The World's Greatest Books - Volume 7 Part 16

And in a moment, as he had come, so he was gone, leaving them stiff and cold, and white as statues, round the smoking board.

Eli drove Cornelis and Sybrandt out of doors at the point of a sword when he understood their infamy, and heavy silence reigned in his house that night.

And where was Clement?

Lying at full length upon the floor of the convent church, with his lips upon the lowest step of the altar, in an indescribable state of terror, misery, penitence, and self-abas.e.m.e.nt; through all of which struggled gleams of joy that Margaret was alive.

Then he suddenly remembered that he had committed another sin besides intemperate rage. He had neglected a dying man. He rose instantly, and set out to repair the omission.

The house he was called to was none other than the Stadthouse, and the dying man was his old enemy Ghysbrecht, the burgomaster.

Clement trembled a little as he entered, and said in a low voice "Pax vobisc.u.m." Ghysbrecht did not recognise Gerard in the Dominican friar, and promised in his sickness to make full rest.i.tution to Margaret Brandt for the withholding of her property from her.

As soon as he was quite sure Margaret had her own, and was a rich woman, Friar Clement disappeared.

The hermit of Gouda had recently died, and Clement found his cell amidst the rocks, and appropriated it. The news that he had been made vicar of Gouda never reached his ears to disturb him.

It was Margaret who discovered Clement's hiding-place and sought him out, and begged him to leave the dismal hole he inhabited, and come to the vacant vicarage.

"My beloved," said he, with a strange mixture of tenderness and dogged resolution, "I bless thee for giving me one more sight of thy sweet face, and may G.o.d forgive thee, and bless thee, for destroying in a minute the holy place it hath taken six months of solitude to build. I am a priest, a monk, and though my heart break I must be firm. My poor Margaret, I seem cruel; yet I am kind; 'tis best we part; ay, this moment."

But Margaret went away, and, determined to drive Clement from his hermitage, returned again with their child, which she left in the cell in its owner's absence. Now, Clement was fond of children, and, thinking the infant had been deserted by some unfortunate mother, he at once set to work to comfort it.

"Now bless thee, bless thee sweet innocent! I would not change thee for e'en a cherub in heaven," said Clement. Soon the child was nestling in the hermit's arms.

"I ikes oo," said the little boy. "Ot is oo? Is oo a man?"

"Ay, little heart, and a great sinner to boot"

"I ikes great tingers. Ting one a tory."

Clement chanted a child's story in a sort of recitative. The boy listened with rapture, and presently succ.u.mbed to sleep.

Clement began to rock his new treasure in his arms, and to crone over him a little lullaby well known in Tergon, with which his own mother had often set him off.

He sighed deeply, and could not help thinking what might have been but for a piece of paper with a lie in it.

The next moment the moonlight burst into his cell, and with it, and in it, Margaret Brandt was down at his knee with a timorous hand upon his shoulder.

"Gerald, you do not reject us. You cannot."

The hermit stared from the child to her in throbbing amazement.

"Us?" he gasped at last.

Margaret was surprised in her turn.

"What!" she cried. "Doth not a father know his own child? Fie, Gerard, to pretend! 'Tis thine own flesh and blood thou holdest to thine heart."

Long they sat and talked that night, and the end of it was Clement promised to leave his cave for the manse at Gouda. But once the new vicar was installed Margaret kept away from the parsonage. She left little Gerard there to complete the conquest her maternal heart ascribed to him, and contented herself with stolen meetings with her child.

Then the new vicar of Gouda, his beard close shaved, and in a grey frock and large felt hat, came to bring her to the vicarage.

"My sweet Margaret!" he cried. "Why is this? Why hold you aloof from your own good deed? We have been waiting and waiting for you every day, and no Margaret."

And Margaret went to the manse, and found Catherine, Clement's mother, there; and next day being Sunday the two women heard the Vicar of Gouda preach in his own church. It was crammed with persons, who came curious, but remained. Never was Clement's gift as a preacher displayed more powerfully. In a single sermon, which lasted two hours, and seemed to last but twenty minutes, he declared the whole scripture.

The two women in a corner sat entranced, with streaming eyes.

As soon as they were by themselves, Margaret threw her arms round Catherine's neck and kissed her.

"Mother, mother, I am not quite a happy woman, but oh! I am a proud one."

