With a sigh of regret we left the sanctuary. Then, turning a corner of the old stone wall we came full upon a side of the house which was receiving shamelessly the biggest sun-kiss I had ever seen. But then, it was the biggest house I had ever seen. It was the gladdest sun—and it was the warmest blending. Between house and sun—as if they were the love children of this union—lay thousands of brilliant flowers.
When I could get my breath I made a quick suggestion that we go closer.
"I want to know which is rosemary—and which is rue!" I told him. But he stopped a moment and detained me.
We halted beside a fallen stone, at a point slightly separated from the walls of the house—a sort of half-way ground, where the shadow of the Greek cross on an isolated pinnacle seemed still to claim the ground for religion, against the encroachments of the work-a-day world. Maitland Tait's sudden smile was a mixture of amusement and tenderness.
"I've recently heard a story about this spot—this identical stone—which will interest you," he said. "A monk comes here at night—one of those old fellows buried in there."
I smiled.
"It's quite true!" he insisted. "People have seen him."
"I know it," I avowed seriously. "I was not smiling out of unbelief, but out of sheer joy at beholding with mine own eyes the 'Norman stone!'
"'He mutters his prayers on the midnight air,
And his mass of the days that are gone.'"