you want him now?
'Wait then—I will go—wait here, and he will come.'
When she passed out and turned the wall, she knew by the sound of feet that two had started to go about the contrary way to make against any escape. At the linhay door she knocked, again getting an impatient answer.
'Christian, come out, or let me in. You must.'
He came out and closed the door, keeping his hand upon it while she told.
'I cannot come. Go, say I cannot come; I will not!' and desperately impatient his hand beat upon the door.
'You must,' she said, and her white face and shaking voice went far to convince him.'I think you must. O Christian, don't you know why they come?'
He looked at her blankly.
'To ask after Philip.'
His face burned red, and he stood dumfoundered.
'You know? From my mother?'
'Yes,' she said. 'No,' she said. 'I thought that first, and told her. Oh! why did she not tell you all when she would not let me confess? Yes, I thought that, and O wretch that I was! I thought no blame either. Now hate me, and never forgive me.'
He also said, 'I have nothing to forgive'; and half audibly he groaned, 'Ah, Christ! is there no forgiveness of sins?'
Footsteps made them turn to see two rounding the linhay; and again, footsteps behind brought two after Rhoda, impatient of delay. None of the four from that moment judged Christian to be innocent, nor Rhoda wholly ignorant: their looks so bespoke guilt and apprehension.
Some touch of resentment at the intolerant intrusion set Christian's head high, and his eyes were not to be daunted as he measured each for strength of will and strength of body. He knew them for the pick of Philip's kin; all were of the League.
'Say why you come,' said Christian.
'Bid me stay,' whispered Rhoda, though she saw that her presence hindered a ready answer; but Christian bade her go, and reluctantly she withdrew.
Out of earshot she went, but no further than to the gate. There she leaned, and tried to keep her face averted, but against resolution now and then her head would turn to better her heart. Uncloaked, in the cold she shivered, and from apprehension.
'Concerning our kinsman Philip,' began the eldest.
His colour went and came for witness against him.
'Speak low,' he said, glancing at a near window, 'lest my mother hear,' and at that a second score went down against his innocence.
'You put to sea with him; you came back alone. Where is he?'
In his haste Christian answered to more than was asked.
'Alive he was when I saw him last. Where he now is I know little as you.'
The youngest put in a word. 'Alive! But was any plank under him? Will you take your oath that he was alive and safe, and unhurt by you?'
At that red guilt flew over his face, for he could not.
Another turn of words might give him a chance, but he had no skill to play for it. The imposition of an oath he might not resent with his old high claim: a promise had been broken, though they knew not, and his head sank for shame. That, with his brief pause, sealed conviction.
One muttered, 'Now I would not believe him though he swore'; but the other three frowned silence upon him, the spokesman saying, 'We do require an oath before we ask further.'
No protest did he offer to hinder a quick despatch. He uttered the form prescribed, though conscience and pride alike took deep wounds of it. Afterwards it was told against him how his countenance worked, as for the first time an oath had been forced upon him.
'Now be speedy,' said Christian, 'for I have little leisure or list to bide.'
At that crass speech something of grim smiling hardly kept to concealment.
'Is Philip alive?'
'Yes,' he said, 'if he be not dead,' an answer that angered them. 'God knows';then he said, 'I have no cause to think him dead.'
'You saw him last alive and like to live?'
'More like to live than I.'
'Where, then, did you leave him?'
'I may not say. I am pledged to silence.'
'How pledged? To whom?'
'To Philip.'
'Ay, we know; but we all are of the League.'
'None were excepted; "not to a soul," he said.'
'He, speaking for the League, meant to not a soul beside.'
'I mean to the League no less. So I think did he.'
A poor satisfaction was in standing to his word against those who compelled him to an oath.
'Crack-brained devil——'
'Lower!' Christian said, glancing anxiously up at the window.
'This is no case for foolery or brag. Out of you we must have the whole truth, lief or loath.'
His stubborn face said no. To no man on earth could he tell the whole truth, nor, were that possible, would it be believed; less thanthe whole doomsday truth could scarce make his own outrageous act comprehensible.
'Philip may tell you, but not I,' he said witlessly. And as he spoke and looked at these four, it came upon him that he might not long outlive Philip's telling of the tale, if only by reason of that lurking thing uncertainly seen. He clapped his hand upon the hidden cross, as a perilous flash told how less cause had set down a record that might not bear the light. So close was he ever to the mouth of hell.
