The Castle of Twilight

by Margaret Horton Potter

Flammecœur looked after her, but for the first time felt no inclination for pursuit. Perhaps this was because, for the first time, Alixe had given him something besides herself to think about. This daughter of Madame Eleanore and her peculiar vocation interested him extremely. It was quite surprising to find how interested one could become in little matters, after a few days in Le Crépuscule. So Flammecœur presently marched off to the armory in search of Yvain, and, finding him, he questioned the little squire minutely as to the gossip of the keep concerning the Demoiselle Laure. Was she mis-shapen? This was the only excuse for entering a nunnery that occurred to the Flame-hearted. Yvain had not heard that she was deformed. Was she crossed in love? Mayhap; but Yvain had not heard it. Flammecœur shrugged his shoulders. The enigma was not solved. It mattered little enough, anyway. Alixe had jilted him again. Heigho! He ordered his horse, and went to seek a falcon. While in the falcon-house he remembered that this nun was coming to the Castle on the morrow, and he decided that he would have a sight of her when she arrived.

Not unnaturally Bertrand Flammecœur had taken on the state of mind of the whole Castle. Mademoiselle was coming home on the morrow. Every one knew it, for a message had arrived on the previous day from Monseigneur the Bishop of St. Nazaire, and Le Crépuscule was in a state of unwonted excitement. The word came to madame as less of a surprise than as an overwhelming relief, and a joy that had some bitterness in it. It had rested with St. Nazaire whether her child should come home to see her twice in the month! Ah, well, she was coming; she would lie in her mother’s arms; the Castle would echo again to the music of her voice! Thus through the whole day madame sat dreaming of the morrow, nor noticed the tardy arrival of Alixe in the spinning-room, nor how, all morning, Isabelle and Viviane whispered and smiled and idled over their tasks.

Now, if Madame Eleanore’s heart and brain were full to overflowing with the dreams of Laure, how feverish with longing came the thought of home, home though for one little hour, to the prisoner herself! On the night before her going, as, indeed, on many nights of late, Laure could not sleep. Her eyes stared wide open into the night, while her mind traced outlines of Le Crépuscule in the soft darkness. Ah! the dearly loved halls and their blessed company, all that she had not seen for nearly nine months, and on the morrow should see again! Her brain burned with impatience. She tossed and tumbled on her hard and narrow bed. Finally, long ere the hour for matins, she rose and went to sit at the window of her cell, looking out upon the clear and frosty winter’s night. How the hours passed till prime she scarcely knew. But at a quarter to five, when matins were over, she went down into the church for first service, wearing short riding-shoes under her white robe, with her hair bound tight beneath her coif and veil, for galloping. During the simple prayer-service, she got twenty penitential Aves for inattention, and read added reproof in the eyes of Mère Piteuse. At length, however, it came to be the hour for the breaking of the fast, and Laure found opportunity to speak to the Sœur Eloise, who was to follow her as attendant and protectress on the road to Crépuscule. Stupid, stolid, faithful, low of birth and therefore much in awe of Laure, was this little nun; and had the Mother-prioress been worldly wise, it had not been she that followed Laure into the world this bright and bitter January morning.

At a quarter to eight o’clock the two young women mounted their palfreys at the convent gate, and were off into the snow-filled forest, while behind them echoed gentle admonitions to unceasing prayer. Feeling a saddle under her once again, and a strong white horse bearing her along over a well-beaten road, Laure drew a breath that seemed to have no end. And as her lungs filled with God’s free air, she pressed one hand to her throat to ease the terrible ache of rising tears. How long it was since she had felt free to move her limbs! How long since she had traversed this shaded road! Eloise did not trouble her. The lay sister was too occupied in clinging to the mane of her horse to venture speech; and she looked at her high-born companion with mingled awe and admiration as she saw her urge her beast into a trot. The convent animal had an easy gait, and appeared to possess possibilities in the way of speed. Laure touched him a little with her spur. The creature responded well. A moment later Eloise turned pale with fright to see her lady strike the spur home in earnest, and go flying wildly down the road till she was presently lost among the thick snow-laden trees.

Laure was happy now. She found herself not much encumbered with her dress, which had been “modified” in obedience to the law for conduct outside the convent. Her gown and mantle were of the usual cut, and she was girdled by her rosary; but her head was covered with a close-fitting black hood from which fell a short white veil, two edges of which were pinned beneath her chin, giving her, though she did not know it, a delightfully softened expression. After she had left Eloise behind, she continued to increase the speed of her animal till she had all but lost control of him. Fifteen minutes later she was out of the forest and running along a heavily packed road, bordered on either side with a thin line of trees, beyond which stretched broad fields and moorlands, among which, somewhere, the priory estate ended and that of Le Crépuscule began. Eloise was now a mile behind; but Laure had no thought for her. Her breath was coming short no less with emotion than with the exercise; for the image of her mother was before her eyes. She let her mind search where it would, through sweet and yearning depths; and her heart was filled with thanksgiving for this hour of freedom. She was nearing that place where the Rennes highway joined that of St. Nazaire, both of them uniting at the Castle road, which led to the Chateau by a long and winding ascent. Presently the Chateau became visible; and Laure, looking on it with all her soul in her eyes, took no heed of the slow-moving horseman ahead of her, on whom she was rapidly gaining. Indeed, neither was aware of the presence of the other, till Laure’s horse, scenting company, made a short dash of a hundred yards, and then came into a sudden walk beside the animal bestrode by Bertrand Flammecœur of Provence. The suddenness of the horse’s stop caused Laure to jerk heavily forward. Flammecœur leaned over and caught her bridle. At that moment their eyes met.

A flush of vivid pink overspread Laure’s lily face. She shrank quickly away from the look in Flammecœur’s eyes. Then her hand went up to her dishevelled hair; and she tried confusedly to straighten it back.

“Take not such pains, reverend lady. By the glory of the saints, thou couldst not make thyself as lovely as God’s world hath made thee!—Prithee, heed me not!”

Laure gave a little gasp at the man’s daring; yet such was Flammecœur’s manner that she did not find herself offended. Presently she had the impulse to give him a sideways glance; and then, all untutored as she was, she read the lively admiration that was written in his face. After that her hands came down from her head, and she took up her bridle again, by the act causing him to relinquish it. “The Sœur Eloise is behind me. I fear that I did much outdistance her,” she said, with a demureness through which a smile was very near to breaking.

Flammecœur looked at her with a peculiar pleasure, a pleasure that he had not often experienced. His immediate impulse was to put a still greater distance between them and Eloise; but prudence came happily to his aid. “Let us stop here till thine attendant comes, while thy horse breathes,” he said, bringing his animal to a gentle halt.

Laure acquiesced at once, and did not analyze her little momentary qualm as one of disappointment. Nevertheless, her face grew white again, and she said not a word through the ten minutes they had to wait till Eloise came riding heavily out of the wood. The other nun looked infinitely startled at the sight of Flammecœur, and was muttering a prayer while she stared from Laure to the trouvère. As soon, however, as she came, the others reined their horses about, and immediately, in the most remarkable silence that the Provençal had ever experienced, proceeded up the hill and into the Castle courtyard.