Chapter Twelve.
Frost and Snow.
“Whan bells were rung, and mass was sung,
And every lady went hame,
Than ilka lady had her yong sonne,
But Lady Helen had nane.”
Old Ballad.
“I have come home, Mother!”
It was Constance who spoke, standing in the hall at Cardiff, wrapped in the arms of the Dowager Lady Le Despenser. And in every sense, from the lightest to the deepest, the words were true. The wanderer had come home. Home to the Castle of Cardiff, which she was never to leave any more; home to the warm motherly arms of Elizabeth Le Despenser, who cast all her worn-out theories to the winds, and took her dead son’s hapless darling to her heart of hearts; home to the great heart of God. And the ear of the elder woman was open to a sound unheard by the younger. The voice of that dead son echoed in her heart, repeating his dying charge to her—“Have a care of my Lady!”
“My poor stricken dove!” sobbed the Lady Elizabeth. “Child, men’s cruel handling hath robbed thee of much, yet it hath left thee God and thy mother!”
Constance looked up, with tears gleaming in her sapphire eyes, now so much calmer and sadder than of old.
“Ay,” she said, the remembrance thrilling through her of the heavy price at which she had bought back her children; “and I have paid nought for God and thee.”
“Nay, daughter dear, Christ paid that wyte (forfeit) for thee. We may trust Him to have a care of the quittance,” (receipt).