Grisly Grisell; Or, The Laidly Lady of Whitburn: A Tale of the Wars of the Roses by - (summer reads .TXT) 📕

the last time, and bade her farewell with a kiss on her forehead, and a charge to Sister Avice to watch her well, and be tender with her.  Indeed no one could look at Sister Avice’s gentle face and think there was much need of the charge.

Sister Avice was one of the women who seem to be especially born for the gentlest tasks of womanhood.  She might have been an excellent wife and mother, but from the very hour of her birth she had been vowed to be a nun in gratitude on her mother’s part for her father’s safety at Agincourt.  She had been placed at Wilton when almost a baby, and had never gone farther from it than on very rare occasions to the Cathedral at Salisbury; but she had grown up with a wonderful instinct for nursing and healing, and had a curious insight into the properties of herbs, as well as a soft deft hand and touch, so that for some years she had been sister infirmarer, and moreover the sick were often brought to the gates for her counsel, treatment, or, as some believed, even her healing touch.

When Grisell awoke she was alone in the long, large, low room, which was really built over the Norman cloister.  The walls were of pale creamy stone, but at the end where she lay there were hangings of faded tapestry.  At one end there was a window, through the thick glass of which could be dimly seen, as Grisell raised herself a little, beautiful trees, and the splendid spire of the Cathedral rising, as she dreamily thought, like a finger pointing upwards.  Nearer were several more narrow windows along the side of the room, and that beside her bed had the lattice open, so that she saw a sloping green bank, with a river at the foot; and there was a trim garden between.  Opposite to her there seemed to be another window with a curtain drawn across it, through which came what perhaps had wakened her, a low, clear murmuring tone, pausing and broken by the full, sweet, if rather shrill response in women’s voices.  Beneath that window was a little altar, with a crucifix and two candlesticks, a holy-water stoup by the side, and there was above the little deep window a carving of the Blessed Virgin with the Holy Child, on either side a niche, one with a figure of a nun holding a taper, the other of a bishop with a book.

Grisell might have begun crying again at finding herself alone, but the sweet chanting lulled her, and she lay back on her pillows, half dozing but quite content, except that the wound on her neck felt stiff and dry; and by and by when the chanting ceased, the kind nun, with a lay sister, came back again carrying water and other appliances, at sight of which Grisell shuddered, for Master Miles never touched her without putting her to pain.

“Benedicite, my little maid, thou art awake,” said Sister Avice.  “I thought thou wouldst sleep till the vespers were ended.  Now let us dress these sad wounds of thine, and thou shalt sleep again.”

Grisell submitted, as she knew she must, but to her surprise Sister Avice’s touch was as soft and soothing as were her words, and the ointment she applied was fragrant and delicious and did not burn or hurt her.

She looked up gratefully, and murmured her thanks, and then the evening meal was brought in, and she sat up to partake of it on the seat of the window looking out on the Cathedral spire.  It was a milk posset far more nicely flavoured than what she had been used to at Amesbury, where, in spite of the Countess’s kindness, the master cook had grown tired of any special service for the Dacre wench; and unless Margaret of York secured fruit for her, she was apt to be regaled with only the scraps that Maudlin managed to cater for her after the meals were over.

After that, Sister Avice gently undressed her, took care that she said her prayers, and sat by her till she fell asleep, herself telling her that she should sleep beside her, and that she would hear the voices of the sisters singing in the chapel their matins and lauds.  Grisell did hear them, as in a dream, but she had not slept so well since her disaster as she slept on that night.

p. 46CHAPTER V
SISTER AVICE

Love, to her ear, was but a name
Combined with vanity and shame;
Her hopes, her fears, her joys, were all
Bounded within the cloister wall.

Scott, Marmion.

Sister Avice sat in the infirmary, diligently picking the leaves off a large mass of wood-sorrel which had been brought to her by the children around, to make therewith a conserve.

Grisell lay on her couch.  She had been dressed, and had knelt at the window, where the curtain was drawn back while mass was said by the Chaplain, the nuns kneeling in their order and making their responses.  It was a low-browed chapel of Norman or even older days, with circular arches and heavy round piers, and so dark that the gleam of the candles was needed to light it.

Grisell watched, till tired with kneeling she went back to her couch, slept a little, and then wondered to see Sister Avice still compounding her simples.

She moved wearily, and sighed for Madge to come in and tell her all the news of Amesbury—who was riding at the ring, or who had shot the best bolt, or who had had her work picked out as not neat or well shaded enough.

Sister Avice came and shook up her pillow, and gave her a dried plum and a little milk, and began to talk to her.

“You will soon be better,” she said, “and then you will be able to play in the garden.”

“Is there any playfellow for me?” asked Grisell.

“There is a little maid from Bemerton, who comes daily to learn her hornbook and her sampler.  Mayhap she will stay and play with you.”

“I had Madge at Amesbury; I shall love no one as well as Madge!  See what she gave me.”

Grisell displayed her pouncet box, which was duly admired, and then she asked wearily whether she should always have to stay in the convent.

“Oh no, not of need,” said the sister.  “Many a maiden who has been here for a time has gone out into the world, but some love this home the best, as I have done.”

“Did yonder nun on the wall?” asked Grisell.

