The Forest Lovers | Page 9

then show love to the Saints and give God honour, Lord
Abbot, by helping you swing your villeins? Pit and gallows, pillory and
tumbril! You go too far."
"Dear lady," said he, "I go no further, if I have them, than my Sisters of
Gracedieu. That hedged community of Christ's brides hath all these
commodities and more, even the paramount privilege of Sanctuary,
which is an appanage of the very highest in the Holy Fold. And I must
consider it as scarcely decent, as (by the Mass) not seemly at all, that
your Holy Thorn, this sainted sprig of your planting, should lack the
power to prick. Our people, madam, do indeed expect it. It is not much.
Nay!"--for he saw his Lady frown and heard her toe-taps
again--"indeed, it is not much. A little pit for your female thief to swim
at large, for your witch and bringer-in of hell's ordinances; a decent
gallows a-top for your proper male rascal; a pillory for your tenderer
blossom of sin while he qualify for an airy crown, or find space for
repentance and the fruits of true contrition; lastly, a persuasive tumbril,
a close lover for your incorrigible wanton girls--homely chastisement
such as a father Abbot may bestow, and yet wear a comely face, and
yet be loved by those he chasteneth. Madam, is this too much for so
great a charge as ours? We of Holy Thorn nurture the good seed with
scant fortune, being ridden down by evil livers, deer-stealers, notorious
persons, scandalous persons. A little pit, therefore! a little limber
gallows!"
But the Countess mused with her hand to her chin, by no means
persuaded. She was still a young woman, and a very lonely one; her
great prerogatives (which she took seriously) tired her to death, but the
need of exercising them through other people was worst of all. Now she

said doubtfully, "I have no reason in especial to trust you, Abbot."
The Abbot, who knew better than she how true this was, bit his lip and
remained silent. He was a very comely man and leaned much to
persuasion, particularly with women. He was always his own audience:
the check, therefore, amounted to exposure, almost put him to open
shame. The Countess went on to ask, who in particular of his villeins
he had dread of, who was turbulent, who a deer-stealer, who notorious
as a witch or wise woman, who wanton and a scandalous liver? And
here the Abbot was apt with his names. There was Red Sweyn, half an
outlaw already, and by far too handy with his hunting-knife; there was
Pinwell, as merry a little rogue as ever spoiled for a cord. There were
Rogerson and Cutlaw; there was Tom Sibby, the procuress. Mald also,
a withered malignant old wife, who had once blighted a year's increase
by her dealing with the devil. Here was stuff for gallows, pit and pillory,
all dropping-ripe for the trick. For tumbril, he went on (watching his
adversary like a cat), "who so proper as black-haired Isoult, witch, and
daughter of a witch, called by men Isoult la Desirous--and a gaunt,
half-starved, loose-legged baggage she is," he went on; "reputed of vile
conversation for all the slimness of her years--witch, and a witch's
brat."
He looked sideways at the great lady as he spoke of this creature, and
saw that all was going exactly as he would wish it. He had not been the
Countess' confessor for nothing, nor had he learnt in vain the story of
her secret marriage with Fulk de Bréauté, and of the murder of this
youth on Spurnt Heath one blowy Bartlemy Eve. And for this reason he
had dared to bring the name of Isoult into his catalogue of rogues, that
he knew his woman, and all woman-kind; how they hate most in their
neighbours that which they are tenderest of in themselves. Let there be
no mistake here. The Countess had been no luxurious liver, though a
most unhappy one. The truth is that, beautiful woman as she still was,
she had been a yet more beautiful girl, Countess of Hauterive in her
own right, and as such betrothed to the great Earl Roger of March and
Bellesme. Earl Roger, who was more than double her age, went out to
fight; she stayed at home, in the nursery or near it, and Fulk de Bréauté
came to make eyes. These he made with such efficacy that Isabel lost

her heart first and her head afterwards, wedded Fulk in secret, bore him
a child, and was the indirect means of his stabbing by the Earl's men as
he was riding through the dark over Spurnt Heath. The child was given
to the Abbot's keeping (whence it promptly and conveniently vanished),
the Countess