One Snowy Night Part 28

"I can't help it, Manning; I can't help it!" she said, when she could speak. "It may be sin, but I must do it and do penance for it--it's not a bit of use telling me I must not. I'll try not to talk if you bid me be silent, but you must give me a day or two to get quieted,--till every living creature round has done spitting venom at them. I don't promise to hold my tongue to that ninny of an Anania--she aggravates me while it isn't in human nature to keep your tongue off her; it's all I can do to hold my hands."

"She is very provoking, Father," said Flemild in an unsteady voice; "she wears Mother fairly out."

"You may both quarrel with Anania whenever you please," replied Manning calmly; "I've nothing to say against that. But you are not to make excuses for those heretics, nor to express compa.s.sion for them. Now those are my orders: don't let me have to give them twice."

"No, Father; you shall not, to me," said Flemild in a low tone.

"I can't promise you nothing," said Isel, wiping her eyes on her ap.r.o.n, "because I know I shall just go and break it as fast as it's made: but when I can, I'll do your bidding, Manning. And till then, you'll have either to thrash me or forgive me--whichever you think the properest thing to do."

Manning walked away without saying more.

Snow, snow everywhere!--lying several inches deep on the tracks our forefathers called roads, drifted several feet high in corners and clefts of the rocks. Pure, white, untrodden, in the silent fields; but trampled by many feet upon the road to Dorchester, the way taken by the hapless exiles. No voice was raised in pity, no hand outstretched for help; every door was shut against the heretics. Did those who in after years were burned at the stake on the same plea suffer more or less than this little band of pioneers, as one after another sank down, and died in the white snow? The trembling hands of the survivors heaped over each in turn the spotless coverlet, and then they pa.s.sed on to their own speedy fate.

The snow descended without intermission, driving pitilessly in the scarred faces of the sufferers. Had they not known that it came from the hand of their heavenly Father, they might have fancied that Satan was warring against them by that means, as the utmost and the last thing that he could do. But as the snow descended, the song ascended as unceasingly. Fainter and less full it grew to human ears, as one voice after another was silenced. It may be that the angels heard it richer and louder, as the choristers grew more few and weak.

Of the little family group which we have followed, the first to give way was Agnes. She had taken from her own shivering limbs, to wrap round the child, one of the mutilated garments which alone her tormentors had left her. As they approached Nuneham, she staggered and fell. Guelph and Adelheid ran to lift her up.

"Oh, let me sleep!" she said. "I can sing no more."

"Ay, let her sleep," echoed Gerhardt in a quivering voice; "she will suffer least so. Farewell for a moment, my true beloved! We shall meet again ere the hour be over."

Gerhardt held on but a little longer. Doubly branded, and more brutally scourged than the rest, he was so ill from the first that he had to be helped along by Wilhelm and Conrad, two of the strongest in the little company. How Ermine fared they knew not: they could only tell that when they reached Bensington, she was no longer among them. Most of the children sank early. Little Rudolph fared the best, for a young mother who had lost her baby gave him such poor nourishment as she could from her own bosom. It was just as they came out of Dorchester, that they laid him down tenderly on a bed of leaves in a sheltered corner, to sleep out his little life. Then they pa.s.sed on, still southwards--still singing "Glory to G.o.d in the highest!" and "Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake!" Oh, what exquisite music must have floated up through the gates of pearl, and filled the heavenly places, from that poor faint song, breathed by those trembling voices that could scarcely utter the notes!

A few hours later, and only one dark figure was left tottering through the snow. Old Berthold was alone.

Snow everywhere!--and the night fell, and the frost grew keen; and Bensington had not long been left behind when old Berthold lay down in the ditch at the road-side. He had sung his last song, and could go no further. He could only wait for the chariot of G.o.d--for the white-winged angels to come silently over the white snow, and carry him Home.

"The Lord will not forget me, though I am the last left," he said to himself. "His blessings are not mere empty words. 'Glory to G.o.d in the highest!'" And Berthold slept.

