The Old Helmet. Volume I

CHAPTER I.

THE RUINS

The first thing noticeable is a gleam of white teeth. Now that is a pleasant thing generally; yet its pleasantness depends, after all, upon the way the lips part over the ivory. There is a world of character discoverable in the curve of those soft lines. In the present case, that of a lady, as it is undoubtedly the very first thing you notice, the matter must be investigated. The mouth is rather large, with well cut lips however; and in the smile which comes not infrequently, the lips part freely and frankly, though not too far, over a wealth of white, beautiful teeth. So free is the curve of the upper lip, and so ready its revelation of the treasures beneath, that there is an instant suspicion of a certain frankness and daring, and perhaps of a little mischief, on the part of their possessor; so free, at the same time, as to forbid the least notion of consciousness or design in that beautiful revelation. But how fine and full and regular are those white treasures of hers! seeming to speak for a strong and perfect physical organisation; and if your eye goes further, for her flat hat is on the ground, you will see in the bountiful rich head of hair another token of the same thing. Her figure is finely developed; her colour clear and healthy; not blonde; the full-brown hair and eyes agree with the notion of a nature more lively than we assign to the other extreme of complexion. The features are not those of a beauty, though better than that, perhaps; there is a world of life and sense and spirit in them.

It speaks for her good nature and feeling, that her smile is as frank as ever just now, and as pleasant as ever; for she is with about the last one of her party on whom she would have chosen to bestow herself. The occasion is a visit to some celebrated ruins; a day of pleasure; and Eleanor would a good deal rather be walking and talking with another much more interesting member of the company, in whose society indeed her day had begun; but Mr. Carlisle had been obliged suddenly to return home for an hour or two; and Eleanor is sitting on a grassy bank, with a gentleman beside her whom she knows very little and does not care about at all. That is, she has no idea he can be very interesting; and he is a grave-looking personage, but we are not going to describe him at present.

A word must be given to the place where they are. It is a little paradise. If the view is not very extended, it is rich in its parts; and the eye and the mind are filled. The grass is shaven smooth on the bank where the two are sitting; so it is all around, under trees which stand with wilful wildness of luxuriance, grouped and scattered apparently as they would. They are very old, in several varieties of kind, and in the perfect development and thrift of each kind. Among them are the ruins of an old priory. They peep forth here and there from the trees. One broken tower stands free, with ivy masking its sides and crumbling top, and stains of weather and the hues of lichen and moss enriching what was once its plain grey colour. Other portions of the ruins are seen by glimpses further on among the trees. Standing somewhat off by itself, yet encompassed by the congeners of those same trees, almost swallowed up among them, is a comfortable, picturesque little building, not in ruins; though it has been built up from the ruins. It is the parsonage, where the rector of the parish lives. Beyond this wood and these buildings, old and new, the eye can catch only bits of hills and woods that promise beauty further on; but nearer than they, and making a boundary line between the present and the distant, the flash of a little river is seen, which curves about the old priory lands. A somewhat doubtful sunlight is struggling over it all; casting a stray beam on the grass, and a light on the ivy of the old tower.

"What a queer old place it must have been," said Eleanor.

"How old is it?"

"O I don't know – ages! Do you mean really how old? I am sure I can't tell; I never can keep those things in my head. If Dr. Cairnes would come out, he could tell you all about it, and more."

"Dr. Cairnes, the rector?"

"Yes. He keeps it all in his head, I know. The ruins are instead of a family to him."

"They must date back pretty far, judging by those Norman arches."

"Norman arches? – what, those round ones? O, they do. The priory was founded by some old courtier or soldier in the time of Henry the First, who got disgusted with the world. That is the beginning of all these places, isn't it?"

"Do you mean, that it is the beginning of all religious feeling?"

"I really think it is. I wouldn't tell Dr. Cairnes so however. How sweet these violets are. Dear little blue things!"

"Do you suppose,", said the young man, stooping to pick one or two, "that they are less sweet to me than to you?"