“Yea, truly.  She was bred here, and never left it, though she was a King’s daughter.  Edith was her name, and two days after Holy Cross day we shall keep her feast.  Shall I tell you her story?”

“Prithee, prithee!” exclaimed Grisell.  “I love a tale dearly.”

Sister Avice told the legend, how St. Edith grew in love and tenderness at Wilton, and how she loved the gliding river and the flowers in the garden, and how all loved her, her young playmates especially.  She promised one who went away to be wedded that she would be godmother to her first little daughter, but ere the daughter was born the saintly Edith had died.  The babe was carried to be christened in the font at Winchester Cathedral, and by a great and holy man, no other than Alphegius, who was then Bishop of Winchester, but was made Archbishop of Canterbury, and died a holy martyr.

“Then,” said Sister Avice, “there was a great marvel, for among the sponsors around the square black font there stood another figure in the dress of our Mother Abbess, and as the Bishop spake and said, “Bear this taper, in token that thy lamp shall be alight when the Bridegroom cometh,” the form held the torch, shining bright, clear, and like no candle or light on earth ever shone, and the face was the face of the holy Edith.  It is even said that she held the babe, but that I know not, being a spirit without a body, but she spake the name, her own name Edith.  And when the holy rite was over, she had vanished away.”

“And that is she, with the lamp in her hand?  Oh, I should have been afraid!” cried Grisell.

“Not of the holy soul?” said the sister.

“Oh!  I hope she will never come in here, by the little window into the church,” cried Grisell trembling.

Indeed, for some time, in spite of all Sister Avice could say, Grisell could not at night be free from the fear of a visit from St. Edith, who, as she was told, slept her long sleep in the church below.  It may be feared that one chief reliance was on the fact that she could not be holy enough for a vision of the Saint, but this was not so valuable to her as the touch of Sister Avice’s kind hand, or the very knowing her present.

That story was the prelude to many more.  Grisell wanted to hear it over again, and then who was the Archbishop martyr, and who were the Virgins in memory of whom the lamps were carried.  Both these, and many another history, parable, or legend were told her by Sister Avice, training her soul, throughout the long recovery, which was still very slow, but was becoming more confirmed every day.  Grisell could use her eye, turn her head, and the wounds closed healthily under the sister’s treatment without showing symptoms of breaking out afresh; and she grew in strength likewise, first taking a walk in the trim garden and orchard, and by and by being pronounced able to join the other girl scholars of the convent.  Only here was the first demur.  Her looks did not recover with her health.  She remained with a much-seamed neck, and a terrible scar across each cheek, on one side purple, and her eyebrows were entirely gone.

She seemed to have forgotten the matter while she was entirely in the infirmary, with no companion but Sister Avice, and occasionally a lay sister, who came to help; but the first time she went down the turret stair into the cloister—a beautiful succession of arches round a green court—she met a novice and a girl about her own age; the elder gave a little scream at the sight and ran away.

The other hung back.  “Mary, come hither,” said Sister Avice.  “This is Grisell Dacre, who hath suffered so much.  Wilt thou not come and kiss and welcome her?”

Mary came forward rather reluctantly, but Grisell drew up her head within, “Oh, if you had liefer not!” and turned her back on the girl.

Sister Avice followed as Grisell walked away as fast as her weakness allowed, and found her sitting breathless at the third step on the stairs.

“Oh, no—go away—don’t bring her.  Every one will hate me,” sobbed the poor child.

Avice could only gather her into her arms, though embraces were against the strict rule of Benedictine nuns, and soothe and coax her to believe that by one at least she was not hated.

“I had forgotten,” said Grisell.  “I saw myself once at Amesbury! but my face was not well then.  Let me see again, sister!  Where’s a mirror?”

“Ah! my child, we nuns are not allowed the use of worldly things like mirrors; I never saw one in my life.”

“But oh, for pity’s sake, tell me what like am I.  Am I so loathly?”

“Nay, my dear maid, I love thee too well to think of aught save that thou art mine own little one, given back to us by the will of Heaven.  Aye, and so will others think of thee, if thou art good and loving to them.”

“Nay, nay, none will ever love me!  All will hate and flee from me, as from a basilisk or cockatrice, or the Loathly Worm of Spindlesheugh,” sobbed Grisell.

“Then, my maid, thou must win them back by thy sweet words and kind deeds.  They are better than looks.  And here too they shall soon think only of what thou art, not of what thou look’st.”

“But know you, sister, how—how I should have been married to Leonard Copeland, the very youth that did me this despite, and he is fair and beauteous as a very angel, and I did love him so, and now he and his father rid away from Amesbury, and left me because I am so foul to see,” cried Grisell, between her sobs.

“If they could treat thee thus despiteously, he would surely not have made thee a good husband,” reasoned the sister.

“But I shall never have a husband now,” wailed Grisell.

“Belike not,” said Sister Avice; “but, my sweetheart, there is better peace and rest and cheer in such a home as this holy house, than in the toils and labours of the world.  When my sisters at Dunbridge and Dinton come to see me they look old and careworn, and are full of tales of the turmoil and trouble of husbands, and sons, and dues, and tenants’ fees, and villeins, and I know