"Rudolph!" The word was breathed softly, eagerly, by some moving thing closely wrapped up, in the dense darkness of the field outside Dorchester. There was no answer.

"Rudolph!" came eagerly again.

The speaker, who was intently listening, fancied she heard the faintest possible sound. Quickly, quietly, flitting from one point to another, feeling with her hands on the ground, under the bushes, by the walls, she went, till her outstretched hands touched something round and soft, and not quite so chillingly cold as every thing else seemed to be that night.

"Rudolph! art thou here?"

"Yes, it's me," said the faint childish voice. "Where am I?--and who are you?"

"Drink," was the answer; and a bottle of warm broth was held to the boy's blue lips. Then, when he had drunk, he was raised from the ground, clasped close to a woman's warm breast, and a thick fur mantle was hastily wrapped round them both.

"Who are you?" repeated the child. "And where--where's Mother?"

"I am an old friend, my little child. Hast thou ever heard the name of Countess?"

"Yes," murmured the child feebly. He could not remember yet how or where he had heard it; he only knew that it was not strange to him.

"That is well. Glory be to the Blessed that I have found thee in time to save thee!"

They were speeding back now into the lighted town--not lighted, indeed, by out-door lamps, but by many an open door and uncovered window, and the lanterns of pa.s.sengers going up or down the street. Countess carried the child to a stone house--only Jews built stone houses in towns at that day--and into a ground-floor room, where she laid him down on a white couch beside the fire. There were two men in the room--both old, and with long white beards.

"Countess! what hast thou there?" sternly asked one of the men.

"Father Jacob!--a babe of the Goyim!" exclaimed the other.

"Hush!" said Countess in a whisper, as she bent over the boy. "The life is barely in him. May the Blessed (to whom be praise!) help me to save my darling!"

"Accursed are all the infidels!" said the man who seemed slightly the younger of the two. "Daughter, how earnest thou by such a child, and how darest thou give him such a name?"

Countess made no answer. She was busy feeding little Rudolph with bits of bread sopped in warm broth.

"Where am I?" asked the child, as sense and a degree of strength returned to him. "It isn't Isel's house."

"Wife, dost thou not answer the Cohen?" said the elder man angrily.

"The Cohen can wait for his answer; the child cannot for his life. When I think him safe I will answer all you choose."

At length, after careful feeding and drying, Countess laid down the spoon, and covered the child with a warm woollen coverlet.

"Sleep, my darling!" she said softly. "The G.o.d of Israel hush thee under His wings!"

A few moments of perfect quiet left no doubt that little Rudolph was sound asleep. Then Countess stood up, and turned to the Rabbi.

"Now, Cohen, I am ready. Ask me what you will."

"Who and what is this child?"

"An exile, as we are. An orphan, cast on the great heart of the All-Merciful. A trust which was given to me, and I mean to fulfil it."

"That depends on the leave of thy lord."

"It depends on nothing of the sort. I sware to the dead father of this boy that I would protect him from all hurt."

"Sware! Well, then--" said the elder Jew--"an oath must be fulfilled, Cohen?"

"That depends on circ.u.mstances," returned the Rabbi in Jesuitical wise.

"For instance, if Countess sware by any idol of the Goyim, it is void.

If she sware by her troth, or faith, or any such thing, it may be doubtful, and might require a synod of the Rabbins to determine it. But if she sware by the Holy One (blessed be He!) then the oath must stand.

But of course, daughter, thou wilt have the boy circ.u.mcised, and bring him up as a proselyte of Israel."

The expression in the eyes of Countess did not please the Rabbi.

"Thus I sware," she said: "'G.o.d do so to me and more also, if I bring not the child to you unhurt!' How can I meet that man at the day of doom, if I have not kept mine oath--if I deliver not the boy to him unhurt, as he will deem hurting?"

"But that were to teach him the idolatries of the Goyim!" exclaimed the Rabbi in horror.

"I shall teach him no idolatry. Only what his father would have taught him--and I know what that was. I have listened to him many a day on Presthey and Pary's Mead."

"Countess, I shall not suffer it. Such a thing must not be done in my house."