“o god, we are but leaves upon thy stream,
clouds in thy sky.”
dinah mulock.
a busy place on a monday morning was bread street, in the city of london. as its name denotes, it was the street of the bakers; for our ancestors did not give names, as we do, without reason, for mere distinction’s sake. if a town gate bore the name of york gate, that was equivalent to a signpost, showing that it opened on the york road. they made history and topography, where we only make confusion.
the fat, flour-besprinkled baker at the harp, in bread street, was in full tide of business. his shelves were occupied by the eight different kinds of bread in common use—wassel, used only by knights and squires; cocket, the kind in ordinary use by smaller folk; maslin, a mixture of wheat, oats, and barley; barley, rye, and brown bread, the fare of tradesmen and monks; oaten, the food of the poorest; and horse bread. there were two or three varieties finer and better than these, only used by the nobles, which were therefore made at home, and not commonly to be found at the baker’s: simnel, manchet or chet, and paynemayne or pain de main (a corruption of panis dominicus). we read also of pain le rei, or the king’s bread, but this may be paynemayne under another name. even in the large towns, at that time, much of the baking was done at home; and the chief customers of the bakers were the cookshops or eating houses, with such private persons as had not time or convenience to prepare their own bread. the price of bread at this time does not appear to be on record; but about seventy years later, four loaves were sold for a penny. (note 1.)
the cooks, who lived mainly in eastcheap and along the water-side, of course had to provide bread of various kinds, to suit their different customers; and a young man, armed with a huge basket, came to have it filled with all varieties. another young man had entered after him, and now stood waiting by the wall till the former should have finished his business.
“now then,” said the baker, turning to the man in waiting, as the other trudged forth with his basket: “what shall i serve you with?”
“i don’t want you to serve me; i want to serve you,” was the answer.
the baker looked him over with a good-natured but doubtful expression.
“want to serve me, do you? whence come you?”
“i’m an upland man.” (from the country.)
“got any one to speak for you?”
“a pair of eyes, a pair of hands, a fair wit, and a good will to work.”
the fat baker looked amused. “and an honest repute, eh?” said he.
“i have it, but i can’t give it you, except from my wife, and i scarcely suppose you’ll be satisfied to go to her for my character.”
“i’m not so sure of that!” laughed the baker. “if she’d speak truth, she could give you the character best worth having of any.”
“she never yet spoke any thing else, nor did i.”
“ha, jolife!—you must be a fine pair. well, now, speak the truth, and tell me why a decent, tidy-seeming young fellow like you can’t get a character to give me.”
“because i should have to put my wife in peril, if i went back to do it,” was the bold answer.
“ha, so!” such a possibility, in those rough days, was only too apparent to the honest baker. “well, well! had to run from a bad master, eh? ay, ay, i see.”
he did not see exactly the accurate details of the facts; but the applicant did not contradict him.
“well! i could do with another hand, it’s true; and i must say i like the look of you. how long have you been a baker’s man?”
“when i’ve been with you seven days, it’ll be just a week,” was the humorous reply.
“what, you’ve all to learn? that’s a poor lookout.”
“a man that has all to learn, and has a will to it, will serve you better than one that has less to learn, and has no will to it.”
“come, i can’t gainsay that. what have you been, then?”
“i have been watchman in a castle.”
“oh, ho!—how long?”
“fifteen years.”
“and what gives you a mind to be a baker?”
“well, more notions than one. it’s a clean trade, and of good repute; wholesome, for aught i know: there’s no killing in it, for which i haven’t a mind; and as folks must eat, it does not depend on fashion like some things. moths don’t get into bread and spoil it, nor rust neither; and if you can’t sell it, you can eat it yourself, and you’re no worse off, or not much. it dries and gets stale, of course, in time: but one can’t have every thing; and seems to me there’s as little risk in bread, and as little dirt or worry, as there is in any thing one can put one’s hand to do. i’m not afraid of work, but i don’t like dirt, loss, nor worry.”
the fat baker chuckled. “good for you, my lad!—couldn’t have put it better myself. man was made to labour, and i like to see a man that’s not afraid of work. keep clear of worry by all means; it eats a man’s heart out, which honest work never does. work away, and sing at your work—that’s my notion: and it’s the way to get on and be happy.”
“i’m glad to hear it; i always do,” said the applicant. “and mind you, lad,—i don’t know an unhappier thing than discontent. when you want to measure your happiness, don’t go and set your ell-wand against him that’s got more than you have, but against him that’s got less. bread and content’s a finer dinner any day than fat capon with grumble-sauce. we can’t all be alike; some are up, and some down: but it isn’t them at the top of the tree that’s got the softest bed to lie on, nor them that sup on the richest pasties that most enjoy their supper. if a man wants to be comfortable, he must keep his heart clear of envy, and put a good will into his work. i believe a man may come to take pleasure in any thing, even the veriest drudgery, that brings a good heart to it and does his best to turn it out well.”
