The Chaplet of Pearls

CHAPTER XV. NOTRE-DAME DE BELLAISE*

There came a man by middle day,

He spied his sport and went away,

And brought the king that very night,

And brake my bower and slew my knight.

The Border Widow's Lament

*[footnote: Bellaise is not meant for a type of all nunneries, but of the condition to which many of the lesser ones had come before the general reaction and purification of the seventeenth century.]

That same Latin hymn which Cecily St. John daily chanted in her own chamber was due from the choir of Cistercian sisters in the chapel of the Convent of Our Lady at Bellaise, in the Bocage of Anjou; but there was a convenient practice of lumping together the entire night and forenoon hours at nine o'clock in the morning, and all the evening ones at Compline, so that the sisters might have undisturbed sleep at night and entertainment by day. Bellaise was a very comfortable little nunnery, which only received richly dowered inmates, and was therefore able to maintain them in much ease, though without giving occasion to a breath of scandal. Founded by a daughter of the first Angevin Ribaumont, it had become a sort of appendage for the superfluous daughters of the house, and nothing would more have amazed its present head, Eustacie Barbe de Ribaumont,-conventually known as La Mere Marie Seraphine de St.-Louis, and to the world as Madame de Bellaise,-than to be accused of not fulfilling the intentions of the Bienheureuse Barbe, the foundress, or of her patron St. Bernard.

Madame de Bellaise was a fine-looking woman of forty, in a high state of preservation, owing to the healthy life she had led. Her eyes were of brilliant, beautiful black her complexion had a glow, her hair-for she wore it visibly-formed crisp rolls of jetty ringlets on her temples, almost hiding her close white cap. The heavy thick veil was tucked back beneath the furred purple silk hood that fastened under her chin. The white robes of her order were not of serge, but of the finest cloth, and were almost hidden by a short purple cloak with sleeves, likewise lined and edged with fur, and fastened on the bosom with a gold brooch. Her fingers, bearing more rings than the signet of her house, were concealed in embroidered gauntlets of Spanish leather. One of them held an ivory-handled riding-rod, the other the reins of the well-fed jennet, on which the lady, on a fine afternoon, late in the Carnival, was cantering home through the lanes of the Bocage, after a successful morning's hawking among the wheat-ears. She was attended by a pair of sisters, arrayed somewhat in the same style, and by a pair of mounted grooms, the falconer with his charge having gone home by a footway.

The sound of horses' feet approaching made her look towards a long lane that came down at right angles to that along which she was riding, and slacken her pace before coming to its opening. And as she arrived at the intersection, she beheld advancing, mounted on a little rough pony, the spare figure of her brother the Chevalier, in his home suit, so greasy and frayed, that only his plumed hat (and a rusty plume it was) and the old sword at his side showed his high degree.

He waved his hand to her as a sign to halt, and rode quickly up, scarcely giving time for a greeting ere he said, 'Sister the little one is not out with you.'

'No, truly, the little mad thing, she is stricter and more head-strong than ever was her preceptress. Poor Monique! I had hoped that we should be at rest when that cass-tete had carried off her scruples to Ste.-Claire, at Lucon, but here is this little droll far beyond her, without being even a nun!'

'Assuredly not. The business must be concluded at once. She must be married before Lent.'

'That will scarce be-in her present frame.'

'It must be. Listen, sister. Here is this miserable alive!'

'Her spouse!'

'Folly about her spouse! The decree from Rome has annulled the foolish mummery of her infancy. It came a week after the Protestant conspiracy, and was registered when the Norman peasants at Chateau Leurre showed contumacy. It was well; for, behold, our gallant is among his English friends, recovering, and even writing a billet. Anon he will be upon our hands in person. By the best fortune, Gillot fell in with his messenger this morning, prowling about on his way to the convent, and brought him to me to be examined. I laid him fat in ward, and sent Gillot off to ride day and night to bring my son down to secure the girl at once.'

'You will never obtain her consent. She is distractedly in love with his memory! Let her guess at his life, and--'

'Precisely. Therefore must we be speedy. All Paris knows it by this time, for the fellow went straight to the English Ambassador; and I trust my son has been wise enough to set off already; for should we wait till after Lent, Monsieur le Baron himself might be upon us.'

'Poor child! You men little heed how you make a woman suffer.'

