"A crown that maiden wore withal
bedecked with pearls, with none other stones,"
whispered Brother Owyn.
"Her look was grave, as a duke's or an earl's;
whiter than whalebone was her hue.
Her locks shone then as bright pure gold,—
loose on her shoulders so softly they lay,"—
There was a trick of his tongue that ever betrayed him that he came out of the west,—and bending, he kissed the little picture where the paint had dried.
From the cloister floated the low, buzzing murmur of children conning a task. This, and the snip-snip of the gardener's shears, were the only sounds. At intervals, good Brother Paul went past the cloister doorway in his slow pacing up and down behind the young scholars. Now and again a lad came out into the garth and crossed the grass to gain Brother Owyn's approval for an illuminated letter, or to have the hexameters lopped off his Latin hymn.
Then, around three sides of the cloister swift footsteps echoed, and the dreamer strode down the school, brushed past Brother Paul, looked out into the garth, and presently stood before Brother Owyn,—the light of the vision shining in his eyes, the mist of the Malverns clinging about his damp hair.
“I go forth a pilgrimage to Truth,” he said.
“And the prior withhold not his blessing,” added Brother Owyn, with a smile.
But the dreamer fell on his knees,—he was past smiling. He laid his hands prayerwise upon the little painting-board; and Brother Owyn, intent upon him wholly, with the loving, expectant eyes of one to whom these raptures were no new thing, yet slipped aside the vellum from the board, lest the picture come to harm from the dew-stained russet.
“I am no monk of Malvern!” cried the dreamer; “neither shall the prior clap me in cloister. I have had a vision. I must sing it.”