Hereward, the Last of the English Part 42

And Winter and Gwenoch heard it, and repeated it word for word.

Then he kissed his mother, and called Winter and Gwenoch, and went forth.

He would be back again, he said, on the third day.

Then those three went to Peterborough, and asked for Abbot Brand. And the monks let them in; for the fame of their deed had pa.s.sed through the forest, and all the French had fled.

And old Brand lay back in his great arm-chair, his legs all m.u.f.fled up in furs, for he could get no heat; and by him stood Herluin the prior, and wondered when he would die, and Thorold take his place, and they should drive out the old Gregorian chants from the choir, and have the new Norman chants of Robert of Fecamp, and bring in French-Roman customs in all things, and rule the English boors with a rod of iron.

And old Brand knew all that was in his heart, and looked up like a patient ox beneath the butcher's axe, and said, "Have patience with me, Brother Herluin, and I will die as soon as I can, and go where there is neither French nor English, Jew nor Gentile, bond or free, but all are alike in the eyes of Him who made them."

But when he saw Hereward come in, he cast the m.u.f.flers off him, and sprang up from his chair, and was young and strong in a moment, and for a moment.

And he threw his arms round Hereward, and wept upon his neck, as his mother had done. And Hereward wept upon his neck, though he had not wept upon his mother's.

Then Brand held him at arms' length, or thought he held him, for he was leaning on Hereward, and tottering all the while; and extolled him as the champion, the warrior, the stay of his house, the avenger of his kin, the hero of whom he had always prophesied that his kin would need him, and that then he would not fail.

But Hereward answered him modestly and mildly,--

"Speak not so to me and of me, Uncle Brand. I am a very foolish, vain, sinful man, who have come through great adventures, I know not how, to great and strange happiness, and now again to great and strange sorrows; and to an adventure greater and stranger than all that has befallen me from my youth up until now. Therefore make me not proud, Uncle Brand, but keep me modest and lowly, as befits all true knights and penitent sinners; for they tell me that G.o.d resists the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. And I have that to do which do I cannot, unless G.o.d and his saints give me grace from this day forth."

Brand looked at him, astonished; and then turned to Herluin.

"Did I not tell thee, prior? This is the lad whom you called graceless and a savage; and see, since he has been in foreign lands, and seen the ways of knights, he talks as clerkly as a Frenchman, and as piously as any monk."

"The Lord Hereward," said Herluin, "has doubtless learned much from the manners of our nation which he would not have learned in England. I rejoice to see him returned so Christian and so courtly a knight."

"The Lord Hereward, Prior Herluin, has learnt one thing in his travels,--to know somewhat of men and the hearts of men, and to deal with them as they deserve of him. They tell me that one Thorold of Malmesbury,--Thorold of Fecamp, the minstrel, he that made the song of Rowland,--that he desires this abbey."

"I have so heard, my lord."

"Then I command,--I, Hereward, Lord of Bourne!--that this abbey be held against him and all Frenchmen, in the name of Swend Ulfsson, king of England, and of me. And he that admits a Frenchman therein, I will shave his crown for him so well, that he shall never need razor more. This I tell thee; and this I shall tell your monks before I go. And unless you obey the same, my dream will be fulfilled; and you will see Goldenbregh in a light low, and burning yourselves in the midst thereof."

"Swend Ulfsson? Swend of Denmark? What words are these?" cried Brand.

"You will know within six months, uncle."

"I shall know better things, my boy, before six months are out."

"Uncle, uncle, do not say that."

"Why not? If this mortal life be at best a prison and a grave, what is it worth now to an Englishman?"

"More than ever; for never had an Englishman such a chance of showing English mettle, and winning renown for the English name. Uncle, you must do something for me and my comrades ere we go."

"Well, boy?"

"Make us knights."

"Knights, lad? I thought you had been a belted knight this dozen years?"

"I might have been made a knight by many, after the French, fas.h.i.+on, many a year agone. I might have been knight when I slew the white bear. Ladies have prayed me to be knighted again and again since. Something kept me from it. Perhaps" (with a glance at Herluin) "I wanted to show that an English squire could be the rival and the leader of French and Flemish knights."

