The Young Lovell: A Romance

by Ford Madox Ford

One of the poor men had been a man-at-arms at Castle Lovell, but was put out now and masterless. He came to the monk Francis as he went in at his door, and reported that it was said that the young Lord Lovell had been seen, having come out of captivity of the false Gilbert Elliott. The monk said he hoped well that that was so, for then all the men-at-arms from Castle Lovell that were there could go again to his service, and that he was a very good lording and his good friend in God.

He wished to cut the matter short for that time because he knew that there awaited him in his outer room John Harbottle an esquire, and the receiver of many domains of the Earl of Northumberland. This esquire was come with the accounts for the building of the great new tower that the Earl had given to the monastery. But the former men of the Lord Lovell crowded before the monk and after him into his outer room, all bringing tidings that the Young Lovell had been seen to ride through his township. And, to the number of thirty or so, they clamoured all at once, asking for his advice as to how they should find their lord and what to do when he was found.

The monk Francis was very glad to think that the Young Lovell was come back, not only because he was his true friend but also because this rabble of disemployed men-at-arms was a burden to the monastery and he had it on his conscience that he let them bide there. For that he had done, so that they might serve his friend if he came back. That monastery was rather for the relief of poor men ruined by raiders, for travellers and for criminals seeking sanctuary. He would very gladly have had news of his friend whom he loved, and have settled the disposal of these sturdy, idle and hungry men. Yet, being a man of many affairs, he thought that the day could only be got through by doing all things in order, and behind all these ragged men in grey, he perceived the esquire, John Harbottle, a portly, bearded man in a rich cloak of purple, with a green square cap that had a jewel of gold. This John Harbottle appeared not greatly pleased at the clamour, for he also was a man of many affairs, being the Percy's receiver, and a very diligent one.

So, without many words, but quietly, the monk Francis drove out some of these fellows, and then, calling to a grizzled and dirty lay brother, he bade him drive out the rest and bar the door. And so he took John Harbottle by the sleeve of his purple coat and drew him through the doorway into his inner room and closed the door. Then there was peace.

This inner cell was a light room with no glass in the windows. Beside the bed head there was a shelf that had on it the water-bottle of the monk Francis, his plate, his cup, his napkin and the book of devotions in which he read during the dinner hour, his needles and bodkins, his leather book of threads and such things as he needed for the repair of his clothes. Beneath this shelf was a curtain, and this hid the spare garments of the monk, as the vestments in which he said the simpler offices, his spare breeches, stockings, braces, and belt. At the other side of the bed head was a large crucifix of painted wood, from which there hung Our Lord who was represented as crying out in a perpetual agony. Before the crucifix was a fald stool, that had across one corner, a great rosary of clumsy wooden beads, and upon it a skull whose top was polished and yellowed by this monk's hands. For he had it there the better to be reminded of what death is when he prayed for the soul of the cousin he had slain.

When he had killed that woman he had been possessed rather with the idea of what he could do for her poor unhanselled soul than with agonies of ecstasy. And so, with a strong will he prayed, year in, year out, for her sooner relief from the pains of purgatory, knowing God to be a just Man and prayer most efficacious.

So, having brought John Harbottle in, he sat himself down on his three-legged stool of wood before his double pulpit. This had in its side a round opening, and in the interior such books, papers, or parchments as the monk Francis had in immediate use. He was of a very orderly nature, rather like a soldier than a priest.

He reached into the inside of his pulpit for his parchment that he was to peruse with John Harbottle, and that esquire stood behind him leaning over his back. Then John Harbottle said:

"Meseems the Master of Lovell has come back?"

"That I hear," the monk Francis answered.