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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/39296-8.txt b/39296-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..79e3a0c --- /dev/null +++ b/39296-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12322 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Story of Francis Cludde, by Stanley J. Weyman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Story of Francis Cludde + +Author: Stanley J. Weyman + +Release Date: March 29, 2012 [EBook #39296] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the +Web Archive (University of California Libraries) + + + + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + 1. Page scan source: + http://www.archive.org/details/storyoffranciscl00weymiala + (University of California Libraries) + + 2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. + + + + + + + + THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE + + + + + + + BY STANLEY J. WEYMAN + + * * * + +THE HOUSE OF THE WOLF. A Romance. With Frontispiece and Vignette. +Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE. A Romance. With four Illustrations. Crown +8vo, $1.25. + +A GENTLEMAN OF FRANCE. Being the Memoirs of Gaston de Bonne, Sieur de +Marsac. With Frontispiece and Vignette. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +UNDER THE RED ROBE. With twelve full-page Illustrations. Crown 8vo, +cloth, $1.25. + +MY LADY ROTHA. A Romance of the Thirty Years' War. With eight +Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +FROM THE MEMOIRS OF A MINISTER OF FRANCE. With thirty-six +Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +SHREWSBURY. A Romance. With twenty-four illustrations. Crown 8vo, +$1.50. + +THE RED COCKADE. A Novel. With 48 illustrations by R. Caton Woodville. +Crown 8vo, $1.50. + + * * * + + New York: Longmans, Green, and Co. + + + + + + + THE STORY + + OF + + FRANCIS CLUDDE + + + + + BY + + STANLEY J. WEYMAN + + AUTHOR OF "A GENTLEMAN OF FRANCE," "UNDER THE RED ROBE," + "MY LADY ROTHA," ETC., ETC. + + + + +_ILLUSTRATED_ + + + + + NEW YORK + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + 1898 + + + + + + + Copyright, 1891, by + CASSELL PUBLISHING COMPANY + + * * * + + Copyright, 1897, by + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + + _All rights reserved_ + + + + + + CONTENTS. + + + CHAPTER + + I. "Hé, Sire Ane, Hé," + + II. In the Bishop's Room, + + III. "Down with Purveyors!" + + IV. Two Sisters of Mercy, + + V. Mistress Bertram, + + VI. Master Clarence, + + VII. On Board the "Framlingham," + + VIII. A House of Peace, + + IX. Playing with Fire, + + X. The Face in the Porch, + + XI. A Foul Blow, + + XII. Anne's Petition, + + XIII. A Willful Man's Way, + + XIV. At Bay in the Gatehouse, + + XV. Before the Court, + + XVI. In the Duke's Name, + + XVII. A Letter that had Many Escapes, + + XVIII. The Witch's Warning + + XIX. Ferdinand Cludde, + + XX. The Coming Queen, + + XXI. My Father, + + XXII. Sir Anthony's Purpose, + + XXIII. The Last Mass, + + XXIV. Awaiting the Blow, + + XXV. In Harbor at Last, + + + + + + THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE. + + + + + CHAPTER I. + + "HÉ, SIRE ANE, HÉ!" + + +On the boundary line between the two counties of Warwick and Worcester +there is a road very famous in those parts, and called the Ridgeway. +Father Carey used to say--and no better Latinist could be found for a +score of miles round in the times of which I write--that it was made +by the Romans. It runs north and south along the narrow spine of the +country, which is spread out on either side like a map, or a picture. +As you fare southward you see on your right hand the green orchards +and pastures of Worcestershire stretching as far as the Malvern Hills. +You have in front of you Bredon Hill, which is a wonderful hill, for +if a man goes down the Avon by boat it goes with him--now before, and +now behind--a whole day's journey--and then stands in the same place. +And on the left hand you have the great Forest of Arden, and not much +besides, except oak trees, which grow well in Warwickshire. + +I describe this road, firstly, because it is a notable one, and forty +years ago was the only Queen's highway, to call a highway, in that +country. The rest were mere horse-tracks. Secondly, because the chase +wall of Coton End runs along the side of it for two good miles; and +the Cluddes--I am Francis Cludde--have lived at Coton End by the +Ridgeway time out of mind, probably--for the name smacks of the +soil--before the Romans made the road. And thirdly, because forty +years ago, on a drizzling February day in 1555--second year of Mary, +old religion just reestablished--a number of people were collected on +this road, forming a group of a score or more, who stood in an ordered +kind of disorder about my uncle's gates and looked all one way, as if +expecting an arrival, and an arrival of consequence. + +First, there was my uncle Sir Anthony, tall and lean. He wore his best +black velvet doublet and cloak, and had put them on with an air of +huge importance. This increased each time he turned, staff in hand, +and surveyed his following, and as regularly gave place to a "Pshaw!" +of vexation and a petulant glance when his eye rested on me. Close +beside him, looking important too, but anxious and a little frightened +as well, stood good Father Carey. The priest wore his silk cassock, +and his lips moved from time to time without sound, as though he +were trying over a Latin oration--which, indeed, was the fact. At a +more respectful distance were ranged Baldwin Moor, the steward, +and a dozen servants; while still farther away lounged as many +ragamuffins--landless men, who swarmed about every gentleman's door +in those times, and took toll of such abbey lands as the king might +have given him. Against one of the stone gate-pillars I leaned +myself--nineteen years and six months old, and none too wise, though +well grown, and as strong as one here and there. And perched on the +top of the twin post, with his chin on his knees, and his hands +clasped about them, was Martin Luther, the fool. + +Martin had chosen this elevated position partly out of curiosity, and +partly, perhaps, under a strong sense of duty. He knew that, whether +he would or no, he must needs look funny up there. His nose was red, +and his eyes were running, and his teeth chattering; and he did look +funny. But as he felt the cold most his patience failed first. The +steady, silent drizzle, the mist creeping about the stems of the oak +trees, the leaden sky proved too much for him in the end. "A watched +pot never boils!" he grumbled. + +"Silence, sirrah!" commanded my uncle angrily. "This is no time for +your fooling. Have a care how you talk in the same breath of pots and +my Lord Bishop!" + +"_Sanctæ ecclesiæ_," Father Carey broke out, turning up his eyes in a +kind of ecstasy, as though he were knee to knee with the prelate--"_te +defensorem inclytum atque ardentem----_" + +"_Pottum!_" cried I, laughing loudly at my own wit. + +It was an ill-mannered word, but I was cold and peevish. I had been +forced to this function against my will. I had never seen the guest +whom we were expecting, and who was no other than the Queen's +Chancellor, Stephen Gardiner, but I disliked him as if I had. In +truth, he was related to us in a peculiar fashion, which my uncle and +I naturally looked at from different standpoints. Sir Anthony viewed +with complacence, if not with pride, any connection with the powerful +Bishop of Winchester, for the knight knew the world, and could +appreciate the value it sets on success, and the blind eyes it has for +spots if they do but speckle the risen sun. I could make no such +allowance, but, with the pride of youth and family, at once despised +the great Bishop for his base blood, and blushed that the shame lay on +our side. I hated this parade of doing honor to him, and would fain +have hidden at home with Petronilla, my cousin, Sir Anthony's +daughter, and awaited our guest there. The knight, however, had not +permitted this, and I had been forced out, being in the worst of +humors. + +So I said "_Pottum!_" and laughed. + +"Silence, boy!" cried Sir Anthony fiercely. He loved an orderly +procession, and to arrange things decently. "Silence!" he repeated, +darting an angry glance first at me and then at his followers, "or I +will warm that jacket of yours, lad! And you, Martin Luther, see to +your tongue for the next twenty-four hours, and keep it off my Lord +Bishop! And, Father Carey, hold yourself ready----" + +"For here Sir Hot-Pot cometh!" cried the undaunted Martin, skipping +nimbly down from his post of vantage; "and a dozen of London saucepans +with him, or may I never lick the inside of one again!" + +A jest on the sauciness of London serving-men was sure to tell with +the crowd, and there was a great laugh at this, especially among the +landless men, who were on the skirts of the party, and well sheltered +from Sir Anthony's eye. He glared about him, provoked to find at this +critical moment smiles where there should have been looks of +deference, and a ring round a fool where he had marshaled a +procession. Unluckily, he chose to visit his displeasure upon me. "You +won't behave, won't you, you puppy!" he cried. "You won't, won't you!" +and stepping forward he aimed a blow at my shoulders, which would have +made me rub myself if it had reached me. But I was too quick. I +stepped back, the stick swung idly, and the crowd laughed. + +And there the matter would have ended, for the Bishop's party were now +close upon us, had not my foot slipped on the wet grass and I fallen +backward. Seeing me thus at his mercy, the temptation proved too much +for the knight. He forgot his love of seemliness and even that his +visitors were at his elbow--and, stooping a moment to plant home a +couple of shrewd cuts, cried, "Take that! Take that, my lad!" in a +voice that rang as crisply as his thwacks. + +I was up in an instant; not that the pain was anything, and before our +own people I should have thought as little of shame, for if the old +may not lay hand to the young, being related, where is to be any +obedience? Now, however, my first glance met the grinning faces of +strange lackeys, and while my shoulders still smarted, the laughter of +a couple of soberly-clad pages stung a hundred times more sharply. I +glared furiously round, and my eyes fell on one face--a face long +remembered. It was that of a man who neither smiled nor laughed; a man +whom I recognized immediately, not by his sleek hackney or his purple +cassock, which a riding-coat partially concealed, or even by his +jeweled hand, but by the keen glance of power which passed over me, +took me in, and did not acknowledge me; which saw my humiliation +without interest or amusement. The look hurt me beyond smarting of +shoulders, for it conveyed to me in the twentieth part of a second how +very small a person Francis Cludde was, and how very great a personage +was Stephen Gardiner, whom in my thoughts I had presumed to belittle. + +I stood irresolute a moment, shifting my feet and glowering at him, my +face on fire. But when he raised his hand to give the Benediction, and +the more devout, or those with mended hose, fell on their knees in the +mud, I turned my back abruptly, and, climbing the wall, flung away +across the chase. + +"What, Sir Anthony!" I heard him say as I stalked off, his voice +ringing clear and incisive amid the reverential silence which followed +the Latin words; "have we a heretic here, cousin? How is this? So near +home too!" + +"It is my nephew, my Lord Bishop," I could hear Sir Anthony answer, +apology in his tone; "and a willful boy at times. You know of him; he +has queer notions of his own, put into his head long ago." + +I caught no more, my angry strides carrying me out of earshot. Fuming, +I hurried across the long damp grass, avoiding here and there the +fallen limb of an elm or a huge round of holly. I wanted to get out of +the way, and be out of the way; and made such haste that before the +slowly moving cavalcade had traversed one-half of the interval between +the road and the house I had reached the bridge which crossed the +moat, and, pushing my way impatiently through the maids and scullions +who had flocked to it to see the show, had passed into the courtyard. + +The light was failing, and the place looked dark and gloomy in spite +of the warm glow of burning logs which poured from the lower windows, +and some show of green boughs which had been placed over the doorways +in honor of the occasion. I glanced up at a lattice in one of the +gables--the window of Petronilla's little parlor. There was no face at +it, and I turned fretfully into the hall--and yes, there she was, +perched up in one of the high window-seats. She was looking out on the +chase, as the maids were doing. + +Yes, as the maids were doing. She too was watching for his High +Mightiness, I muttered, and that angered me afresh. I crossed the +rushes in silence, and climbed up beside her. + +"Well," I said ungraciously, as she started, hearing me at her +shoulder, "well, have you seen enough of him yet, cousin? You will, I +warrant you, before he leaves. A little of him goes far." + +"A little of whom, Francis?" she asked simply. + +Though her voice betrayed some wonder at my rough tone, she was so +much engaged with the show that she did not look at me immediately. +This of course kept my anger warm, and I began to feel that she was in +the conspiracy against me. + +"Of my Lord of Winchester, of course," I answered, laughing rudely; +"of Sir Hot-Pot!" + +"Why do you call him that?" she remonstrated in gentle wonder. And +then she did turn her soft dark eyes upon me. She was a slender, +willowy girl in those days, with a complexion clear yet pale--a maiden +all bending and gracefulness, yet with a great store of secret +firmness, as I was to learn. "He seems as handsome an old man," she +continued, "as I have ever met, and stately and benevolent, too, as I +see him at this distance. What is the matter with you, Francis? What +has put you out?" + +"Put me out!" I retorted angrily. "Who said anything had put me out?" + +But I reddened under her eyes; I was longing to tell her all, and be +comforted, while at the same time I shrank with a man's shame from +saying to her that I had been beaten. + +"I can see that something is the matter," she said sagely, with her +head on one side, and that air of being the elder which she often +assumed with me, though she was really the younger by two years. "Why +did you not wait for the others? Why have you come home alone? +Francis," [with sudden conviction] "you have vexed my father! That is +it!" + +"He has beaten me like a dog!" I blurted out passionately; "and before +them all! Before those strangers he flogged me!" + +She had her back to the window, and some faint gleam of wintry +sunshine, passing through the gules of the shield blazoned behind her, +cast a red stain on her dark hair and shapely head. She was silent, +probably through pity or consternation; but I could not see her face, +and misread her. I thought her hard, and, resenting this, bragged on +with a lad's empty violence. + +"He did; but I will not stand it! I give you warning, I won't stand +it, Petronilla!" and I stamped, young bully that I was, until the dust +sprang out of the boards, and the hounds by the distant hearth jumped +up and whined. "No! not for all the base bishops in England!" I +continued, taking a step this way and that. "He had better not do it +again! If he does, I tell you it will be the worse for some one!" + +"Francis," she exclaimed abruptly, "you must not speak in that way!" + +But I was too angry to be silenced, though instinctively I changed my +ground. + +"Stephen Gardiner!" I cried furiously. "Who is Stephen Gardiner, I +should like to know? He has no right to call himself Gardiner at all! +Dr. Stephens he used to call himself, I have heard. A child with no +name but his godfather's; that is what he is, for all his airs and his +bishopric! Who is he to look on and see a Cludde beaten? If my uncle +does not take care----" + +"Francis!" she cried again, cutting me short ruthlessly. "Be silent, +sir!" [and this time I was silent], "You unmanly boy," she continued, +her face glowing with indignation, "to threaten my father before my +face! How dare you, sir? How dare you? And who are you, you poor +child," she exclaimed, with a startling change from invective to +sarcasm--"who are you to talk of bishops, I should like to know?" + +"One," I said sullenly, "who thinks less of cardinals and bishops than +some folk, Mistress Petronilla!" + +"Ay, I know," she retorted scathingly--"I know that you are a kind of +half-hearted Protestant--neither fish, flesh, nor fowl!" + +"I am what my father made me!" I muttered. + +"At any rate," she replied, "you do not see how small you are, or you +would not talk of bishops. Heaven help us! That a boy who has done +nothing and seen nothing, should talk of the Queen's Chancellor! Go! +Go on, you foolish boy, and rule a country, or cut off heads, and then +you may talk of such men--men who could unmake you and yours with a +stroke of the pen! You, to talk so of Stephen Gardiner! Fie, fie, I +say! For shame!" + +I looked at her, dazed and bewildered, and had long afterward in my +mind a picture of her as she stood above me, in the window bay, her +back to the light, her slender figure drawn to its full height, her +hand extended toward me. I could scarcely understand or believe that +this was my gentle cousin. I turned without a word and stole away, not +looking behind me. I was cowed. + +It happened that the servants came hurrying in at the moment with a +clatter of dishes and knives, and the noise covered my retreat. I had +a fancy afterward that, as I moved away, Petronilla called to me. But +at the time, what with the confusion and my own disorder, I paid no +heed to her, but got myself blindly out of the hall, and away to my +own attic. + +It was a sharp lesson. But my feelings when, being alone, I had time +to feel, need not be set down. After events made them of no moment, +for I was even then on the verge of a change so great that all the +threats and misgivings, the fevers and agues, of that afternoon, real +as they seemed at the time, became in a few hours as immaterial as the +dew which fell before yesterday's thunderstorm. + +The way the change began to come about was this. I crept in late to +supper, facing the din and lights, the rows of guests and the hurrying +servants, with a mixture of shame and sullenness. I was sitting down +with a scowl next the Bishop's pages--my place was beside them, +half-way down the table, and I was not too careful to keep my feet +clear of their clothing--when my uncle's voice, raised in a harsher +tone than was usual with him, even when he was displeased, summoned +me. + +"Come here, sirrah!" he cried roundly. "Come here, Master Francis! I +have a word to speak to you!" + +I went slowly, dragging my feet, while all looked up, and there was a +partial silence. I was conscious of this, and it nerved me. For a +moment indeed, as I stepped on to the dais I had a vision of scores of +candles and rushlights floating in mist, and of innumerable bodiless +faces all turned up to me. But the vision and the mistiness passed +away, and left only my uncle's long, thin face inflamed with anger, +and beside it, in the same ring of light, the watchful eyes and stern, +impassive features of Stephen Gardiner. The Bishop's face and his eyes +were all I saw then; the same face, the same eyes, I remembered, which +had looked unyielding into those of the relentless Cromwell and had +scarce dropped before the frown of a Tudor. His purple cap and +cassock, the lace and rich fur, the chain of office, I remembered +afterward. + +"Now, boy," thundered Sir Anthony, pointing out the place where I +should stand, "what have you to say for yourself? why have you so +misbehaved this afternoon? Let your tongue speak quickly, do you hear, +or you will smart for it. And let it be to the purpose, boy!" + +I was about to answer something--whether it was likely to make things +worse or better, I cannot remember--when Gardiner stayed me. He laid +his hand gently on Sir Anthony's sleeve, and interposed. "One moment," +he said mildly, "your nephew did not stay for the Church's blessing, I +remember. Perhaps he has scruples. There are people nowadays who have. +Let us hear if it be so." + +This time it was Sir Anthony who did not let me answer. + +"No, no," he cried hastily; "no, no; it is not so. He conforms, my +lord, he conforms. You conform, sir," he continued, turning fiercely +upon me, "do you not? Answer, sir." + +"Ah!" the Bishop put in with a sneer, "you conform, do you?" + +"I attend mass--to please my uncle," I replied boldly. + +"He was ill brought up as a child," Sir Anthony said hastily, speaking +in a tone which those below could not hear. "But you know all that, my +lord--you know all that. It is an old story to you. So I make, and I +pray you to make for the sake of the house, some allowance. He +conforms; he undoubtedly conforms." + +"Enough!" Gardiner assented. "The rest is for the good priest here, +whose ministrations will no doubt in time avail. But a word with this +young gentleman, Sir Anthony, on another subject. If it was not to the +holy office he objected, perhaps it was to the Queen's Chancellor, or +to the Queen?" He raised his voice with the last words and bent his +brows, so that I could scarcely believe it was the same man speaking. +"Eh, sir, was that so?" he continued severely, putting aside Sir +Anthony's remonstrance and glowering at me. "It may be that we have a +rebel here instead of a heretic." + +"God forbid!" cried the knight, unable to contain himself. It was +clear that he repented already of his ill-timed discipline. "I will +answer for it that we have no Wyatts here, my lord." + +"That is well!" the Chancellor replied. "That is well!" he repeated, +his eyes leaving me and roving the hall with so proud a menace in +their glance that all quailed, even the fool. "That is very well," he +said, drumming on the table with his fingers; "but let Master Francis +speak for himself." + +"I never heard," said I boldly--I had had a moment for thought--"that +Sir Thomas Wyatt had any following in this country. None to my +knowledge. As for the Queen's marriage with the Prince of Spain, which +was the ground, as we gathered here, of Wyatt's rising with the +Kentish folk, it seems a matter rather for the Queen's grace than her +subjects. But if that be not so, I, for my part, would rather have +seen her married to a stout Englishman--ay, or to a Frenchman." + +"And why, young gentleman?" + +"Because I would we kept at peace with France. We have more to gain by +fighting Spain than fighting France," I answered bluntly. + +My uncle held up his hands. "The boy is clean mad!" he groaned. "Who +ever heard of such a thing? With all France, the rightful estate of +her Majesty, waiting to be won back, he talks of fighting Spain! And +his own grandmother was a Spaniard!" + +"I am none the less an Englishman for that!" I said; whereon there was +a slight murmur of applause in the hall below. "And for France," I +continued, carried away by this, "we have been fighting it, off and +on, as long as men remember; and what are we the better? We have only +lost what we had to begin. Besides, I am told that France is five +times stronger than it was in Henry the Fifth's time, and we should +only spend our strength in winning what we could not hold. While as to +Spain----" + +"Ay, as to Spain?" grumbled Sir Anthony, forgetting his formidable +neighbor, and staring at me with eyes of wonder. "Why, my father +fought the French at Guinegate, and my grandfather at Cherbourg, and +his father at Agincourt! But there! As to Spain, you popinjay?" + +"Why, she is conquering here," I answered warmly, "and colonizing +there among the newly-discovered countries of the world, and getting +all the trade and all the seaports and all the gold and silver; and +Spain after all is a nation with no greater strength of men than +England. Ay, and I hear," I cried, growing more excited and raising my +voice, "that now is our time or never! The Spaniards and the +Portuguese have discovered a new world over seas. + + + "A Castilla y á Leon + Nuevo mundo dió Coton! + + +say they; but depend upon it, every country that is to be rich and +strong in the time that is coming must have part in it. We cannot +conquer either Spain or France; we have not men enough. But we have +docks and sailors, and ships in London and Fowey, and Bristol and the +Cinque Ports, enough to fight Spain over the great seas, and I say, +'Have at her!'" + +"What next?" groaned Sir Anthony piteously. "Did man ever hear such +crackbrained nonsense?" + +But I think it was not nonsense, for his words were almost lost in the +cry which ran through the hall as I ceased speaking--a cry of English +voices. One moment my heart beat high and proudly with a new sense of +power; the next, as a shadow of a cloud falls on a sunny hillside, the +cold sneer on the statesman's face fell on me and chilled me. His set +look had neither thawed nor altered, his color had neither come nor +gone. "You speak your lesson well, lad," he said. "Who taught you +statecraft?" + +I grew smaller, shrinking with each word he uttered; and faltered, and +was dumb. + +"Come," he said, "you see but a little way; yet country lads do not +talk of Fowey and Bristol! Who primed you?" + +"I met a Master Sebastian Cabot," I said reluctantly at last, when he +had pressed me more than once, "who stayed a while at a house not far +from here, and had been Inspector of the Navy to King Edward. He had +been a seaman seventy years, and he talked----" + +"Too fast!" said Gardiner, with a curt nod. "But enough, I understand. +I know the man. He is dead." + +He was silent then, and seemed to have fallen suddenly into thought, +as a man well might who had the governing of a kingdom on his +shoulders. + +Seemingly he had done with me. I looked at Sir Anthony. "Ay, go!" he +said irritably, waving me off. "Go!" + +And I went. The ordeal was over, and over so successfully that I felt +the humiliation of the afternoon cheap at the price of this triumph; +for, as I stepped down, there was a buzz around me, a murmur of +congratulation and pride and excitement. On every Coton face I marked +a flush, in every Coton eye I read a sparkle, and every flush and +every sparkle was for me. Even the Chancellor's secretaries, grave, +down-looking men, all secrecy and caution, cast curious glances at me, +as though I were something out of the common; and the Chancellor's +pages made way for me with new-born deference. "There is for country +wits!" I heard Baldwin Moor cry gleefully, while the man who put food +before me murmured of "the Cludde bull-pup!" If I read in Father +Carey's face, as indeed I did, solicitude as well as relief and +gladness, I marked the latter only, and hugged a natural pride to my +breast. When Martin Luther said boldly that it was not only Bishop +could fill a bowl, it was by an effort I refrained from joining in the +laugh which followed. + +For an hour I enjoyed this triumph, and did all but brag of it. +Especially I wished Petronilla had witnessed it. At the end of that +time--_Finis_, as the book says. I was crossing the courtyard, +one-half of which was bathed in a cold splendor of moonlight, and was +feeling the first sobering touch of the night air on my brow, when I +heard some one call out my name. I turned, to find one of the +Chancellor's servants, a sleek, substantial fellow, with a smug mouth, +at my elbow. + +"What is it?" I said. + +"I am bidden to fetch you at once, Master Cludde," he answered, a +gleam of sly malice peeping through the gravity of his demeanor. "The +Chancellor would see you in his room, young sir." + + + + + CHAPTER II. + + IN THE BISHOP'S ROOM. + + +Chancellor was lodged in the great chamber on the southern side of the +courtyard, a room which we called the Tapestried Chamber, and in which +tradition said that King Henry the Sixth had once slept. It was on the +upper floor, and for this reason free from the damp air which in +autumn and winter rose from the moat and hung about the lower range of +rooms. It was besides, of easy access from the hall, a door in the +gallery of the latter leading into an anteroom, which again opened +into the Tapestried Chamber; while a winding staircase, starting from +a dark nook in the main passage of the house, also led to this state +apartment, but by another and more private door. + +I reached the antechamber with a stout heart in my breast, though a +little sobered by my summons, and feeling such a reaction from the +heat of a few minutes before as follows a plunge into cold water. In +the anteroom I was bidden to wait while the great man's will was +taken, which seemed strange to me, then unused to the mummery of Court +folk. But before I had time to feel much surprise, the inner door was +opened, and I was told to enter. + +The great room, which I had seldom seen in use, had now an appearance +quite new to me. A dull red fire was glowing comfortably on the +hearthstone, before which a posset stool was standing. Near this, +seated at a table strewn with a profusion of papers and documents, was +a secretary writing busily. The great oaken bedstead, with its nodding +tester, lay in a background of shadows, which played about the figures +broidered on the hangings, or were lost in the darkness of the +corners; while near the fire, in the light cast by the sconces fixed +above the hearth, lay part of the Chancellor's equipment. The fur rugs +and cloak of sable, the saddle-bags, the dispatch-boxes, and the +silver chafing-dish, gave an air of comfort to this part of the room. +Walking up and down in the midst of these, dictating a sentence at +every other turn, was Stephen Gardiner. + +As I entered the clerk looked up, holding his pen suspended. His +master, by a quick nod, ordered him to proceed. Then, signaling to me +in a like silent fashion his command that I should stand by the +hearth, the Bishop resumed his task of composition. + +For some minutes my interest in the man, whom I had now an opportunity +of scrutinizing unmarked and at my leisure, took up all my attention. +He was at this time close on seventy, but looked, being still tall and +stout, full ten years younger. His face, square and sallow, was indeed +wrinkled and lined; his eyes lay deep in his head, his shoulders were +beginning to bend, the nape of his neck to become prominent. He had +lost an inch of his full height. But his eyes still shone brightly, +nor did any trace of weakness mar the stern character of his mouth, or +the crafty wisdom of his brow. The face was the face of a man austere, +determined, perhaps cruel; of a man who could both think and act. + +My curiosity somewhat satisfied, I had leisure, first to wonder why I +had been sent for, and then to admire the prodigious number of books +and papers which lay about, more, indeed, than I had ever seen +together in my life. From this I passed to listening, idly at first, +and with interest afterward, to the letter which the Chancellor was +dictating. It seemed from its tenor to be a letter to some person in +authority, and presently one passage attracted my attention, so that I +could afterward recall it word for word. + +"I do not think"--the Chancellor pronounced, speaking in a sonorous +voice, and the measured tone of one whose thoughts lie perfectly +arranged in his head--"that the Duchess Katherine will venture to take +the step suggested as possible. Yet Clarence's report may be of +moment. Let the house, therefore, be watched if anything savoring of +flight be marked, and take notice whether there be a vessel in the +Pool adapted to her purpose. A vessel trading to Dunquerque would be +most likely. Leave her husband till I return, when I will deal with +him roundly." + +I missed what followed. It was upon another subject, and my thoughts +lagged behind, being wholly taken up with the Duchess Katherine and +her fortunes. I wondered who she was, young or old, and what this step +could be she was said to meditate, and what the jargon about the Pool +and Dunquerque meant. I was still thinking of this when I was aroused +by an abrupt silence, and looking up found that the Chancellor was +bending over the papers on the table. The secretary was leaving the +room. + +As the door closed behind him, Gardiner rose from his stooping posture +and came slowly toward me, a roll of papers in his hand. "Now," he +said tranquilly, seating himself in an elbow-chair which stood in +front of the hearth, "I will dispose of your business, Master Cludde." + +He paused, looking at me in a shrewd, masterful way, much as if--I +thought at the time, little knowing how near the truth my fancy +went--I were a beast he was about to buy; and then he went on. "I have +sent for you, Master Francis," he said dryly, fixing his piercing eyes +on mine, "because I think that this country does not suit your health. +You conform, but you conform with a bad grace, and England is no +longer the place for such. You incite the commonalty against the +Queen's allies, and England is not the place for such. Do not +contradict me; I have heard you myself. Then," he continued, grimly +thrusting out his jaw in a sour smile, "you misname those whom the +Queen honors; and were Dr. Stephens--you take me, Master Malapert? +such a man as his predecessors, you would rue the word. For a trifle +scarce weightier Wolsey threw a man to rot six years in a dungeon, +boy!" + +I changed color, yet not so much in fear--though it were vain to say I +did not tremble--as in confusion. I had called him Dr. Stephens +indeed, but it had been to Petronilla only. I stood, not knowing what +to say, until he, after lingering on his last words to enjoy my +misery, resumed his subject. "That is one good and sufficient +reason--mind you, sufficient, boy--why England is no place for you. +For another, the Cluddes have always been soldiers; and you--though +readier-witted than some, which comes of your Spanish grandmother--are +quicker with a word than a thought, and a blow than either. Of which +afterward. Well, England is going to be no place for soldiers. Please +God, we have finished with wars at home. A woman's reign should be a +reign of peace." + +I hardened my heart at that. A reign of peace, forsooth, when the week +before we had heard of a bishop burned at Gloucester! I hardened my +heart. I would not be frightened, though I knew his power, and knew +how men in those days misused power. I would put a bold face on the +matter. + +He had not done with me yet, however. "One more reason I have," he +continued, stopping me as I was about to speak, "for saying that +England will not suit your health, Master Cludde. It is that I do not +want you here. Abroad, you may be of use to me, and at the same time +carve out your own fortune. You have courage and can use a sword, I +hear. You understand--and it is a rare gift with Englishmen--some +Spanish, which I suppose your father or your uncle taught you. You +can--so Father Carey says--construe a Latin sentence if it be not too +difficult. You are scarcely twenty, and you will have me for your +patron. Why, were I you, boy, with your age and your chances, I would +die Prince or Pope! Ay, I would!" He stopped speaking, his eyes on +fire. Nay, a ring of such real feeling flashed out in his last words +that, though I distrusted him, though old prejudices warned me against +him, and, at heart a Protestant, I shuddered at things I had heard of +him, the longing to see the world and have adventures seized upon me. +Yet I did not speak at once. He had told me that my tongue outran my +thoughts, and I stood silent until he asked me curtly, "Well, sirrah, +what do you say?" + +"I say, my Lord Bishop," I replied respectfully, "that the prospect +you hold out to me would tempt me were I a younger son, or without +those ties of gratitude which hold me to my uncle. But, my father +excepted, I am Sir Anthony's only heir." + +"Ah, your father!" he said contemptuously. "You do well to remind me +of him, for I see you are forgetting the first part of my speech in +thinking of the last! Should I have promised first and threatened +later? You would fain, I expect, stay here and woo Mistress +Petronilla? Do I touch you there? You think to marry the maid and be +master of Coton End in God's good time, do you? Then listen, Francis +Cludde. Neither one nor the other, neither maid nor meadow will be +yours should you stay here till Doomsday!" + +I started, and stood glowering on him, speechless with anger and +astonishment. + +"You do not know who you are," he continued, leaning forward with a +sudden movement, and speaking with one claw-like finger extended, and +a malevolent gleam in his eyes. "You called me a nameless child a +while ago, and so I was; yet have I risen to be ruler of England, +Master Cludde! But you--I will tell you which of us is base-born. I +will tell you who and what your father, Ferdinand Cludde, was. He was, +nay, he is, my tool, spy, jackal! Do you understand, boy? Your father +is one of the band of foul creatures to whom such as I, base-born +though I be, fling the scraps from their table! He is the vilest of +the vile men who do my dirty work, my lad." + +He had raised his voice and hand in passion, real or assumed. He +dropped them as I sprang forward. "You lie!" I cried, trembling all +over. + +"Easy! easy!" he said. He stopped me where I was by a gesture of stern +command. "Think!" he continued, calmly and weightily. "Has any one +ever spoken to you of your father since the day seven years ago, when +you came here, a child, brought by a servant? Has Sir Anthony talked +of him? Has any servant named his name to you. Think, boy. If +Ferdinand Cludde be a father to be proud of, why does his brother make +naught of him?" + +"He is a Protestant," I said faintly. Faintly, because I had asked +myself this very question not once but often. Sir Anthony so seldom +mentioned my father that I had thought it strange myself. I had +thought it strange, too, that the servants, who must well remember +Ferdinand Cludde, never talked to me about him. Hitherto I had always +been satisfied to answer, "He is a Protestant"; but face to face with +this terrible old man and his pitiless charge, the words came but +faintly from my lips. + +"A Protestant," he replied solemnly. "Yes, this comes of schism, that +villains cloak themselves in it, and parade for true men. A Protestant +you call him, boy? He has been that, ay, and all things to all men; +and he has betrayed all things and all men. He was in the great +Cardinal's confidence, and forsook him, when he fell, for Cromwell. +Thomas Cromwell, although they were of the same persuasion, he +betrayed to me. I have here, here"--and he struck the letters in his +hand a scornful blow--"the offer he made to me, and his terms. Then +eight years back, when the late King Edward came to the throne, I too +fell on evil days, and Master Cludde abandoned me for my Lord +Hertford, but did me no great harm. But he did something which blasted +him--blasted him at last." + +He paused. Had the fire died down, or was it only my imagination +that the shadows thickened round the bed behind him, and closed in +more nearly on us, leaving his pale grim face to confront me--his +face, which seemed the paler and grimmer, the more saturnine and +all-mastering, for the dark frame which set it off? + +"He did this," he continued slowly, "which came to light and blasted +him. He asked, as the price of his service in betraying me, his +brother's estate." + +"Impossible!" I stammered. "Why, Sir Anthony----" + +"What of Sir Anthony, you would ask?" the Chancellor replied, +interrupting me with savage irony. "Oh, he was a Papist! an obstinate +Papist! He might go hang--or to Warwick Jail!" + +"Nay, but this at least, my lord, is false!" I cried. "Palpably false! +If my father had so betrayed his own flesh and blood, should I be +here? Should I be at Coton End? You say this happened eight years ago. +Seven years ago I came here. Would Sir Anthony----" + +"There are fools everywhere," the old man sneered. "When my Lord +Hertford refused your father's suit, Ferdinand began--it is his +nature--to plot against him. He was found out, and execrated by +all--for he had been false to all--he fled for his life. He left you +behind, and a servant brought you to Coton End, where Sir Anthony took +you in." + +I covered my face. Alas! I believed him; I, who had always been so +proud of my lineage, so proud of the brave traditions of the house and +its honor, so proud of Coton End and all that belonged to it! Now, if +this were true, I could never again take pleasure in one or the other. +I was the son of a man branded as a turncoat and an informer, of one +who was the worst of traitors! I sank down on the settle behind me and +hid my face. Another might have thought less of the blow, or, with +greater knowledge of the world, might have made light of it as a thing +not touching himself. But on me, young as I was, and proud, and as yet +tender, and having done nothing myself, it fell with crushing force. + +It was years since I had seen my father, and I could not stand forth +loyally and fight his battle, as a son his father's friend and +familiar for years might have fought it. On the contrary, there was so +much which seemed mysterious in my past life, so much that bore out +the Chancellor's accusation, that I felt a dread of its truth even +before I had proof. Yet I would have proof. "Show me the letters!" I +said harshly; "show me the letters, my lord!" + +"You know your father's handwriting?" + +"I do." + +I knew it, not from any correspondence my father had held with me, but +because I had more than once examined with natural curiosity the +wrappers of the dispatches which at intervals of many months, +sometimes of a year, came from him to Sir Anthony. I had never known +anything of the contents of the letters, all that fell to my share +being certain formal messages, which Sir Anthony would give me, +generally with a clouded brow and a testy manner that grew genial +again only with the lapse of time. + +Gardiner handed me the letters, and I took them and read one. One was +enough. That my father! Alas! alas! No wonder that I turned my face to +the wall, shivering as with the ague, and that all about me--except +the red glow of the fire, which burned into my brain--seemed darkness! +I had lost the thing I valued most. I had lost at a blow everything of +which I was proud. The treachery that could flush that worn face +opposite to me, lined as it was with statecraft, and betray the wily +tongue into passion, seemed to me, young and impulsive, a thing so +vile as to brand a man's children through generations. + +Therefore I hid my face in the corner of the settle, while the +Chancellor gazed at me a while in silence, as one who had made an +experiment might watch the result. + +"You see now, my friend," he said at last, almost gently, "that you +may be base-born in more ways than one. But be of good cheer; you are +young, and what I have done you may do. Think of Thomas Cromwell--his +father was naught. Think of the old Cardinal--my master. Think of the +Duke of Suffolk--Charles Brandon, I mean. He was a plain gentleman, +yet he married a queen. More, the door which they had to open for +themselves I will open for you--only, when you are inside, play the +man, and be faithful." + +"What would you have me do?" I whispered hoarsely. + +"I would have you do this," he answered. "There are great things +brewing in the Netherlands, boy--great changes, unless I am mistaken. +I have need of an agent there, a man, stout, trusty, and, in +particular, unknown, who will keep me informed of events. If you will +be that agent, I can procure for you--and not appear in the matter +myself--a post of pay and honor in the Regent's Guards. What say you +to that, Master Cludde? A few weeks and you will be making history, +and Coton End will seem a mean place to you. Now, what do you say?" + +I was longing to be away and alone with my misery, but I forced myself +to reply patiently. + +"With your leave I will give you my answer to-morrow, my lord," I +said, as steadily as I could; and I rose, still keeping my face turned +from him. + +"Very well," he replied, with apparent confidence. But he watched me +keenly, as I fancied. "I know already what your answer will be. Yet +before you go I will give you a piece of advice which in the new +life you begin to-night will avail you more than silver, more than +gold--ay, more than steel, Master Francis. It is this: Be prompt to +think, be prompt to strike, be slow to speak! Mark it well! It is a +simple recipe, yet it has made me what I am, and may make you greater. +Now go!" + +He pointed to the little door opening on the staircase, and I bowed +and went out, closing it carefully behind me. On the stairs, moving +blindly in the dark, I fell over some one who lay sleeping there, and +who clutched at my leg. I shook him off, however, with an exclamation +of rage, and, stumbling down the rest of the steps, gained the open +air. Excited and feverish, I shrank with aversion from the confinement +of my room, and, hurrying over the drawbridge, sought at random the +long terrace by the fish-pools, on which the moonlight fell, a sheet +of silver, broken only by the sundial and the shadows of the rose +bushes. The night air, weeping chill from the forest, fanned my cheeks +as I paced up and down. One way I had before me the manor-house--the +steep gable-ends, the gateway tower, the low outbuildings and +cornstacks and stables--and flanking these the squat tower and nave of +the church. I turned. Now I saw only the water and the dark line of +trees which fringed the further bank. But above these the stars were +shining. + +Yet in my mind there was no starlight. There all was a blur of wild +passions and resolves. Shame and an angry resentment against those who +had kept me so long in ignorance--even against Sir Anthony--were my +uppermost feelings. I smarted under the thought that I had been living +on his charity. I remembered many a time when I had taken much on +myself, and he had smiled, and the remembrance stung me. I longed to +assert myself and do something to wipe off the stain. + +But should I accept the Bishop's offer? It never crossed my mind to do +so. He had humiliated me, and I hated him for it. Longing to cut +myself off from my old life, I could not support a patron who would +know, and might cast in my teeth the old shame. A third reason, too, +worked powerfully with me as I became cooler. This was the conviction +that, apart from the glitter which the old man's craft had cast about +it, the part he would have me play was that of a spy--an informer! A +creature like--I dared not say like my father, yet I had him in my +mind. And from this, from the barest suspicion of this, I shrank as +the burned puppy from the fire--shrank with fierce twitching of nerve +and sinew. + +Yet if I would not accept his offer it was clear I must fend for +myself. His threats meant as much as that, and I smiled sternly as I +found necessity at one with inclination. I would leave Coton End at +once, and henceforth I would fight for my own hand. I would have no +name until I had made for myself a new one. + +This resolve formed, I turned and went back to the house, and felt my +way to my own chamber. The moonlight poured through the lattice and +fell white on my pallet. I crossed the room and stood still. Down the +middle of the coverlet--or my eyes deceived me--lay a dark line. + +I stooped mechanically to see what this was and found my own sword +lying there; the sword which Sir Anthony had given me on my last +birthday. But how had it come there? As I took it up something soft +and light brushed my hand and drooped from the hilt. Then I +remembered. A week before I had begged Petronilla to make me a +sword-knot of blue velvet for use on state occasions. No doubt she had +done it, and had brought the sword back this evening, and laid it +there in token of peace. + +I sat down on my bed, and softer and kindlier thoughts came to me; +thoughts of love and gratitude, in which the old man who had been a +second father to me had part. I would go as I had resolved, but I +would return to them when I had done a thing worth doing; something +which should efface the brand that lay on me now. + +With gentle fingers I disengaged the velvet knot and thrust it into my +bosom. Then I tied about the hilt the old leather thong, and began to +make my preparations; considering this or that route while I hunted +for my dagger and changed my doublet and hose for stouter raiment and +long, untanned boots. I was yet in the midst of this, when a knock at +the door startled me. + +"Who is there?" I asked, standing erect. + +For answer Martin Luther slid in, closing the door behind him. The +fool did not speak, but turning his eyes first on one thing and then +on another nodded sagely. + +"Well?" I growled. + +"You are off, master," he said, nodding again. "I thought so." + +"Why did you think so?" I retorted impatiently. + +"It is time for the young birds to fly when the cuckoo begins to +stir," he answered. + +I understood him dimly and in part. "You have been listening," I said +wrathfully, my cheeks burning. + +"And been kicked in the face like a fool for my pains," he answered. +"Ah, well, it is better to be kicked by the boot you love than kissed +by the lips you hate. But Master Francis, Master Francis!" he +continued in a whisper. + +He said no more, and I looked up. The man was stooping slightly +forward, his pale face thrust out. There was a strange gleam in his +eyes, and his teeth grinned in the moonlight. Thrice he drew his +finger across his lean knotted throat. "Shall I?" he hissed, his hot +breath reaching me, "shall I?" + +I recoiled from him shuddering. It was a ghastly pantomime, and it +seemed to me that I saw madness in his eyes. + +"In Heaven's name, no!" I cried--"No! Do you hear, Martin? No!" + +He stood back on the instant, as a dog might have done being reproved. +But I could hardly finish in comfort after that with him standing +there, although when I next turned to him he seemed half asleep and +his eyes were dull and fishy as ever. + +"One thing you can do," I said brusquely. Then I hesitated, looking +round me. I wished to send something to Petronilla, some word, some +keepsake. But I had nothing that would serve a maid's purpose, and +could think of nothing until my eye lit on a house-martin's nest, +lying where I had cast it on the window-sill. I had taken it down that +morning because the droppings during the last summer had fallen on the +lead work, and I would not have it used when the swallows returned. It +was but a bit of clay, and yet it would serve. She would guess its +meaning. + +I gave it into his hands. "Take this," I said, "and give it privately +to Mistress Petronilla. Privately, you understand. And say nothing to +any one, or the Bishop will flay your back, Martin." + + + + + CHAPTER III. + + "DOWN WITH PURVEYORS!" + + +The first streak of daylight found me already footing it through the +forest by paths known to few save the woodcutters, but with which many +a boyish exploration had made me familiar. From Coton End the London +road lies plain and fair through Stratford-on-Avon and Oxford. But my +plan, the better to evade pursuit, was, instead, to cross the forest +in a northeasterly direction, and, passing by Warwick, to strike the +great north road between Coventry and Daventry, which, running thence +southeastward, would take me as straight as a bird might fly through +Dunstable, St. Albans, and Barnet, to London. My baggage consisted +only of my cloak, sword, and dagger; and for money I had but a gold +angel, and a few silver bits of doubtful value. But I trusted that +this store, slender as it was, would meet my charges as far as London. +Once there I must depend on my wits either for providence at home or a +passage abroad. + +Striding steadily up and down hill, for Arden Forest is made up of +hills and dells which follow one another as do the wave and trough of +the sea, only less regularly, I made my way toward Wootton Wawen. As +soon as I espied its battlemented church lying in a wooded bottom +below me, I kept a more easterly course, and, leaving Henley-in-Arden +far to the left, passed down toward Leek Wootton. The damp, dead +bracken underfoot, the leafless oaks and gray sky overhead, nay the +very cry of the bittern fishing in the bottoms, seemed to be at one +with my thoughts; for these were dreary and sad enough. + +But hope and a fixed aim form no bad makeshifts for happiness. +Striking the broad London road as I had purposed I slept that +night at Ryton Dunsmoor, and the next at Towcester; and the third day, +which rose bright and frosty, found me stepping gayly southward, +travel-stained indeed, but dry and whole. My spirits rose with the +temperature. For a time I put the past behind me, and found amusement +in the sights of the road; in the heavy wagons and long trains of +pack-horses, and the cheery greetings which met me with each mile. +After all, I had youth and strength, and the world before me; and +particularly Stony Stratford, where I meant to dine. + +There was one trouble common among wayfarers which did not touch me; +and that was the fear of robbers, for he would be a sturdy beggar who +would rob an armed foot-passenger for the sake of an angel; and the +groats were gone. So I felt no terrors on that account, and even when +about noon I heard a horseman trot up behind me, and rein in his horse +so as to keep pace with me at a walk, step for step--a thing which +might have seemed suspicious to some--I took no heed of him. I was +engaged with my first view of Stratford, and did not turn my head. We +had walked on so for fifty paces or more, before it struck me as odd +that the man did not pass me. + +Then I turned, and shading my eyes from the sun, which stood just over +his shoulder, said, "Good-day, friend." + +"Good-day, master," he answered. + +He was a stout fellow, looking like a citizen, although he had a sword +by his side, and wore it with an air of importance which the sunshine +of opportunity might have ripened into a swagger. His dress was plain; +and he sat a good hackney as a miller's sack might have sat it. His +face was the last thing I looked at. When I raised my eyes to it, I +got an unpleasant start. The man was no stranger. I knew him in a +moment for the messenger who had summoned me to the Chancellor's +presence. + +The remembrance did not please me; and reading in the fellow's sly +look that he recognized me, and thought he had made a happy discovery +on finding me, I halted abruptly. He did the same. + +"It is a fine morning," he said, taken aback by my sudden movement, +but affecting an indifference which the sparkle in his eye belied. "A +rare day for the time of year." + +"It is," I answered, gazing steadily at him. + +"Going to London? Or may be only to Stratford?" he hazarded. He +fidgeted uncomfortably under my eye, but still pretended ignorance of +me. + +"That is as may be," I answered. + +"No offense, I am sure," he said. + +I cast a quick glance up and down the road. There happened to be no +one in sight. "Look here!" I replied, stepping forward to lay my hand +on the horse's shoulder--but the man reined back and prevented me, +thereby giving me a clew to his character--"you are in the service of +the Bishop of Winchester?" + +His face fell, and he could not conceal his disappointment at being +recognized. "Well, master," he answered reluctantly, "perhaps I am, +and perhaps I am not." + +"That is enough," I said shortly. "And you know me. You need not lie +about it, man, for I can see you do. Now, look here, Master Steward, +or whatever your name may be----" + +"It is Master Pritchard," he put in sulkily; "and I am not ashamed of +it." + +"Very well. Then let us understand one another. Do you mean to +interfere with me?" + +He grinned. "Well, to be plain, I do," he replied, reining his horse +back another step. "I have orders to look out for you, and have you +stopped if I find you. And I must do my duty, sir; I am sworn to it, +Master Cludde." + +"Right," said I calmly; "and I must do mine, which is to take care of +my skin." And I drew my sword and advanced upon him with a flourish. +"We will soon decide this little matter," I added grimly, one eye on +him and one on the empty road, "if you will be good enough to defend +yourself." + +But there was no fight in the fellow. By good luck, too, he was so +startled that he did not do what he might have done with safety; +namely, retreat, and keep me in sight until some passers-by came up. +He did give back, indeed, but it was against the bank. "Have a care," +he cried in a fume, his eye following my sword nervously; he did not +try to draw his own. "There is no call for fighting, I say." + +"But I say there is," I replied bluntly. "Call and cause! Either you +fight me, or I go where I please." + +"You may go to Bath for me!" he spluttered, his face the color of a +turkey-cock's wattles with rage. + +"Do you mean it, my friend?" I said, and I played my point about his +leg, half-minded to give him a little prod by way of earnest. "Make up +your mind." + +"Yes!" he shrieked out, suspecting my purpose, and bouncing about in +his saddle like a parched pea. "Yes, I say!" he roared. "Do you hear +me? You go your way, and I will go mine." + +"That is a bargain," I said quietly; "and mind you keep to it." + +I put up my sword with my face turned from him, lest he should see the +curl of my lip and the light in my eyes. In truth, I was uncommonly +well pleased with myself, and was thinking that if I came through all +my adventures as well, I should do merrily. Outwardly, however, I +tried to ignore my victory, and to make things as easy as I could for +my friend--if one may call a man who will not fight him a friend, a +thing I doubt. "Which way are you going?" I asked amicably; "to +Stratford?" + +He nodded, for he was too sulky to speak. + +"All right!" I said cheerfully, feeling that my dignity could take +care of itself now. "Then so far we may go together. Only do you +remember the terms. After dinner each goes his own way." + +He nodded again, and we turned, and went on in silence, eying one +another askance, like two ill-matched dogs coupled together. But, +luckily, our forced companionship did not last long, a quarter of a +mile and a bend in the road bringing us to the first low, gray houses +of Stratford; a long, straggling village it seemed, made up of inns +strewn along the road, like beads threaded on a rosary. And to be +sure, to complete the likeness, we came presently upon an ancient +stone cross standing on the green. I pulled up in front of this with a +sigh of pleasure, for on either side of it, one facing the other, was +an inn of the better class. + +"Well," I said, "which shall it be? The Rose and Crown, or the Crown +without the Rose?" + +"Choose for yourself," he answered churlishly. "I go to the other." + +I shrugged my shoulders. After all, you cannot make a silk purse out +of a sow's ear, and if a man has not courage he is not likely to have +good-fellowship. But the words angered me, nevertheless, for a shabby, +hulking fellow lounging at my elbow overheard them and grinned; a +hiccoughing, blear-eyed man he was as I had ever met, with a red nose +and the rags of a tattered cassock about him. I turned away in +annoyance, and chose the "Crown" at hazard; and pushing my way through +a knot of horses that stood tethered at the door, went in, leaving the +two to their devices. + + +I found a roaring fire in the great room, and three or four yeomen +standing about it, drinking ale. But I was hot from walking, so, after +saluting them and ordering my meal, I went and sat for choice on a +bench by the window away from the fire. The window was one of a kind +common in Warwickshire houses; long and low and beetle-browed, the +story above projecting over it. I sat here a minute looking idly out +at the inn opposite, a heavy stone building with a walled courtyard +attached to it; such an inn as was common enough about the time of the +Wars of the Roses when wayfarers looked rather for safety than +comfort. Presently I saw a boy come out of it and start up the road at +a run. Then, a minute later, the ragged fellow I had seen on the green +came out and lurched across the road. He seemed to be making, though +uncertainly, for my inn, and, sure enough, just as my bread and +bacon--the latter hot and hissing--were put before me, he staggered +into the room, bringing a strong smell of ale and onions with him. +"_Pax vobiscum!