“i am sure of that,” was the response, heartily given.
the baker was pleased with the hearty response to the neat epigrammatic apothegms wherein he delighted to unfold himself. he nodded approval.
“i’ll take you on trial for a month,” he said. “and if you’ve given yourself a true character, you’ll stay longer. i’ll pay you—no, we’ll settle that question when i have seen how you work.”
“i’ll stay as long as i can,” was the answer, as the young man turned to leave the shop.
“tarry a whit! what’s your name, and how old are you?”
“i am one-and-thirty years of age, and my name is stephen.”
“good. be here when the vesper bell begins to ring.”
stephen went up to cheapside, turned along it, up lady cicely’s lane, and out into smithfield by one of the small posterns in the city wall. entering a small house in cock lane, he went up a long ladder leading to a tiny chamber, screened-off from a garret. here a tabby cat came to meet him, and rubbed itself against his legs as he stooped down to caress it, while ermine, who sat on the solitary bench, looked up brightly to greet him.
“any success, stephen?”
“thy prayer is heard, sweet heart. i have entered the service of a baker in bread street,—a good-humoured fellow who would take me at my own word. i told him i had no one to refer him to for a character but you,—i did not think of gib, or i might have added him. you’d speak for me, wouldn’t you, old tabby?”
gib replied by an evidently affirmative “me-ew!”
“i’ll give you an excellent character,” said ermine, smiling, “and so will gib, i am sure.”
the baker was well satisfied when his new hand reached the harp exactly as the vesper bell sounded its first stroke at saint mary-le-bow.
“that’s right!” said he. “i like to see a man punctual. take this damp cloth and rub the shelves.”
“clean!” said he to himself a minute after. “have you ever rubbed shelves before?”
“not much,” said stephen.
“how much do you rub ’em?”
“till they are clean.”
“you’ll do. can you carry a tray on your head?”
“don’t know till i try.”
“best practise a bit, before you put any thing on it, or else we shall have mud pies,” laughed the baker.
when work was over, the baker called stephen to him.
“now,” said he, “let us settle about wages. i could not tell how much to offer you, till i saw how you worked. you’ve done very well for a new hand. i’ll give you three-halfpence a-day till you’ve fairly learnt the trade, and twopence afterwards: maybe, in time, if i find you useful, i may raise you a halfpenny more: a penny of it in bread, the rest in money. will that content you?”
“with a very good will,” replied stephen.
his wages as watchman at the castle had been twopence per day, so that he was well satisfied with the baker’s proposal.
“what work does your wife do?”
“she has none to do yet. she can cook, sew, weave, and spin.”
“i’ll bear it in mind, if i hear of any for her.”
“thank you,” said stephen; and dropping the halfpenny into his purse, he secured the loaves in his girdle, and went back to the small screened-off corner of the garret which at present he called home.
it was not long before the worthy baker found stephen so useful that he raised his wages even to the extravagant sum of threepence a day. his wife, too, had occasional work for ermine; and the thread she spun was so fine and even, and the web she wove so regular and free from blemishes, that one employer spoke of her to another, until she had as much work as she could do. not many months elapsed before they were able to leave the garret where they had first found refuge, and take a little house in ivy lane; and only a few years were over when stephen was himself a master baker and pastiller (or confectioner), ermine presiding over the lighter dainties, which she was able to vary by sundry german dishes not usually obtainable in london, while he was renowned through the city for the superior quality of his bread. odinel, the fat baker, who always remained his friend, loved to point a moral by stephen’s case in lecturing his journeymen.
“why, do but look at him,” he was wont to say; “when he came here, eight years ago, he scarcely knew wassel bread from cocket, and had never seen a fish pie save to eat. now he has one of the best shops in bread street, and four journeymen under him. and how was it done, think you? there was neither bribery nor favour in it. just by being honest, cleanly, and punctual, thorough in all he undertook, and putting heart and hands into the work. every one of you can do as well as he did, if you only bestir yourselves and bring your will to it. depend upon it, lads, ‘i will’ can do a deal of work. ‘i can’ is very well, but if ‘i will’ does not help him, ‘i can’ will not put many pennies in his pocket. ‘i can’—‘i ought’—‘i will’—those are the three good fairies that do a man’s work for him: and the man that starts work without them is like to turn out but a sorry fellow.”
it was for ermine’s sake, that he might retain a hiding place for her if necessary, that stephen continued to keep up the house in ivy lane. the ordinary custom was for a tradesman to live over or behind his shop. the excuse given out to the world was that stephen and his wife, being country people, did not fancy being close mewed up in city streets; and between ivy lane and the fresh country green and air, there were only a few lanes and the city walls.
those eight years passed quietly and peacefully to stephen and ermine. a small family—five in number—grew up around them, and gib purred tranquilly on the hearth. they found new friends in london, and thanked god that he had chosen their inheritance for them, and had set their feet in a large room.
at that time, and for long afterwards, each trade kept by itself to its own street or district. the mercers and haberdashers lived in west chepe or cheapside, which stephen had to go down every day. one morning, at the end of those eight years, he noticed that a shop long empty had been reopened, and over it hung a newly-painted signboard, with a nun’s head. as stephen passed, a woman came to the door to hang up some goods, and they exchanged a good look at each other.