"Why should they be?"

"Because, religion is the most precious thing in the world to me; and by your rule, I must be disgusted with the world, and all sweet things have lost their savour."

He spoke with quiet gravity, and Eleanor's eye went to his face with a bright glance of inquiry. It came back with no change of opinion.

"You don't convert me," she said. "I do not know what you have given up for religion, so I cannot judge. But all the other people I ever saw, grew religious only because they had lost all care about everything else."

"I wonder how that discontented old soldier found himself, when he got into these solitudes?" said the young man, with a smile of his own then. It was sweet, and a little arch, and withal harmonised completely with the ordinary gravity of his face, not denying it at all. Eleanor looked, once and again, with some curiosity, but the smile passed away as quietly as it had come.

"The solitude was not this solitude then."

"O no, it was very wild."

"These were Augustine canons, were they not?"

"Who?"

"The monks of this priory."

"I am sure I don't know. I forget. What was the difference?"

"You know there were many orders of religious houses. The Augustines were less severe in their rule, and more genial in their allowed way of life, than most of the others?"

"What was their rule?"

"Beginning with discontent of the world, you know, they went on with the principle that nothing worldly was good."

"Well, isn't that the principle of all religious people now?"

"I like violets" – said the young man, smiling again.

"But do tell me, what did those old monks do? What was their 'rule?' I don't know anything about it, nor about them."

"Another old discontented soldier, who founded an abbey in Wales, is said by the historian to have dismissed all his former companions, and devoted himself to God. For his military belt, he tied a rope about his waist; instead of fine linen he put on haircloth. And it is recorded of him, that the massive suit of armour which he had been used to wear in battle, to protect him against the arrows and spears and axes of the enemy, he put on now and wore as a defence against the wiles and assaults of the devil – and wore it till it rusted away with age."

"Poor old soul!" said Eleanor.

"Does that meet your ideas of a religious life?"

Eleanor laughed, but answered by another question. "Was that the rule of all the Augustine monks?"

"It gives the key to it. Is that your notion of a religious life? You don't answer me."

"Well," said Eleanor laughing again, "it gives the key to it, as you say. I do not suppose you wear a suit of armour to protect yourself."

"I beg your pardon. I do."

"Armour?" said Eleanor, looking incredulous. But her friend fairly burst into a little laugh at that.

"Are you rested?" said he.

And Eleanor got up, feeling a little indignant and a little curious. Strolling towards the ruins, however, there was too much to start conversation and too much to give delight, to permit either silence or pique to last.

"Isn't it beautiful!" burst from both at once.

"How exquisite that ivy is, climbing up that old tower!"

"And what a pity it is crumbling away so!" said Eleanor. "See that nearer angle – it is breaking down fast. I wish it would stay as it is."

"Nothing will do that for you. What is all that collection of rubbish yonder?"

"That is where Mr. Carlisle is going to build a cottage for one of his people – somebody to take care of the ruins, I believe."

"And he takes the ruins to build it with, and the old priory grounds too!"

Eleanor looked again at her companion.

"I think it is better than to have the broken stones lying all over – don't you?"

"I do not."

"Mr. Carlisle thinks so. Now here we are in the body of the church – there you see where the roof went, by the slanting lines on the tower wall; and we are standing where the congregation used to assemble."

"Not much of a congregation," said her companion. "The neighbouring country furnished few attendants, I fancy; the old monks and their retainers were about all. The choir would hold most of them; the nave, where we are standing, would have been of little use except for processions."

"Processions?" said Eleanor.

"On particular days there were processions of the brotherhood, with lighted candles – round and round in the church. In the church at York twelve rounds made a mile, and there were twelve holes at the great door, with a little peg, so that any one curious about the matter might reckon the miles."

"And so they used to go up and down here, burning their fingers with melted tallow!" said Eleanor. "Poor creatures! What a melancholy existence! Are you preparing to renounce the world yourself, Mr. Rhys?"

