I. B. Stoughton Holborn

“ The tears were now running freely down the boy’s face, he took her hand in both his and smothered it with kisses. “Oh, Joan, Joan, my little Joan, how can I bear it? How can you really be dead and I alive? Why is the world so cruel? Oh, Joan, if only I could have died for you.”
Aline bent over and kissed him on the forehead. “She told me to give you that,” she said; then, after a pause, she went on;—“I am only a little girl and I do not pretend to understand things, Wilfred. But think, if you had died as you have been wishing, poor little Joan would have been as unhappy as you are now. ”

“ I hate a child I cannot trust,” she said in freezing tones.
“I have not been dishonourable, Mistress Mowbray. I never said that I would not go out. I was disobedient and I am sorry, but if Father was alive, he would not have liked me to be kept in doors; and I do not think Cousin Richard would approve,” she added with some boldness, as she knew it was really unjust and had no one to defend her.
At that moment Master Mowbray entered. “What is this, about ‘Cousin Richard’?” he exclaimed.
Aline was silent and Mistress Mowbray looked confused. ”

“ You could not fight her exactly. She was not worth fighting, so to speak.”
“But I always felt,” said Audry, “that behind the old woman, not in the old woman herself, was a power of evil and hate, a great power that could be fought.”
“Oh, yes, quite so. I think there are things to hate. I do not believe in sickly sentiment; but that poor wretched old woman in herself was rather a thing to be pitied than hated, and, now that I come to think of it, I never did meet any one really to hate.”
“What about Thomas?”
“That is just a case in point,” said Aline. ”

“ I have indeed made my sacrifice.
“All things work together for good, Aline,” he said aloud, “the forces of good must win in the end, but the powers of darkness are strong and the victory may be long delayed; yet it will come.”
“But the world is cruel, Father,” said Aline.
“Yes, my child, I know, and the world often seems to be victorious; but it is only victorious in the things of the world. ”

“ For a time the children forgot everything but themselves and Ian stood and watched them in their perfect happiness. Aline was very much taller than Joan and in contrast with the frail delicate child looked like a goddess of strength. Joan clung to her in ecstatic abandon and gazed into those wonderful ultramarine blue eyes as though they were the windows of heaven. “I never knew before what it was,” she said, “to be perfectly happy. Mistress Aline, I think the old folk at Holwick were right. You cannot be a child of ordinary flesh and blood like the rest of us.” ”

“ Ian was just going to steal away and leave them to their joy, it was so pure, so unalloyed, when Aline suddenly bethought herself of him and leaving little Joan she rushed forward, seized his hand with both her own and pressed it to her lips. “It was you who thought out all this; oh, you are good to me.”
She lifted up her face and he printed a kiss on her forehead. “No, princess; you remember my quotation from Homer. It is you that are good to me. I owe you everything—I do not mean mere physical life—that is nothing—nothing.” ”

“ Sometimes she would imagine herself as a great lady, sought after by all the noble knights of the land, but holding herself aloof with reserved dignity until one, by some deed of unusual distinction, should win her favour. As a rule, however, this seemed rather a dull part to play, though there was something naturally queenly in her nature, and she would therefore prefer something more active. She would take the old Scots romance of Burd Helen, or Burd Aline, as her own inspiration, and follow her knight in the disguise of a page over mountain and torrent and through every hardship. ”

“ Now if one could find some one really strong, really great and wicked, one could hate them. But no one of that sort has ever come my way.”
“Have you thought of Father Martin?”
“I did not hate him. I was afraid of him and I did not think him altogether a good man; but in the main he seemed to act up to his lights. Father Austin, I might have hated, perhaps; but I do not know enough about him. There is some one over there that I love,” she said suddenly, as Father Laurence appeared at the other end of the garden. “I think he is the best man I have ever seen.”
“Better than Ian?” asked Audry. ”

“ She turned to Thomas with the same frank smile to take his hand, “So you are going to stay with us, Thomas; I wonder whether you would be kind enough to help Mistress Audry to look after my falcon while I am ill.”
“Oh, yes, indeed, Mistress Aline,” he replied, “I shall never forget your kindness to me. May the Mother of God bless you for what you have done. We are all of us sinners and may God have mercy upon me.” He kneeled as he spoke and pressed her hand to his lips and added, “You may be sure that I shall always be ready to serve you to my dying day. ”

“ Little Joan will go as I said; and if we are safely rid of one you need not fear for the other. The stars in their courses fight on our side,” and she laughed an evil laugh. “There is no room in this world for your weak-minded gentle creatures, bah! cowards, worms, with their snivelling pity. Does nature feel pity when the field mouse is killed by the hawk? Does nature feel pity when a mother dies of the plague? ”

“ It was full of gold. “Yes,” she said, “money is a good thing, too. How little they know what ‘old Moll o’ the graves’ has got,—old, indeed, Moll is not old! Ah, could not that money tell some strange tales? Love and learning and self-control! Leave all that to the priests. Hate will do for me,—money and liberty are my gods.
“Aha, Aline Gillespie, you little fool, what do you mean by crossing my path? I was a pretty little girl once and you are not going to win the love of Upper Teesdale folk for nothing, I’ll warrant you.” ”

“ Suspicion would be roused tenfold if Aline were simply to disappear. John would certainly be seen, sooner or later, carrying food to the gully. Mortifying as the discovery of old Moll had been, it was a mercy to be forewarned. No, it might do as a very temporary expedient, but no more.
Of course it might be just within the bounds of possibility to get horses from Holwick Hall itself; but failure would mean absolute and irretrievable disaster. No again, nothing must be left to chance. Suddenly a thought struck him, there were horses on the estate where Andrew Woolridge worked. ”

