“Father, Beatrice actually fancies that the Archbishop of Antioch could excommunicate the holy Father!” observed Hawise in tones of horror.
“I suppose any authority can excommunicate those below him, in the Church visible,” said Bruno, calmly: “in the invisible Jerusalem above, which is the mother of us all, none excommunicates but God. ‘Every branch in Me, not fruit-bearing, He taketh it away.’ My daughters, it would do us more good to bear that in mind, than to blame either the Pope or the Archbishop.”
And he walked away, as was his wont when he had delivered his sentence.
That afternoon, the Countess sent for Beatrice and Doucebelle to her own bower. They found her seated by the window, with unusually idle hands, and an expression of sore disturbance on her fair, serene face.
“There is bad news come, my damsels,” she said, when the girls had made their courtesies. “And I do not know how to tell my Magot. Perhaps one of you might manage it better than I could. And she had better be told, for she is sure to hear it in some way, and I would fain spare the child all I can.”
“About Sir Richard the Earl, Lady?” asked Beatrice.
“Yes, of course. He is married, Beatrice.”
“To whom, Lady?” asked Beatrice, calmly but Doucebelle uttered an ejaculation under her breath.
“To Maud, daughter of Sir John de Lacy, the Earl of Lincoln. It is no fault of his, poor boy! The Lord King would have it so. And the King has made a good thing of it, for I hear that the Earl of Lincoln has given him above three thousand gold pennies to have the marriage, and has remitted a debt of thirteen hundred more. A good thing for him!—and it may be quite as well for Richard. But my poor child! I cannot understand how it is that she does not rouse up and forget her disappointment. It is very strange.”
It was very strange, to the mother who loved Margaret so dearly, and yet understood her so little. But Doucebelle silently thought that any thing else would have been yet stranger.