Avalon (3 page)

The Abbot nodded slowly. "A most edifying account." He turned to Rumon. "You will see from this history of St. Rumon how dangerous women can be, my son. Profit by the lesson."

"Yes, Reverend Father," answered the guest. Yet he had not found the tale edifying. He found it puzzling. If the woman had been possessed by the Devil, if indeed she were mad, as it sounded, and if the saint could work miracles, why could he not have routed the Devil, have converted her, and 'spared her the loathsome affliction of leprosy? Was then the Lord's injunction to love one's enemies, to turn the other cheek, as stupidly impractical as Edgive beheved? Yet, to be sure, murder must be punished. Keban had tried to do murder. Did the Lord Jesus any^vhere say that murder must not be punished? Aye, He had said it on the Cross. 'Tather, forgive them—" Yet was that the same, was it not blasphemy to think so?

Rumon's mind buzzed with questions. The crowded refectory was stifling; he escaped and went riding in the chill twilight.

That night he dreamed about a beautiful naked woman. He knew she was naked though her yellow hair fell around her

shoulders like a mantle. Ivory and gold she was except for rosy nipples on the round uptilted breasts. He could not quite see her eyes, yet knew that they were looking at him with desire and defiance. A strange expression. Rumon felt a thrill of excitement in his dream.

There was cruelty in the woman's face, in the set of the short, square jaw, the outthrust lower lip which disclosed ever so slightly the white teeth behind. Cruelty, power, and an immense allure. She continued to look at him unsmiling, arching her neck, thrusting forward her breasts. He moved toward her fascinated, and saw that she held low down against her side a small jeweled dagger. From its point, blood dripped steadily. When he saw the dagger Rumon was afraid, yet he could not stop going towards her, his hands outstretched as though to cup her breasts.

From somewhere there came a peal of laughter, a harsh, malicious sound which awakened Rumon, who found that he was sweating, and much disturbed. It was the first time that he had felt lust in life or dreams, and it was the first time since his childhood that he had felt such fear.

Too much strong cider, he thought as the impression faded. And perhaps that gruesome story of Keban. Yet he knew that the dream had nothing to do with Keban. Though it undoubtedly came from the Devil. Rumon shivered, and touched the golden crucifix which hung at his neck. "Libera nos, Domine, ab omnibus malis —" he murmured, and rising hastily from the fine-sheeted feather bed the monks had provided for his comfort, he strode into the chapel.

Rumon's jaded old horse stumbled as it plodded along the path towards Padstow. Merewyn clutched hard on Rumon's waist as he jerked the bridle up. "Ai-ee-e," she cried. "It will fall?" She had never ridden a horse before. She did not like it much. She was not exactly afraid of this great beast, not if the Stranger were there, and in all this adventure there was a kind of excitement, yet she knew that the man who was called Romieux de

Provence — a meaningless jumble of syllables — was not in the least aware of her.

"I won't let it fall," said Rumon kindly as to a child, which he thought she was — a very young gawky peasant girl. "How much farther have we to go?"

She considered the landmarks, the broadening of the Camel on their right, the squat thatches in a palisade, which she had gone to visit alone some years ago, and her mother had been angry. Breaca never wanted Merewyn to explore anywhere except on the empty headland of Pentire.

"More on," said Merewyn. "Not very far, to my home at Tre-Uther."

Rumon sighed. He did not care about her home, wherever it was. The monastery she had mentioned was the only hope for a night's sleep — and a meal. Though what hospitality there was in Cornwall, he had so far found very peculiar.

"Move this way a little," said Rumon, indicating the middle of the horse's rump, "I don't suppose you weigh much, but still a double load for this old nag . , ."

It took her a moment to understand his meaning in the oddly accented Celtic. "I can walk," she said, "I always do." She shd off the horse.

"If you like," said Rumon, with the courteous smile he had long been drilled to by Edgive. That it was aA abstracted, as well as courteous smile, Merewyn knew very well, despite her inexperience with any being such as this. Or indeed with any men.

"If you get tired," Rumon said, "you must mount again." He looked at her bare, dirty feet, which actually went along faster than the horse. It occurred to him that she had a grace of carriage, and that her "Thank you" was nicely said. Then he forgot her again as the horse ambled along and had to be guided out of potholes and between rocks.