_" he said, leering at me with tipsy solemnity. + +I guessed what he was--a monk, one of those unfortunates still to be +found here and there up and down the country, whom King Henry, when he +put down the monasteries, had made homeless. I did not look on the +class with much favor, thinking that for most of them the cloister, +even if the Queen should succeed in setting the abbeys on their legs +again, would have few attractions. But I saw that the simple farmers +received his scrap of Latin with respect, and I nodded civilly as I +went on with my meal. + +I was not to get off so easily, however. He came and planted himself +opposite to me. + +"_Pax vobiscum_, my son," he repeated. "The ale is cheap here, and +good." + +"So is the ham, good father," I replied cheerfully, not pausing in my +attack on the victuals. "I will answer for so much." + +"Well, well," the knave replied with ready wit, "I breakfasted early. +I am content. Landlord, another plate and a full tankard. The young +gentleman would have me dine with him." + +I could not tell whether to be angry or to laugh at his impudence. + +"The gentleman says he will answer for it!" repeated the rascal, with +a twinkle in his eye, as the landlord hesitated. He was by no means so +drunk as he looked. + +"No, no, father," I cried, joining in the general laugh into which the +farmers by the fire broke. "A cup of ale is in reason, and for that I +will pay, but for no more. Drink it, and wish me Godspeed." + +"I will do more than that, lad," he answered. Swaying to and fro +my cup, which he had seized in his grasp, he laid his hand on the +window-ledge beside me, as though to steady himself, and stooped until +his coarse, puffy face was but a few inches from mine. "More than +that," he whispered hoarsely; and his eyes, peering into mine, were +now sober and full of meaning. "If you do not want to be put in the +stocks or worse, make tracks! Make tracks, lad!" he continued. "Your +friend over there--he is a niggardly oaf--has sent for the hundredman +and the constable, and you are the quarry. So the word is, Go! That," +he added aloud, standing erect again, with a drunken smile, "is for +your cup of ale; and good coin too!" + +For half a minute I sat quite still; taken aback, and wondering, while +the bacon cooled on the plate before me, what I was to do. I did not +doubt the monk was telling the truth. Why should he lie to me? And I +cursed my folly in trusting to a coward's honor or a serving-man's +good faith. But lamentations were useless. What was I to do? I had no +horse, and no means of getting one. I was in a strange country, and to +try to escape on foot from pursuers who knew the roads, and had the +law on their side, would be a hopeless undertaking. Yet to be haled +back to Coton End a prisoner--I could not face that. Mechanically I +raised a morsel of bacon to my lips, and as I did so, a thought +occurred to me--an idea suggested by some talk I had heard the evening +before at Towcester. + +Fanciful as the plan was, I snatched at it; and knowing each instant +to be precious, took my courage in my hand--and my tankard. "Here," I +cried, speaking suddenly and loudly, "here is bad luck to purveyors, +Master Host!" + +There were a couple of stablemen within hearing, lounging in the +doorway, besides the landlord and his wife and the farmers. A villager +or two also had dropped in, and there were two peddlers lying half +asleep in the corner. All these pricked up their ears more or less at +my words. But, like most country folk, they were slow to take in +anything new or unexpected; and I had to drink afresh and say again, +"Here is bad luck to purveyors!" before any one took it up. + +Then the landlord showed he understood. + +"Ay, so say I!" he cried, with an oath. "Purveyors, indeed! It is such +as they give the Queen a bad name." + +"God bless her!" quoth the monk loyally. + +"And drown the purveyors!" a farmer exclaimed. + +"They were here a year ago, and left us as bare as a shorn sheep," +struck in a strapping villager, speaking at a white heat, but telling +me no news; for this was what I had heard at Towcester the night +before. "The Queen should lie warm if she uses all the wool they took! +And the pack-horses they purveyed to carry off the plunder--why, the +packmen avoid Stratford ever since as though we had the Black Death! +Oh, down with the purveyors, say I! The first that comes this way I +will show the bottom of the Ouse. Ay, that I will, though I hang for +it!" + +"Easy! easy, Tom Miller!" the host interposed, affecting an air of +assurance, even while he cast an eye of trouble at his flitches. "It +will be another ten years before they harry us again. There is +Potter's Pury! They never took a tester's worth from Potter's Pury! +No, nor from Preston Gobion! But they will go to them next, depend +upon it!" + +"I hope they will," I said, with a world of gloomy insinuation in my +words. "But I doubt it!" + +And this time my hint was not wasted. The landlord changed color. +"What are you driving at, master?" he asked mildly, while the others +looked at me in silence and waited for more. + +"What if there be one across the road now!" I said, giving way to the +temptation, and speaking falsely--for which I paid dearly afterward. +"A purveyor, I mean, unless I am mistaken in him, or he tells lies. He +has come straight from the Chancellor, white wand, warrant, and all. +He is taking his dinner now, but he has sent for the hundredman, so I +guess he means business." + +"For the hundredman?" repeated the landlord, his brows meeting. + +"Yes; unless I am mistaken." + +There was silence for a moment. Then the man they called Tom Miller +dashed his cap on the floor and, folding his arms defiantly, looked +round on his neighbors. "He has come, has he!" he roared, his face +swollen, his eyes bloodshot. "Then I will be as good as my word! Who +will help? Shall we sit down and be shorn like sheep, as we were +before, so that our children lay on the bare stones, and we pulled the +plow ourselves? Or shall we show that we are free Englishmen, and not +slaves of Frenchmen? Shall we teach Master Purveyor not to trouble us +again? Now, what say you, neighbors?" + +So fierce a growl of impatience and anger rose round me as at once +answered the question. A dozen red faces glared at me and at one +another, and from the very motion and passion of the men as they +snarled and threatened, the room seemed twice as full as it was. Their +oaths and cries of encouragement, not loud, but the more dangerous for +that, the fresh burst of fury which rose as the village smith and +another came in and learned the news, the menacing gestures of a score +of brandished fists--these sights, though they told of the very effect +at which I had aimed, scared as well as pleased me. I turned red and +white, and hesitated, fearing that I had gone too far. + +The thing was done, however; and, what was more, I had soon to take +care of myself. At the very moment when the hubbub was at its loudest +I felt a chill run down my back as I met the monk's eye, and, reading +in it whimsical admiration, read in it something besides, and that was +an unmistakable menace. "Clever lad!" the eye said. "I will expose +you," it threatened. + +I had forgotten him--or, at any rate, that my acting would be +transparent enough to him holding the clew in his hand--and his look +was like the shock of cold water to me. But it is wonderful how keen +the wits grow on the grindstone of necessity. With scarcely a second's +hesitation I drew out my only piece of gold, and unnoticed by the +other men, who were busy swearing at and encouraging one another, I +disclosed a morsel of it. The monk's crafty eye glistened. I laid my +finger on my lips. + +He held up two fingers. + +I shook my head and showed an empty palm. I had no more. He nodded; +and the relief that nod gave me was great. Before I had time, however, +to consider the narrowness of my escape, a movement of the crowd--for +the news had spread with strange swiftness, and there was now a crowd +assembled which more than filled the room--proclaimed that the +purveyor had come out, and was in the street. + +The room was nearly emptied at a rush. Though I prudently remained +behind, I could, through the open window, hear as well as see what +passed. The leading spirits had naturally struggled out first, and +were gathered, sullen and full of dangerous possibilities, about the +porch. + + +I suppose the Bishop's messenger saw in them nothing but a crowd of +country clowns, for he came hectoring toward the door, smiting his +boot with his whip, and puffing out his red cheeks mightily. He felt +brave enough, now that he had dined and had at his back three stout +constables sworn to keep the Queen's peace. + +"Make way! Make way, there, do you hear?" he cried in a husky, pompous +voice. "Make way!" he repeated, lightly touching the nearest man with +his switch. "I am on the Queen's service, boobies, and must not be +hindered." + +The man swore at him, but did not budge, and the bully, brought up +thus sharply, awoke to the lowering faces and threatening looks which +confronted him. He changed color a little. But the ale was still in +him, and, forgetting his natural discretion, he thought to carry +matters with a high hand. "Come! come!" he exclaimed angrily. "I have +a warrant, and you resist me at your peril. I have to enter this +house. Clear the way, Master Hundredman, and break these fellows' +heads if they withstand you." + +A growl as of a dozen bulldogs answered him, and he drew back, as a +child might who has trodden on an adder. "You fools!" he spluttered, +glaring at them viciously. "Are you mad? Do you know what you are +doing? Do you see this?" He whipped out from some pocket a short white +staff and brandished it. "I come direct from the Lord Chancellor and +upon his business, do you hear, and if you resist me it is treason. +Treason, you dogs!" he cried, his rage getting the better of him, "and +like dogs you will hang for it. Master Hundredman, I order you to take +in your constables and arrest that man!" + +"What man?" quoth Tom Miller, eying him fixedly. + +"The stranger who came in an hour ago, and is inside the house." + +"Him, he means, who told about the purveyor across the road," +explained the monk with a wink. + +That wink sufficed. There was a roar of execration, and in the +twinkling of an eye the Jack-in-office, tripped up this way and shoved +that, was struggling helplessly in the grasp of half a dozen men, who +fought savagely for his body with the Hundredman and the constables. + +"To the river! To the Ouse with him!" yelled the mob. "In the Queen's +name!" shouted the officers. But these were to those as three to a +score, and taken by surprise besides, and doubtful of the rights of +the matter. Yet for an instant, as the crowd went reeling and fighting +down the road, they prevailed; the constables managed to drag their +leader free, and I caught a glimpse of him, wild-eyed and frantic with +fear, his clothes torn from his back, standing at bay like some +animal, and brandishing his staff in one hand, a packet of letters in +the other. + +"I have letters, letters of state!" he screamed shrilly. "Let me +alone, I tell you! Let me go, you curs!" + +But in vain. The next instant the mob were upon him again. The packet +of letters went one way, the staff was dashed another. He was thrown +down and plucked up again, and hurried, bruised and struggling, toward +the river, his screams for mercy and furious threats rising shrilly +above the oaths and laughter. + +I felt myself growing pale as scream followed scream. "They will kill +him!" I exclaimed trembling, and prepared to follow. "I cannot see +this done." + +But the monk, who had returned to my side, grasped my arm. "Don't be a +fool," he said sharply. "I will answer for it they will not kill him. +Tom Miller is not a fool, though he is angry. He will duck him, and +let him go. But I will trouble you for that bit of gold, young +gentleman." + +I gave it to him. + +"Now," he continued with a leer, "I will give you a hint in return. If +you are wise, you will be out of this county in twelve hours. Tethered +to the gate over there is a good horse which belongs to a certain +purveyor now in the river. Take it! There is no one to say you nay. +And begone!" + +I looked hard at him for a minute, my heart beating fast. This was +horse-stealing. And horse-stealing was a hanging matter. But I had +done so much already that I felt I might as well be hanged for a sheep +as for a lamb. I was not sure that I had not incited to treason, and +what was stealing a horse beside that? "I will do it!" I said +desperately. + +"Don't lose time, then," quoth my mentor. + +I went out then and there, and found he had told the truth. Every soul +in the place had gone to see the ducking, and the street was empty. +Kicked aside in the roadway lay the bundle of letters, soiled but not +torn, and in the gutter was the staff. I stooped and picked up one and +the other--in for a lamb, in for a sheep! and they might be useful +some day. Then I jumped into the saddle, and twitched the reins off +the hook. + +But before I could drive in the spurs, a hand fell on the bridle, and +the monk's face appeared at my knee. "Well?" I said, glaring down at +him--I was burning to be away. + +"That is a good cloak you have got there," he muttered hurriedly. +"There, strapped to the saddle, you fool. You do not want that, give +it me. Do you hear? Quick, give it me," he cried, raising his voice +and clutching at it fiercely, his face dark with greed and fear. + +"I see," I replied, as I unstrapped it. "I am to steal the horse that +you may get the cloak. And then you will lay the lot on my shoulders. +Well, take it!" I cried, "and go your way as fast as you can." + +Throwing it at him as hard as I could, I shook up the reins and went +off down the road at a gallop. The wind whistled pleasantly past my +ears. The sounds of the town grew faint and distant. Each bound of the +good hack carried me farther and farther from present danger, farther +and farther from the old life. In the exhilaration and excitement of +the moment I forgot my condition; forgot that I had not a penny-piece +in my pocket, and that I had left an unpaid bill behind me; forgot +even that I rode a--well, a borrowed horse. + + + + + CHAPTER IV. + + TWO SISTERS OF MERCY. + + +A younger generation has often posed me finely by asking, "What, Sir +Francis! Did you not see _one_ bishop burned? Did you not know _one_ +of the martyrs? Did you _never_ come face to face with Queen Mary?" To +all which questions I have one answer, No, and I watch small eyes grow +large with astonishment. But the truth is, a man can only be at one +place at a time. And though, in this very month of February, 1555, +Prebendary Rogers--a good, kindly man, as I have heard, who had a wife +and nine children--was burned in Smithfield in London for religion, +and the Bishop of Gloucester suffered in his own city, and other +inoffensive men were burned to death, and there was much talk of these +things, and in thousands of breasts a smoldering fire was kindled +which blazed high enough by and by--why, I was at Coton End, or on the +London Road, at the time, and learned such things only dimly and by +hearsay. + +But the rill joins the river at last; and ofttimes suddenly and at a +bound, as it were. On this very day, while I cantered easily southward +with my face set toward St. Albans, Providence was at work shaping a +niche for me in the lives of certain people who were at the time as +unconscious of my existence as I was of theirs. In a great house in +the Barbican in London there was much stealthy going and coming on +this February afternoon and evening. Behind locked doors, and in fear +and trembling, mails were being packed and bags strapped, and fingers +almost too delicate for the task were busy with nails and hammers, +securing this and closing that. The packers knew nothing of me, nor I +of them. Yet but for me all that packing would have been of no avail; +and but for them my fate might have been very different. Still, the +sound of the hammer did not reach my ears, or, doing so, was covered +by the steady tramp of the roadster; and no vision, so far as I ever +heard, of a dusty youth riding Londonward came between the secret +workers and their task. + +I had made up my mind to sleep at St. Albans that night, and for this +reason, and for others relating to the Sheriff of Buckinghamshire, in +which county Stony Stratford lies, I pushed on briskly. I presently +found time, however, to examine the packet of letters of which I had +made spoil. On the outer wrapper I found there was no address, only an +exhortation to be speedy. Off this came, therefore, without ceremony, +and was left in the dirt. Inside I found two sealed epistles, each +countersigned on the wrapper, "Stephen Winton." + +"Ho! ho!" said I. "I did well to take them." + +Over the signature on the first letter--it seemed to be written on +parchment--were the words, "Haste! haste! haste!" This was the thicker +and heavier of the two, and was addressed to Sir Maurice Berkeley, at +St. Mary Overy's, Southwark, London. I turned it over and over in my +hands, and peeped into it, hesitating. Twice I muttered, "All is fair +in love and war!" And at last, with curiosity fully awake, and a +glance behind me to make sure that the act was unobserved, I broke the +seal. The document proved to be as short and pithy as it was +startling. It was an order commanding Sir Maurice Berkeley forthwith +in the Queen's name, and by the authority of the Council, and so on, +and so on, to arrest Katherine Willoughby de Eresby, Duchess of +Suffolk, and to deliver her into the custody of the Lieutenant of the +Tower, "These presents to be his waranty for the detention of the said +Duchess of Suffolk until her Grace's pleasure in the matter be known." + +When it was too late I trembled to think what I had done. To meddle +with matters of state might be more dangerous a hundred times than +stealing horses, or even than ducking the Chancellor's messenger! +Seeing at this moment a party of travelers approach, I crammed the +letter into my pocket, and rode by them with a red face, and a tongue +that stuttered so feebly that I could scarcely return their greetings. +When they had gone by I pulled out the warrant again, having it in my +mind to tear it up without a moment's delay--to tear it into the +smallest morsels, and so get rid of a thing most dangerous. But the +great red seal dangling at the foot of the parchment caught my eye, +and I paused to think. It was so red, so large, so imposing, it seemed +a pity to destroy it. It must surely be good for something. I folded +up the warrant again, and put it away in my safest pocket. Yes, it +might be good for something. + +I took out the other letter. It was bound with green ribbon and sealed +with extreme care, being directed simply to Mistress Clarence--there +was no address. But over Gardiner's signature on the wrapper were the +words, "These, on your peril, very privately." + +I turned it over and over, and said the same thing about love and war, +and even repeated to myself my old proverb about a sheep and a lamb. +But somehow I could not do it. The letter was a woman's letter; the +secret, her secret; and though my fingers itched as they hovered about +the seals, my cheek tingled too. So at last, with a muttered, "What +would Petronilla say?" I put it away unopened in the pocket where the +warrant lay. The odds were immense that Mistress Clarence would never +get it; but at least her secret should remain hers, my honor mine! + + +It was dark when I rode, thoroughly jaded, into St. Albans. I was +splashed with mud up to the waist and wetted by a shower, and looked, +I have no doubt, from the effect of my journeying on foot and +horseback, as disreputable a fellow as might be. The consciousness too +that I was without a penny, and the fear lest, careful as I had been +to let no one outsrip me, the news of the riot at Stratford might have +arrived, did not tend to give me assurance. I poked my head timidly +into the great room, hoping that I might have it to myself. To my +disgust it was full of people. Half-a-dozen travelers and as many +townsfolk were sitting round the fire, talking briskly over their +evening draught. Yet I had no choice. I was hungry, and the thing had +to be done, and I swaggered in, something of the sneak, no doubt, +peeping through my bravado. I remarked, as I took my seat by the fire +and set to drying myself, that I was greeted by a momentary silence, +and that two or three of the company began to eye me suspiciously. + +There was one man, who sat on the settle in the warmest corner of the +chimney, who seemed in particular to resent my damp neighborhood. His +companions treated him with so much reverence, and he snubbed them so +regularly, that I wondered who he was; and presently, listening to the +conversation which went on round me, I had my curiosity satisfied. He +was no less a personage than the Bailiff of St. Albans, and his manner +befitted such a man; for it seemed to indicate that he thought himself +heir to all the powers of the old Abbots under whose broad thumb his +father and grandfather had groaned. + +My conscience pricking me, I felt some misgiving when I saw him, after +staring at me and whispering to two or three of his neighbors, beckon +the landlord aside. His big round face and burly figure gave him a +general likeness to bluff King Hal and he appeared to be aware of this +himself, and to be inclined to ape the stout king's ways, which, I +have heard my uncle say, were ever ways heavy for others' toes. For a +while, however, seeing my supper come in, I forgot him. The bare-armed +girl who brought it to me, and in whom my draggled condition seemed to +provoke feelings of a different nature, lugged up a round table to the +fire. On this she laid my meal, not scrupling to set aside some of the +snug dry townsfolk. Then she set a chair for me well in the blaze, and +folding her arms in her apron stood to watch me fall to. I did so with +a will, and with each mouthful of beef and draught of ale, spirit and +strength came back to me. The cits round me might sneer and shake +their heads, and the travelers smile at my appetite. In five minutes I +cared not a whit! I could give them back joke for joke, and laugh with +the best of them. + +Indeed, I had clean forgotten the Bailiff, when he stalked back to his +place. But the moment our eyes met, I guessed there was trouble afoot. +The landlord came with him and stood looking at me, sending off the +wench with a flea in her ear; and I felt under his eye an +uncomfortable consciousness that my purse was empty. Two or three late +arrivals, to whom I suppose Master Bailiff had confided his +suspicions, took their stand also in a half-circle and scanned me +queerly. Altogether it struck me suddenly that I was in a tight place, +and had need of my wits. + +"Ahem!" said the Bailiff abruptly, taking skillful advantage of a lull +in the talk. "Where from last, young man?" He spoke in a deep choky +voice, and, if I was not mistaken, he winked one of his small eyes in +the direction of his friends, as though to say, "Now see me pose him!" + +But I only put another morsel in my mouth. For a moment indeed the +temptation to reply "Towcester," seeing that such a journey over a +middling road was something to brag of before the Highway Law came in, +almost overcame me. But in time I bethought me of Stephen Gardiner's +maxim, "Be slow to speak!" and I put another morsel in my mouth. + +The Bailiff's face grew red, or rather, redder. "Come, young man, did +you hear me speak?" he said pompously. "Where from last?" + +"From the road, sir," I replied, turning to him as if I had not heard +him before. "And a very wet road it was." + +A man who sat next me chuckled, being apparently a stranger like +myself. But the Bailiff puffed himself into a still more striking +likeness to King Henry, and including him in his scowl shouted at me, +"Sirrah! don't bandy words with me! Which way did you come along the +road, I asked." + +It was on the tip of my tongue to answer saucily, "The right way!" But +I reflected that I might be stopped; and to be stopped might mean to +be hanged at worst, and something very unpleasant at best. So I +controlled myself, and answered--though the man's arrogance was +provoking enough--"I have come from Stratford, and I am going to +London. Now you know as much as I do." + +"Do I?" he said, with a sneer and a wink at the landlord. + +"Yes, I think so," I answered patiently. + +"Well, I don't!" he retorted, in vulgar triumph. "I don't. It is my +opinion that you have come from London." + +I went on with my supper. + +"Do you hear?" he asked pompously, sticking his arms akimbo and +looking round for sympathy. "You will have to give an account of +yourself, young man. We will have no penniless rogues and sturdy +vagabonds wandering about St. Albans." + +"Penniless rogues do not go a-horseback," I answered. But it was +wonderful how my spirits sank again under that word "penniless." It +hit me hard. + +"Wait a bit," he said, raising his finger to command attention for his +next question. "What is your religion, young man?" + +"Oh!" I replied, putting down my knife and looking open scorn at him, +"you are an inquisitor, are you?" At which words of mine there was a +kind of stir. "You would burn me as I hear they burned Master Sandars +at Coventry last week, would you? They were talking about it down the +road." + +"You will come to a bad end, young man!" he retorted viciously, his +outstretched finger shaking as if the palsy had seized him. For this +time my taunt had gone home, and more than one of the listeners +standing on the outer edge of the group, and so beyond his ken, had +muttered "shame." More than one face had grown dark. "You will come to +a bad end!" he repeated. "If it be not here, then somewhere else! It +is my opinion that you have come from London, and that you have been +in trouble. There is a hue-and-cry out for a young fellow just your +age, and a cock of your hackle, I judge, who is wanted for heresy. A +Londoner too. You do not leave here until you have given an account of +yourself, Master Jack-a-Dandy!" The party had all risen round me, and +some of the hindmost had got on benches to see me the better. Among +these, between two bacon flitches, I caught a glimpse of the +serving-maid's face as she peered at me, pale and scared, and a queer +impulse led me to nod to her--a reassuring little nod. I found myself +growing cool and confident, seeing myself so cornered. + +"Easy! easy!" I said, "let a man finish his supper and get warmed in +peace." + +"Bishop Bonner will warm you!" cried the Bailiff. + +"I dare say--as they warm people in Spain!" I sneered. + +"He will be Bishop Burner to you!" shrieked the Bailiff, almost beside +himself with rage at being so bearded by a lad. + +"Take care!" I retorted. "Do not you speak evil of dignitaries, or you +will be getting into trouble!" + +He fairly writhed under this rejoinder. + +"Landlord!" he spluttered. "I shall hold you responsible! If this +person leaves your house, and is not forthcoming when wanted, you will +suffer for it!" + +The landlord scratched his head, being a good-natured fellow; but a +bailiff is a bailiff, especially at St. Albans. And I was muddy and +travel-stained, and quick of my tongue for one so young; which the +middle-aged never like, though the old bear it better. He hesitated. + +"Do not be a fool, Master Host!" I said. "I have something +here----" and I touched my pocket, which happened to be near my +sword-hilt--"that will make you rue it if you interfere with me!" + +"Ho! ho!" cried the Bailiff, in haste and triumph. "So that is his +tone! We have a tavern-brawler here, have we! A young swashbuckler! +His tongue will not run so fast when he finds his feet in the stocks. +Master landlord, call the watch! Call the watch at once, I command +you!" + +"You will do so at your peril!" I said sternly. Then, seeing that my +manner had some effect upon all save the angry official, I gave way to +the temptation to drive the matter home and secure my safety by the +only means that seemed possible. It is an old story that one deception +leads inevitably to another. I solemnly drew out the white staff I had +taken from the apparitor. "Look here!" I continued, waving it. "Do you +see this, you booby? I am traveling in the Queen's name, and on her +service. By special commission, too, from the Chancellor! Is that +plain speaking enough for you? And let me tell you, Master Bailiff," I +added, fixing my eye upon him, "that my business is private, and that +my Lord of Winchester will not be best pleased when he hears how I +have had to declare myself. Do you think the Queen's servants go +always in cloth of gold, you fool? The stocks indeed!" + +I laughed out loudly and without effort, for there never was anything +so absurd as the change in the Bailiff's visage. His color fled, his +cheeks grew pendulous, his lip hung loose. He stared at me, gasping +like a fish out of water, and seemed unable to move toe or finger. The +rest enjoyed the scene, as people will enjoy a marvelous sudden stroke +of fortune. It was as good as a stage pageant to them. They could not +take their eyes from the pocket in which I had replaced my wand, and +continued, long after I had returned to my meal, to gaze at me in +respectful silence. The crestfallen Bailiff presently slipped out, and +I was left cock of the walk, and for the rest of the evening enjoyed +the fruits of victory. + +They proved to be more substantial than I had expected, for, as I was +on my way upstairs to bed, the landlord preceding me with a light, a +man accosted me, and beckoned me aside mysteriously. + +"The Bailiff is very much annoyed," he said, speaking in a muffled +voice behind his hand, while his eyes peered into mine. + +"Well, what is that to me?" I replied, looking sternly at him. I was +tired and sleepy after my meal. "He should not make such a fool of +himself." + +"Tut, tut, tut, tut! You misunderstood me, young sir," the man +answered, plucking my sleeve as I turned away. "He regrets the +annoyance he has caused you. A mistake, he says, a pure mistake, and +he hopes you will have forgotten it by morning." Then, with a skillful +hand, which seemed not unused to the task, he slid two coins into my +palm. I looked at them, for a moment not perceiving his drift. Then I +found they were two gold angels, and I began to understand. "Ahem!" I +said, fingering them uneasily. "Yes. Well, well, I will look over it, +I will look over it! Tell him from me," I continued, gaining +confidence as I proceeded with my new rôle, "that he shall hear no +more about it. He is zealous--perhaps over zealous!" + +"That is it!" muttered the envoy eagerly; "that is it, my dear sir! +You see perfectly how it is. He is zealous. Zealous in the Queen's +service!" + +"To be sure; and so I will report him. Tell him that so I will report +him. And here, my good friend, take one of these for yourself," I +added, magnificently giving him back half my fortune--young donkey +that I was. "Drink to the Queen's health; and so good-night to you." + +He went away, bowing to the very ground, and, when the landlord +likewise had left me, I was very merry over this, being in no mood for +weighing words. The world seemed--to be sure, the ale was humming in +my head, and I was in the landlord's best room--easy enough to +conquer, provided one possessed a white staff. The fact that I had no +right to mine only added--be it remembered I was young and foolish--to +my enjoyment of its power. I went to bed in all comfort with it under +my pillow, and slept soundly, untroubled by any dream of a mischance. +But when did a lie ever help a man in the end? + + +When I awoke, which I seemed to do on a sudden, it was still dark. I +wondered for a moment where I was, and what was the meaning of the +shouting and knocking I heard. Then, discerning the faint outline of +the window, I remembered the place in which I had gone to bed, and I +sat up and listened. Some one--nay, several people--were drumming and +kicking against the wooden doors of the inn-yard, and shouting +besides, loud enough to raise the dead. In the next room to mine I +caught the grumbling voices of persons disturbed, like myself, from +sleep. And by and by a window was opened, and I heard the landlord ask +what was the matter. + +"In the Queen's name!" came the loud, impatient answer, given in a +voice that rose above the ring of bridles and the stamping of iron +hoofs, "open! and that quickly, Master Host. The watch are here, and +we must search." + +I waited to hear no more. I was out of bed, and huddling on my +clothes, and thrusting my feet into my boots, like one possessed. My +heart was beating as fast as if I had been running in a race, and my +hands were shaking with the shock of the alarm. The impatient voice +without was Master Pritchard's, and it rang with all the vengeful +passion which I should have expected that gentleman, duped, ducked, +and robbed, to be feeling. There would be little mercy to be had at +his hands. Moreover, my ears, grown as keen for the moment as the +hunted hare's, distinguished the tramping of at least half-a-dozen +horses, so that it was clear that he had come with a force at his +back. Resistance would be useless. My sole chance lay in flight--if +flight should still be possible. + +Even in my haste I did not forsake the talisman which had served me so +well, but stayed an instant to thrust it into my pocket. The Cluddes +have, I fancy, a knack of keeping cool in emergencies, getting, +indeed, the cooler the greater the stress. + +By this time the inn was thoroughly aroused. Doors were opening and +shutting on all sides of me, and questions were being shouted in +different tones from room to room. In the midst of the hubbub I heard +the landlord come out muttering, and go downstairs to open the door. +Instantly I unlatched mine, slipped through it stealthily, sneaked a +step or two down the passage, and then came plump in the dark against +some one who was moving as softly as myself. The surprise was +complete, and I should have cried out at the unexpected collision, had +not the unknown laid a cold hand on my mouth, and gently pushed me +back into my room. + +Here there was now a faint glimmer of dawn, and by this I saw that my +companion was the serving-maid. "Hist!" she said, speaking under her +breath, "Is it you they want?" + +I nodded. + +"I thought so," she muttered. "Then you must get out through your +window. You cannot pass them. They are a dozen or more, and armed. +Quick! knot this about the bars. It is no great depth to the bottom, +and the ground is soft from the rain." + +She tore, as she spoke, the coverlet from the bed, and, twisting it +into a kind of rope, helped me to secure one corner of it about the +window-bar. "When you are down," she whispered, "keep along the wall +to the right until you come to a haystack. Turn to the left there--you +will have to ford the water--and you will soon be clear of the town. +Look about you then, and you will see a horse-track, which leads to +Elstree, running in a line with the London Road, but a mile from it +and through woods. At Elstree any path to the left will take you to +Barnet, and not two miles lost." + +"Heaven bless you!" I said, turning from the gloom, the dark sky, and +driving scud without to peer gratefully at her. "Heaven bless you for +a good woman!" + +"And God keep you for a bonny boy," she whispered. + +I kissed her, forcing into her hands--a thing the remembrance of which +is very pleasant to me to this day--my last piece of gold. + + +A moment more, and I stood unhurt, but almost up to my knees in mud, +in an alley bounded on both sides, as far as I could see, by blind +walls. Stopping only to indicate by a low whistle that I was safe, I +turned and sped away as fast as I could run in the direction which she +had pointed out. There was no one abroad, and in a shorter time than I +had expected I found myself outside the town, traveling over a kind of +moorland tract bounded in the distance by woods. + +Here I picked up the horse-track easily enough, and without stopping, +save for a short breathing space, hurried along it, to gain the +shelter of the trees. So far so good! I had reason to be thankful. But +my case was still an indifferent one. More than once in getting out of +the town I had slipped and fallen. I was wet through, and plastered +with dirt owing to these mishaps; and my clothes were in a woeful +plight. For a time excitement kept me up, however, and I made good +way, warmed by the thought that I had again baffled the great Bishop. +It was only when the day had come, and grown on to noon, and I saw no +sign of any pursuers, that thought got the upper hand. Then I began to +compare, with some bitterness of feeling, my present condition--wet, +dirty, and homeless--with that which I had enjoyed only a week before; +and it needed all my courage to support me. Skulking, half famished, +between Barnet and Tottenham, often compelled to crouch in ditches or +behind walls while travelers went by, and liable each instant to have +to leave the highway and take to my heels, I had leisure to feel; and +I did feel, more keenly, I think, that afternoon than at any later +time, the bitterness of fortune. I cursed Stephen Gardiner a dozen +times, and dared not let my thoughts wander to my father. I had said +that I would build my house afresh. Well, truly I was building it from +the foundation. + +It added very much to my misery that it rained all day a cold, +half-frozen rain. The whole afternoon I spent in hiding, shivering and +shaking in a hole under a ledge near Tottenham; being afraid to go +into London before nightfall, lest I should be waited for at the gate +and be captured. Chilled and bedraggled as I was, and weak through +want of food which I dared not go out to beg, the terrors of capture +got hold of my mind and presented to me one by one every horrible form +of humiliation, the stocks, the pillory, the cart-tail; so that even +Master Pritchard, could he have seen me and known my mind, might have +pitied me; so that I loathe to this day the hours I spent in that foul +hiding-place. Between a man's best and worse, there is little but a +platter of food. + +The way this was put an end to, I well remember. An old woman came +into the field where I lay hid, to drive home a cow. I had had my eyes +on this cow for at least an hour, having made up my mind to milk it +for my own benefit as soon as the dusk fell. In my disappointment at +seeing it driven off, and also out of a desire to learn whether the +old dame might not be going to milk it in a corner of the pasture, in +which case I might still get an after taste, I crawled so far out of +my hole that, turning suddenly, she caught sight of me. I expected to +see her hurry off, but she did not. She took a long look, and then +came back toward me, making, however, as it seemed to me, as if she +did not see me. When she had come within a few feet of me, she looked +down abruptly, and our eyes met. What she saw in mine I can only +guess. In hers I read a divine pity. "Oh, poor lad!" she murmured; +"oh, you poor, poor lad!" and there were tears in her voice. + +I was so weak--it was almost twenty-four hours since I had tasted +food, and I had come twenty-four miles in the time--that at that I +broke down, and cried like a child. + +I learned later that the old woman took me for just the same person +for whom the Bailiff at St. Albans had mistaken me, a young apprentice +named Hunter, who had got into trouble about religion, and was at this +time hiding up and down the country; Bishop Bonner having clapped his +father into jail until the son should come to hand. But her kind heart +knew no distinction of creeds. She took me to her cottage as soon as +night fell, and warmed, and dried, and fed me. She did not dare to +keep me under her roof for longer than an hour or two, neither would I +have stayed to endanger her. But she sent me out a new man, with a +crust, moreover, in my pocket. A hundred times between Tottenham and +Aldersgate I said "God bless her!" And I say so now. + +So twice in one day, and that the gloomiest day of my life, I was +succored by a woman. I have never forgotten it. I have tried to keep +it always in mind; remembering too a saying of my uncle's, that "there +is nothing on earth so merciful as a good woman, or so pitiless as a +bad one!" + + + + + CHAPTER V. + + MISTRESS BERTRAM. + + +"Ding! ding! ding! Aid ye the poor! Pray for the dead! Five o'clock and +a murky morning." + +The noise of the bell, and the cry which accompanied it, roused me +from my first sleep in London, and that with a vengeance; the bell +being rung and the words uttered within three feet of my head. Where +did I sleep, then? Well, I had found a cozy resting-place behind some +boards which stood propped against the wall of a baker's oven in a +street near Moorgate. The wall was warm and smelt of new bread, and +another besides myself had discovered its advantages. This was the +watchman, who had slumbered away most of his vigil cheek by jowl with +me, but, morning approaching, had roused himself, and before he was +well out of his bed, certainly before he had left his bedroom, had +begun--the ungrateful wretch--to prove his watchfulness by disturbing +every one else. + +I sat up and rubbed my eyes, grinding my shoulders well against the +wall for warmth. I had no need to turn out yet, but I began to think, +and the more I thought the harder I stared at the planks six inches +before my nose. My thoughts turned upon a very knotty point; one that +I had never seriously considered before. What was I going to do next? +How was I going to live or to rear the new house of which I have made +mention? Hitherto I had aimed simply at reaching London. London had +paraded itself before my mind--though my mind should have known +better--not as a town of cold streets and dreary alleys and shops open +from seven to four with perhaps here and there a vacant place for an +apprentice; but as a gilded city of adventure and romance, in which a +young man of enterprise, whether he wanted to go abroad or to rise at +home, might be sure of finding his sword weighed, priced, and bought +up on the instant, and himself valued at his own standard. + +But London reached, the hoarding in Moorgate reached, and five o'clock +in the morning reached, somehow these visions faded rapidly. In the +cold reality left to me I felt myself astray. If I would stay at home, +who was going to employ me? To whom should I apply? What patron had I? +Or if I would go abroad, how was I to set about it? how find a vessel, +seeing that I might expect to be arrested the moment I showed my face +in daylight? + +Here all my experience failed me. I did not know what to do, though +the time had come for action, and I must do or starve. It had been all +very well when I was at Coton, to propose that I would go up to +London, and get across the water--such had been my dim notion--to the +Courtenays and Killigrews, who, with other refugees, Protestants for +the most part, were lying on the French coast, waiting for better +times. But now that I was in London, and as good as an outlaw myself, +I saw no means of going to them. I seemed farther from my goal than I +had been in Warwickshire. + +Thinking very blankly over this I began to munch the piece of bread +which I owed to the old dame at Tottenham; and had solemnly got +through half of it, when the sound of rapid footsteps--the footsteps +of women, I judged from the lightness of the tread--caused me to hold +my hand and listen. Whoever they were--and I wondered, for it was +still early, and I had heard no one pass since the watchman left +me--they came to a stand in front of my shelter, and one of them +spoke. Her words made me start; unmistakably the voice was a +gentlewoman's, such as I had not heard for almost a week. And at this +place and hour, on the raw borderland of day and night, a gentlewoman +was the last person I expected to light upon. Yet if the speaker were +not some one of station, Petronilla's lessons had been thrown away +upon me. + +The words were uttered in a low voice; but the planks in front of me +were thin, and the speaker was actually leaning against them. I caught +every accent of what seemed to be the answer to a question. "Yes, yes! +It is all right!" she said, a covert ring of impatience in her tone. +"Take breath a moment. I do not see him now." + +"Thank Heaven!" muttered another voice. As I had fancied, there were +two persons. The latter speaker's tone smacked equally of breeding +with the former's, but was rounder and fuller, and more masterful; and +she appeared to be out of breath. "Then perhaps we have thrown him off +the trail," she continued, after a short pause, in which she seemed to +have somewhat recovered herself. "I distrusted him from the first, +Anne--from the first. Yet, do you know, I never feared him as I did +Master Clarence; and as it was too much to hope that we should be rid +of both at once--they took good care of that--why, the attempt had to +be made while he was at home. But I always felt he was a spy." + +"Who? Master Clarence?" asked she who had spoken first. + +"Ay, he certainly. But I did not mean him, I meant Philip." + +"Well, I--I said at first, you remember, that it was a foolhardy +enterprise, mistress!" + +"Tut, tut, girl!" quoth the other tartly--this time the impatience lay +with her, and she took no pains to conceal it--"we are not beaten yet. +Come, look about! Cannot you remember where we are, nor which way the +river should be? If the dawn were come, we could tell." + +"But with the dawn----" + +"The streets would fill. True, and, Master Philip giving the alarm, we +should be detected before we had gone far. The more need, girl, to +lose no time. I have my breath again, and the child is asleep. Let us +venture one way or the other, and Heaven grant it be the right one!" + +"Let me see," the younger woman answered slowly, as if in doubt. "Did +we come by the church? No; we came the other way. Let us try this +turning, then." + +"Why, child, we came that way," was the decided answer. "What are you +thinking of? That would take us straight back into his arms, the +wretch! Come, come! you loiter," continued this, the more masculine +speaker, "and a minute may make all the difference between a prison +and freedom. If we can reach the Lion Wharf by seven--it is like to be +a dark