“i wonder who it is you are like!” said stephen to himself.
then he passed on, and thought no more about her.
on two occasions this happened. when the third came, the woman suddenly exclaimed—
“i know who you are now!”
“do you?” asked stephen, coming to a halt. “i wish i knew who you are. i have puzzled over your likeness to somebody, and i cannot tell who it is.”
the woman laughed, thereby increasing the mysterious resemblance which was perplexing stephen.
“why,” said she, “you are stephen esueillechien, unless i greatly mistake.”
“so i am,” answered stephen, “or rather, so i was; for men call me now stephen le bulenger. but who are you?”
“don’t you think i’m rather like leuesa?”
“that’s it! but how come you hither, old friend? have you left my cousin? or is she—”
“the lady derette is still in the anchorhold. i left her when i wedded. do you remember roscius le mercer, who dwelt at the corner of north gate street? he is my husband—but they call him here roscius de oxineford—and we have lately come to london. so you live in bread street, i suppose, if you are a baker?”
stephen acknowledged his official residence, mentally reserving the private one, and purposing to give ermine a hint to confine herself for the present to ivy lane.
“do come in,” said leuesa hospitably, “and let us have a chat about old friends.”
and lifting up her voice she called—“roscius!”
the mercer, whom stephen remembered as a slim youth, presented himself in the changed character of a stout man of five-and-thirty, and warmly seconded his wife’s invitation, as soon as he recognised an old acquaintance.
“i’m glad enough to hear of old friends,” said stephen, “for i haven’t heard a single word since i left oxford about any one of them. tell me first of my brother. is he living and in the old place?”
“ay, and anania too, and all the children. i don’t think there have been any changes in the castle.”
“uncle manning and aunt isel?”
“manning died three years ago, and isel dwells now with raven and flemild, who have only one daughter, so they have plenty of room for her.”
“then what has become of haimet?”
“oh, he married asselot, the rich daughter of old tankard of bicester. he lives at bicester now. romund and mabel are well; they have no children, but haimet has several.”
“both my cousins married heiresses? they have not done badly, it seems.”
“n-o, they have not, in one way,” said leuesa. “but i do not think haimet is bettered by his marriage. he seems to me to be getting very fond of money, and always to measure everything by the silver pennies it cost. that’s not the true ell-wand; or i’m mistaken.”
“you are not, leuesa. i’d as soon be choked with a down pillow as have my soul all smothered up with gold. well, and how do other folks get on?—franna, and turguia, and chembel and veka, and all the rest?”
“turguia’s gone, these five years; the rest are well—at least i don’t recall any that are not.”
“is old benefei still at the corner?”
“ay, he is, and rubi and jurnet. regina is married to jurnet’s wife’s nephew, samuel, and has a lot of children—one pretty little girl, with eyes as like countess as they can be.”
“oh, have you any notion what is become of countess?”
“they removed from reading to dorchester, i believe, and then i heard old leo had divorced countess, and married deuslesalt’s daughter and heir, drua. what became of her i don’t know.”
“by the way, did either of you know aught of the wise woman of bensington? mother haldane, they used to call her. she’ll perhaps not be alive now, for she was an old woman eight years gone. she did me a good turn once.”
“i don’t know anything about her,” said leuesa.
“ah, well, i do,” answered roscius. “i went to her when our cow was fairy-led, twelve years gone; and after that for my sister, when she had been eating chervil, and couldn’t see straight before her. ay, she was a wise woman, and helped a many folks. no, she’s not alive now.”
“you mean more than you say, roscius,” said stephen, with a sudden sinking of heart. what had happened to haldane?
“well, you see, they ducked her for a witch.”
“and killed her?” stephen’s voice was hard.
“ay—she did not live many minutes after. she sank, though—she was no witch: though it’s true, her cat was never seen afterwards, and some folks would have it he’d gone back to sathanas.”
“then it must have been that night!” said stephen to himself. “did she know, that she sent us off in haste? was that the secret she would not tell?” aloud, he said,—“and who were ‘they’ that wrought that ill deed?”
“oh, there was a great crowd at the doing of it—all the idle loons in bensington and dorchester: but there were two that hounded them on to the work—the bishop’s sumner malger, and a woman: i reckon they had a grudge against her of some sort. wigan the charcoal-burner told me of it—he brought her out, and loosed the cord that bound her.”
“god pardon them as he may!” exclaimed stephen. “she was no more a witch than you are. a gentle, harmless old woman, that healed folks with herbs and such—shame on the men that dared to harm her!”
“ay, i don’t believe there was aught bad in her. but, saints bless you!—lads are up to anything,” said roscius. “they’d drown you, or burn me, any day, just for the sake of a grand show and a flare-up.”
“they’re ill brought up, then,” said stephen. “i’ll take good care my lads don’t.”
