Brother Thomas moved stealthily to the door,and thrust in the wooden bolt.Then he sat him heavily down on my bed,and put his fiend's face close to mine,his eyes stabbing into my eyes.But Ibit my lip,and stared right back into his yellow wolf's eyes,that shone like flames of the pit with evil and cruel thoughts.
So I lay,with that yellow light on me;and strength came strangely to me,and I prayed that,since die I must,I might at least gladden him with no sign of fear.When he found that he could not daunton me,he laughed again.
"Our chick of Pitcullo has picked up a spirit in the wars,"he said;and turning his back on me,he leaned his face on his hand,and so sat thinking.
The birds of May sang in the garden;there was a faint shining of silver and green,from the apple-boughs and buds without,in the little chamber;and the hooded back of the cordelier was before me on my bed,like the shape of Death beside the Sick Man,in a picture.Now I did not even pray,I waited.
Doubtless he knew that no cruel thing which the devil could devise was more cruel than this suspense.
Then he turned about and faced me,grinning like a dog.
"These are good words,"said he,"in that foolish old book they read to the faithful in the churches,'Vengeance is Mine,saith the Lord.'Ay,it is even too sweet a morsel for us poor Christian men,such as the lowly Brother Thomas of the Order of St.Francis.
Nevertheless,I am minded to put my teeth in it";and he bared his yellow dog's fangs at me,smiling like a hungry hound."My sick brother,"he went on,"both as one that has some science of leech-craft and as thy ghostly counsellor,it is my duty to warn thee that thou art now very near thine end.Nay,let me feel thy pulse";and seizing my left wrist,he grasped it lightly in his iron fingers.
"Now,ere I administer to thee thy due,as a Christian man,let me hear thy parting confession.But,alas!as the blessed Maid too truly warned thee,thou must not open thy poor lips in speech.
There is death in a word!Write,then,write the story of thy sinful life,that I may give thee absolution."So saying,he opened the shutter,and carefully set the paper and inkhorn before me,putting the pen in my fingers.
"Now,write what I shall tell thee";and here he so pressed and wrung my wrist that his fingers entered into my living flesh with a fiery pang.I writhed,but I did not cry.
"Write--"
"I,Norman Leslie of Pitcullo--"and,to escape that agony,I wrote as he bade me.
"--being now in the article of death--"
And I wrote.
"--do attest on my hope of salvation--"And I wrote.
"--and do especially desire Madame Jeanne,La Pucelle,and all Frenchmen and Scots loyal to our Sovereign Lord the Dauphin,to accept my witness,that Brother Thomas,of the Order of St.Francis,called Noiroufle while of the world,has been most falsely and treacherously accused by me--"I wrote,but I wrote not his false words,putting my own in their place--"has been most truly and righteously accused by me--""--of divers deeds of black treason,and dealing with our enemies of England,against our Lord the Dauphin,and the Maid,the Sister of the Saints,and of this I heartily repent me,--"But I wrote,"All which I maintain--""--as may God pardon my sins,on the faith of a sinful and dying man.""Now sign thy name,and that of thy worshipful cabbage-garden and dunghill in filthy Scotland."So I signed,"Norman Leslie,the younger,of Pitcullo,"and added the place,Orleans,with the date of day and year of our Lord,namely,May the eighth,fourteen hundred and twenty-nine.
"A very laudable confession,"quoth Brother Thomas;"would that all the sinners whom I have absolved,as I am about to absolve thee,had cleansed and purged their sinful souls as freely.And now,my brother,read aloud to me this scroll;nay,methinks it is ill for thy health to speak or read.A sad matter is this,for,in faith,Ihave forgotten my clergy myself,and thou mayst have beguiled me by inditing other matter than I have put into thy lying mouth.Still,where the safety of a soul is concerned,a few hours more or less of this vain,perishable life weigh but as dust in the balance."Here he took from about his hairy neck a heavy Italian crucifix of black wood,whereon was a figure of our Lord,wrought in white enamel,with golden nails,and a golden crown of thorns.
"Now read,"he whispered,heaving up the crucifix above me.And as he lifted it,a bright blade,strong,narrow,and sharp,leaped out from beneath the feet of our Lord,and glittered within an inch of my throat.An emblem of this false friar it was,the outside of whom was as that of a holy man,while within he was a murdering sword.
"Read!"he whispered again,pricking my throat with the dagger's point.
Then I read aloud,and as I read I was half choked with my blood,and now and then was stopped;but still he cried -"Read,and if one word is wrong,thine absolution shall come all the swifter."So I read,and,may I be forgiven if I sinned in deceiving one so vile!I uttered not what I had written,but what he had bidden me to write.
"I,Norman Leslie of Pitcullo,being now in the article of death,do attest on my hope of salvation,and do especially desire Madame Jeanne,La Pucelle,and all Frenchmen and Scots loyal to our Sovereign Lord the Dauphin,to accept my witness that Brother Thomas,of the Order of St.Francis,called Noiroufle while of the world,has been most falsely and treacherously accused by me of divers deeds of black treason,and dealing with our enemies of England,against our Lord the Dauphin,and the Maid,the Sister of the Saints,and of this I heartily repent me,as may God pardon my sins,on the faith of a sinful and dying man.Signed,at Orleans,Norman Leslie,the younger,of Pitcullo,this eighth of May,in the year of our Lord fourteen hundred and twenty-nine."When I had ended,he took away his blasphemous dagger-point from my throat.
