• Amelotte still was on her knees
• As she had kneeled to pray.
• Deeming her sister swooned, she thought,
• At first, some succour to have brought;
• 100 But Aloÿse rocked, as one distraught.

• She would have pushed the lattice wide
• To gain what breeze might be;
• But marking that no leaf once beat
• The outside casement, it seemed meet
• Not to bring in more scent and heat

• So she said only: ‘Aloÿse,
• Sister, when happened it
• At any time that the bride came
• To ill, or spoke in fear of shame,
• 110 When speaking first the bridegroom's name?’

• A bird had out its song and ceased
• Ere the bride spoke. At length
• She said: ‘The name is as the thing:—
• Sin hath no second christening,
• And shame is all that shame can bring.

• ‘In divers places many an while
• I would have told thee this;
• But faintness took me, or a fit
• Like fever. God would not permit
• 120 That I should change thine eyes with it.

• ‘Yet once I spoke, hadst thou but heard:—
• That time we wandered out
• All the sun's hours, but missed our way
• When evening darkened, and so lay
• The whole night covered up in hay.

• ‘At last my face was hidden: so,
• Having God's hint, I paused
• Not long; but drew myself more near
• Where thou wast laid, and shook off fear,
• 130 And whispered quick into thine ear

• ‘Something of the whole tale. At first
• I lay and bit my hair
• For the sore silence thou didst keep:
• Till, as thy breath came long and deep,
• I knew that thou hadst been asleep.

• ‘The moon was covered, but the stars
• Lasted till morning broke.
• Awake, thou told'st me that thy dream
• Had been of me,—that all did seem
• 140 At jar,—but that it was a dream.

• ‘I knew God's hand and might not speak.
• After that night I kept
• Silence and let the record swell:
• Till now there is much more to tell
• Which must be told out ill or well.’

• She paused then, weary, with dry lips
• Apart. From the outside
• By fits there boomed a dull report
• From where i' the hanging tennis-court
• 150 The bridegroom's retinue made sport.

• The room lay still in dusty glare,
• Having no sound through it
• Except the chirp of a caged bird
• That came and ceased: and if she stirred,
• Amelotte's raiment could be heard.

• Quoth Amelotte: ‘The night this chanced
• Was a late summer night
• Last year! What secret, for Christ's love,
• Keep'st thou since then? Mary above!
• 160 What thing is this thou speakest of?

• ‘Mary and Christ! Lest when 'tis told
• I should be prone to wrath,—
• This prayer beforehand! How she errs
• Soe'er, take count of grief like hers,
• Whereof the days are turned to years!’

• She bowed her neck, and having said,
• Kept on her knees to hear;
• And then, because strained thought demands
• Quiet before it understands,
• 170 Darkened her eyesight with her hands.

• So when at last her sister spoke,
• She did not see the pain
• O' the mouth nor the ashamèd eyes,
• But marked the breath that came in sighs
• And the half-pausing for replies.

• This was the bride's sad prelude-strain:—
• ‘I' the convent where a girl
• I dwelt till near my womanhood,
• I had but preachings of the rood
• 180 And Aves told in solitude

• ‘To spend my heart on: and my hand
• Had but the weary skill
• To eke out upon silken cloth
• Christ's visage, or the long bright growth
• Of Mary's hair, or Satan wroth.

• ‘So when at last I went, and thou,
• A child not known before,
• Didst come to take the place I left,—
• My limbs, after such lifelong theft
• 190 Of life, could be but little deft

• ‘In all that ministers delight
• To noble women: I
• Had learned no word of youth's discourse,
• Nor gazed on games of warriors,
• Nor trained a hound, nor ruled a horse.

• ‘Besides, the daily life i' the sun
• Made me at first hold back.
• To thee this came at once; to me
• It crept with pauses timidly;
• 200 I am not blithe and strong like thee.

