Part 4

Fra Corinto it was (looking not for Madonna in a baggage), who, by discreetly coughing, brought his master back to his senses. The prior cleared his throat once or twice, looked at the young woman, and felt quite himself. Ridiculous what tricks a flicker of sunlight will play on the wisest of men!

"Monna Vanna," said he, "I have not brought you here to judge between you and my brother Battista, now at discipline in his cell. The flesh, which he should have tamed, has raised, it appears, a bruised head for one last spite. My brother was bitten, and my brother fell into sin. Whether, as of old, the tempter was the woman, it is sure that, as of old, the eater was a man. I will not condemn you unheard, lest I incur reproach in my turn. But our order is in peril; the enemy is abroad, with Envy, Hatred, and Malice barking on their leashes. What can the poor sheep do but scatter before the wolves? Fra Battista, his penance duly done, must leave Verona; and you, my sister, must do penance, that God be not mocked, nor the Veronese upraised to mock Him."

Of this solemn appeal, Vanna, to all seeming, understood not one word. True, she blushed a little, but that was because a prior was talking to her: her honest grey eyes were quite untroubled, her smile as tender as ever. She spoke as one deprecating temerity--that she should speak at all to so great a man--and by no means any judgment.

"I am only a poor girl, reverend prior," said she, "most ignorant and thick-witted. Pray, what have I and my baby to do with these high matters of Fra Battista's error?"

The prior grew angry. "Tush, my woman," he grunted, "I beg you to drop the artless. It is out of place here. Let me look at the youngster."

"Yes, yes, mistress, let us see the child," said Fra Corinto, who croaked like a nightingale in June.

Vanna moved forward on a light foot. "Willingly, reverend fathers," said she. "He is a fine child, they all say, and reputed the image of his father." A sublime utterance, full of humoursome matter, if it had been a time for humours.

But it was not. La Testolina could not contain her virtuous indignation--for who is so transcendently righteous as your rascal for once in the right?

"Hey, woman!" she cried shrilly, "what grossness is this? Do you think the whole city don't know about you?"

Vanna turned quivering. "And what is it that the whole city knows but does not say, if you please?"

The prior wagged helplessly his hands. Like Pilate, he would have washed off the business if he could. He looked at the two women. Eh, by the Lord! there would be a scene. But the whole thing was too impudent a fraud: there must be an end of it. He caught Fra Corinto's eyes and raised his brows. Fra Corinto was his jackal--here was his cue. He went swiftly to the door, set it open, came back and caught Vanna roughly by the shoulder. He turned her shocked face to the open door, and his dry voice grated horribly upon her ears.

"Out with you, piece!" was what he said; and Vanna reeled.

For a full minute she gaped at him for a meaning; his face taught the force of his words only too well. She sobbed, threw up her high head, bent it, like Jesus, for the cross, and fled.

The old porter leered by his open gates. "He! he! They are all outside," he chuckled--"Magpies and Dusty-hoods, Parvuses, Minors and Minims, Benets, and Austins, every cowl in Verona! Come along, my handsome girl, you must move briskish this day!"

She heard the hoarse muttering of the men, and, a worse poison for good ears, the shrill venom of the women. Out of the gates she blindly went, and all the pack opened their music upon her. Stones flew, but words flew faster and stuck more deep. The mob, as she blundered through the streets, shuffling, gasping, stumbling at her caught gown, dry-eyed, open-mouthed, panting her terror, her bewilderment, her shame and amaze--the mob, I say, dizzied about her like a cloud of wasps; yet they had in them what wasps have not--voices primed by hatred to bay her mad. There was no longer any doubt for her: the pittanciar's word (which had not been "piece") was tossed from pavement to pavement, from balcony to balcony, out at every open door, shot like slops from every leaning casement, and hissed in her ears as it flew. It was a mad race. The Franciscans tucked up their frocks and discarded stones, that they might run and shout the more freely. The Dominicans soon tired: their end was served. The cloistered orders were out of condition; the secular clergy came to weary of what was, after all, but a matter for the mendicants. The common people, however, had the game well in hand. They headed her off the narrow streets, where safety might have been, and kept her to the Lung' Adige. Round the great S the river makes she battled her blind way, trying for nothing, with wits for nothing, without hope, or understanding, or thought. She ran, a hunted woman, straight before her, and at last shook off the last of her pursuers by San Zeno. Stumbling headlong into a little pine-wood beyond the gates, she fell, swooned, and forgot.

It was near dark when she opened her loaded eyes--that is, there was no moon, but a great concourse of stars, which kept the night as a long time of dusk. The baby was awake, too, groping for food and whimpering a little. She sat up to supply him: though in that act her brain swam, it is probable the duty saved her. Fearing to faint again, she dared not allow herself to think; for children must be fed though their mothers are stoned from the gates. Vanna nursed him till he dropped asleep, and sat on with her thoughts and troubles. Happily for her, he had turned these to other roads than the Lung' Adige. She knew that if he was to be fed again she must feed also.

THE MIRACLE OF THE PEACH-TREE

Directly you were outside the Porta San Zeno the peach-trees began--acre by acre of bent trunks, whose long branches, tied at the top, took shapes of blown candle-flames: beyond these was an open waste of bents and juniper scrub, which afforded certain eatage for goats.

Here three herd-boys, Luca, Biagio, and Astorre, simple brown-skinned souls, watched their flocks all the summer night, sleeping, waking to play pranks with each other, whining endless doggerel, praying at every scare, and swearing at every reassurance. Simple puppyish folk though they were, Madonna of the Peach-Tree chose them to witness her epiphany.

