Chapter Eight.
Repenting his repentance.
It was Saturday evening, and three days after Alice returned home. Mr Benden sat in the chimney-corner, having just despatched a much more satisfactory supper than Mary had ever allowed him to see during her mistress’s imprisonment; and Alice, her household duties finished for the day, came and sat in the opposite corner with her work.
The chimney-corner, at that date, was literally a chimney-corner. There were no grates, and the fire of logs blazed on a wide square hearth, around which, and inside the chimney, was a stone seat, comfortably cushioned, and of course extremely warm. This was the usual evening seat of the family, especially its elder and more honourable members. How they contrived to stand the very close quarters to the blazing logs, and how they managed never to set themselves on fire, must be left to the imagination.
Alice’s work this evening was knitting. Stockings? Certainly not; the idea of knitted stockings had not yet dawned. Stockings were still, as they had been for centuries, cut out of woollen cloth, and sewn together like any other garment. The woman who was to immortalise her name by the brilliant invention of knitting stockings was then a little girl, just learning to use her needles. What Alice was knitting this evening was a soft woollen cap, intended for the comfort of Mr Benden’s head.
The inside of the head in question was by no means so comfortable as Alice was preparing to make the outside. Mr Benden was pulled two ways, and not knowing which to go, he kept trying each in turn and retracing his steps. He wanted to make Alice behave herself; by which he meant, conform to the established religion as Queen Mary had Romanised it, and go silently to church without making insubordinate objections to idolatry, or unpleasant remarks afterwards. This was only to be attained, as it seemed to him, by sending her to prison. But, also, he wanted to keep her out of prison, and to ensure the continuance of those savoury suppers on which his comfort and contentment depended, and the existence of which appeared to depend on her remaining at home. How were the two to be harmoniously combined? Reflections of this kind resulted in making Mr Benden a very uncomfortable man; and he was a man with whom to be uncomfortable was to be unreasonable.
“Alice!” he said at last, after a period of silent thought Alice looked up from her work.
“The morrow shall be Sunday.”
Alice assented to that indisputable fact.
“You’ll come to church with me?”
For one instant Alice was silent. Her husband thought she was wavering in her decision, but on that point he was entirely mistaken. She was doing what Nehemiah did when he “prayed to the God of heaven” between the King’s question and his answer. Well she knew that to reply in the negative might lead to reproach, prison, torture, even death. Yet that was the path of God’s commandments, and no flowery By-path Meadow must tempt her to stray from it. In her heart she said to Him who had redeemed her—
“Saviour, where’er Thy steps I see,
Dauntless, untired, I follow Thee!”
and then she calmly answered aloud, “No, Edward, that I cannot do.”
“What, hath your taste of the Bishop’s prison not yet persuaded you?” returned he angrily.
“Nay, nor never will.”
“Then you may look to go thither again, my mistress.”
“Very well, Edward.” Her heart sank low, but she did not let him see it.
“You’ll either go to church, or here you bide by yourself.”
“I thought to go and sit a while by Christie,” she said.
“You’ll not go out of this house. I’ll have no whisperings betwixt you and those brethren of yours—always tuting in your ear, and setting you up to all manner of mischief. You’d not be so troublesome if you hadn’t Roger Hall at your back—that’s my belief. You may just keep away from them; and if they keep not away from you, they’ll maybe get what they shall love little.”
Alice was silent for a moment. Then she said very quietly, “As you will, Edward. I would only ask of you one favour—that I may speak once with Roger, to tell him your pleasure.”
“I’ll tell him fast enough when I see him. Nay, my mistress: you come not round me o’ that fashion. I’ll not have him and you plotting to win you away ere the catchpoll (constable) come to carry you hence. You’ll tarry here, without you make up your mind to be conformable, and go to church.”
The idea of escape from the toils drawing close around her had never entered Alice’s brain till then. Now, for one moment, it surged in wild excitement through her mind. The next moment it was gone. A voice seemed to whisper to her—
“The cup which thy Father hath given thee, wilt thou not drink it?”
Then she said tranquilly, “Be it as you will. Because I cannot rightly obey you in one matter, I will be the more careful in all other to order me as you desire.”
Mr Benden answered only by a sneer. He did not believe in meekness. In his estimation, women who pretended to be meek and submissive were only trying to beguile a man. In his heart he knew that this gentle obedience was not natural to Alice, who had a high spirit and plenty of fortitude; and instead of attributing it to the grace of God, which was its real source, he set it down to a desire to cheat him in some unrevealed fashion.
