Brother William that was a giant fell upon him. They pinned him down. The sub-prior appeared with two or three more at his heels. “O Our Lady! Hath he gone mad!” He fought with them all. “Robbers of souls!” he shouted. They haled him into refectory that was near-by. One ran for Brother Walter the leech. But Brother Norbert and Brother Anselm vanished in the direction of the cell he had left. “You are cheats and murderers!” he cried, to the true bewilderment of three or four. Brother William, at a nod from the sub-prior, thrust cloth into his mouth, wound and tied the gag. Brother Walter came. “What is wrong? What is wrong? Doth he rave? They do so oft after so much hath come to them!” He was haled down the passage to the cell he had left. All was quiet there, ordered, still, plain monk’s cell, lighted only by the lights they brought. The opening was closed and the great rood in place. When he made to attack it, push it aside, they cried out in horror and the sub-prior ordered his arms tied. Finally, perhaps because he had ceased to struggle and seemed to be collecting his wits, and a madman with wits was notoriously dangerous, they bound him with a rope to the window stanchions and went off to put his case before the Abbot. Brother Walter the leech would have stayed, but the sub-prior sharply forbade. He seemed to hesitate whether or no to leave Brother Norbert but at last signed him forth. The rope was strong, the man was quiet. Let him be till council was taken! Solitude and none to hear was regimen, time out of mind, for mad monk!
They went. The cell was like a tomb, and he bound in it. It was dark, with a faint sense of morning in the air.
Despite all weakening Richard Englefield was yet strong of body. And he had rage that came like a giant to possess him, and a will that was now gathered, collected, and hurled through space to one point. He broke the cord that bound his arms. This done he could free himself from the gag and unknot at last the rope that bound him to the stanchions. It was now to break stanchion and cross bar and clear the window. He did this. He climbed through the window, held by his hands, dropped to earth. It had been impossible to the sub-prior or to Brother Norbert, but it was not impossible to him. It was all done quickly. Stone rang beneath his feet. Light shone in the Abbot’s house. Doubtless all were gathered there,—the thieves and murderers! Where was that one, that painted fiend, who had given him cap and bells to wear through life? Through life—through eternity! The church rose dark. He looked at the stars above it, and they seemed to him sparks from a mean and smoky fire. Now he was at Silver Cross outer wall. He climbed it and came down upon the other side with cuts and bruises that he did not feel. A palest light shone in the east. Behind him, over him, he heard the bell for lauds. He knew where ran the highway down Wander vale to Middle Forest. He went straight like a wild wind blowing down. All since he had waked was done as it were in one moment.
CHAPTER XV
In Middle Forest it was market morning, high May weather and many abroad. Country folk, town folk, folk from across river made a humming and buzzing in High Street and the market place. The sun was an hour up, and all thrifty marketers out of house. Saint Ethelred’s bells rang, the Carmelites’, the Poor Clares’. Father Edmund walked about; there were two of Leofric’s friars from over river. May sun struck the castle, up the steep hill from market. The bells stopped. Eyes, thoughts, turned this way and that.
A Silver Cross monk sped like an arrow through the market place. He was at town cross, on the lower step, on the upper step. He faced around. “Middle Forest! Ho, Middle Forest!”
They recognized him. All the countryside, flocking now to Silver Cross church, had sought with their eyes for Brother Richard. Near or at distance, he had been pointed out to many. A cry arose and spread. “The monk of Silver Cross!” Those close at hand came closer; those afar hastened to the thickening centre. He flung his arms out and up. He seemed to appeal to Middle Forest, but also to high heaven,—or he seemed to threaten high heaven. His voice rang and reached like Montjoy’s trumpets. He told what he had to tell, and all those ears drank it in and all those eyes stared and mouths gaped. He had power, and now it was power at the top of its straining. As he told, what he told they believed.
He paused, gasping, his face working. From the step beside him sprang forth another voice, that of Father Edmund, master-preacher and scourge of the vices of the time. “Who alone, in all earth around us, would dare so to blacken the Mother of God, the Bride of Heaven? Have I not cried that she was never gone but hidden hereabouts—the harlot and sorceress, Morgen Fay!”