A Forgotten Hero Part 3

"There are few gentlemen more kindly or generous towards a wife. Nay, the harsh treatment is all on her side."

"What a miserable life to live!" commented Clarice.

"I fear he finds it so," said Heliet.

The dillegrout, or white soup, was now brought in, and Clarice, being hungry, attended more to her supper than to her mistress for a time.

But during the next interval between the courses she studied her master.

He was a tall and rather fine-looking man, with a handsome face and a gentle, pleasant expression.

There certainly was not in his exterior any cause for repulsion. His hair was light, his eyes bluish-grey. He seemed--or Clarice thought so at first--a silent man, who left conversation very much to others; but the decidedly intelligent glances of the grey eyes, and an occasional twinkle of fun in them when any amusing remark was made, showed that he was not in the least devoid of brains.

Clarice thought that the priest who sat between the Earl and Countess was a far more unprepossessing individual than his master. He was a Franciscan friar, in the robe of his order; while the friar who sat on the other side of the Countess was a Dominican, and much more agreeable to look at.

At this juncture the Earl of Lancaster, who bore a strong family likeness to his cousin, the Earl of Cornwall--a likeness which extended to character no less than person--inquired of the latter if any news had been heard lately from France.

"I have had no letters lately," replied his host; and, turning to the Countess, he asked, "Have you, Lady?"

Now, thought Clarice, she must speak to him. Much to her surprise, the Countess, imagining, apparently, that the Franciscan friar was her questioner, answered, [Note 1], "None, holy Father."

The friar gravely turned his head and repeated the words to the Earl, though he must have heard them. And Clarice became aware all at once that her own puzzled face was a source of excessive amus.e.m.e.nt to her _vis-a-vis_, Elaine. Her eyes inquired the reason.

"Oh, I know!" said Elaine, in a loud whisper across the table. "I know what perplexes thee. They are all like that when they first come. It is such fun to watch them!"

And she did not succeed in repressing a convulsion behind her handkerchief, even with the aid of Diana's "Elaine! do be sensible."

"Hush, my maid," said Mistress Underdone, gently. "If the Lady see thee laugh--"

"I shall be sent away without more supper, I know," said Elaine, shrugging her shoulders. "It is Clarice who ought to be punished, not I. I cannot help laughing when she looks so funny."

Elaine having succeeded in recovering her gravity without attracting the notice of the Countess, Clarice devoured her helping of salt beef along with much cogitation concerning her mistress's singular ways. Still, she could not restrain a supposition that the latter must have supposed the priest to speak to her, when she heard the Earl say, "I hear from Geoffrey Spenser, [Note 2], that our stock of salt ling is beyond what is like to be wanted. Methinks the villeins might have a cade or two thereof, my Lady."

And again, turning to the friar, the Countess made answer, "It shall be seen to, holy Father;" while the friar, with equal composure, as though it were quite a matter of course, repeated to the Earl, "The Lady will see to it, my Lord."

"Does she always answer him so?" demanded Clarice of Heliet, in an astonished whisper. "Always," replied Heliet, with a sad smile. "But surely," said Clarice, her amazement getting the better of her shyness, "it must be very wanting in reverence from a dame to her baron!"

Clarice's ideas of wifely duty were of a very primitive kind. Unbounded reverence, unreasoning obedience, and diligent care for the husband's comfort and pleasure were the main items. As for love, in the sense in which it is usually understood now, that was an item which simply might come into the question, but it was not necessary by any means. Parents, at that time, kept it out of the matter as much as possible, and regarded it as more of an enc.u.mbrance than anything else.

"It is a very sad tale, Clarice," answered Heliet, in a low tone. "He loves her, and would cherish her dearly if she would let him. But there is not any love in her. When she was a young maid, almost a child, she set her heart on being a nun, and I think she has never forgiven her baron for being the innocent means of preventing her. I scarcely know which of them is the more to be pitied."

"Oh, he, surely!" exclaimed Clarice.

"Nay, I am not so sure. G.o.d help those who are unloved! but, far more, G.o.d help those who cannot love! I think she deserves the more compa.s.sion of the two."

"May be," answered Clarice, slowly--her thoughts were running so fast that her words came with hesitation. "But what shouldst thou say to one that had outlived a sorrowful love, and now thought it a happy chance that it had turned out contrary thereto?"

"It would depend upon how she had outlived it," responded Heliet, gravely.

"I heard one say, not many days gone," remarked Clarice--not meaning to let Heliet know from whom she had heard it--"that when she was young she loved a squire of her father, which did let her from wedding with him; and that now she was right thankful it so were, for he was killed on the field, and left never a plack behind him, and she was far better off, being now wed unto a gentleman of wealth and substance. What shouldst thou say to that?"

"If it were one of any kin to thee I would as lief say nothing to it,"

was Heliet's rather dry rejoinder.

"Nay, heed not that; I would fain know."

"Then I think the squire may have loved her, but so did she never him."

"In good sooth," said Clarice, "she told me she slept many a night on a wet pillow."

"So have I seen a child that had broken his toy," replied Heliet, smiling.

Clarice saw pretty plainly that Heliet thought such a state of things was not love at all.

"But how else can love be outlived?" she said.

"Love cannot. But sorrow may be."

"Some folks say love and sorrow be nigh the same."

"Nay, 'tis sin and sorrow that be nigh the same. All selfishness is sin, and very much of what men do commonly call love is but pure selfishness."

"Well, I never loved none yet," remarked Clarice.

"G.o.d have mercy on thee!" answered Heliet.

"Wherefore?" demanded Clarice, in surprise.

"Because," said Heliet, softly, "'he that loveth not knoweth not G.o.d, for G.o.d is charity.'"

"Art thou destined for the cloister?" asked Clarice.

Only priests, monks, and nuns, in her eyes, had any business to talk religiously, or might reasonably be expected to do so.

"I am destined to fulfil that which is G.o.d's will for me," was Heliet's simple reply. "Whether that will be the cloister or no I have not yet learned."

Clarice cogitated upon this reply while she ate stewed apples.

"Thou hast an odd name," she said, after a pause.

"What, Heliet?" asked its bearer, with a smile. "It is taken from the name of the holy prophet Elye, [Elijah] of old time."

"Is it? But I mean the other."

"Ah, I love it not," said Heliet.

"No, it is very queer," replied Clarice, with an apologetic blush, "very odd--Underdone!"

"Oh, but that is not my name," answered Heliet, quickly, with a little laugh; "but it is quite as bad. It is Pride."