It was a very still night, of wonderful star-shine, but without a moon. The stars were so thickly spread, so clear and hot, that there was light enough for the lads to see each other's faces, the rough shapes of each other. It was light enough to notice how the square belfry of San Zeno cut a wedge of black into the spangled blue vault. Sheer through the Milky Way it ploughed a broad furrow, which ended in a ragged edge. You would never have seen that if it had not been a clear night.

Still also it was. You heard the cropping of the goats, the jaws' champ when they chewed the crisp leaves; the flicker of the bats' wings. In the marsh, half a mile away, the chorus of frogs, when it swelled up, drowned all nearer noise; but when it broke off suddenly, those others resumed their hold upon the stillness. It was a breathless night of suspense. Anything might happen on such a night.

Luca, Biagio, and Astorre, under the spell of this marvellous night, lay on their stomachs alert for alarms. A heavy-wheeling white owl had come by with a swish, and Biagio had called aloud to Madonna in his agony. Astorre had crossed himself over and over again: this was the Angel of Death cruising abroad on the hunt for goats or goat-herds; but "No, no!" cried Luca, eldest of the three, "the wings are too short, friends. That is a fluffy new soul just let loose. She knows not the way, you see. Let us pray for her. There are devils abroad on such close nights as this."

Pray they did, with a will, "Ave Maria," "O maris Stella," and half the Paternoster, when Biagio burst into a guffaw, and gave Luca a push which sent Astorre down.

"Why, 'tis only a screech-owl, you fools!" he cried, though the sound of his own voice made him falter; "an old mouse-teaser," he went on in a much lower voice. "Who's afraid?"

A black and white cat making a pounce had sent hearts to mouths after this: though they found her out before they had got to "Dominus tecum," she left them all in a quiver. It had been a cat, but it might have been the devil. Then, before the bristles had folded down on their backs, they rose up again, and the hair of their heads became rigid as quills. Over the brow of a little hill, through the peach-trees (which bowed their spiry heads to her as she walked), came quietly a tall white Lady in a dark cloak. Hey! powers of earth and air, but this was not to be doubted! Evenly forward she came, without a footfall, without a rustle or the crackling of a twig, without so much as kneeing her skirt--stood before them so nearly that they saw the pale oval of her face, and said in a voice like a muffled bell, "I am hungry, my friends; have you any meat?" She had a face like the moon, and great round eyes; within her cloak, on the bosom of her white dress, she held a man-child. He, they passed their sacred word, lifted in his mother's arms and turned open-handed towards them. Luca, Biagio, and Astorre, goat-herds all and honest lads, fell on their faces with one accord; with one voice they cried, "Madonna, Madonna, Madonna! pray for us sinners!"

But again the Lady spoke in her gentle tones. "I am very hungry, and my child is hungry. Have you nothing to give me?" So then Luca kicked the prone Biagio, and Biagio's heel nicked Astorre on the shin. But it was Luca, as became the eldest, who got up first, all the same; and as soon as he was on his feet the others followed him. Luca took his cap off, Biagio saw the act and followed it. Astorre, who dared not lift his eyes, and was so busy making crosses on himself that he had no hands to spare, kept his on till Luca nudged Biagio, and Biagio cuffed him soundly, saying, "Uncover, cow-face."

Then Luca on his knees made an offering of cheese and black bread to the Lady. They saw the gleam of her white hand as she stretched it out to take the victual. That hand shone like agate in the dark. They saw her eat, sitting very straight and noble upon a tussock of bents. Astorre whispered to Biagio, Biagio consulted with Luca for a few anxious moments, and communicated again with Astorre. Astorre jumped up and scuttled away into the dark. Presently he came back, bearing something in his two hands. The three shock-heads inspected his burden; there was much whispering, some contention, almost a scuffle. The truth was, that Biagio wanted to take the thing from Astorre, and that Luca would not allow it. Luca was the eldest and wanted to take it himself. Astorre was in tears. "Cristo amore!" he blubbered, "you will spill the milk between you. I thought of it all by myself. Let go, Biagio; let go, Luca!" So they whispered and tussled, pulling three different ways. The Lady's voice broke over them like silver rain. "Let him who thought of the kind act give me the milk," she said; so young Astorre on his knees handed her the horn cup, and through the cracks of his fingers watched her drink every drop.

That done, the cup returned with a smile piercingly sweet, the Lady rose. Saints on thrones, how tall she was! "The bimbo will thank you for this to-morrow, as I do now," said she. "Goodnight, my friends, and may the good God have mercy upon all souls!" She turned to go the way she had come, but Astorre, covering his eyes with one hand, crept forward on three legs (as you might say) and plucked the hem of her robe up, and kissed it. She stooped to lay a hand upon his head. "Never kiss my robe, Astorre," said she--and how under Heaven did she know his name if she were not what she was?--"never kiss my robe, but get up and let me kiss you." Well of Truth! to think of it! Up gets Astorre, shaking like a nun in a fit, and the Lady bent over him and, as sure as you are you, kissed his forehead. Astorre told his village next day as they sat round him in a ring, and he on the wellhead as plain to be seen as this paper, that he felt at that moment as if two rose-leaves had dropped from heaven upon his forehead. Slowly then, very slowly and smoothly (as they report), did the Lady move away towards the peach-trees whence she had come. In the half light there was--for by this it was the hour before dawn--they saw her take a peach from one of the trees. She stayed to eat it. Then she walked over the crest of the orchard and disappeared. As soon as they dared, when the light had come, they looked for her over that same crest, but could see nothing whatever. With pale, serious faces the three youths regarded each other. There was no doubt as to what had happened--a miracle! a miracle!