VI
THEREAFTER for two years the Hermit and the Wild Woman lived side by
side, meeting together to pray on the great feast-days of the year,
but on all other days dwelling apart, engaged in pious practices.
At first the Hermit, knowing the weakness of woman, and her little
aptitude for the life apart, had feared that he might be disturbed
by the nearness of his penitent; but she faithfully held to his
commands, abstaining from all sight of him save on the Days of
Obligation; and when they met, so modest and devout was her
demeanour that she raised his soul to fresh fervency. And gradually
it grew sweet to him to think that, near by though unseen, was one
who performed the same tasks at the same hours; so that, whether he
tended his garden, or recited his chaplet, or rose under the stars
to repeat the midnight office, he had a companion in all his labours
and devotions.
Meanwhile the report had spread abroad that a holy woman who cast
out devils had made her dwelling in the Hermit's cliff; and many
sick persons from the valley sought her out, and went away restored
by her. These poor pilgrims brought her oil and flour, and with her
own hands she made a garden like the Hermit's, and planted it with
corn and lentils; but she would never take a trout from the brook,
or receive the gift of a snared wild-fowl, for she said that in her
vagrant life the wild creatures of the wood had befriended her, and
as she had slept in peace among them, so now she would never suffer
them to be molested.
In the third year came a plague, and death walked the cities, and
many poor peasants fled to the hills to escape it. These the Hermit
and his penitent faithfully tended, and so skilful were the Wild
Woman's ministrations that the report of them reached the town
across the valley, and a deputation of burgesses came with rich
offerings, and besought her to descend and comfort their sick. The
Hermit, seeing her depart on so dangerous a mission, would have
accompanied her, but she bade him remain and tend those who fled to
the hills; and for many days his heart was consumed in prayer for
her, and he feared lest every fugitive should bring him word of her
death.
But at length she returned, wearied-out but whole, and covered with
the blessings of the townsfolk; and thereafter her name for holiness
spread as wide as the Hermit's.
Seeing how constant she remained in her chosen life, and what
advance she had made in the way of perfection, the Hermit now felt
that it behoved him to exhort her again to return to the convent;
and more than once he resolved to speak with her, but his heart hung
back. At length he bethought him that by failing in this duty he
imperilled his own soul, and thereupon, on the next feast-day, when
they met, he reminded her that in spite of her good works she still
lived in sin and excommunicate, and that, now she had once more
tasted the sweets of godliness, it was her duty to confess her fault
and give herself up to her superiors.
She heard him meekly, but when he had spoken she was silent and her
tears ran over; and looking at her he wept also, and said no more.
And they prayed together, and returned each to his cave.
It was not till late winter that the plague abated; and the spring
and early summer following were heavy with rains and great heat.
When the Hermit visited his penitent at the feast of Pentecost, she
appeared to him so weak and wasted that, when they had recited the
_Veni, sancte spiritus_, and the proper psalms, he taxed her with
too great rigour of penitential practices; but she replied that her
weakness was not due to an excess of discipline, but that she had
brought back from her labours among the sick a heaviness of body
which the intemperance of the season no doubt increased. The evil
rains continued, falling chiefly at night, while by day the land
reeked with heat and vapours; so that lassitude fell on the Hermit
also, and he could hardly drag himself down to the spring whence he
drew his drinking-water. Thus he fell into the habit of going down
to the glen before cockcrow, after he had recited Matins; for at
that hour the rain commonly ceased, and a faint air was stirring.
Now because of the wet season the stream had not gone dry, and
instead of replenishing his flagon slowly at the trickling spring,
the Hermit went down to the waterside to fill it; and once, as he
descended the steep slope of the glen, he heard the covert rustle,
and saw the leaves stir as though something moved behind them. As he
looked silence fell, and the leaves grew still; but his heart was
shaken, for it seemed to him that what he had seen in the dusk had a
human semblance, such as the wood-people wear. And he was loth to
think that such unhallowed beings haunted the glen.
A few days passed, and again, descending to the stream, he saw a
figure flit by him through the covert; and this time a deeper fear
entered into him; but he put away the thought, and prayed fervently
for all souls in temptation. And when he spoke with the Wild Woman
again, on the feast of the Seven Maccabees, which falls on the first
day of August, he was smitten with fear to see her wasted looks, and
besought her to cease from labouring and let him minister to her in
her weakness. But she denied him gently, and replied that all she
asked of him was to keep her steadfastly in his prayers.
Before the feast of the Assumption the rains ceased, and the plague,
which had begun to show itself, was stayed; but the ardency of the
sun grew greater, and the Hermit's cliff was a fiery furnace. Never
had such heat been known in those regions; but the people did not
murmur, for with the cessation of the rain their crops were saved
and the pestilence banished; and these mercies they ascribed in
great part to the prayers and macerations of the two holy anchorets.