Rumon's nether thoughts slipped back to the shipwreck which had brought him to Cornwall.

On the first of April, though the weather was still unsettled, Rumon had most thankfully sailed from Brittany. He bought room for himself, his beasts, and servants on a large Frisian coasting vessel which touched at St. Brieuc and was bound for Plymouth with a miscellaneous cargo of wine, silk, and spices that had come overland through Venice from the Byzantine Empire.

A favorable shore breeze blew into the one square sail, the sailors scarcely had to row, and there was hope that the passage of a hundred or so miles would be made by tomorrow.

The hope soon vanished. As they passed the Isle of Guernsey, and left its lee to starboard, an east wind came tearing down the Channel. The waves mounted and began to break. The sailors hauled down the sail and rowed desperately while the captain struggled to hold his course with the steering oar. The frightened horses and the donkey neighed and plunged, straining against their tethers. Rumon, though drenched like the others with rain and spray, was exhilarated by this new experience, and he had felt an immediate love for the sea. He did not know when they were swept far out past Plymouth nor could he understand the captain's despairing cry in Frisian that they must try to head for the open ocean, lest they end up like many before them on the rocks along the South Cornish coast.

They raised the sail again to try to scud before the wind. The sail cracked, tore asunder, and disappeared in the murk ahead.

Rumon knew then that they were in danger. He spoke to his Provencal servants, but in the fury of the storm they could not hear him, and he saw that they were praying. How many hours passed he did not know. It grew dark. He became very quiet inside, as he clung to the gunwhales which were constantly awash. He did not know what was to happen to them, yet he felt that he would not die. The memory of his vision long ago came close to him, and with it the sense of dedication and purpose. It is Thy Will that I should not die now, he thought with certainty.

The ship struck, lifted high by the force of a tremendous wave. She cracked down on the Craggan — off the east tip of the Lizard.

Rumon hit his head against the gunwhale. For some minutes he was dazed. He heard the screams of his companions, he felt the ship breaking up beneath him. Water gushed over him. He struggled, suffocating. He could not swim, but even if he could have, his wet clothes and the money pouch on his chest would have weighed him down. Gasping, he got his head above water, standing for an instant on the Craggan rock itself, as the wave ebbed. Something oblong and dark pushed against him. It was one of the oarsmen's benches. Instinctively he grabbed it. Another wave came and washed him away, yet the bench held his head up. He clung to it frantically. The tide and waves were with him. Presently he felt ground under his feet. He staggered up onto a little pebbly beach, surrounded by cliffs.

He got beyond the line of foam that gleamed in the darkness, before his legs began to shake. He lay down abruptly, his arms outstretched on the welcoming sands. The terror he had not felt earlier rushed through him, to be followed by a passion of gratitude.

He pressed his lips to the sand, turned his head and fell into exhausted sleep. ^

When Rumon awoke, the sun shone full on him. The sea lapped gently a few yards away — translucent shimmering green, so innocent in the sunlight.

A noise behind him made him start. Two people were staring at him, a beady-eyed crone and a stunted black-haired man, both naked to the waist, around which were tied rabbit-fur aprons. While they gave him sidelong, wary glances, they also crouched over a driftwood fire, on which some large spitted animal was roasting. Still a trifle confused, Rumon discovered that he had lost his sword and helmet somehow in the shipwreck. His clothes and fur-trimmed blue mantle were nearly dry. He

must have been lying in the sun for hours. He got up and approached the pair who drew back, muttering and holding out their hands to fend him off. The man had a long skinning knife which he fingered.

"Where am I?' said Rumon in his native Provengal.

They shook their heads, still backing away. Rumon tried EngHsh. They looked at him blankly, — a wary beastlike stare. The man made a tentative gesture with his knife.

Rumon's wits began to clear. Where could he be? He summoned his scanty knowledge of geography, and the memory of a map he had once seen. "Is this Cornwall, my good folk?" he asked in the Breton he had recently learned.

There was a slight flicker in the man's dull eyes. "Ya, Kernuow," he answered slowly.

