The Monastery by Walter Scott (free novels to read .txt) 📖

“You drive me beyond my patience,” said the Euphuist, “even as the over-driven ox is urged into madness!—What can I tell you of a young fellow whom I have not seen since the second hour after sunrise?”

“But can you explain in what circumstances you parted with him?” said the monk.

“What are the circumstances, in the devil's name, which you desire should be explained?—for although I protest against this constraint as alike unworthy and inhospitable, yet would I willingly end this fray, provided that by words it may be ended,” said the knight.

“If these end it not,” said Edward, “blows shall, and that full speedily.”

“Peace, impatient boy!” said the Sub-Prior; “and do you, Sir Piercie Shafton, acquaint me why the ground is bloody by the verge of the fountain in Corri-nan-shian, where, as you say yourself, you parted from Halbert Glendinning?”

Resolute not to avow his defeat if possibly he could avoid it, the knight answered in a haughty tone, that he supposed it was no unusual thing to find the turf bloody where hunters had slain a deer.

“And did you bury your game as well as kill it?” said the monk. “We must know from you who is the tenant of that grave, that newly-made grave, beside the very fountain whose margin is so deeply crimsoned with blood?—thou seest thou canst not evade me; therefore be ingenuous, and tell us the fate of this unhappy youth, whose body is doubtless lying under that bloody turf.”

“If it be,” said Sir Piercie, “they must have buried him alive; for I swear to thee, reverend father, that this rustic juvenal parted from me in perfect health. Let the grave be searched, and if his body be found, then deal with me as ye list.”

“It is not my sphere to determine thy fate, Sir Knight, but that of the Lord Abbot, and the right reverend Chapter. It is but my duty to collect such information as may best possess their wisdom with the matters which have chanced.”

“Might I presume so far, reverend father,” said the knight, “I should wish to know the author and evidence of all these suspicions, so unfoundedly urged against me?”

“It is soon told,” said the Sub-Prior; “nor do I wish to disguise it, if it can avail you in your defence. This maiden, Mary Avenel, apprehending that you nourished malice against her foster-brother under a friendly brow, did advisedly send up the old man, Martin Tacket, to follow your footsteps and to prevent mischief. But it seems that your evil passions had outrun precaution: for when he came to the spot, guided by your footsteps upon the dew, he found but the bloody turf and the new covered grave; and after long and vain search through the wilds after Halbert and yourself, he brought back the sorrowful news to her who had sent him.”

“Saw he not my doublet, I pray you?” said Sir Piercie; “for when I came to myself, I found that I was wrapped in my cloak, but without my under garment as your reverence may observe.”

So saying, he opened his cloak, forgetting, with his characteristical inconsistency, that he showed his shirt stained with blood.

“How! cruel man,” said the monk, when he observed this confirmation of his suspicions; “wilt thou deny the guilt, even while thou bearest on thy person the blood thou hast shed?—Wilt thou longer deny that thy rash hand has robbed a mother of a son, our community of a vassal, the Queen of Scotland of a liege subject? and what canst thou expect, but that, at the least, we deliver thee up to England, as undeserving our farther protection?”

“By the Saints!” said the knight, now driven to extremity, “if this blood be the witness against me, it is but rebel blood, since this morning at sunrise it flowed within my own veins.”

“How were that possible, Sir Piercie Shafton,” said the monk, “since I see no wound from whence it can have flowed?”

“That,” said the knight, “is the most mysterious part of the transaction—See here!”

So saying, he undid his shirt collar, and, opening his bosom, showed the spot through—which Halbert's sword had passed, but already cicatrized, and bearing the appearance of a wound lately healed.

“This exhausts my patience, Sir Knight,” said the Sub-Prior, “and is adding insult to violence and injury. Do you hold me for a child or an idiot, that you pretend to make me believe that the fresh blood with which your shirt is stained, flowed from a wound which has been healed for weeks or months? Unhappy mocker, thinkest thou thus to blind us? Too well do we know that it is the blood of your victim, wrestling with you in the desperate and mortal struggle, which has thus dyed your apparel.”

The knight, after a moment's recollection, said in reply, “I will be open with you, my father—bid these men stand out of ear-shot, and I will tell you all I know of this mysterious business; and muse not, good father, though it may pass thy wit to expound it, for I avouch to you it is too dark for mine own.”

The monk commanded Edward and the two men to withdraw, assuring the former that his conference with the prisoner should be brief, and giving him permission to keep watch at the door of the apartment; without which allowance he might, perhaps, have had some difficulty in procuring his absence. Edward had no sooner left the chamber, than he despatched messengers to one or two families of the Halidome, with whose sons his brother and he sometimes associated, to tell them that Halbert Glendinning had been murdered by an Englishman, and to require them to repair to the Tower of Glendearg without delay. The duty of revenge in such cases was held so sacred, that he had no reason to doubt they would instantly come with such assistance as would ensure the detention of the prisoner. He then locked the doors of the tower, both inner and outer, and also the gate of the court-yard. Having taken these precautions, he made a hasty visit to the females of the family, exhausting himself in efforts to console them, and in protestations that he would have vengeance for his murdered brother.