“ Ian came towards Audry as she spoke. “Why? cannot you find her?” he said.
“No, she is not in the hall and not in our room.”
“Perhaps old Elspeth knows.”
“I had forgotten her for the moment,” and Audry’s face brightened up. “I will run and find her.” This she did at once but Aline had not been seen.
At length Audry felt that she must tell the others. So she came back to the great hall and told Master Mowbray that Aline had disappeared.
“’Sdeath,” he exclaimed, “what has happened to her; call the men at once, run, Audry.” ”

“ Aline helped for a short time and then, leaving them for a moment all cheerful and joking but working with a will, she looked into the buttery, where she saw Thomas and Edward, the seneschal, a pompous but good hearted fellow, merely talking and doing nothing.
“You are not setting us a good example,” she said laughing; “everybody else is working so hard,” and then she added in a tone that combined something of jest, something of command and something of a coaxing quality, “do try to keep things going; Master Richard would be much put about if he failed in his hospitality.” ”

“ They say a boy can’t love,” he said bitterly; “they know nothing about it;—I do not suppose they know what love is. If only I were dying for you, Joan, I should be quite happy, but to die for what I have not done...!”
He threw himself on the floor and sobbed and sobbed until from the sheer physical exhaustion of the paroxysms of grief he fell asleep.
Meanwhile Ian was anxiously awaiting his return. The strange feeling that had possessed him ever since the day that Aline had talked about it in the secret room and that lately had been somewhat less intense, came back stronger than ever. ”

“ Was he justified in risking his life when Aline’s necessities might require him? There certainly seemed no other chance for the boy; he had thought of all the obvious possibilities of saving him, but every case was barred by an insuperable objection less obvious, perhaps, but fatal nevertheless. “Why am I made so that I always see both sides so clearly?” he said. “Other people have no such difficulties in making up their minds.” ”

“ He said that they were people who were not satisfied with the way that things were going in the church and that in particular they denied that it was only through the priests of the church that God spoke to his people. They say that the priests are no better than any one else and indeed are sometimes even worse.”
“I do not know that they claim to be better than other people,” objected Audry.
“Well, dear, I am not defending the heretics. I only say what they think. They do feel, however, that if the priests really were the special channels of God that that fact itself would make them better. ”

“ It was thirteen years since any one person had filled his life as this child had done, and now he was to lose her. “Surely,” he said to himself, “life is compact of most mysterious bitterness”; but he tried to be cheerful for the child’s sake and said, “Never mind, Aline, I shall come and see you again. I think I shall try and become a packman like your friend who gave you your necklace, if I can get some money somehow to begin, and then I can pay many visits to Holwick. ”

“ When they went down to visit Ian they told him the story and the three discussed it together.
“Anyway it does not matter telling you,” said Aline to Ian, “because you are not a real person.”
“And why am I not a real person, pray?” said Ian.
“Oh, you do not belong to the world at all; you never see anybody and live down here; you are only a sort of figure in our dream,” said Aline playfully.
“That’s rather a shadowy kind of existence,” he said, “but it’s nice to be dreamed into existence by such delightful people.”
“Look here, you two,” said Audry, “talk a little common sense. ”

“ Eleanor Mowbray calculated that, with Audry out of the way, it would be more possible for her to wreak her spite on the child without it being known. Why should this pauper dependent, this mere skelpie, dare to thwart her will? Master Gower and Master Latour indeed! should she not be mistress in her own house? And by way of further justification, was not Aline depriving Audry of her birthright, since, attracted as all undoubtedly were by Audry, they were attracted by Aline still more? ”

“ Father Austin knew only too well that, clever as he was himself, he was no match for this man, who had beaten him once; “But he shall not escape me this time,” he said to himself, and having already alighted, he followed into the hostelry. “The day is past its prime,” he remarked, “and we have caught our main game. We have come far and there is no haste. We will bide here and rest till Wednesday; the little bird at Holwick will not flutter far, I warrant ye.”
It amused Father Austin to have Ian with them at meals to taunt him and to gloat over his own triumph. ”

“ That is so, is it not, Cousin Richard? and we must investigate the case before Edward is sent away.”
Eleanor Mowbray flushed crimson; Aline had found the weak spot in her armour. The vintner’s daughter was not a lady, but the one thing in life that she desired was to be thought one.
“Yes, child,” said Master Richard, for the remark had touched his proper pride. “Yes, keeping within his rights is good enough for common people. But gentle blood demands more than rights. It has higher standards altogether. It is a matter of honour, not of rights. Many things are right but they are not honourable. ”

“ The children stumbled as they entered the dark room and crossed the uneven floor of stamped earth. There was no movable furniture save one or two wooden kists or chests, a dilapidated spinning wheel and a couple of small stools. In the very middle of the floor was a fire of peats on a flat slab of stone in the ground and a simple hole in the roof allowed the choking smoke to escape after it had wandered round the whole building.
An old man, bent double with rheumatism, hastened forward as the children came to the door and, holding out both his hands, shook Audry’s and Aline’s at the same time. ”

“ Why cannot they leave folk in peace? I want to go my own way; why should I not go my own way? All my life they have been at me, ever since I was a little girl. My foolish old mother began it. Why should I not please myself? Well, she’s dead anyway! I like people to die. ”