“o stephen! have you some children?—how many?”
“ay, two lads and three lasses. how many have you?”
“we’re not so well off as you; we have only two maids. why, stephen, i’d forgot you were married. i must come and see your wife. but i never heard whom you did marry: was she a stranger?”
poor stephen was sorely puzzled what to say. on the one hand, he thought leuesa might safely be trusted; and as ermine had already suffered the sentence passed upon her, and the entire circumstances were forgotten by most people, it seemed as if the confession of facts might be attended by no danger. yet he could not know with certainty that either of his old acquaintances was incorruptibly trustworthy; and if the priests came to know that one of their victims had survived the ordeal, what might they not do, in hatred and revenge? a moment’s reflection, and an ejaculatory prayer, decided him to trust leuesa. she must find out the truth if she came to see ermine.
“no,” he said slowly; “she was not a stranger.”
“why, who could it be?” responded leuesa. “nobody went away when you did.”
“but somebody went away before i did. leuesa, i think you are not the woman who would do an old friend an ill turn?”
“indeed, i would not, stephen,” said she warmly. “if there be any secret, you may trust me, and my husband too; we would not harm you or yours for the world.”
“i believe i may,” returned stephen. “my cousin derette knows, but don’t name it to any one else. my wife is—ermine.”
“stephen! you don’t mean it? well, i am glad to know she got safe away! but how did you get hold of her?”
stephen told his story.
“you may be very certain we shall not speak a word to injure ermine,” said leuesa. “ay, i’ll come and see her, and glad i shall be. why, stephen, i thought more of ermine than you knew; i called one of my little maids after her. ermine and derette they are. i can never forget a conversation i once had with gerard, when he took me back to the castle from isel’s house; i did not think so much of it at the time, but it came to me with power afterwards, when he had sealed his faith with his blood.”
“ah! there’s nothing like dying, to make folks believe you,” commented roscius.
“can’t agree with you there, friend,” answered stephen with a smile. “there is one other thing, and that is living. a man may give his life in a sudden spurt of courage and enthusiasm. it is something more to see him spend his life in patient well-doing through many years. that is the harder of the two to most.”
“maybe it is,” assented roscius. “i see now why you were so anxious about old haldane.”
“ay, we owed her no little. and i cannot but think she had some notion, poor soul! of what was coming: she was in such haste to get us off by dawn. if i had known—”
“eh, what could you have done if you had?” responded roscius. “wigan told me there were hundreds in the crowd.”
“nothing, perchance,” answered stephen sadly. “well! the good lord knew best, and he ordered matters both for us and her.”
“wigan said he thought she had been forewarned—i know not why.”
“ay, i think some one must have given her a hint. that was why she sent us off so early.”
“i say, stephen,” asked roscius rather uneasily, “what think you did become of that cat of hers? the thing was never seen after she died—not once. it looks queer, you know.”
“does it?” said stephen, with a little laugh.
“why, yes! i don’t want to think any ill of the poor old soul—not i, indeed: but never to be seen once afterwards—it does look queer. do you think sathanas took the creature?”
“not without i am sathanas. that terrible cat that so troubles you, roscius, sits purring on my hearth at this very moment.”
“you! why, did you take the thing with you?”
“we did. it came away in ermine’s arms.”
“eh, saint frideswide be our aid! i wouldn’t have touched it for a king’s ransom.”
“i’ve touched it a good few times,” said stephen, laughing, “and it never did aught worse to me than rub itself against me and mew. why, surely, man! you’re not feared of a cat?”
“no, not of a real cat; but that—”
“it is just as real a cat as any other. my children play with it every day; and if you’ll bring your little maids, i’ll lay you a good venison pasty that they are petting it before they’ve been in the house a paternoster. trust a girl for that! ah, yes! that was one reason why i thought she had some fancy of what was coming—the poor soul begged us to take old gib. he’d been her only companion for years, and she did not want him ill-used. poor, gentle, kindly soul! ermine will be grieved to hear of her end.”
“tell ermine i’ll come to see her,” said leuesa, “and bring the children too.”
“we have a derette as well as you,” replied stephen with a smile. “she is the baby. our boys are gerard and osbert, and our elder girls agnes and edild—my mother’s name, you know.”
as stephen opened the door of his house that evening, gib came to meet him with erect tail.
“well, old fellow!” said stephen, rubbing his ears—a process to which gib responded with loud purrs. “i have seen a man to-day who is afraid to touch you. i don’t think you would do much to him—would you, now?”
“that’s nice—go on!” replied gib, purring away.
leuesa lost no time in coming to see ermine. she brought her two little girls, of whom the elder, aged five years, immediately fell in love with the baby, while the younger, aged three, being herself too much of a baby to regard infants with any sentiment but disdain, bestowed all her delicate attentions upon gib. stephen declared laughingly that he saw he should keep the pasty.
“well, really, it does look very like a cat!” said the mercer, eyeing gib still a little doubtfully.
“very like, indeed,” replied stephen, laughing again. “i never saw anything that looked more like one.”
