XXXV
So with Colgran and his rebels beating at the inner gate, Flavian ofGambrevault took Yeoland to wife, and was married that same eve byFather Julian in the castle chapel. There was pathetic cynicism in theservice, celebrating as it did the temporal blending of two bodies whobade fair by their destinies to return speedily to dust. The chant mighthave served as a requiem, or a dirge for the fall of the mighty. It wasa tragic scene, a solemn ceremony, attended by grim-faced men in platedsteel, by frightened women and sickly children. Famine, disease, anddeath headed the procession, jigged with the torches, danced likeskeletons about a bier. Trumpets and cannon gave an epithalamium; bonesmight have been scattered in lieu of flowers, and wounds espoused inplace of favours. For a marriage pageant war pointed to the grinningcorpses in the breach and the clotted ruins. It was such a ceremonythat might have appealed to a Stoic, or to a Marius brooding amid theruins of Carthage.
Peril chastens the brave, and death is as wine to the heart of thesaint. Even as the sky seems of purer crystal before a storm, so thesoul pinions to a more luminous heroism when the mortal tragedy of lifenears the "explicit." As the martyrs exulted in their spiritualtriumph, or as Pico of Mirandola beheld transcendent visions on his bedof death, when the Golden Lilies of France waved into luckless Florence,so Flavian and Yeoland his wife took to their hearts a true bridalbeauty.
When the door was closed on them that night, a mysterious cavern, aspiritual shrine of gold, came down as from heaven to cover their souls.They had no need of the subtleties of earth, of music and of colour, offlowers, or scent, or song. They were the world, the sky, the sea, theinfinite. Imperishable atoms from the alembic of God, they fused soulwith soul, became as one fair gem that wakes a thousand lustres in itssapphire unity. To such a festival bring no fauns and dryads, no lewdand supple goddess, no Orphean flute. Rather, let Christ hold forth Hiswounded hands, and let the wings of angels glimmer like snow over thealchemy of souls.
Flavian knelt beside the bed and prayed. He had the girl's hand in his,and her dark hair swept in masses over the pillow, framing her spiritualface as a dark cloud holds the moon. Her bed-gown was of the whitestlace and linen, like foam bounding the violet coverlet that swept to herbosom. The light from the single lamp burnt steadily in her great darkeyes.
Flavian lifted up his face from the coverlet and looked long at her.
"Dear heart, have no fear of me," he said.
She smiled wonderfully, and read all the fine philosophy of his soul.
"God be thanked, you are a good man."
"Ah, child, you are so wonderful that I dare not touch you; I have suchgrand awe in my heart that even your breath upon my face makes me bowdown as though an angel touched my forehead."
"All good and great love is of heaven."
"Pure as the lilies in the courts of God. Every fragment of you is liketo me as a pearl from the lips of angels; your flesh is of silver, yourbosom as snow from Lebanon, girded with the gold of truth. Oh, secondAdam, thanks be to thee for thy philosophy."
She put out her hands and touched his hair; their eyes were like sea andsky in summer, tranquil, tender, and unshadowed.
"I love you for this purity, ah, more and more than I can tell."
"True love is ever pure."
"And for me, such love as yours. Never to see the wolfish stare, theflushed forehead, and the loosened lip; never to feel the burningbreath. God indeed be thanked for this."
"Have no fear of me."
"Ah, like a white gull into a blue sky, like water into a crystal bowl,I give myself into your arms."
Love Among the Ruins Page 35