Page:Walter Scott - The Monastery (Henry Frowde, 1912).djvu/165

RV 97 (Rh) will I presently tell thee why I conceive myself rather the baffled sport of a spirit of another sort, than the protected favourite of the heavenly powers. But first let me ask this unhappy man a question or two.'

'Do as ye list,' replied the abbot; 'but you shall not convince me that it is fitting you remain in this inferior office in the convent of Saint Mary.'

'I would ask of this poor man,' said Father Eustace, 'for what purpose he nourished the thought of putting to death one who never did him evil?'

'Aye! but thou didst menace me with evil,' said the ruffian, 'and no one but a fool is menaced twice. Dost thou not remember what you said touching the Primate and Lord James, and the black pool of Jedwood? Didst thou think me fool enough to wait till thou hadst betrayed me to the sack and the fork! There were small wisdom in that, methinks—as little as in coming hither to tell my own misdeeds: I think the devil was in me when I took this road. I might have remembered the proverb, "Never friar forgot feud."'

'And it was solely for that—for that only hasty word of mine, uttered in a moment of impatience, and forgotten ere it was well spoken?' said Father Eustace.

'Aye! for that, and—for the love of thy gold crucifix,' said Christie of the Clinthill.

'Gracious Heaven! and could the yellow metal—the glittering earth—so far overcome every sense of what is thereby represented? Father abbot, I pray, as a dear boon, you will deliver this guilty person to my mercy.'

'Nay, brother,' interposed the sacristan, 'to your doom, if you will, not to your mercy. Remember, we are not all equally favoured by our blessed Lady, nor is it likely that every frock in the convent will serve as a coat of proof when a lance is couched against it.'

'For that very reason,' said the sub-prior, 'I would not that for my worthless self the community were to fall at feud with Julian of Avenel, this man's master.'

'Our Lady forbid!' said the sacristan, 'he is a second Julian the Apostate.'

'With our reverend father the abbot's permission, then,' said Father Eustace, 'I desire this man be freed from his Rh