“there’s more than one at oxford would like to see you, ermine, and stephen too,” said leuesa.
“mother isel would, and derette,” was ermine’s answer. “i am not so sure of any one else.”
“i am sure of one else,” interpolated stephen. “it would be a perfect windfall to anania, for she’d get talk out of it for nine times nine days. but would it be safe, think you?”
“why not?” answered roscius. “the earl has nought against you, has he?”
“oh no, he has nought against me; i settled every thing with him—went back on purpose to do so. i was thinking of ermine. the bishop is not the same (note 2), but for aught i know, the sumners are.”
“only one of them: malger went to lincoln some two years back.”
“well, i should be glad not to meet that villain,” said stephen.
“you’ll not meet him. then as to the other matter, what could they do to her? the sentence was carried out. you can’t execute a man twice.”
“that’s a point that does not generally rise for decision. but you see she got taken in, and that was forbidden. they were never meant to survive it, and she did.”
“i don’t believe any penalty could fall on her,” said roscius. “but if you like, i’ll ask my cousin, who is a lawyer, what the law has to say on that matter.”
“then don’t mention ermine’s name.”
“i’ll mention nobody’s name. i shall only say that i and a friend of mine were having a chat, and talking of one thing and another, we fell a-wondering what would happen if a man were to survive a punishment intended to kill him.”
“that might serve. i don’t mind if you do.”
the law, in 1174, was much more dependent on the personal will of the sovereign than it is now. the lawyer looked a little doubtful when asked the question.
“why,” said he, “if the prisoner had survived by apparent miracle, the chances are that he would be pardoned, as the probability would be that his innocence was thus proved by visitation of god. i once knew of such a case, where a woman was accused of murdering her husband; she held her mute of malice at her trial, and was adjudged to suffer peine forte et dure.”
when a prisoner refused to plead, he was held to be “mute of malice.” the peine forte et dure, which was the recognised punishment for this misdemeanour, was practically starvation to death. in earlier days it seems to have been pure starvation; but at a later period, the more refined torture was substituted of allowing the unhappy man on alternate days three mouthfuls of bread with no liquid, and three sips of water with no food, for a term which the sufferer could not be expected to survive. at a later time again, this was exchanged for heavyweights, under which he was pressed to death.
“strange to say,” the lawyer went on, “the woman survived her sentence; and this being an undoubted miracle, she received pardon to the laud of god and the honour of his glorious mother, dame mary. (such a case really happened at nottingham in 1357.) but if you were supposing a case without any such miraculous intervention—”
“oh, we weren’t thinking of miracles, any way,” answered roscius.
“then i should say the sentence would remain in force. there is of course a faint possibility that it might not be put in force; but if the man came to me for advice, i should not counsel him to build much upon that. especially if he happened to have an enemy.”
“well, it does not seem just, to my thinking, that a man should suffer a penalty twice over.”
“just!” repeated the lawyer, with a laugh and a shrug of his shoulders. “were you under the impression, cousin roscius, that law and justice were interchangeable terms?”
“i certainly was,” said roscius.
“then, you’d better get out of it,” was the retort.
“i daren’t take ermine, after that,” said stephen, rather sorrowfully, “the only hope would be that she might be so changed, nobody would know her; and then, as my wife, she might pass unharmed but the risk seems too great.”
“she’s scarcely changed enough for that,” replied leuesa. “very likely she would not be recognised by those to whom she was a comparative stranger; but such as had known her well would guess in a moment. otherwise—”
“then her name would tell tales,” suggested stephen.
“oh, you might change that,” said roscius. “call her emma or aymeria—folks would never think.”
“and tell lies?” responded stephen.
“why, you’d never call that telling lies, surely?”
“it’s a bit too like it to please me. is father dolfin still at saint frideswide’s?”
“ay, he’s still there, but he’s growing an old man, and does not get outside much now. he has resigned saint aldate’s.”
“then that settles it. he’d know.”
“but he’s not an unkindly man, stephen.”
“no, he isn’t. but he’s a priest. and maybe the priest might be stronger than the man. let’s keep on the safe side.”
“let us wait,” said ermine quietly.
“i don’t see how waiting is to help you, unless you wait till every body is dead and buried—and it won’t be much good going then.”
“perhaps we may have to wait for the better country. there will be no sumners and sentences there.”
“but are you sure of knowing folks there?”
“saint paul would scarcely have anticipated meeting his friends with joy in the resurrection if they were not to know each other when they met. there are many passages in scripture which make it very plain that we shall know each other.”
“are you so sure of getting there yourself?” was the query put by roscius, with raised eyebrows.
“i am quite sure,” was ermine’s calm answer, “because christ is there, and i am a part of christ. he wills that his people shall be with him where he is.”
“but does not holy church teach rather different?” (note 3.)
stephen would fain have turned off the question. but it was answered as calmly as before.