He went to church, and Alice stayed at home as she was bidden. Finding that she had done so, Mr Benden tried hard to discover that one of her brothers had been to see her, sharply and minutely questioning Mary on the subject.
“I told him nought,” said Mary afterwards to Mistress Tabitha: “and good reason why—there was nought to tell. But if every man Jack of you had been here, do you think I’d ha’ let on to the likes o’ him?”
A very uncomfortable fortnight followed. Mr Benden was in the exasperating position of the Persian satraps, when they could find no occasion against this Daniel. He was angry with the Bishop for releasing Alice at his own request, angry with the neighbouring squires, who had promoted the release, angry with Roger Hall for not allowing himself to be found visiting his sister, most angry with Alice for giving him no reasonable cause for anger. The only person with whom he was not angry was his unreasonable self.
“If it wasn’t for Mistress yonder, I should be in twenty minds not to tarry here,” said Mary to Mistress Tabitha, whom she overtook in the road as both were coming home from market. “I’d as lief dwell in the house with a grizzly bear as him. How she can put up with him that meek as she do, caps me. Never gives him an ill word, no matter how many she gets; and I do ensure you, Mistress Hall, his mouth is nothing pleasant. And how do you all, I pray you? for it shall be a pleasure to my poor mistress to hear the same. Fares little Mistress Christabel any better?”
“Never a whit, Mall; and I am at my wits’ end to know what I shall next do for her. She wearies for her Aunt Alice, and will not allow of me in her stead.”
Mary felt privately but small astonishment at this.
“I sent Friswith and Justine over to tarry with her, but she seemed to have no list to keep them; they were somewhat too quick for her, I reckon.” By quick, Mistress Hall meant lively. “I’ll tell you what, Mary Banks—with all reverence I speak it, but I do think I could order this world better than it is.”
“Think you so, Mistress Hall? And how would you go to do it?”
“First business, I’d be rid of that Edward Benden. Then I’d set Alice in her brother Roger’s house, to look after him and Christabel. She’d be as happy as the day is long, might she dwell with them, and had that cantankerous dolt off her hands for good. Eh dear! but if Master Hall, my father-in-law, that made Alice’s match with Benden, but had it to do o’er again, I reckon he’d think twice and thrice afore he gave her to that toad. The foolishness o’ folks is beyond belief. Why, she might have had Master Barnaby Final, that was as decent a man as ever stepped in leather—he wanted her: but Benden promised a trifle better in way of money, and Master Hall, like an ass as he was, took up wi’ him. There’s no end to men’s doltishness (foolishness). I’m homely, (plain-spoken) you’ll say, and that’s true; I love so to be. I never did care for dressing my words with all manner o’ frippery, as if they were going to Court. ’Tis a deal the best to speak plain, and then folks know what you’re after.”
When that uncomfortable fortnight came to an uncomfortable end, Mr Benden went to church in a towering passion. He informed such of his friends as dared to approach him after mass, that the perversity and obduracy of his wife were beyond all endurance on his part. Stay another week in his house she should not! He would be incalculably indebted to any friend visiting Cranbrook, if he would inform the Justices of her wicked ways, so that she might be safely lodged again in gaol. An idle young man, more out of thoughtless mischief than from any worse motive, undertook the task.
When Alice Benden appeared the second time before the Bench, it was not with ease-loving, good-natured Justice Roberts that she had to do. Sir John Guildford was now the sitting magistrate, and he committed her to prison with short examination. But the constable, whether from pity or for some consideration of his own convenience, did not wish to take her; and the administration of justice being somewhat lax, she was ordered by that official to go home until he came for her.
“Go home, forsooth!” cried Mr Benden in angry tones. “I’ll not have her at home!”
“Then you may carry her yourself to Canterbury,” returned the constable. “I cannot go this week, and I have nobody to send.”
“Give me a royal farthing, and I will!” was the savage answer.
The constable looked in his face to see if he meant it. Then he shook his head, dipped his hand into his purse, and pulled out half-a-crown, which he passed to Mr Benden, who pocketed this price of blood. Alice had walked on down the Market Place, and was out of hearing. Mr Benden strode after her, with the half-crown in his pocket.