He smiled, but it was a compound smile, light and earnest both at once, which Eleanor did not comprehend.

"Why do you suspect me?" he asked.

"You seem to be studying the thing. Are you going to be a white or a black monk – or a grey friar?"

"There is a prior question. It is coming on to rain, Miss Powle."

"Rain! It is beginning this minute! And all the umbrellas are nobody knows where – only that it is where we ought to be. I was glad just now that the old roof in gone – but I think I would like a piece of it back."

"You can take shelter at the parsonage."

"No, I cannot – they have got fever there."

"Then come with me. I believe I can find you a piece of roof somewhere."

Eleanor smiled to herself that he should think so, as all traces of beam and rafter had long since disappeared from the priory and its dependencies. However she followed her conductor, who strode along among the ruins at a pace which it taxed her powers to keep up with. Presently he plunged down into a wilderness of bushes and wild thorn and piled up stones which the crumbling walls had left in confusion strewn over the ground. It was difficult walking. Eleanor had never been there; for in that quarter the decay of the buildings was more entire, and the growth of shrubs and brambles had been allowed to mask the disorder. As they went on, the footing grew very rough; they were obliged to go over heaps and layers of the crumbling, moss-grown ruins. Eleanor's conductor turned and gave her his hand to help; it was a strong hand and quickened her progress. Presently turning a sharp corner, through a thicket of thorn and holly bushes, with young larches and beeches, a small space of clearance was gained, bounded on the other side by a thick wall, one angle of which was standing. On this clear spot the rain drops were falling fast. The hand that held Eleanor's hurried her across it, to where an old window remained sunk in the wall. The arch over the window was still entire, and as the wall was one of the outer walls and very thick, the shelter of a "piece of roof" was literally afforded. Eleanor's conductor seated her on the deep window sill, where she was perfectly screened from the rain; and apologising for the necessity of the occasion, took his place beside her. The window was narrow as well as deep; and the two, who hardly knew each other, were brought into very familiar neighbourhood. Eleanor would have been privately amused, if the first passing consciousness of amusement had not been immediately chased away by one or two other thoughts. The first was the extreme beauty of her position as a point of view.

The ruins were all behind them. As they looked out of the window, nothing was seen but the most exquisite order and the most dainty perfection of nature. The ground, shaven and smooth, sloped away down to a fringe of young wood, amidst which peeped out a pretty cottage and above which a curl of smoke floated. The cottage stood so low, and the trees were so open, that above and beyond appeared the receding slopes and hills of the river valley, in their various shades of colour, grass and foliage. There was no sun on all this now, but a beautiful light under the rain cloud from the distant horizon. And the dark old stone window was the frame for this picture. It was very perfect. It was very rare. Eleanor exclaimed in delight.

"But I never was here – I never saw this before! How did you know of it, Mr. Rhys?"

"I have studied the ruins," he said lightly.

"But you have been at Wiglands only a few months."

"I come here very often," he answered. "Happily for you."

He might add that well enough, for the clouds poured down their rain now in torrents, or in sheets; the light which had come from the horizon a few minutes before was hidden, and the grey gloom of a summer storm was over everything. The little window seemed dark, with the two people sitting there. Then there came a blinding flash of lightning. Eleanor started and cowered, and the thunder rolled its deep tones over them, and under them, for the earth shook. She raised her head again, but only to shrink back the second time, when the lightning and the thunder were repeated. This time her head was not raised again, and she kept her hand covered over her eyes. Yet whenever the sound of the thunder came, Eleanor's frame answered it by a start. She said nothing; it was merely the involuntary answer of the nerves. The storm was a severe one, and when the severity of it passed a little further off, the torrents of rain still fell.

"You do not like thunder storms" – Mr. Rhys remarked, when the lightnings had ceased to be so vivid or so near.

"Does anybody like them?"

"Yes. I like everything."

"You are happy" – said Eleanor.

"Why are not you?"

