“All did well,” said Elfric, “but there were some that did wondrously. Colin Rush, thou madest a very pretty nimble devil! Hugh, thy roar was perfection! Joseph the novice, thou wast so terrible a devil to look upon, that although I dressed thee myself, I was more than half afraid of thee!”
“And I,” responded Joseph, “was wholly terrified at thee, master Elfric! nor can I yet make out how thou didst contrive to throw about all that fire and flame, through eyes, mouth, and nostrils, without burning thy big vizard. Hodge the miller set fire to his big head and burned it to pieces, and so could do nothing but stay below in the cellar and help in the roaring.”
“And not much did I like that dark underground place,“ quoth Hodge: ”and when the lights were all out, and goodman Hugh, groping his way in the dark, caught my tail in his hand and pulled it till it nearly came away from my breech, I ’gan fancy that the Crowland devils were angered, and that some real devil was going to haul me off! I wot that the roar I then gave was quite in earnest! My flesh still quivers, and ice comes over my heart as I think of it!”
“Then melt thine ice with good warm wine,” said Elfric: pushing him a cup: “I thought thou hadst known that all the Crowland devils had been laid for aye by the good Guthlacus, and that thou hadst had nothing to fear whilst engaged in so good a work and all for the service of thy liege lord the abbat, and for the honour and service of the church and the liberties of England. Did I not besprinkle thee with holy water before thou didst don thy devil-skin?”
“For my part,” said another, “what most feared me was that awful stench! I was told, that as a devil I must not cough, but help coughing I could not as I stirred up the pan over the charcoal fire, and kept throwing in the foul drugs the dark stranger gave me to throw in. In sooth I neither frisked about nor hauled myself up by the rope over the trap-door; nor did I howl, nor did I help to carry the blue links and torches; but the stinking part did I all myself, and I think I may be proud of it! Not to defraud an honest man and good artisan of his due, I may say it was Hob the carpenter that bored the holes through the floor so that the incense might rise right under our Norman abbat’s nose; but for all the rest it was I that did it. That hell-broth still stinks in the nose of my memory. Prithee, another cup of wine, that I may forget it.”
“Well,” said old Gaffer the tithing-man of Crowland, “we have done the thing, and I hope it hath been honestly done; and without offence to the saints or to the beatified Guthlacus.”
“Never doubt it,” quoth Elfric: “the Norman spoilers and oppressors are gone to a man, and as naked as they came. I, the humble friend and follower of my Lord Hereward the liberator, am here to dispense hospitality to-night; your own Lord Abbat will be here in a few days; and the dread of our demons of the fens and Crowland devils will make the invaders run from all the fen country. So much good could not have come out of evil; if the means employed had been unlawful or in any way sinful, we should have failed, and never have met with such easy and complete success.”
“Nevertheless,” continued Gaffer, “the things which I have seen fill me with doubt and amaze. Whoever saw the like before? Fire burning upon the top of water, flames not to be quenched by water from below nor by water from above! Smoke and flames not of their natural colours, but blue, and green, and scarlet, and bright yellow! and the light from these flames so dazzling and so ghastly! In truth I wot not how this can be done by mortal man!”
“Nor wot I,” said Elfric; “but this I know full well, that there was no magic or sortilege in the preparation, and that the stranger is as good and devout a Christian as any that dwells in the land. Many are the things which I have seen done by the hand of man that I cannot understand; but am I therefore to think that the evil one hath a finger in them? I have carried on my back, and have handled with mine own hands, the liquids and the substances which have been used, and yet have felt neither cramp nor any other ache. And plain homely things those substances and liquids do appear to be—the quietest and dullest trash until mixed together and compounded. Girolamo, who hath studied in the schools in foreign parts, even as our young clerks studied at Cam-Bridge before the detestable Normans came and built their donjon there, calls this art of compounding by the name of Chemeia, or Chimia, and he says that things much more wondrous are to be done by it. Further, he says, that his own proficiency has been acquired by long fasting and diligent study, by prayers to heaven and votive offerings to the saints. Methinks it were better to give God credit for these inventions and combinations, and for the wit and ingenuity of man, than to be always attributing them to the devil, as our uninformed clowns do. [But these last words the ex-novice spoke under his breath.] And this also do I know—the stranger sprinkled his powders with holy water, and prayed the prayers of our church all the while he was doing his preparations.”
“But what makes him look so grim and black, and so wild about the eyes,” said the old cook.