Therefore on the eve of the Assumption they sent a messenger to the
Hermit, saying that at daylight on the morrow the townspeople and
all the dwellers in the valley would come forth, led by their
Bishop, who bore the Pope's blessing to the two solitaries, and who
was mindful to celebrate the Mass of the Assumption in the Hermit's
cave in the cliffside. At the blessed word the Hermit was well-nigh
distraught with joy, for he felt this to be a sign from heaven that
his prayers were heard, and that he had won the Wild Woman's grace
as well as his own. And all night he prayed that on the morrow she
might confess her fault and receive the Sacrament with him.
Before dawn he recited the psalms of the proper nocturn; then he
girded on his gown and sandals, and went forth to meet the Bishop in
the valley.
As he went downward daylight stood on the mountains, and he thought
he had never seen so fair a dawn. It filled the farthest heaven with
brightness, and penetrated even to the woody crevices of the glen,
as the grace of God had entered into the obscurest folds of his
heart. The morning airs were hushed, and he heard only the sound of
his own footfall, and the murmur of the stream which, though
diminished, still poured a swift current between the rocks; but as
he reached the bottom of the glen a sound of chanting came to him,
and he knew that the pilgrims were at hand. His heart leapt up and
his feet hastened forward; but at the streamside they were suddenly
stayed, for in a pool where the water was still deep he saw the
shining of a woman's body--and on a stone hard by lay the Wild
Woman's gown and sandals.
Fear and rage possessed the Hermit's heart, and he stood as one
smitten speechless, covering his eyes from the shame. But the song
of the approaching pilgrims swelled ever louder and nearer, and
finding voice he cried to the Wild Woman to come forth and hide
herself from the people.
She made no answer, but in the dusk he saw her limbs sway with the
swaying of the water, and her eyes were turned to him as if in
mockery. At the sight blind fury filled him, and clambering over the
rocks to the pool's edge he bent down and caught her by the
shoulder. At that moment he could have strangled her with his hands,
so abhorrent to him was the touch of her flesh; but as he cried out
on her, heaping her with cruel names, he saw that her eyes returned
his look without wavering; and suddenly it came to him that she was
dead. Then through all his anger and fear a great pang smote him;
for here was his work undone, and one he had loved in Christ laid
low in her sin, in spite of all his labours.
One moment pity possessed him; the next he bethought him how the
people would find him bending above the body of a naked woman, whom
he had held up to them as holy, but whom they might now well take
for the secret instrument of his undoing; and beholding how at her
touch all the slow edifice of his holiness was demolished, and his
soul in mortal jeopardy, he felt the earth reel round him and his
sight grew red.
Already the head of the procession had entered the glen, and the
stillness shook with the great sound of the _Salve Regina_. When the
Hermit opened his eyes once more the air was quivering with thronged
candle-flames, which glittered on the gold thread of priestly
vestments, and on the blazing monstrance beneath its canopy; and
close above him was bent the Bishop's face.
The Hermit struggled to his knees.
"My Father in God," he cried, "behold, for my sins I have been
visited by a demon--" But as he spoke he perceived that those about
him no longer heeded him, and that the Bishop and all his clergy had
fallen on their knees about the pool. Then the Hermit, following
their gaze, saw that the brown waters of the pool covered the Wild
Woman's limbs as with a garment, and that about her floating head a
great light floated; and to the utmost edges of the throng a cry of
praise went up, for many were there whom the Wild Woman had healed
and comforted, and who read God's mercy in this wonder. But fresh
fear fell on the Hermit, for he had cursed a dying saint, and
denounced her aloud to all the people; and this new anguish, coming
so close upon the other, smote down his weakened frame, so that his
limbs failed him and he sank once more to the ground.
Again the earth reeled about him, and the bending faces grew remote;
but as he forced his weak voice once more to proclaim his sins he
felt the blessed touch of absolution, and the holy oils of the last
voyage laid on his lips and eyes. Peace returned to him then, and
with it a great longing to look once more upon his lauds, as he had
dreamed of doing at his last hour; but he was too far gone to make
this longing known, and so tried to banish it from his mind. Yet in
his weakness the wish held him, and the tears ran down his face.
Then, as he lay there, feeling the earth slip from under him, and
the Everlasting Arms replace it, he heard a great peal of voices
that seemed to come down from the sky and mingle with the singing of
the throng; and the words of the chant were the words of his own
lauds, so long hidden in the secret of his breast, and now rejoicing
above him through the spheres. And his soul rose on the chant, and
soared with it to the seat of mercy.
