Pabo, the Priest: A Novel

by S. Baring-Gould

Pabo ate the pieces of bread ravenously.

He was not thirsty. The coolness and moisture of the prison prevented him from becoming parched. What he had received was not, indeed, much, but it was sufficient to take off the gnawing pain that had consumed his vitals.

Now for the first time he realized the force of the prelate's words when he had bidden Gerald of Windsor to cast him—Pabo—into a dungeon, there to be forgotten. Forgotten he was to be, ignored as a human being immured in this subterranean den. He was to be left there, totally unattended and unprovided for. Of this he was now convinced, both because of the neglect he had undergone, and also because of the attempt made by some Welshwoman, unknown to him, surreptitiously to supply him with food. This she would not have done had she not been aware of the fate intended for him. He was to be left to die of cold and hunger and thirst, and was not to leave the prison save as a dwindled, emaciated wreck, with the life driven out of him by privation of all that is necessary for the support of life. He was now well assured of what was purposed, and also, and equally assured, that he had in the castle some friend who would employ all her feminine craft to deliver him from such a fate.

Slowly, tediously the day passed. Still, occasionally voices were audible, but no feet approached the dungeon doorway. Overhead there were chambers, but the prison was vaulted with stone, and even were any persons occupying an upper story, they were not likely to be heard by one below.

It was, perhaps, fortunate that for some time on the mountain Pabo had led a very frugal life and had contented himself with parched grain, or girdle-cakes of his own grinding and making. Yet to these had been added the milk of a goat, and for this he now craved. He thought of his poor Nanny bleating, distressed with her milk; he thought of how she had welcomed him when he returned to the cell. Poor Nanny! What would he not now give for a draught of her sweet sustaining milk!

Another night passed, and again in the morning there ensued the feeding of the pigeons, and therewith a fall of crusts within his reach by the door.

During the day he heard a clatter of hoofs in the courtyard, and by seating himself on the lowest step in his vault, leaning one elbow on another, and bringing first eye and then ear near to the gap below the door, he saw and heard sufficient to lead him to suppose that the bishop was leaving Careg Cennen, to return to his own castle of Llawhaden.

He could even distinguish his strident voice, and catch a few words uttered by him, as he turned his face towards the dungeon-door, and said: "My good friend Gerald—is, humph! the impostor forgotten?"

"Forgotten, as though he had never been," was the response, in the rough tones of the Norman Baron.

Then both laughed.