"I can't help it," said the girl, lifting up her head, though she did not let her eyes go out of the window. "I cannot bear to see the lightning. It is foolish, but I cannot help it."

"Are you sure it is foolish? Is there not some reason at the bottom of it?"

"I think there is a reason, though still it is foolish. There was a man killed by lightning just by our door, once – when I was a child. I saw him – I never can forget it, never!"

And a sort of shudder ran over Eleanor's shoulders as she spoke.

"You want my armour," said her companion. The tone of voice was not only grave but sympathising. Eleanor looked up at him.

"Your armour?"

"You charged me with wearing armour – and I confessed it," he said with something of a smile. "It is a sort of armour that makes people safe in all circumstances."

He looked so quiet, so grave, so cool, and his eye had such a light in it, that Eleanor could not throw off his words. He looked like a man in armour. But no mail of brass was to be seen.

"What do you mean?" she said.

"Did you never hear of the helmet of salvation?"

"I don't know," said Eleanor wonderingly. "I think I have heard the words. I do not think I ever attached any meaning to them."

"Did you never feel," he said, speaking with a peculiar deliberation of manner, "that you were exposed to danger – and to death – from which no effort of yours could free you; and that after death, there is a great white throne to meet, for which you are not ready?"

While he spoke slowly, his eyes were fixed upon Eleanor with a clear piercing glance which she felt read her through and through; but she was fascinated instead of angered, and submitted her own eyes to the reading without wishing to turn them away. Carrying on two trains of thought at the same time, as the mind will, her inward reflection was, "I had no idea that you were so good-looking!" – the answer in words was a sober, "I have felt so."

"Was the feeling a happy one?"

Eleanor's lip suddenly trembled; then she put down that involuntary natural answer, and said evasively, looking out of the window, "I suppose everybody has such feelings sometimes."

"Not with that helmet on" – said her companion.

With all the quietness of his speech, and it was very unimpassioned, his accent had a clear ring to it, which came from some unsounded spirit-depth of power; and Eleanor's heart for a moment sunk before it in a secret convulsion of pain. She concealed this feeling, as she thought, successfully; but that single ray of light had shewed her the darkness; it was keen as an arrow, and the arrow rankled. And her neighbour's next words made her feel that her heart lay bare; so quietly they touched it.

"You feel that you want something, Miss Powle."

Eleanor's head drooped, as well as her heart. She wondered at herself; but there was a spell of power upon her, and she could by no means lift up either. It was not only that his words were true, but that he knew them to be so.

"Do you know what you want?" her friend went on, in tons that were tender, along with that deliberate utterance that carried so much force with it. "You know yourself an offender before the Lord – and you want the sense of forgiveness in your heart. You know yourself inclined to be an offender again – and you want the renewing grace of God to make your heart clean, and set it free from the power of sin. Then you want also something to make you happy; and the love of Jesus alone can do that."

"What is the use of telling over the things one has not got?" – said Eleanor in somewhat smothered tones. The words of her companion came again clear as a bell —

"Because you may have them if you want them."

Eleanor struggled with herself, for her self-possession was endangered, and she was angry at herself for being such a fool; but she could not help it; yet she would not let her agitation come any more to the surface. She waited for clearness of voice, and then could not forbear the question, "How, Mr. Rhys?"

"Jesus said, 'If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.' There is all fulness in him. Go to him for light – go to him for strength – go to him for forgiveness, for healing, for sanctification. 'Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely.'"

"'Go to him?'" repeated Eleanor vaguely.

"Ask him."

Ask Him! It was such a far-off, strange idea to her a heart, there seemed such a universe of distance between, Eleanor's face grew visibly shadowed with the thought. She? She could not. She did not know how. She was silent a little while. The subject was getting unmanageable.

"I never had anybody talk to me so before, Mr. Rhys," she said, thinking to let it pass.