Live temper faded from his face, and it settled to the old blank mildness that had been lifting somewhat of late days.
'Is he so mad?'
'No, he shams.'
'Leave fooling, and speak straight in a matter of life and death.'
'Oh! more—more than life and death. For the love of God, make an end, and take a final answer. I will tell no more; nor would the most I know further you to Philip.'
The comment of a vigorous curse checked him there.
'Hear me out. If you need but to know how a venture went, I can tell you: well. If you have other need of him that does notbrook delay, I can but offer to serve you to my best, for following and bringing him again; whatever be the risk, I owe that to him and you. Only this day I must have to myself. I must, though I pay for it with the rest of my life.'
That preposterous offer took away breath. Then an oath yelping high with derision above anger brought Christian to entreat for his mother's quiet.
'Let us in here, then,' said one, and reached to the latch behind him.
Christian struck up his arm. 'No!' he said, and barred the way.
Instantly, moved by a prompt suspicion, the four sprang out ready steel and swung one way, ringing him in. At that, Christian realised his desperate case. He blanched, and sweat started. 'For life and death!' he said hoarsely. 'O my God, my God!'
Rhoda shot in between, and, voiceless from fear and speed, clung to Christian, presuming her weakness to turn offence.
'Cowards!' she panted, 'four against one, and he empty-handed. What—why? Christian?'
'You would do well to counsel your madman to give way and let us pass, if he care greatly for the quiet of any there within.'
Christian yielded. He lifted the latch and thrust the door open, standing aside that they might pass him by; but two linked arm with him, walked him in, and held him a prisoner. He did not offer to resist. Rhoda pressed after him close; the last to enter closed and bolted the door.
Puzzled silence fell. Not a corner of the bare place could harbour suspicion. Some tools were ranged against the walls; twine and canvas and common oddments lay there, a small enough show of garden store, and of fuel a pile pitifully low. A stool overthrown told of Christian's last hasty rising; on a bench lay his cap, half filled with scarlet berries, and strung berries were spread beside. Four blank countenances were turned upon him, whose looks were sullen and guilty like a criminal's taken in the act. Rhoda, bewildered, owned to her sinking heart that here showed such vagary of his wits as passed her reckoning.
'You were best away, Rhoda.'
'I will not go,' she said, 'except I be thrust out.'
None urged for that rough kindness now, having gone so far; her presence might even turn to account, for it must lie with the Alien to spare her distress.
The prisoner took up question.
'The League has charged you to be judges?'
'Yes.'
'To give sentence?'
'Yes.'
'To execute it?'
'Yes.'
Christian grew as white as a coward; he went on steadily nevertheless.
'You are charged to do murder.'
'To do justice.'
'Without any proof that Philip is dead.'
'Lack of proof that he is alive comes to the same as the case stands.'
No lie would now avail of Philip lost overboard. In the stress of clear thinking for his life he felt relief that he could not be so tempted to damn his fair cause before Heaven.
'He will return,' he muttered, 'but too late, for me too late.'
'Christian, they dare not,' gasped Rhoda; 'no, you dare not, for Philip will return to confound you. Should he return—too late—then may God have no mercy on your souls.'
Christian said 'Amen' to that.
The spokesman turned to Rhoda.
'You speak positively: can you bear witness in his favour?'
'I know nothing—nothing.'
'Yet have you shown singular quickness of apprehension.'
She looked piteously at Christian, galled by remorse.
'Oh me! Must I say?'
'Why not? None here will blame you. I cannot.'
So Rhoda faltered out how she too had entertained a wicked suspicion.
'What evidence then routed it?'
'His.'
'His evidence?'
'His denial.'
Her sincerity was beyond question; her simplicity commanded respect; no ingenuity could have spoken better to his credit. Yet all was vain.
'Bare denial may not suffice for us, when furthermore without valid cause he has refused any clear statement to satisfy a reasonable demand, and quibbled and defied.'
'Give me a moment's grace,' pleaded Christian, 'to make sure if I can go no further.'
He might take his time; but little he neededto gain conviction for despair; for he saw how inevitably answer would beget question point by point, till, again at bay, having traversed ground bristling with hostile indications, he must stand at yet worse disadvantage.