“holy church is built on christ our lord. she cannot therefore teach contrary to him, though we may misunderstand either.”
roscius was satisfied. he had not, however, the least idea that by that vague term “holy church,” while he meant a handful of priests and bishops, ermine meant the elect of god, for whom his words settle every question, and who are not apt to trouble themselves for the contradictions either of priests or critics. “for the world passeth away, and the lust thereof”—the pleasures, the opinions, the prejudices of the world—“but he that doeth the will of god abideth for ever.”
the times of henry second knew neither post-offices nor carriers. when a man wanted to send a parcel anywhere, he was obliged to carry it himself or send a servant to do so, if he could not find some acquaintance journeying in that direction who would save him the trouble.
a few weeks after stephen had come to the conclusion that he could not take ermine to oxford, he was passing down bread street to his shop early one morning, when odinel hailed him from the door.
“hi, stephen! just turn in here a minute, will you?—you don’t happen to be going or sending up into the shires, do you, these next few days?”
“which of the shires?” inquired stephen, without committing himself.
“well, it’s abingdon i want to send to—but if i could get my goods carried as far as wallingford, i dare say i could make shift to have them forwarded.”
“would oxford suit you equally well?”
“ay, as well or better.”
stephen stood softly whistling for a moment. he might work the two things together—might at least pay a visit to derette, and learn from her how far it was safe to go on. he felt that anania was the chief danger; osbert would placidly accept as much or as little as he chose to tell, and isel, if she asked questions, might be easily turned aside from the path. could he be sure that anania was out of the way, he thought he would not hesitate to go himself, though he no longer dared to contemplate taking ermine.
“well, i might, mayhap, be going in that direction afore long,—i can’t just say till i see how things shape themselves. if i can, i’ll let you know in a few days.”
“all right! i’m in no hurry to a week or two.”
stephen meditated on the subject in the intervals of superintendence of his oven, and serving out wassel and cocket, with the result that when evening came, he was almost determined to go, if ermine found no good reasons to the contrary. he consulted her when he went home, for she was not at the shop that day. she looked grave at first, but her confidence in stephen’s discretion was great, and she made no serious objection. no sooner, however, did the children hear of such a possibility as their father’s visiting the country, than they all, down to three-year-old edild, sent in petitions to be allowed to accompany him.
“couldn’t be thought of!” was stephen’s decided though good-tempered answer: and the petitioners succumbed with a look of disappointment.
“i might perchance have taken gerard,” stephen allowed to his wife, out of the boy’s hearing: “but to tell truth, i’m afraid of anania’s hearing his name—though, as like as not, she’ll question me on the names of all the children, and who they were called after, and why we selected them, and if each were your choice or mine.”
“better not, i think,” said ermine, with a smile. “i almost wish i could be hidden behind a curtain, to hear your talk with her.”
stephen laughed. “well, i won’t deny that i rather enjoy putting spokes in her wheels,” said he.
the next morning he told odinel to make up his goods, and he would carry them to oxford on the following monday.
odinel’s parcel proved neither bulky nor heavy. instead of requiring a sumpter-mule to carry it, it could readily be strapped at the back of stephen’s saddle, while the still smaller package of his own necessaries went in front. he set out about four o’clock on a spring morning, joining himself for the sake of safety to the convoy of travellers who started from the black bull in the poultry, and arrived at the east gate of oxford before dark, on the tuesday evening. his first care was to commit odinel’s goods to the safe care of mine host of the blue boar (note 4) in fish street, as had been arranged. here he supped on fried fish, rye bread, and cheese; and having shared the “grace-cup” of a fellow-traveller, set off for saint john’s anchorhold. a young woman in semi-conventual dress left the door just as he came up. stephen doffed his cap as he asked her—“i pray you, are you the maid of the lady derette?”
“i am,” was the reply. “do you wish speech of her?”
“would you beseech her to let me have a word with her at the casement?”
the girl turned back into the anchorhold, and the next minute the casement was opened, and the comely, pleasant face of derette appeared behind it. she looked a little older, but otherwise unaltered.
there was nothing unusual in stephen’s request. anchorites lived on alms, and were also visited to desire their prayers. the two ideas likely to occur to the maid as the object of stephen’s visit were therefore either a present to be offered, or intercession to be asked and probably purchased.
“christ save you, lady!” said stephen to his cousin. “do you know me?”
“why, is it stephen? are you come back? i am glad to see you.”
when the natural curiosity and interest of each was somewhat satisfied, stephen asked derette’s advice as to going further.
“you may safely go to see mother,” said she, “if you can be sure of your own tongue; for you will not meet anania there. she has dislocated her ankle, and is lying in bed.”
“poor soul! it seems a shame to say i’m glad to hear it; but really i should like to avoid her at aunt isel’s, and to be able to come away at my own time from the lodge.”
“you have the chance of both just now.”
stephen thought he would get the worse interview over first. he accordingly went straight on into civil school lane, which ran right across the north portion of christ church, coming out just above saint aldate’s, pursued his way forward by pennyfarthing street, and turning up a few yards of castle street, found himself at the drawbridge leading to the porter’s lodge where his brother lived. there were voices inside the lodge; and stephen paused for a moment before lifting the latch.
