Charles Reade

“ The mind of one who has led a quiet, uneventful life, is not apt to take in contradictory feelings at the same moment and balance them, but rather to be overpowered by each in turn. While Gerard was with the countess, the excitement of so new a situation, the unlooked-for promise, the joy and pride it would cause at home, possessed him wholly: but now it was passion's turn to be heard again. What, give up Margaret, whose soft hand he still felt in his, and her deep eyes in his heart? ”

“ What is your opinion?”
“No! that is all a silly old song,” explained Gerard. “’Tis a byword our elders keep repeating out of custom—it is not true.”
“How can you know? you are but a child,” said Margaret, with pensive dignity.
“Why only look round! And then I thought I had lost you—for ever; and you are by my side: and now the minstrels are going to play again. Sin and misery? Stuff and nonsense!”
“What do you admire most of all these beautiful things, Gerard?”
“You know my name? How is that?”
“White magic. I am a witch.”
“Angels are never witches. ”

“ And it was a relief to them when the dessert came and the valets retired a few steps, and they could talk without being overheard. But there is a delicate kind of sensuality, to whose influence these two were perhaps more sensitive than any other pair in that assembly; the delights of colour, music, and perfume, all of which blended so fascinatingly here.
Margaret leaned back and half closed her eyes, and murmured to Gerard: “What a lovely scene! the warm sun, the green shade, the rich dresses, the bright music of the lutes and the cool music of the fountain, and all faces so happy and gay! ”

“ At the foot of the tower stood a thing in white, that looked exactly like the figure of a female. Gerard and Margaret palpitated with awe.
“The rope—the rope! It is going up the rope—not the wall,” gasped Gerard.
As they gazed, the glow-worm disappeared in Gerard’s late prison, but its light illuminated the cell inside and reddened the window. The white figure stood motionless below. Such as can retain their senses after the first prostrating effect of the supernatural, are apt to experience terror in one of its strangest forms, a wild desire to fling themselves upon the terrible object. ”

“ Argus! what eyes! so bright, so blood-shot, so threatening—they followed a man and his every movement. But, indeed, I need the pencil of my artist associate to make you see the two gilt valets on the opposite side of the table putting the monster down before our friends, with a smiling, self-satisfied, benevolent obsequiousness—for this ghastly monster was the flower of all comestibles; old Peter clasping both hands in pious admiration of it; Margaret wheeling round with horror-stricken eyes and her hand on Gerard’s shoulder, squeaking and pinching ”

“ The Duke’s minstrels swept their lutes at intervals, and a fountain played red Burgundy in six jets that met and battled in the air. The evening sun darted its fires through those bright and purple wine spouts, making them jets and cascades of molten rubies, then passing on, tinged with the blood of the grape, shed crimson glories here and there on fair faces, snowy beards, velvet, satin, jewelled hilts, glowing gold, gleaming silver, and sparkling glass. Gerard and his friends stood dazzled, spell bound. Presently a whisper buzzed round them, “Salute the Duke! Salute the Duke!” ”

“ But as the olive branches shot up, and the parents grew older, and saw with their own eyes the fate of large families, misgivings and care mingled with their love. They belonged to a singularly wise and provident people: in Holland reckless parents were as rare as disobedient children. So now when the huge loaf came in on a gigantic trencher, looking like a fortress in its moat, and, the tour of the table once made, seemed to have melted away, Gerard and Catherine would look at one another and say, “Who is to find bread for them all when we are gone?” ”

“ Going to the box to take out instead of putting in—it is like going to my heart with a knife for so many drops of blood. You will be sure to want it, Gerard. The house is never built for less than the builder counted on."
Sure enough, when the time came, Gerard longed to go to Rotterdam and see the Duke, and above all to see the work of his competitors, and so get a lesson from defeat. And the crown came out of the housewife’s pocket with a very good grace. Gerard would soon be a priest. It seemed hard if he might not enjoy the world a little before separating himself from it for life. ”