Before his eyes, one, fingering in mere impatience, took hold of the strung berries; at a rough twitch some scattered. Christian, exasperated, plucked for a free hand, and a tightened grip set him struggling for one instant with the natural indignation of young blood at rude constraint. So well dreaded was his strength, that on a misconstruction of his aim, every tool that might serve as a weapon was caught up and thrust hastily from the window, while more of the rowan danced down. Balked the Alien seemed, resisting no longer, and sweating, shaking, choking, with eyes miserably wet with rage. But Rhoda, who had watched his face, turned, and gathering all the berries loose and strung, laid them safe from handling.
'God bless you, dear!' he said; and so she knew that she had guessed right, and so she could not doubt but his wits had fallen again to their old infirmity.
He had ended patience and grace when a gleam of hope came.
'It must be within your knowledge,' he said, 'who last saw him with me.'
'Yes.'
'Then this I may say—he and Philip went together when we parted company.'
'That too we had thought to be possible.'
Christian recognised an ominous note, and the hostile faces he saw more dark and grim.
'Speak out!' he cried; 'what is it you think?' Yet half he knew; yet quite he knew. 'Speak out! Do you dare think I have betrayed them?'
'We have little doubt. Traitor, thrice over traitor, the League's account with you is overdue.'
He laughed out savagely.
'Now, devils that you are you show, that bring a false accusation, since well you know that once only have I been on a venture.'
'Well we know how two ventures before failed—well-planned ventures. Now we know how you have played the fool and the spy together. Two times have you been gone, no man knew where; over a day gone, and not at sea. Will you say now where you went?'
He despaired, and did not answer, while Rhoda's glance wavered consciously. At last he said:
'Though I myself can make no defence, in due time I cannot fail to be cleared—of murder and treason. I cannot wait. This day I want; I must be free on any terms. No terms? But hear! I claim judgment instantly, this hour. Men, you dare not give it. Then I claim the judgment of God. I will fight it out. Choose your place and pick your man,—nay, any two. What? Cowards! three, all four together, but forgo your knives or lend me one.'
'Fight you may, but the place shall be here, and the odds against you, as you see.'
The door was fast, and the six within stood close in the limited space; he was held at disadvantage, and weaponless, against choice men prepared. Also he cared for two women.
'Oh!' he cried, shaken and white with fury, 'I must, I must have one day. With what but my life may I purchase? Is it cheap, think you? As you hope for heaven by mercy, deal with me. Only one day! By this hour to-morrow, if I breathe, I surrender. I will swear to it by any form you will. Make harder conditions, and I take them. All my life-days after would I engage to set this day free. What more can a man offer than his life for lending or ending?'
His face and voice were so dreadful to Rhoda's heart, that she could not brook the limits of reason.
'Mine! Christian, you have mine. You will not refuse; you will let him go, for I will be his surety.'
'This is folly.'
'It is not. Is it not enough? I—life—honour, in pledge for him. O Christian, you cannot gainsay, else you dishonour your own purpose.'
'We are plain men who are dealing for justice. An innocent girl cannot be substitute for a traitor all but proved, whom, moreover, the League needs for a better information.'
Still Rhoda tried protests.
'Girl, are you out of your senses too? dishonest too? Can you state any circumstance to justify this urgency for a day's grace? Failing that, well we can guess what he would do with it. It is somewhat barefaced.'
Christian checked her answering, and owned defeat.
'Give over now,' he said. 'An hour have I wasted fighting over losing ground. You have gained all along, and I know it. In every way you have the advantage. Say now, what will you do with it?'
'You surrender?'
'No. By your force, not by my will, shall liberty go. Quit words and be doing. No: what then?'
'Consider that the odds are against your taking boat alive were a hint out of your foul dealing with the League. Yet if you promise resistance we have no choice but to hale you an open prisoner. Have you a mind to face stones?'
Rhoda's scared looks drew one to assure her, that were Christian free from guilt, his cause could not miscarry at their hands, unless by his own intemperance; therefore should she persuade him to voluntary submission. He groaned in miserable despair.
'I yield, but only till these stringent conditions be passed. Dispose with me as you will, and I submit—yes, absolutely—yes; but for a time only. A limited term; for one half-hour? More I will not, and look you after. I cannot surrender my will to be free this day.'