morning and foggy--we may still escape before Master Philip +brings the watch upon us." + +They moved briskly away as she spoke, and her words were already +growing indistinct from distance, while I remained still, idly seeking +the clew to their talk and muttering over and over again the name +Clarence, which seemed familiar to me, when a cry of alarm, in which I +recognized one of their voices, cut short my reverie. I crawled with +all speed from my shelter, and stood up, being still in a line with +the boards, and not easily distinguishable. As she had said, it was a +dark morning; but the roofs of the houses--now high, now low--could be +plainly discerned against a gray, drifting sky wherein the first signs +of dawn were visible; and the blank outlines of the streets, which met +at this point, could be seen. Six or seven yards from me, in the +middle of the roadway, stood three dusky figures, of whom I judged the +nearer, from their attitudes, to be the two women. The farthest seemed +to be a man. + +I was astonished to see that he was standing cap in hand; nay, I was +disgusted as well, for I had crept out hot-fisted, expecting to be +called upon to defend the women. But, despite the cry I had heard, +they were talking to him quietly enough, as far as I could hear. And +in a minute or so I saw the taller woman give him something. + +He took it with a low bow, and appeared almost to sweep the dirt with +his bonnet. She waved her hand in dismissal, and he stood back still +uncovered. And--hey, presto! the women tripped swiftly away. + +By this time my curiosity was intensely excited, but for a moment I +thought it was doomed to disappointment. I thought that it was all +over. It was not, by any means. The man stood looking after them until +they reached the corner, and the moment they had passed it, he +followed. His stealthy manner of going, and his fashion of peering +after them, was enough for me. I guessed at once that he was dogging +them, following them unknown to them and against their will; and with +considerable elation I started after him, using the same precautions. +What was sauce for the geese was sauce for the gander! So we went, +two--one--one, slipping after one another through half a dozen dark +streets, tending generally southward. + +Following him in this way I seldom caught a glimpse of the women. The +man kept at a considerable distance behind them, and I had my +attention fixed on him. But once or twice, when, turning a corner, I +all but trod on his heels, I saw them; and presently an odd point +about them struck me. There was a white kerchief or something attached +apparently to the back of the one's cloak, which considerably assisted +my stealthy friend to keep them in view. It puzzled me. Was it a +signal to him? Was he really all the time acting in concert with them; +and was I throwing away my pains? Or was the white object which so +betrayed them merely the result of carelessness, and the lack of +foresight of women grappling with a condition of things to which they +were unaccustomed? Of course I could not decide this, the more as, at +that distance, I failed to distinguish what the white something was, +or even which of the two wore it. + +Presently I got a clew to our position, for we crossed Cheapside close +to Paul's Cross, which my childish memories of the town enabled me to +recognize, even by that light. Here my friend looked up and down, and +hung a minute on his heel before he followed the women, as if +expecting or looking for some one. It might be that he was trying to +make certain that the watch were not in sight. They were not, at any +rate. Probably they had gone home to bed, for the morning was growing. +And, after a momentary hesitation, he plunged into the narrow street +down which the women had flitted. + +He had only gone a few yards when I heard him cry out. The next +instant, almost running against him myself, I saw what had happened. +The women had craftily lain in wait for him in the little court into +which the street ran and had caught him as neatly as could be. When I +came upon them the taller woman was standing at bay with a passion +that was almost fury in her pose and gesture. Her face, from which the +hood of a coarse cloak had fallen back, was pale with anger; her gray +eyes flashed, her teeth glimmered. Seeing her thus, and seeing the +burden she carried under her cloak--which instinct told me was her +child--I thought of a tigress brought to bay. + +"You lying knave!" she hissed. "You Judas!" + +The man recoiled a couple of paces, and in recoiling nearly touched +me. + +"What would you?" she continued. "What do you want? What would you do? +You have been paid to go. Go, and leave us!" + +"I dare not," he muttered, keeping away from her as if he dreaded a +blow. She looked a woman who could deal a blow, a woman who could both +love and hate fiercely and openly--as proud and frank and haughty a +lady as I had ever seen in my life. "I dare not," he muttered +sullenly; "I have my orders." + +"Oh!" she cried, with scorn. "You have your orders, have you! The +murder is out. But from whom, sirrah? Whose orders are to supersede +mine? I would King Harry were alive, and I would have you whipped to +Tyburn. Speak, rogue; who bade you follow me?" + +He shook his head. + +She looked about her wildly, passionately, and I saw that she was at +her wits' end what to do, or how to escape him. But she was a woman. +When she next spoke there was a marvelous change in her. Her face had +grown soft, her voice low. "Philip," she said gently, "the purse was +light. I will give you more. I will give you treble the amount within +a few weeks, and I will thank you on my knees, and my husband shall be +such a friend to you as you have never dreamed of, if you will only go +home and be silent. Only that--or, better still, walk the streets an +hour, and then report that you lost sight of us. Think, man, think!" +she cried with energy--"the times may change. A little more, and Wyatt +had been master of London last year. Now the people are fuller of +discontent than ever, and these burnings and torturings, these +Spaniards in the streets--England will not endure them long. The times +will change. Let us go, and you will have a friend--when most you need +one." + +He shook his head sullenly. "I dare not do it," he said. And somehow I +got the idea that he was telling the truth, and that it was not the +man's stubborn nature only that withstood the bribe and the plea. He +spoke as if he were repeating a lesson and the master were present. + +When she saw that she could not move him, the anger, which I think +came more naturally to her, broke out afresh. "You will not, you +hound!" she cried. "Will neither threats nor promises move you?" + +"Neither," he answered doggedly; "I have my orders." + +So far, I had remained a quiet listener, standing in the mouth of the +lane which opened upon the court where they were. The women had taken +no notice of me; either because they did not see me, or because, +seeing me, they thought that I was a hanger-on of the man before them. +And he, having his back to me, and his eyes on them, could not see me. +It was a surprise to him--a very great surprise, I think--when I took +three steps forward, and gripped him by the scruff of his neck. + +"You have your orders, have you?" I muttered in his ear, as I shook +him to and fro, while the taller woman started back and the younger +uttered a cry of alarm at my sudden appearance. "Well, you will not +obey them. Do you hear? Your employer may go hang! You will do just +what these ladies please to ask of you." + +He struggled an instant; but he was an undersized man, and he could +not loosen the hold which I had secured at my leisure. Then I noticed +his hand going to his girdle in a suspicious way. "Stop that!" I said, +flashing before his eyes a short, broad blade, which had cut many a +deer's throat in Old Arden Forest. "You had better keep quiet, or it +will be the worse for you! Now, mistress," I continued, "you can +dispose of this little man as you please." + +"Who are you?" she said, after a pause; during which she had stared at +me in open astonishment. No doubt I was a wild-looking figure. + +"A friend," I replied. "Or one who would be such. I saw this fellow +follow you, and I followed him. For the last five minutes I have been +listening to your talk. He was not amenable to reason then, but I +think he will be now. What shall I do with him?" + +She smiled faintly, but did not answer at once, the coolness and +resolution with which she had faced him before failing her now, +possibly in sheer astonishment, or because my appearance at her side, +by removing the strain, sapped the strength. "I do not know," she said +at length, in a vague, puzzled tone. + +"Well," I answered, "you are going to the Lion Wharf, and----" + +"Oh, you fool!" she screamed out loud. "Oh, you fool!" she repeated +bitterly. "Now you have told him all." + +I stood confounded. My cheeks burned with shame, and her look of +contempt cut me like a knife. That the reproach was deserved I knew at +once, for the man in my grasp gave a start, which proved that the +information was not lost upon him. "Who told you?" the woman went on, +clutching the child jealously to her breast, as though she saw herself +menaced afresh. "Who told you about the Lion Wharf?" + +"Never mind," I answered gloomily. "I have made a mistake, but it is +easy to remedy it." And I took out my knife again. "Do you go on and +leave us." + +I hardly know whether I meant my threat or no. But my prisoner had no +doubts. He shrieked out--a wild cry of fear which rang round the empty +court--and by a rapid blow, despair giving him courage, he dashed the +hunting-knife from my hand. This done he first flung himself on me, +then tried by a sudden jerk to free himself. In a moment we were down +on the stones, and tumbling over one another in the dirt, while he +struggled to reach his knife, which was still in his girdle, and I +strove to prevent him. The fight was sharp, but it lasted barely a +minute. When the first effort of his despair was spent, I came +uppermost, and he was but a child in my hands. Presently, with my knee +on his chest, I looked up. The women were still there, the younger +clinging to the other. + +"Go! go!" I cried impatiently. Each second I expected the court to be +invaded, for the man had screamed more than once. + +But they hesitated. I had been forced to hurt him a little, and he was +moaning piteously. "Who are you?" the elder woman asked--she who had +spoken all through. + +"Nay, never mind that!" I answered. "Do you go! Go, while you can. You +know the way to the Wharf." + +"Yes," she answered. "But I cannot go and leave him at your mercy. +Remember he is a man, and has----" + +"He is a treacherous scoundrel," I answered, giving his throat a +squeeze. "But he shall have one more chance. Listen, sirrah!" I +continued to the man, "and stop that noise or I will knock out your +teeth with my dagger-hilt. Listen and be silent. I shall go with these +ladies, and I promise you this: If they are stopped or hindered on +their way, or if evil happen to them at that wharf, whose name you had +better forget, it will be the worse for you. Do you hear? You will +suffer for it, though there be a dozen guards about you! Mind you," I +added, "I have nothing to lose myself, for I am desperate already." + +He vowed--the poor craven--with his stuttering tongue, that he would +be true, and vowed it again and again. But I saw that his eyes did not +meet mine. They glanced instead at the knife-blade, and I knew, even +while I pretended to trust him, that he would betray us. My real hope +lay in his fears, and in this, that as the fugitives knew the way to +the wharf, and it could not now be far distant, we might reach it, +and go on board some vessel--I had gathered they were flying the +country--before this wretch could recover himself and get together a +force to stop us. That was my real hope, and in that hope only I left +him. + +We went as fast as the women could walk. I did not trouble them with +questions; indeed, I had myself no more leisure than enabled me to +notice their general appearance, which was that of comfortable +tradesmen's womenfolk. Their cloaks and hoods were plainly fashioned, +and of coarse stuff, their shoes were thick, and no jewel or scrap of +lace, peeping out, betrayed them. Yet there was something in their +carriage which could not be hidden, something which, to my eye, told +tales; so that minute by minute I became more sure that this was +really an adventure worth pursuing, and that London had kept a reward +in store for me besides its cold stones and inhospitable streets. + +The city was beginning to rouse itself. As we flitted through the +lanes and alleys which lie between Cheapside and the river, we met +many people, chiefly of the lower classes, on their way to work. Yet +in spite of this, we had no need to fear observation, for, though the +morning was fully come, with the light had arrived such a thick, +choking, yellow fog as I, being for the most part country-bred, had +never experienced. It was so dense and blinding that we had a +difficulty in keeping together, and even hand in hand could scarcely +see one another. In my wonder how my companions found their way, I +presently failed to notice their condition, and only remarked the +distress and exhaustion which one of them was suffering, when she +began, notwithstanding all her efforts, to lag behind. Then I sprang +forward, blaming myself much. "Forgive me," I said. "You are tired, +and no wonder. Let me carry the child, mistress." + +Exhausted as she was, she drew away from me jealously. + +"No," she panted. "We are nearly there. I am better now." And she +strained the child closer to her, as though she feared I might take it +from her by force. + +"Well, if you will not trust me," I answered, "let your friend carry +it for a time. I can see you are tired out." + +Through the mist she bent forward, and peered into my face, her eyes +scarcely a foot from mine. The scrutiny seemed to satisfy her. She +drew a long breath and held out her burden. "No," she said; "you shall +take him. I will trust you." + +I took the little wrapped-up thing as gently as I could. "You shall +not repent it, if I can help it, Mistress----" + +"Bertram," she said. + +"Mistress Bertram," I repeated. "Now let us get on and lose no time." + +A walk of a hundred yards or so brought us clear of the houses, and +revealed before us, in place of all else, a yellow curtain of fog. +Below this, at our feet, yet apparently a long way from us, was a +strange, pale line of shimmering light, which they told me was the +water. At first I could hardly believe this. But, pausing a moment +while my companions whispered together, dull creakings and groanings +and uncouth shouts and cries, and at last the regular beat of oars, +came to my ears out of the bank of vapor, and convinced me that we +really had the river before us. + +Mistress Bertram turned to me abruptly. "Listen," she said, "and +decide for yourself, my friend. We are close to the wharf now, and in +a few minutes shall know our fate. It is possible that we may be +intercepted at this point, and if that happen, it will be bad for me +and worse for any one aiding me. You have done us gallant service, but +you are young; and I am loath to drag you into perils which do not +belong to you. Take my advice, then, and leave us now. I would I could +reward you," she added hastily, "but that knave has my purse." + +I put the child gently back into her arms. "Good-by," she said, with +more feeling. "We thank you. Some day I may return to England, and +have ample power----" + +"Not so fast," I answered stiffly. "Did you think it possible, +mistress, that I would desert you now? I gave you back the child only +because it might hamper me, and will be safer with you. Come, let us +on at once to the wharf." + +"You mean it?" she said. + +"Of a certainty!" I answered, settling my cap on my head with perhaps +a boyish touch of the braggart. + +At any rate, she did not take me at once at my word; and her thought +for me touched me the more because I judged her--I know not exactly +why--to be a woman not over prone to think of others. "Do not be +reckless," she said slowly, her eyes intently fixed on mine. "I should +be sorry to bring evil upon you. You are but a boy." + +"And yet," I answered, smiling, "there is as good as a price upon my +head already. I should be reckless if I stayed here. If you will take +me with you, let us go. We have loitered too long already." + +She turned then, asking no questions; but she looked at me from time +to time in a puzzled way, as though she thought she ought to know +me--as though I reminded her of some one. Paying little heed to this +then, I hurried her and her companion down to the water, traversing a +stretch of foreshore strewn with piles of wood and stacks of barrels +and old rotting boats, between which the mud lay deep. Fortunately it +was high tide, and so we had not far to go. In a minute or two I +distinguished the hull of a ship looming large through the fog; and a +few more steps placed us safely on a floating raft, on the far side of +which the vessel lay moored. + +There was only one man to be seen lounging on the raft, and the +neighborhood was quiet. My spirits rose as I looked round. "Is this +the _Whelp?_" the tall lady asked. I had not heard the other open her +mouth since the encounter in the court. + +"Yes, it is the _Whelp_, madam," the man answered, saluting her and +speaking formally, and with a foreign accent. "You are the lady who is +expected?" + +"I am," she answered, with authority. "Will you tell the captain that +I desire to sail immediately, without a moment's delay? Do you +understand?" + +"Well, the tide is going out," quoth the sailor, dubiously, looking +steadily into the fog, which hid the river. "It has just turned, it is +true. But as to sailing----" + +She cut him short. "Go, go! man. Tell your captain what I say. And let +down a ladder for us to get on board." + +He caught a rope which hung over the side, and, swinging himself up, +disappeared. We stood below, listening to the weird sounds which came +off the water, the creaking and flapping of masts and canvas, the whir +of wings and shrieks of unseen gulls, the distant hail of boatmen. A +bell in the city solemnly tolled eight. The younger woman shivered. +The elder's foot tapped impatiently on the planks. Shut in by the +yellow walls of fog, I experienced a strange sense of solitude; it was +as if we three were alone in the world--we three who had come together +so strangely. + + + + + CHAPTER VI. + + MASTER CLARENCE. + + +We had stood thus for a few moments when a harsh voice, hailing us +from above, put an end to our several thoughts and forebodings. We +looked up and I saw half a dozen night-capped heads thrust over the +bulwarks. A rope ladder came hurtling down at our feet, and a man, +nimbly descending, held it tight at the bottom. "Now, madame!" he said +briskly. They all, I noticed, had the same foreign accent, yet all +spoke English; a singularity I did not understand, until I learned +later that the boat was the _Lions Whelp_, trading between London and +Calais, and manned from the latter place. + +Mistress Bertram ascended quickly and steadily, holding the baby in +her arms. The other made some demur, lingering at the foot of the +ladder and looking up as if afraid, until her companion chid her +sharply. Then she too went up, but as she passed me--I was holding one +side of the ladder steady--she shot at me from under her hood a look +which disturbed me strangely. + +It was the first time I had seen her face, and it was such a face as a +man rarely forgets. Not because of its beauty; rather because it was a +speaking face, a strange and expressive one, which the dark waving +hair, swelling in thick clusters upon either temple, seemed to +accentuate. The features were regular, but, the full red lips +excepted, rather thin than shapely. The nose, too, was prominent. But +the eyes! The eyes seemed to glorify the dark brilliant thinness of +the face, and to print it upon the memory. They were dark flashing +eyes, and their smile seemed to me perpetually to challenge, to allure +and repulse, and even to goad. Sometimes they were gay, more rarely +sad, sometimes soft, and again hard as steel. They changed in a moment +as one or another approached her. But always at their gayest, there +was a suspicion of weariness and fatigue in their depths. Or so I +thought later. + +Something of this flashed through my mind as I followed her up the +side. But once on board I glanced round, forgetting her in the novelty +of my position. The _Whelp_ was decked fore and aft only, the +blackness of the hold gaping amidships, spanned by a narrow gangway, +which served to connect the two decks. We found ourselves in the +forepart, amid coils of rope and windlasses and water-casks; +surrounded by half a dozen wild-looking sailors wearing blue knitted +frocks and carrying sheath-knives at their girdles. + +The foremost and biggest of these seemed to be the captain, although, +so far as outward appearances went, the only difference between him +and his crew lay in a marlin-spike which he wore slung to a thong +beside his knife. When I reached the deck he was telling a long story +to Mistress Bertram, and telling it very slowly. But the drift of it I +soon gathered. While the fog lasted he could not put to sea. + +"Nonsense!" cried my masterful companion, chafing at his slowness of +speech. "Why not? Would it be dangerous?" + +"Well, madam, it would be dangerous," he answered, more slowly than +ever. "Yes, it would be dangerous. And to put to sea in a fog? That is +not seamanship. And your baggage has not arrived." + +"Never mind my baggage!" she answered imperiously. "I have made other +arrangements for it. Two or three things I know came on board last +night. I want to start--to start at once, do you hear?" + +The captain shook his head, and said sluggishly that it was +impossible. Spitting on the deck he ground his heel leisurely round in +a knothole. "Impossible," he repeated; "it would not be seamanship to +start in a fog. When the fog lifts we will go. 'Twill be all the same +to-morrow. We shall lie at Leigh to-night, whether we go now or go +when the fog lifts." + +"At Leigh?" + +"That is it, madam." + +"And when will you go from Leigh?" she cried indignantly. + +"Daybreak to-morrow," he answered. "You leave it to me, mistress," he +continued, in a tone of rough patronage, "and you will see your good +man before you expect it." + +"But, man!" she exclaimed, trembling with impotent rage. "Did not +Master Bertram engage you to bring me across whenever I might be +ready? Ay, and pay you handsomely for it? Did he not, sirrah?" + +"To be sure, to be sure!" replied the giant unmoved. "Using +seamanship, and not going to sea in a fog, if it please you." + +"It does not please me!" she retorted. "And why stay at Leigh?" + +He looked up at the rigging, then down at the deck. He set his heel in +the knothole, and ground it round again. Then he looked at his +questioner with a broad smile. "Well, mistress, for a very good +reason. It is there your good man is waiting for you. Only," added +this careful keeper of a secret, "he bade me not tell any one." + +She uttered a low cry, which might have been an echo of her baby's +cooing, and convulsively clasped the child more tightly to her. "He is +at Leigh!" she murmured, flushing and trembling, another woman +altogether. Even her voice was wonderfully changed. "He is really at +Leigh, you say?" + +"To be sure!" replied the captain, with a portentous wink and a +mysterious roll of the head. "He is there safe enough! Safe enough, +you may bet your handsome face to a rushlight. And we will be there +to-night." + +She started up with a wild gesture. For a moment she had sat down on a +cask standing beside her, and forgotten our peril, and the probability +that we might never see Leigh at all. Now, I have said, she started +up. "No, no!" she cried, struggling for breath and utterance. "Oh, no! +no! Let us go at once. We must start at once!" Her voice was +hysterical in its sudden anxiety and terror, as the consciousness of +our position rolled back upon her. "Captain! listen, listen!" she +pleaded. "Let us start now, and my husband will give you double. I +will promise you double whatever he said if you will chance the fog." + +I think all who heard her were moved, save the captain only. He rubbed +his head and grinned. Slow and heavy, he saw nothing in her prayer +save the freak of a woman wild to get to her man. He did not weigh her +promise at a groat; she was but a woman. And being a foreigner, he did +not perceive a certain air of breeding which might have influenced a +native. He was one of those men against whose stupidity Father Carey +used to say the gods fight in vain. When he answered good-naturedly, +"No, no, mistress, it is impossible. It would not be seamanship," I +felt that we might as well try to stop the ebbing tide as move him +from his position. + +The feeling was a maddening one. The special peril which menaced my +companions I did not know; but I knew they feared pursuit, and I had +every reason to fear it for myself. Yet at any moment, out of the +fog which encircled us so closely that we could barely see the raft +below--and the shore not at all--might come the tramp of hurrying feet +and the stern hail of the law. It was maddening to think of this, and +to know that we had only to cast off a rope or two in order to escape; +and to know also that we were absolutely helpless. + +I expected that Mistress Bertram, brave as she had shown herself, +would burst into a passion of rage or tears. But apparently she had +one hope left. She looked at me. + +I tried to think--to think hard. Alas, I seemed only able to listen. +An hour had gone by since we parted from that rascal in the court, and +we might expect him to appear at any moment, vengeful and exultant, +with a posse at his back. Yet I tried hard to think; and the fog +presently suggested a possible course. "Look here," I said suddenly, +speaking for the first time, "if you do not start until the fog lifts, +captain, we may as well breakfast ashore, and return presently." + +"That is as you please," he answered indifferently. + +"What do you think?" I said, turning to my companions with as much +carelessness as I could command. "Had we not better do that?" + +Mistress Bertram did not understand, but in her despair she obeyed the +motion of my hand mechanically, and walked to the side. The younger +woman followed more slowly, so that I had to speak to her with some +curtness, bidding her make haste; for I was in a fever until we were +clear of the _Whelp_ and the Lion Wharf. It had struck me that, if the +ship were not to leave at once, we were nowhere in so much danger as +on board. At large in the fog we might escape detection for a time. +Our pursuers might as well look for a needle in a haystack as seek us +through it when once we were clear of the wharf. And this was not the +end of my idea. But for the present it was enough. Therefore I took up +Mistress Anne very short. "Come!" I said, "be quick! Let me help you." + +She obeyed, and I was ashamed of my impatience when at the foot of the +ladder she thanked me prettily. It was almost with good cheer in my +voice and a rebound of spirits that I explained, as I hurried my +companions across the raft, what my plan was. + +The moment we were ashore I felt safer. The fog swallowed us up quick, +as the Bible says. The very hull of the ship vanished from sight +before we had gone half a dozen paces. I had never seen a London fog +before, and to me it seemed portentous and providential; a marvel as +great as the crimson hail which fell in the London gardens to mark her +Majesty's accession. + +Yet after all, without my happy thought, the fog would have availed us +little. We had scarcely gone a score of yards before the cautious +tread of several people hastening down the strand toward the wharf +struck my ear. They were proceeding in silence, and we might not have +noticed their approach if the foremost had not by chance tripped and +fallen; whereupon one laughed and another swore. With a warning hand I +grasped my companions' arms, and hurried them forward some paces until +I felt sure that our figures could not be seen through the mist. Then +I halted, and we stood listening, gazing into one another's strained +eyes, while the steps came nearer and nearer, crossed our track and +then with a noisy rush thundered on the wooden raft. My ear caught the +jingle of harness and the clank of weapons. + +"It is the watch," I muttered. "Come, and make no noise. What I want +is a little this way. I fancy I saw it as we passed down to the +wharf." + +They turned with me, but we had not taken many steps before Mistress +Anne, who was walking on my left side, stumbled over something. She +tried to save herself, but failed and fell heavily, uttering as she +did so a loud cry. I sprang to her assistance, and even before I +raised her I laid my hand lightly on her mouth. "Hush!" I said softly, +"for safety's sake, make no noise. What is the matter?" + +"Oh!" she moaned, making no effort to rise, "my ankle! my ankle! I am +sure I have broken it." + +I muttered my dismay, while Mistress Bertram, stooping anxiously, +examined the injured limb. "Can you stand?" she asked. + +But it was no time for questioning, and I put her aside. The troop +which had passed were within easy hearing, and if there should be one +among them familiar with the girl's voice, we might be pounced upon, +fog or no fog. I felt that it was no time for ceremony, and picked +Mistress Anne up in my arms, whispering to the elder woman: "Go on +ahead! I think I see the boat. It is straight before you." + +Luckily I was right, it was the boat; and so far well. But at the +moment I spoke I heard a sudden outcry behind us, and knew the hunt +was up. I plunged forward with my burden, recklessly and blindly, +through mud and over obstacles. The wherry for which I was making was +moored in the water a few feet from the edge. I had remarked it idly +and without purpose as we came down to the wharf, and had even noticed +that the oars were lying in it. Now, if we could reach it and start +down the river for Leigh, we might by possibility gain that place, and +meet Mistress Bertram's husband. + +At any late, nothing in the world seemed so desirable to me at the +moment as the shelter of that boat. I plunged through the mud, and +waded desperately through the water to it, Mistress Bertram scarce a +whit behind me. I reached it, but reached it only as the foremost +pursuer caught sight of us. I heard his shout of triumph, and somehow +I bundled my burden into the boat--I remember that she clung about my +neck in fear, and I had to loosen her hands roughly. But I did loosen +them--in time. With one stroke of my hunting-knife, I severed the +rope, and pushing off the boat with all my strength, sprang into it as +it floated away--and was in time. But one second's delay would have +undone us. Two men were already in the water up to their knees, and +their very breath was hot on my face as we swung out into the stream. + +Fortunately, I had had experience of boats on the Avon, at Bidford and +Stratford, and could pull a good oar. For a moment indeed the wherry +rolled and dipped as I snatched up the sculls; but I quickly got her +in hand, and, bending to my work, sent her spinning through the mist, +every stroke I pulled increasing the distance between us and our now +unseen foes. Happily we were below London Bridge, and had not that +dangerous passage to make. The river, too, was nearly clear of craft, +and though once and again in the Pool a huge hulk loomed suddenly +across our bows, and then faded behind us into the mist like some +monstrous phantom, and so told of a danger narrowly escaped, I thought +it best to run all risks, and go ahead as long as the tide should ebb. + +It was strange how suddenly we had passed from storm into calm. +Mistress Anne had bound her ankle with a handkerchief, and bravely +made light of the hurt; and now the two women sat crouching in the +stern watching me, their heads together, their faces pale. The mist +had closed round us, and we were alone again, gliding over the bosom +of the great river that runs down to the sea. I was oddly struck by +the strange current of life which for a week had tossed me from one +adventure to another, only to bring me into contact at length with +these two, and sweep me into the unknown whirlpool of their fortunes. + +Who were they? A merchant's wife and her sister flying from Bishop +Bonner's inquisition? I thought it likely. Their cloaks and hoods +indeed, and all that I could see of their clothes, fell below such a +condition; but probably they were worn as a disguise. Their speech +rose as much above it, but I knew that of late many merchant's wives +had become scholars, and might pass in noblemen's houses; even as in +those days when London waxed fat, and set up and threw down +governments, every alderman had come to ride in mail. + +No doubt the women, watching me in anxious silence, were as curious +about me. I still bore the stains of country travel. I was unwashen, +unkempt, my doublet was torn, the cloak I had cast at my feet was the +very wreck of a cloak. Yet I read no distrust in their looks. The +elder's brave eyes seemed ever thanking me. I never saw her lips move +silently that they did not shape "Well done!" And though I caught +Mistress Anne scanning me once or twice with an expression I could ill +interpret, a smile took its place the moment her gaze met mine. + +We had passed, but were still in sight of, Greenwich Palace--as they +told me--when the mist rose suddenly like a curtain rolled away, and +the cold, bright February sun, shining out, disclosed the sparkling +river with the green hills rising on our right hand. Here and there on +its surface a small boat such as our own moved to and fro, and in the +distant Pool from which we had come rose a little forest of masts. I +hung on the oars a moment, and my eyes were drawn to a two-masted +vessel which, nearly half a mile below us, was drifting down, gently +heeling over with the current as the crew got up the sails. "I wonder +whither she is bound," I said thoughtfully, "and whether they would +take us on board by any chance." + +Mistress Bertram shook her head. "I have no money," she answered +sadly. "I fear we must go on to Leigh, if it be any way possible. You +are tired, and no wonder. But what is it?" with a sudden change of +voice. "What is the matter?" + +I had flashed out the oars with a single touch, and begun to pull as +fast as I could down the stream. No doubt my face, too, proclaimed my +discovery and awoke her fears. "Look behind!" I muttered between my +set teeth. + +She turned, and on the instant uttered a low cry. A wherry like our +own, but even lighter--in my first glance up the river I had not +noticed it--had stolen nearer to us, and yet nearer, and now throwing +aside disguise was in hot pursuit of us. There were three men on +board, two rowing and one steering. When they saw that we had +discovered them they hailed us in a loud voice, and I heard the +steersman's feet rattle on the boards, as he cried to his men to give +way, and stamped in very eagerness. My only reply was to take a longer +stroke, and, pulling hard, to sweep away from them. + +But presently my first strength died away, and the work began to tell +upon me, and little by little they overhauled us. Not that I gave up +at once for that. They were still some sixty yards behind, and for a +few minutes at any rate I might put off capture. In that time +something might happen. At the worst they were only three to one, and +their boat looked light and cranky and easy to upset. + +So I pulled on, savagely straining at the oars. But my chest heaved +and my arms ached more and more with each stroke. The banks slid by +us; we turned one bend, then another, though I saw nothing of them. I +saw only the pursuing boat, on which my eyes were fixed, heard only +the measured rattle of the oars in the rowlocks. A minute, two +minutes, three minutes passed. They had not gained on us, but the +water was beginning to waver before my eyes, their boat seemed +floating in the air, there was a pulsation in my ears louder than that +of the oars, I struggled and yet I flagged. My knees trembled. Their +boat shot nearer now, nearer and nearer, so that I could read the +smile of triumph on the steersman's dark face and hear his cry of +exultation. Nearer! and then with a cry I dropped the oars. + +"Quick!" I panted to my companions. "Change places with me! So!" +Trembling and out of breath as I was, I crawled between the women and +gained the stern sheets of the boat. As I passed Mistress Bertram she +clutched my arm. Her eyes, as they met mine, flashed fire, her lips +were white. "The man steering!" she hissed between her teeth. "Leave +the others. He is Clarence, and I fear him!" + +I nodded; but still, as the hostile boat bore swiftly down upon us, I +cast a glance round to see if there were any help at hand. I saw no +sign of any. I saw only the pale blue sky overhead, and the stream +flowing swiftly under the boat. I drew my sword. The case was one +rather for despair than courage. The women were in my charge, and if I +did not acquit myself like a man now, when should I do so? Bah! it +would soon be over. + +There was an instant's confusion in the other boat, as the crew ceased +rowing, and, seeing my attitude and not liking it, changed their +seats. To my joy the man, who had hitherto been steering, flung a +curse at the others and came forward to bear the brunt of the +encounter. He was a tall, sinewy man, past middle age, with a +clean-shaven face, a dark complexion, and cruel eyes. So he was Master +Clarence! Well, he had the air of a swordsman and a soldier. I +trembled for the women. + +"Surrender, you fool!" he cried to me harshly. "In the Queen's +name--do you hear? What do you in this company?" + +I answered nothing, for I was out of breath. But softly, my eyes on +his, I drew out with my left hand my hunting-knife. If I could beat +aside his sword, I would spring upon him and drive the knife home with +that hand. So, standing erect in bow and stern we faced one another, +the man and the boy, the flush of rage and exertion on my cheek, a +dark shade on his. And silently the boats drew together. + +Thought is quick, quicker than anything else in the world I suppose, +for in some drawn-out second before the boats came together I had time +to wonder where I had seen his face before, and to rack my memory. I +knew no Master Clarence, yet I had seen this man somewhere. Another +second, and away with thought! He was crouching for a spring. I drew +back a little, then lunged--lunged with heart and hand. Our swords +crossed and whistled--just crossed--and even as I saw his eyes gleam +behind his point, the shock of the two boats coming together flung us +both backward and apart. A moment we reeled, staggering and throwing +out wild hands. I strove hard to recover myself, nay, I almost did so; +then I caught my foot in Mistress Anne's cloak, which she had left in +her place, and fell heavily back into the boat. + +I was up in a moment--on my knees at least--and unhurt. But another +was before me. As I stooped half-risen, I saw one moment a dark shadow +above me, and the next a sheet of flame shone before my eyes, and a +tremendous shock swept all away. I fell senseless into the bottom of +the boat, knowing nothing of what had happened to me. + + + + + CHAPTER VII. + + ON BOARD THE "FRAMLINGHAM." + + +I am told by people who have been seasick that the sound of the waves +beating against the hull comes in time to be an intolerable torment. +But bad as this may be, it can be nothing in comparison with the pains +I suffered from the same cause, as I recovered my senses. My brain +seemed to be a cavern into which each moment, with a rhythmical +regularity which added the pangs of anticipation to those of reality, +the sea rushed, booming and thundering, jarring every nerve and +straining the walls to bursting, and making each moment of +consciousness a vivid agony. And this lasted long; how long I cannot +say. But it had subsided somewhat when I first opened my eyes, and +dully, not daring to move my head, looked up. + +I was lying on my back. About a foot from my eyes were rough beams of +wood disclosed by a smoky yellow light, which flickered on the +knotholes and rude joists. The light swayed to and fro regularly; and +this adding to my pain, I closed my eyes with a moan. Then some one +came to me, and I heard voices which sounded a long way off, and +promptly fell again into a deep sleep, troubled still, but less +painfully, by the same rhythmical shocks, the same dull crashings in +my brain. + +When I awoke again I had sense to know what caused this, and where I +was--in a berth on board ship. The noise which had so troubled me was +that of the waves beating against her forefoot. The beams so close to +my face formed the deck, the smoky light came from the ship's lantern +swinging on a hook. I tried to turn. Some one came again, and with +gentle hands arranged my pillow and presently began to feed me with a +spoon. When I had swallowed a few mouthfuls I gained strength to turn. + +Who was this feeding me? The light was at her back and dazzled me. +For a short while I took her for Petronilla, my thoughts going back at +one bound to Coton, and skipping all that had happened since I left +home. But as I grew stronger I grew clearer, and recalling bit by bit +what had happened in the boat, I recognized Mistress Anne. I tried to +murmur thanks, but she laid a cool finger on my lips and shook her +head, smiling on me. "You must not talk," she murmured, "you are +getting well. Now go to sleep again." + +I shut my eyes at once as a child might. Another interval of +unconsciousness, painless this time, followed, and again I awoke. I +was lying on my side now, and without moving could see the whole of +the tiny cabin. The lantern still hung and smoked. But the light was +steady now, and I heard no splashing without, nor the dull groaning +and creaking of the timbers within. There reigned a quiet which seemed +bliss to me; and I lay wrapped in it, my thoughts growing clearer and +clearer each moment. + +On a sea-chest at the farther end of the cabin were sitting two people +engaged in talk. The one, a woman, I recognized immediately. The gray +eyes full of command, the handsome features, the reddish-brown hair +and gracious figure left me in no doubt, even for a moment, that I +looked on Mistress Bertram. The sharer of her seat was a tall, thin +man with a thoughtful face and dreamy, rather melancholy eyes. One of +her hands rested on his knee, and her lips as she talked were close to +his ear. A little aside, sitting on the lowest step of the ladder +which led to the deck, her head leaning against the timbers, and a +cloak about her, was Mistress Anne. + +I tried to speak, and after more than one effort found my voice. +"Where am I?" I whispered. My head ached sadly, and I fancied, though +I was too languid to raise my hand to it, that it was bandaged. My +mind was so far clear that I remembered Master Clarence and his +pursuit and the fight in the boats, and knew that we ought to be on +our way to prison. Who, then, was the mild, comely gentleman whose +length of limb made the cabin seem smaller than it was? Not a jailer, +surely? Yet who else? + +I could compass no more than a whisper, but faint as my voice was they +all heard me, and looked up. "Anne!" the elder lady cried sharply, +seeming by her tone to direct the other to attend to me. Yet was she +herself the first to rise, and come and lay her hand on my brow. "Ah! +the fever is gone!" she said, speaking apparently to the gentleman, +who kept his seat. "His head is quite cool. He will do well now, I am +sure. Do you know me?" she continued, leaning over me. + +I looked up into her eyes, and read only kindness. "Yes," I muttered. +But the effort of looking was so painful that I closed my eyes again +with a sigh. Nevertheless, my memory of the events which had gone +before my illness grew clearer, and I fumbled feebly for something +which should have been at my side. "Where is--where is my sword?" I +made shift to whisper. + +She laughed. "Show it to him, Anne," she said; "what a never-die it +is! There, Master Knight Errant, we did not forget to bring it off the +field, you see!" + +"But how," I murmured, "how did you escape?" I saw that there was no +question of a prison. Her laugh was gay, her voice full of content. + +"That is a long story," she answered kindly. "Are you well enough to +hear it? You think you are? Then take some of this first. You remember +that knave Philip striking you on the head with an oar as you got up? +No? Well, it was a cowardly stroke, but it stood him in little stead, +for we had drifted, in the excitement of the race, under the stern of +the ship which you remember seeing a little before. There were English +seamen on her; and when they saw three men in the act of boarding two +defenseless women, they stepped in, and threatened to send Clarence +and his crew to the bottom unless they sheered off." + +"Ha!" I murmured. "Good!" + +"And so we escaped. I prayed the captain to take us on board his ship, +the _Framlingham_, and he did so. More, putting into Leigh on his way +to the Nore, he took off my husband. There he stands, and when you are +better he shall thank you." + +"Nay, he will thank you now," said the tall man, rising and stepping +to my berth with his head bent. He could not stand upright, so low was +the deck. "But for you," he continued, his earnestness showing in his +voice and eyes--the latter were almost too tender for a man's--"my +wife would be now lying in prison, her life in jeopardy, and her +property as good as gone. She has told me how bravely you rescued her +from that cur in Cheapside, and how your presence of mind baffled the +watch at the riverside. It is well, young gentleman. It is very well. +But these things call for other returns than words. When it lies in +her power my wife will make them; if not to-day, to-morrow, and if not +to-morrow, the day after." + +I was very weak, and his words brought the tears to my eyes. "She has +saved my life already," I murmured. + +"You foolish boy!" she cried, smiling down on me, her hand on her +husband's shoulder. "You got your head broken in my defense. It was a +great thing, was it not, that I did not leave you to die in the boat? +There, make haste and get well. You have talked enough now. Go to +sleep, or we shall have the fever back again." + +"One thing first," I pleaded. "Tell me whither we are going." + +"In a few hours we shall be at Dort in Holland," she answered. "But be +content. We will take care of you, and send you back if you will, or +you shall still come with us; as you please. Be content. Go to sleep +now and get strong. Presently, perhaps, we shall have need of your +help again." + +They went and sat down then on their former seat and talked in +whispers, while Mistress Anne shook up my pillows, and laid a fresh +cool bandage on my head. I was too weak to speak my gratitude, but I +tried to look it and so fell asleep again, her hand in mine, and the +wondrous smile of those lustrous eyes the last impression of which I +was conscious. + + +A long dreamless sleep followed. When I awoke once more the light +still hung steady, but the peacefulness of night was gone. We lay in +the midst of turmoil. The scampering of feet over the deck above me, +the creaking of the windlass, the bumping and clattering of barrels +hoisted in or hoisted out, the harsh sound of voices raised in a +foreign tongue and in queer keys, sufficed as I grew wide-awake to +tell me we were in port. + +But the cabin was empty, and I lay for some time gazing at its dreary +interior, and wondering what was to become of me. Presently an uneasy +fear crept into my mind. What if my companions had deserted me? Alone, +ill, and penniless in a foreign land, what should I do? This fear in +my sick state was so terrible that I struggled to get up, and with +reeling brain and nerveless hands did get out of my berth. But this +feat accomplished I found that I could not stand. Everything swam +before my eyes. I could not take a single step, but remained, clinging +helplessly to the edge of my berth, despair at my heart. I tried to +call out, but my voice rose little above a whisper, and the banging +and shrieking, the babel without went on endlessly. Oh, it was cruel! +cruel! They had left me! + +I think my senses were leaving me too, when I felt an arm about my +waist, and found Mistress Anne by my side guiding me to the chest. I +sat down on it, the certainty of my helplessness and the sudden relief +of her presence bringing the tears to my eyes. She fanned me, and gave +me some restorative, chiding me the while for getting out of my berth. + +"I thought that you had gone and left me," I muttered. I was as weak +as a child. + +She said cheerily: "Did you leave us when we were in trouble? Of +course you did not. There, take some more of this. After all, it is +well you are up, for in a short time we must move you to the other +boat." + +"The other boat?" + +"Yes, we are at Dort, you know. And we are going by the Waal, a branch +of the Rhine, to Arnheim. But the boat is here, close to this one, +and, with help, I think you will be able to walk to it." + +"I am sure I shall if you will give me your arm," I answered +gratefully. + +"But you will not think again," she replied, "that we have deserted +you?" + +"No," I said. "I will trust you always." + +I wondered why a shadow crossed her face at that. But I had no time to +do more than wonder, for Master Bertram, coming down, brought our +sitting to an end. She bustled about to wrap me up, and somehow, +partly walking, partly carried, I was got on deck. There I sat down on +a bale to recover myself, and felt at once much the better for the +fresh, keen air, the clear sky and wintry sunshine which welcomed me +to a foreign land. + +On the outer side of the vessel stretched a wide expanse of turbid +water, five or six times as wide as the Thames at London, and +foam-flecked here and there by the up-running tide. On the other side +was a wide and spacious quay, paved neatly with round stones, and +piled here and there with merchandise; but possessing, by virtue of +the lines of leafless elms which bordered it, a quaint air of +rusticity in the midst of bustle. The sober bearing of the sturdy +landsmen, going quietly about their business, accorded well with the +substantial comfort of the rows of tall, steep-roofed houses I saw +beyond the quay, and seemed only made more homely by the occasional +swagger and uncouth cry of some half-barbarous seaman, wandering +aimlessly about. Above the town rose the heavy square tower of a +church, a notable landmark where all around, land and water, lay so +low, where the horizon seemed so far, and the sky so wide and breezy. + +"So you have made up your mind to come with us," said Master Bertram, +returning to my side--he had left me to make some arrangements. "You +understand that if you would prefer to go home I can secure your +tendance here by good, kindly people, and provide for your passage +back when you feel strong enough to cross. You understand that? And +that the choice is entirely your own? So which will you do?" + +I changed color and felt I did. I shrunk, as being well and strong I +should not have shrunk, from losing sight of those three faces which I +had known for so short a time, yet which alone stood between myself +and loneliness. "I would rather come with you," I stammered. "But I +shall be a great burden to you now, I fear." + +"It is not that," he replied, with hearty assurance in his voice. "A +week's rest and quiet will restore you to strength, and then the +burden will be on the other shoulder. It is for your own sake I give +you the choice, because our future is for the time uncertain. Very +uncertain," he repeated, his brow clouding over; "and to become our +companion may expose you to fresh dangers. We are refugees from +England; that you probably guess. Our plan was to go to France, where +are many of our friends, and where we could live safely until better +times. You know how that plan was frustrated. Here the Spaniards are +masters--Prince Philip's people; and if we are recognized, we shall be +arrested and sent back to England. Still, my wife and I must make the +best of it. The hue and cry will not follow us for some days, and +there is still a degree of independence in the cities of Holland which +may, since I have friends here, protect us for a time. Now you know +something of our position, my friend. You can make your choice with +your eyes open. Either way we shall not forget you." + +"I will go on with you, if you please," I answered at once. "I, too, +cannot go home." And as I said this, Mistress Bertram also came up, +and I took her hand in mine--which looked, by the way, so strangely +thin I scarcely recognized it--and kissed it. "I will come with you, +madam, if you will let me," I said. + +"Good!" she replied, her eyes sparkling. "I said you would! I do not +mind telling you now that I am glad of it. And if ever we return to +England, as God grant we may and soon, you shall not regret your +decision. Shall he, Richard?" + +"If you say he shall not, my dear," he responded, smiling at her +enthusiasm, "I think I may answer for it he will not." + +I was struck