Robin Tremayne Part 6

"Ay, sweet heart; 'tis a great syllabub, full of sugar," answered Jennifer, laughing.

"That is as it may be, Mrs Jennifer," observed Dr Thorpe, who was present. "I have known that syllabub full of vinegar. That is, methinks, a true proverb,--'If Christ be not asked at the match, He will never make one at the marriage-feast.' And 'tis a sorry feast where He sitteth not at the table."

"I think He shall not be absent from this," said Isoult, softly.

So Kate went to Crowe with her parents; but her baby brother Walter, a year old, was left behind in charge of Jennifer.

The evening after their arrival, the bride took Isoult apart, and, rather to her surprise, asked her if she thought that the dead knew what was pa.s.sing in this world. To such a question there was but one answer.

Isoult could not tell.

"Isoult," she said, her eyes filling with tears, "I would not have him know of this, if it be so. And can that be right and good which I would not he should know?"

Isoult needed not to ask her who "he" was.

"Nay, sweet heart!" said she, "thinkest thou he would any thing save thy comfort and gladness? He is pa.s.sed into the land where (saith David) all things are forgotten--to wit, (I take it) all things earthly and carnal, all things save G.o.d; and when ye shall meet again in the body, it shall be in that resurrection where they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are equal unto the angels."

"All things forgotten!" she faltered. "Hath he forgot me? They must sleep, then; that is a kind of forgetting. But if I were awake and witful, I never could forget him. It were not _I_ that did so."

"Let us leave that with G.o.d, beloved," answered Isoult.

"O Isoult," she murmured, her tears beginning to drop fast, "I would do G.o.d's will, and leave all to Him: but is this G.o.d's will? Thou little knowest how I am tortured and swayed to and fro with doubt. It was easier for thee, that hadst but a contract to fulfil."

Isoult remembered the time before she had ever seen her husband, when it did not look very easy. She scarcely knew what she ought to answer.

She only said--

"Dear heart, if thou do truly desire to do only G.o.d's will, methinks He will pardon thee if thou lose thy way."

"It looketh unto me at times," she said, "as if it scarce could be right, seeing it should lift me above want, and set me at ease."

This was a new thought to Isoult, and she was puzzled what to say. But in the evening she told John, and asked his advice. Much to her astonishment, he, usually gentle, pulled to the cas.e.m.e.nt with a bang.

"Is that thine answer, Jack?" said Isoult, laughing.

"Somewhat like it," answered he drily. "'Tis no marvel that ill men should lose the good way, when the true ones love so much to walk in byepaths."

"Thou riddlest, Jack," said Isoult.

"Tell me, dear heart," he answered, "doth G.o.d or Satan rule the world?"

"G.o.d ruleth the world, without doubt," said she, "but if Satan spake sooth unto our Lord, he hath the power of the glory of it."

"Did Satan ever speak sooth, thinkest?" he replied smiling somewhat bitterly. "Howbeit to leave that point,--doth G.o.d, or doth Satan, mete out the lives of G.o.d's people, and give them what is best for them?"

"G.o.d doth, a.s.suredly," said she.

"Well said," answered he. "Then (according unto this doctrine) when G.o.d giveth His child a draught of bitter physic, he may with safety take and drink it; but when He holdeth forth a cup of sugared succades [sweetmeats], that must needs be refused. Is it so?"

"Jack!" wonderingly cried Isoult.

"There be that think so," he made answer, "but I had scarce accounted my Lady Frances one ere now. Set the thing afore her in that light. This is the self spring whence cometh all the monasteries and nunneries, and anchorites' cells in all the world. Is G.o.d the author of darkness, and not of light? Doth He create evil, and not good? Tell her, when the Lord holdeth forth an honeycomb, He would have her eat it, as a.s.suredly as, when He giveth a cup of gall into her hand, He meaneth she should drink it. And methinks it can scarce be more joyful to Him to watch her drink the gall than eat the honeycomb."

The last words were uttered very tenderly.

When Isoult told Frances what John had said, the tears rose to her eyes.

"O Isoult! have I been wronging my G.o.d and Father?" she said in a quivering voice. "I never meant to do that."

"Tell Him so, sweet heart," answered Isoult.

Isoult thought her husband was right, when, on the following day, she came across the text, "The Lord that hath pleasure in the prosperity of His people." But in her innocent way she showed it to John, and asked him if he thought it meant that it was a pleasure to the Lord Himself to bestow happiness on His people. John smiled at her, as he often did.

"Sweet heart," he answered, "doth it please or offend thee, when thou dost kiss Kate, and comfort her for some little trouble, and she stayeth her crying, and smileth up at thee?"

"Why, Jack, 'tis one of my greatest pleasures," answered Isoult.

Very gravely and tenderly he answered,--"'As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you.'"

On the 17th of June, Isoult Avery wrote in her diary:--

"The church-bells are making music in mine ears as I sit to write. An hour gone, Frances and Mr Monke went forth, no longer twain, but one.

G.o.d go with her, and bless her, this dear sister of mine heart, and comfort her for all she hath lost--ay, as 'one whom his mother comforteth!'"

The ink was scarcely dry from this entry when Philippa Ba.s.set marched in, with unrecognised step, for her shoes were new.

"Why, Mrs Philippa! your new shoes wrought that I knew not your step,"

said Isoult, with a smile.

"New shoes!" said she, "yea, in good sooth. I flung both mine old ones after Frank; and had I had an hundred pairs in my cupboard, I had sent them all flying."

The thought of a hundred pairs of shoes falling about, was too much for Isoult's gravity.

"One of them smote the nag on his tail," continued Philippa; "I warrant you it gave him a smart, for I sent it with all my might. 'Tis a good omen that--saving only that it might cause the beast to be restive."

"Believe you in omens, Mrs Philippa?" answered Isoult.

"Not one half so much as I do believe in mine own good sense," said she.

"Yet I have known some strange things in my time. Well, what thinkest thou of this match of Frank's?"

"I trust with all mine heart she may find it an happy and a comfortable," was the reply.

"Ay, maybe a sc.r.a.p of happiness shall not hurt her overmuch," said Philippa in her dry way. "As to Mr Monke, I will wish him none, for methought from his face he were as full as he could hold; and an' he had some trouble, he demeriteth it, for having away Frank."

And so away she went, both laughing.

News that stirred _every_ Gospeller's heart reached Bradmond ere the Christmas of 1547. The b.l.o.o.d.y Statute was repealed; and in every parish church, by royal order, a Bible and a copy of the Paraphrases of Erasmus were set open, for all the people to read.

But the repeal of the b.l.o.o.d.y Statute, ardently as she desired it, was not without sad memories to Isoult Avery. The Act now abrogated had brought death, four years before, to one very dear to her heart; and it was not in human nature for her to hear of its destruction without a sigh given to the memory of Grace Rayleigh. In the churchyard at Bodmin were two nameless graves--of a husband and wife whom that b.l.o.o.d.y Statute had parted, and who had only met at last in its despite, and to die.

And when Grace had closed the eyes of her beloved, she lay down to her own long rest. Her work was finished in this world; and very welcome was the summons to her--"Come up higher."