Meanwhile, the heretic Wellfields of Wellfield continued to flourish, seemingly, like a green bay-tree; though, taking the royalist side in the Stuart troubles, they are said to have suffered heavy losses therefrom. The most perfect entente cordiale always existed between them and the neighbouring Catholic gentry, and the reverend fathers at Brentwood; and they were always classed amongst the first families of the neighbourhood when they were at home. Of late years they had lived much abroad. At the time now referred to, 18—, there were only two representatives of the line: John Felix Wellfield, and a son; the said John Felix had been an only child, as had his father before him, and his own wife was recently dead.
Meantime, while the gorgeous abbey church, which had been centuries a-building, had been so razed to the ground as that hardly a vestige of it remained, save a green space in the shape of a cross to show where it had once stood, and while the two great entrances of the abbey—Monk’s-gate and Abbot’s-gate—were like great ruined caverns, grown over with ivy; while the cloisters were a line of hoary ruins, and nought of the abbey remained save enough to make a quaint old dwelling-house—all this time the White Church under the Hill stood intact—added to a little here and there; enriched by the spoils of the abbey—they rescued the exquisite carved black oak stalls and a magnificent rood-screen, and set them up in the humbler building. Now it was a Protestant place of worship; in the midst of the old oak pews some evangeliser had set up a ‘three-decker,’ in which the service was performed, and there is no record of this piece of vandalism having met with the condign punishment it deserved. It—the ‘three-decker’—stared down upon an ancient pew of black carved oak which glittered like a mirror, which pew was said—along with many others—to be the oldest in England. Built by one Roger of Wellfield, it had been left by him as a legacy for ‘the proud dames of Wellfield’ to sit in every Sunday, which ‘proud dames’ are at this date represented by three decrepit old women, who enjoy the best view in the church of—the pulpit. The old church is sturdy yet, having survived so many changes, including a visit from George Fox, in the days when he went about denouncing ‘steeple-houses,’ and who stood in the aisle and stigmatised the then priest of Wellfield as ‘a light, scornful, chaffy fellow.’ It shows no signs of decay. May it be long before such symptoms appear in it!
A party of visitors, thirty years ago and more, were strolling round this old church one summer afternoon, escorted by a young woman who had the keys, and who had told them all she knew about the place and its history.
‘Then does the present Mr. Wellfield not live at the abbey?’ inquired a young lady who was of the party.
‘No, ma’am. They say he lives a deal in Italy, and the lady he married came from those parts. Young Mr. Wellfield is staying at the abbey now, and his tutor says it’s because of his health; but they do say that Mr. Wellfield is going to be married again, and wants him away.’
The visitors exchanged glances, and the young woman continued:
‘See, there’s the young gentleman looking in now, and his playfellow, old Mr. Leyburn’s lad.’
Indeed, at this moment two boys, whose ages might be ten and eleven, or eleven and twelve years, came strolling into the church by the chancel door, which stood open, their arms about one another’s shoulders, and their faces rubbing together now and then after the fashion of a couple of friendly ponies. One was tall and slender, and was of an extraordinary beauty of face and figure, with solemn, liquid dark eyes, and a very un-English look. The other was not quite so tall, was sturdy, square and strong, but clumsily built—‘a little pleb,’ thought the young lady, who was watching them with interest. The rest of her party had strolled on with the young woman to look at proud Abbot ——’s tombstone, which, said tradition, if a Wellfield walked over it, he should not live out the year. But the girl—she was no more—remained where she was until the boys came up to her, and they were all standing at the foot of the chancel steps, just outside the rood-screen.
‘Have you come to see the church?’ she asked, smiling.