then, as I had been before, by a certain air of deference +which the husband assumed toward the wife. It did not surprise me, for +her bearing and manner, as well as such of her actions as I had seen, +stamped her as singularly self-reliant and independent for a woman; +and to these qualities, as much as to the rather dreamy character of +the husband, I was content to set down the peculiarity. I should add +that a rare and pretty tenderness constantly displayed on her part +toward him robbed it of any semblance of unseemliness. + +They saw that the exertion of talking exhausted me, and so, with an +encouraging nod, left me to myself. A few minutes later a couple of +English sailors, belonging to the _Framlingham_, came up, and with +gentle strength transported me, under Mistress Anne's directions, to a +queer-looking wide-beamed boat which lay almost alongside. She was +more like a huge Thames barge than anything else, for she drew little +water, but had a great expanse of sail when all was set. There was a +large deck-house, gay with paint and as clean as it could be; and in a +compartment at one end of this--which seemed to be assigned to our +party--I was soon comfortably settled. + +Exhausted as I was by the excitement of sitting up and being moved, I +knew little of what passed about me for the next two days, and +remember less. I slept and ate, and sometimes awoke to wonder where I +was. But the meals and the vague attempts at thought made scarcely +more impression on my mind than the sleep. Yet all the while I was +gaining strength rapidly, my youth and health standing me in good +stead. The wound in my head, which had caused great loss of blood, +healed all one way, as we say in Warwickshire; and about noon, on the +second day after leaving Dort, I was well enough to reach the deck +unassisted, and sit in the sunshine on a pile of rugs which Mistress +Anne, my constant nurse, had laid for me in a corner sheltered from +the wind. + + * * * * * + +Fortunately the weather was mild and warm, and the sunshine fell +brightly on the wide river and the wider plain of pasture which +stretched away on either side of the horizon, dotted, here and there +only, by a windmill, a farmhouse, the steeple of a church, the brown +sails of a barge, or at most broken by a low dike or a line of +sand-dunes. All was open, free; all was largeness, space, and +distance. I gazed astonished. + +The husband and wife, who were pacing the deck forward, came to me. He +noticed the wondering looks I cast round. "This is new to you?" he +said smiling. + +"Quite--quite new," I answered. "I never imagined anything so flat, +and yet in its way so beautiful." + +"You do not know Lincolnshire?" + +"No." + +"Ah, that is my native county," he answered. "It is much like this. +But you are better, and you can talk again. Now I and my wife have +been discussing whether we shall tell you more about ourselves. And +since there is no time like the present I may say that we have decided +to trust you." + +"All in all or not at all," Mistress Bertram added brightly. + +I murmured my thanks. + +"Then, first to tell you who we are. For myself I am plain Richard +Bertie of Lincolnshire, at your service. My wife is something more +than appears from this, or"--with a smile--"from her present not too +graceful dress. She is----" + +"Stop, Richard! This is not sufficiently formal," my lady cried +prettily. "I have the honor to present to you, young gentleman," she +went on, laughing merrily and making a very grand courtesy before me, +"Katherine, Duchess of Suffolk." + +I made shift to get to my feet, and bowed respectfully, but she forced +me to sit down again. "Enough of that," she said lightly, "until we go +back to England. Here and for the future we are Master Bertram and his +wife. And this young lady, my distant kinswoman, Anne Brandon, must +pass as Mistress Anne. You wonder how we came to be straying in the +streets alone and unattended when you found us?" + +I did wonder, for the name of the gay and brilliant Duchess of +Suffolk was well known even to me, a country lad. Her former husband, +Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, had been not only the one trusted +and constant friend of King Henry the Eighth, but the king's +brother-in-law, his first wife having been Mary, Princess of England +and Queen Dowager of France. Late in his splendid and prosperous +career the Duke had married Katherine, the heiress of Lord Willoughby +de Eresby, and she it was who stood before me, still young and +handsome. After her husband's death she had made England ring with her +name, first by a love match with a Lincolnshire squire, and secondly +by her fearless and outspoken defense of the reformers. I did wonder +indeed how she had come to be wandering in the streets at daybreak, an +object of a chance passer's chivalry and pity. + +"It is simple enough," she said dryly; "I am rich, I am a Protestant, +and I have an enemy. When I do not like a person I speak out. Do I +not, Richard?" + +"You do indeed, my dear," he answered smiling. + +"And once I spoke out to Bishop Gardiner. What! Do you know Stephen +Gardiner?" + +For I had started at the name, after which I could scarcely have +concealed my knowledge if I would. So I answered simply, "Yes, I have +seen him." I was thinking how wonderful this was. These people had +been utter strangers to me until a day or two before, yet now we were +all looking out together from the deck of a Dutch boat on the low +Dutch landscape, united by one tie, the enmity of the same man. + +"He is a man to be dreaded," the Duchess continued, her eyes resting +on her baby, which lay asleep on my bundle of rugs--and I guessed what +fear it was had tamed her pride to flight. "His power in England is +absolute. We learned that it was his purpose to arrest me, and +determined to leave England. But our very household was full of spies, +and though we chose a time when Clarence, our steward, whom we had +long suspected of being Gardiner's chief tool, was away, Philip, his +deputy, gained a clew to our design, and watched us. We gave him the +slip with difficulty, leaving our luggage, but he dogged and overtook +us, and the rest you know." + +I bowed. As I gazed at her, my admiration, I know, shone in my eyes. +She looked, as she stood on the deck, an exile and fugitive, so gay, +so bright, so indomitable, that in herself she was at once a warranty +and an omen of better times. The breeze had heightened her color and +loosened here and there a tress of her auburn hair. No wonder Master +Bertie looked proudly on his Duchess. + +Suddenly a thing I had clean forgotten flashed into my mind, and I +thrust my hand into my pocket. The action was so abrupt that it +attracted their attention, and when I pulled out a packet--two +packets--there were three pairs of eyes upon me. The seal dangled from +one missive. "What have you there?" the Duchess asked briskly, for she +was a woman, and curious. "Do you carry the deeds of your property +about with you?" + +"No," I said, not unwilling to make a small sensation. "This touches +your Grace." + +"Hush!" she cried, raising one imperious finger. "Transgressing +already? From this time forth I am Mistress Bertram, remember. But +come," she went on, eying the packet with the seal inquisitively, "how +does it touch me?" + +I put it silently into her hands, and she opened it and read a few +lines, her husband peeping over her shoulder. As she read her brow +darkened, her eyes grew hard. Master Bertie's face changed with hers, +and they both peeped suddenly at me over the edge of the parchment, +suspicion and hostility in their glances. "How came you by this, young +sir?" he said slowly, after a long pause. "Have we escaped Peter to +fall into the hands of Paul?" + +"No, no!" I cried hurriedly. I saw that I had made a greater sensation +than I had bargained for. I hastened to tell them how I had met with +Gardiner's servant at Stony Stratford, and how I had become possessed +of his credentials. They laughed of course--indeed they laughed so +loudly that the placid Dutchmen, standing aft with their hands in +their breeches-pockets, stared open-mouthed at us, and the kindred +cattle on the bank looked mildly up from the knee-deep grass. + +"And what was the other packet?" the Duchess asked presently. "Is that +it in your hand?" + +"Yes," I answered, holding it up with some reluctance. "It seems to be +a letter addressed to Mistress Clarence." + +"Clarence!" she cried. "Clarence!" arresting the hand she was +extending. "What! Here is our friend again then. What is in it? You +have opened it?" + +"No." + +"You have not? Then quick, open it!" she exclaimed. "This too touches +us, I will bet a penny. Let us see at once what it contains. Clarence +indeed! Perhaps we may have him on the hip yet, the arch-traitor!" + +But I held the pocket-book back, though my cheeks reddened and I knew +I must seem foolish. They made certain that this letter was a +communication to some spy, probably to Clarence himself under cover of +a feminine address. Perhaps it was, but it bore a woman's name and it +was sealed; and foolish though I might be, I would not betray the +woman's secret. + +"No, madam," I said confused, awkward, stammering, yet withholding it +with a secret obstinacy; "pardon me if I do not obey you--if I do not +let this be opened. It may be what you say," I added with an effort; +"but it may also contain an honest secret, and that a woman's." + +"What do you say?" cried the Duchess; "here are scruples!" At that her +husband smiled, and I looked in despair from him to Mistress Anne. +Would she sympathize with my feelings? I found that she had turned her +back on us, and was gazing over the side. "Do you really mean," +continued the Duchess, tapping her foot sharply on the deck, "that you +are not going to open that, you foolish boy?" + +"I do--with your Grace's leave," I answered. + +"Or without my Grace's leave! That is what you mean," she retorted +pettishly, a red spot in each cheek. "When people will not do what I +ask, it is always, Grace! Grace! Grace! But I know them now." + +I dared not smile; and I would not look up, lest my heart should fail +me and I should give her her way. + +"You foolish boy!" she again said, and sniffed. Then with a toss of +her head she went away, her husband following her obediently. + +I feared that she was grievously offended, and I got up restlessly and +went across the deck to the rail on which Mistress Anne was leaning, +meaning to say something which should gain for me her sympathy, +perhaps her advice. But the words died on my lips, for as I approached +she turned her face abruptly toward me, and it was so white, so +haggard, so drawn, that I uttered a cry of alarm. "You are ill!" I +exclaimed. "Let me call the Duchess!" + +She gripped my sleeve almost fiercely, "Hush!" she muttered. "Do +nothing of the kind. I am not well. It is the water. But it will pass +off, if you do not notice it. I hate to be noticed," she added, with +an angry shrug. + +I was full of pity for her and reproached myself sorely. "What a +selfish brute I have been!" I said. "You have watched by me night +after night, and nursed me day after day, and I have scarcely thanked +you. And now you are ill yourself. It is my fault!" + +She looked at me, a wan smile on her face. "A little, perhaps," she +answered faintly. "But it is chiefly the water. I shall be better +presently. About that letter--did you not come to speak to me about +it?" + +"Never mind it now," I said anxiously. "Will you not lie down on the +rugs awhile? Let me give you my place," I pleaded. + +"No, no!" she cried impatiently; and seeing I vexed her by my +importunity, I desisted. "The letter," she went on; "you will open it +by and by?" + +"No," I said slowly, considering, to tell the truth, the strength of +my resolution, "I think I shall not." + +"You will! you will!" she repeated, with a kind of scorn. "The Duchess +will ask you again, and you will give it to her. Of course you will!" + +Her tone was strangely querulous, and her eyes continually flashed +keen, biting glances at me. But I thought only that she was ill and +excited, and I fancied it was best to humor her. "Well, perhaps I +shall," I said soothingly. "Possibly. It is hard to refuse her +anything. And yet I hope I may not. The girl--it may be a girl's +secret." + +"Well?" she asked, interrupting me abruptly, her voice harsh and +unmusical. "What of her?" She laid her hand on her bosom as though to +still some secret pain. I looked at her, anxious and wondering, but +she had again averted her face. "What of her?" she repeated. + +"Only that--I would not willingly hurt her!" I blurted out. + +She did not answer. She stood a moment, then to my surprise she turned +away without a word, and merely commanding me by a gesture of the hand +not to follow, walked slowly away. I watched her cross the deck and +pass through the doorway into the deck-house. She did not once turn +her face, and my only fear was that she was ill; more seriously ill, +perhaps, than she had acknowledged. + + + + + CHAPTER VIII. + + A HOUSE OF PEACE. + + +As the day went on, therefore, I looked eagerly for Mistress Anne's +return, but she appeared no more, though I maintained a close watch +on the cabin-door. All the afternoon, too, the Duchess kept away from +me, and I feared that I had seriously offended her; so that it was +with no very pleasant anticipations that, going into that part of the +deck-house which served us for a common room, to see if the evening +meal was set, I found only the Duchess and Master Bertie prepared to +sit down to it. I suppose that something of my feeling was expressed +in my face, for while I was yet half-way between door and table, my +lady gave way to a peal of merriment. + +"Come, sit down, and do not be afraid!" she cried pleasantly, her gray +eyes still full of laughter. "I vow the lad thinks I shall eat him. +Nay, when all is said and done, I like you the better, Sir Knight +Errant, for your scruples. I see that you are determined to act up to +your name. But that reminds me," she added in a more serious vein. "We +have been frank with you. You must be equally frank with us. What are +we to call you, pray?" + +I looked down at my plate and felt my face grow scarlet. The wound +which the discovery of my father's treachery had dealt me had begun to +heal. In the action, the movement, the adventure of the last +fortnight, I had well-nigh lost sight of the blot on my escutcheon, of +the shame which had driven me from home. But the question, "What are +we to call you?" revived the smart, and revived it with an added pang. +It had been very well, in theory, to proudly discard my old name. It +was painful, in practice, to be unable to answer the Duchess, "I am a +Cludde of Coton, nephew to Sir Anthony, formerly esquire of the body +to King Henry. I am no unworthy follower and associate even for you," +and to have instead to reply, "I have no name. I am nobody. I have all +to make and win." Yet this was my ill-fortune. + +Her woman's eye saw my trouble as I hesitated, confused and doubting +what I should reply. "Come!" she said good-naturedly, trying to +reassure me. "You are of gentle birth. Of that we feel sure." + +I shook my head. "Nay, I am of no birth, madam," I answered hurriedly. +"I have no name, or at any rate no name that I can be proud of. Call +me--call me, if it please you, Francis Carey." + +"It is a good name," quoth Master Bertie, pausing with his knife +suspended in the air. "A right good Protestant name!" + +"But I have no claim to it," I rejoined, mere and more hurt. "I have +all to make. I am a new man. Yet do not fear!" I added quickly, as I +saw what I took to be a cloud of doubt cross my lady's face. "I will +follow you no less faithfully for that!" + +"Well," said the Duchess, a smile again transforming her open +features, "I will answer for that, Master Carey. Deeds are better than +names, and as for being a new man, what with Pagets and Cavendishes +and Spencers, we have nought but new men nowadays. So, cheer up!" she +continued kindly. "And we will poke no questions at you, though I +doubt whether you do not possess more birth and breeding than you +would have us think. And if, when we return to England, as I trust we +may before we are old men and women, we can advance your cause, then +let us have your secret. No one can say that Katherine Willoughby ever +forgot her friend." + +"Or forgave her enemy over quickly," quoth her husband naïvely. + +She rapped his knuckles with the back of her knife for that; and under +cover of this small diversion I had time to regain my composure. But +the matter left me sore at heart, and more than a little homesick. And +I sought leave to retire early. + +"You are right!" said the Duchess, rising graciously. "To-night, after +being out in the air, you will sleep soundly, and to-morrow you will +be a new man," with a faint smile. "Believe me, I am not ungrateful, +Master Francis, and I will diligently seek occasion to repay both your +gallant defense of the other day and your future service." She gave me +her hand to kiss, and I bent over it. "Now," she continued, "do homage +to my baby, and then I shall consider that you are really one of us, +and pledged to our cause." + +I kissed the tiny fist held out to me, a soft pink thing looking like +some dainty sea-shell. Master Bertie cordially grasped my hand. And so +under the oil-lamp in the neat cabin of that old Dutch boat, somewhere +on the Waal between Gorcum and Nimuegen, we plighted our troth to one +another, and in a sense I became one of them. + + +I went to my berth cheered and encouraged by their kindness. But the +interview, satisfactory as it was, had set up no little excitement in +my brain, and it was long before I slept. When I did I had a strange +dream. I dreamed that I was sitting in the hall at Coton, and that +Petronilla was standing on the dais looking fixedly at me with gentle, +sorrowful eyes. I wanted to go to her, but I could not move; every +dreamer knows the sensation. I tried to call to her, to ask her what +was the matter, and why she so looked at me. But I could utter no +sound. And still she continued to fix me with the same sad, +reproachful eyes, in which I read a warning, yet could not ask its +meaning. + +I struggled so hard that at last the spell was in a degree broken. +Following the direction of her eyes I looked down at myself, and saw +fastened to the breast of my doublet the knot of blue velvet which she +had made for my sword-hilt, and which I had ever since carried in my +bosom. More, I saw, with a singular feeling of anger and sorrow, that +a hand which came over my shoulder was tugging hard at the ribbon in +the attempt to remove it. + +This gave me horrible concern, yet at the moment I could not move nor +do anything to prevent it. At last, making a stupendous effort, I +awoke, my last experience, dreaming, being of the strange hand working +at my breast. My first waking idea was the same, so that I threw out +my arms, and cried aloud, and sat up. "Ugh!" I exclaimed, trembling in +the intensity of my relief, as I looked about and welcomed the now +familiar surroundings. "It was only a dream. It was----" + +I stopped abruptly, my eyes falling on a form lurking in the doorway. +I could see it only dimly by the light of a hanging lamp, which smoked +and burned redly overhead. Yet I could see it. It was real, +substantial--a waking figure; nevertheless, a faint touch of +superstitious terror still clung to me. "Speak, please!" I asked. "Who +is it?" + +"It is only I," answered a soft voice, well known to me--Mistress +Anne's. "I came in to see how you were," she continued, advancing a +little, "and whether you were sleeping. I am afraid I awoke you. But +you seemed," she added, "to be having such painful dreams that perhaps +it was as well I did." + +I was fumbling in my breast while she spoke; and certainly, whether in +my sleep I had undone the fastenings or had loosened them +intentionally before I lay down (though I could not remember doing +so), my doublet and shirt were open at the breast. The velvet knot was +safe, however, in that tiny inner pocket beside the letter, and I +breathed again. "I am very glad you did awake me!" I replied, looking +gratefully at her. "I was having a horrible dream. But how good it was +of you to think of me--and when you are not well yourself, too." + +"Oh, I am better," she murmured, her eyes, which glistened in the +light, fixed steadily on me. "Much better. Now go to sleep again, and +happier dreams to you. After to-night," she added pleasantly, "I shall +no longer consider you as an invalid, nor intrude upon you." + +And she was gone before I could reiterate my thanks. The door fell to, +and I was alone, full of kindly feelings toward her, and of +thankfulness that my horrible vision had no foundation. "Thank +Heaven!" I murmured more than once, as I lay down; "it was only a +dream." + + +Next day we reached Nimuegen, where we stayed a short time. Leaving +that place in the afternoon, twenty-four hours' journeying, partly by +river, partly, if I remember rightly, by canal, brought us to the +neighborhood of Arnheim on the Rhine. It was the 1st of March, but the +opening month belied its reputation. There was a brightness, a +softness in the air, and a consequent feeling as of spring which would +better have befitted the middle of April. All day we remained on deck +enjoying the kindliness of nature, which was especially grateful to +me, in whom the sap of health was beginning to spring again; and we +were still there when one of those gorgeous sunsets which are peculiar +to that country began to fling its hues across our path. We turned a +jutting promontory, the boat began to fall off, and the captain came +up, his errand to tell us that our journey was done. + +We went eagerly forward at the news, and saw in a kind of bay, formed +by a lake-like expansion of the river, a little island green and low, +its banks trimly set with a single row of poplars. It was perhaps a +quarter of a mile every way, and a channel one-fourth as wide +separated it from the nearer shore of the river; to which, however, a +long narrow bridge of planks laid on trestles gave access. On the +outer side of the island, facing the river's course, stood a low white +house, before which a sloping green terrace, also bordered with +poplars, led down to a tiny pier. Behind and around the house were +meadows as trim and neat as a child's toys, over which the eye roved +with pleasure until it reached the landward side of the island, and +there detected, nestling among gardens, a tiny village of half a dozen +cottages. It was a scene of enchanting peace and quietude. As we +slowly plowed our way up to the landing-place, I saw the rabbits stand +to gaze at us, and then with a flick of their heels dart off to their +holes. I marked the cattle moving homeward in a string, and heard the +wild fowl rise in creek and pool with a whir of wings. I turned with a +full heart to my neighbor. "Is it not lovely?" I cried with +enthusiasm. "Is it not a peaceful place--a very Garden of Eden?" + +I looked to see her fall into raptures such as women are commonly more +prone to than men. But all women are not the same. Mistress Anne was +looking, indeed, when I turned and surprised her, at the scene which +had so moved me, but the expression of her face was sad and bitter and +utterly melancholy. The weariness and fatigue I had often seen lurking +in her eyes had invaded all her features. She looked five years older; +no longer a girl, but a gray-faced, hopeless woman whom the sight of +this peaceful haven rather smote to the heart than filled with +anticipations of safety and repose. + +It was but for a moment I saw her so. Then she dashed her hand across +her eyes--though I saw no tears in them--and with a pettish +exclamation turned away. "Poor girl!" I thought. "She, too, is +homesick. No doubt this reminds her of some place at home, or of some +person." I thought this the more likely, as Master Bertie came from +Lincolnshire, which he said had many of the features of this strange +land. And it was conceivable enough that she should know Lincolnshire +too, being related to his wife. + +I soon forgot the matter in the excitement of landing. A few minutes +of bustle and it was over. The boat put out again; and we four were +left face to face with two strangers, an elderly man and a girl, who +had come down to the pier to meet us. The former, stout, bluff, and +red-faced, with a thick gray beard and a gold chain about his neck, +had the air of a man of position. He greeted us warmly. His companion, +who hung behind him, somewhat shyly, was as pretty a girl as one could +find in a month. A second look assured me of something more--that she +formed an excellent foil to the piquant brightness and keen vivacity, +the dark hair and nervous features of Mistress Anne. For the Dutch +girl was fair and plump and of perfect complexion. Her hair was very +light, almost flaxen indeed, and her eyes were softly and limpidly +blue; grave, innocent, wondering eyes they were, I remember. I guessed +rightly that she was the elderly man's daughter. Later I learned that +she was his only child, and that her name was Dymphna. + +He was a Master Lindstrom, a merchant of standing in Arnheim. He had +visited England and spoke English fairly, and being under some +obligations, it appeared, to the Duchess Katherine, was to be our +host. + +We all walked up the little avenue together. Master Lindstrom talking +as he went to husband or wife, while his daughter and Mistress Anne +came next, gazing each at each in silence, as women when they first +meet will gaze, taking stock, I suppose, of a rival's weapons. I +walked last, wondering why they had nothing to say to one another. + +As we entered the house the mystery was explained. "She speaks no +English," said Mistress Anne, with a touch of scorn. + +"And we no Dutch," I answered, smiling. "Here in Holland I am afraid +that she will have somewhat the best of us. Try her with Spanish." + +"Spanish! I know none." + +"Well, I do, a little." + +"What, you know Spanish?" Mistress Anne's tone of surprise amounted +almost to incredulity, and it flattered me, boy that I was. I dare say +it would have flattered many an older head than mine. "You know +Spanish? Where did you learn it?" she continued sharply. + +"At home." + +"At home! Where is that?" And she eyed me still more closely. "Where +is your home, Master Carey? You have never told me." + +But I had said already more than I intended, and I shook my head. "I +mean," I explained awkwardly, "that I learned it in a home I once had. +Now my home is here. At any rate I have no other." + +The Dutch girl, standing patiently beside us, had looked first at one +face and then at the other as we talked. We were all by this time in a +long, low parlor, warmed by a pretty closed fireplace covered with +glazed tiles. On the shelves of a great armoire, or dresser, at one +end of the room appeared a fine show of silver plate. At the other end +stood a tall linen-press of walnut-wood, handsomely carved; and even +the gratings of the windows and the handles of the doors were of +hammered iron-work. There were no rushes on the floor, which was made +of small pieces of wood delicately joined and set together and +brightly polished. But everything in sight was clean and trim to a +degree which would have shamed our great house at Coton, where the +rushes sometimes lay for a week unchanged. With each glance round I +felt a livelier satisfaction. I turned to Mistress Dymphna. + +"Señorita!" I said, mustering my noblest accent. "Beso los pies de +usted! Habla usted Castillano?" + +Mistress Anne stared, while the effect on the girl whom I addressed +was greater than I had looked for, but certainly of a different kind. +She started and drew back, an expression of offended dignity and of +something like anger ruffling her placid face. Did she not understand? +Yes, for after a moment's hesitation, and with a heightened color, she +answered, "Si, Señor." + +Her constrained manner was not promising, but I was going on to open a +conversation if I could--for it looked little grateful of us to stand +there speechless and staring--when Mistress Anne interposed. "What did +you say to her? What was it?" she asked eagerly. + +"I asked her if she spoke Spanish. That was all," I replied, my eyes +on Dymphna's face, which still betrayed trouble of some kind, "except +that I paid her the usual formal compliment. But what is she saying to +her father?" + +It was like the Christmas game of cross-questions. The girl and I had +spoken in Spanish. I translated what we had said into English for +Mistress Anne, and Mistress Dymphna turned it into Dutch for her +father; an anxious look on her face which needed no translation. + +"What is it?" asked Master Bertie, observing that something was wrong. + +"It is nothing--nothing!" replied the merchant apologetically, though, +as he spoke, his eyes dwelt on me curiously. "It is only that I did +not know that you had a Spaniard in your company." + +"A Spaniard?" Master Bertie answered. "We have none. This," pointing +to me, "is our very good friend and faithful follower, Master +Carey--an Englishman." + +"To whom," added the Duchess, smiling gravely, "I am greatly +indebted." + +I hurriedly explained the mistake, and brought at once a smile of +relief to the Mynheer's face. "Ah! pardon me, I beseech you," he said. +"My daughter was in error." And he added something in Dutch which +caused Mistress Dymphna to blush. "You know," he continued--"I may +speak freely to you, since our enemies are in the main the same--you +know that our Spanish rulers are not very popular with us, and grow +less popular every day, especially with those who are of the reformed +faith. We have learned some of us to speak their language, but we love +them none the better for that." + +"I can sympathize with you, indeed," cried the Duchess impulsively. +"God grant that our country may never be in the same plight: though it +looks as if this Spanish marriage were like to put us in it. It is +Spain! Spain! Spain! and nothing else nowadays!" + +"Nevertheless, the Emperor is a great and puissant monarch," rejoined +the Arnheimer thoughtfully; "and could he rule us himself, we might do +well. But his dominions are so large, he knows little of us. And +worse, he is dying, or as good as dying. He can scarcely sit his +horse, and rumor says that before the year is out he will resign the +throne. Then we hear little good of his successor, your queen's +husband, and look to hear less. I fear that there is a dark time +before us, and God only knows the issue." + +"And alone will rule it," Master Bertie rejoined piously. + +This saying was in a way the keynote to the life we found our host +living on his island estate. Peace, but peace with constant fear for +an assailant, and religion for a supporter. Several times a week +Master Lindstrom would go to Arnheim to superintend his business, and +always after his return he would shake his head, and speak gravely, +and Dymphna would lose her color for an hour or two. Things were going +badly. The reformers were being more and more hardly dealt with. The +Spaniards were growing more despotic. That was his constant report. +And then I would see him, as he walked with us in orchard or garden, +or sat beside the stove, cast wistful glances at the comfort and +plenty round him. I knew that he was asking himself how long they +would last. If they escaped the clutches of a tyrannical government, +would they be safe in the times that were coming from the violence of +an ill-paid soldiery? The answer was doubtful, or rather it was too +certain. + +I sometimes wondered how he could patiently foresee such +possibilities, and take no steps, whatever the risk, to prevent them. +At first I thought his patience sprang from the Dutch character. Later +I traced its deeper roots to a simplicity of faith and a deep +religious feeling, which either did not at that time exist in England, +or existed only among people with whom I had never come into contact. +Here they seemed common enough and real enough. These folks' faith +sustained them. It was a part of their lives; a bulwark against the +fear that otherwise would have overwhelmed them. And to an extent, +too, which then surprised me, I found, as time went on, that the +Duchess and Master Bertie shared this enthusiasm, although with them +it took a less obtrusive form. + +I was led at the time to think a good deal about this; and just a word +I may say of myself, and of those days spent on the Rhine inland--that +whereas before I had taken but a lukewarm interest in religious +questions, and, while clinging instinctively to the teaching of my +childhood, had conformed with a light heart rather than annoy my +uncle, I came to think somewhat differently now; differently and more +seriously. And so I have continued to think since, though I have never +become a bigot; a fact I owe, perhaps, to Mistress Dymphna, in whose +tender heart there was room for charity as well as faith. For she was +my teacher. + +Of necessity, since no other of our party could communicate with her, +I became more or less the Dutch girl's companion. I would often, of an +evening, join her on a wooden bench which stood under an elm on a +little spit of grass looking toward the city, and at some distance +from the house. Here, when the weather was warm, she would watch for +her father's return; and here one day, while talking with her, I had +the opportunity of witnessing a sight unknown in England, but which +year by year was to become more common in the Netherlands, more +heavily fraught with menace in Netherland eyes. + +We happened to be so deeply engaged in watching the upper end of the +reach at the time in question, where we expected each moment to see +Master Lindstrom's boat round the point, that we saw nothing of a boat +coming the other way, until the flapping of its sails, as it tacked, +drew our eyes toward it. Even then in the boat itself I saw nothing +strange, but in its passengers I did. They were swarthy, mustachioed +men, who in the hundred poses they assumed, as they lounged on deck or +leaned over the side, never lost a peculiar air of bravado. As they +drew nearer to us the sound of their loud voices, their oaths and +laughter reached us plainly, and seemed to jar on the evening +stillness. Their bold, fierce eyes, raking the banks unceasingly, +reached us at last. The girl by my side uttered a cry of alarm, and +rose as if to retreat. But she sat down again, for behind us was an +open stretch of turf, and to escape unseen was impossible. Already a +score of eyes had marked her beauty, and as the boat drew abreast of +us, I had to listen to the ribald jests and laughter of those on +board. My ears tingled and my cheeks burned. But I could do nothing. I +could only glare at them, and grind my teeth. + +"Who are they?" I muttered. "The cowardly knaves!' + +"Oh, hush! hush!" the girl pleaded. She had retreated behind me. And +indeed I need not have put my question, for though I had never seen +the Spanish soldiery, I had heard enough about them to recognize them +now. In the year 1555 their reputation was at its height. Their +fathers had overcome the Moors after a contest of centuries, and they +themselves had overrun Italy and lowered the pride of France. As a +result they had many military virtues and all the military vices. +Proud, bloodthirsty, and licentious everywhere, it may be imagined +that in the subject Netherlands, with their pay always in arrear, they +were, indeed, people to be feared. It was seldom that even their +commanders dared to check their excesses. + +Yet, when the first flush of my anger had subsided, I looked after +them, odd as it may seem, with mingled feelings. With all their faults +they were few against many, a conquering race in a foreign land. They +could boast of blood and descent. They were proud to call themselves +the soldiers and gentlemen of Europe. I was against them, yet I +admired them with a boy's admiration for the strong and reckless. + +Of course I said nothing of this to my companion. Indeed, when she +spoke to me I did not hear her. My thoughts had flown far from the +burgher's daughter sitting by me, and were with my grandmother's +people. I saw, in imagination, the uplands of Old Castile, as I had +often heard them described, hot in summer and bleak in winter. I +pictured the dark, frowning walls of Toledo, with its hundred Moorish +trophies, the castles that crowned the hills around, the gray olive +groves, and the box-clad slopes. I saw Palencia, where my grandmother, +Petronilla de Vargas, was born; Palencia, dry and brown and sun-baked, +lying squat and low on its plain, the eaves of its cathedral a man's +height from the ground. All this I saw. I suppose the Spanish blood in +me awoke and asserted itself at sight of those other Spaniards. And +then--then I forgot it all as I heard behind me an alien voice, and I +turned and found Dymphna had stolen from me and was talking to a +stranger. + + + + + CHAPTER IX. + + PLAYING WITH FIRE. + + +He was a young man, and a Dutchman, but not a Dutchman of the stout, +burly type which I had most commonly seen in the country. He had, it +is true, the usual fair hair and blue eyes, and he was rather short +than tall; but his figure was thin and meager, and he had a pointed +nose and chin, and a scanty fair beard. I took him to be nearsighted: +at a second glance I saw that he was angry. He was talking fast to +Dymphna--of course in Dutch--and my first impulse, in face of his +excited gestures and queer appearance, was to laugh. But I had a +notion what his relationship to the girl was, and I smothered this, +and instead asked, as soon as I could get a word in, whether I should +leave them. + +"Oh, no!" Dymphna answered, blushing slightly, and turning to me with +a troubled glance. I believe she had clean forgotten my presence. +"This is Master Jan Van Tree, a good friend of ours. And this," she +continued, still in Spanish, but speaking to him, "is Master Carey, +one of my father's guests." + +We bowed, he formally, for he had not recovered his temper, and I--I +dare say I still had my Spanish ancestors in my head--with +condescension. We disliked one another at sight, I think. I dubbed him +a mean little fellow, a trader, a peddler; and, however he classed me, +it was not favorably. So it was no particular desire to please him +which led me to say with outward solicitude, "I fear you are annoyed +at something, Master Van Tree?" + +"I am!" he said bluntly, meeting me half-way. + +"And am I to know the cause?" I asked, "or is it a secret?" + +"It is no secret!" he retorted. "Mistress Lindstrom should have been +more careful. She should not have exposed herself to the chance of +being seen by those miserable foreigners." + +"The foreigners--in the boat?" I said dryly. + +"Yes, of course--in the boat," he answered. He was obliged to say +that, but he glared at me across her as he spoke. We had turned and +were walking back to the house, the poplars casting long shadows +across our path. + +"They were rude," I observed carelessly, my chin very high. "But there +is no particular harm done that I can see, Master Van Tree." + +"Perhaps not, as far as you can see," he retorted in great excitement. +"But perhaps also you are not very far-sighted. You may not see it +now, yet harm will follow." + +"Possibly," I said, and I was going to follow up this seemingly candid +admission by something very boorish, when Mistress Dymphna struck in +nervously. + +"My father is anxious," she explained, speaking to me, "that I should +have as little to do with our Spanish governors as possible, Master +Carey. It always vexes him to hear that I have fallen in their way, +and that is why my friend feels annoyed. It was not, of course, your +fault, since you did not know of this. It was I," she continued +hurriedly, "who should not have ventured to the elm tree without +seeing that the coast was clear." + +I knew that she was timidly trying, her color coming and going, to +catch my eye; to appease me as the greater stranger, and to keep the +peace between her ill-matched companions, who, indeed, stalked along +eying one another much as a wolf-hound and a badger-dog might regard +each other across a choice bone. But the young Dutchman's sudden +appearance had put me out. I was not in love with her, yet I liked to +talk to her, and I grudged her to him, he seemed so mean a fellow. And +so--churl that I was--in answer to her speech I let drop some sneer +about the great fear of the Spaniards which seemed to prevail in these +parts. + +"_You_ are not afraid of them, then?" Van Tree said, with a smile. + +"No, I am not," I answered, my lip curling also. + +"Ah!" with much meaning. "Perhaps you do not know them very well." + +"Perhaps not," I replied. "Still, my grandmother was a Spaniard." + +"So I should have thought," he retorted swiftly. + +So swiftly that I felt the words as I should have felt a blow. "What +do you mean?" I blurted out, halting before him, with my cheek +crimson. In vain were all Dymphna's appealing glances, all her signs +of distress. "I will have you explain, Master Van Tree, what you mean +by that?" I repeated fiercely. + +"I mean what I said," he answered, confronting me stubbornly, and +shaking off Dymphna's hand. His blue eyes twinkled with rage, his thin +beard bristled; he was the color of a turkey-cock's comb. At home we +should have thought him a comical little figure; but he did not seem +so absurd here. For one thing, he looked spiteful enough for anything; +and for another, though I topped him by a head and shoulders, I could +not flatter myself that he was afraid of me. On the contrary, I felt +that in the presence of his mistress, small and short-sighted as he +was, he would have faced a lion without winking. + +His courage was not to be put to the proof. I was still glaring at +him, seeking some retort which should provoke him beyond endurance, +when a hand was laid on my shoulder, and I turned to find that Master +Bertie and the Duchess had joined us. + +"So here are the truants," the former said pleasantly, speaking in +English, and showing no consciousness whatever of the crisis in the +middle of which he had come up, though he must have discerned in our +defiant attitudes, and in Dymphna's troubled face, that something was +wrong. "You know who this is, Master Francis," he continued heartily. +"Or have you not been introduced to Master Van Tree, the betrothed of +our host's daughter?" + +"Mistress Dymphna has done me that honor," I said stiffly, recovering +myself in appearance, while at heart sore and angry with everybody. +"But I fear the Dutch gentleman has not thanked her for the +introduction, since he learned that my grandmother was Spanish." + +"_Your_ grandmother, do you mean?" cried the Duchess, much astonished. + +"Yes, madam." + +"Well, to be sure!" she exclaimed, lifting up her hands and appealing +whimsically to the others. "This boy is full of starts and surprises. +You never know what he will produce next. The other day it was a +warrant! To-day it is a grandmother, and a temper!" + +I could not be angry with her; and perhaps I was not sorry now that my +quarrel with the young Dutchman had stopped where it had. I affected, +as well as I could, to join in the laugh at my expense, and took +advantage of the arrival of our host--who at this moment came up the +slope from the landing-place, his hands outstretched and a smile of +greeting on his kindly face--to slip away unnoticed, and make amends +to my humor by switching off the heads of the withes by the river. + +But naturally the scene left a degree of ill-feeling behind it; and +for the first time, during the two months we had spent under Master +Lindstrom's roof, the party who sat down to supper were under some +constraint. I felt that the young Dutchman had had the best of the +bout in the garden; and I talked loudly and foolishly in the boyish +attempt to assert myself, and to set myself right at least in my own +estimation. Master Van Tree meanwhile sat silent, eying me from time +to time in no friendly fashion. Dymphna seemed nervous and frightened, +and the Duchess and her husband exchanged troubled glances. Only our +host and Mistress Anne, who was in particularly good spirits, were +unaffected by the prevailing chill. + + +Mistress Anne, indeed, in her ignorance, made matters worse. She had +begun to pick up some Dutch, and was fond of airing her knowledge and +practicing fresh sentences at meal-times. By some ill-luck she +contrived this evening--particularly after, finding no one to +contradict me, I had fallen into comparative silence--to frame her +sentences so as to cause as much embarrassment as possible to all of +us. "Where did you walk with Dymphna this morning?" was the question +put to me. "You are fond of the water; Englishmen are fond of the +water," she said to Dymphna. "Dymphna is tall; Master Francis is tall. +I sit by you to-night; the Dutch lady sat by you last night," and +soon, and so on, with prattle which seemed to amuse our host +exceedingly--he was never tired of correcting her mistakes--but which +put the rest of us out of countenance, bringing the tears to poor +Dymphna's eyes--she did not know where to look--and making her lover +glower at me as though he would eat me. + +It was in vain that the Duchess made spasmodic rushes into +conversation, and in the intervals nodded and frowned at the +delinquent. Mistress Anne in her innocence saw nothing. She went on +until Van Tree could stand it no longer, and with a half-smothered +threat, which was perfectly intelligible to me, rose roughly from the +table, and went to the door as if to look out at the night. + +"What is the matter?" Mistress Anne said, wonderingly, in English. Her +eyes seemed at length to be opened to the fact that something was +amiss with us. + +Before I could answer, the Duchess, who had risen, came behind her. +"You little fool!" she whispered fiercely, "if fool you are. You +deserve to be whipped!" + +"Why, what have I done?" murmured the girl, really frightened now, and +appealing to me. + +"Done!" whispered the Duchess; and I think she pinched her, for my +neighbor winced. "More harm than you guess, you minx! And for you, +Master Francis, a word with you. Come with me to my room, please." + +I went with her, half-minded to be angry, and half-inclined to feel +ashamed of myself. She did not give me time, however, to consider +which attitude I should take up, for the moment the door of her room +was closed behind us, she turned upon me, the color high in her +cheeks. "Now, young man," she said in a tone of ringing contempt, "do +you really think that that girl is in love with you?" + +"What girl?" I asked sheepishly. The unexpected question and her tone +put me out of countenance. + +"What girl? What girl?" she replied impatiently. "Don't play with me, +boy! You know whom I mean. Dymphna Lindstrom!" + +"Oh, I thought you meant Mistress Anne," I said, somewhat +impertinently. + +Her face fell in an extraordinary fashion, as if the suggestion were +not pleasant to her. But she answered on the instant: "Well! The +vanity of the lad! Do you think all the girls are in love with you? +Because you have been sitting with a pretty face on each side of you, +do you think you have only to throw the handkerchief, this way or +that? If you do, open your eyes, and you will find it is not so. My +kinswoman can take care of herself, so we will leave her out of the +discussion, please. And for this pink and white Dutch girl," my lady +continued viciously, "let me tell you that she thinks more of Van +Tree's little finger than of your whole body." + +I shrugged my shoulders, but still I was mortified. A young man may +not be in love with a girl, yet it displeases him to hear that she is +indifferent to him. + +The Duchess noticed the movement. "Don't do that," she cried in +impatient scorn. "You do not see much in Master Van Tree, perhaps? I +thought not. Therefore you think a girl must be of the same mind as +yourself. Well," with a fierce little nod, "you will learn some day +that it is not so, that women are not quite what men think them; and +particularly, Master Francis, that six feet of manhood, and a pretty +face on top of it, do not always have their way. But there, I did not +bring you here to tell you that. I want to know whether you are aware +what you are doing?" + +I muttered something to the effect that I did not know I was doing any +harm. + +"You do not call it harm, then," the Duchess retorted with energy, "to +endanger the safety of every one of us? Cannot you see that if you +insult and offend this young man--which you are doing out of pure +wanton mischief, for you are not in love with the girl--he may ruin +us?" + +"Ruin us?" I repeated incredulously. + +"Yes, ruin us!" she cried. "Here we are, living more or less in hiding +through the kindness of Master Lindstrom--living in peace and +quietness. But do you suppose that inquiries are not being made for +us? Why, I would bet a dozen gold angels that Master Clarence is in +the Netherlands, at this moment, tracking us." + +I was startled by this idea, and she saw I was. "We can trust Master +Lindstrom, were it only for his own sake," she continued more quietly, +satisfied perhaps with the effect she had produced. "And this young +man, who is the son of one of the principal men of Arnheim, is also +disposed to look kindly on us, as I fancy it is his nature to look. +But if you make mischief between Dymphna and him----" + +"I have not," I said. + +"Then do not," she replied sharply. "Look to it for the future. And +more, do not let him fancy it possible. Jealousy is as easily awakened +as it is hardly put to sleep. A word from this young man to the +Spanish authorities, and we should be hauled back to England in a +trice, if worse did not befall us here. Now, you will be careful?" + +"I will," I said, conscience-stricken and a little cowed. + +"That is better," she replied smiling. "I think you will. Now go." + +I went down again with some food for thought--with some good +intentions, too. But I was to find--the discovery is made by +many--that good resolutions commonly come too late. When I went +downstairs I found my host and Master Bertie alone in the parlor. The +girls had disappeared, so had Van Tree, and I saw at once that +something had happened. Master Bertie was standing gazing at the stove +very thoughtfully, and the Dutchman was walking up and down the room +with an almost comical expression of annoyance and trouble on his +pleasant face. + +"Where are the young ladies?" I asked. + +"Upstairs," said Master Bertie, not looking at me. + +"And--and Van Tree?" I asked mechanically. Somehow I anticipated the +answer. + +"Gone!" said the Englishman curtly. + +"Ay, gone, the foolish lad!" the Dutchman struck in, tugging at his +beard. "What has come to him? He is not wont to show temper. I have +never known him and Dymphna have a cross word before. What has come to +the lad, I say, to go off in a passion at this time of night? And no +one knows whither he has gone, or when he will come back again!" + +He seemed as he spoke hardly conscious of my presence; but Master +Bertie turned and looked at me, and I hung my head, and very shortly +afterward, I slunk out. The thought of what I might have brought upon +us all by my petulance and vanity made me feel sick. I crept up to bed +nervous and fearful of the morrow, listening to every noise without, +and praying inwardly that my alarm might not be justified. + + +When the morrow came I went downstairs as anxious to see Van Tree in +the flesh as I had been yesterday disappointed by his appearance. But +no Van Tree was there to be seen. Nothing had been heard of him. +Dymphna moved restlessly about, her cheeks pale, her eyes downcast, +and if I had ever flattered myself that I was anything to the girl, I +was undeceived now. The Duchess shot angry glances at me from time to +time. Master Bertie kept looking anxiously at the door. Every one +seemed to fear and to expect something. But none of them feared and +expected it as I did. + +"He must have gone home; he must have gone to Arnheim," said our host, +trying to hide his vexation. "He will be back in a day or two. Young +men will be young men." + +But I found that the Duchess did not share the belief that Van Tree +had gone home; for in the course of the morning she took occasion, +when we were alone, to charge me to be careful not to come into +collision with him. + +"How can I, now he has gone?" I said meekly, feeling I was in +disgrace. + +"He has not gone far," replied the Duchess meaningly. "Depend upon it, +he will not go far out of sight unless there is more harm done than I +think, or he is very different from English lovers. But if you come +across him, I pray you to keep clear of him, Master Francis." + +I nodded assent. + +But of what weight are resolutions, with fate in the other scale! It +was some hours after this, toward two o'clock indeed, when Mistress +Anne came to me, looking flurried and vexed. "Have you seen Dymphna?" +she asked abruptly. + +"No," I answered. "Why?" + +"Because she is not in the house," the girl answered, speaking +quickly, "nor in the garden; and the last time I saw her she was +crossing the island toward the footbridge. I think she has gone that +way to be on the lookout--you can guess for whom [with a smile]. But I +am fearful lest she shall meet some one else, Master Francis; she is +wearing her gold chain, and one of the maids says that she saw two of +the Spanish garrison on the road near the end of the footbridge this +morning. That is the way by land to Arnheim, you know." + +"That is bad," I said. "What is to be done?" + +"You must go and look for her," Anne suggested. "She should not be +alone." + +"Let her father go, or Master Bertie," I answered. + +"Her father has gone down the river--to Arnheim, I expect; and Master +Bertie is fishing in a boat somewhere. It will take time to find him. +Why cannot you go? If she has crossed the footbridge she will not be +far away." + +She seemed so anxious as she spoke for the Dutch girl's safety, that +she infected me with her fears, and I let myself be persuaded. After +all there might be danger, and I did not see what else was to be done. +Indeed, Mistress Anne did not leave me until she had seen me clear of +the orchard and half across the meadows toward the footbridge. "Mind +you bring her back," she cried after me. "Do not let her come alone!" +And those were her last words. + +After we had separated I did think for a moment that it was a pity I +had not asked her to come with me. But the thought occurred too late, +and I strode on toward the head of the bridge, resolving that, as soon +as I had sighted Dymphna, I would keep away from her and content +myself with watching over her from a distance. As I passed by the +little cluster of cottages on the landward side of the island, I +glanced sharply about me, for I thought it not unlikely that Master +Van Tree might be lurking in the neighborhood. But I saw nothing +either of her or him. All was quiet, the air full of spring sunshine +and warmth and hope and the blossoms of fruit trees; and with an +indefinable pleasure, a feeling of escape from control and restraint, +I crossed the long footbridge, and set foot, almost for the first time +since our arrival--for at Master Lindstrom's desire we had kept very +close--on the river bank. + +To the right a fair road or causeway along the waterside led to +Arnheim. At the point where I stood, this road on its way from the +city took a turn at right angles, running straight away from the river +to avoid a wide track of swamp and mere which lay on my left--a +quaking marsh many miles round, overgrown with tall rushes and sedges, +which formed the head of the bay in which our island lay. I looked up +the long, straight road to Arnheim, and saw only a group of travelers +moving slowly along it, their backs toward me. The road before me was +bare of passengers. Where, then, was Dymphna, if she had crossed the +bridge? In the last resort I scanned the green expanse of rushes and +willows, which stretched, with intervals of open water, as far as the +eye could reach on my left. It was all rustling and shimmering in the +light breeze, but my eye picked out one or two raised dykes which +penetrated it here and there, and served at once as pathways to islets +in the mere and as breastworks against further encroachments of the +river. Presently, on one of these, of which the course was fairly +defined by a line of willows, I made out the flutter of a woman's +hood. And I remembered that the day before I had heard Dymphna express +a wish to go to the marsh for some herb which grew there. + +"Right!" I said, seating myself with much satisfaction on the last +post of the bridge. "She is safe enough there! And I will go no +nearer. It is only on the road she is likely to be in danger from our +Spanish gallants!" + +My eyes, released from duty, wandered idly over the landscape for a +while, but presently returned to the dyke across the mere. I could not +now see Dymphna. The willows hid her, and I waited for her to +reappear. She did not, but some one else did; for by and by, on the +same path and crossing an interval between the willows, there came +into sight a man's form. + +"Ho! ho!" I said, following it with my eyes. "So I may go home! Master +Van Tree is on the track. And now I hope they will make it up!" I +added pettishly. + +Another second and I started up with a low cry. The sunlight had +caught a part of the man's dress, a shining something which flashed +back a point of intense light. The something I guessed at once was a +corselet, and it needed scarce another thought to apprise me that +Dymphna's follower was not Van Tree at all, but a Spanish soldier! + +I lost no time; yet it took me a minute--a minute of trembling haste +and anxiety--to discover the path from the causeway on to the dyke. +When once I had stumbled on to the latter I found I had lost sight of +both figures; but I ran along at the top of my speed, calculating that +the two, who could not be far apart, the man being the nearer to me, +were about a quarter of a mile or rather more from the road. I had +gone one-half of this distance perhaps when a shrill scream in front +caused me to redouble my efforts. I expected to find the ruffian in +the act of robbing the girl, and clutched my cudgel--for, alas! I had +left my sword at home--more tightly in my grasp, so that it was an +immense relief to me when, on turning an angle in the dyke, I saw her +running toward me. Her face, still white with fear, however, and her +hair streaming loosely behind her, told how narrow had been her +escape--if escape it could be called. For about ten feet behind her, +the hood he had plucked off still in his grasp, came Master Spaniard, +hot-foot and panting, but gaining on her now with every stride. + + +[Illustration: I STOOD OVER HIM WATCHING HIM] + + +He was a tall fellow, gayly dressed, swarthy, mustachioed, and +fierce-eyed. His corselet and sword-belt shone and jingled as he ran +and swore; but he had dropped his feathered bonnet in the slight +struggle which had evidently taken place when she got by him; and it +lay a black spot in the middle of the grassy avenue behind him. The +sun--it was about three hours after noon--was at my back, and shining +directly into his eyes, and I marked this as I raised my cudgel and +jumped aside to let the girl pass; for she in her blind fear would +have run against me. + +It was almost the same with him. He did not see me until I was within +a few paces of him, and even then I think he noticed my presence +merely as that of an unwelcome spectator. He fancied I should step +aside; and he cursed me, calling me a Dutch dog for getting in his +way. + +The next moment--he had not drawn his sword nor made any attempt to +draw it--we came together violently, and I had my hand on his throat. +We swayed as we whirled round one another in the first shock of the +collision. A cry of astonishment escaped him--astonishment at my +hardihood. He tried, his eyes glaring into mine, and his hot breath on +my cheek, to get at his dagger. But it was too late. I brought down my +staff, with all the strength of an arm nerved at the moment by rage +and despair, upon his bare head. + +He went down like a stone, and the blood bubbled from his lips. I +stood over him watching him. He stretched himself out and turned with +a convulsive movement on his face. His hands clawed the grass. His leg +moved once, twice, a third time faintly. Then he lay still. + +There was a lark singing just over my head, and its clear notes +seemed, during the long, long minute while I stood bending over him in +an awful fascination, to be the only sounds in nature. I looked so +long at him in that dreadful stillness and absorption, I dared not at +last look up lest I should see I knew not what. Yet when a touch fell +on my arm I did not start. + +"You have killed him!" the girl whispered, shuddering. + +"Yes, I have killed him," I answered mechanically. + +I could not take my eyes off him. It was not as if I had done this +thing after a long conflict, or in a _mêlée_ with others fighting +round me, or on the battle-field. I should have felt no horror then +such as I felt now, standing over him in the sunshine with the lark's +song in my ears. It had happened so quickly, and the waste about us +was so still; and I had never killed a man before, nor seen a man die. + +"Oh, come away!" Dymphna wailed suddenly. "Come away!" + +I turned then, and the sight of the girl's wan face and strained eyes +recalled me in some degree to myself. I saw she was ill; and hastily I +gave her my arm, and partly carried, partly supported, her back to the +road. The way seemed long and I looked behind me often. But we reached +the causeway at last, and there in the open I felt some relief. Yet +even then, stopping to cast a backward glance at the marsh, I +shuddered anew, espying a bright white spark gleaming amid the green +of the rushes. It was the dead man's corselet. But if it had been his +eye I could scarcely have shrunk from it in greater dread. + +It will be imagined that we were not long in crossing the island. +Naturally I was full of what had happened, and never gave a thought to +Van Tree's jealousy, or the incidents of his short visit. I had indeed +forgotten his existence until we reached the porch. There entering +rapidly, with Dymphna clinging to my arm, I was so oblivious of other +matters that when the young Dutchman rose suddenly from the seat on +one side of the door, and at the same moment the Duchess rose from the +bench on the other, I did not understand in the first instant of +surprise what was the matter, though I let Dymphna's hand fall from my +arm. The dark scowling face of the one, however, and the anger and +chagrin written on the features of the other, as they both glared at +us, brought all back to me in a flash. But it was too late. Before I +could utter a word the girl's lover pushed by me with a fierce gesture +and fiercer cry, and disappeared round a corner of the house. + +"Was ever such folly!" cried the Duchess, stamping her foot, and +standing before us, her face crimson. "Or such fools! You idiot! +You----" + +"Hush, madam," I said sternly--had I really grown older in doing the +deed? "something has happened." + +And Dymphna, with a low cry of "The Spaniard! The Spaniard!" tottered +up to her and fainted in her arms. + + + + + CHAPTER X. + + THE FACE IN THE PORCH. + + +"This is a serious matter," said Master Bertie thoughtfully, as we sat +in conclave an hour later round the table in the parlor. Mistress Anne +was attending to Dymphna upstairs, and Van Tree had not returned +again; so that we had been unable to tell him of the morning's +adventure. But the rest of us were there. "It considerably adds to the +danger of our position," Bertie continued. + +"Of course it does," his wife said promptly. "But Master Lindstrom +here can best judge of that, and of what course it will be safest to +take." + +"It depends," our host answered slowly, "upon whether the dead man be +discovered before night. You see if the body be not found----" + +"Well?" said my lady impatiently, as he paused. + +"Then we must some of us go after dark and bury him," he decided. "And +perhaps, though he will be missed at the next roll-call in the city, +his death may not be proved, or traced to this neighborhood. In that +case the storm will blow over, and things be no worse than before." + +"I fear there is no likelihood of that," I said; "for I am told he had +a companion. One of the maids noticed them lurking about the end of +the bridge more than once this morning." + +Our host's face fell. + +"That is bad," he said, looking at me in evident consternation. "Who +told you?" + +"Mistress Anne. And one of the maids told her. It was that which led +me to follow your daughter." + +The old man got up for about the fortieth time, and shook my hand, +while the tears stood in his eyes and his lip trembled. "Heaven bless +you, Master Carey!" he said. "But for you, my girl might not have +escaped." + +He could not finish. His emotion choked him, and he sat down again. +The event of the morning--his daughter's danger, and my share in +averting it--had touched him as nothing else could have touched him. I +met the Duchess's eyes and they too were soft and shining, wearing an +expression very different from that which had greeted me on my return +with Dymphna. + +"Ah, well! she is safe," Master Lindstrom resumed, when he had +regained his composure. "Thanks to Heaven and your friend, madam! +Small matter now if house and lands go!" + +"Still, let us hope they will not," Master Bertie said. "Do you think +these miscreants were watching the island on our account? That some +information had been given as to our presence, and they were sent to +learn what they could?" + +"No, no!" the Dutchman answered confidently. "It was the sight of the +girl and her gewgaws yesterday brought them--the villains! There is +nothing safe from them and nothing sacred to them. They saw her as +they passed up in the boat, you remember." + +"But then, supposing the worst to come to the worst?" + +"We must escape across the frontier to Wesel, in the Duchy of Cleves," +replied Lindstrom in a matter-of-fact tone, as if he had long +considered and settled the point. "The distance is not great, and in +Wesel we may find shelter, at any rate for a time. Even there, if +pressure be brought to bear upon the Government to give us up, I would +not trust it. Yet for a time it may do." + +"And you would leave all this?" the Duchess said in wonder, her eyes +traveling round the room, so clean and warm and comfortable, and +settling at length upon the great armoire of plate, which happened to +be opposite to her. "You would leave all this at a moment's notice?" + +"Yes, madam, all we could not carry with us," he answered simply. +"Honor and life, these come first. And I thank Heaven that I live here +within reach of a foreign soil, and not in the interior, where escape +would be hopeless." + +"But if the true facts were known," the Duchess urged, "would you +still be in danger? Would not the magistrates protect you? The Schout +and Schepen as you call them? They are Dutchmen." + +"Against a Spanish governor and a Spanish garrison?" he replied with +emphasis. "Ay, they would protect me--as one sheep protects another +against the wolves. No! I dare not risk it. Were I in prison, what +would become of Dymphna?" + +"Master Van Tree?" + +"He has the will to shelter her, no doubt. And his father has +influence; but such as mine--a broken reed to trust to. Then Dymphna +is not all. Once in prison, whatever the charge, there would be +questioning about religion; perhaps," with a faint smile, "questioning +about my guests." + +"I suppose you know best," said the Duchess, with a sigh. "But I hope +the worst will not come to the worst." + +"Amen to that!" he answered quite cheerfully. + +Indeed, it was strange that we seemed to feel more sorrow at the +prospect of leaving this haven of a few weeks, than our host of +quitting the home of a lifetime. But the necessity had come upon us +suddenly, while he had contemplated it for years. So much fear and +humiliation had mingled with his enjoyment of his choicest possessions +that this long-expected moment brought with it a feeling akin to +relief. + +For myself I had a present trouble that outweighed any calamity of +to-morrow. Perforce, since I alone knew the spot where the man lay, I +must be one of the burying party. My nerves had not recovered from the +blow which the sight of the Spaniard lying dead at my feet had dealt +them so short a time before, and I shrank with a natural repulsion +from the task before me. Yet there was no escaping it, no chance of +escaping it, I saw. + +None the less, throughout the silent meal to which we four sat down +together, neither the girls nor Van Tree appearing, were my thoughts +taken up with the business which was to follow. I heard our host, who +was to go with me, explaining that there was a waterway right up to +the dyke, and that we would go by boat; and heard him with apathy. +What matter how we went, if such were the object of our journey? +I wondered how the man's face would look when we came to turn him +over, and pictured it in all ghastliest shapes. I wondered whether I +should ever forget the strange spasmodic twitching of his leg, the +gurgle--half oath, half cry--which had come with the blood from his +throat. When Lindstrom said the moon was up and bade me come with him +to the boat, I went mechanically. No one seemed to suspect me of fear. +I suppose they thought that, as I had not feared to kill him, I should +not fear him dead. And in the general silence and moodiness I escaped +notice. + + +"It is a good night for the purpose," the Dutchman said, looking about +when we were outside. "It is light enough for us, yet not so light +that we run much risk of being seen." + +I assented, shivering. The moon was almost at the full, and the +weather was dry, but scud after scud of thin clouds, sweeping across +the breezy sky, obscured the light from time to time, and left nothing +certain. We loosed the smallest boat in silence, and getting in, +pulled gently round the lower end of the island, making for the fringe +of rushes which marked the line of division between river and fen. We +could hear the frogs croaking in the marsh, and the water lapping the +banks, and gurgling among the tree-roots, and making a hundred strange +noises to which daylight ears are deaf. Yet as long as I was in the +open water I felt bold enough. I kept my tremors for the moment when +we should brush through the rustling belt of reeds, and the willows +should whisper about our heads, and the rank vegetation, the +mysterious darkness of the mere should shut us in. + +For a time I was to be spared this. Master Lindstrom suddenly stopped +rowing. "We have forgotten to bring a stone, lad," he said in a low +voice. + +"A stone?" I answered, turning. I was pulling the stroke oar, and my +back was toward him. "Do we want a stone?" + +"To sink the body," he replied. "We cannot bury it in the marsh, and +if we could it were trouble thrown away. We must have a stone." + +"What is to be done?" I asked, leaning on my oar and shivering, as +much in impatience as nervousness. "Must we go back?" + +"No, we are not far from the causeway now," he answered, with Dutch +coolness. "There are some big stones, I fancy, by the end of the +bridge. If not, there are some lying among the cottages just across +the bridge. Your eyes are younger than mine, so you had better go. I +will pull on, and land you." + +I assented, and the boat's course being changed a point or two, three +minutes' rowing laid her bows on the mud, some fifty yards from the +landward bend of the bridge, and just in the shadow of the causeway. I +sprang ashore and clambered up. "Hist!" he cried, warning me as I was +about to start on my errand. "Go about it quietly, Master Francis. The +people will probably be in bed. But be secret." + +I nodded and moved off, as warily as he could desire. I spent a minute +or two peering about the causeway, but I found nothing that would +serve our purpose. There was no course left then but to cross the +planks, and seek what I wanted in the hamlet. Remembering how the +timbers had creaked and clattered when I went over them in the +daylight, I stole across on tiptoe. I fancied I had seen a pile of +stones near one of the posts at that end, but I could not find them +now, and after groping about a while--for this part was at the moment +in darkness--I crept cautiously past the first hovel, peering to right +and left as I went. I did not like to confess to myself that I was +afraid to be alone in the dark, but that was nearly the truth. I was +feverishly anxious to find what I wanted and return to my companion. + +Suddenly I paused and held my breath. A slight sound had fallen on my +ears, nervously ready to catch the slightest. I paused and listened. +Yes, there it was again; a whispering of cautious voices close by me, +within a few feet of me. I could see no one. But a moment's thought +told me that the speakers were hidden by the farther corner of the +cottage abreast of which I stood. The sound of human voices, the +assurance of living companionship, steadied my nerves, and to some +extent rid me of my folly. I took a step to one side, so as to be more +completely in the shadow cast by the reed-thatched eaves, and then +softly advanced until I commanded a view of the whisperers. + +They were two, a man and a woman. And the woman was of all people +Dymphna! She had her back to me, but she stood in the moonlight, and I +knew her hood in a moment. The man--surely the man was Van Tree then, +if the woman was Dymphna? I stared. I felt sure it must be Van Tree. +It was wonderful enough that Dymphna should so far have regained nerve +and composure as to rise and come out to meet him. But in that case +her conduct, though strange, was explicable. If not, however, if the +man were not Van Tree---- + +Well, he certainly was not. Stare as I might, rub my eyes as I might, +I could not alter the man's figure, which was of the tallest, whereas +I have said that the young Dutchman was short. This man's face, too, +though it was obscured as he bent over the girl by his cloak, which +was pulled high up about his throat, was swarthy; swarthy and +beardless, I made out. More, his cap had a feather, and even as he +stood still I thought I read the soldier in his attitude. The soldier +and the Spaniard! + +What did it mean? On what strange combination had I lit? Dymphna and a +Spaniard! Impossible. Yet a thousand doubts and thoughts ran riot in +my brain, a thousand conjectures jostled one another to get uppermost. +What was I to do? What ought I to do? Go nearer to them, as near as +possible, and listen and learn the truth? Or steal back the way I had +come, and fetch Master Lindstrom? But first, was it certain that the +girl was there of her own free will? Yes, the question was answered as +soon as put. The man laid his hand gently on her shoulder. She did not +draw back. + +Confident of this, and consequently of Dymphna's bodily safety, I +hesitated, and was beginning to consider whether the best course might +not be to withdraw and say nothing, leaving the question of future +proceedings to be decided after I had spoken to her on the morrow, +when a movement diverted my thoughts. The man at last raised his head. +The moonlight fell cold and bright on his face, displaying every +feature as clearly as if it had been day. And though I had only once +seen his face before, I knew it again. + +And knew him! In a second I was back in England, looking on a far +different scene. I saw the Thames, its ebb tide rippling in the +sunshine as it ripples past Greenwich, and a small boat gliding over +it, and a man in the bow of the boat, a man with a grim lip and a +sinister eye. Yes, the tall soldier talking to Dymphna in the +moonlight, his cap the cap of a Spanish guard, was Master Clarence! +the Duchess's chief enemy! + + * * * * * + +I stayed my foot. With a strange settling into resolve of all my +doubts I felt if my sword, which happily I had brought with me, was +loose in its sheath, and leaned forward scanning him. So he had +tracked us! He was here! With wonderful vividness I pictured all the +dangers which menaced the Duchess, Master Bertie, the Lindstroms, +myself, through his discovery of us, all the evils which would befall +us if the villain went away with his tale. Forgetting Dymphna's +presence, I set my teeth hard together. He should not escape me this +time. + +But man can only propose. As I took a step forward, I trod on a round +piece of wood which turned under my foot, and I stumbled. My eye left +the pair for a second. When it returned to them they had taken the +alarm. Dymphna had started away, and I saw her figure retreating +swiftly in the direction of the house. The man poised himself a moment +irresolute opposite to me; then dashed aside and disappeared behind +the cottage. + +I was after him on the instant, my sword out, and caught sight of his +cloak as he whisked round a corner. He dodged me twice round the next +cottage, the one nearer the river. Then he broke away and made for the +bridge, his object evidently to get off the island. But he seemed at +last to see that I was too quick for him--as I certainly was--and +should catch him half way across the narrow planking; and changing his +mind again he doubled nimbly back and rushed into the open porch of a +cottage, and I heard his sword ring out. I had him at bay. + +At bay indeed! But ready as I was, and resolute to capture or kill +him, I paused. I hesitated to run in on him. The darkness of the porch +hid him, while I must attack with the moonlight shining on me. I +peered in cautiously. "Come out!" I cried. "Come out, you coward!" +Then I heard him move, and for a moment I thought he was coming, and I +stood a-tiptoe waiting for his rush. But he only laughed a derisive +laugh of triumph. He had the odds, and I saw he would keep them. + +I took another cautious step toward him, and shading my eyes with +my left hand, tried to make him out. As I did so, gradually his face +took dim form and shape, confronting mine in the darkness. I stared +yet more intently. The face became more clear. Nay, with a sudden +leap into vividness, as it were, it grew white against the dark +background--white and whiter. It seemed to be thrust out nearer and +nearer, until it almost touched mine. It--his face? No, it was not his +face! For one awful moment a terror, which seemed to still my heart, +glued me to the ground where I stood, as it flashed upon my brain that +it was another face that grinned at me so close to mine, that it was +another face I was looking on; the livid, bloodstained face and stony +eyes of the man I had killed! + +With a wild scream I turned and fled. By instinct, for terror had +deprived me of reason, I hied to the bridge, and keeping, I knew not +how, my footing upon the loose clattering planks, made one desperate +rush across it. The shimmering water below, in which I saw that face a +thousand times reflected, the breeze, which seemed the dead man's hand +clutching me, lent wings to my flight. I sprang at a bound from the +bridge to the bank, from the bank to the boat, and overturning, yet +never seeing, my startled companion, shoved off from the shore with +all my might--and fell a-crying. + +A very learned man, physician to the Queen's Majesty has since told +me, when I related this strange story to him, that probably that burst +of tears saved my reason. It so far restored me at any rate that I +presently knew where I was--cowering in the bottom of the boat, with +my eyes covered; and understood that Master Lindstrom was leaning over +me in a terrible state of mind, imploring me in mingled Dutch and +English to tell him what had happened. "I have seen him!" was all I +could say at first, and I scarcely dared remove my hands from my eyes. +"I have seen him!" I begged my host to row away from the shore, and +after a time was able to tell him what the matter was, he sitting the +while with his arm round my shoulder. + +"You are sure that it was the Spaniard?" he said kindly, after he had +thought a minute. + +"Quite sure," I answered shuddering, yet with less violence. "How +could I be mistaken? If you had seen him----" + +"And you are sure--did you feel his heart this morning? Whether it was +beating?" + +"His heart?" Something in his voice gave me courage to look up, though +I still shunned the water, lest that dreadful visage should rise from +the depths. "No, I did not touch him." + +"And you tell me that he fell on his face. Did you turn him over?" + +"No." I saw his drift now. I was sitting erect. My brain began to work +again. "No," I admitted; "I did not." + +"Then how----" asked the Dutchman roughly--"how do you know that he +was dead, young sir? Tell me that." + +When I explained, "Bah!" he cried. "There is nothing in that! You +jumped to a conclusion. I thought a Spaniard's head was harder to +break. As for the blood coming from his mouth, perhaps he bit his +tongue, or did any one of a hundred things--except die, Master +Francis. That you may be sure is just what he did not do." + +"You think so?" I said gratefully. I began to look about me, yet still +with a tremor in my limbs, and an inclination to start at shadows. + +"Think?" he rejoined, with a heartiness which brought conviction home +tome; "I am sure of it. You may depend upon it that Master Clarence, +or the man you take for Master Clarence--who no doubt was the other +soldier seen with the scoundrel this morning--found him hurt late in +the evening. Then, seeing him in that state, he put him in the porch +for shelter, either because he could not get him to Arnheim at once, +or because he did not wish to give the alarm before he had made his +arrangements for netting your party." + +"That is possible!" I allowed, with a sigh of relief. "But what of +Master Clarence?" + +"Well," the old man said; "let us get home first. We will talk of him +afterward." + +I felt he had more in his mind than appeared, and I obeyed; growing +ashamed now of my panic, and looking forward with no very pleasant +feelings to hearing the story narrated. But when we reached the house, +and found Master Bertie and the Duchess in the parlor waiting for +us--they rose startled at sight of my face--he bade me leave that out, +but tell the rest of the story. + +I complied, describing how I had seen Dymphna meet Clarence, and what +I had observed to pass between them. The astonishment of my hearers +may be imagined. "The point is very simple," said our host coolly, +when I had, in the face of many exclamations and some incredulity, +completed the tale; "it is just this! The woman certainly was not +Dymphna. In the first place, she would not be out at night. In the +second place, what could she know of your Clarence, an Englishman and +a stranger? In the third place, I will warrant she has been in her +room all the evening. Then if Master Francis was mistaken in the +woman, may he not have been mistaken in the man? That is the point." + +"No," I said boldly. "I only saw her back. I saw his face." + +"Certainly, that is something," Master Lindstrom admitted reluctantly. + +"But how many times had you seen him before?" put in my lady very +pertinently. "Only once." + +In answer to that I could do no more than give further assurance of my +certainty on the point. "It was the man I saw in the boat at +Greenwich," I declared positively. "Why should I imagine it?" + +"All the same, I trust you have," she rejoined. "For, if it was indeed +that arch scoundrel, we are undone." + +"Imagination plays us queer tricks sometimes," Master Lindstrom said, +with a smile of much meaning. "But come, lad, I will ask Dymphna, +though I think it useless to do so. For whether you are right or wrong +as to your friend, I will answer for it you are wrong as to my +daughter." + +He was rising to go from them for the purpose, when Mistress Anne +opened the door and came in. She looked somewhat startled at finding +us all in conclave. "I thought I heard your voices," she explained +timidly, standing between us and the door. "I could not sleep." + +She looked indeed as if that were so. Her eyes were very bright, and +there was a bright spot of crimson in each cheek. "What is it?" she +went on abruptly, looking hard at me and shutting her lips tightly. +There was so much to explain that no one had taken it in hand to +begin. + +"It is just this," the Duchess said, opening her mouth with a snap. +"Have you been with Dymphna all the time?" + +"Yes, of course," was the prompt answer. + +"What is she doing?" + +"Doing?" Mistress Anne repeated in surprise. "She is asleep." + +"Has she been out since nightfall?" the Duchess continued. "Out of her +room? Or out of the house?" + +"Out? Certainly not. Before she fell asleep she was in no state to go +out, as you know, though I hope she will be all right when she awakes. +Who says she has been out?" Anne added sharply. She looked at me with +a challenge in her eyes, as much as to say, "Is it you?" + +"I am satisfied," I said, "that I was mistaken as to Mistress Dymphna. +But I am just as sure as before that I saw Clarence." + +"Clarence?" Mistress Anne repeated, starting violently, and the color +for an instant fleeing from her cheeks. She sat down on the nearest +seat. + +"You need not be afraid, Anne," my lady said smiling. She had a +wonderfully high courage herself. "I think Master Francis was +mistaken, though he is so certain about it." + +"But where--where did he see him?" the girl asked. She still trembled. + +Once more I had to tell the tale; Mistress Anne, as was natural, +listening to it with the liveliest emotions. And this time so much of +the ghost story had to be introduced--for she pressed me closely as to +where I had left Clarence, and why I had let him go--that my +assurances got less credence than ever. + +"I think I see how it is," she said, with a saucy scorn that hurt me +not a little. "Master Carey's nerves are in much the same state +to-night as Dymphna's. He thought he saw a ghost, and he did not. He +thought he saw Dymphna, and he did not. And he thought he saw Master +Clarence, and he did not." + +"Not so fast, child!" cried the Duchess sharply, seeing me wince. +"Your tongue runs too freely. No one has had better proofs of Master +Carey's courage--for which I will answer myself--than we have!" + +"Then he should not say things about Dymphna!" the young lady +retorted, her foot tapping the floor, and the red spots back in her +cheeks. "Such rubbish I never heard!" + + + + + CHAPTER XI. + + A FOUL BLOW. + + +They none of them believed me, it seemed; and smarting under Mistress +Anne's ridicule, hurt by even the Duchess's kindly incredulity, what +could I do? Only assert what I had asserted already, that it was +undoubtedly Clarence, and that before twenty-four hours elapsed they +would have proof of my words. + +At mention of this possibility Master Bertie looked up. He had left +the main part in the discussion to others, but now he intervened. "One +moment!" he said. "Take it that the lad is right, Master Lindstrom. Is +there any precaution we can adopt, any back door, so to speak, we can +keep open, in case of an attempt to arrest us being made? What would +be the line of our retreat to Wesel?" + +"The river," replied the Dutchman promptly. + +"And the boats are all at the landing-stage?" + +"They are, and for that reason they are useless in an emergency," our +host answered thoughtfully. "Knowing the place, any one sent to +surprise and arrest us would secure them first, and the bridge. Then +they would have us in a trap. It might be well to take a boat round, +and moor it in the little creek in the farther orchard," he added, +rising. "It is a good idea, at any rate. I will go and do it." + +He went out, leaving us four--the Duchess, her husband, Anne, and +myself--sitting round the lamp. + +"If Master Carey is so certain that it was Clarence," my lady began, +"I think he ought to----" + +"Yes, Kate?" her husband said. She had paused and seemed to be +listening. + +"Ought to open that letter he has!" she continued impetuously. "I have +no doubt it is a letter to Clarence. Now the rogue has come on the +scene again, the lad's scruples ought not to stand in the way. They +are all nonsense. The letter may throw some light on the Bishop's +schemes and Clarence's presence here; and it should be read. That is +what I think." + +"What do you say, Carey?" her husband asked, as I kept silence. "Is +not that reasonable?" + +Sitting with my elbows on the table, I twisted and untwisted the +fingers of my clasped hands, gazing at them the while as though +inspiration might come of them. What was I to do? I knew that the +three pairs of eyes were upon me, and the knowledge distracted me, and +prevented me really thinking, though I seemed to be thinking so hard. +"Well," I burst out at last, "the circumstances are certainly altered. +I see no reason why I should not----" + +Crash! + +I stopped, uttering an exclamation, and we all sprang to our feet. +"Oh, what a pity!" the Duchess cried, clasping her hands. "You clumsy, +clumsy girl! What have you done?" + +Mistress Anne's sleeve as she turned had swept from the table a +Florentine jug, one of Master Lindstrom's greatest treasures, and it +lay in a dozen fragments on the floor. We stood and looked at it, the +Duchess in anger, Master Bertie and I in comic dismay. The girl's lip +trembled, and she turned quite white as she contemplated the ruin she +had caused. + +"Well, you have done it now!" the Duchess said pitilessly. What woman +could ever overlook clumsiness in another woman! "It only remains to +pick up the pieces, miss. If a man had done it--but there, pick up the +pieces. You will have to make your tale good to Master Lindstrom +afterward." + +I went down on my knees and helped Anne, the annoyance her incredulity +had caused me forgotten. She was so shaken that I heard the bits of +ware in her hand clatter together. When we had picked up all, even to +the smallest piece, I rose, and the Duchess returned to the former +subject. "You will open this letter, then?" she said; "I see you will. +Then the sooner the better. Have you got it about you?" + +"No, it is in my bedroom," I answered. "I hid it away there, and I +must fetch it. But do you think," I continued, pausing as I opened the +door for Mistress Anne to go out with her double handful of fragments, +"it is absolutely necessary to read it, my lady?" + +"Most certainly," she answered, gravely nodding with each syllable, "I +think so. I will be responsible." And Master Bertie nodded also. + +"So be it," I said reluctantly. And I was about to leave the room to +fetch the letter--my bedroom being in a different part of the house, +only connected with the main building by a covered passage--when our +host returned. He told us that he had removed a boat, and I stayed a +while to hear if he had anything more to report, and then, finding he +had not, went out to go to my room, shutting the door behind me. + + +The passage I have mentioned, which was merely formed of rough planks, +was very dark. At the nearer end was the foot of the staircase leading +to the upper rooms. Farther along was a door in the side opening into +the garden. Going straight out of the lighted room, I had almost to +grope my way, feeling the walls with my hands. When I had about +reached the middle I paused. It struck me that the door into the +garden must be open, for I felt a cold draught of air strike my brow, +and saw, or fancied I saw, a slice of night sky and the branch of a +tree waving against it. I took a step forward, slightly shivering in +the night air as I did so, and had stretched out my hand with the +intention of closing the door, when a dark form rose suddenly close to +me, I saw a knife gleam in the starlight, and the next moment I reeled +back into the darknesss of the passage, a sharp pain in my breast. + +I knew at once what had happened to me, and leaned a moment against +the planking with a sick, faint feeling, saying to myself, "I have it +this time!" The attack had been so sudden and unexpected, I had been +taken so completely off my guard, that I had made no attempt either to +strike or to clutch my assailant, and I suppose only the darkness of +the passage saved me from another blow. But was one needed? The hand +which I had raised instinctively to shield my throat was wet with the +warm blood trickling fast down my breast. I staggered back to the door +of the parlor, groped blindly for the latch, seemed to be an age +finding it, found it at last, and walked in. + +The Duchess sprang up at sight of me. "What," she cried, backing from +me, "what has happened?" + +"I have been stabbed," I said, and I sat down. + +It amused me afterward to recall what they all did. The Dutchman +stared, my lady screamed loudly, Master Bertie whipped out his sword; +he could make up his mind quickly enough at times. + +"I think he has gone," I said faintly. + +The words brought the Duchess to her knees by my chair. She tore open +my doublet, through which the blood was oozing fast. I made no doubt +that I was a dead man, for I had never been wounded in this way +before, and the blood scared me. I remember my prevailing idea was a +kind of stunned pity for myself. Perhaps later--I hope so--I should +have come to think of Petronilla and my uncle and other people. But +before this stage was readied, the Duchess reassured me. "Courage, +lad!" she cried heartily. "It is all right, Dick. The villain struck +him on the breastbone an inch too low, and has just ripped up a scrap +of skin. It has blooded him for the spring, that is all. A bit of +plaster----" + +"And a drink of strong waters," suggested the Dutchman soberly--his +thoughts were always to the point when they came. + +"Yes, that too," quoth my lady, "and he will be all right." + +I thought so myself when I had emptied the cup they offered me. I had +been a good deal shaken by the events of the day. The sight of blood +had further upset me. I really think it possible I might have died of +this slight hurt and my imagination, if I had been left to myself. But +the Duchess's assurance and the draught of schnapps, which seemed to +send new blood through my veins, made me feel ashamed of myself. If +the Duchess would have let me, I would at once have gone to search the +premises; as it was, she made me sit still while she ran to and fro +for hot water and plaster, and the men searched the lower rooms and +secured the door afresh. + +"And so you could see nothing of him?" our host asked, when he and +Master Bertie returned, weapons in hand. "Nothing of his figure or +face?" + +"Nothing, save that he was short," I answered; "shorter than I am, at +any rate, and I fancy a good deal." + +"A good deal shorter than you are?" my lady said uneasily; "that is no +clew. In this country nine people out of ten are that. Clarence, now, +is not." + +"No," I said; "he is about the same height. It was not Clarence." + +"Then who could it be?" she muttered, rising, and then with a quick +shudder sitting down again. "Heaven help us, we seem to be in the +midst of foes! What could be the motive? And why should the villain +have selected you? Why pick you out?" + +Thereupon a strange thing happened. Three pairs of English eyes met, +and signaled a common message eye to eye. No word passed, but the +message was "Van Tree!" When we had glanced at one another we looked +all of us at our host--looked somewhat guiltily. He was deep in +thought, his eyes on the stove; but he seemed to feel our gaze upon +him, and he looked up abruptly. "Master Van Tree----" he said, and +stopped. + +"You know him well?" the Duchess said, appealing to him softly. We +felt a kind of sorrow for him, and some delicacy, too, about accusing +one of his countrymen of a thing so cowardly. "Do you think it is +possible," she continued with an effort--"possible that he can have +done this, Master Lindstrom?" + +"I have known him from a boy," the merchant said, looking up, a hand +on either knee, and speaking with a simplicity almost majestic, "and +never knew him do a mean thing, madam. I know no more than that." And +he looked round on us. + +"That is a good deal; still, he went off in a fit of jealousy when +Master Carey brought Dymphna home. We must remember that." + +"Yes, I would he knew the rights of that matter," said the Dutchman +heartily. + +"And he has been hanging about the place all day," my lady persisted. + +"Yes," Master Lindstrom rejoined patiently; "yet I do not think he did +this." + +"Then who did?" she said, somewhat nettled. + +That was the question. I had my opinion, as I saw Master Bertie and +the Duchess had. I did not doubt it was Van Tree. Yet a thought struck +me. "It might be well," I suggested, "that some one should ask +Mistress Anne whether the door was open when she left the room. She +passed out just in front of me." + +"But she does not go by the door," my lady objected. + +"No, she would turn at once and go upstairs," I agreed. "But she could +see the door from the foot of the stairs--if she looked that way, I +mean." + +The Duchess assented, and went out of the room to put the question. We +three, left together, sat staring at the dull flame of the lamp, and +were for the most part silent, Master Bertie only remarking that it +was after midnight. The suspicion he and I entertained of Van Tree's +guilt seemed to raise a barrier between us and our host. My wound, +slight as it was, smarted and burned, and my head ached. After +midnight, was it? What a day it had been! + +When the Duchess came back, as she did in a few minutes, both Anne and +Dymphna came with her. The girls had risen hastily, and were shivering +with cold and alarm. Their eyes were bright, their manner was excited. +They were full of sympathy and horror and wonder, as was natural; of +nervous fear for themselves, too. But my lady cut short their +exclamations. "Anne says she did not notice the door," she said. + +"No," the girl answered, trembling visibly as she spoke. "I went up +straight to bed. But who could it be? Did you see nothing of him as he +struck you? Not a feature? Not an outline?" + +"No," I murmured. + +"Did he not say a word?" she continued, with strange insistence. "Was +he tall or short?" Her dark eyes dwelling on mine seemed to probe my +thoughts, as though they challenged me to keep anything back from her. +"Was it the man you hurt this morning?" she suggested. + +"No," I answered reluctantly. "This man was short." + +"Short, was he? Was it Master Van Tree, then?" + +We, who felt also certain that it was Van Tree, started, nevertheless, +at hearing the charge put into words before Dymphna. I wondered, and I +think the others did, too, at Mistress Anne's harshness. Even my lady, +so blunt and outspoken by nature, had shrunk from trying to question +the Dutch girl about her lover. We looked at Dymphna, wondering how +she would take it. + +We had forgotten that she could not understand English. But this did +not serve her; for without a pause Mistress Anne turned to her, and +unfalteringly said something in her scanty Dutch which came to the +same thing. A word or two of questioning and explanation followed. +Then the meaning of the accusation dawned at last on Dymphna's mind. I +looked for an outburst of tears or protestations. Instead, with a +glance of wonder and great scorn, with a single indignant widening of +her beautiful eyes, she replied by a curt Dutch sentence. + +"What does she say?" my lady exclaimed eagerly. + +"She says," replied Master Lindstrom, who was looking on gravely, +"that it is a base lie, madam." + +On that we became spectators. It seemed to me, and I think to all of +us, that the two girls stood apart from us in a circle of light by +themselves; confronting one another with sharp glances as though a +curtain had been raised from between them, and they saw one another in +their true colors and recognized some natural antagonism, or, it might +be, some rivalry each in the other. I think I was not peculiar in +feeling this, for we all kept silence for a space as though expecting +something to follow. In the middle of this silence there came a low +rapping at the door. + +One uttered a faint shriek; another stood as if turned to stone. The +Duchess cried for her child. The rest of us looked at one another. +Midnight was past. Who could be abroad, who could want us at this +hour? As a rule we should have been in bed and asleep long ago. We had +no neighbors save the cotters on the far side of the island. We knew +of no one likely to arrive at this time with any good intent. + +"I will open," said Master Lindstrom. But he looked doubtfully at the +women-folk as he said it. + +"One minute," whispered the Duchess. "That table is solid and heavy. +Could you not----" + +"Put it across the door?" concluded her husband. "Yes, we will." And +it was done at once, the two men--my lady would not let me help--so +arranging it that it prevented the door being opened to its full +width. + +"That will stop a rush," said Master Bertie with satisfaction. + +It did strengthen the position, yet it was a nervous moment when our +host prepared to lower the bar. "Who is there?" he cried loudly. + +We waited, listening and looking at one another, the fear of arrest +and the horrors of the Inquisition looming large in the minds of some +of us at least. The answer, when it came, did not reassure us. It was +uttered in a voice so low and muffled that we gained no information, +and rather augured treachery the more. I remember noticing how each +took the crisis; how Mistress Anne's face was set hard, and her breath +came in jerks; how Dymphna, pale and trembling, seemed yet to have +eyes only for her father; how the Duchess faced the entrance like a +queen at bay. All this I took in at a glance. Then my gaze returned to +Master Lindstrom, as he dropped the bar with a jerk. The door was +pushed open at once as far as it would go. A draught of cold air came +in, and with it Van Tree. He shut the door behind him. + + +Never were six people so taken aback as we were. But the newcomer, +whose face was flushed with haste and excitement, observed nothing. +Apparently he saw nothing unexpected even in our presence downstairs +at that hour, nothing hostile or questioning in the half circle of +astonished faces turned toward him. On the contrary, he seemed +pleased. "Ah!" he exclaimed gutturally. "It is well! You are up! You +have taken the alarm!" + +It was to me he spoke, and I was so surprised by that, and by his +sudden appearance, so dumfounded by his easy address and the absence +of all self-consciousness on his part, so struck by a change in him, +that I stared in silence. I could not believe that this was the same +half-shy, half-fierce young man who had flung away a few hours before +in a passion of jealousy. My theory that he was the assassin seemed on +a sudden extravagant, though here he was on the spot. When Master +Lindstrom asked, "Alarm! What alarm?" I listened for his answer as I +should have listened for the answer of a friend and ally, without +hesitation, without distrust. For in truth the man was transfigured; +changed by the rise of something to the surface which ordinarily lay +hid in him. Before, he had seemed churlish, awkward, a boor. But in +this hour of our need and of his opportunity he showed himself as he +was. Action and purpose lifted him above his outward seeming. I caught +the generous sparkle in his eye, and trusted him. + +"What!" he said, keeping his voice low. "You do not know? They are +coming to arrest you. Their plan is to surround the house before +daybreak. Already there is a boat lying in the river watching the +landing-stage." + +"Whom are they coming to arrest?" I asked. The others were silent, +looking at this strange messenger with mingled feelings. + +"All, I fear," he replied. "You, too, Master Lindstrom. Some one has +traced your English friends hither and informed against you. I know +not on what ground you are included, but I fear the worst. There is +not a moment to be lost if you would escape by the bridge, before the +troop who are on the way to guard it arrives." + +"The landing-stage, you say, is already watched?" our host asked, his +phlegmatic coolness showing at its best. His eyes roved round the +room, and he tugged, as was his habit when deep in thought, at his +beard. I felt sure that he was calculating which of his possessions he +could remove. + +"Yes," Van Tree answered. "My father got wind of the plan in Arnheim. +An English envoy arrived there yesterday on his way to Cleves or some +part of Germany. It is rumored that he has come out of his road to +inquire after certain English fugitives whom his Government are +anxious to seize. But come, we have no time to lose! Let us go!" + +"Do you come too?" Master Lindstrom said, pausing in the act of +turning away. He spoke in Dutch, but by some inspiration born of +sympathy I understood both his question and the answer. + +"Yes, I come. Where Dymphna goes I go, and where she stops I stop, +though it be at Madrid itself," the young man answered gallantly. His +eyes kindled, and he seemed to grow taller and to gain majesty. The +barrier of race, which had hindered me from viewing him fairly before, +fell in a trice. I felt now only a kindly sorrow that he had done this +noble thing, and not I. I went to him and grasped his hand; and though +I said nothing, he seemed, after a single start of surprise, to +understand me fully. He understood me even better, if that were +possible, an hour later, when Dymphna had told him of her adventure +with the Spaniard, and he came to me to thank me. + +Ordered myself to be idle, I found all busy round me, busy with a +stealthy diligence. Master Lindstrom was packing his plate. Dymphna, +pale, but with soft, happy eyes--for had she not cause to be +proud?