• ‘Yet my feet liked the dances well,
• The songs went to my voice,
• The music made me shake and weep;
• And often, all night long, my sleep
• Gave dreams I had been fain to keep.

• ‘But though I loved not holy things,
• To hear them scorned brought pain,—
• They were my childhood; and these dames
• Were merely perjured in saints' names
• 210 And fixed upon saints' days for games.

• ‘And sometimes when my father rode
• To hunt with his loud friends,
• I dared not bring him to be quaff'd,
• As my wont was, his stirrup-draught,
• Because they jested so and laugh'd.

• ‘At last one day my brothers said,
• “The girl must not grow thus,—
• Bring her a jennet,—she shall ride.”
• They helped my mounting, and I tried
• 220 To laugh with them and keep their side.

• ‘But brakes were rough and bents were steep
• Upon our path that day:
• My palfrey threw me; and I went
• Upon men's shoulders home, sore spent,
• While the chase followed up the scent.

• ‘Our shrift-father (and he alone
• Of all the household there
• Had skill in leechcraft,) was away
• When I reached home. I tossed, and lay
• 230 Sullen with anguish the whole day.

• ‘For the day passed ere some one brought
• To mind that in the hunt
• Rode a young lord she named, long bred
• Among the priests, whose art (she said)
• Might chance to stand me in much stead.

• ‘I bade them seek and summon him:
• But long ere this, the chase
• Had scattered, and he was not found.
• I lay in the same weary stound,
• 240 Therefore, until the night came round.

• ‘It was dead night and near on twelve
• When the horse-tramp at length
• Beat up the echoes of the court:
• By then, my feverish breath was short
• With pain the sense could scarce support.

• ‘My fond nurse sitting near my feet
• Rose softly,—her lamp's flame
• Held in her hand, lest it should make
• My heated lids, in passing, ache;
• 250 And she passed softly, for my sake.

• ‘Returning soon, she brought the youth
• They spoke of. Meek he seemed,
• But good knights held him of stout heart.
• He was akin to us in part,
• And bore our shield, but barred athwart.

• ‘I now remembered to have seen
• His face, and heard him praised
• For letter-lore and medicine,
• Seeing his youth was nurtured in
• 260 Priests' knowledge, as mine own had been.’

• The bride's voice did not weaken here,
• Yet by her sudden pause
• She seemed to look for questioning;
• Or else (small need though) 'twas to bring
• Well to her mind the bygone thing.

• Her thought, long stagnant, stirred by speech,
• Gave her a sick recoil;
• As, dip thy fingers through the green
• That masks a pool,—where they have been
• 270 The naked depth is black between.

• Amelotte kept her knees; her face
• Was shut within her hands,
• As it had been throughout the tale;
• Her forehead's whiteness might avail
• Nothing to say if she were pale.

• Although the lattice had dropped loose,
• There was no wind; the heat
• Being so at rest that Amelotte
• Heard far beneath the plunge and float
• 280 Of a hound swimming in the moat.

• Some minutes since, two rooks had toiled
• Home to the nests that crowned
• Ancestral ash-trees. Through the glare
• Beating again, they seemed to tear
• With that thick caw the woof o' the air.

• But else, 'twas at the dead of noon
• Absolute silence; all,
• From the raised bridge and guarded sconce
• To green-clad places of pleasaùnce
• 290 Where the long lake was white with swans.

• Amelotte spoke not any word
• Nor moved she once; but felt
• Between her hands in narrow space
• Her own hot breath upon her face,
• And kept in silence the same place.

• Aloÿse did not hear at all
• The sounds without. She heard
• The inward voice (past help obey'd)
• Which might not slacken nor be stay'd,
• 300 But urged her till the whole were said.

• Therefore she spoke again: ‘That night
• But little could be done:
• My foot, held in my nurse's hands,
• He swathed up heedfully in bands,
• And for my rest gave close commands.

