“Sweet Lady, an’ he were hither, methinks Father Ademar—”
“No, no—not Father Ademar. Oh, if I could rend the grave open!—if I could tear asunder the blue veil of Heaven! I set no store by it all then; but now! He would forgive me: he would not scorn me! He would not count me too vile for his mercy. O my Lord, mine own dear Lord! you would never have served me thus!”
And down rained the blessed tears, and relieved the dry, parched soil of the agonised heart. She lay quieter after that torrent of pain and passion. The terrible spell of dark silence was broken; and Maude knew at last, that through this bitterest trial she had ever yet experienced, the wandering heart was coming home—at least to Le Despenser.
Was it needful that she should pass through yet deeper waters, before she would come home to God?
The leaves were carpeting the ground around Kenilworth, when Custance granted a second interview to her cousin Isabel. There was more news for her by that time. Edward had been once more pardoned, and was again in his usual place at Court. How this inscrutable man procured his pardon, and what sum he paid for it, in cash or service, is among the mysteries of the medieval “back-stairs.” He had to be forgiven for more than Custance knew. Among his other political speculations, he had been making love to the Queen; a fact which, though there can be little doubt that it was a mere piece of policy on his part, was unlikely to be acceptable to the King. But the one item which most closely concerned his sister was indicated in plain terms by his pardon—that she need look for no help at her brother’s hands until she too “put herself in the King’s mercy.”
The King’s mercy! What that meant depended on the King. In the reign of Richard of Bordeaux, that prisoner must be heavily-charged to whom it did not mean at least a smile of pardon—not unfrequently a grant of lands, or sometimes a coronet. But in the reign of Henry of Bolingbroke, it meant rigid justice, as he understood justice. And his mercy, to any Lollard, convicted or suspected, usually meant solitary confinement in a prison cell. What inducement was there for Custance to throw herself on such mercy as that? Nor was she further encouraged by hearing of another outbreak on behalf of King Richard or the Earl of March, headed by Archbishop Scrope and Lord Mowbray, and the heads of the ringleaders had fallen on the scaffold.
Isabel had sat and talked for an hour without winning any answer beyond monosyllables. She was busy with her rosary—a new coral one—while she unfolded her budget of news, and tried to persuade her cousin into compliance with the King’s wish. The last bead was just escaping from her fingers with an Amen, when Custance turned to her with a direct question.
“Now speak plainly, fair Cousin;—what wouldst have me to do?”
“In good sooth, to put thee in the King’s mercy.”