"Not a word more, Baron. Go home to Starning, go where you like, and wait. If you see me again the lady will be with me."
"You shall not find me ungrateful, I promise," cried Malise, going out.
"Damn your gratitude," said Galors, when the door was shut.
A mortified Perseus in drab cloak and slouch hat, he went to Malbank next day and verified his prognosis. The Abbot sang Mass, his old colleagues huddled in choir; the place echoed with the chastened snuffling he knew so well. Galors had no sentiment to pour over them. Standing, bowing, genuflecting, signing himself at the bidding of the bell, he had no eyes for any but the frail apparition whose crown of black seemed to weigh her toward the pavement. The change wrought in her by a year's traffic might have shocked, as the eyes might have haunted him; but she was nothing but a symbol by now. A frayed ensign, she stood for an earldom and a fee. The time had been when her beauty had bewitched him; that was when she went flesh and blood, sun-browned, full of the sap of untamed desires. Now she was a ghost with a dowry; stricken, but holding a fief.
He judged the chain, the time, the place, the chances. He had three men. It was enough. Next Sunday he would act. Then for the forest roads and High March!
That next Sunday was Lammas Day and a solemn feast. All Malbank was in the nave, a beaten and weather-scarred bundle of drabs packed in one corner under the great vaulting ribs. Within the dark aisles the chapels gloomed, here and there a red lamp made darkness darker; but the high altar was a blaze of lights. The faces, scared or sharp-set, of the worshippers fronted the glory open-mouthed, but all dull. Hunger makes a bad altar-flame; when it burns not sootily it fires the fabric.
Afterwards came something which they understood—Isoult between her two women, the monk behind. A girl chained by the middle to a monk—Oh, miracle! She sat very still in her carved chair, folding her patient hands. So thin, so frail, so transparent she was, they thought her pure spirit, a whisp of gossamered breath, or one of those gauzy sublimations which the winter will make of a dead leaf. The cowed audience watched her wonderfully; some of the women snivelled. The white monks, the singing boys, the banners and tapers, Ceremoniar, Deacon, Subdeacon, the vested Abbot himself, passed like a shining cloud through the nave. All their light came from the Chained Virgin of Saint Thorn. And then the Mass began.
There was a ring of hoofs outside, but no one looked round, and none came in. A shadow fell across the open door. At a Dominus Vobiscum you might have seen the ministrant falter; there might have been a second or two of check in his chant, but he mastered it without effort, and turned again with displayed hands to his affair. The choir of white hoods, however, watched the shadow at the west door. Isoult saw nothing and heard nothing; she was kneeling at prayer. It may be doubted if any prayed but the girl and the priest.
The holy office proceeded; the Sanctus bell shrilled for the first time. Hoofs shattered scandalously on the flags, and Galors, with an armed man on either hand of him, rode into the nave. The choir rose in a body, the nave huddled; Isoult, as she believed, saw Prosper, spear, crest, and shield. Her heart gave a great leap, then stood still. Perhaps there was a flicker in the Abbot's undertone; his lips may have been dry; but his courage was beyond proof. He held on.
Isoult was blanched as a cloth; lips, fingers and ears, the tongue in her open mouth—all creeks for the blood were ebbed dry. Her awful eyes, fixed and sombre stars, threatened to gulf her in their dark. Love was drowned in such horror as this.