--was preparing food and thick clothing. The Duchess had fetched +her child and was dressing it for the journey. Master Bertie was +collecting small matters, and looking to our arms. In one or other of +these occupations--I can guess in which--Van Tree was giving his aid. +And so, since the Duchess would not let me do anything, it chanced +that presently I found myself left alone for a few minutes with Anne. + +I was not watching her. I was gnawing my nails in a fit of +despondency, reflecting that I was nothing but a hindrance and a +drawback to my friends, since whenever a move had to be made I was +sure to be invalided, when I became aware, through some mysterious +sense, that my companion, who was kneeling on the floor behind me, +packing, had desisted from her work and was gazing fixedly at me. I +turned. Yes, she was looking at me; her eyes, in which a smoldering +fire seemed to burn, contrasting vividly with her pale face and +contracted brows. When she saw that I had turned--of which at first +she did not seem aware--she rose and came to me, and laid a hand on my +shoulder and leaned over me. A feeling that was very like fright fell +upon me, her manner was so strange. "What is it?" I stammered, as she +still pored on me in silence, still maintained her attitude. "What is +the matter, Anne?" + +"Are you _quite_ a fool?" she whispered, her voice almost a hiss, her +hot breath on my cheek. "Have you no sense left, that you trust that +man?" + +For a moment I failed to understand her. "What man?" I said. "Oh, Van +Tree!" + +"Ay, Van Tree! Who else? Will you go straight into the trap he has +laid for you?" She moistened her lips with her tongue, as though they +were parched. "You are all mad! Mad, I think! Don't you see," she +continued, stooping over me again and whispering hurriedly, her wild +eyes close to mine, "that he is jealous of you?" + +"He was," I said uneasily. "That is all right now." + +"He was? He is!" she retorted. "He went away wild with you. He comes +back smiling and holding out his hand. Do you trust him? Don't you +see--don't you see," she cried, rocking me to and fro with her hand in +her excitement, "that he is fooling you? He is leading us all into a +trap that has been laid carefully enough. What is this tale of an +English envoy on his way to Germany? Rubbish! Rubbish, I tell you." + +"But Clarence----" + +"Bah! It was all your fancy!" she cried fiercely, her eyes for the +moment flitting to the door, then returning to my face. "How should he +find us here? Or what has Clarence to do with an English envoy?" + +"I do not know," I said. She had not in the least persuaded me. In a +rare moment I had seen into Van Tree's soul and trusted him +implicitly. "Please take care," I added, wincing under her hand. "You +hurt me!" + +She sprang back with a sudden change of countenance as if I had struck +her, and for a moment cowered away from me, her former passion still +apparent fighting for the mastery in her face. I set down her +condition to terror at the plight we were all in, or to vexation that +no one would take her view. The next moment I went farther. I thought +her mad, when she turned abruptly from me and, flying to the door by +which Van Tree had entered, began with trembling fingers to release +the pin which confined the bar. + +"Stop! stop! you will ruin all!" I cried in horror. "They can see that +door from the river, and if they see the light, they will know we are +up and have taken the alarm; and they may make a dash to secure us. +Stop, Anne! Stop!" I cried. But the girl was deaf. She tugged +desperately at the pin, and had already loosened the bar when I caught +her by the arms, and, pushing her away, set my back against the door. +"Don't be foolish!" I said gently. "You have lost your head. You must +let us men settle these things, Anne." + +She was indeed beside herself, for she faced me during a second or two +as though she would spring upon me and tear me from the door. Her +hands worked, her eyes gleamed, her strong white teeth showed +themselves. I shuddered. I had never pictured her looking like that. +Then, as steps sounded on the stairs and cheerful voices--cheerful +they seemed to me as they broke in on that strange scene--drew nearer, +she turned, and walking deliberately to a seat, fell to weeping +hysterically. + +"What are you doing to that door?" cried the Duchess sharply, as she +entered with the others. I was securing the bar again. + +"Nothing," I said stolidly. "I am seeing that it is fast." + +"And hoity toity, miss!" she continued, turning to Anne. "What has +come over you, I would like to know? Stop crying, girl; what is the +matter with you? Will you shame us all before this Dutch maid? Here, +carry these things to the back door." + +Anne somehow stifled her sobs and rose. Seeming by a great effort to +recover composure, she went out, keeping her face to the last averted +from me. + +We all followed, variously laden, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree, who +carried between them the plate-chest, being the last to leave. There +was not one of us--even of us who had only known the house a few +weeks--who did not heave a sigh as we passed out of the warm lamp-lit +parlor, which, littered as it was with the debris of packing, looked +still pleasant and comfortable in comparison with the darkness outside +and the uncertain future before us. What, then, must have been the +pain of parting to those who had never known any other home? Yet they +took it bravely. To Dymphna, Van Tree's return had brought great +happiness. To Master Lindstrom, any ending to a long series of +anxieties and humiliations was welcome. To Van Tree--well, he had +Dymphna with him, and his side of the plate-chest was heavy, and gave +him ample employment. + + +We passed out silently through the back door, leaving the young +Dutchman to lock it behind us, and flitted, a line of gliding shadows, +through the orchard. It was two o'clock, the sky was overcast, a +slight drizzle was falling. Once an alarm was given that we were being +followed; and we huddled together, and stood breathless, a clump of +dark figures gazing affrightedly at the tree trunks which surrounded +us, and which seemed--at least to the women's eyes--to be moving, and +to be men closing in on us. But the alarm was groundless, and with no +greater mishap than a few stumbles when we came to the slippery edge +of the creek, we reached the boat, and one by one, admirably ordered +by our host, got in and took our seats. Van Tree and Master Lindstrom +pushed us off; then they swung themselves in and paddled warily along, +close under the bank, where the shadows of the poplars fell across us, +and our figures blended darkly with the line of rushes on the shore. + + + + + CHAPTER XII. + + ANNE'S PETITION. + + +We coasted along in this silent fashion, nearly as far as the hamlet +and bridge, following, but farther inshore, the course which Master +Lindstrom and I had taken when on our way to bury the Spaniard. A +certain point gained, at a signal from our host we struck out into the +open, and rowed swiftly toward the edge of the marsh. This was the +critical moment; but, so far as we could learn, our passage was +unnoticed. We reached the fringe of rushes; with a prolonged hissing +sound the boat pushed through them; a flight of water-fowl rose, +whirring and clapping about us, and we floated out into a dim misty +lake, whose shores and surface stretched away on every side, alike +dark, shifting, and uncertain. + +Across this the Dutchman steered us, bringing us presently to a narrow +opening, through which we glided into a second and smaller mere. At +the farther end of this one the way seemed barred by a black, +impenetrable wall of rushes, which rose far above our heads. But the +tall stems bent slowly with many a whispered protest before our silent +onset, and we slid into a deep water-lane, here narrow, there widening +into a pool, in one place dark, in another reflecting the gray night +sky. Down this we sped swiftly, the sullen plash of the oars and the +walls of rushes always with us. For ourselves, we crouched still and +silent, shivering and listening for sounds of pursuit; now starting at +the splash of a frog, again shuddering at the cry of a night-bird. The +Duchess, her child, and I were in the bows, Master Lindstrom, his +daughter, and Mistress Anne in the stern. They had made me comfortable +with the baggage and some warm coverings, and would insist on treating +me as helpless. Even when the others began to talk in whispers, the +Duchess enjoined silence on me, and bade me sleep. Presently I did so, +my last impression one of unending water-ways and shoreless, shadowy +lakes. + +When I awoke the sun was high and the scene was changed indeed. We lay +on the bosom of a broad river, our boat seeming now to stand still as +the sail flapped idly, now to heel over and shoot forward as the light +breeze struck us. The shores abreast of us were still low and reedy, +but ahead the slopes of green wooded hills rose gently from the +stream. Master Bertie was steering, and, seeing me lift my head, +greeted me with a smile. The girls in the stern were covered up and +asleep. Amidships, too, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree had curled +themselves up between the thwarts, and were slumbering peacefully. I +turned to look for the Duchess, and found her sitting wide awake at my +elbow, her eyes on her husband. + +"Well," she said smiling, "do you feel better now? You have had a good +sleep." + +"How long have I been asleep, please?" I asked, bewildered by the +sunshine, by the shining river and the green hills, by the fresh +morning air, by the change in everything; and answering in a question, +as people freshly aroused do nine times out of ten. "Where are we?" + +"You have been asleep nearly six hours, and we are on the Rhine, near +Emmerich," she answered, smiling. She was pale, and the long hours of +watching had drawn dark circles round her eyes. But the old undaunted +courage shone in them still, and her smile was as sweet as ever. + +"Have we passed the frontier?" I asked eagerly. + +"Well, nearly," she answered. "But how does your wound feel?" + +"Rather stiff and sore," I said ruefully, after making an experiment +by moving my body to and fro. "And I am very thirsty, but I could +steer." + +"So you shall," she said. "Only first eat something. We broke our fast +before the others lay down. There is bread and meat behind you, and +some hollands and water in the bottle." + +I seized the latter and drank greedily. Then, finding myself hungry +now I came to think about it, I fell upon the eatables. + +"You will do now, I think," she said, when she had watched me for some +time. + +I laughed for answer, pleased that the long dark night, its gloom and +treachery were past. But its memories remained and presently I said, +"If Van Tree did not try to kill me--and I am perfectly sure he did +not----" + +"So am I," she said. "We were all wrong." + +"Then," I continued, looking at her gravely, "who did? that is the +question. And why?" + +"You are sure that it was not the Spaniard whom you hurt in defense of +Dymphna?" my lady asked. + +"Quite sure." + +"And sure that it was not Clarence?" she persisted. + +"Quite sure. It was a short man," I explained again, "and dressed in a +cloak. That is all I can tell about him." + +"It might be some one employed by Clarence," she suggested, her face +gloomy, her brows knit. + +"True, I had not thought of that," I answered. "And it reminds me. I +have heard so much of Clarence----" + +"And seen some little--even that little more than was good for you." + +"Yes, he has had the better of me, on both occasions," I allowed. "But +I was going to ask you," I continued, "to tell me something about him. +He was your steward, I know. But how did he come to you? How was it +you trusted him?" + +"We are all fools at times," she answered grimly. "We wanted to have +persons of our own faith about us, and he was highly commended to us +by Protestants abroad, as having seen service in the cause. He applied +to us just at the right moment, too. And at the first we felt a great +liking for him. He was so clever in arranging things, he kept such +excellent order among the servants; he was so ready, so willing, so +plausible! Oh!" she added bitterly, "he had ways that enabled him to +twist nine women out of ten round his fingers! Richard was fond of +him; I liked him; we had talked more than once of how we might advance +his interests. And then, like a thunderbolt on a clear day, the +knowledge of his double-dealing fell upon us. We learned that he had +been seen talking with a known agent of Gardiner, and this at a time +when the Bishop was planning our ruin. We had him watched, and just +when the net had all but closed round us we discovered that he had +been throughout in Gardiner's pay." + +"Ah!" I said viciously. "The oddest thing to me is the way he has +twice escaped me when I had him at the sword's point!" + +"The third time may bring other fortune, Master Francis," she answered +smiling. "Yet be wary with him. He is a good swordsman, as my husband, +who sometimes fenced with him, will tell you." + +"He can be no common man," I said. + +"He is not. He is well-bred, and has seen service. He is at once bold +and cunning. He has a tongue would win most women, and a hardihood +that would chain them to him. Women love bold men," my lady added +naïvely. And she smiled on me--yet humorously--so that I blushed. + +There was silence for a moment. The sail flapped, then filled again. +How delicious this morning after that night, this bright expanse after +the dark, sluggish channels! Far away in front a great barge, +high-laden with a mighty stack of rushes, crept along beside the bank, +the horse that drew it covered by a kind of knitted rug. When my lady +spoke next, it was abruptly. "Is it Anne?" she asked. + +I knew quite well what she meant, and blushed again. I shook my head. + +"I think it was going to be," she said sagely, "only Mistress Dymphna +came upon the scene. You have heard the story of the donkey halting +between two bundles of hay, Master Francis? And in the multitude of +sweethearts there is safety." + +"I do not think that was my case," I said. Instinctively my hand went +to my breast, in which Petronilla's velvet sword-knot lay safe and +warm. The Duchess saw the gesture and instantly bent forward and +mimicked it. "Ha! ha!" she cried, leaning back with her hands clasped +about her knees, and her eyes shining with fun and amusement. "Now I +understand. You have left her at home; now, do not deny it, or I will +tell the others. Be frank and I will keep your secret, on my honor." + +"She is my cousin," I said, my cheeks hot. + +"And her name?" + +"Petronilla." + +"Petronilla?" my lady repeated shrewdly. "That was the name of your +Spanish grandmother, then?" + +"Yes, madam." + +"Petronilla? Petronilla?" she repeated, stroking her cheek with her +hand. "She would be before my time, would she not? Yet there used to +be several Petronillas about the court in Queen Catherine of Aragon's +days, I remember. There was Petronilla de Vargas for one. But there, I +guess at random. Why do you not tell me more about yourself, Master +Francis? Do you not know me well enough now?" + +"There is nothing to tell, madam," I said in a low voice. + +"Your family? You come, I am sure, of a good house." + +"I did, but it is nothing to me now. I am cut off from it. I am +building my house afresh. And," I added bitterly, "I have not made +much way with it yet." + +She broke, greatly to my surprise, into a long peal of laughter. "Oh, +you vain boy!" she cried. "You valiant castle-builder! How long have +you been about the work? Three months? Do you think a house is to be +built in a day? Three months, indeed? Quite a lifetime!" + +Was it three months? It seemed to me to be fully three years. I seemed +to have grown more than three years older since that February morning +when I had crossed Arden Forest with the first light, and looked down +on Wootton Wawen sleeping in its vale, and roused the herons fishing +in the bottoms. + +"Come, tell me all about it!" she said abruptly. "What did you do to +be cut off?" + +"I cannot tell you," I answered. + +A shade of annoyance clouded her countenance. But it passed away +almost on the instant. "Very well," she said, with a little nod of +disdain and a pretty grimace. "So be it. Have your own way. But I +prophesy you will come to me with your tale some day." + +I went then and took Master Bertie's place at the tiller; and, he +lying down, I had the boat to myself until noon, and drew no little +pleasure from the placid picture which the moving banks and the wide +river presented. About noon there was a general uprising; and, coming +immediately afterward to a little island lying close to one bank, we +all landed to stretch our legs and refresh ourselves after the +confinement on board. + + +"We are over the border now and close to Emmerich," said Master +Lindstrom, "though the mere line of frontier will avail us little if +the Spanish soldiers can by hook or crook lay hands on us! Therefore, +we must lose no time in getting within the walls of some town. We +should be fairly secure for a few days either in Wesel or Santon." + +"I thought Wesel was the point we were making for," Master Bertie said +in some surprise. + +"It was Wesel I mentioned the other day," the Dutchman admitted +frankly. "And it is the bigger town and the stronger. But I have more +friends in Santon. To Wesel the road from Emmerich runs along the +right bank. To Santon we go by a cross-country road, starting from the +left bank opposite Emmerich, a road longer and more tedious. But we +are much less likely to be followed that way than along the Wesel +road, and on second thoughts I incline to Santon." + +"But why adopt either road? Why not go on by river?" I asked. + +"Because we should be overtaken. The wind is falling, and the boat," +our late host explained, more truly than politely, "with the women in +it is heavy." + +"I understand," I said. "And you feel sure we shall be pursued?" + +For answer he pointed with a smile to his plate-chest. "Quite sure," +he added. "With that before them they will think nothing of the +frontier. I fancy that for you, if the English Government be in +earnest, there will be no absolutely safe place short of the free city +of Frankfort. Unless indeed you have interest with the Duke of +Cleves." + +"Ah!" said the Duchess. And she looked at her husband. + +"Ah!" said Master Bertie, and he looked very blankly at his wife. So +that I did not derive much comfort from that suggestion. + +"Then it is Santon, is it?" said my lady. + +"That first, at any rate. Then, if they follow us along the Wesel +road, we shall still give them the slip." + +So it was settled, neither Van Tree nor the girls having taken any +part in the discussion. The former and Dymphna were talking aside, and +Mistress Anne was sitting low down on the bank, with her feet almost +in the water, immersed to all appearance in her own thoughts. There +was a little bustle as we rose to get into the boat, which we had +drawn up on the landward side of the island so as to be invisible from +the main channel; and in the middle of this I was standing with one +foot in the boat and one on shore, taking from Anne various articles +which we had landed for rearrangement, when she whispered to me that +she wanted to speak to me alone. + +"I want to tell you something," she said, raising her eyes to my face, +and then averting them. "Follow me this way." + +She strolled, as if accidentally, twenty or thirty paces along the +bank; and in a minute I joined her. I found her gazing down the river +in the direction from which we had come. "What is it?" I said +anxiously. "You do not see anything, do you?" For there had been a +hint of bad news in her voice. + +She dropped the hand with which she had been shading her eyes and +turned to me. "Master Francis, you will not think me very foolish?" +she said. Then I perceived that her lip was quivering and that there +were tears in her eyes. They were very beautiful eyes when, as now, +they grew soft, and appeal took the place of challenge. + +"What is it?" I replied, speaking cheerfully to reassure her. She had +scarcely got over her terror of last night. She trembled as she stood. + +"It is about Santon," she answered with a miserable little catch in +her voice. "I am so afraid of going there! Master Lindstrom says it is +a rough, long road, and when we are there we are not a bit farther +from those wretches than at Wesel, and--and----" + +"There, there!" I said. She was on the point of bursting into tears, +and was clearly much overwrought. "You are making the worst of it. If +it were not for Master Lindstrom I should be inclined to choose Wesel +myself. But he ought to know best." + +"But that is not all," she said, clasping her hands and looking up at +me with her face grown full of solemn awe; "I have had a dream." + +"Well, but dreams----" I objected. + +"You do not believe in dreams?" she said, dropping her head +sorrowfully. + +"No, no; I do not say that," I admitted, naturally startled. "But what +was your dream?" + +"I thought we took the road to Santon. And mind," she added earnestly, +"this was before Master Lindstrom had uttered a word about going that +way, or any other way save to Wesel. I dreamt that we followed the +road through such a dreadful flat country, a country all woods and +desolate moorland, under a gray sky, and in torrents of rain, to----" + +"Well, well?" I said, with a passing shiver at the picture. She +described it with a rapt, absent air, which made me creep--as if even +now she were seeing something uncanny. + +"And then I thought that in the middle of these woods, about half-way +to Santon, they overtook us, and there was a great fight." + +"There would be sure to be that!" I muttered, with shut teeth. + +"And I thought you were killed, and we women were dragged back! There, +I cannot tell you the rest!" she added wildly. "But try, try to get +them to go the old way. If not, I know evil will come of it. Promise +me to try?" + +"I will tell them your dream," I said. + +"No, no!" she exclaimed still more vehemently. "They would only laugh. +Madam does not believe in dreams. But they will listen to you if you +say you think the other way better. Promise me you will! Promise me!" +she pleaded, her hands clasping my arm, and her tearful eyes looking +up to mine. + +"Well," I agreed reluctantly, "I will try. After all, the shortest way +may be the best. But if I do," I said kindly, "you must promise me in +return not to be alarmed any longer, Anne." + +"I will try," she said gratefully; "I will indeed, Francis." + + +We were summoned at that minute, for the boat was waiting for us. The +Duchess scanned us rather curiously as we ran up--we were the last. +But Anne kept her word, and concealed her fears so bravely that, as +she jumped in from the bank, her air of gayety almost deceived me, and +would have misled the sharpest-sighted person who had not been present +at our interview, so admirably was it assumed. + +We calculated that our pursuers would not follow us down the river for +some hours. They would first have to search the island, and the watch +which they had set on the landing-stage would lead them to suspect +rather that we had fled by land. We hoped, therefore, to reach +Emmerich unmolested. There Master Lindstrom said we could get horses, +and he thought we might be safe in Santon by the following evening. + +"If you really think we had better go to Santon," I said. This was an +hour or two after leaving the island, and when we looked to sight +Emmerich very soon, the hills which we had seen in front all day, and +which were grateful to eyes sated with the monotony of Holland, being +now pretty close to us. + +"I thought that we had settled that," replied the Dutchman promptly. + +I felt they were all looking at me. "I look at it this way," I said, +reddening. "Wesel is not far from Emmerich by the road. Should we not +have an excellent chance of reaching it before our pursuers come up?" + +"You might reach it," Master Lindstrom said gravely. "Though, again, +you might not." + +"And, Wesel once reached," I persisted, "there is less fear of +violence being attempted there than in Santon. It is a larger town." + +"True," he admitted. "But it is just this. Will you be able to reach +Wesel? It is the getting there--that is the difficulty; the getting +there before you are caught." + +"If we have a good start, why should we not?" I urged; and urged it +the more persistently, the more I found them opposed to it. Naturally +there ensued a warm discussion. At first they all sided against me, +save of course Anne, and she sat silent, though she was visibly +agitated, as from minute to minute I or they seemed likely to prevail. +But presently when I grew warmer, and urged again and again the +strength of Wesel, my own party veered round, yet still with doubt and +misgiving. The Dutchman shrugged his shoulders to the end and remained +unpersuaded. But finally it was decided that I should have my own way. +We would go to Wesel. + + +Every one knows how a man feels when he comes victorious out of such a +battle. He begins on the instant to regret his victory, and to see the +possible evils which may result from it; to repent the hot words he +has used in the strife and the declarations he has flung broadcast. +That dreadful phrase, "I told you so!" rises like an avenging fury +before his fancy, and he quails. + +I felt all this the moment the thing was settled. But I was too young +to back out and withdraw my words. I hoped for the best, and resolved +inwardly to get the party mounted the moment we reached Emmerich. + +I soon had the opportunity of proving this resolution to be more +easily made than carried out. About three o'clock we reached the +little town dominated, as we saw from afar, by an ancient minster, +and, preferring not to enter it, landed at the steps of an inn a +quarter of a mile short of the gates, and marking a point where we +might take the road to Wesel, or, crossing the river, the road to +Santon. Master Lindstrom seemed well known, but there were +difficulties about the horses. The German landlord listened to his +story with apparent sympathy--but no horses! We could not understand +the tongue in which the two talked, but the Dutchman's questions, +quick and animated for once, and the landlord's slow replies, reminded +me of the foggy morning when in a similar plight we had urged the +master of the _Lion's Whelp_ to put to sea. And I feared a similar +result. + +"He says he cannot get so many horses to-night," said Master Lindstrom +with a long face. + +"Offer him more money!" quoth the Duchess. + +"If we cannot have horses until the morning, we may as well go on in +the boat," I urged. + +"He says, too, that the water is out on the road," continued the +Dutchman. + +"Nonsense! Double the price!" cried my lady impatiently. + +I suppose that this turned the scale. The landlord finally promised +that in an hour four saddle-horses for Master Bertie and the Duchess, +Anne and myself, should be ready, with a couple of pack-horses and a +guide. Master Lindstrom, his daughter, and Van Tree would start a +little later for Cleves, five miles on the road to Santon, if +conveyance could be got. "And if not," our late host added, as we said +something about our unwillingness to leave him in danger, "I shall be +safe enough in the town, but I hope to sleep in Cleves." + +It was all settled very hastily. We felt--and I in particular, since +my plan had been adopted--an unreasonable impatience to be off. As we +stood on the bank by the inn-door, we had a straight reach of river a +mile long in full view below us; and now we were no longer moving +ourselves, but standing still, expected each minute to see the Spanish +boat, with its crew of desperadoes, sweep round the corner before our +eyes. Master Lindstrom assured us that if we were once out of sight +our pursuers would get no information as to the road we had taken, +either from the inn-keeper or his neighbors. "There is no love lost +between them and the Spaniards," he said shrewdly. "And I know the +people here, and they know me. The burghers may not be very keen to +come to blows with the Spaniards or to resent their foray. But the +latter, on their part, will be careful not to go too far or to make +themselves obnoxious." + + +We took the opportunity of supping then, not knowing when we might get +food again. I happened to finish first, and, hearing the horses' +hoofs, went out and watched the lads who were to be our guides +fastening the baggage on the sumpter beasts. I gave them a hand--not +without a wince or two, for the wound in my chest was painful--and +while doing so had a flash of remembrance. I went to the unglazed +window of the kitchen in which the others sat, and leaned my elbows on +the sill. "I say!" I said, full of my discovery, "there is something +we have forgotten!" + +"What?" asked the Duchess, rising and coming toward me, while the +others paused in their meal to listen. + +"The letter to Mistress Clarence," I answered. "I was going to get it +when I was stabbed, you remember, and afterward we forgot all about +it. Now it is too late. It has been left behind." + +She did not answer then, but came out to me, and turned with me to +look at the horses. "This comes of your foolish scruples, Master +Francis!" she said severely. "Where was it?" + +"I slipped it between the leathers of the old haversack you gave me," +I answered, "which I used to have for a pillow. Van Tree brought my +things down, but overlooked the haversack, I suppose. At any rate, it +is not here." + +"Well, it is no good crying over spilt milk," she said. + +She called the others out then, and there was no mistaking Mistress +Anne's pleasure at escaping the Santon road. She was radiant, and +vouchsafed me a very pretty glance of thanks, in which her relief as +well as her gratitude shone clearly. By half-past four we had got, +wearied as we were, to horse, and with three hours of daylight before +us hoped to reach Wesel without mishap. But for most of us the start +was saddened by the parting--though we hoped it would be only for a +time--from our Dutch friends. We remembered how good and stanch they +had been to us. We feared--though Master Lindstrom would not hear of +it--that we had brought misfortune upon them, and neither the +Duchess's brave eyes nor Dymphna's blue ones were free from tears as +they embraced. I wrung Van Tree's hand as if I had known him for +months instead of days, for a common danger is a wondrous knitter of +hearts; and he only smiled--though Dymphna blushed--when I kissed her +cheek. A few broken words, a last cry of farewell, and we four, with +our two guides behind us, moved down the Wesel road, the last I heard +of our good friends being Master Lindstrom's charge, shouted after us, +"to beware of the water if it was out!" + + + + + CHAPTER XIII. + + A WILLFUL MAN'S WAY. + + +Only to feel that we were moving was a relief, though our march was +very slow. Master Bertie carried the child slung in a cloak before +him, and, thus burdened, could not well go beyond a smooth amble, +while the guides, who were on foot, and the pack-horses, found this +pace as much as they could manage. A little while and the exhilaration +of the start died away. The fine morning was followed by a wet +evening, and before we had left Emmerich three miles behind us Master +Bertie and I had come to look at one another meaningly. We were moving +in a dreary, silent procession through heavy rain, with the prospect +of the night closing in early. The road, too, grew more heavy with +each furlong, and presently began to be covered with pools of water. +We tried to avoid this inconvenience by resorting to the hill slopes +on our left, but found the attempt a waste of time, as a deep stream +or backwater, bordered by marshes, intervened. The narrow road, raised +but little above the level of the swiftly flowing river on our right, +turned out to be our only possible path; and when Master Bertie +discerned this his face grew more and more grave. + +We soon found, indeed, as we plodded along, that a sheet of water, +which palely reflected the evening light, was taking the place of the +road; and through this we had to plash and plash at a snail's pace, +one of the guides on a pack-horse leading the way, and Master Bertie +in charge of his wife coming next; then, at some distance, for her +horse did not take kindly to the water, the younger woman followed in +my care. The other guide brought up the rear. In this way, stopped +constantly by the fears of the horses, which were scared by the +expanse of flood before them, we crept wearily on until the moon rose. +It brought, alas, an access of light, but no comfort! The water seemed +continually to grow deeper, the current on our right swifter; and each +moment I dreaded the announcement that farther advance was impossible. + +It seemed to have come to that at last, for I saw the Duchess and her +husband stop and stand waiting for me, their dark shadows projected +far over the moonlit surface. + +"What is to be done?" Master Bertie called out, as we moved up to +them. "The guide tells me that there is a broken piece of road in +front which will be impassable with this depth of water." + +I had expected to hear this; yet I was so dumfoundered--for, this +being true, we were lost indeed--that for a time I could not answer. +No one had uttered a word of reproach, but I knew what they must be +thinking. I had brought them to this. It was my foolish insistence had +done it. The poor beast under me shivered. I struck him with my heels. +"We must go forward!" I said desperately. "Or what? What do you think? +Go back?" + +"Steady! steady, Master Knight Errant!" the Duchess cried in her calm, +brave voice. "I never knew you so bad a counselor before!" + +"It is my fault that you are here," I said, looking dismally around. + +"Perhaps the other road is as bad," Master Bertie replied. "At any +rate, that is past and gone. The question is, what are we to do now? +To remain here is to die of cold and misery. To go back may be to run +into the enemy's arms. To go forward----" + +"Will be to be drowned!" Mistress Anne cried with a pitiful sob. + +I could not blame her. A more gloomy outlook than ours, as we sat on +our jaded horses in the middle of this waste of waters, which appeared +in the moonlight to be boundless, could scarcely be imagined. The +night was cold for the time of year, and the keen wind pierced our +garments and benumbed our limbs. At any moment the rain might begin +afresh, and the moon be overcast. Of ourselves, we could not take a +step without danger, and our guides had manifestly lost their heads +and longed only to return. + +"Yet, I am for going forward," the Duchess urged. "If there be but +this one bad place we may pass it with care." + +"We may," her husband assented dubiously. "But suppose when we have +passed it we can go no farther. Suppose the----" + +"It is no good supposing!" she retorted with some sharpness. "Let us +cross this place first, Richard, and we will deal with the other when +we come to it." + +He nodded assent, and we moved slowly forward, compelling the guides +to go first. In this order we waded some hundred yards through water, +which grew deeper with each step, until it rose nearly to our girths. +Then the lads stopped. + +"Are we over?" said the Duchess eagerly. + +For answer one of them pointed to the flood before him, and peering +forward I made out a current sweeping silently and swiftly across our +path--a current with an ominous rush and swirl. + +"Over?" grunted Master Bertie. "No, this is the place. See, the road +has given way, and the stream is pouring through from the river. I +expect it is getting worse every minute as the banks crumble." + +We all craned forward, looking at it. It was impossible to say how +deep the water was, or how far the deep part might extend. And we had +with us a child and two women. + +"We must go back!" said Master Bertie resolutely. "There is no doubt +about it. The flood is rising. If we do not take care, we shall be cut +off, and be able to go neither backward nor forward. I cannot see a +foot of dry land, as it is, before or behind us." + +He was right. Far and wide, wherever our eyes could reach, the +moonlight was reflected in a sheet of water. We were nearly up to our +girths in water. On one side was the hurrying river, on the other were +the treacherous depths of the backwater. I asked the guide as well as +I could whether the road was good beyond. He answered that he did not +know. He and his companion were so terrified that we only kept them +beside us by threats. + +"I fear we must go back," I said, assenting sorrowfully. + +Even the Duchess agreed, and we were in the act of turning to +retrace our steps with what spirit we might, when a distant sound +brought us all to a standstill again. The wind was blowing from the +quarter whence we had come--from Emmerich; and it brought to us the +sound of voices. We all stopped to listen. Yes, they were voices we +heard--loud, strident tones, mingled now with the sullen plash of +horses tramping through the water. I looked at the Duchess. Her face +was pale, but her courage did not fail her. She understood in a trice +that the danger we had so much dreaded was upon us--that we were +followed, and the followers were at our heels; and she turned her +horse round again. Without a word she spurred it back toward the deep +part. I seized Anne's rein and followed, notwithstanding that the poor +girl in her terror would have resisted. Letting the guides go as they +pleased, we four in a moment found ourselves abreast again, our horses +craning over the stream, while we, with whip and spur, urged them on. + +In cold blood we should scarcely have done it. Indeed, for a minute, +as our steeds stumbled, and recovered themselves, and slid forward, +only to draw back trembling--as the water rose above our boots or was +flung by our fellows in our eyes, and all was flogging and scrambling +and splashing, it seemed as if we were to be caught in a trap despite +our resolve. But at last Master Bertie's horse took the plunge. His +wife's followed; and both, partly floundering and partly swimming, set +forward snorting the while in fear. To my joy I saw them emerge safely +not ten yards away, and, shaking themselves, stand comparatively high +out of the water. + +"Come!" cried my lady imperatively, as she turned in her saddle with a +gesture of defiance. "Come! It is all right." + +Come, indeed! I wanted nothing better, for I was beside myself with +passion. But, flog as I might, I could not get Anne's brute to take +the plunge. The girl herself could give me no aid; clinging to her +saddle, pale and half-fainting, she could only beg me to leave her, +crying out again and again in a terrified voice that she would be +drowned. With her cry there suddenly mingled another, the hail of our +pursuers as they sighted us. I could hear them drawing nearer, and I +grew desperate. Luckily they could not make any speed in water so +deep, and time was given me for one last furious effort. It succeeded. +My horse literally fell into the stream; it dragged Anne's after it. +How we kept our seats, how they their footing, I never understood; +but, somehow, splashing and stumbling and blinded by the water dashed +in our faces, we came out on the other side, where the Duchess and her +husband, too faithful to us to save themselves, had watched the +struggle in an agony of suspense. I did but fling the girl's rein to +Master Bertie; and then I wheeled my horse to the stream again. I had +made up my mind what I must do. "Go on," I cried, waving my hand with +a gesture of farewell. "Go on! I can keep them here for a while." + +"Nonsense!" I heard the Duchess cry, her voice high and shrill. "It +is----" + +"Go on!" I cried. "Go on! Do not lose a moment, or it will be +useless." + +Master Bertie hesitated. But he too saw that this was the only chance. +The Spaniards were on the brink of the stream now, and must, if they +passed it, overtake us easily. He hesitated, I have said, for a +moment. Then he seized his wife's rein and drew her on, and I heard +the three horses go splashing away through the flood. I threw a +glance at them over my shoulder, bethinking me that I had not told +the Duchess my story, and that Sir Anthony and Petronilla would +never--but, pish! What was I thinking of? That was a thought for a +woman. I had only to harden my heart now, and set my teeth together. +My task was very simple indeed. I had just to keep these men--there +were four--here as long as I could, and if possible to stop Clarence's +pursuit altogether. + +For I had made no mistake. The first man to come up was +Clarence--Clarence himself. He let fall a savage word as his horse +stopped suddenly with its fore feet spread out on the edge of the +stream, and his dark face grew darker as he saw the swirling eddies, +and me standing fronting him in the moonlight with my sword out. He +discerned at once, I think, the strength of my position. Where I stood +the water was scarcely over my horse's fetlocks. Where he stood it was +over his horse's knees. And between us it flowed nearly four feet +deep. + +He held a hasty parley with his companions. And then he hailed me. +"Will you surrender?" he cried in English. "We will give you quarter." + +"Surrender? To whom?" I said. "And why--why should I surrender? Are +you robbers and cutpurses?" + +"Surrender in the name of the Emperor, you fool!" he answered sternly +and roughly. + +"I know nothing about the Emperor!" I retorted. "What Emperor?" + +"In the Queen's name, then!" + +"The Duke of Cleves is queen here!" I cried. "And as the flood is +rising," I added scornfully, "I would advise you to go home again." + +"You would advise, would you? Who _are_ you?" he replied, in a kind of +wrathful curiosity. + +I gave him no answer. I have often since reflected, with a fuller +knowledge of certain facts, that no stranger interview ever took place +than this short colloquy between us, that no stranger fight ever was +fought than that which we contemplated as we stood there bathed in the +May moonlight, with the water all round us, and the cold sky above. A +strange fight indeed it would have been between him and me, had it +ever come to the sword's point! + +But this was what happened. His last words had scarcely rung out when +my horse began to quiver under me and sway backward and forward. I had +just time to take the alarm, when the poor beast sank down and rolled +gently over, leaving me bestriding its body, my feet in the water. +Whatever the cause of this, I had to disentangle myself, and that +quickly, for the four men opposite me, seeing me dismounted, plunged +with a cry of triumph into the water, and began to flounder across. +Without more ado I stepped forward to keep the ford. + +The foremost and nearest to me was Clarence, whose horse began, +half-way across, to swim. It was still scrambling to regain its +footing when it came within my reach, and I slashed it cruelly across +the nostrils. It turned in an instant on its side. I saw the rider's +face gleam white in the water; his stirrup shone a moment as the horse +rolled over, then in a second the two were gone down the stream. It +was done so easily, so quickly, it amazed me. One gone! hurrah! I +turned quickly to the others, who were about landing. My blood was +fired, and my yell of victory, as I dashed at them, scared back two of +the horses. Despite their riders' urging, they turned and scrambled +out on the side from which they had entered. Only one was left, the +farthest from me. He got across indeed. Yet he was the most unlucky of +all, for his horse stumbled on landing, came down heavily on its head, +and flung him at my very feet. + + +[Illustration: I LUNGED TWICE AT THE RIDER] + + +It was no time for quarter--I had to think of my friends--and while +with one hand I seized the flying rein as the horse scrambled +trembling to its feet, with the other I lunged twice at the rider as +he half tried to rise, half tried to grasp at me. The second time I +ran him through, and he screamed shrilly. In those days I was young +and hotheaded, and I answered only by a shout of defiance, as I flung +myself into the saddle and dashed away through the water after my +friends. + +_V[oe] victis!_ I had done enough to check the pursuit, and had yet +escaped myself. If I could join the others again, what a triumph it +would be! I had no guide, but neither had those in front of me; and +luckily at this point a row of pollard willows defined the line +between the road and the river. Keeping this on my right, I made good +way. The horse seemed strong under me, the water was shallow, and +appeared to be growing more so, and presently across the waste of +flood I discerned before me a dark, solitary tower, the tower +seemingly of a church, for it was topped by a stumpy spire, which +daylight would probably have shown to be of wood. + +There was a little dry ground round the church, a mere patch in a sea +of water, but my horse rang its hoofs on it with every sign of joy, +and arched its neck as it trotted up to the neighborhood of the +church, whinnying with pleasure. From the back of the building, I was +not surprised, came an answering neigh. As I pulled up, a man, his +weapon in his hand, came from the porch, and a woman followed him. I +called to them gayly. "I fancied you would be here the moment I saw +the church!" I said, sliding to the ground. + +"Thank Heaven you are safe!" the Duchess answered, and to my +astonishment she flung her arms round my neck and kissed me. "What has +happened?" she asked, looking in my eyes, her own full of tears. + +"I think I have stopped them," I answered, turning suddenly shy, +though, boylike, I had been longing a few minutes before to talk of my +victory. "They tried to cross, and----" + +I had not sheathed my sword. Master Bertie caught my wrist, and, +lifting the blade, looked at it. "So, so!" he said nodding. "Are you +hurt?" + +"Not touched!" I answered. Before more was said he compelled his wife +to go back into the porch. The wind blew keenly across the open +ground, and we were all wet and shivering. When we had fastened up the +horse we followed her. The door of the church was locked, it seemed, +and the porch afforded the best shelter to be had. Its upper part was +of open woodwork, and freely admitted the wind; but wide eaves +projected over these openings, and over the door, so that at least it +was dry within. By huddling together on the floor against the windward +side we got some protection. I hastily told what had happened. + +"So Clarence is gone!" My lady's voice as she said the words trembled, +but not in sorrow or pity as I judged. Rather in relief. Her dread and +hatred of the man were strange and terrible, and so seemed to me then. +Afterward, I learned that something had passed between them which made +almost natural such feelings on her part, and made natural also a +bitter resentment on his. But of that no more. "You are quite sure," +she said--pressing me anxiously for confirmation--"that it was he!" + +"Yes. But I am not sure that he is dead," I explained. + +"You seem to bear a charmed life yourself," she said. + +"Hush!" cried her husband quickly. "Do not say that to the lad. It is +unlucky. But do you think," he continued--the porch was in darkness, +and we could scarcely make out one another's faces--"that there is any +further chance of pursuit?" + +"Not by that party to-night," I said grimly. "Nor I think to-morrow." + +"Good!" he answered. "For I can see nothing but water ahead, and it +would be madness to go on by night without a guide. We must stay here +until morning, whatever the risk." + +He spoke gloomily--and with reason. Our position was a miserable, +almost a desperate one, even on the supposition that pursuit had +ceased. We had lost all our baggage, food, wraps. We had no guides, +and we were in the midst of a flooded country, with two tender women +and a baby, our only shelter the porch of God's house. Mistress Anne, +who was crouching in the darkest corner next the church, seemed to +have collapsed entirely. I remembered afterward that I did not once +hear her speak that night. The Duchess tried to maintain our spirits +and her own; but in the face of cold, damp, and hunger, she could do +little. Master Bertie and I took it by turns to keep a kind of watch, +but by morning--it was a long night and a bitter one--we were worn +out, and slept despite our misery. We should have been surprised and +captured without a blow if the enemy had come upon us then. + +I awoke with a start to find the gray light of a raw misty morning +falling upon and showing up our wretched group. The Duchess's head was +hidden in her cloak; her husband's had sunk on his breast; but +Mistress Anne--I looked at her and shuddered. Had she sat so all +night? Sat staring with that stony face of pain, and those tearless +eyes on the moonlight, on the darkness which had been before the dawn, +on the cold first rays of morning? Stared on all alike, and seen none? +I shuddered and peered at her, alarmed, doubtful, wondering, asking +myself what this was that had happened to her. Had fear and cold +killed her, or turned her brain? "Anne!" I said timidly. "Anne!" + +She did not answer nor turn; nor did the fixed gaze of her eyes waver. +I thought she did not hear. "Anne!" I cried again, so loudly that the +Duchess stirred, and muttered something in her sleep. But the girl +showed no sign of consciousness. I put out my hand and touched her. + +She turned sharply and saw me, and in an instant drew her skirt away +with a gesture of such dread, loathing repulsion as froze me; while a +violent shudder convulsed her whole frame. Afterward she seemed unable +to withdraw her eyes from me, but sat in the same attitude, gazing at +me with a fixed look of horror, as one might gaze at a serpent, while +tremor after tremor shook her. + +I was frightened and puzzled, and was still staring at her, wondering +what I had done, when a footstep fell on the road outside and called +away my attention. I turned from her to see a man's figure looming +dark in the doorway. He looked at us--I suppose he had found the +horses outside--gazing in surprise at the queer group. I bade him +good-morning in Dutch, and he answered as well as his astonishment +would let him. He was a short, stout fellow, with a big face, capable +of expressing a good deal of astonishment. He seemed to be a peasant +or farmer. "What do you here?" he continued, his guttural phrases +tolerably intelligible to me. + +I explained as clearly as I could that we were on the way to Wesel. +Then I awoke the Duchess and her husband, and stretching our chilled +and aching limbs, we went outside, the man still gazing at us. Alas! +the day was not much better than the night. We could see but a very +little way, a couple of hundred yards round us only. The rest was +mist--all mist. We appealed to the man for food and shelter, and he +nodded, and, obeying his signs rather than his words, we kicked up our +starved beasts and plodded out into the fog by his side. Anne mounted +silently and without objection, but it was plain that something +strange had happened to her. Her condition was unnatural. The Duchess +gazed at her very anxiously, and, getting no answers, or very scanty +ones, to her questions, shook her head gravely. + +But we were on the verge of one pleasure at least. When we reached the +hospitable kitchen of the farmhouse it was joy indeed to stand before +the great turf fire, and feel the heat stealing into our half-frozen +bodies; to turn and warm back and front, while the good wife set bread +and hot milk before us. How differently we three felt in half an hour! +How the Duchess's eyes shone once more! How easily rose the laugh to +our lips! Joy had indeed come with the morning. To be warm and dry and +well fed after being cold and wet and hungry--what a thing this is! + +But on one neither food nor warmth seemed to have any effect. Mistress +Anne did, indeed, in obedience to my lady's sharp words, raise her +bowl to her lips. But she set it down quickly and sat looking in dull +apathy at the glowing peat. What had come over her? + + +Master Bertie went out with the farmer to attend to the horses, and +when he came back he had news. + +"There is a lad here," he said in some excitement, "who has just seen +three foreigners ride past on the road, along with two Germans on +pack-horses; five in all. They must be three of the party who followed +us yesterday." + +I whistled. "Then Clarence got himself out," I said, shrugging my +shoulders. "Well! well!" + +"I expect that is so," Master Bertie answered, the Duchess remaining +silent. "The question arises again, what is to be done?" he continued. +"We may follow them to Wesel, but the good man says the floods are +deep between here and the town, and we shall have Clarence and his +party before us all the way--shall perhaps run straight into their +arms." + +"But what else can we do?" I said. "It is impossible to go back." + +We held a long conference, and by much questioning of our host learned +that half a league away was a ferry-boat, which could carry as many as +two horses over the river at a time. On the farther side we might hit +a road leading to Santon, three leagues distant. Should we go to +Santon after all? The farmer thought the roads on that side of the +river might not be flooded. We should then be in touch once more with +our Dutch friends and might profit by Master Lindstrom's advice, on +which I for one was now inclined to set a higher value. + +"The river is bank full. Are you sure the ferry-boat can cross?" I +asked. + +Our host was not certain. And thereupon an unexpected voice struck in. + +"Oh, dear, do not let us run any more risks!" it said. It was Mistress +Anne's. She was herself again, trembling, excited, bright-eyed; as +different as possible from the Anne of a few minutes before. A great +change had come over her. Perhaps the warmth had done it. + +A third course was suggested, to stay quietly where we were. The +farmhouse stood at some little distance from the road; and though it +was rough--it was very rough, consisting only of two rooms, in one of +which a cow was stalled--still it could furnish food and shelter. Why +not stay there? + +But the Duchess wisely, I think, decided against this. "It is +unpleasant to go wandering again," she said with a shiver. "But I +shall not rest until we are within the walls of a town. Master +Lindstrom laid so much stress on that. And I fancy that the party who +overtook us last night are not the main body. Others will have gone to +Wesel by boat perhaps, or along the other bank. There they will meet, +and, learning we