"And thou hast shown it, brave lad!" said Brand, clapping his great hands.

"Perhaps I longed to do some mighty deed at last, which would give me a right to go to the bravest knight in all Christendom, and say, 'Give me the accolade, then! Thou only art worthy to knight as good a man as thyself.'"

"Pride and vainglory," said Brand, shaking his head.

"But now I am of a sounder mind. I see now why I was kept from being knighted,--till I had done a deed worthy of a true knight; till I had mightily avenged the wronged, and mightily succored the oppressed; till I had purged my soul of my enmity against my own kin, and could go out into the world a new man, with my mother's blessing on my head."

"But not of the robbery of St. Peter," said Herluin. The French monk wanted not for moral courage,--no French monk did in those days. And he proved it by those words.

"Do not anger the lad, Prior; now, too, above all times, when his heart is softened toward the Lord."

"He has not angered me. The man is right. Here, Lord Abbot and Sir Prior, is a chain of gold, won in the wars. It is worth fifty times the sixteen pence which I stole, and which I repaid double. Let St. Peter take it, for the sins of me and my two comrades, and forgive. And now, Sir Prior, I do to thee what I never did for mortal man. I kneel, and ask thy forgiveness.

Kneel, Winter! Kneel, Gwenoch!" And Hereward knelt.

Herluin was of double mind. He longed to keep Hereward out of St. Peter's grace. He longed to see Hereward dead at his feet; not because of any personal hatred, but because he foresaw in him a terrible foe to the Norman cause. But he wished, too, to involve Abbot Brand as much as possible in Hereward's "rebellions" and "misdeeds," and above all, in the master-offence of knighting him; for for that end, he saw, Hereward was come. Moreover, he was touched with the sudden frankness and humility of the famous champion. So he answered mildly,--

"Verily, thou hast a knightly soul. May G.o.d and St. Peter so forgive thee and thy companions as I forgive thee, freely and from my heart."

"Now," cried Hereward, "a boon! a boon! Knight me and these my fellows, Uncle Brand, this day."

Brand was old and weak, and looked at Herluin.

"I know," said Hereward, "that the French look on us English monk-made knights as spurious and adulterine, unworthy of the name of knight. But, I hold--and what churchman will gainsay me?--that it is n.o.bler to receive sword and belt from a man of G.o.d than from a man of blood like one's self; the fittest to consecrate the soldier of an earthly king, is the soldier of Christ, the King of kings." [Footnote: Almost word for word from the "Life of Hereward."]

"He speaks well," said Herluin. "Abbot, grant him his boon."

"Who celebrates high ma.s.s to-morrow?"

"Wilton the priest, the monk of Ely," said Herluin, aloud. "And a very dangerous and stubborn Englishman," added he to himself.

"Good. Then this night you shall watch in the church. To-morrow, after the Gospel, the thing shall be done as you will."

That night two messengers, knights of the Abbot, galloped from Peterborough. One to Ivo Taillebois at Spalding, to tell him that Hereward was at Peterborough, and that he must try to cut him off upon the Egelric's road, the causeway which one of the many Abbots Egelric had made some thirty years before, through Deeping Fen to Spalding, at an enormous expense of labor and of timber. The other knight rode south, along the Roman road to London, to tell King William of the rising of Kesteven, and all the evil deeds of Hereward and of Brand.

And old Brand slept quietly in his bed, little thinking on what errands his prior had sent his knights.

Hereward and his comrades watched that night in St. Peter's church.

Oppressed with weariness of body, and awe of mind, they heard the monks drone out their chants through the misty gloom; they confessed the sins--and they were many--of their past wild lives. They had to summon up within themselves courage and strength henceforth to live, not for themselves, but for the fatherland which they hoped to save. They prayed to all the heavenly powers of that Pantheon which then stood between man and G.o.d, to help them in the coming struggle; but ere the morning dawned, they were nodding, unused to any long strain of mind.

Suddenly Hereward started, and sprang up, with a cry of fire.

"What? Where?" cried his comrades, and the monks who ran up.

"The minster is full of flame. No use! too late! you cannot put it out! It must burn."