“oh dear, dear!” said a querulous voice, which he recognised as that of anania, “i never thought to be laid by the heels like this!—not a soul coming in to see a body, and those children that ungovernable—gilbert, get off that ladder! and selis, put the pitchfork down this minute! not a bit of news any where, and if there were, not a creature coming in to tell one of it! eline, let those buttons alone, or i’ll be after—oh deary dear, i can’t!”
stephen lifted the latch and looked in. anania lay on a comfortable couch, drawn up by the fire; and at a safe distance from it, her four children were running riot—turning out all her treasures, inspecting, trying on, and occasionally breaking them—knowing themselves to be safe from any worse penalty than a scolding, for which evidently they cared nothing.
“you seem to want a bit of help this afternoon,” suggested stephen coolly, collaring selis, from whom he took the pitchfork, and then lifting gilbert off the ladder, to the extreme disapprobation of both those young gentlemen, as they showed by kicks and angry screams. “come, now, be quiet, lads: one can’t hear one’s self speak.”
“stephen! is it you?” cried anania incredulously, trying to lift herself to see him better, and sinking back with a groan.
“looks rather like me, doesn’t it? i am sorry to find you suffering, sister.”
“i’ve suffered worse than any martyr in the calendar, stephen!—and those children don’t care two straws for me. nobody knows what i’ve gone through. are you come home for good? oh dear, this pain!”
“no, only for a look at you. i had a little business to bring me this way. how is osbert?”
“he’s well enough to have never a bit of sympathy for me. where are you living, stephen, and what do you do now?”
“oh, up london way; i’m a baker. have you poulticed that foot, anania?”
“i’ve done all sorts of things to it, and it’s never—julian, if you touch that clasp, i declare i’ll—are you married, stephen?”
“married, and have one more trouble than you,” answered stephen laughingly, as he took the clasp from his youthful and inquisitive niece; “but my children are not troublesome, i am thankful to say. i was going to tell you that marsh-mallows makes one of the finest poultices you can have. pluck it when jupiter is in the ascendant, and the moon on the wane, and you’ll find it first-rate for easing that foot of yours.—gilbert, i heard thy mother tell thee not to go up the ladder.”
“well, what if she did?” demanded gilbert sulkily. “she’s only a woman.”
“then she must be obeyed,” said stephen.
“but who did you marry, for i never—oh deary me, but it does sting!”
“now, anania, i’ll just go to the market and get you some marsh mallow; selis will come with me to carry it. i’ve to see aunt isel yet, and plenty more. come, selis.”
“ha, chétife!—you’ve no sooner come than you’re off again! who did you marry? that’s what i want to know.”
“the sooner you get that poultice on the better. i may look in again, if i have time. if not, you’ll tell osbert i’ve been, and all’s well with me.”
stephen shut the door along with his last word, disregarding anania’s parting cry of—“but you haven’t told me who your wife is!” and marched selis off to the market, where he laded him with marsh mallow, and sent him home with strict injunctions not to drop it by the way. then, laughing to himself at the style wherein he had disposed of anania, he turned off to turlgate street (now the turl) where raven soclin lived.
the first person whom he saw there was his cousin flemild.
“why, stephen, this is an unexpected pleasure!” she said warmly. “mother, here’s cousin stephen come.”
“i’m glad to see thee, lad,” responded isel: and the usual questions followed as to his home and calling. but to stephen’s great satisfaction, though isel expressed her hope that he had a good wife, nobody asked for her name. the reason was that they all took it for granted she must be a stranger to them; and when they had once satisfied themselves that he was doing well, and had learnt such details as his present calling, the number of his family, and so forth, they seemed more eager to impart information than to obtain it. at their request, stephen promised to sleep there, and then went out to pay a visit to romund and mabel, which proved to be of a very formal and uninteresting nature. he had returned to turlgate street, but they had not yet gone to rest, when osbert lifted the latch.
“so you’re real, are you?” said he, laughing to his brother. “anania couldn’t tell me if you were or not; she said she rather thought she’d been dreaming,—more by reason that you did not tarry a minute, and she could not get an answer to one question, though she asked you three times.”
stephen too well knew what that question was to ask for a repetition of it “nay, i tarried several minutes,” said he; “but i went off to get some marsh mallow for a poultice for the poor soul; she seemed in much pain. i hope selis took it home all right? has she got it on?”
“i think she has,” said osbert. “but she wants you very badly to go back and tell her a lot more news.”
“well, i’ll see,” replied stephen; “i scarcely think i can. but if she wants news, you tell her i’ve heard say women’s head-kerchiefs are to be worn smaller, and tied under the chin; that’s a bit of news that’ll take her fancy.”
“that’ll do for a while,” answered osbert; “but what she wants to know most is your wife’s name and all the children’s.”
