The girl's eyes grew larger and darker. "Are they going to hang me?"
she asked.
"Are you not a witch?"
"It is said."
"Your mother Mald is a witch--eh?"
"Yes, she is a witch."
"And are not you? You know Deerleap--eh?"
"It is said that I do."
"And you know what must be done to witches."
"They will hang me, Dom Galors! Will they hang me by Cutlaw and
Rogerson?"
"There is room for you there."
"What can they prove?"
"Pshaw! Is proof needed? Are you not a baggage?"
"I know not."
"A wanton?"
"Ah, you should know that!"
"If it depended upon me, Isoult, I could save you. But the Abbot means
to make an example and set a terror up before the evil-doers in this
walk of Morgraunt. What am I before the Abbot, or what is my love for
you to be brought to his ears? It is doom more certain still, my
dear."
"Then I shall be hanged."
"Listen to me now, Isoult. Listen close. No, leave your hands where
they are; they are safer there than elsewhere. So leave them and
listen close. No soul in Malbank but myself and the Lord Abbot knows
of what I have told you now. Me he told this morning. Judge if that
was good news for your lover's ear!"
Isoult shivered and hung her head. Galors went on--"At the risk of
everything a monk should fear, and of everything, by God, that such a
monk as I am should care to win, I contended with my spiritual father.
Spare me the particulars; I got some shrewd knocks over it, but I did
win this much. You are to be hanged to-morrow, Isoult, or noosed in
another way. A ring is to play a part. You shall be bride of the tree
or a man's bride. I won this, and left the Abbot chuckling, for much
as he knows he has not guessed that the goose-girl, the tossed-out
kitchen-girl, the scarecrow haunter of the heath, should be sought in
marriage. But I knew more than he; and now," he said, stooping over
the bent girl,--"and now, Isoult la Desirous, come with me!"
He tried to draw her towards him, but she trembled in his hands so
much that he had to give over. He began his arguments again, reasoned,
entreated, threatened, cajoled; he could not contain himself now,
being so near fruition. The spell of the forest was upon him. "Let
Love be the master," he said, "for there is no gainsaying him, nor can
cloister walls bar his way; but his flamy wings top even these. Ah,
Isoult!" he cried out in his passion; "ah, Isoult la Desirée, come,
lest I die of love and you of the tree."