“ When three run in company, the pace is that of the slowest of the three. From Peter’s house to the edge of the forest Gerard ran Margaret’s pace; but now he ran his own; for the mule was fleet, and could have left them all far behind. Moreover, youth and chaste living began to tell. Daylight grew imperceptibly between the hunted ones and the hunters. Then Dierich made a desperate effort, and gained two yards; but in a few seconds Gerard had stolen them quickly back. The pursuers began to curse.
Martin heard, and his face lighted up. “Courage, Gerard! courage, brave lad! they are straggling.” ”

“ Heed her not! “That God takes from us still seems better than what he spares to us: that is to say, men are by nature unthankful—and women silly.”
“And I say Richart and Jacob were the flower of the flock,” sobbed Catherine.
The little coffer was empty again, and to fill it they gathered like ants. In those days speculation was pretty much confined to the card-and-dice business. Gerard knew no way to wealth but the slow and sure one. “A penny saved is a penny gained,” was his humble creed. ”

“ Gerard turned red with anger, the more so as the others began to titter. White Catherine saw, and a pink tinge just perceptible came to her cheek. She said softly,” Why do you laugh? Is it because he is our brother you think he cannot be capable. Yes, Gerard, try with the rest. Many say you are skilful; and mother and I will pray the Virgin to guide your hand."
“Thank you, little Kate. You shall pray to our Lady, and our mother shall buy vellum and the colours to illuminate with.” ”

“ And these new and exquisite sensations Margaret unwittingly prolonged: it is not natural to her sex to hurry aught that pertains to the sacred toilet. Nay, when the taper fingers had at last subjugated the ends of the knot, her mind was not quite easy, till, by a manœuvre peculiar to the female hand, she had made her palm convex, and so applied it with a gentle pressure to the centre of the knot—a sweet little coaxing hand-kiss, as much as to say, “Now be a good knot, and stay as you are.” ”

“ They entered Rotterdam by the Schiedamze Poort; and, as Gerard was unacquainted with the town, Peter directed him the way to the Hooch Straet, in which the Stadthouse was. He himself was going with Margaret to his cousin, in the Ooster Waagen Straet; so almost on entering the gate, their roads lay apart. They bade each other a friendly adieu, and Gerard dived into the great town. A profound, an aching sense of solitude, fell upon him, yet the streets were crowded. ”

“ Not a creature to be seen, not even Peter. They went up-stairs, and then suddenly one of the men gave a shout, and pointed through Peter’s window, which was open. The others looked, and there, at some little distance, walking quietly across the fields with Margaret and Martin, was the man they sought.
Ghysbrecht, with an exulting yell, descended the stairs, and flung himself on his mule; and he and his men set off in hot pursuit. ”

“ There was a crowd of persons at the gate endeavouring to soften this official rock. They came up in turn like ripples, and retired to make way for others equally unsuccessful. It cost Gerard a struggle to get near him, and when he got within four heads of the gate, he saw something that made his heart beat: there was Peter, with Margaret on his arm, soliciting humbly for entrance. ”

“ There are black sheep in nearly every large family: and these two were Gerard’s black brothers. Idleness is vitiating: waiting for the death of those we ought to love is vitiating: and these two one-idead curs were ready to tear any one to death that should interfere with that miserable inheritance, which was their thought by day and their dream by night. ”

“ The sun was peeping above the horizon as they crossed the stony field and made for the wood. They had crossed about half, when Margaret, who kept nervously looking back every now and then, uttered a cry, and, following her instinct, began to run towards the wood, screaming with terror all the way. ”

“ Margaret had declined Italy. She could not leave her father; he was too learned and too helpless. But it was settled they should retire into Flanders for a few weeks until the storm should be blown over at Tergou. The curé did not keep them waiting long, though it seemed an age. Presently he stood at the altar, and called them to him. They went hand in hand, the happiest in Holland. The curé opened his book.
But ere he had uttered a single word of the sacred rite, a harsh voice cried “Forbear!” And the constables of Tergou came up the aisle and seized Gerard in the name of the law. ”