“oh, is that it?” said stephen coolly. “then you may tell her one of the children is named after you, and another for our mother; and we have an agnes and a derette: and if she wants to know the cat’s name too—”
osbert roared. “oh, let’s have the cat’s name, by all means,” said he; and stephen gravely informed him that it was gib.
as agnes was at that time one of the commonest names in england, about as universal as mary or elizabeth now, stephen felt himself pretty safe in giving it; but the name of his eldest son he did not mention.
“well, i’d better go home before i forget them,” said osbert. “let’s see—osbert, edild, agnes, and derette—and the cat is gib. i think i shall remember. but i haven’t had your wife’s.”
“i’ll walk back with you,” said stephen, evading the query; and they went out together.
“stephen, lad,” said osbert, when they had left the house, “i’ve a notion thou dost not want to tell thy wife’s name. is it true, or it’s only my fancy?”
“have you?” responded stephen shortly.
“ay, i have; and if it be thus, say so, but don’t tell me what it is. it’s nought to me; so long as she makes thee a good wife i care nought who she is; but if i know nothing, i can say nothing. only, if i knew thou wouldst as lief hold thy peace o’er it, i would not ask thee again.”
“she is the best wife and the best woman that ever breathed,” replied stephen earnestly: “and you are right, old man—i don’t want to tell it.”
“then keep thine own counsel,” answered his brother. “farewell, and god speed thee!”
stephen turned back, and osbert stood for a moment looking after him. “if i thought it possible,” said the porter to himself,—“but i don’t see how it could be any way—i should guess that the name of stephen’s wife began and ended with an e. i am sure he was set on her once—and that would account for any reluctance to name her: but i don’t see how it could be. well! it doesn’t matter to me. it’s a queer world this.”
with which profoundly original and philosophical remark, osbert turned round and went home.
“well, what is it?” cried anania, the moment he entered.
“let me unlade my brains,” said osbert, “for i’m like a basket full of apples; and if they are not carefully taken out, they’ll be bruised and good for nought. stephen’s children are called edild, agnes, osbert, and derette—”
“but his wife! it’s his wife i want to know about.”
“dear, now! i don’t think he told me that,” said osbert with lamb-like innocence, as if it had only just occurred to him.
“why, that was what you went for, stupid!”
“well, to be sure!” returned osbert in meek astonishment, which he acted to perfection. “he told me the cat’s name, if that will suit you instead.”
“i wish the cat were inside you this minute!” screamed anania.
“thank you for your kind wishes,” replied osbert with placid amiability. “i’m not sure the cat would.”
“was there ever any mortal thing in this world so aggravating as a man?” demanded anania, in tones which were not placid by any means. “went down to kepeharme lane to find something out, and came back knowing ne’er a word about it! do you think you’ve any brains, you horrid tease?”
“can’t say: never saw them,” answered osbert sweetly.
“i wonder if you have your match in the county!”
“oh, i don’t think there’s any doubt of that.”
“well, at any rate, first thing to-morrow morning, if you please, back you go and ask him. and mind you don’t let him slip through your fingers this time. he’s as bad as an eel for that.”
“first thing! i can’t, anania. the earl has sent word that he means to fly the new hawks at five o’clock to-morrow morning.”
“bother the—hawks! couldn’t you go again to-night?”
“no, they’ll be gone to bed by now. why, wife, what on earth does it matter to thee?”
anania’s reply to this query was so sharp a snarl that osbert let her alone thereafter.
the next morning, when released from his duties, he went again to kepeharme lane—to hear that stephen had set out on his return journey half-an-hour before. “well, now, it’s plain to me what that means!” announced anania solemnly, when this distressing fact was communicated to her. “he’s married somebody he’s ashamed of—some low creature, quite beneath him, whom he doesn’t care to own. that must be the explanation. she’s no better than she should be; take my word for it!”
“that’s quite possible,” said osbert drily. “there’s another or two of us in that predicament.”
anania flounced over on her couch, thereby making herself groan.
“you are, and no mistake!” she growled.
“father vincent said, when he married us, that you and i were thenceforth one, my dearest!” was the pleasing response.
“what in the name of wonder i ever wished to marry you for—!”
“i will leave you to consider it, my darling, and tell me when i come back,” said osbert, shutting the door and whistling the agnus as he went up castle street.
“well, if you aren’t the worst, wickedest, aggravatingest man that ever worrited a poor helpless woman,” commented anania, as she turned on her uneasy couch, “my new boots are made of pear jelly!”
but it did not occur to her to inquire of what the woman was made who habitually tormented that easy-tempered man, nor how much happier her home might have been had she learnt to bridle her own irritating tongue.
note 1. close roll, 32 henry third. about 5 pence per loaf according to modern value.
note 2. the bishop of lincoln who sat on the council of oxford was robert de chesney. he died on january 26th, 1168, and was succeeded by the king’s natural son, geoffrey plantagenet, a child of only nine years of age. such were the irregularities in the “apostolical succession” during the “ages of faith!”
note 3. even wycliffe taught that no man could know whether he were elected to salvation or not.
note 4. the blue boar in saint aldate’s street really belongs to a later date than this.