"Thank you," said Rumon. He approached the fire, the roasting animal gave forth a rank odor, but Rumon was very hungry. He started to ask for a piece of meat when he saw what it was. Parts of the donkey he had brought from Provence. Its bloody head had been flung aside and was recognizable by a black star between the eyes.

Poor beast, he thought. It must have come ashore as he had. But where were the others? Not only the horses, but the men. The ship's captain, the sailors, his own two devoted servants.

"Where are the men?" he cried. "Many men with me in the ship!"

The old woman hunched her shoulders, and turned the donkey's leg on the spit. The man answered after a moment. He waved his hairy hand towards the sea. "Out there." He frowned, glowering at Rumon. "Only you the sea would not keep. You are a Bucca." The old woman sucked in her breath, and shivered.

It took Rumon a second to understand that they thought him an evil spirit or ghost, and it was obvious that they were afraid of him. Otherwise, he thought, I suppose I would have had my

throat cut like that donkey's. He walked away from the fire, the sizzling meat now disgusted him, and realization of the catastrophe began.

There had been thirteen men in that ship. Could they all be drowned? He crossed himself and whispered, "Omnibus in Christo —" If so and some bodies were washed ashore, he should arrange for a Christian burial. Or if by the same miracle which had saved him someone living appeared from the sea, he should be here to help. There would certainly be no help from this uncouth pair.

"Where is the nearest priest?" he said. "The 'Papa.' "

They stared at him with the same blankness they had shown before he spoke Breton to them. The man shook his head, and shcing a hunk from the half-cooked donkey, gobbled a huge mouthful. The old woman did the same.

"The Papa," repeated Rumon sternly. To clarify his meaning he pulled the golden crucifix from under his tunic and held it up.

They gazed at the crucifix without interest, returned to their meat.

Can they be heathens? thought Rumon. Strange, because at St. Brieuc they had often talked of the conversion of Cornwall hundreds of years ago. Many saints, including St. Rumon, had christianized the country, before continuing on their missions to Brittany.

Rumon secretly fished in his pouch, aware that they might plan to rob him. He brought out a small silver piece, and tendered it towards the man. "Here is money. I need food. You must have bread at least somewhere."

They glanced at the silver and showed as little interest as they had in the gold cross. It was apparent that they had never seen either metal, and did not know its meaning,

Rumon sighed. He thought that his conscience would not let him leave this coast for some days, and the first requisite was food.

"Listen!" he cried in the tone of command his rank had long

since taught him. "This donkey you are eating was mine! Oh, I permit you to eat it!" They had both ceased munching, their faces showed fresh alarm. "But in return you must find me something else to eat. Now!"

The old woman wavered, her hands shook; she put down her hunk of meat. She nodded sullenly, and beckoned. Rumon followed her up a steep hill from the cove, clambering over strangely marked serpentine rocks. A track led inland across a heath of bracken and gorse, an occasional patch of buttercup-spotted grass. There were no trees and there seemed to be no habitation, until suddenly they came on a round turf hut Hke a beehive. It was set against a thicket of brambles. In front of the hut stood a nine-foot upright stone, roughly oblong. A menhir from the old days, thought Rumon who had seen some in Brittany, though he had never seen one like this — covered with blood both fresh and dried, and speckled with bits of bird feathers.

Jesu! he thought as he stared at the great stone. They must worship the thing, make sacrifices to it. He averted his eyes from a soggy red mess of what looked like liver which was placed at the menhir's base. He stooped low through the open door and followed the old woman into the hut. The stench nearly drove him out again, though he paused as something on the ground gave a long wail of fear.

It was a young woman, and in her arms she held a naked newborn infant. She struggled to rise from a soiled bed of grass and bracken, fell back again panting, trying to shield the infant with her arms.

"I won't hurt you," said Rumon. "Don't be afraid."

The dense black eyes were glittering bright, even in the gloom he could see the unhealthy flush of her dark square face, the sweat glistening below matted black hair.

"She's ill!" he said to the old woman, who shrugged and announced, "I've done what I can, I gave the afterbirth to the menhir god, shall I give it the baby too?"

At this the young mother screamed, clutching the squirming infant tighter to her bare breasts.