'How, Reverend Mother! you pleading for a heretic marriage, that would give our rights to a Huguenot-what say I?-an English renegade!'

'I plead not, brother. The injustice towards you must be repaired; but I have a certain love for my niece, and I fear she will be heartbroken when she learns the truth, the poor child.'

'Bah! The Abbess should rejoice in thus saving her soul! How if her heretic treated Bellaise like the convents of England?'

'No threats, brother. As a daughter of Ribaumont and a mother of the Church will I stand by you,' said the Abbess with dignity.

'And now tell me how it has been with the child. I have not seen her since we agreed that the request did but aggravate her. You said her health was better since her nurse had been so often with her, and that she had ceased from her austerities.'

'Not entirely; for when first she came, in her transports of despair and grief on finding Soeur Monique removed, she extorted from Father Bonami a sort of hope that she might yet save her husband's, I mean the Baron's soul. Then, truly, it was a frenzy of fasts and prayers. Father Bonami has made his profit, and so have the fathers of Chollet-all her money has gone in masses, and in alms to purchase the prayers of the poor, and she herself fasting on bread and water, kneeling barefooted in the chapel till she was transfixed with cold. No chaufferette, not she! Obstinate to the last degree! Tell her she would die-it was the best news one could bring; all her desire, to be in a more rigid house with Soeur Monique at Lucon. At length, Mere Perrine and Veronique found her actually fainting and powerless with cold on the chapel-floor; and since that time she has been more reasonable. There are prayers as much as ever; but the fancy to kill herself with fasting has passed. She begins to recover her looks, nay, sometimes I have thought she had an air of hope in her eyes and lips; but what know I? I have much to occupy me, and she persists in shutting herself up with her woman.'

'You have not allowed her any communication from without?'

'Mere Perrine has come and gone freely; but she is nothing. No, the child could have no correspondence. She did, indeed, write a letter to the Queen, as you know, brother, six weeks ago; but that has never been answered, nor could any letters have harmed you, since it is only now that this young man is known to be living.'

'You are right, sister. No harm can have been done. All will go well. The child must be wearied with her frenzy of grief and devotion! She will catch gladly at an excuse for change. A scene or two, and she will readily yield!'

'It is true,' said the Abbess, thoughtfully, 'that she has walked and ridden out lately. She has asked questions about her Chateaux, and their garrisons. I have heard nothing of the stricter convent for many weeks; but still, brother, you must go warily to work.'

'And you, sister, must show no relenting. Let her not fancy she can work upon you.'

By this time the brother and sister were at the gateway of the convent; a lay sister presided there, but there was no cloture , as the strict seclusion of a nunnery was called, and the Chevalier rode into the cloistered quadrangle as naturally as if he had been entering a secular Chateau, dismounted at the porch of the hall, and followed Madame de Bellaise to the parlour, while she dispatched a request that her niece would attend her there.

The parlour had no grating to divide it, but was merely a large room furnished with tapestry, carved chests, chairs, and cushions, much like other reception-rooms. A large, cheerful wood-fire blazed upon the hearth, and there was a certain air of preparation, as indeed an ecclesiastical dignity from Saumur was expected to sup with the ladies that evening.

After some interval, spent by the Chevalier in warming himself, a low voice at the door was heard, saying, 'Deus vobiscum.' The Abbess answered, 'Et cum spiritu tuo;' and on this monastic substitute for a knock and 'come in,' there appeared a figure draped and veiled from head to foot in heavy black, so as to look almost like a sable moving cone. She made an obeisance as she entered, saying, 'You commanded my presence, Madame?'

'Your uncle would speak to you, daughter, on affairs of moment.'

'At his service. I, too, would speak to him.'

'First, then, my dear friend,' said the Chevalier, 'let me see you. That face must not be muffled any longer from those who love you.'

She made no movement of obedience, until her aunt peremptorily bade her turn back her veil. She did so, and disclosed the little face, so well known to her uncle, but less childish in its form, and the dark eyes sparkling, though at once softer and more resolute.

'Ah! my fair niece,' said the Chevalier, 'this is no visage to be hidden! I am glad to see it re-embellished, and it will be lovelier than ever when you have cast off this disguised.'

'That will never be,' said Eustacie.

'Ah! we know better! My daughter is sending down a counterpart of her own wedding-dress for your bride of the Mardi-Gras.'

'And who may that bride be?' said Eustacie, endeavouring to speak as though it were nothing to her.

