Part 53 (2/2)
She turned sharply upon Sholto with a strip of paper in her outstretched hand.
”I think, young sir, that you have some reason to know from whom that comes.”
Sholto grasped at the writing with a new and wonderful hope in his heart. He knew instinctively before he touched it that none but Maud Lindesay could have written that script--small, clear, and distinct as a motto cut on a gem.
”_To our friends in France and Scotland,_” so it ran. ”_We are still safe this eve of the Blessed Saint Michael. Trust her who brings this letter. She is our saviour and our only hope in a dark and evil place.
She is sorry for that which by her aid hath been done. As you hope for forgiveness, forgive her. And for G.o.d's dear sake, do immediately the thing she bids you. This comes from Margaret de Douglas and Maud Lindesay. It is written by the hand of M. L._”
The wax at the bottom was sealed in double with the boar's head of Lindesay and the heart of Margaret of Douglas.
Sholto, having read the missive silently, pa.s.sed it to the Lord James that he might prove the seals, for it was his only learning to be skilled in heraldry.
”It is true,” he said; ”I myself gave the little maid that ring. See, it hath a piece broken from the peak of the device.”
”My lady,” said Sholto, ”that which you bring is more than enough. We kiss your hand and we will sacredly do all your bidding, were it unto the death or the trial by fire.”
Then, as was the custom to do to ladies whom knights would honour, the Lord James and Sholto kneeled down and kissed the hand of Sybilla de Thouars. But Malise, not being a knight, took it only and settled it upon his great grizzled head, where it rested for a moment, lightly as upon some grey and ancient tower lies a flake of snow before it melts.
”I thank you for your overmuch courtesy,” the girl said, casting her eyes on the ground with a new-born shyness most like that of a modest maid; ”I thank you, indeed. You do me honour far above my desert.
Still, after all, we work for one end. You have, it is true, the n.o.bler motive,--the lives of those you love; but I the deadlier,--the death of one I hate! Hearken!”
She paused as if to gather strength for that which she had to reveal, and then, reaching her hands out, she motioned the three men to gather more closely about her, as if the blue Atlantic waves or the red boles of the pine trees might carry the matter.
”Listen,” she said, ”the end comes fast--faster than any know, save I, to whom for my sins the gift of second sight hath been given. I who speak to you am of Brittany and of the House of De Thouars. To one of us in each generation descends this abhorred gift of second sight. And I, because as a child it was my lot to meet one wholly given over to evil, have seen more and clearer than all that have gone before me.
But now I do foresee the end of the wickedest and most devilish soul ever prisoned within the body of man.”
As she spoke the heads of the three Scots bent lower and closer to catch every word, for the voice of the Lady Sybilla was more like the cooing of a mating turtle as it answers its comrade than that of a woman betrayed, denouncing vengeance and death upon him whom her soul hated.
”Be of good heart, then, and depart as I shall bid you. None can help or hinder here at Machecoul but I alone. Be sure that at the worst the unnameable shall not happen to the maids. For in me there is the power to slay the evil-doer. But slay I will not unless it be to keep the lives of the maids. Because I desire for Gilles de Retz a fate greater, more terrible, more befitting iniquity such as the world hath never heard spoken of since it arose from the abyss.
”And this is it given to me to bring upon him whom my soul hateth,”
she went on. ”I have seen the hempen cord by which he shall hang. I have seen the fire through which his soul shall pa.s.s to its own place.
Through me this fate shall come upon him suddenly in one night.”
Her face lighted up with an inner glow, and shone translucent in the darkening of the day and the dusk of the trees, as if the fair veil of flesh wavered and changed about the vengeful soul within.
”And now,” she went on after a pause, ”I bid you, gentlemen of the house of Douglas, to depart to John, Duke of Brittany, and having found him to lay this paper before him. It contains the number and the names of those who have died in the castles of de Retz. It shows in what hidden places the bones of these slaughtered innocents may be found. Clamour in his ear for justice in the name of the King of France, and if he will not hear, then in the name of the folk of Brittany. And if still because of his kins.h.i.+p he will not listen, go to the Bishop of Nantes, who hates Gilles de Retz. Better than any he knows how to stir the people, and he will send with you trusty men to cause the country to rise in rebellion. Then they will overturn all the castles of de Retz, and the hidden things shall come to light.
This do, and for this time depart from Machecoul, and entrust me (as indeed you must) with the honour and lives of those you love. I will keep them with mine own until destruction pa.s.s upon him who is outcast from G.o.d, and whom now his own fiend from h.e.l.l hath deserted.”
Then, having sworn to do her bidding, the three Scots conducted the Lady Sybilla with honour and observance to her white palfrey, and like a spirit she vanished into the sea mists which had sifted up from the west, going back to the drear Castle of Machecoul, but bearing with her the burden of her revenge.
CHAPTER LIV
THE CROSS UNDER THE Ap.r.o.n
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