Likely enough it was out of pity for the girl that his offer was taken. Against suspicion of some reservation he was constrained to swear faith under dictation; also the order of his going was ruled minutely, with warningthat the lifting of a hand unallowed would be instantly fatal. 'Be doing—be doing quickly,' he said, and the bolt was drawn.
Christian turned to stay Rhoda, who came following, and the four men, with fine consideration, passed out first, letting the door swing to on the unhappy pair. Their eyes met, poor souls, with miserable consciousness that a barrier of reserve thwarted solace.
'Keep heart, dear,' he said; and bravely tearless she echoed him.
'But, oh!' she said, 'be patient, and not rash, for the sake of those who love you.'
'O Rhoda, Rhoda! you do not know. I have a work this night. I think—I know it was meant for me. By Heaven, I think. My own sins have risen up against me now. They thwart. Hell itself striving against me has advantage by them. There must be some way. But I cannot see it. There must be! Oh! I cannot be condemned through turning back on an amended hope. So Heaven-sent I blessed it. No way—no way!'
Muttering, he reached over to the rowan and absently fingered it, while Rhoda urged on him what she knew of reason. He turned on her a musing look.
'Rhoda, will you help me?'
'Oh, tell me to: never ask.'
'Take the rowan, and finish what I was about.'
She broke down at last, and turned away in such a passion of sobbing as owned desertion of hope.
'Rhoda! You desert me, Rhoda!' in so broken a voice he said, that against all sense she cried: 'But I will! Yes, yes; trust me, I will!' and could not after retract when she saw his face.
'I am not mad,' he said; 'look at me: I am not.' And with that she knew not how to reconcile evidence.
'Be speedy against my return.'
'Is it possible? How?' she whispered.
'As God wills, I cannot know; but some way will show, must show.'
Again she entreated against temerity, and for answer he taught her of a lonely spot, asking her to carry the threaded rowan there, and to wait his coming. 'If I do not come,' he said, 'I shall be——'
'Not dead!' she breathed.
'Oh, damned and dead,' he said.
'It cannot be. No. Yet, O Christian, should any harm befall you, avenged you shall be. Yes. No law can serve us here efficientagainst the tyranny of the League; but if in all the land high places of justice be, there will I go, and there denounce the practice of such outrage and wrong. Those four, they shall not escape from account. For that I will live—ay, even hazard living—I know.'
'You will not,' ordered Christian; 'for I myself freely have served the League, and have taken payment. And these four mean to deal justly; and I have no right to complain.'
A hint of impatience sounded against the door, and Christian, with a last word enjoining secrecy, turned and lifted the latch. A forlorn sob complained. He caught both her hands in his.
'Dear heart, dear hands, a farewell were misdoubt,' he said, and on brow and hands he crossed her. 'A human soul shall bless your faithful doing.'
He loosed and left her. She saw the door's blank exchange for him; she heard the brisk departure of feet; away fled the spurious confidence she had caught in his presence, and desolate and despairing, blind and choked with grief, she cursed her own folly and bewailed his.
When she took up her lunatic task the red berries like told beads registered one by oneprayer too like imprecation, for sure she was that the strange-named woman stirred at the heart of this coil. In heats of exasperation she longed to scatter and crush the rowan; yet the thread crept on steadily through her hands, inch by inch, till that misery was over.
Then it pleased her grief to bring out her own best scarf for enfolding. 'So I further him to her,' she said; 'so I fashion some love-token between them.' As soft-foot she went for it, outside a fastened door she stood to listen. She heard the low mutter of petition, and jealous resentment sprang up against a monopoly by the dead of the benefit of prayer, so wanted by the living.
As she stood, a patch of calm sea shone into her eyes through a narrow light; and from the frame, small as a beetle, moved a boat rowing across. Five men she counted, and she made out that the second rower was the biggest. So had he entirely surrendered. All hopeless she turned away to fulfil her promise.
At that moment Christian was speaking.
'I take it, the time is now up.'
By a mile of engirding sea the prospect of escape looked so vain that one joined assent with a fleer. Placid as the sea's calm was the Alien's countenance, and he pulled on steadily.The leader from the helm leaned forward to regard him fixedly, finding his tranquillity consonant only with imperfect wits.
'You think better of resistance, nevertheless?'
'Truly I do,' he answered. 'I think better of resistance now,' and in his eyes was no reading of resentment or anxiety.
