“But this monk, Father … can you really call him a heathen?”
“I can, Meg, and I do.”
“Yet he claims to be a man of God. It is not God whom he reviles; it is the Church of Rome.”
“But the Church of Rome is the Church of our fathers. You know that, Meg.”
She looked at him and thought: For the first time in my life I doubt his wisdom. I have never known this ferocity in him before. I have never before known him show such anger as he does toward these heretics.
“Father,” she said uneasily, “the King has said that if this heathen—meaning the monk Luther—does not recant, he should be burned alive. Burned alive, Father! You cannot believe that that should be done! You used to say that we should be kind to others, treat them as we ourselves would be treated.”
“Meg, if your right hand was evil, if it was touched with a poison that would infect the rest of your body, would you not cut it off?”
She was silent, but he insisted on an answer. “Yes, Father.”
“Well, then. The suffering of the body is as naught to the eternal damnation of the soul. If, by setting the flames at the feet of this monk Luther, we could restore his soul to God, then would it not be well to burn him alive?”
“I do not know.”
“Meg, it is a glorious thing to subdue the flesh, to become indifferent to pain. What happens to these bodies cannot be of importance. And if those who deny God are to suffer eternal damnation, what can a few minutes in the fire mean to them?”
Margaret covered her face with her hands. I have lost a part of him, she thought.
He drew her hands from her face and smiled at her; all the gentleness was back in his eyes.
She saw that he was tired, that he longed to escape from the life at Court, to retire to the quietness and peace of family life.
It was a strange revelation to find that she did not entirely agree with him. Yet how she loved him! Even more, now that she believed she had detected a certain weakness in him, than she had when she had loved him for all his strength.
She almost wished that he had not educated her so thoroughly, that he had not trained her mind to be so logical. She wished that she could have gone on seeing him as perfect.
He was begging her to return to the old relationship. He wanted to laugh and be gay.
“Now you have talked to me, Margaret,” he said. “You have examined me with many questions, and you look at me quizzically, and you are turning over in your mind what I have said, and you doubt the wisdom of my words. Very well, my Meg. We will talk of this later. Now I have something to say to you. Can you guess what it is?”
“No, Father.”
“Well then, it is about Will.”
“Will Roper?”
“Who else? Do you not like him a little, Meg?”
She blushed, and he smiled to see her blush. “I like him, Father.”
“He loves you dearly. He has told me so.”
“I would rather he did not burden you with his foolish feelings.”
“Is it foolish to love you? Then, Meg, I must be the most foolish man on Earth.”
“ 'Tis different with us. You are my father, and it is natural that you and I should love.”
“ 'Tis natural that Will should also. He is good. I like him. I like him very much. There is no one I would rather see as your husband, Meg. For although he may not be as rich or handsome as our gay young Allington, although he may not make a lady or a duchess of you one day… he is none the worse for that.”
“Do you think I should care to be a lady or a duchess, Father? I am not like your wife, who has been so proud since she has become Lady More.”
He laughed. “Leave her her pleasures, Meg. They are small ones, and we understand her delight in them, do we not? But to return to Will. You are fond of him, I know.”
“As I am of the others. To me he is no more than… any of them.”
“But, Meg, he is personable and clever… a pleasant boy. What do you look for in a man?”
“He seems to me to be overyoung.”
“He is seven years your senior.”
“Still, he seems young. He lacks seriousness. He is no great scholar. If he had written something like Utopia … something that showed his ideals and … Oh, you have set us a high standard, Father. Your daughter measures all men against you, which means that she finds them sadly lacking.”
He laughed those words to scorn, but he could not help showing his pleasure.
Now he was himself again, full of laughter, enjoying every moment. This evening they would be together … all of them; they would converse in Latin as they were wont to do; and Alice would chide them, but only mildly. Her title, to her, was a bright bauble. They all smiled to see her face when the servants addressed her as “My Lady.”
It was good to have him back, to forget his fierceness against heretics, to sing and be gay as in the old days.
PERHAPS THERE is always something good in what seems to be evil, thought Margaret. She longed for the days when her father had been a humble lawyer and Under-Sheriff of the City; she remembered with a tender pain the walks through the City; but this was not the case with all the members of the family.
Ailie was bright-eyed with happiness as she came into the schoolroom where Margaret sat with her books.
How lovely she is! thought Margaret. And more beautiful now that she is a member of this distinguished family than she was in the days of our humility.
Ailie pulled off the net which held back her golden hair from her face. That beautiful hair now fell about her shoulders and down to her waist.
“Such news, Meg! I am to be married. My Lady Allington! What do you think of that?”
“So Giles is to be your husband?”
“I shall be the first in the family to find one.”
“That does not really surprise us.”
“To tell the truth, Meg, it does not surprise me. Giles says what a good thing it is that Father has written this book with the King and become such an important person at Court. His father could not withhold his consent to a union with the stepdaughter of Sir Thomas More. Oh Meg, is it not a marvelous thing … what great happenings are set in motion by such little things? A mere book is written and I become Lady Allington!”
Margaret laughed. There was that in Ailie which amused her as it did her father. Perhaps Ailie was selfish because she saw herself as the center of the world, but it was a charming little world, and Ailie herself was so pretty and pleasant in her ways that it was impossible not to love her.
“Ailie, you will go away from us, for Giles will not live here.”
“He will certainly have his estates to attend to. But, depend upon it, I shall insist on many visits to my darling family.”
“Then I doubt not that there will be many visits, for I believe you will have your way as Lady Allington just as you have as Alice Middleton.”
“So do not fret, dearest Meg. We shall be together often. I shall bring you tales of the great world. I shall tell you what the ladies are wearing and what new dances are being danced… and all Court matters which Father never notices. Meg, it will be your turn next… yours or Mercy's. I wonder who will first find a husband.”