Part 38

As he thought, his task was ended, the floor of the little church was clean.

"Swept," he murmured to himself as he laid his broom aside, and taking up the basket of white roses proceeded to set them tenderly upon the altar.

"Garnished," he murmured again, as he stepped back a little way and regarded his handiwork with a greater pleasure than he had ever known, in days now dim as dreams, in the pageants and the festals of Naples. The little church was now the kingdom in which he lived, not as king, but as its lowliest servitor; yet he breathed in it a spirit of content such as he had never known before. Those solemn pillars, those gloomy spaces, those narrow staircases set in the thickness of the walls, were the landmarks, were the confines of his home. The colored light that poured through the windows of painted glass, mottling the stone flooring with splendid patches of yellow and blue and red, gave the gray place to his sad eyes a pomp beyond the pride of courts. Here and there in the darkness dim lamps burned, the beacons for him of inexpressible havens. Portions of the walls were covered with votive offerings--little models of ships that had been set there by sailors, grateful for succor in storm and escape from shipwreck, wreaths and pictures and crosses and images of saints, emblems all of a simple piety that his racked spirit was slowly learning to understand. In front of him was the altar with its image of Our Lady of the Sea, curiously and beautifully wrought in silver, the figure of the Divine Woman on a space of tumbling sea. At the left of the altar, in a niche in the wall hard by, stood the most precious relic of the church, a huge iron cross more than seven feet in height, which had been carried on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem by the founder of the church. On the right of the altar was the golden railing and gateway on which the eyes of Robert always rested in joy, for behind it lay the space of sanctuary, the spot where Perpetua had found a shelter from her enemies. Yet close to this railing rose a pillar, the sight of which always had power to banish any joy from Robert's eyes. Down its length hung a thick rope running through iron rings set in the stone-work. That rope conducted to a bell on the roof of the church. That bell had been set there in the spring of the reign of King Robert the Good for this purpose, that if any man in his kingdom thought he was wrongly used by its King, he had but to drag at the rope to set the great bell ringing, whose sound, tolling over the city, called all good citizens together to hear and decide upon the complaint of the subject against the King. In such a benignant spirit had Sicily been ruled in the days of Robert the Good.

One white rose remained in his fingers. He lifted it to his lips and kissed it reverently. Then he laid it down before the gilded gateway of the sanctuary, with the thought in his mind that perhaps her foot might touch it as she passed and make it sacred. Then he lit a taper at a lamp, and in obedience to the order given him by Father Hieronymus the previous night, he carried the tiny flame to each of the candles on the altar, till all were lighted. This task done, he prostrated himself on the steps before the shrine and prayed aloud.

"Heaven," he supplicated--"Heaven, against whom I have sinned so deeply, hear my prayer for the white child who has led Thy light into my dark. Shield her from danger. Keep holy her who is holy."

As his voice died away into silence, he still knelt with bent head and clasped hands, so steeped in penitential thoughts that he did not hear the sea-door open, did not hear the entrance of a man, grizzled, bronzed, eagle-faced, ascetic, clad in the brown robe of his order. Father Hieronymus paused for a moment, seeing with gratification the kneeling figure before the altar. It would be the sweetest triumph of a life of ceaseless struggle with the Prince of the Power of the Air to save alive the soul of the distracted fool.

XIV

THE EXILES

Hieronymus advanced to the kneeling figure. "My son," he said, gently.

Robert leaped to his feet at the sound of the familiar voice, and moved to meet Hieronymus.

"Father, when we came to you a month ago and begged for shelter, I told you how I lied to save the girl, pretending to be plague-stricken."

Hieronymus inclined his head. "And I absolved you."

Robert spoke in a lower voice, almost a whisper. "I told you, too, that I was Sicily, Robert himself, lapped in this hideous shape."

Hieronymus raised a warning hand. "Does that delusion still vex you?" he asked, sadly.

Robert bowed his head. "My spirit is free from many delusions," he whispered; "but I did not tell you that I, unlovely as I am, I love Perpetua. Her hand has led me, her voice has inspired me. If ever I be saved she will have saved me."

The grave face of Hieronymus looked kindly pity upon the fool in the friar's gown.

"God chooses the time and the way. An earthly love may win the grace of Heaven."

Robert sighed. "My hopeless love is happy service. Daily my spirit creeps a little nearer to the light."

Hieronymus beat his breast.

"Daily the tyrant of Sicily grows more wicked, reeling like a madman from crime to crime. The island groans beneath him more piteously than the imprisoned Titan groans beneath Mount Etna."

Robert turned away from Hieronymus with a bitter sigh. "God forgive me," he said to himself, "for he does the deeds I meant to do!"

Hieronymus did not heed the agitation of his companion; he stood as if listening to some distant sound. "Son, do you hear...?" he questioned.

Robert came swiftly to his side, listened, heard, and answered: "The measured tread of many feet. They seem to walk mournfully over my heart."

"Look out, my son," Hieronymus commanded, "and tell me what you see."

Robert opened the door that gave upon the sea, looked out, and answered, sadly: "A company of men and women, all in black. They seem weighed down with sorrow."

"These," said Hieronymus, grimly, "are the noblest folk in Sicily, flying into exile from the tyrant's lust and greed."

Robert stood motionless, frozen with sorrow.

"These," he said, in his heart, "are the just and righteous whom I meant to vex and banish."