And she vowed on her knees never by word or deed to let her love come between this young saint and heaven.

The child, who lived to become the great Erasmus, was already winning a famous name at school, when Margaret was stricken with the plague and died. A fortnight later and Clement left his vicarage and entered the Dominican convent to end life as he began it. A few days later and he, too, was dead, and the convent counted him a saint.

SAMUEL RICHARDSON

Pamela

Samuel Richardson, the son of a joiner, was born at some place not identified in Derbyshire, England, 1689. After serving an apprenticeship to a stationer, he entered a printing office as compositor and corrector of the press. In 1719 Richardson, whose career throughout was that of the industrious apprentice, took up his freedom, and began business as printer and stationer in Salisbury Court, London. Success attended his venture; he soon published a newspaper, and also obtained the printing of the journals of the House of Commons. "Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded," was written as the result of a suggestion by two booksellers that Richardson should compose a volume of familiar letters for illiterate country folk. It was published towards the end of 1740, and its vogue, in an age particularly coa.r.s.e and robust, was extraordinary. Of the many who ridiculed his performance the most noteworthy was Fielding, who produced what Richardson and his friends regarded as the "lewd and ungenerous engraftment of 'Joseph Andrews.'" The story has many faults, but the portrayal of Pamela herself is accomplished with the success of a master hand. Richardson died July 4, 1761.

_I.--Pamela to her Parents_

MY DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER,--I have great trouble, and some comfort, to acquaint you with. The trouble is that my good lady died of the illness I mention'd to you, and left us all griev'd for the loss of her; for she was a dear good lady, and kind to all us her servants. Much I fear'd, that as I was taken by her ladyship to wait upon her person, I should be quite dest.i.tute again, and forc'd to return to you and my poor mother, who have enough to do to maintain yourselves; and, as my lady's goodness had put me to write and cast accounts, and made me a little expert at my needle, and otherwise qualify'd above my degree, it was not every family that could have found a place that your poor Pamela was fit for. But G.o.d, whose graciousness to us we have so often experienc'd, put it into my good lady's heart, on her death-bed, just an hour before she expir'd, to recommend to my young master all her servants, one by one; and when it came to my turn to be recommended (for I was sobbing and crying at her pillow) she could only say, "My dear son!" and so broke off a little; and then recovering--"remember my poor Pamela!" and those were some of her last words! O, how my eyes overflow! Don't wonder to see the paper so blotted!

Well, but G.o.d's will must be done, and so comes the comfort, that I shall not be obliged to return back to be a burden to my dear parents!

For my master said, "I will take care of you all, my good maidens; and for you, Pamela (and took me by the hand before them all), for my dear mother's sake I will be a friend to you, and you shall take care of my linen." G.o.d bless him! and pray with me, my dear father and mother, for a blessing upon him, for he has given mourning and a year's wages to all my lady's servants; and I, having no wages as yet, my lady having said she would do for me as I deserv'd, ordered the housekeeper to give me mourning with the rest, and gave me with his own hand four guineas and some silver, which were in my lady's pocket when she died; and said if I was a good girl, and faithful and diligent, he would be a friend to me, for his mother's sake. And so I send you these four guineas for your comfort. I send them by John, our footman, who goes your way; but he does not know what he carries; because I seal them up in one of the little pill-boxes which my lady had, wrapp'd close in paper, that they may not c.h.i.n.k, and be sure don't open it before him.

Pray for your Pamela; who will ever be--

Your dutiful Daughter.

I have been scared out of my senses, for just now, as I was folding up this letter in my lady's dressing-room, in comes my young master! Good sirs, how I was frightened! I went to hide the letter in my bosom, and he, seeing me tremble, said smiling, "To whom have you been writing, Pamela?" I said, in my confusion, "Pray your honour, forgive me! Only to my father and mother." "Well, then, let me see what a hand you write."

He took it without saying more, and read it quite through, and then gave it me again. He was not angry, for he took me by the hand and said, "You are a good girl to be kind to your aged father and mother; tho' you ought to be wary what tales you send out of a family." And then he said, "Why, Pamela, you write a pretty hand, and _spell_ very well, too. You may look into any of my mother's books to improve yourself, so you take care of them."

But I am making another long letter, so will only add to it, that I shall ever be your dutiful daughter.