have not arrived, they will probably return this way +and search for us." + +"Clarence----" + +"Yes, if we have Clarence to deal with," Master Bertie assented +gravely, "we cannot afford to lose a point. We will try the ferry." + +It was something gained to start dry and warm. But the women's pale +faces--for little by little the fatigue, the want of rest, the fear, +were telling even on the Duchess--were sad to see. I was sore and +stiff myself. The wound I had received so mysteriously had bled +afresh, probably during last night's fight. We needed all our courage +to put a brave face on the matter, and bear up and go out again into +the air, which for the first week in May was cold and nipping. +Suspense and anxiety had told in various ways on all of us. While I +felt a fierce anger against those who were driving us to these +straits. Master Bertie was nervous and excited, alarmed for his wife +and child, and inclined to see an enemy in every bush. + +However, we cheered up a little when we reached the ferry and found +the boat could cross without much risk. We had to go over in two +detachments, and it was nearly an hour past noon before we all stood +on the farther bank and bade farewell to the honest soul whose help +had been of so much importance to us. He told us we had three leagues +to go, and we hoped to be at rest in Santon by four o'clock. + +But the three leagues turned out to be more nearly five, while the +road was so founderous that we had again and again to quit it. + +The evening came on, the light waned, and still we were feeling our +way, so to speak--the women tired and on the verge of tears; the men +muddy to the waist, savage, and impatient. It was eight o'clock, and +dusk was well upon us before we caught sight of the first lights of +Santon, and in fear lest the gates might be shut, pressed forward at +such speed as our horses could compass. + +"Do you go on!" the Duchess adjured us. "Anne and I will be safe +enough behind you. Let me take the child, and do you ride on. We +cannot pass the night in the fields." + +The importance of securing admission was so great that Master Bertie +and I agreed; and cantered on, soon outstripping our companions, and +almost in the gloom losing sight of them. Dark masses of woods, the +last remnants, apparently, of a forest, lay about the road we had to +traverse. We were passing one of these, scarcely three hundred paces +short of the town, and I was turning in the saddle to see that the +ladies were following safely, when I heard Master Bertie, who was a +bow-shot in front of me, give a sudden cry. + +I wheeled round hastily to learn the reason, and was just in time to +see three horsemen sweep into the road before him from the cover of +the trees. They were so close to him--and they filled the road--that +his horse carried him amongst them almost before he could check it, or +so it seemed to me. I heard their loud challenge, saw his arm wave, +and guessed that his sword was out. I spurred desperately to join him, +giving a wild shout of encouragement as I did so. But before I could +come up, or indeed cross half the distance, the scuffle was over. One +man fell headlong from his saddle, one horse fled riderless down the +road, and at sight of this, or perhaps of me, the others turned tail +without more ado and made off, leaving Master Bertie in possession of +the field. The whole thing had passed in the shadow of the wood in +less than half a minute. When I drew rein by him he was sheathing his +sword. "Is it Clarence?" I cried eagerly. + +"No, no; I did not see him. I think not," he answered. He was +breathing hard and was very much excited. "They were poor swordsmen, +for Spaniards," he added--"very poor, I thought." + +I jumped off my horse, and, kneeling beside the man, turned him over. +He was badly hurt, if not dying, cut across the neck. He looked hard +at him by such light as there was, and did not recognize him as one of +our assailants of the night before. + +"I do not think he is a Spaniard," I said slowly. Then a certain +suspicion occurred to my mind, and I stooped lower over him. + +"Not a Spaniard?" Master Bertie said stupidly. "How is that?" + +Before I answered I raised the man in my arms, and, carrying him +carefully to the side of the road, set him with his back to a tree. +Then I got quickly on my horse. The women were just coming up. "Master +Bertie," I said in a low voice, as I looked this way and that to see +if the alarm had spread, "I am afraid there is a mistake. But say +nothing to them. It is one of the town-guard you have killed!" + +"One of the town-guard!" he cried, a light bursting in on him, and +the reins dropping from his hand. "What shall we do? We are lost, man!" + + + + + CHAPTER XIV. + + AT BAY IN THE GATEHOUSE. + + +What was to be done? That was the question, and a terrible question it +was. Behind us we had the inhospitable country, dark and dreary, the +night wind sweeping over it. In front, where the lights twinkled and +the smoke of the town went up, we were like to meet with a savage +reception. And it was no time for weighing alternatives. The choice +had to be made, made in a moment; I marvel to this day at the +quickness with which I made it for good or ill. + +"We must get into the town!" I cried imperatively. "And before the +alarm is given. It is hopeless to fly, Master Bertie, and we cannot +spend another night in the fields. Quick, madam!" I continued to the +Duchess, as she came up. I did not wait to hear his opinion, for I saw +he was stunned by the catastrophe. "We have hurt one of the town-guard +through a mistake. We must get through the gate before it is +discovered!" + +I seized her rein and flogged up her horse, and gave her no time to +ask questions, but urged on the party at a hand gallop until the gate +was reached. The attempt, I knew, was desperate, for the two men who +had escaped had ridden straight for the town; but I saw no other +resource, and it seemed to me to be better to surrender peaceably, if +that were possible, than to expose the women to another night of such +cold and hunger as the last. And fortune so far favored us that when +we reached the gate it was open. Probably, the patrol having ridden +through to get help, no one had thought fit to close it; and, no one +withstanding us, we spurred our sobbing horses under the archway and +entered the street. + +It was a curious entry, and a curious scene we came upon. I remember +now how strange it all looked. The houses, leaning forward in a dozen +quaint forms, clear cut against the pale evening sky, caused a +darkness as of a cavern in the narrow street below. Here and there in +the midst of this darkness hung a lantern, which, making the gloom +away from it seem deeper, lit up the things about it, throwing into +flaring prominence some barred window with a scared face peering from +it, some corner with a puddle, a slinking dog, a broken flight of +steps. Just within the gate stood a brazier full of glowing coal, and +beside it a halbert rested against the wall. I divined that the +watchman had run into the town with the riders, and I drew rein in +doubt, listening and looking. I think if we had ridden straight on +then, all might have been well; or, at least, we might have been +allowed to give ourselves up. + +But we hesitated a moment, and were lost. No doubt, though we saw but +one, there were a score of people watching us, who took us for four +men, Master Bertie and I being in front; and these, judging from the +boldness of our entry that there were more behind, concluded that this +was a foray upon the town. At any rate, they took instant advantage of +our pause. With a swift whir an iron pot came hurtling past me, and, +missing the Duchess by a hand's-breadth, went clanking under the +gatehouse. That served for a signal. In a moment an alarm of hostile +cries rose all round us. An arrow whizzed between my horse's feet. +Half a dozen odd missiles, snatched up by hasty hands, came raining in +on us out of the gloom. The town seemed to be rising as one man. A +bell began to ring, and a hundred yards in front, where the street +branched off to right and left, the way seemed suddenly alive from +wall to wall with lights and voices and brandished arms, the gleam of +steel, and the babel of a furious crowd--a crowd making down toward us +with a purpose we needed no German to interpret. + + +It was a horrible moment; the more horrible that I had not expected +this fury, and was unnerved as well as taken aback by it. Remembering +that I had brought my companions here, and that two were women, one +was a child, I quailed. How could I protect them? There was no +mistaking the stern meaning of those cries, of that rage so much +surpassing anything I had feared. Though I did not know that the man +we had struck down was a bridegroom, and that there were those in the +crowd in whose ears the young wife's piercing scream still rang, I yet +quailed before their yells and curses. + +As I glanced round for a place of refuge, my eyes lit on an open +doorway close to me, and close also to the brazier and halbert. It was +a low stone doorway, beetle-browed, with a coat of arms carved over +it. I saw in an instant that it must lead to the tower above us--the +gatehouse; and I sprang from my horse, a fresh yell from the houses +hailing the act. I saw that, if we were to gain a moment for +parleying, we must take refuge there. I do not know how I did it, but +somehow I made myself understood by the others and got the women off +their horses and dragged Mistress Anne inside, where at once we both +fell in the darkness over the lower steps of a spiral staircase. This +hindered the Duchess, who was following, and I heard a scuffle taking +place behind us. But in that confined space--the staircase was very +narrow--I could give no help. I could only stumble upward, dragging +the fainting girl after me, until we emerged through an open doorway +at the top into a room. What kind of room I did not notice then, only +that it was empty. Notice! It was no time for taking notice. The bell +was clanging louder and louder outside. The mob were yelling like +hounds in sight of their quarry. The shouts, the confused cries, and +threats, and questions deafened me. I turned to learn what was +happening behind me. The other two had not come up. + +I felt my way down again, one hand on the central pillar, my shoulder +against the outside wall. The stair-foot was faintly lit by the glow +from outside, and on the bottom step I came on some one, hurt or dead, +just a dark mass at my feet. It was Master Bertie. I gave a cry and +leaped over his body. The Duchess, brave wife, was standing before +him, the halbert which she had snatched up presented at the doorway +and the howling mob outside. + +Fortunately the crowd had not yet learned how few we were; nor saw, I +think, that it was but a woman who confronted them. To rush into the +low doorway and storm the narrow winding staircase in the face of +unknown numbers was a task from which the bravest veterans might have +flinched, and the townsfolk, furious as they were, hung back. I took +advantage of the pause. I grasped the halbert myself and pushed the +Duchess back. "Drag him up!" I muttered. "If you cannot manage it, +call Anne!" + +But grief and hard necessity gave her strength, and, despite the noise +in front of me, I heard her toil panting up with her burden. When I +judged she had reached the room above, I too turned and ran up after +her, posting myself in the last angle just below the room. There I was +sheltered from missiles by the turn in the staircase, and was further +protected by the darkness. Now I could hold the way with little risk, +for only one could come up at a time, and he would be a brave man who +should storm the stairs in my teeth. + +All this, I remember, was done in a kind of desperate frenzy, in haste +and confusion, with no plan or final purpose, but simply out of the +instinct of self-preservation, which led me to do, from moment to +moment, what I could to save our lives. I did not know whether there +was another staircase to the tower, nor whether there were enemies +above us; whether, indeed, enemies might not swarm in on us from a +dozen entrances. I had no time to think of more than just this; that +my staircase, of which I did know, must be held. + +I think I had stood there about a minute, breathing hard and listening +to the din outside, which came to my ears a little softened by the +thick walls round me--so much softened, at least, that I could hear my +heart beating in the midst of it--when the Duchess came back to the +door above. I could see her, there being a certain amount of light in +the room behind her, but she could not see me. "What can I do?" she +asked softly. + +I answered by a question. "Is he alive?" I muttered. + +"Yes; but hurt," she answered, struggling with a sob, with a +fluttering of the woman's heart she had repressed so bravely. "Much +hurt, I fear! Oh, why, why did we come here?" + +She did not mean it as a reproach, but I took it as one, and braced +myself more firmly to meet this crisis--to save her at least if it +should be any way possible. When she asked again "Can I do anything?" +I bade her take my pike and stand where I was for a moment. Since no +enemy had yet made his appearance above, the strength of our position +seemed to hold out some hope, and it was the more essential that I +should understand it and know exactly what our chances were. + + +I sprang up the stairs into the room and looked round, my eyes seeming +to take in everything at once. It was a big bare room, with signs of +habitation only in one corner. On the side toward the town was a long, +low window, through which--a score of the diamond panes were broken +already--the flare of the besiegers' torches fell luridly on the walls +and vaulted roof. By the dull embers of a wood fire, over which hung a +huge black pot, Master Bertie was lying on the boards, breathing +loudly and painfully, his head pillowed on the Duchess's kerchief. +Beside him sat Mistress Anne, her face hidden, the child wailing in +her lap. A glance round assured me that there was no other staircase, +and that on the side toward the country, the wall was pierced with no +window bigger than a loophole or an arrow-slit; with no opening which +even a boy could enter. For the present, therefore, unless the top of +the tower should be escaladed from the adjacent houses--and I could do +nothing to provide against that--we had nothing to fear except from +the staircase and the window I have mentioned. Every moment, however, +a missile or a shot crashed through the latter, adding the shiver of +falling glass to the general din. No wonder the child wailed and the +girl sank over it in abject terror. Those savage yells might well make +a woman blench. They carried more fear and dread to my heart than did +the real danger of our position, desperate as it was. + +And yet it was so desperate that, for a moment, I leant against the +wall dazed and hopeless, listening to the infernal tumult without and +within. Had Bertie been by my side to share the responsibility and +join in the risk, I could have borne it better. I might have felt then +some of the joy of battle, and the stern pleasure of the one matched +against the many. But I was alone. How was I to save these women and +that poor child from the yelling crew outside? How indeed? I did not +know the enemy's language; I could not communicate with him, could not +explain, could not even cry for quarter for the women. + + +A stone which glanced from one of the mullions and grazed my shoulder +roused me from this fit of cowardice, which, I trust and believe, had +lasted for a few seconds only. At the same moment an unusual volley of +missiles tore through the window as if discharged at a given signal. +We were under cover, and they did us no harm, rolling for the most +part noisily about the floor. But when the storm ceased and a calm as +sudden followed, I heard a dull, regular sound close to the window--a +thud! thud! thud!--and on the instant divined the plan and the danger. +My courage came back and with it my wits. I remembered an old tale +I had heard, and, dropping my sword where I stood, I flew to the +hearth, and unhooked the great pot. It was heavy; half full of +something--broth, most likely; but I recked nothing of that, I bore it +swiftly to the window, and just as the foremost man on the ladder had +driven in the lead work before him with his ax, flung the whole of the +contents--they were not scalding, but they were very hot--in his face. +The fellow shrieked loudly, and, blinded and taken by surprise, lost +his hold and fell against his supporter, and both tumbled down again +more quickly than they had come up. + +Sternly triumphant, I poised the great pot itself in my hands, +thinking to fling it down upon the sea of savage upturned faces, of +which I had a brief view, as the torches flared now on one, now on +another. But prudence prevailed. If no more blood were shed it might +still be possible to get some terms. I laid the pot down by the side +of the window as a weapon to be used only in the last resort. + +Meanwhile the Duchess, posted in the dark, had heard the noise of the +window being driven in, and cried out pitifully to know what it was. +"Stand firm!" I shouted loudly. "Stand firm. We are safe as yet." + +Even the uproar without seemed to abate a little as the first fury of +the mob died down. Probably their leaders were concerting fresh +action. I went and knelt beside Master Bertie and made a rough +examination of his wound. He had received a nasty blow on the back of +the head, from which the blood was still oozing, and he was +insensible. His face looked very long and thin and deathlike. But, so +far as I could ascertain, the bones were uninjured, and he was now +breathing more quietly. "I think he will recover," I said, easing his +clothes. + +Anne was crouching on the other side of him. As she did not answer I +looked up at her. Her lips were moving, but the only word I caught was +"Clarence!" I did not wonder she was distraught; I had work enough to +keep my own wits. But I wanted her help, and I repeated loudly, "Anne! +Anne!" trying to rouse her. + +She looked past me shuddering. "Heaven forgive you!" she muttered. +"You have brought me to this! And now I must die! I must die here. In +the net they have set for others is their own foot taken!" + +She was quite beside herself with terror. I saw that she was not +addressing me; and I had not time to make sense of her wanderings. I +left her and went out to speak to the Duchess. Poor woman! even her +brave spirit was giving way. I felt her cold hands tremble as I took +the halbert from her. "Go into the room a while," I said softly. "He +is not seriously hurt, I am sure. I will guard this. If any one +appears at the window, scream." + +She went gladly, and I took her place, having now to do double duty. I +had been there a few minutes only, listening, with my soul in my ears, +to detect the first signs of attack, either below me or in the room +behind, when I distinguished a strange rustling sound on the +staircase. It appeared to come from a point a good deal below me, and +probably, whoever made it was just within the doorway. I peered into +the gloom, but could see no one as yet. "Stand!" I cried in a tone of +warning. "Who is that?" + +The sound ceased abruptly, but it left me uneasy. Could they be going +to blow us up with gunpowder? No! I did not think so. They would not +care to ruin the gateway for the sake of capturing so small a party. +And the tower was strong. It would not be easy to blow it up. + +Yet in a short time the noise began again; and my fears returned with +it. "Stand!" I cried savagely, "or take care of yourself." + +The answer was a flash of bright light--which for a second showed the +rough stone walls winding away at my feet--a stunning report, and the +pattering down of half a dozen slugs from the roof. I laughed, my +first start over. "You will have to come a little higher up!" I cried +tauntingly, as I smelt the fumes. My eyes had become so accustomed to +the darkness that I felt sure I should detect an assailant, however +warily he might make his approach. And my halbert was seven feet long, +so that I could reach as far as I could see. I had had time, too, to +grow cool. + +After this there was comparative quiet for another space. Every now +and then a stone or, more rarely, the ball of an arquebuse would come +whizzing into the room above. But I did not fear this. It was easy to +keep under cover. And their shouting no longer startled me. I began to +see a glimpse of hope. It was plain that the townsfolk were puzzled +how to come at us without suffering great loss. They were unaware of +our numbers, and, as it proved, believed that we had three uninjured +men at least. The staircase was impracticable as a point of assault, +and the window, being only three feet in height and twenty from the +ground, was not much better, if defended, as they expected it would +be, by a couple of desperate swordsmen. + + +I was not much astonished, therefore, when the rustling sound, +beginning again at the foot of the staircase, came this time to no +more formidable issue than a hail in Spanish. "Will you surrender?" +the envoy cried. + +"No!" I said roundly. + +"Who are you?" was the next question. + +"We are English!" I answered. + +He went then; and there for the time the negotiations ended. But, +seeing the dawn of hope, I was the more afraid of any trap or +surprise, and I cried to the Duchess to be on her guard. For this +reason, too, the suspense of the next few minutes was almost more +trying than anything which had gone before. But the minutes came at +last to an end. A voice below cried loudly in English, "Holloa! are +you friends?" + +"Yes, yes," I replied joyfully, before the words had well ceased to +rebound from the walls. For the voice and accent were Master +Lindstrom's. A cry of relief from the room behind me showed that +there, too, the speaker was recognized. The Duchess came running to +the door, but I begged her to go back and keep a good lookout. And she +obeyed. + +"How come you here? How has it happened?" Master Lindstrom asked, his +voice, though he still remained below, betraying his perplexity and +unhappiness. "Can I not do something? This is terrible, indeed." + +"You can come up, if you like," I answered, after a moment's thought. +"But you must come alone. And I cannot let even you, friend as you +are, see our defenses." + +As he came up I stepped back and drew the door of the room toward me, +so that, though a little light reached the head of the stairs, he +could not, standing there, see into the room or discern our real +weakness. I did not distrust him--Heaven forbid! but he might have to +tell all he saw to his friends below, and I thought it well, for his +sake as well as our own, that he should be able to do this freely, and +without hurting us. As he joined me I held up a finger for silence and +listened keenly. But all was quiet below. No one had followed him. +Then I turned and warmly grasped his hands, and we peered into one +another's faces. I saw he was deeply moved; that he was thinking of +Dymphna, and how I had saved her. He held my hands as though he would +never loose them. + +"Well!" I said, as cheerfully as I could, "have you brought us an +offer of terms? But let me tell you first," I continued, "how it +happened." And I briefly explained that we had mistaken the captain of +the guard and his two followers for Clarence and the two Spaniards. +"Is he dead?" I continued. + +"No, he is still alive," Master Lindstrom answered gravely. "But the +townsfolk are furious, and the seizure of the tower has still further +exasperated them. Why did you do it?" + +"Because we should have been torn to pieces if we had not done it," I +answered dryly. "You think we are in a strait place?" + +"Do you not think so yourself?" he said, somewhat astonished. + +I laughed. "That is as may be," I answered with an affectation of +recklessness. "The staircase is narrow and the window low. We shall +sell our lives dearly, my friend. Yet, for the sake of the women who +are with us, we are willing to surrender if the citizens offer us +terms. After all, it was an accident. Cannot you impress this on +them?" I added eagerly. + +He shook his head. "They will not hear reason," he said. + +"Then," I replied, "impress the other thing upon them. Tell them that +our swords are sharp and we are desperate." + +"I will see what I can do," he answered slowly. "The Duke of Cleves is +expected here to-morrow, and the townsfolk feel they would be +disgraced forever if he should find their gate held by a party of +marauders, as they consider you." + +"The Duke of Cleves?" I repeated. "Perhaps he may be better affected +toward us." + +"They will overpower you before he comes," Master Lindstrom answered +despondently. "I would put no trust in him if I were you. But I will +go to them, and, believe me, I will do all that man can do." + +"Of that I am sure," I said warmly. And then, cautioning me to remain +strictly on the defensive, he left me. + + +Before his footsteps had ceased to echo on the stairs the door beside +me opened, and Mistress Anne appeared at it. I saw at once that his +familiar voice had roused her from the stupor of fear in which I had +last seen her. Her eyes were bright, her whole frame was thrilling +with excitement, hope, suspense. I began to understand her; to discern +beneath the disguise thrown over it in ordinary times by a strong +will, the nervous nature which was always confident or despairing, +which felt everything so keenly--everything, that is, which touched +itself. "Well?" she cried, "well?" + +"Patience! patience!" I replied rather sharply. I could not help +comparing her conduct with that of the Duchess, and blaming her, not +for her timidity, but for the selfishness which she had betrayed in +her fear. I could fancy Petronilla trembling and a coward, but not +despairing nor utterly cast down, nor useless when others needed her, +nor wrapped in her own terrors to the very exclusion of reason. +"Patience!" I said; "he is coming back. He and his friends will do all +they can for us. We must wait a while and hope, and keep a good +lookout." + +She had her hand on the door, and by an abrupt movement, she slipped +out to me and closed it behind her. This made the staircase so dark +that I could no longer distinguish her face, but I judged from her +tone that her fears were regaining possession of her. "Clarence," she +muttered, her voice low and trembling. "Have you thought of him? Could +not he help us? He may have followed us here, and may be here now. +Now! And perhaps he does not know in what danger we are." + +"Clarence!" I said, astonished and almost angry. "Clarence help us? Go +back, girl, go back. You are mad. He would be more likely to complete +our ruin. Go in and nurse the baby!" I added bitterly. + +What could she mean, I asked myself, when she had gone in. Was there +anything in her suggestion? Would Clarence follow us hither? If so, +and if he should come in time, would he have power to help us, using +such mysterious influence, Spanish or English, as he seemed to +possess? And if he could help us, would it be better to fall into his +hands than into those of the exasperated Santonese? I thought the +Duchess would say "No!" + +So it mattered not what I answered myself. I hoped, now Master +Lindstrom had appeared, that the women would be allowed to go free; +and it seemed to me that to surrender to Clarence would be to hand +over the Duchess to her enemy simply that the rest of us might escape. + +Master Lindstrom returned while I was still considering this, and, +observing the same precautions as before, I bade him join me. "Well?" +I said, not so impetuously, I hope, as Mistress Anne, yet I dare say +with a good deal of eagerness. "Well, what do they say?" For he was +slow to speak. + +"I have bad news," he answered gently. + +"Ah!" I ejaculated, a lump which was due as much to rage as to any +other emotion rising in my throat. "So they will give us no terms? +Then so be it! Let them come and take us." + +"Nay," he hastened to answer. "It is not so bad as that, lad. They are +fathers and husbands themselves, and not lanzknechts. They will suffer +the women to go free, and will even let me take charge of them if +necessary." + +"They will!" I exclaimed, overjoyed. I wondered why on earth he had +hesitated to tell me this. "Why, that is the main point, friend." + +"Yes," he said gravely, "perhaps so. More, the men may go too, if the +tower be surrendered within an hour. With one exception, that is. The +man who struck the blow must be given up." + +"The man who struck the blow!" I repeated slowly. "Do you mean--you +mean the man who cut the patrol down?" + +"Yes," he said. He was peering very closely at me, as though he would +learn from my face who it was. And I stood thinking. This was as much +as we could expect. I divined, and most truly, that but for the honest +Dutchman's influence, promises, perhaps bribes, such terms would never +have been offered to us by the men who hours before had driven us to +hold as if we had been vermin. Yet give up Master Bertie? "What," I +said, "will be done to him? The man who must be given up, I mean?" +Master Lindstrom shook his head. "It was an accident," I urged, my +eyes on his. + +He grasped my hand firmly, and, turning away his face, seemed for a +while unable to speak. At last he whispered, "He must suffer for the +others, lad. I fear so. It is a hard fate, a cruel fate. But I can do +no more. They will not hear me on this. It is true he will be first +tried by the magistrate, but there is no hope. They are very hard." + +My heart sank. I stood irresolute, pondering on what we ought to do, +pondering on what I should say to the wife who so loved the man who +must die. What could I say? Yet, somehow I must break the news. I +asked Master Lindstrom to wait where he was while I consulted the +others, adding, "You will answer for it that there will be no attack +while you are here, I suppose?" + +"I will," he said. I knew I could trust him, and I went in to the +Duchess, closing the door behind me. A change had come over the room +since I had left it. The moon had risen and was flinging its cold +white light through the twisted and shattered framework of the window, +to fall in three bright panels on the floor. The torches in the street +had for the most part burned out, or been extinguished. In place of +the red glare, the shouts and the crash of glass, the atmosphere of +battle and strife I had left, I found this silvery light and a +stillness made more apparent by the distant hum of many voices. + +Mistress Anne was standing just within the threshold, her face showing +pale against the gloom, her hands clasped. The Duchess was kneeling by +her husband, but she looked up as I entered. + +"They will let us all go," I said bluntly; it was best to tell the +tale at once--"except the one who hurt the patrol, that is." + +It was strange how differently the two women received the news; while +Mistress Anne flung her hands to her face with a sobbing cry of +thankfulness, and leaned against the wall crying and shaking, my lady +stood up straight and still, breathing hard but saying nothing. I saw +that she did not need to ask what would be done to the one who was +excepted. She knew. "No," she murmured at last, her hands pressed to +her bosom, "we cannot do it! Oh, no, no!" + +"I fear we must," I said gently--calmly, too, I think. Yet in saying +it I was not quite myself. An odd sensation was growing upon me in the +stillness of the room. I began on a sudden, I did not know why, to +thrill with excitement, to tremble with nervousness, such as would +rather have become one of the women than a man. My head grew hot, my +heart began to beat quickly. I caught myself looking out, listening, +waiting for something to happen, something to be said. It was +something more terrible, as it seemed to me, than the din and crash of +the worst moments of the assault. What was it? What was it that was +threatening my being? An instant and I knew. + +"Oh, no, never!" cried the Duchess again, her voice quivering, her +face full of keenest pain. "We will not give you up. We will stand or +fall together, friend." + +Give _you_ up! Give _you_ up! Ha! The veil was lifted now, and I saw +what the something with the cold breath going before it was. I looked +quietly from her to her husband; and I asked--I fancy she thought my +question strangely irrelevant at that moment, "How is he? Is he +better?" + +"Much better. He knew me for a moment," she answered. "Then he seemed +to sink away again. But his eyes were quite clear." + +I stood gazing down at his thin face, which had ever looked so kindly +into mine. My fingers played idly with the knot of my sword. "He will +live?" I asked abruptly, harshly. + +She started at the sudden question. But, brutal as it must have +sounded, she was looking at me in pity so great and generous that it +did not wound her. "Oh, yes," she said, her eyes still clinging to me. +"I think he will live, thank Heaven!" + +Thank Heaven! Ah, yes, thank Heaven! + +I turned and went slowly toward the door. But before I reached it she +was at my side, nay, was on her knees by me, clasping my hand, looking +up to me with streaming eyes. "What are you going to do?" she cried, +reading, I suppose, something in my face. + +"I will see if Master Lindstrom cannot get better terms for us," I +answered. + +She rose, still detaining me. "You are sure?" she said, still eying me +jealously. + +"Quite sure," I answered, forcing a smile. "I will come back and +report to you." + +She let me go then, and I went out and joined Lindstrom on the +staircase. + +"Are you certain," I asked, speaking in a whisper, "that they +will--that the town will keep its word and let the others go?" + +"I am quite sure of it," he replied nodding. "They are Germans, and +hard and pitiless, but you may trust them. So far I will answer for +them." + +"Then we accept," I said gravely. "I give myself up. Let them take +me." + + + + + CHAPTER XV. + + BEFORE THE COURT. + + +I had not seen the first moonbeams pierce the broken casement of the +tower-room, but I was there to watch the last tiny patch of silver +glide aslant from wall to sill, and sill to frame, and so pass out. +Near the fire, which had been made up, and now glowed and crackled +bravely on the hearthstone at my elbow, my three jailers had set a +mattress for me; and on this I sat, my back to the wall and my face to +the window. The guards lounged on the other side of the hearth round a +lantern, playing at dice and drinking. They were rough, hard men, +whose features, as they leaned over the table and the light played +strongly on their faces, blazoning them against a wall of shadow, were +stern and rugged enough. But they had not shown themselves unkindly. +They had given me a share of their wine, and had pointed to the window +and shrugged their shoulders, as much as to say that it was my own +fault if I suffered from the draught. Nay, from time to time, one of +them would turn from his game and look at me--in pity, I think--and +utter a curse that was meant for encouragement. + +Even when the first excitement had passed away, I felt none of the +stupefaction which I have heard that men feel in such a position. My +brain was painfully active. In vain I longed to sleep, if it were only +that I might not be thought to fear death. But the fact that I was to +be tried first, though the sentence was a certainty, distracted and +troubled me. My thoughts paced from thing to thing; now dwelling on +the Duchess and her husband, now flitting to Petronilla and Sir +Anthony, to the old place at home and the servants; to strange petty +things, long familiar--a tree in the chase at Coton, an herb I had +planted. Once a great lump rose in my throat, and I had to turn away +to hide the hot tears that would rise at the thought that I must die +in this mean German town, in this unknown corner, and be buried and +forgotten! And once, too, to torment me, there rose a doubt in my mind +whether Master Bertie would recover; whether, indeed, I had not thrown +my life away for nothing. But it was too late to think of that! And +the doubt, which the Evil One himself must have suggested, so terrible +was it passed away quickly. + +My thoughts raced, but the night crawled. We had surrendered about +ten, and the magistrates, less pitiful than the jailers, had forbidden +my friends to stay with me. An hour or more after midnight, two of the +men lay down and the other sat humming a drinking-song, or at +intervals rose to yawn and stretch himself and look out of the window. +From time to time, the cry of the watchman going his rounds came +drearily to my ears, recalling to me the night I had spent behind the +boarding in Moorgate Street, when the adventure which was to end +to-morrow--nay, to-day--in a few hours--had lured me away. To-day? Was +I to die to-day? To perish with all my plans, hopes, love? It seemed +impossible. As I gazed at the window, whose shape began to be printed +on my brain, it seemed impossible. My soul so rose in rebellion +against it, that the perspiration stood on my brow, and I had to clasp +my hands about my knees, and strain every muscle to keep in the cry I +would have uttered! a cry, not of fear, but of rage and remonstrance +and revolt. + +I was glad to see the first streaks of dawn, to hear the first +cock-crowings, and, a few minutes later, the voices of men in the +street and on the stairs. The sounds of day and life acted magically +upon me. The horror of the night passed off as does the horror of a +dream. When a man, heavily cloaked and with his head covered, came in, +the door being shut behind him by another hand, I looked up at him +bravely. The worst was past. + +He replied by looking down at me for a few moments without disclosing +himself, the collar of his cloak being raised so high that I could see +nothing of his features. My first notion that he must be Master +Lindstrom passed away; and, displeased by his silent scrutiny, and +thinking him a stranger, I said sharply, "I hope you are satisfied, +sir." + +"Satisfied?" he replied, in a voice which made me start so that the +irons clanked on my feet, "Well, I think I should be--seeing you so, +my friend!" + +It was Clarence! Of all men, Clarence! I knew his voice, and he, +seeing himself recognized, lowered his cloak. I stared at him in +stupefied silence, and he at me in a grim curiosity. I was not +prepared for the blunt abruptness with which he continued--using +almost the very words he had used when face to face with me in the +flood: "Now tell me who you are, and what brought you into this +company?" + +I gave him no answer. I still stared at him in silence. + +"Come!" he continued, his hawk's eyes bent on my face, "make a clean +breast of it, and perhaps--who knows? I may help you yet, lad. You +have puzzled and foiled me, and I want to understand you. Where did my +lady pick you up just when she wanted you? I had arranged for every +checker on the board except you. Who are you?" + +This time I did answer him--by a question. "How many times have we +met?" I asked. + +"Three," he said readily, "and the last time you nearly rid the world +of me. Now the luck is against you. It generally is in the end against +those who thwart me, my friend." He chuckled at the conceit, and I +read in his face at once his love of intrigue and his vanity. "I come +uppermost, as always." + +I only nodded. + +"What do you want?" I asked. I felt a certain expectation. He wanted +something. + +"First, to know who you are." + +"I shall not tell you!" I answered. + +He smiled dryly, sitting opposite to me. He had drawn up a stool, and +made himself comfortable. He was not an uncomely man as he sat there +playing with his dagger, a dubious smile on his lean, dark face. +Unwarned, I might have been attracted by the masterful audacity, the +intellect as well as the force which I saw stamped on his features. +Being warned, I read cunning in his bold eyes, and cruelty in the curl +of his lip. "What do you want next?" I asked. + +"I want to save your life," he replied lightly. + +At that I started--I could not help it. + +"Ha! ha!" he laughed, "I thought the stoicism did not go quite down to +the bottom, my lad. But there, it is true enough, I have come to help +you. I have come to save your life if you will let me." + +I strove in vain to keep entire mastery over myself. The feelings to +which he appealed were too strong for me. My voice sounded strange, +even in my own ears, as I said hoarsely, "It is impossible! What can +you do?" + +"What can I do?" he answered with a stern smile. "Much! I have, boy, a +dozen strings in my hands, and a neck--a life at the end of each!" + +He raised his hand, and extending the fingers, moved them to and fro. + +"See! see! A life, a death!" he exclaimed. "And for you, I can and +will save your life--on one condition." + +"On one condition?" I murmured. + +"Ay, on one condition; but it is a very easy one. I will save your +life on my part; and you, on yours, must give me a little assistance. +Do you see? Then we shall be quits." + +"I do not understand," I said dully. I did not. His words had set my +heart fluttering so that I could for the moment take in only one +idea--that here was a new hope of life. + +"It is very simple," he resumed, speaking slowly. "Certain plans of +mine require that I should get your friend the Duchess conveyed back +to England. But for you I should have succeeded before this. In what +you have hindered me, you can now help me. You have their confidence +and great influence with them. All I ask is that you will use that +influence so that they may be at a certain place at a certain hour. I +will contrive the rest. It shall never be known, I promise you, that +you----" + +"Betrayed them!" + +"Well, gave me some information," he said lightly, puffing away my +phrase. + +"No. Betrayed them!" I persisted. + +"Put it so, if you please," he replied, shrugging his shoulders and +raising his eyebrows. "What is in a word?" + +"You are the tempter himself, I think!" I cried in bitter rage--for it +_was_ bitter--bitter, indeed, to feel that new-born hope die out. "But +you come to me in vain. I defy you!" + +"Softly! softly!" he answered with calmness. + +Yet I saw a little pulse beating in his cheek that seemed to tell of +some emotion kept in subjection. + +"It frightens you at first," he said. "But listen. You will do them no +harm, and yourself good. I shall get them anyway, both the Duchess and +her husband; though, without your aid, it will be more difficult. Why, +help of that kind is given every day. They need never know it. Even +now there is one of whom you little dream who has----" + +"Silence!" I cried fiercely. "I care not. I defy you!" + +I could think of only one thing. I was wild with rage and +disappointment. His words had aggravated the pain of every regret, +every clinging to life I felt. + +"Go!" I cried. "Go and leave me, you villain!" + +"If I do leave you," he said, fixing his eyes on me, "it will be, my +friend--to death." + +"Then so be it!" I answered wildly. "So be it! I will keep my honor." + +"Your honor!" The mask dropped from his face, and he sneered as he +rose from his seat. A darker scowl changed and disfigured his brow, +as he lost hope of gaining me. "Your honor? Where will it be by +to-night?" he hissed, his eyes glowering down at me. "Where a week +hence, when you will be cast into a pit and forgotten? Your honor, +fool? What is the honor of a dead man? Pah! But die, then, if you will +have it so! Die, like the brainless brute you are! And rot, and be +forgotten!" he concluded passionately. + + +They were terrible words; more terrible I know now than either he or I +understood then. They so shook me that when he was gone I crouched +trembling on my pallet, hiding my face in a fit of horror--taking no +heed of my jailers or of appearances. "Die and be forgotten! Die and +be forgotten!" The doom rang in my ears. + +Something which seemed to me angelic roused me from this misery. It +was the sound of a kindly, familiar voice speaking English. I looked +up and found the Dutchman bending over me with a face of infinite +distress. With him, but rather behind him, stood Van Tree, pale and +vicious-eyed, tugging his scanty chin-beard and gazing about him like +a dog seeking some one to fasten upon. "Poor lad! poor lad!" the old +man said, his voice shaking as he looked at me. + +I sprang to my feet, the irons rattling as I dashed my hand across my +eyes. + +"It is all right!" I said hurriedly. "I had a--but never mind that. It +was like a dream. Only tell the Duchess to look to herself," I +continued, still rather vehemently. "Clarence is here. He is in +Santon. I have seen him." + +"You have seen him?" both the Dutchmen cried at once. + +"Ay!" I said, with a laugh that was three parts hysterical--indeed, I +was still tingling all over with excitement. "He has been here to +offer me my life if I would help him in his schemes. I told him he was +the tempter, and defied him. And he--he said I should die and be +forgotten!" I added, trembling, yet laughing wildly at the same time. + +"I think he _is_ the tempter!" said Master Lindstrom solemnly, his +face very grim. "And therefore a liar and the father of lies! You may +die, lad, to-day; perhaps you must. But forgotten you shall not be, +while we live, or one of us lives, or one of the children who shall +come after us. He is a liar!" + +I got my hands, with a struggle, from the old man, and turning my back +upon him, went and looked out of the window. The sun was rising. The +tower of the great minster, seen row for the first time, rose in +stately brightness above the red roofs and quaint gables and the +rows of dormer windows. Down in the streets the grayness and chill +yet lingered. But above was a very glory of light and warmth and +color--the rising of the May sun. When I turned round I was myself +again. The calm beauty of that sight had stolen into my soul. "Is it +time?" I said cheerfully. For the crowd was gathering below, and there +were voices and feet on the stairs. + +"I think it is," Master Lindstrom answered. "We have obtained leave to +go with you. You need fear no violence in the streets, for the man who +was hurt is still alive and may recover. I have been with the +magistrates this morning," he continued, "and found them better +disposed to you; but the Sub-dean has joint jurisdiction with them, as +the deputy of the Bishop of Arras, who is dean of the minster; and he +is, for some reason, very bitter against you." + +"The Bishop of Arras? Granville, do you mean?" I asked. I knew the +name of the Emperor's shrewd and powerful minister, by whose advice +the Netherlands were at this time ruled. + +"The same. He, of course, is not here, but his deputy is. Were it not +for him---- But there, it is no good talking of that!" the Dutchman +said, breaking off and rubbing his head in his chagrin. + +One of the guards who had spent the night with me brought me at this +moment a bowl of broth with a piece of bread in it. I could not eat +the bread, but I drank the broth and felt the better for it. Having in +my pocket a little money with which the Duchess had furnished me, I +put a silver piece in the bowl and handed it back to him. The man +seemed astonished, and muttered something in German as he turned away. + +"What did he say?" I asked the Dutchman. + +"Oh, nothing, nothing," he answered. + +"But what was it? It was something," I persisted, seeing him confused. + +"He--well, he said he would have a mass said for you!" Lindstrom +answered in despair. "It will do no harm." + +"No, why should it?" I replied mechanically. + + +We were in the street by this time, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree +walking beside me in the middle of a score of soldiers, who seemed to +my eyes fantastically dressed. I remarked, as we passed out, a tall +man clothed in red and black, who was standing by the door as if +waiting to fall in behind me. He carried on his shoulder a long +broad-bladed sword, and I guessed who he was, seeing how Master +Lindstrom strove to intercept my view of him. But I was not afraid of +_that_. I had heard long ago--perhaps six months in time, but it +seemed long ago--how bravely Queen Jane had died. And if a girl had +not trembled, surely a man should not. So I looked steadfastly at him, +and took great courage, and after that was able to gaze calmly on the +people, who pressed to stare at me, peeping over the soldiers' +shoulders, and clustering in every doorway and window to see me go +past. They were all silent, and it even seemed to me that some--but +this may have been my fancy--pitied me. + +I saw nothing of the Duchess, and might have wondered, had not Master +Lindstrom explained that he had contrived to keep her in ignorance of +the hour fixed for the proceedings. Her husband was better, he said, +and conscious; but, for fear of exciting him, they were keeping the +news from him also. I remember I felt for a moment very sore at this, +and then I tried to persuade myself that it was right. + +The distance through the streets was short, and almost before I was +aware of it I was in the court-house, the guard had fallen back, and I +was standing before three persons who were seated behind a long table. +Two of them were grave, portly men wearing flat black caps and scarlet +robes, with gold chains about their necks. The third, dressed as an +ecclesiastic, wore a huge gem ring upon his thumb. Behind them stood +three attendants holding a sword, a crosier, and a ducal cap upon a +cushion; and above and behind all was a lofty stained window, whose +rich hues, the sun being low as yet, shot athwart the corbels of the +roof. At the end of the table sat a black-robed man with an ink-horn +and spectacles, a grave, still, down-looking man; and the crowd being +behind me, and preserving a dead silence, and the attendants standing +like statues, I seemed indeed to be alone with these four at the +table, and the great stained window and the solemn hush. They talked +to one another in low tones for a minute, gazing at me the while. And +I fancied they were astonished to find me so young. + +At length they all fell back into their chairs. "Do you speak German?" +the eldest burgher said, addressing me gravely. He sat in the middle, +with the Sub-dean on his right. + +"No; but I speak and understand Spanish," I answered in that language, +feeling chilled already by the stern formality which like an iron hand +was laying its grip upon me. + +"Good! Your name?" replied the president. + +"I am commonly called Francis Carey, and I am an Englishman." The +Sub-dean--he was a pale, stout man, with gloomy eyes--had hitherto +been looking at me in evident doubt. But at this he nodded assent, +and, averting his eyes from me, gazed meditatively at the roof of the +hall, considering apparently what he should have for breakfast. + +"You are charged," said the president slowly, consulting a document, +"with having assaulted and wounded in the highway last night one +Heinrich Schröder, a citizen of this town, acting at the time as +Lieutenant of the Night Guard. Do you admit this, prisoner, or do you +require proof?" + +"He was wounded," I answered steadily, "but by mistake, and in error. +I supposed him to be one of three persons who had unlawfully waylaid +me and my party on the previous night between Emmerich and Wesel." + +The Sub-dean, still gazing at the roof, shook his head with a faint +smile. The other magistrates looked doubtfully at me, but made no +comment, and my words seemed to be wasted on the silence. The +president consulted his document again, and continued: "You are also +charged with having by force of arms, in time of peace, seized a gate +of this town, and maintained it, and declined to surrender it when +called upon so to do. What do you say to that?" + +"It is true in part," I answered firmly. "I seized not the gate, but +part of the tower, in order to preserve my life and to protect certain +ladies traveling with me from the violence of a crowd which, under a +misapprehension, was threatening to do us a mischief." + +The priest again shook his head, and smiled faintly at the carved +roof. His colleagues were perhaps somewhat moved in my favor, for a +few words passed between them. However, in the end they shook their +heads, and the president mechanically asked me if I had anything +further to say. + +"Nothing!" I replied bitterly. The ecclesiastic's cynical +heedlessness, his air of one whose mind is made up, seemed so cruel to +me whose life was at stake, that I lost patience. "Except what I have +said," I continued--"that for the wounding, it was done in error; and +for the gate-seizing, I would do it again to save the lives of those +with me. Only that and this: that I am a foreigner ignorant of your +language and customs, desiring only to pass peacefully through your +country." + +"That is all?" the president asked impassively. + +"All," I answered, yet with a strange tightening at my throat. Was it +all? All I could say for my life? + +I was waiting, sore and angry and desperate, to hear the sentence, +when there came an interruption. Master Lindstrom, whose presence at +my side I had forgotten, broke suddenly into a torrent of impassioned +words, and his urgent voice, ringing through the court, seemed in a +moment to change its aspect--to infuse into it some degree of life and +sympathy. More than one guttural exclamation, which seemed to mark +approval, burst from the throng at the back of the hall. In