Part 6 (1/2)
She does come bringing bannuts,[12] for she knows I love to eat them!”
[12] Walnuts.
”My father,” Lily interposed, ”they say that the girl is here.”
”Well, indeed, now,” said David, ”let her come forth.”
Several women pushed a maiden into the middle of the ring formed by the a.s.sembly. She seemed to have been weeping, for her eyelids were flushed; she shook her dark hair over her face, and clutched her hands together and plucked at a ring she wore.
”Daughter,” said David, ”why do you torment and pester Cynyr son of Cyngen, a hermit seeking G.o.d?”
Her lips moved. Some thought she whispered hoa.r.s.ely:
”I do not!”
”Dost thou hate Cynyr?”
”I hate him in my heart!” cried she.
”I will hang him from yonder ash-tree,” said David with a mocking twinkle, ”to-morrow at dawn.”
”No, no!” she shrieked. ”Mercy, mercy! Holy David, there is cruel he is! Spare him--spare Cynyr----”
”Peace, woman!” David's face had become a mask of fury, but his voice was mellifluous. ”Nothing will thy tongue avail thee. Thou hast wrought devilish magic, and surely we shall slay thee as a witch!”
”Myn Duw!” shouted Cynyr the novice, tossing his arms on high. ”Do not so! I was mistaken--there is mad I have been. David has cleared the covering from my eyes! I love Indeg....”
”And thou, Indeg,” said David softly, ”dost thou love Cynyr?”
Said she, more softly still:
”I like him ... as well as I like any man.”
”Our Lord G.o.d lays hold upon His own,” cried David, ”and, Teilo, there is no need to grab souls for him. Rhaint mab Brychan, wilt thou adopt this Cynyr into thy tribe, when he shall have sojourned with thee the accustomed number of years? He will make a brave fighting-man, though not in the picked army of heaven.”
”Yes, indeed!” replied Rhaint the King. ”I am David's servant, to do his bidding.”
”Now, upon blessed Llywel's land, where he lived and died,” the saint continued, ”we will set a new church, and Llywel, Teilo, and I, we three, will own it in perpetuity. And of the three thou, Teilo, shalt have the pre-eminence. Willingly wilt thou fast forty days upon this spot, for our church's hallowing. A small omission troubles thy conscience, I know. Children,” turning from the Abbot of Llandaff to the man and woman before him, ”I would see all well with you before I depart. Give me thy ring, Indeg.”
She put her ring in the palm of David.
”It is not yet the noon-hour,” said he. ”Lily, where is my altar, and the other things I now require?”
”Here is your altar, my father,” was Lily's reply, ”and the sacred elements, look you!--ready for the swearing of oaths.”
He brought David's portable altar and placed it before him, and set bread and wine upon it.
David rose to his feet, and, supported by Teilo and Ismael, said ma.s.s as it was celebrated for a marriage.
”Cynyr,” said he in the British tongue, ”wilt thou have Indeg as thy wife?”
”Yes, yes!” Cynyr answered.
”And, Indeg, wilt thou have Cynyr as thy husband?”