'Nay, ma petite! it is too long to play the ignorant when the bridegroom is on his way from Paris.'

'Madame,' said Eustacie, turning to her aunt, 'you cannot suffer this scandal. The meanest peasant may weep her first year of widowhood in peace.'

'Listen, child. There are weighty reasons. The Duke of Anjou is a candidate for the throne of Poland, and my son is to accompany him thither. He must go as Marquis de Nid de Merle, in full possession of your estates.'

'Let him take them,' began Eustacie, 'who first commits a cowardly murder, and then forces himself on the widow he has made?'

'Folly, child, folly,' said the Chevalier, who supposed her ignorant of the circumstances of her husband's assassination; and the Abbess, who was really ignorant, exclaimed-'Fid donc niece; you know not what you say.'

'I know, Madame-I know from an eye-witness,' said Eustacie, firmly. 'I know the brutal words that embittered my husband's death; and were there no other cause, they would render wedlock with him who spoke them sacrilege.' Resolutely and steadily did the young wife speak, looking at them with the dry fixed eye to which tears had been denied ever since that eventful night.'

'Poor child,' said the Chevalier to his sister. 'She is under the delusion still. Husband! There is none in the case.' Then waving his hand as Eustacie's face grew crimson, and her eyes flashed indignation, while her lips parted, 'It was her own folly that rendered it needful to put an end to the boy's presumption. Had she been less wilful and more obedient, instead of turning the poor lad's head by playing at madame, we could have let him return to his island fogs; but when SHE encouraged him in contemplating the carrying her away, and alienating her and her lands from the true faith, there was but one remedy-to let him perish with the rest. My son is willing to forgive her childish pleasure in a boy's passing homage, and has obtained the King's sanction to an immediate marriage.'

'Which, to spare you, my dear,' added the aunt, 'shall take place in our chapel.'

'It shall never take place anywhere,' said Eustacie, quietly, though with a quiver in her voice; 'no priest will wed me when he has heard me.'

'The dispensation will overcome all scruples,' said the Abbess. 'Hear me, niece. I am sorry for you, but it is best that you should know at once that there is nothing in heaven or earth to aid you in resisting your duty.'

Eustacie made no answer, but there was a strange half-smile on her lip, and a light in her eye which gave her an air not so much of entreaty as of defiance. She glanced from one to the other, as if considering, but then slightly shook her head. 'What does she mean?' asked the Chevalier and the Abbess one of another, as, with a dignified gesture, she moved to leave the room.

'Follow her. Convince her that she has no hope,' said the uncle; and the Abbess, moving faster than her wont, came up with her at the archway whence one corridor led to the chapel, another to her own apartments. Her veil was down again, but her aunt roughly withdrew it, saying, 'Look at me, Eustacie. I come to warn you that you need not look to tamper with the sisters. Not one will aid you in your headstrong folly. If you cast not off ere supper-time this mockery of mourning, you shall taste of that discipline you used to sigh for. We have borne with your fancy long enough- you, who are no more a widow than I-nor wife.'

'Wife and widow am I in the sight of Him who will protect me,' said Eustacie, standing her ground.

'Insolent! Why, did I not excuse this as a childish delusion, should I not spurn one who durst love-what say I-not a heretic merely, but the foe of her father's house?'

'He!' cried Eustacie; 'what had he ever done?'

'He inherited the blood of the traitor Baron,' returned her aunt. 'Ever have that recreant line injured us! My nephew's sword avenged the wrongs of many generations.'

'Then,' said Eustacie, looking at her with a steady, fixed look of inquire, 'you, Madame l'Abbesse, would have neither mercy nor pity for the most innocent offspring of the elder line?'

'Girl, what folly is this to talk to me of innocence. That is not the question. The question is-obey willingly as my dear daughter, or compulsion must be used.'

'My question is answered,' said Eustacie, on her side. 'I see that there is neither pity nor hope from you.'

And with another obeisance, she turned to ascend the stairs.

Madame paced back to her brother.

'What,' he said; 'you have not yet dealt with her?'

'No, brother, I never saw a like mood. She seems neither to fear nor to struggle. I knew she was too true a Ribaumont for weak tears and entreaties; but, fiery little being as once she was, I looked to see her force spend itself in passion, and that then the victory would have been easy; but no, she ever looks as if she had some inward resource-some security-and therefore could be calm. I should deem it some Huguenot fanaticism, but she is a very saint as to the prayers of the Church, the very torment of our lives.'

