“Thou hast loved me well, and so thou hast drawn me, servant Richard, knight Richard, my poet Richard! I love all places—but now I love this place well and would do it good.”
He found daring to speak. “Star of me—Bringer of me into full being—”
“Thou canst not know all the counsel of heaven. I will come again, renewing thy joy. But now hearken what thou art to do, unquestioning, as thou lovest me! The morn comes. When rings the bell for lauds, when thy brethren flock into church, haste thou, haste! Stand before them. Cry, thou that lovest me. ‘This night hath the Blessed among women appeared to me, Richard Englefield!’ And she saith, ‘Speak to all of Silver Cross, and say thou for me, Of old I loved this place, and I will love it again, for I see it returning to its first strength and worship!’ Say thou, ‘I will give it room again in men’s minds. I will return and show a thing whereby multitudes shall be healed and glory shall come!’”
There was pause, then “Be thou he, Richard, who loveth me well, through whom I shall speak! Morn cometh. The bell begins to ring.”
The soft, the playing light withdrew. He felt her still—oh, real!—then in the darkness, into it, behind it as it were, she was gone. He knew that she was gone into utter light.
But here was vacancy, faint moonbeams, a cell of shadows. But the comfort and the passion and the splendour were in his heart, his veins, his blood, in the potent cells of his body! With power, with success, they summoned the brain to do them service. He believed like a child, and he was the impassioned lover.
He felt more than man. A great lightness and gaiety, a rest upon promise, held him one moment, and the next a longing, an agony,—and all was huge and resonant, deep, wide and high; and all was fine and small and subtle and profoundly at home! Time and space had radically changed for him.
He was yet kneeling when the bell for lauds began to ring. Rising, he saw through the window the setting moon,—then he was gone.
The candles were lighted. It was not Abbot Mark’s wont to be seated there, in Abbot’s stall, for lauds. But he was here, picked out by the light. The hollow of the church was all dark; the choir, the ranged monks, thinly dyed with amber. When he passed the tomb of the Lady of Montjoy he thought that a warmer light laved it, touching the stone almost to life. But the great picture—ah, the great picture! He lifted to it light-filled eyes. She was there—she was in heaven—she had stood in his cell. His being was in her hands; he lay with the Babe in her arms.