“ So, while the English gentry, in velvet jerkins and chicken-toed shoes, trode floors of stale rushes, foul receptacle of bones, decomposing morsels, spittle, dogs’ eggs, and all abominations, this hosier’s sitting-room at Tergou was floored with Dutch tiles, so highly glazed and constantly washed, that you could eat off them. There was one large window; the cross stone-work in the centre of it was very massive, and stood in relief, looking like an actual cross to the inmates, and was eyed as such in their devotions. ”

“ When a man misbehaves, the effect is curious on a girl who loves him sincerely. It makes her pity him. This, to some of us males, seems anything but logical. The fault is in our own eye, the logic is too swift for us. The girl argues thus:—“How unhappy, how vexed, poor * * * must be; him to misbehave!”
Margaret was full of this sweet womanly pity, when, to her great surprise, scarce an hour and a half after he left her, Gerard came running back to her with the fragments of a picture in his hand, and panting with anger and grief. ”

“ Gerard, and Catherine his wife, lived in the little town of Tergou. He traded, wholesale and retail, in cloth, silk, brown holland, and, above all, in curried leather, a material highly valued by the middling people, because it would stand twenty years’ wear, and turn a knife if not fresh sharpened; no small virtue in a jerkin of that century, in which folk were so liberal of their steel: even at dinner a man would leave his meat awhile, and carve you his neighbour, on a very moderate difference of opinion. ”

“ And Margaret smiled slily.
“Ay, ay!” said the old man: “but my poor bones are stiff, and indeed the fire is too hot for a body to kneel over with these short straws. St. John the Baptist! but the young man is adroit.”
For, while he stated his difficulty, Gerard removed it. He untied in a moment the knot on his breast, took his hat off his back, put three stones into the corner, then, wrapping his hand in the tail of his jerkin, whipped the flask off the fire, wedged it in between the stones, and put the hat under the old man’s nose with a merry smile. ”

“ A benefice will do to begin your career with; and I must take care it is not too far from—what call you the place?”
“Tergou, madam.”
“A priest gives up much,” continued the countess; “often, I fear, he learns too late how much:” and her woman’s eye rested a moment on Gerard with mild pity and half surprise at his resigning her sex, and all the heaven they can bestow, and the great parental joys: “at least you shall be near your friends. Have you a mother ?” ”

“ For this was a century in which the fine arts and the higher mechanical arts were not separated by any distinct boundary, nor were those who practised them: and it was an age in which artists sought out and loved one another. Should this last statement stagger a painter or writer of our day, let me remind him that Christians loved one another at first starting.
Backed by an acquaintance so venerable, and strengthened by female sympathy, Gerard advanced in learning and skill. ”

“ At this moment, who should come bounding up but Gerard. He had two straws in his hand, and he threw himself down by the fire, and relieved Margaret of the cooking part: then suddenly recognising the Burgomaster, he coloured all over. Ghysbrecht Van Swieten started and glared at him, and took his hand out of his purse. “Oh,” said he bitterly, “I am not wanted:” and went slowly on, casting along look of suspicion on Margaret, and hostility on Gerard, that was not very intelligible. However, there was something about it that Margaret could read enough to blush at, and almost toss her head. ”

“ Towards the tail of the pageant rode one that excited more attention still—the duke’s leopard. A huntsman mounted on a Flemish horse of prodigious size and power carried a long box fastened to the rider’s loins by straps curiously contrived, and on this box sat a huge leopard crouching. She was chained to the huntsman. The people admired her glossy hide and spots, and pressed near, and one or two were for feeling her, and pulling her tail; then the huntsman shouted in a terrible voice, “Beware! At Antwerp one did but throw a handful of dust at her, and the duke made dust of him.” ”

“ As Gerard was long in coming, the patient Hans—his employer’s eye being no longer on him—“tandem custode remoto,” improved the time by quaffing solemnly, silently, and at short but accurately measured intervals, goblets of Corsican wine. The wine was strong, so was Cloterman’s head: and it was not until Gerard had been gone a good hour the model secretary had imbibed the notion that creation expected of Cloterman to drink the health of all good fellows, and “nommément” of the Duke of Burgundy there present. ”