Edwy the Fair or the First Chronicle of Aescendune Part 29

Alfred reluctantly obeyed, and Father Cuthbert went forth. So great was their anxiety that it almost banished the power of prayer, save such mental shafts as could be sent heavenward in each interval of thought.

At last Alfred, who was at the window, saw Redwald and his followers-- nearly a hundred in number--leave the castle and ride across towards the forest in the direction of the farm in question. Another moment and Father Cuthbert entered.

"Are you ready? If so, follow me."

He took them by a private pa.s.sage into the chapel, where four men already stood by the bier, ready to head the procession, and thirty or forty others were gathered in the chapel or about the door--their own va.s.sals, good and true. They all were armed.

Father Cuthbert ascended the wooden tower above the chapel, which served as a bell cot. He looked from its windows; the party of Redwald had disappeared behind the trees.

He came down and gave the signal. The sad procession started; they descended the steps to the courtyard. Redwald had left some forty or fifty men behind--men who had grown old in arms, and who, if they had pleased, might perhaps have stopped the exit, but they were not sufficiently in the confidence of their leader to take the initiative; and the only man who was in his confidence, and whom he had charged to see that no one departed, was fortunately at that moment in another part of the building. The sentinel at the drawbridge was one of Redwald's troop. He menaced opposition, and refused to let the drawbridge be peaceably lowered.

"Art thou a Christian?" said Father Cuthbert, coming forward in his priestly attire, "and dost thou presume to interfere with a servant of the Lord and to delay a funeral?"

"I must obey my orders."

"Then I will excommunicate thee, and deliver thy soul to Satan."

And he began to utter some awful Latin imprecation, which so aroused the superst.i.tion of the sentinel that he made no further opposition, which perhaps saved his life, for the retainers of Aescendune were meditating instant violence, indignant at the delay and the outrage to their lady.

They themselves let the drawbridge down and guarded the sad cortege over the plain. Their numbers increased every moment, and before they reached the neighbourhood of the priory they had little cause to fear any attack, should Redwald have arrived and have been rash enough to attempt one.

The old parsonage house, which had served for the residence of each successive parish prior or ma.s.s-thane, was a large and commodious building, containing all such accommodation as the family absolutely required in the emergency, while furniture, provision and comforts of all kinds were sent over from the priory, for the good fathers did not forget at this hour of need that they owed their own home to the liberality of Ella and his father.

So when they had deposited the loved remains before the altar of the church, and had knelt a brief season in prayer, the exiled family took possession of their temporary home. It was hard--very hard--to give up their loved dwelling at such a season of affliction, but the dread which Redwald had somehow inspired made it a great relief to be removed from his immediate presence.

Yet they could give no reason for the feeling they all shared. Father Cuthbert evidently suspected, or knew, things which he as yet concealed from them.

"Who could have slain the husband and father?"

This was the unanswered question. Their suspicions could only turn to Redwald or some of his crew: no marauders were known to lurk in the forest; there was, they felt a.s.sured, not one of his own people who would not have died in his defence. Again, it was not the l.u.s.t of gold which had suggested the deed, for they had found the gold chain he wore untouched. What then could have been the motive of the murderer?

Father Cuthbert had found a solution, which was based upon sad experience of the traditional feuds so frequently handed down from father to son. Still he would not suggest further cause of disquietude, and added no further words.

The utter uncertainty about Elfric was another cause of uneasiness.

Whether he had gone southward with the king, or had fallen on the battlefield, they knew not; or whether he had surrendered with the prisoners taken in the entrenched camp, and who had been all admitted to mercy.

In the course of the morning they saw Redwald return, laden with the spoils of the Grange farm--oxen and sheep, waggons containing corn, driven before him. What pa.s.sed within on his entrance they could not tell; how narrow their escape they knew not--were not even certain it had been an escape at all.

It was now determined that the interment should take place on the morrow, and the intelligence was communicated rapidly to all the tenantry.

Hourly they expected the forces of Mercia to appear, and exact a heavy account from Redwald for his offences. He was supposed to be the instigator of the expedition which had failed so utterly; it was not likely that he would be allowed to retain Aescendune a long time. The only surprise people felt was that he should have dared to remain at the post when all hope of successful resistance had ceased. He had his own reasons, which they knew not.