His glance turned with his thoughts to distinguish the roof that covered his mother and Rhoda. Dear heart, cried his, do your part and I will mine.
Rhoda by then was doing after her own thought and liking. Though fasting herself, poor child, that on the morrow the board might be the better spread, for Christian she was lavish. Wine she took that Giles had not lived to drink; of griddle cakes the best she chose, and also of figs from those she summer-time ago had gathered and dried. Then she wound the silly rowan in brown moss, knotted it up in her scarf, and cloaked herself, and went out on her fool's errand.
Some miles to the west, on the edge of waste, stood a landmark of three trees, and near by, off the path, a furze-stack. Thither by devious ways of caution came Rhoda on the first wane of daylight, and having done all, faced thedrear without heart, crouching into shelter of the furze.
Poorly clad for such a vigil, thin from days of want, fasting, exhausted by excitement and grief, she had no strength left to bear bravely any further trial. Though Christian's desperate emphasis stood out to bar despair, she told herself his coming was impossible, and her spirit quailed in utter cowardice as she realised her own outlook. She was afraid of the night, and her engagement had taken no limit of time. Should the dreaded ice-wind of the season rise, there were peril to life; but her heart died under a worse terror, that increased as waste and tree bulked large and shapeless under drawing dark. For was it not the Eve of Christmas, when the strict limitations of nature were so relaxed that things inanimate could quit station, and very beasts speak like men, and naked spirits be clothed with form. Her mortal senses were averse. With desperate desire for relief she scanned the large through the longest hour of her life.
Night was in the valleys, but on the uplands twilight still, when against the sky a runner came. He, dear saviour.
But his footsteps made no sound; but he showed too white. Doubt of agony that thiswas not he in human flesh froze her, till he came and stood, and not seeing her close crouched, uttered his heart in a sound dreadful to hear.
'Here, here!' cried Rhoda, and had her hands on him before her eyes had fairly realised him. He was mostly naked.
Coatless, shirtless, unshod, his breeks and his hair clung damp, showing by what way he had come free. She held him, and laughed and sobbed.
'You have it?' he said. 'Give it here—give it.'
'This also—this first. Drink—eat.'
'No; I cannot stay.'
'You shall—you must,' she urged. 'Do you owe me nothing? What, never a word?'
He declined impatience to her better counsel; and when he had got the rowan and belted it safe, to the praise of her providence he drank eagerly and ate.
Rhoda spied a dark streak on his shoulder. 'You are hurt—oh!'
'Only skin-deep. Salt water stanched it.'
'And what of them? Christian, what have you done?' she asked with apprehension.
'Yes; I have a charge for you. Oh, theirskins are whole all. Can you step on with me a pace? You will not be afraid?'
She looked at the wan south-west, and the sable heath, and the stark trees; but she could answer now: 'No,' stoutly and truly, and shiver for fear only. He withheld his pace for her, she stretched to a stride for him.
'Well done, I know,' she said, 'but tell me how.'
He gave a meagre tale, but many a detail she heard later to fill it out. It was easy doing according to Christian, when time and place suited, to beat out a rib of the boat, to stand his ground for a moment while the sea accomplished for him, then to drop overboard when blades struck too quick and close. The boat went down, he said, near three miles from shore.
'O Christian! are any drowned?'
'No, no. I had done my best by them. You know how the Tortoises lie. We were well within a furlong of them. I got there first, and was doffed and ready when they came, waiting to offer them fair. Rhoda, you will carry word of this that some fellows may go to take them off.'
'Not I,' she said vindictively; 'let them wear the night there for due quittance.'
'No. They might be perished. And'twas I counselled them not to attempt the shore, and said I could send word of their plight; and I meant it honestly, though the fools grew so mad at that, that they took to stoning.'
When, later, Rhoda heard the tale more fully, it showed elements of incongruous comedy; later still, she heard it grown into monstrous proportions, when the name of the Tortoises was put aside, and the place was known as the Devil's Rocks thenceforward. The Alien's feats that day, his mighty stroke staving the boat, his swimming of marvellous speed, his confidence and temerity, were not passed on to his credit: adverse was the interpretation, and he never lived it down.
'Tell me, Christian, where you will be, and how we are to get news of you till you dare return.'
'Dare return! If I be not dead, that will I to-morrow.'