• ‘I slept till noon, but an ill sleep
• Of dreams: through all that day
• My side was stiff and caught the breath;
• Next day, such pain as sickeneth
• 310 Took me, and I was nigh to death.

• ‘Life strove, Death claimed me for his own
• Through days and nights: but now
• 'Twas the good father tended me,
• Having returned. Still, I did see
• The youth I spoke of constantly.

• ‘For he would with my brothers come
• To stay beside my couch,
• And fix my eyes against his own,
• Noting my pulse; or else alone,
• 320 To sit at gaze while I made moan.

• ‘(Some nights I knew he kept the watch,
• Because my women laid
• The rushes thick for his steel shoes.)
• Through many days this pain did use
• The life God would not let me lose.

• ‘At length, with my good nurse to aid,
• I could walk forth again:
• And still, as one who broods or grieves,
• At noons I'd meet him and at eves,
• 330 With idle feet that drove the leaves.

• ‘The day when I first walked alone
• Was thinned in grass and leaf
• And yet a goodly day o' the year:
• The last bird's cry upon mine ear
• Left my brain weak, it was so clear.

• The tears were sharp within mine eyes;
• I sat down, being glad,
• And wept; but stayed the sudden flow
• Anon, for footsteps that fell slow;
• 340 'Twas that youth passed me, bowing low.

• ‘He passed me without speech; but when,
• At least an hour gone by,
• Rethreading the same covert, he
• Saw I was still beneath the tree,
• He spoke and sat him down with me.

• ‘Little we said; nor one heart heard
• Even what was said within;
• And, faltering some farewell, I soon
• Rose up; but then i' the autumn noon
• 350 My feeble brain whirled like a swoon.

• ‘He made me sit. “Cousin, I grieve
• Your sickness stays by you.”
• “I would,” said I, “that you did err
• So grieving. I am wearier
• Than death, of the sickening dying year.”

• ‘He answered: “If your weariness
• Accepts a remedy,
• I hold one and can give it you.”
• I gazed: “What ministers thereto,
• 360 Be sure,” I said, “that I will do.”

• ‘He went on quickly:—'Twas a cure
• He had not ever named
• Unto our kin, lest they should stint
• Their favour, for some foolish hint
• Of wizardry or magic in't:

• ‘But that if he were let to come
• Within my bower that night,
• (My women still attending me,
• He said, while he remain'd there,) he
• 370 Could teach me the cure privily.

• ‘I bade him come that night. He came;
• But little in his speech
• Was cure or sickness spoken of,
• Only a passionate fierce love
• That clamoured upon God above.

• ‘My women wondered, leaning close
• Aloof. At mine own heart
• I think great wonder was not stirr'd.
• I dared not listen, yet I heard
• 380 His tangled speech, word within word.

• ‘He craved my pardon first,—all else
• Wild tumult. In the end
• He remained silent at my feet
• Fumbling the rushes. Strange quick heat
• Made all the blood of my life meet.

• ‘And lo! I loved him. I but said,
• If he would leave me then,
• His hope some future might forecast.
• His hot lips stung my hand: at last
• 390 My damsels led him forth in haste.’

• The bride took breath to pause; and turned
• Her gaze where Amelotte
• Knelt,—the gold hair upon her back
• Quite still in all its threads,—the track
• Of her still shadow sharp and black.

• That listening without sight had grown
• To stealthy dread; and now
• That the one sound she had to mark
• Left her alone too, she was stark
• 400 Afraid, as children in the dark.

• Her fingers felt her temples beat;
• Then came that brain-sickness
• Which thinks to scream, and murmureth;
• And pent between her hands, the breath
• Was damp against her face like death.

• Her arms both fell at once; but when
• She gasped upon the light,
• Her sense returned. She would have pray'd
• To change whatever words still stay'd
• 410 Behind, but felt there was no aid.

• So she rose up, and having gone
• Within the window's arch
• Once more, she sat there, all intent
• On torturing doubts, and once more bent
• To hear, in mute bewilderment.