Under these circ.u.mstances it seemed desirable to hurry forward the interment, lest it should be interfered with from without, in the confusion of hostile operations against the hall.

The priory church was a n.o.ble but irregular structure, of great size for those days. The cunning architect from the Continent, who had designed it, had far surpa.s.sed the builders of ordinary churches in the grandeur of his conception. The lofty roof, the long choir beyond the transept, gave the idea of magnitude most forcibly, and added dignity to the design. In the south transept was a chapel dedicated especially to St.

Cuthbert, where the aged Offa reposed, and the mother of Ella. There they had removed the body to await the last solemn rites. Six large wax tapers burned around it, and watchers were there day and night-- mourners who had loved him well, and felt that in him they had lost a dear friend.

The wife, the son, or the daughter, were ever there, but seldom alone.

For when the monks in the choir were not saying the canonical hours, or the low ma.s.s was not being said at one of the side altars, still the voice of intercession arose, with its burden:

"Eternal rest give unto him, O Lord, And let perpetual light s.h.i.+ne upon him."

At length the morning came, the second only after death. The neighbouring thanes whom the troubled times did not detain at home, the churls of the estate, the thralls, crowded the precincts of the minster, as the solemn bell tolled the deep funeral knell. At length the monks poured into the church, while the solemn "_Domino refugium_" arose from their lips--the same grand words which for these thousand years past have told of the eternity of G.o.d and the destiny of the creature; speaking as deeply to the heart then as in these days of civilisation.

The mourners entered, Alfred supporting his widowed mother, who had summoned all her fort.i.tude to render the last sad offices to her dear lord; her daughter, a few distant relations--there were none nearer of kin. The bier, with its precious burden, was placed in the centre before the high altar. Six monks, bearing torches, knelt around it. A pall, beautifully embroidered, covered the coffin, a wreath of flowers surmounting a cross was placed upon it.

The solemn requiem ma.s.s commenced, and the great Sacrifice once offered upon Calvary was pleaded for the soul of the deceased thane. When the last prayer had been said, the coffin was sprinkled with hallowed water, and perfumed with sweet incense, after which it was removed to its last resting place. The grave was already prepared. Again the earthly cavern was sprinkled with the hallowed water, emblematical of the blood of sprinkling which speaketh better things than that of Abel, and the body --the sacred dust for which Christ had died, in which G.o.d had dwelt as in a temple--was lowered, to be sown in corruption, that hereafter it might be raised in incorruption and joy unspeakable.

All crowded to take the last sad look. Alfred felt his dear mother's arm tremble as she leant on him, yet gazed firmly into that last resting place, while the solemn strain arose:

"Ego sum resurrectio et vita. Qui credit in Me, etiam si mortuus fuerit vivet; et omnis qui vivit, et credit in Me, non morietur in aeternum."

[x.x.x]

CHAPTER XX. "AND THE DOOR WAS SHUT."

The reader is, we trust, somewhat impatient to learn what had really been the fate of the unhappy Elfric of Aescendune--whether he had indeed been cut off with the work of repentance incomplete, or whether he yet survived to realise the calamity which had fallen upon his household.

He lived. When the blow of his adversary, as we have seen, crushed him to the earth, and he lay there with his head on the ground, prostrate, amidst kicking and plunging hoofs, and the roar and confusion of deadly strife, Providence, without which not one sparrow falleth to the ground, watched over him, and averted the iron hoofs from his forehead. Could one have concentrated his gaze upon that little spot of earth and have seen the furious hoofs graze, without injuring, that tender forehead, could he have beheld the gallop of the retreating steeds over and around that senseless form, for it now lay senseless, he would have realised that there is One Whose Eye is observant of each minute detail which concerns the life of His beloved ones--nay, Who knows the movements of the tiniest insect, while His Hand directs the rolling spheres. And his care preserved Elfric for His Own wise ends, until the fight receded, leaving its traces behind it, as when the tide of ocean recedes after a storm and the beach is strewn with wreck--bodies of men, of horses, mutilated, dismembered, dead or dying, disabled or desperately wounded.