She cried out against such insanity.
'You must not. It is wicked with a foolhardy parade to torment us—your mother.'
'Have no fear, dear. If I come again, it will be with joy, bearing my sheaves.'
She could put an interpretation on his words that loaded her heart.
'Rhoda, dear sister, I owe you much this day, and now I will ask for one thing more.'
She said 'Yes,' though foreboding ordeal. It was a minute before he spoke.
'Will you pray for us?'
Poor heart, how could she? Anything but that.
'What worth are the prayers of such an one as I? Desire rather your mother's prayers.'
'She for another cause will be praying the night through. Will you do as much for us?'
He stopped her, for she did not speak, and held her by the shoulders, trying to see her face to get answered.
'O Rhoda, will you not pray for us?'
She made her answer singular. 'I will pray for thee'; but his greater want overcame her into ending: 'and—for Diadyomene.'
He stood stock-still and gripped her hard when that name came, but he asked nothing. 'I will, I will,' she whispered; and then he kissed her brow and said: 'God bless you.' She flung her arms round his neck without reserve; her cheek lay against his bare breast, and because she felt a cross there she dared to turn her lips and kiss. He gathered her to close embrace, so that swept from her feet she lay inhis arms rapt for one precious instant from all the world.
When he had set her on her feet, when he had blessed her many times, she clung to him still, heaving great sobs, till he had to pluck away her hands.
'Yes, go,' she said. 'I will pray for you both,' and down she knelt straightway.
'God be with you.'
'God be with you.'
He passed from her into the darkness, away from sorrows she knew to some unknown. Rhoda, flung prostrate, wept bitterly, rending her heart for the getting of very prayer for that unknown woman, her bane.
Too little thought Christian, though he loved her well, of her who so faithfully went on his bidding, trudging wearily on to make good his word, kneeling afterwards through the long hours in prayer that was martyrdom. If the value of prayer lie in the cost, hers that night greatly should avail.
Late knocking came importunate to the House Monitory. One went to the wicket and looked out. Her light, convulsed, for an instant abetted a delusion that he who stood knocking outside was Christ Himself with the signs of His Passion: unclothed was the man she saw, bloodstained, both head and hands. Then she noted fair hair, and had to believe that this haggard man was one with the brave-faced boy of earliest summer. He clung to the ledge for support; so spent was he that a word was hard to compass.
'For the love of God,' he said, 'you who are watchers to-night pray for a human soul in sore need.'
She would vouch for that; she would summon one with authority to vouch for more.
When she carried word within: ''Tis the same,' said one, 'who twice has left fish at the gate, who slept once at the feet of St. Margaret.'
To the wicket went the head monitress, and, moved to compassion by the sight of his great distress, she gave him good assurance that not the five watchers only, but one and all, should watch and pray for him that night, and she asked his name for the ordering of prayer.
'Not mine!' he said. 'I ask your prayers for another whose need is mine. Pray for her by the name Diadyomene.'
He unfastened the cross from his neck and gave it.
'This is a pledge,' he said, 'I would lay out of my weak keeping for St. Mary, St. Margaret, and St. Faith to hold for me, lest to-night I should desire I had it, to be rid of it finally according to promise.'
He had not made himself intelligible; clearer utterance was beyond him.
'No matter!' he said. 'Take it—keep it—till I come again.'
He knotted the empty string again to his neck, and, commended to God, went his way.
Now when these two, little later, asked of each other, 'What was the strange name he gave?' neither could remember it. But they said 'God knows,' and prayed for that nameless soul.
Somehow Christian got down the cliffs to the shore, as somehow he had come all the way. Little wonder head and hands showed bloody: every member was bruised and torn, for he had stumbled and gone headlong a score of times in his desperate speed over craggy tracks, where daylight goings needed to be wary. Scarcely could hoofed creatures have come whole-foot, and he, though of hardy unshod practice, brought from that way not an inch sound under tread. An uncertain moon had favoured him at worst passes, else had he fallen to certain destruction.
He stood at the sea's edge and paused to get breath and courage. To his shame, he was deficient in fortitude: the salt of the wet shingle bit his feet so cruelly, that he shrank at the prospect of intensified pain through all the innumerable wounds he bore. He saw exposed a pitiful, unstable wretch, with a body drained of strength and nerve, and a spirit servile to base instances. In desperate spite he plunged and swam.