'Could she escape?' exclaimed the Chevalier, who had been considering while his sister was speaking.

'Impossible! Besides, where could she go? But the gates shall be closed. I will warn the portress to let none pass out without my permission.'

'The Chevalier took a turn up and down the room; then exclaimed, 'It was very ill-advised to let her women have access to her! Let us have Veronique summoned instantly.'

At that moment, however, the ponderous carriage of Monseigneur, with out-riders, both lay and clerical, came trampling up to the archway, and the Abbess hurried off to her own apartment to divest herself of her hunting-gear ere she received her guest; and the orders to one of the nuns to keep a watch on her niece were oddly mixed with those to the cook, confectioner, and butterer.

La Mere Marie Seraphine was not a cruel or an unkind woman. She had been very fond of her pretty little niece in her childhood, but had deeply resented the arrangement which had removed her from her own superintendence to that of the Englishwoman, besides the uniting to the young Baron one whom she deemed the absolute right of Narcisse. She had received Eustacie on her first return with great joy, and had always treated her with much indulgence, and when the drooping, broken-hearted girl came back once more to the shelter of her convent, the good-humoured Abbess only wished to make her happy again.

But Eustacie's misery was far beyond the ken of her aunt, and the jovial turn of these consolations did but deepen her agony. To be congratulated on her release from the heretic, assured of future happiness with her cousin, and, above all, to hear Berenger abused with all the bitterness of rival family and rival religion, tore up the lacerated spirit. Ill, dejected, and broken down, too subdued to fire up in defence, and only longing for the power of indulging in silent grief, Eustacie had shrunk from her, and wrapped herself up in the ceaseless round of masses and prayers, in which she was allowed to perceive a glimmering of hope for her husband's soul. The Abbess, ever busy with affairs of her convent or matters of pleasure, soon relinquished the vain attempt to console where she could not sympathize, trusted that the fever of devotion would wear itself out, and left her niece to herself. Of the seven nuns, two were decorously gay, like their Mother Abbess; one was a prodigious worker of tapestry, two were unrivalled save by one another as confectioners. Eustacie had been their pet in her younger days; now she was out of their reach, they tried in turn to comfort her; and when she would not be comforted, they, too, felt aggrieved by the presence of one whose austerity reproached their own laxity; they resented her disappointment at Soeur Monique's having been transferred to Lucon, and they, too, left her to the only persons whose presence she had ever seemed to relish,-namely, her maid Veronique, and Veronique's mother, her old nurse Perrine, wife of a farmer about two miles off. The woman had been Eustacie's foster-mother, and continued to exert over her much of the caressing care of a nurse.

After parting with her aunt, Eustacie for a moment looked towards the chapel, then, clasping her hands, murmured to herself, 'No! no! speed is my best hope;' and at once mounted the stairs, and entered a room, where the large stone crucifix, a waxen Madonna, and the holy water font gave a cell-like aspect to the room; and a straw pallet covered with sackcloth was on the floor, a richly curtained couch driven into the rear, as unused.

She knelt for a moment before the Madonna; 'Ave Maria, be with me and mine. Oh! blessed Lady, thou hadst to fly with thy Holy One from cruel men. Have thou pity on the fatherless!'

Then going to the door, she clapped her hands; and, as Veronique entered, she bade her shut and bolt the door, and at the same moment began in nervous haste to throw off her veil and unfasten her dress.

'Make haste, Veronique. A dress of thine--'

'All is known, then!' cried Veronique, throwing up her arms.

'No, but he is coming-Narcisse-to marry me at once-Marde-Gras --'

'Et quoi? Madame has but to speak the word, and it is impossible.'

'And after what my aunt has said, I would die a thousand deaths ere speaking that word. I asked her, Veronique! She would have vengeance on the most guiltless-the most guiltless-do you hear?- of the Norman house. Never, never shall she have the chance! Come, thy striped petticoat!'

'But, oh! what will Madame do? Where would she go? Oh! it is impossible.'

'First to thy father's. Yes, I know. He has once called it a madness to think of rallying my vassals to protect their lady. That was when he heard of it from thee-thou faint of heart-and thy mother. I shall speak to him in person now. Make haste, I tell thee, girl. I must be out of this place before I am watched or guarded,' she added breathlessly. 'I feel as if each moment I lost might have death upon it;' and she looked about her like a startled deer.

