blood to know that you defended the church for the church's sake; but, while you remain unhappily her enemy, I would not that you endangered your own safety, or diminished your own comforts, for the sake of my individual protection.?But who comes hither to disturb the few minutes of fraternal communication which our evil fate allows us?'
The door of the apartment opened as the Abbot spoke, and Dame Magdalen entered.
'Who is this woman?' said Sir Halbert Glendinning, somewhat sternly, 'and what does she want?'
'That you know me not,' said the matron, 'signifies little; I come by your own order, to give my free consent that the stripling, Roland Graeme, return to your service; and, having said so, I cumber you no longer with my presence. Peace be with you!' She turned to go away, but was stopped by inquiries of Sir Halbert Glendinning.
'Who are you??what are you??and why do you not await to make me answer?'
'I was,' she replied, 'while yet I belonged to the world, a matron of no vulgar name; now I am Magdalen, a poor pilgrimer, for the sake of Holy Kirk.'
'Yea,' said Sir Halbert, 'art thou a Catholic? I thought my dame said that Roland Graeme came of reformed kin.'
'His father,' said the matron, 'was a heretic, or rather one who regarded neither orthodoxy or heresy?neither the temple of the church or of antichrist. I, too, for the sins of the times make sinners, have seemed to conform to your unhallowed rites?but I had my dispensation and my absolution.'
'You see, brother,' said Sir Halbert, with a smile of meaning towards his brother, 'that we accuse you not altogether without grounds of mental equivocation.'
'My brother, you do us injustice,' replied the Abbot; 'this woman, as her bearing may of itself warrant you, is not in her perfect mind. Thanks, I must needs say, to the persecution of your marauding barons, and of your latitudinarian clergy.'
'I will not dispute the point,' said Sir Halbert; 'the evils of the time are unhappily so numerous, that both churches may divide them, and have enow to spare.' So saying, he leaned from the window of the apartment, and winded his bugle.
'Why do you sound your horn, my brother?' said the Abbot; 'we have spent but few minutes together.'
'Alas!' said the elder brother, 'and even these few have been sullied by disagreement. I sound to horse, my brother?the rather that, to avert the consequences of this day's rashness on your part, requires hasty efforts on mine.?Dame, you will oblige me by letting your young relative know that we mount instantly. I intend not that he shall return to Avenel with me?it would lead to new quarrels betwixt him and my household; at least to taunts which his proud heart could ill brook, and my wish is to do him kindness. He shall, therefore, go forward to Edinburgh with one of my retinue, whom I shall send back to say what has chanced here.?You seem rejoiced at this?' he added, fixing his eyes keenly on Magdalen Graeme, who returned his gaze with calm indifference.
'I would rather,' she said, 'that Roland, a poor and friendless orphan, were the jest of the world at large, than of the menials at Avenel.'
'Fear not, dame?he shall be scorned by neither,' answered the Knight.
'It may be,' she replied?'it may well be?but I will trust more to his own bearing than to your countenance.' She left the room as she spoke.
The Knight looked after her as she departed, but turned instantly to his brother, and expressing, in the most affectionate terms, his wishes for his welfare and happiness, craved his leave to depart. 'My knaves,' he said, 'are too busy at the ale-stand, to leave their revelry for the empty breath of a bugle-horn.'
'You have freed them from higher restraint, Halbert,' answered the Abbot, 'and therein taught them to rebel against your own.'
'Fear not that, Edward,' exclaimed Halbert, who never gave his brother his monastic name of Ambrosius; 'none obey the command of real duty so well as those who are free from the observance of slavish bondage.'
He was turning to depart, when the Abbot said,?'Let us not yet part, my brother?here comes some light refreshment. Leave not the house which I must now call mine, till force expel me from it, until you have at least broken bread with me.'
The poor lay brother, the same who acted as porter, now entered the apartment, bearing some simple refreshment, and a flask of wine. 'He had found it,' he said with officious humility, 'by rummaging through every nook of the cellar.'
The Knight filled a small silver cup, and, quaffing it off, asked his brother to pledge him, observing, the wine was Bacharac, of the first vintage, and great age.
'Ay,' said the poor lay brother, 'it came out of the nook which old brother Nicholas, (may his soul be happy!) was wont to call Abbot Ingelram's corner; and Abbot Ingelram was bred at the Convent of Wurtzburg, which I understand to be near where that choice wine grows.'
'True, my reverend sir,' said Sir Halbert; 'and therefore I entreat my brother and you to pledge me in a cup of this orthodox vintage.'
The thin old porter looked with a wishful glance towards the Abbot. '
'And to you, my beloved Edward,' replied Glendinning, 'I wish the free exercise of your own free reason, and the discharge of more important duties than are connected with the idle name which you have so rashly assumed.'
The brothers parted with deep regret; and yet, each confident in his opinion, felt somewhat relieved by the absence of one whom he respected so much, and with whom he could agree so little.