He had ever waited for an outgoing tide; he had ever taken a daylight tide; now for his sins he had night and the flood against him. But still the moon blessed him. Delusions beset him that pains of his body came fromthe very teeth of sea-creatures, too fierce and many for him to cope with, crowding, dragging, gnawing hard at his life. For ease a passive moment and a little painful, airless sobbing would suffice: soonest, best. And had the pale moon darkened, he had gone under as at a supreme command, to such depravity and destitution were come his vital instincts. But, her light holding him alive, by hard degrees he won his way, till, for the last time, he stood upon the Isle Sinister.
But when he had made his way through the narrow gorge, and trod sand, the moon was dark, and night fell upon his heart. He dared not call, and neither sight nor sound granted him assurance of Diadyomene's presence. Wanting her footprints to tell she had passed in, he feared lest he should be barring her very entrance. He fell down and prayed, being without resource.
And Lois was praying, and Rhoda with bitter tears, and the House Monitory with the ring of its bells. Very faint was the moan of the sea in their ears.
Slowly, slowly, the blessed moon stepped out, and lifted him up and delivered to his sight the track of light feet set from seaward—one track only. In haste, by the wavering lightof the moon, he laid out the threaded rowan and weighted one end against the rock. The whole length extended came short of the further wall by about two feet.
He rallied from the momentary shock, resolving that he himself could stand in the gap to bar passage.
No form nor motion could he discern within his range as in slow scrutiny his eyes sought her from side to side. He lighted on despair; the entrance to the cavern had escaped his providence.
In the dark he went to the low arch, and felt about the sand inch by inch for the dint of her feet. Naught could he find. Yet what did it profit him that she had not yet passed? To drop prone on the sand was his poor conclusion, abandoned to despair.
He was but cast back on the morning's portion, then of fair sufficiency, but now oh! meagre, meagre, compared to the ripe hope that had come of nourishment strange and opportune as manna from heaven. Then had he incurred to no purpose expense of blood and sweat and anguish of body and mind, nay, brought to the crucial hour such an appalling deficiency.
To contest a human soul with powers of darkness required perfect steadfastness of will and faith; lost, lost, with mere self-control lost in a useless barter that left him now a clod of effete manhood, with just life enough for groaning pain. Before conflict was he vanquished. Diadyomene need but come with a word of anger or derision to break him into childish sobbings.
Yet driven to last extremity, such man's strength as remained to him might prevail in sanctified violence for the winning of a soul. He would hold her by the feet; his hands were bloody, but he would hold her by the feet; should he have to cling round her, he would not hurt; meek and gentle could he be, though fury should set her to such savage handling as a woman's strength may compass.
To win a human soul? O wretched piece of clay, not that! The mere thought of contact with Diadyomene, close contact with her, cool, soft, naked there in the cold dark, swept the bright delirium of sea-magic over him again, stung his blood to a burning fever, set him writhing as pain had never. At the fiery blast, in this nadir hour the place of pure love was assaulted and taken by base lust; hisdesire was most strong, not for the winning of a human soul, but for the wicked winning of a human body, ay, maugre her will—any way.
Yet, oh for the fair way of her favour! Had she not allowed him very gracious hints?—'lay your hand upon my breast, set your lips to mine.' Thrice she had said it—once when a touch on her hand had brought magical vision, once at her kindest, once at her cruelest. Though her command was against him, though her anger might not be overpast, a hope kindled that dread of the dark hour of her fate might urge her to his arms, there to find such gladness and consolation as might leave no place for horror to come into possession.
'And give up your soul.' Thrice too had that been said. He was loath to give it remembrance, but it entered, whenever faint bells tolled on his ear it entered.
Very strangely, while good and evil fought equal-handed for his will, he perceived that his body had risen to hands and knees, and was going forward very fitly like a beast. All round the cold dark began to burn. A boulder lay athwart his course, and then very strangely he was aware that his arms had fastened roundit with convulsive strength, and brow and breast were wounded against it. He could not take possession to end this disgraceful treason; all that was left to him was to rescue integrity at least by undoing the knot at his neck.
Then prevailed the blessed guile of Lois. The trivial exaction brought her son face to face with her, with her sorrows, with her prayers, and the mere communion of love set him praying frantically, and so brought him to himself again.