Hours had pa.s.sed, during which the sounds of the combat still maintained at the entrenched camp came freshly on the ear, and then died away, until the solemn night fell upon the scene, and the only sound which smote the ear were faint, faint moans--cries of "Water! water!"

incessantly repeated from hundreds of feeble lips.

It was then that Elfric awoke from the insensibility which had resulted from exhaustion and the stunning blow he had received in his fall. Every limb seemed in pain, for the loss of blood had not left the vital powers strength for the maintenance of the due circulation through the body, and the cold night air chilled the frame. He did not at first comprehend where he was, but as his senses returned he perceived all too well that he was left for dead.

His first impulse was to see whether he had strength to arise. He raised himself partially, first on one elbow, and then he strove to stand up, but fell back feebly and helplessly, like an infant who first essays to escape its mother's arms and to trust its feeble limbs.

Then he looked around him, thus raising his head, and gazed upon the sad and shocking scene. Close by him, with the head cleft literally in two by a battle-axe, lay a horseman, and his blood reddened all the ground around Elfric's feet, and had deeply dyed the youth's lower garments; a horse, his own, lay dead, the jugular vein cut through, with all the surrounding muscles and sinews; hard by, a rider had fallen with such impetus, that his helmet had fixed itself deeply in the ground, and the body seemed as if it had quivered for the moment in the air; a dart had transfixed another through belt and stomach, and he lay with the weapon appearing on either side the body. Near these lay another, whose thigh had been pierced to the great artery, and who had bled to death, as the deadly paleness of the face showed; here and there one yet lived, as faint moan and broken utterance testified; but Elfric could bear no more, his head sank upon the ground, and he hid his face.

It was bright starlight, and the gleam of the heavenly host seemed to mock the wounded youth as he thought of the previous night, when, sound in body, he had wandered beneath the glittering canopy of the heavens; and thus reminded, all the thoughts of that previous night came back upon him, especially the remembrance of his sin, of his desertion of his father, of his vicious life at court, of his neglect for three years and more of all the obligations of religion, and he groaned aloud in the anguish of his spirit.

"Oh! spare me, my G.o.d!" he cried, "for I am not fit to die! Spare me, that I may at least receive my father's forgiveness."

For he felt as if he could not ask G.o.d to forgive him until he had been forgiven by his father. Little did he think, poor boy, that that father lay cold in death; that never could he hear the blessed words of forgiveness from his tongue; neither had he the consolation of knowing how completely he had been forgiven, and how lovingly he had been remembered in his father's last hours upon earth.

"I cannot die! I cannot die!" thus he cried; and he strove again to raise himself from the ground, but in vain; strove again, as if he would have dragged his feeble body through pain and anguish all the way to Aescendune, but could not. The story of the prodigal son, often told him by Father Cuthbert, came back to him, not so much in its spiritual as in its literal aspect: he would fain arise and go to his father; but he could not.

"O happy prodigal!" he cried; "thou couldst at least go from that far off country, and the husks which the swine did eat; but I cannot, I cannot!"

While thus grieving in bitterness of spirit, he saw a light flitting about amongst the dead bodies, and stopping every now and then; once he saw it pause, and heard a cry of expostulation, then a faint scream, and all was still; and he comprehended that this was no ministering angel, but one of those villainous beings who haunt the battlefield to prey upon the slain, and to despatch with short mercy those who offer resistance.

He lay very, very quiet, hoping that the light would not come near him, and he trembled every time it bent its course that way; but at length his fears seemed about to be realised--it drew near, and he saw the face of a hideous looking hag, dressed in coa.r.s.e and vile garments, who held a b.l.o.o.d.y dagger in the right hand, and kept the left in a kind of bag, tied to her person, in which she had evidently acc.u.mulated great store. Her eyes were roaming about, until the light suddenly was reflected from the poor lad's brilliant accoutrements, and she advanced towards him.

He groaned, and sank backwards, and her hand was upon the dagger, while she cast such a look as the fabled vampire might cast upon her destined victim, loving gold much, but perhaps blood most, when all at once she turned and fled.

Elfric knew not what had saved him; when voices fell upon his ear, and the baying of a dog.

"Which way has that hag fled? Pursue her, she murders the wounded."