'To my father's. Ah! there it is not so ill! But the twilights, the length of way,' sobbed Veronique, in grievous distress and perplexity. 'Oh! Madame, I cannot see you go. The Mother Abbess is good. She must have pity. Oh, trust to her!'

'Trust! Did I not trust to my cousin Diane? Never! Nothing will kill me but remaining in their hands.'

Veronique argued and implored in vain. Ever since, in the height of those vehement austerities by which the bereaved and shattered sufferer strove to appease her wretchedness by the utmost endeavour to save her husband's soul, the old foster-mother had made known to her that she might thus sacrifice another than herself. Eustacie's elastic heart had begun to revive, with all its dauntless strength of will. What to her women seemed only a fear, was to her only a hope.

Frank and confiding as was her nature, however, the cruel deceptions already practiced on her by her own kindred, together with the harsh words with which the Abbess spoke of Berenger, had made her aware that no comfort must be looked for in that quarter. It was, after all, perhaps her won instinct, and the aunt's want of sympathy, that withheld her from seeking counsel of any save Perrine and her daughter, at any rate till she could communicate with the kind young Queen. To her, then, Eustacie had written, entreating that a royal mandate would recall her in time to bestow herself in some trustworthy hands, or even in her husband's won Norman castle, where his heir would be both safe and welcome. But time has passed-the whole space that she had reckoned as needful for the going and coming of her messenger-allowing for all the obstructions of winter roads-nay, he had come back; she knew letter was delivered, but answer there was none. It might yet come-perhaps a royal carriage and escort-and day after day had she waited and hoped, only tardily admitting the conviction that Elisabeth of Austria was as powerless as Eustacie de Ribaumont, and meantime revolving and proposing many a scheme that could only have entered the brain of a brave-spirited child as she was. To appeal to her vassals, garrison with them a ruinous old tower in the woods, and thence send for aid to the Montmorencys; to ride to Saumur, and claim the protection of the governor of the province; to make her way to the coast and sail for England; to start for Paris, and throw herself in person on the Queen's protection,-all had occurred to her, and been discussed with her two confidantes; but the hope of the Queen's interference, together with the exceeding difficulty of acting, had hitherto prevented her from taking any steps, since no suspicion had arisen in the minds of those about her. Veronique, caring infinitely more for her mistress's health and well-being than for the object of Eustacie's anxieties, had always secretly trusted that delay would last till action was impossible, and that the discovery would be made, only without her being accused of treason. In the present stress of danger, she could but lament and entreat, for Eustacie's resolution bore her down; and besides, as she said to herself, her Lady was after all going to her foster-father and mother, who would make her hear reason, and bring her back at once, and then there would be no anger nor disgrace incurred. The dark muddy length of walk would be the worst of it-and, bah! most likely Madame would be convinced by it, and return of her own accord.

So Veronique, though not intermitting her protests, adjusted her own dress upon her mistress,-short striped petticoat, black bodice, winged turban-like white cap, and a great muffling gray cloth cloak and hook over the head and shoulders-the costume in which Veronique was wont to run to her home in the twilight on various errands, chiefly to carry her mistress's linen; for starching Eustacie's plain bands and cuffs was Mere Perrine's special pride. The wonted bundle, therefore, now contained a few garments, and the money and jewels, especially the chaplet of pearls, which Eustacie regarded as a trust.

Sobbing, and still protesting, Veronique, however, engaged that if her Lady succeeded in safely crossing the kitchen in the twilight, and in leaving the convent, she would keep the secret of her escape as long as possible, reporting her refusal to appear at supper, and making such excuses as might very probably prevent the discovery of her flight till next day.

'And then,' said Eustacie, 'I will send for thee, either to Saumur or to the old tower! Adieu, dear Veronique, do not be frightened. Thou dost not know how glad I am that the time for doing something is come! To-morrow!'

'To-morrow!' thought Veronique, as she shut the door; 'before that you will be back here again, my poor little Lady, trembling, weeping, in dire need of being comforted. But I will make up a good fire, and shake out the bed. I'll let her have no more of that villainous palliasse. No, no, let her try her own way, and repent of it; then, when this matter is over, she will turn her mind to Chevalier Narcisse, and there will be no more languishing in this miserable hole.'