"Perhaps you never will again," he said. "Hear it now. The Lord Jesus is not far off – as you think – he is very near; he can hear the faintest whisper of a petition that you send to him. It is his message I bring you to-day – a message to you. I am his servant, and he has given me this charge for you to-day – to tell you that he loves you – that he has given his life for yours – and that he calls Eleanor Powle to give him her heart, and then to give him her life, in all the obedience his service may require."

Eleanor felt her heart strangely bowed, subdued, bent to his words. "I will" – was the secret language of her thoughts – "but I must not let this man see all I am feeling, if I can help it." She held herself still, looking out of the window, where the rain fell in torrents yet, though the thunder and the lightning were no longer near. So did he; he added no more to his last words, and a silence lasted in the old ruined window as if its chance occupants were gone again. As the silence lasted, Eleanor felt it grow awkward. She was at a loss how to break it. It was broken for her then.

"What will you do, Miss Powle?"

"I will think about it" – she answered, startled and hesitating.

"How long, before you decide?"

"How can I tell?" she said.

"You are shrinking from a decision already formed. The answer is given in your secret thoughts, and something is rising up in the midst of them to thwart it. Shall I tell my Master that his message is refused?"

"Mr. Rhys!" said Eleanor looking up, "I never heard any one talk so in all my life! You speak as if – "

"As if, what?"

"You speak as if – I never heard any one speak as you do."

"I speak as if I were in the habit of telling my Master how his message is received? I often do that."

"But it seems superfluous to tell what is known already," said Eleanor, wondering secretly much more than she dared to say at her companion's talk.

"Do you never, in speaking to those you love, tell them what is no information?"

Eleanor was now dumb. There was too great a gulf of difference between her companion and herself, to try to frame any words or thoughts that might bridge it over. She must remain on one side and he on the other; yet she went on wondering.

"Are you a clergyman, Mr. Rhys?" she said after a pause.

"I am not what you would call such."

"Do you not think the rain is over?"

"Nearly, for the present; but the grass is as wet as possible."

"O, I don't mind that. There is somebody now in the shrubbery yonder, looking for me."

"He will not find you here," said Mr. Rhys. "I have this window all to myself. But we will find him."

The rain-drops fell now but scatteringly, the last of the shower; the sun was breaking out, and the green world was all in a glitter of wet leaves. Wet as they were, Eleanor and Mr. Rhys pushed through the thick bramble and holly bushes, which with honeysuckles, eglantine, and broom, and bryony, made a sweet wild wilderness. They got plentifully besprinkled in their way, shook that off as well as they could, and with quick steps sought to rejoin their companions. The person Eleanor had seen in the shrubbery was the first one found, as Mr. Rhys had said. It was Mr. Carlisle. He at once took charge of Eleanor.

"What has become of you?"

"What has become of you, Mr. Carlisle?" Eleanor's gleaming smile was as bright as ever.

"Despair, nearly," said he; "for I feared business would hold me all day; but I broke away. Not time enough to protect you from this shower."

"Water will wet," said Eleanor, laughing; for the politeness of this speech was more evident than its plausibility. She was on the point of speaking of the protection that had been actually found for her, but thought better of it. Meantime they were joined by a little girl, bright and rather wild looking, who addressed Eleanor as her sister.

"O come!" she said, – "where have you been? We can't go on till you come. We are going to lunch at Barton's Tower – and mamma says she will make Mr. Carlisle build a fire, so that we may all dry ourselves."

"Julia! – how you speak!"

"She did say so," repeated the child. "Come – make haste."

Eleanor glanced at her companion, who met the glance with a smile. "I hope Mrs. Powle will always command me," he said, somewhat meaningly; and Eleanor hurried on.

She was destined to long tête-à-têtes that day; for as soon as her little party was seen in the distance, the larger company took up their line of march again. Julia and Mr. Rhys had fallen behind; and the long walk to Barton's Tower was made with Mr. Carlisle alone, who was in no haste to abridge it, and seemed to enjoy himself very well. Eleanor once or twice looked back, and saw her little sister, hand in hand with her companion of the old window, walking and talking in very eager and gay style; to judge by Julia's lively movements.