another +moment, indeed, the Dutchman's courage might have saved me. But there +was one who marked the danger. The Sub-dean, who had at first only +glowered at the speaker in rude astonishment, now cut him short with a +harsh question. + +"One moment, Master Dutchman!" he cried. "Are you one of the heretics +who call themselves Protestants?" + +"I am. But I understand that there is here liberty of conscience," our +friend answered manfully, nothing daunted in his fervor at finding the +attack turned upon himself. + +"That depends upon the conscience," the priest answered with a scowl. +"We will have no Anabaptists here, nor foreign praters to bring us +into feud with our neighbors. It is enough that such men as you are +allowed to live. We will not be bearded by you, so take warning! Take +heed, I say, Master Dutchman, and be silent!" he repeated, leaning +forward and clapping his hand upon the table. + +I touched Master Lindstrom's sleeve--who would of himself have +persisted--and stayed him. "It is of no use," I muttered. "That dog in +a crochet has condemned me. He will have his way!" + +There was a short debate between the three judges, while in the court +you might have heard a pin drop. Master Lindstrom had fallen back once +more. I was alone again, and the stained window seemed to be putting +forth its mystic influence to enfold me, when, looking up, I saw a +tiny shadow flit across the soft many-hued rays which streamed from it +athwart the roof. It passed again, once, twice, thrice. I peered +upward intently. It was a swallow flying to and fro amid the carved +work. + +Yes, a swallow. And straightway I forgot the judges; forgot the crowd. +The scene vanished and I was at Coton End again, giving Martin Luther +the nest for Petronilla--a sign, as I meant it then, that I should +return. I should never return now. Yet my heart was on a sudden so +softened that, instead of this reflection giving me pain, as one would +have expected, it only filled me with a great anxiety to provide for +the event. She must not wait and watch for me day after day, perhaps +year after year. I must see to it somehow; and I was thinking with +such intentness of this, that it was only vaguely I heard the sentence +pronounced. It might have been some other person who was to be +beheaded at the east gate an hour before noon. And so God save the +Duke! + + + + + CHAPTER XVI. + + IN THE DUKE'S NAME. + + +They took me back to the room in the tower, it being now nearly ten +o'clock. Master Lindstrom would fain have stayed with me constantly to +the end, but having the matter I have mentioned much in my mind, I +begged him to go and get me writing materials. When he returned Van +Tree was with him. With a particularity very curious at that moment, I +remarked that the latter was carrying something. + +"Where did you get that?" I said sharply and at once. + +"It is your haversack," he answered, setting it down quietly. "I found +the man who had taken possession of your horse, and got it from him. I +thought there might be something in it you might like." + +"It is my haversack," I assented. "But it was not on my horse. I have +not seen it since I left it in Master Lindstrom's house by the river. +I left it on the pallet in my room there, and it was forgotten. I +searched for it at Emmerich, you remember." + +"I only know," he replied, "that I discovered it behind the saddle of +the horse you were riding yesterday." + +He thought that I had become confused and was a little wrong-headed +from excitement. Master Lindstrom also felt troubled, as he told me +afterward, at seeing me taken up with a trifle at such a time. + +But there was nothing wrong with my wits, as I promptly showed them. + +"The horse I was riding yesterday?" I continued. "Ah! then, I +understand. I was riding the horse which I took from the Spanish +trooper. The Spaniard must have annexed the haversack when he and his +companions searched the house after our departure." + +"That is it, no doubt," Master Lindstrom said. "And in the hurry of +yesterday's ride you failed to notice it." + +It was a strange way of recovering one's property--strange that the +enemy should have helped one to it. But there are times--and this to +me was one--when the strange seems the ordinary and commonplace. I +took the sack and slipped my hand through a well-known slit in the +lining. Yes, the letter I had left there was there still--the letter +to Mistress Clarence. I drew it out. The corners of the little packet +were frayed, and the parchment was stained and discolored, no doubt by +the damp which had penetrated to it. But the seal was whole. I placed +it, as it was, in Master Lindstrom's hands. + +"Give it," I said, "to the Duchess afterward. It concerns her. You +have heard us talk about it. Bid her make what use she pleases of it." + +I turned away then and sat down, feeling a little flurried and +excited, as one about to start upon a journey might feel; not afraid +nor exceedingly depressed, but braced up to make a brave show and hide +what sadness I did feel by the knowledge that many eyes were upon me, +and that more would be watching me presently. At the far end of the +room a number of people had now gathered, and were conversing +together. Among them were not only my jailers of the night, but two or +three officers, a priest who had come to offer me his services, and +some inquisitive gazers who had obtained admission. Their curiosity, +however, did not distress me. On the contrary, I was glad to hear the +stir and murmur of life about me to the last. + +I will not set down the letter I wrote to the Duchess, though it were +easy for me to do so, seeing that her son has it now. It contains some +things very proper to be said by a dying man, of which I am not +ashamed--God forbid! but which it would not be meet for me to repeat +here. Enough that I told her in a few words who I was, and entreated +her, in the name of whatever services I had rendered her, to let +Petronilla and Sir Anthony know how I had died. And I added something +which would, I thought, comfort her and her husband--namely, that I +was not afraid, or in any suffering of mind or body. + +The writing of this shook my composure a little. But as I laid down +the pen and looked up and found that the time was come, I took courage +in a marvelous manner. The captain of the guard--I think that out of a +compassionate desire not to interrupt me they had allowed me some +minutes of grace--came to me, leaving the group at the other end, and +told me gravely that I was waited for. I rose at once and gave the +letter to Master Lindstrom with some messages in which Dymphna and +Anne were not forgotten. And then, with a smile--for I felt under all +those eyes as if I were going into battle--I said: "Gentlemen, I am +ready if you are. It is a fine day to die. You know," I added gayly, +"in England we have a proverb, 'The better the day, the better the +deed!' So it is well to have a good day to have a good death, Sir +Captain." + +"A soldier's death, sir, is a good death;" he answered gravely, +speaking in Spanish and bowing. + +Then he pointed to the door. + +As I walked toward it, I paused momentarily by the window, and looked +out on the crowd below. It filled the sunlit street--save where a +little raised platform strewn with rushes protruded itself--with heads +from wall to wall, with faces all turned one way--toward me. It was a +silent crowd standing in hushed awe and expectation, the consciousness +of which for an instant sent a sudden chill to my heart, blanching my +cheek, and making my blood run slow for a moment. The next I moved on +to the door, and bowing to the spectators as they stood aside, began +to descend the narrow staircase. + +There were guards going down before me, and behind me were Master +Lindstrom and more guards. The Dutchman reached forward in the gloom, +and clasped my hand, holding it, as we went down, in a firm, strong +grip. + +"Never fear," I said to him cheerily, looking back. "It is all right." + +He answered in words which I will not write here; not wishing, as I +have said, to make certain things common. + +I suppose the doorway at the bottom was accidentally blocked, for a +few steps short of it we came to a standstill; and almost at the same +moment I started, despite myself, on hearing a sudden clamor and a +roar of many voices outside. + +"What is it?" I asked the Dutchman. + +"It is the Duke of Cleves arriving, I expect," he whispered. "He comes +in by the other gate." + + +A moment later we moved on and passed out into the light, the soldiers +before me stepping on either side to give me place. The sunshine for +an instant dazzled me, and I lowered my eyes. As I gradually raised +them again I saw before me a short lane formed by two rows of +spectators kept back by guards; and at the end of this, two or three +rough wooden steps leading to a platform on which were standing a +number of people. And above and beyond all only the bright blue sky, +the roofs and gables of the nearer houses showing dark against it. + +I advanced steadily along the path left for me, and would have +ascended the steps. But at the foot of them I came to a standstill, +and looked round for guidance. The persons on the scaffold all had +their backs turned to me, and did not make way, while the shouting and +uproar hindered them from hearing that we had come out. Then it struck +me, seeing that the people at the windows were also gazing away, and +taking no heed of me, that the Duke was passing the farther end of the +street, and a sharp pang of angry pain shot through me. I had come out +to die, but that which was all to me was so little to these people +that they turned away to see a fellow-mortal ride by! + +Presently, as we stood there, in a pit, as it were, getting no view, I +felt Master Lindstrom's hand, which still clasped mine, begin to +shake; and turning to him, I found that his face had changed to a deep +red, and that his eyes were protruding with a kind of convulsive +eagerness which instantly infected me. + +"What is it?" I stammered. I began to tremble also. The air rang, it +seemed to me, with one word, which a thousand tongues took up and +reiterated. But it was a German word, and I did not understand it. + +"Wait! wait!" Master Lindstrom exclaimed. "Pray God it be true!" + +He seized my other hand and held it as though he would protect me from +something. At the same moment Van Tree pushed past me, and, bounding +up the steps, thrust his way through the officials on the scaffold, +causing more than one fur-robed citizen near the edge to lose his +balance and come down as best he could on the shoulders of the guards. + +"What is it?" I cried. "What is it?" I cried in impatient wonder. + +"Oh! my lad, my lad!" Master Lindstrom answered, his face close to +mine, and the tears running down his cheeks. "It is cruel if it be not +true! Cruel! They cry a pardon!" + +"A pardon?" I echoed. + +"Ay, lad, a pardon. But it may not be true," he said, putting his arm +about my shoulder. "Do not make too sure of it. It is only the mob cry +it out." + +My heart made a great bound, and seemed to stand still. There was a +loud surging in my brain, and a mist rose before my eyes and hid +everything. The clamor and shouting of the street passed away, and +sounded vague and distant. The next instant, it is true, I was myself +again, but my knees were trembling under me, and I stood flaccid and +unnerved, leaning on my friend. + +"Well?" I said faintly. + +"Patience! patience a while, lad!" he answered. + +But, thank Heaven! I had not long to wait. The words were scarcely off +his tongue, when another hand sought mine and shook it wildly; and I +saw Van Tree before me, his face radiant with joy, while a man whom he +had knocked down in his hasty leap from the scaffold was rising beside +me with a good-natured smile. As if at a signal, every face now turned +toward me. A dozen friendly hands passed me up the steps amid a fresh +outburst of cheering. The throng on the scaffold opened somehow, and I +found myself in a second, as it seemed, face to face with the +president of the court. He smiled on me gravely and kindly--what +smiles there seemed to be on all those faces--and held out a paper. + +"In the name of the Duke!" he said, speaking in Spanish, in a clear, +loud voice. "A pardon!" + +I muttered something, I know not what; nor did it matter, for it was +lost in a burst of cheering. When this was over and silence obtained, +the magistrate continued, "You are required, however, to attend the +Duke at the courthouse. Whither we had better proceed at once." + +"I am ready, sir," I muttered. + + +A road was made for us to descend, and, walking in a kind of beautiful +dream, I passed slowly up the street by the side of the magistrate, +the crowd everywhere willingly standing aside for us. I do not know +whether all those thousands of faces really looked joyfully and kindly +on me as I passed, or whether the deep thankfulness which choked me, +and brought the tears continually to my eyes, transfigured them and +gave them a generous charm not their own. But this I do know: that the +sunshine seemed brighter and the air softer than ever before; that the +clouds trailing across the blue expanse were things of beauty such as +I had never met before; that to draw breath was a joy, and to move, +delight; and that only when the dark valley was left behind did I +comprehend its full gloom--by Heaven's mercy. So may it be with all! + +At the door of the court-house, whither numbers of the people had +already run, the press was so great that we came to a standstill, and +were much buffeted about, though in all good humor, before, even with +the aid of the soldiers, we could be got through the throng. When I at +last emerged I found myself again before the table, and saw--but only +dimly, for the light now fell through the stained window directly on +my head--a commanding figure standing behind it. Then a strange thing +happened. A woman passed swiftly round the table, and came to me and +flung her arms round my neck and kissed me. It was the Duchess, and +for a moment she hung upon me, weeping before them all. + +"Madam," I said softly, "then it is you who have done this!" + +"Ah!" she exclaimed, holding me off from her and looking at me with +eyes which glowed through her tears, "and it was you who did that!" + +She drew back from me then, and took me by the hand, and turned +impetuously to the Duke of Cleves, who stood behind smiling at her in +frank amusement. "This," she said, "is the man who gave his life for +my husband, and to whom your highness has given it back." + +"Let him tell his tale," the Duke answered gravely. "And do you, my +cousin, sit here beside me." + +She left me and walked round the table, and he came forward and placed +her in his own chair amid a great hush of wonder, for she was still +meanly clad, and showed in a hundred places the marks and stains of +travel. Then he stood by her with his hand on the back of the seat. He +was a tall, burly man, with bold, quick-glancing eyes, a flushed face, +and a loud manner; a fierce, blusterous prince, as I have heard. He +was plainly dressed in a leather hunting-suit, and wore huge gauntlets +and brown boots, with a broad-leaved hat pinned up on one side. Yet he +looked a prince. + +Somehow I stammered out the tale of the surrender. + +"But why? why? why, man?" he asked, when I had finished; "why did you +let them think it was you who wounded the burgher, if it was not?" + +"Your highness," I answered, "I had received nothing but good from her +grace, I had eaten her bread and been received into her service. +Besides, it was through my persuasion that we came by the road which +led to this misfortune instead of by another way. Therefore it seemed +to me right that I should suffer, who stood alone and could be +spared--and not her husband." + +"It was a great deed!" cried the prince loudly. "I would I had such a +servant. Are you noble, lad?" + +I colored high, but not in pain or mortification. The old wound might +reopen, but amid events such as those of this morning it was a slight +matter. "I come of a noble family, may it please your highness," I +answered modestly; "but circumstances prevent me claiming kinship with +it." + +He was about, I think, to question me further, when the Duchess looked +up, and said something to him and he something to her. She spoke again +and he answered. Then he nodded assent. "You would fain stand on your +own feet?" he cried to me. "Is that so?" + +"It is, sire," I answered. + +"Then so be it!" he replied loudly, looking round on the throng with a +frown. "I will ennoble you. You would have died for your lord and +friend, and therefore I give you a rood of land in the common +graveyard of Santon to hold of me, and I name you Von Santonkirch. And +I, William, Duke of Cleves, Julich and Guelders, prince of the Empire, +declare you noble, and give you for your arms three swords of justice; +and the motto you may buy of a clerk! Further, let this decree be +enrolled in my Chancery. Are you satisfied?" + + +As I dropped on my knees, my eyes sparkling, there was a momentary +disturbance behind me. It was caused by the abrupt entrance of the +Sub-dean. He took in part of the situation at a glance; that is, he +saw me kneeling before the Duke. But he could not see the Duchess of +Suffolk, the Duke's figure being interposed. As he came forward, the +crowd making way for him, he cast an angry glance at me, and scarcely +smoothed his brow even to address the prince. "I am glad that your +highness has not done what was reported to me," he said hastily, his +obeisance brief and perfunctory. "I heard an uproar in the town, and +was told that this man was pardoned." + +"It is so!" said the Duke curtly, eying the ecclesiastic with no great +favor. "He is pardoned." + +"Only in part, I presume," the priest rejoined urgently. "Or, if +otherwise, I am sure that your highness has not received certain +information with which I can furnish you." + +"Furnish away, sir," quoth the Duke, yawning. + +"I have had letters from my Lord Bishop of Arras respecting him." + +"Respecting him!" exclaimed the prince, starting and bending his brows +in surprise. + +"Respecting those in whose company he travels," the priest answered +hastily. "They are represented to me as dangerous persons, pestilent +refugees from England, and obnoxious alike to the Emperor, the Prince +of Spain, and the Queen of England." + +"I wonder you do not add also to the King of France and the Soldan of +Turkey!" growled the Duke. "Pish! I am not going to be dictated to by +Master Granvelle--no, nor by his master, be he ten times Emperor! Go +to! Go to! Master Sub-dean! You forget yourself, and so does your +master the Bishop. I will have you know that these people are not what +you think them. Call you my cousin, the widow of the consort of the +late Queen of France, an obnoxious person? Fie! Fie! You forget +yourself!" + +He moved as he stopped speaking, so that the astonished churchman +found himself confronted on a sudden by the smiling, defiant Duchess. +The Sub-dean started and his face fell, for, seeing her seated in the +Duke's presence, he discerned at once that the game was played out. +Yet he rallied himself, bethinking him, I fancy, that there were many +spectators. He made a last effort. "The Bishop of Arras----" he began. + +"Pish!" scoffed the Duke, interrupting him. + +"The Bishop of Arras----" the priest repeated firmly. + +"I would he were hung with his own tapestry!" retorted the Duke, with +a brutal laugh. + +"Heaven forbid!" replied the ecclesiastic, his pale face reddening and +his eyes darting baleful glances at me. But he took the hint, and +henceforth said no more of the Bishop. Instead, he continued smoothly, +"Your highness has, of course, considered the danger--the danger, I +mean, of provoking neighbors so powerful by shielding this lady and +making her cause your own. You will remember, sir----" + +"I will remember Innspruck!" roared the Duke, in a rage, "where the +Emperor, ay, and your everlasting Bishop too, fled before a handful of +Protestants, like sheep before wolves. A fig for your Emperor! I never +feared him young, and I fear him less now that he is old and decrepit +and, as men say, mad. Let him get to his watches, and you to your +prayers. If there were not this table between us, I would pull your +ears, Master Churchman!" + + * * * * * + +"But tell me," I asked Master Bertie as I stood beside his couch an +hour later, "how did the Duchess manage it? I gathered from something +you or she said, a short time back, that you had no influence with the +Duke of Cleves." + +"Not quite that," he answered. "My wife and the late Duke of Suffolk +had much to do with wedding the Prince's sister to King Henry, +thirteen--fourteen years back, is it? And so far we might have felt +confident of his protection. But the marriage turned out ill, or +turned out short, and Queen Anne of Cleves was divorced. And--well, we +felt a little less confident on that account, particularly as he has +the name of a headstrong, passionate man." + +"Heaven keep him in it!" I said, smiling. "But you have not told me +yet what happened." + +"The Duchess was still asleep this morning, fairly worn out, as you +may suppose, when a great noise awoke her. She got up and went to +Dymphna, and learned it was the Duke's trumpets. Then she went to the +window, and, seeing few people in the streets to welcome him, inquired +why this was. Dymphna broke down at that, and told her what was +happening to you, and that you were to die at that very hour. She went +out straightway, without covering her head,--you know how impetuous +she is,--and flung herself on her knees in the mud before the Duke's +horse as he entered. He knew her, and the rest you can guess." + +Can guess? Ah, what happiness it was! Outside, the sun fell hotly on +the steep red roofs, with their rows of casements, and on the sleepy +square, in which knots of people still lingered, talking of the +morning's events. I could see below me the guard which Duke William, +shrewdly mistrusting the Sub-dean, had posted in front of the house, +nominally to do the Duchess honor. I could hear in the next room the +cheerful voices of my friends. What happiness it was to live! What +happiness to be loved! How very, very good and beautiful and glorious +a world, seemed the world to me on that old May morning in that quaint +German town which we had entered so oddly! + +As I turned from the window full of thankfulness, my eyes met those of +Mistress Anne, who was sitting on the far side of the sick man's +couch, the baby in a cradle beside her. The risk and exposure of the +last week had made a deeper mark upon her than upon any of us. She was +paler, graver, older, more of a woman and less, much less, of a girl. +And she looked very ill. Her eyes, in particular, seemed to have grown +larger, and as they dwelt on me now there was a strange and solemn +light in them, under which I grew uneasy. + +"You have been wonderfully preserved," she said presently, speaking +dreamily, and as much to herself as to me. + +"I have, indeed," I answered, thinking she referred only to my escape +of the morning. + +But she did not. + +"There was, firstly, the time on the river when you were hurt with the +oar," she continued, gazing absently at me, her hands in her lap; "and +then the night when you saw Clarence with Dymphna." + +"Or, rather, saw him without her," I interposed, smiling. It was +strange that she should mention it as a fact, when at the time she had +so scolded me for making the statement. + +"And then," she continued, disregarding my interruption, "there was +the time when you were stabbed in the passage; and again when you had +the skirmish by the river; and then to-day you were within a minute of +death. You have been wonderfully preserved!" + +"I have," I assented thoughtfully. "The more as I suspect that I have +to thank Master Clarence for all these little adventures." + +"Strange--very strange!" she muttered, removing her eyes from me that +she might fix them on the floor. + +"What is strange?" + + +The abrupt questioner was the Duchess, who came bustling in at the +moment. "What is strange?" she repeated, with a heightened color and +dancing eyes. "Shall I tell you?" She paused and looked brightly at +me, holding something concealed behind her. I guessed in a moment, +from the aspect of her face, what it was: the letter which I had given +to Master Lindstrom in the morning, and which, with a pardonable +forgetfulness, I had failed to reclaim. + +I turned very red. "It was not intended for you now," I said shyly. +For in the letter I had told her my story. + +"Pooh! pooh!" she cried. "It is just as I thought. A pretty piece of +folly! No," she continued, as I opened my mouth, "I am not going to +keep your secret, sir. You may go down on your knees. It will be of no +use. Richard, you remember Sir Anthony Cludde of Coton End in +Warwickshire?" + +"Oh, yes," her husband said, rising on his elbow, while his face lit +up, and I stood bashfully, shifting my feet. + +"I have danced with him a dozen times, years ago!" she continued, her +eyes sparkling with mischief. "Well, sir, this gentleman, Master +Francis Carey, otherwise Von Santonkirch, is Francis Cludde, his +nephew!" + +"Sir Anthony's nephew?" + +"Yes, and the son of Ferdinand Cludde, whom you also have heard of, of +whom the less----" + +She stopped, and turned quickly, interrupted by a half-stifled scream. +It was a scream full of sudden horror and amazement and fear; and it +came from Mistress Anne. The girl had risen, and was gazing at me with +distended eyes and blanched cheeks, and hands stretched out to keep me +off--gazing, indeed, as if she saw in me some awful portent or some +dreadful threat. She did not speak, but she began, without taking her +eyes from me, to retreat toward the door. + +"Hoity toity!" cried my lady, stamping her foot in anger. "What has +happened to the girl? What----" + +What, indeed? The Duchess stopped, still more astonished. For, without +uttering a word of explanation or apology, Mistress Anne had reached +the door, groped blindly for the latch, found it, and gone out, her +eyes, with the same haunted look of horror in them, fixed on me to the +last. + + + + + CHAPTER XVII. + + A LETTER THAT HAD MANY ESCAPES. + + +"Hoity, toity!" the Duchess cried again, looking from one to another +of us when Anne had disappeared. "What has come to the little fool? +Has she gone crazy?" + +I shook my head, too completely at sea even to hazard a conjecture. +Master Bertie shook his head also, keeping his eyes glued to the door, +as if he could not believe Anne had really gone. + +"I said nothing to frighten her!" my lady protested. + +"Nothing at all," I answered. For how should the announcement that my +real name was Cludde terrify Mistress Anne Brandon nearly out of her +senses? + +"Well, no," Master Bertie agreed, his thoughtful face more thoughtful +than usual; "so far as I heard, you said nothing. But I think, my +dear, that you had better follow her and learn what it is. She must be +ill." + +The Duchess sat down. "I will go by-and-by," she said coolly, at which +I was not much surprised, for I have always remarked that women have +less sympathy with other women's ailments, especially of the nerves, +than have men. + +"For the moment I want to scold this brave, silly boy here!" she +continued, looking so kindly at me that I blushed again, and forgot +all about Mistress Anne. "To think of him leaving his home to become a +wandering squire of dames merely because his father was a--well, not +quite what he would have liked him to be! I remember something about +him," she continued, pursing up her lips, and nodding her head at us. +"I fancied him dead, however, years ago. But there! if every one whose +father were not quite to his liking left home and went astraying, +Master Francis, all sensible folk would turn innkeepers, and make +their fortunes." + +"It was not only that which drove me from home," I explained. "The +Bishop of Winchester gave me clearly to understand----" + +"That Coton was not the place for you!" exclaimed my lady scornfully. +"He is a sort of connection of yours, is he not? Oh, I know. And he +thinks he has a kind of reversionary interest in the property! With +you and your father out of the way, and only your girl cousin left, +his interest is much more likely to come to hand. Do you see?" + +I recalled what Martin Luther had said about the cuckoo. But I have +since thought that probably they both wronged Stephen Gardiner in +this. He was not a man of petty mind, and his estate was equal to his +high place. I think it more likely that his motive in removing me from +Coton was chiefly the desire to use my services abroad, in conjunction +perhaps with some remoter and darker plan for eventually devoting the +Cludde property to the Church. Such an act of piety would have been +possible had Sir Anthony died leaving his daughter unmarried, and +would certainly have earned for the Chancellor Queen Mary's lasting +favor. I think it the more likely to have been in his mind because his +inability to persuade the gentry to such acts of restitution--King +Harry had much enriched us--was always a sore point with the Queen, +and more than once exposed him to her resentment. + +"The strangest thing of all," the Duchess continued with alacrity, +"seems to me to be this: that if he had not meddled with you, he would +not have had his plans in regard to us thwarted. If he had not driven +you from home, you would never have helped me to escape from London, +nor been with us to foil his agents." + +"A higher power than the Chancellor arranged that!" said Master Bertie +emphatically. + +"Well, at any rate, I am glad that you are you!" the Duchess answered, +rising gayly. "A Cludde? Why, one feels at home again. And yet," she +continued, her lips trembling suddenly, and her eyes filling with +tears as she looked at me, "there was never house raised yet on nobler +deed than yours." + +"Go! go! go!" cried her husband, seeing my embarrassment. "Go and look +to that foolish girl!" + +"I will! Yet stop!" cried my lady, pausing when she was half way +across the floor, and returning, "I was forgetting that I have another +letter to open. It is very odd that this letter was never opened +before," she continued, producing that which had lain in my haversack. +"It has had several narrow escapes. But this time I vow I will see +inside it. You give me leave?" + +"Oh, yes," I said, smiling. "I wash my hands of it. Whoever the +Mistress Clarence to whom it is addressed may be, it is enough that +her name is Clarence! We have suffered too much at his hands." + +"I open it, then!" my lady cried dramatically. I nodded. She took her +husband's dagger and cut the green silk which bound the packet, and +opened and read. + +Only a few words. Then she stopped, and looking off the paper, +shivered. "I do not understand this," she murmured. "What does it +mean?" + +"No good! I'll be sworn!" Master Bertie replied, gazing at her +eagerly. "Read it aloud, Katherine." + + +"'To Mistress A---- B----. I am advertised by my trusty agent, Master +Clarence, that he hath benefited much by your aid in the matter in +which I have employed him. Such service goeth always for much, and +never for naught, with me. In which belief confirm yourself. For the +present, working with him as heretofore, be secret, and on no account +let your true sentiments come to light. So you will be the more +valuable to me, even as it is more easy to unfasten a barred door from +within than from without.'" + + +Here the Duchess broke off abruptly, and turned on us a face full of +wonder. "What does it mean?" she asked. + +"Is that all?" her husband said. + +"Not quite," she answered, returning to it, and reading: + +"'Those whom you have hitherto served have too long made a mockery of +sacred things, but their cup is full and the business of seeing that +they drink it lieth with me, who am not wont to be slothful in these +matters. Be faithful and secret. Good speed and fare you well.--Ste. +Winton." + +"One thing is quite clear!" said Master Bertie slowly. "That you and I +are the persons whose cup is full. You remember how you once dressed +up a dog in a rochet, and dandled it before Gardiner? And it is our +matter in which Clarence is employed. Then who is it who has been +cooperating with him, and whose aid is of so much value to him?" + +"'Even as it is easier,'" I muttered thoughtfully, "'to unfasten a +barred door from within than from without." What was it of which that +strange sentence reminded me? Ha! I had it. Of the night on which we +had fled from Master Lindstrom's house, when Mistress Anne had been +seized with that odd fit of perverseness, and had almost opened the +door looking upon the river in spite of all I could say or do. It was +of that the sentence reminded me. "To whom is it addressed?" I asked +abruptly. + +"To Mistress Clarence," my lady answered. + +"No; inside, I mean." + +"Oh! to Mistress A---- B----. But that gives us no clew," she added. +"It is a disguise. You see they are the two first letters of the +alphabet." + +So they were. And the initial letters of Anne Brandon! I wondered that +the Duchess did not see it, that she did not at once turn her +suspicions toward the right quarter. But she was, for a woman, +singularly truthful and confiding. And she saw nothing. + +I looked at Master Bertie. He seemed puzzled, discerning, I fancy, +how strangely the allusions pointed to Mistress Anne, but not daring +at once to draw the inference. She was his wife's kinswoman by +marriage--albeit a distant one--and much indebted to her. She had been +almost as his own sister. She was young and fair, and to associate +treachery and ingratitude such as this with her seemed almost too +horrible. + +Then why was I so clear sighted as to read the riddle? Why was I the +first to see the truth? Because I had felt for days a vague and +ill-defined distrust of the girl. I had seen more of her odd fits and +caprices than had the others. Looking back now I could find a +confirmation of my idea in a dozen things which had befallen us. I +remembered how ill and stricken she had looked on the day when I had +first brought out the letter, and how strangely she had talked to me +about it. I remembered Clarence's interview with, not Dymphna,--as I +had then thought,--but, as I now guessed, Anne, wearing her cloak. I +recalled the manner in which she had used me to persuade Master Bertie +to take the Wesel instead of the Santon road; no doubt she had told +Clarence to follow in that direction, if by any chance we escaped +him on the island. And her despair when she heard in the church porch +that I had killed Clarence at the ford! And her utter abandonment to +fear--poor guilty thing!--when she thought that all her devices had +only led her with us to a dreadful death! These things, in the light +in which I now viewed them, were cogent evidences against her. + +"It must have been written to some one about us!" said the Duchess at +length. "To some one in our confidence. 'On our side of the door,' as +he calls it." + +"Yes, that is certain," I said. + +"And on the wrapper he styles her Mistress Clarence. Now who----" + +"Who could it have been? That is the question we have to answer," +Master Bertie replied dryly. Hearing his voice, I knew he had come at +last to the same conclusion to which I had jumped. "I think you may +dismiss the servants from the inquiry," he continued. "The Bishop of +Winchester would scarcely write to them in that style." + +"Dismiss the servants? Then who is left?" she protested. + +"I think----" He lost courage, hesitated, and broke off. She looked at +him wonderingly. He turned to me, and, gaining confirmation from my +nod, began again. "I think I should ask A---- B----," he said. + +"A---- B----?" she cried, still not seeing one whit. + +"Yes. Anne Brandon," he answered sternly. + +She repeated his words softly and stood a moment gazing at him. In +that moment she saw it all. She sat down suddenly on the chair beside +her and shuddered violently, as if she had laid her hand unwittingly +upon a snake. "Oh, Richard," she whispered, "it is too horrible!" + +"I fear it is too true," he answered gloomily. + +I shrank from looking at them, from meeting her eyes or his. I felt as +if this shame had come upon us all. The thought that the culprit might +walk into the room at any moment filled me with terror. I turned away +and looked through the window, leaving the husband and wife together. + +"Is it only the name you are thinking of?" she muttered. + +"No," he answered. "Before I left England to go to Calais I saw +something pass between them--between her and Clarence--which, +surprised me. Only in the confusion of those last days it slipped from +my memory for the time." + +"I see," she said quietly. "The villain!" + + +Looking back on the events of the last week, I found many things made +plain by the lurid light now cast upon them. I understood how Master +Lindstrom's vase had come to be broken when we were discussing the +letter, which in my hands must have been a perpetual terror to the +girl. I discerned that she had purposely sown dissension between +myself and Van Tree, and recalled how she had striven to persuade us +not to leave the island; then, how she had induced us to take that +unlucky road; finally, how on the road her horse had lagged and lagged +behind, detaining us all when every minute was precious. The things +all dovetailed into one another; each by itself was weak, but together +they formed a strong scaffold--a scaffold strong enough for the +hanging of a man, if she had been a man! The others appealed to me, +the Duchess feverishly anxious to be assured one way or the other. The +very suspicion of the existence of such treachery at her side seemed +to stifle her. Still looking out of the window I detailed the proofs I +have mentioned, not gladly, Heaven knows, or in any spirit of revenge. +But my duty was rather to my companions who had been true to me, than +to her. I told them the truth as far as I knew it. The whole wretched, +miserable truth was only to become known to me later. + + +"I will go to her," the Duchess said presently, rising from her seat. + +"My dear!" her husband cried. He stretched out his hand, and grasping +her skirt detained her. "You will not----" + +"Do not be afraid!" she replied sadly, as she stooped over him and +kissed his forehead. "It is a thing past scolding, Richard; past love +and even hope, and all but past pity. I will be merciful as we hope +for mercy, but she can never be friend of ours again, and some one +must tell her. I will do so and return. As for that man!" she +continued, obscuring suddenly the fair and noble side of her character +which she had just exhibited, and which I confess had surprised me, +for I had not thought her capable of a generosity so uncommon; "as for +that man," she repeated, drawing herself up to her full height, while +her eyes sparkled and her cheek grew red, "who has turned her into a +vile schemer and a shameless hypocrite, as he would fain have turned +better women, I will show him no mercy nor grace if I ever have him +under my feet. I will crush him as I would an adder, though I be +crushed next moment myself!" + +She was sweeping with that word from the room, and had nearly reached +the door before I found my voice. Then I called out "Stay!" just in +time. "You will do no good, madam, by going!" I said, rising. "You +will not find her. She is gone." + +"Gone?" + +"Yes," I said quietly. "She left the house twenty minutes ago. I saw +her cross the market-place, wearing her cloak and carrying a bag. I do +not think she will return." + +"Not return? But whither has she gone?" they both cried at once. + +I shook my head. + +"I can only guess," I said in a low voice. "I saw no more than I have +told you." + +"But why did you not tell me'" the Duchess cried reproachfully. "She +shall be brought back." + +"It would be useless," Master Bertie answered. "Yet I doubt if it be +as Carey thinks. Why should she go just at this time? She does not +know that she is found out. She does not know that this letter has +been recovered. Not a word, mind, was said of it before she left the +room." + +"No," I allowed; "that is true." + +I was puzzled on this point myself, now I came to consider it. I could +not see why she had taken the alarm so opportunely; but I maintained +my opinion nevertheless. + +"Something frightened her," I said; "though it may not have been the +letter." + +"Yes," said the Duchess, after a moment's silence. "I suppose you are +right. I suppose something frightened her, as you say. I wonder what +it was, poor wretch!" + + +It turned out that I was right. Mistress Anne had gone indeed, having +stayed, so far as we could learn from an examination of the room which +she had shared with Dymphna, merely to put together the few things +which our adventures had left her. She had gone out from among us in +this foreign land without a word of farewell, without a good wish +given or received, without a soul to say God speed! The thought made +me tremble. If she had died it would have been different. Now, to feel +sorrow for her as for one who had been with us in heart as well as in +body, seemed a mockery. How could we grieve for one who had moved day +by day and hour by hour among us, only that with each hour and day she +might plot and scheme and plan our destruction? It was impossible! + +We made inquiries indeed, but without result; and so, abruptly and +terribly she passed--for the time--out of our knowledge, though often +afterward I recalled sadly the weary, hunted look which I had +sometimes seen in her eyes when she sat listless and dreamy. Poor +girl! Her own acts had placed her, as the Duchess said, beyond love or +hope, but not beyond pity. + +So it is in life. The day which sees one's trial end sees another's +begin. We--the Duchess and her child, Master Bertie and I--stayed with +our good and faithful friends the Lindstroms a while, resting and +recruiting our strength; and during this interval, at the pressing +instance of the Duchess, I wrote letters to Sir Anthony and +Petronilla, stating that I was abroad, and was well, and looked +presently to return; but not disclosing my refuge or the names of my +companions. At the end of five days, Master Bertie being fairly strong +again and Santon being considered unsafe for us as a permanent +residence, we went under guard to Wesel, where we were received as +people of quality, and lodged, there being no fitting place, in the +disused church of St. Willibrod. Here the child was christened +Peregrine--a wanderer; the governor of the city and I being +godfathers. And here we lived in peace--albeit with hearts that +yearned for home--for some months. + +During this time two pieces of news came to us from England: one, that +the Parliament, though much pressed to it, had refused to acquiesce in +the confiscation of the Duchess's estates; the other, that our joint +persecutor, the great Bishop of Winchester, was dead. This last we at +first disbelieved. It was true, nevertheless. Stephen Gardiner, whose +vast schemes had enmeshed people so far apart in station, and indeed +in all else, as the Duchess and myself, was dead at last; had died +toward the end of 1555, at the height of his power, with England at +his feet, and gone to his Maker. I have known many worse men. + +We trusted that this might open the way for our return, but we found +on the contrary that fresh clouds were rising. The persecution of the +Reformers, which Queen Mary had begun in England, was carried on with +increasing rigor, and her husband, who was now King of Spain and +master of the Netherlands, freed from the prudent checks of his +father, was inclined to pleasure her in this by giving what aid he +could abroad. His Minister in the Netherlands, the Bishop of Arras, +brought so much pressure to bear upon our protector to induce him to +give us up, that it was plain the Duke of Cleves must sooner or later +comply. We thought it better, therefore, to remove ourselves, and +presently did so, going to the town of Winnheim in the Rhine +Palatinate. + +We found ourselves not much more secure here, however, and all our +efforts to discover a safe road into France failing, and the stock of +money which the Duchess had provided beginning to give out, we were in +great straits whither to go or what to do. + +At this time of our need, however, Providence opened a door in a +quarter where we least looked for it. Letters came from Sigismund, the +King of Poland, and from the Palatine of Wilna in that country, +inviting the Duchess and Master Bertie to take up their residence +there, and offering the latter an establishment and honorable +employment. The overture was unlooked for, and was not accepted +without misgivings, Wilna being so far distant, and there being none +of our race in that country. However, assurance of the Polish King's +good faith reached us--I say us, for in all their plans I was +included--through John Alasco, a nobleman who had visited England. And +in due time we started on this prodigious journey, and came safely to +Wilna, where our reception was such as the letters had led us to +expect. + + +I do not propose to set down here our adventures, though they were +many, in that strange country of frozen marshes and endless plains, +but to pass over eighteen months which I spent not without profit to +myself in the Pole's service, seeing something of war in his +Lithuanian campaigns, and learning much of men and the world, which +here, to say nothing of wolves and bears, bore certain aspects not +commonly visible in Warwickshire. I pass on to the early autumn of +1558, when a letter from the Duchess, who was at Wilna, was brought to +me at Cracovy. It was to this effect: + +"Dear Friend: Send you good speed! Word has come to us here of an +enterprise Englandward, which promises, if it be truly reported to us, +to so alter things at home that there may be room for us at our own +firesides. Heaven so further it, both for our happiness and the good +of the religion. Master Bertie has embarked on it, and I have taken +upon myself to answer for your aid and counsel, which have never been +wanting to us. Wherefore, dear friend, come, sparing neither horse nor +spurs, nor anything which may bring you sooner to Wilna, and your +assured and loving friend, Katherine Suffolk." + + +In five days after receiving this I was at Wilna, and two months later +I saw England again, after an absence of three years. Early in +November, 1558, Master Bertie and I landed at Lowestoft, having made +the passage from Hamburg in a trading vessel of that place. We stopped +only to sleep one night, and then, dressed as traveling merchants, we +set out on the road to London, entering the city without accident or +hindrance on the third day after landing. + + + + + CHAPTER XVIII. + + THE WITCH'S WARNING. + + +"One minute!" I said. "That is the place." + +Master Bertie turned in his saddle, and looked at it. The light was +fading into the early dusk of a November evening, but the main +features of four cross streets, the angle between two of them filled +by the tall belfry of a church, were still to be made out. The east +wind had driven loiterers indoors, and there was scarcely any one +abroad to notice us. I pointed to a dead wall ten paces down one +street. "Opposite that they stopped," I said. "There was a pile of +boards leaning against it then." + +"You have had many a worse bedchamber since, lad," he said, smiling. + +"Many," I answered. And then by a common impulse we shook up the +horses, and trotting gently on were soon clear of London and making +for Islington. Passing through the latter we began to breast the steep +slope which leads to Highgate, and coming, when we had reached the +summit, plump upon the lights of the village, pulled up in front of a +building which loomed darkly across the road. + +"This is the Gatehouse Tavern," Master Bertie said in a low voice. "We +shall soon know whether we have come on a fool's errand--or worse!" + +We rode under the archway into a great courtyard, from which the road +issued again on the other side through another gate. In one corner two +men were littering down a line of packhorses by the light of the +lanterns, which brought their tanned and rugged faces into relief. In +another, where the light poured ruddily from an open doorway, an +ostler was serving out fodder, and doing so, if we might judge from +the travelers' remonstrances, with a niggardly hand. From the windows +of the house a dozen rays of light shot athwart the darkness, and +disclosed as many pigs wallowing asleep in the middle of the yard. In +all we saw a coarse comfort and welcome. Master Bertie led the way +across the yard, and accosted the ostler. "Can we have stalls and +beds?" he asked. + +The man stayed his chaffering, and looked up at us. "Every man to his +business," he replied gruffly. "Stalls, yes; but of beds I know +nothing. For women's work go to the women." + +"Right!" said I, "so we will. With better luck than you would go, I +expect, my man!" + +Bursting into a hoarse laugh at this--he was lame and one-eyed and not +very well-favored--he led us into a long, many-stalled stable, feebly +lit by lanterns which here and there glimmered against the walls. +"Suit yourselves," he said; "first come is first served here." + +He seemed an ill-conditioned fellow, but the businesslike way in which +we went about our work, watering, feeding, and littering down in old +campaigners' fashion, drew from him a grunt of commendation. "Have you +come from far, masters?" he asked. + +"No, from London," I answered curtly. "We come as linen-drapers from +Westcheap, if you want to know." + +"Ay, I see that," he said chuckling. "Never were atop of a horse +before nor handled anything but a clothyard; oh, no!" + +"We want a merchant reputed to sell French lace," I continued, looking +hard at him. "Do you happen to know if there is a dealer here with +any?" + +He nodded rather to himself than to me, as if he had expected the +question. Then in the same tone, but with a quick glance of +intelligence, he answered, "I will show you into the house presently, +and you can see for yourselves. A stable is no place for French lace." +He pointed with a wink over his shoulder toward a stall in which a +man, apparently drunk, lay snoring. "That is a fine toy!" he ran on +carelessly, as I removed my dagger from the holster and concealed it +under my cloak--"a fine plaything--for a linen draper!" + +"Peace, peace, man! and show us in," said Master Bertie impatiently. + +With a shrug of his shoulders the man obeyed. Crossing the courtyard +behind him, we entered the great kitchen, which, full of light +and warmth and noise, presented just such a scene of comfort and +bustle, of loud talking, red-faced guests, and hurrying bare-armed +serving-maids, as I remembered lighting upon at St. Albans three years +back. But I had changed much since then, and seen much. The bailiff +himself would hardly have recognized his old antagonist in the tall, +heavily cloaked stranger, whose assured air, acquired amid wild +surroundings in a foreign land, gave him a look of age to which I +could not fairly lay claim. Master Bertie had assigned the lead to me +as being in less danger of recognition, and I followed the ostler +toward the hearth without hesitation. "Master Jenkin!" the man cried, +with the same rough bluntness he had shown without, "here are two +travelers want the lace-seller who was here to-day. Has he gone?" + +"Who gone?" retorted the host as loudly. + +"The lace merchant who came this morning." + +"No; he is in No. 32," returned the landlord. "Will you sup first, +gentlemen?" + +We declined, and followed the ostler, who made no secret of our +destination, telling those in our road to make way, as the gentlemen +were for No. 32. One of the crowd, however, who seemed to be crossing +from the lower end of the room, failed apparently to understand, and, +interposing between us and our guide, brought me perforce to a halt. + +"By your leave, good woman!" I said, and turned to pass round her. + +But she foiled me with unexpected nimbleness, and I could not push her +aside, she was so very old. Her gums were toothless and her forehead +was lined and wrinkled. About her eyes, which under hideous red lids +still shone with an evil gleam--a kind of reflection of a wicked +past--a thousand crows' feet had gathered. A few wisps of gray hair +struggled from under the handkerchief which covered her head. She was +humpbacked, and stooped over a stick, and whether she saw or not my +movement of repugnance, her voice was harsh when she spoke. + +"Young gentleman," she croaked, "let me tell your fortune by the +stars. A fortune for a groat, young gentleman!" she continued, peering +up into my face and frustrating my attempts to pass. + +"Here is a groat," I answered peevishly, "and for the fortune, I will +hear it another day. So let us by!" + +But she would not. My companion, seeing that the attention of the room +was being drawn to us, tried to pull me by her. But I could not use +force, and short of force there was no remedy. The ostler, indeed, +would have interfered on our behalf, and returned to bid her, with a +civility he had not bestowed on us, "give us passage." But she swiftly +turned her eyes on him in a sinister fashion, and he retreated with an +oath and a paling face, while those nearest to us--and half a dozen +had crowded round--drew back, and crossed themselves in haste almost +ludicrous. + +"Let me see your face, young gentleman," she persisted, with a hollow +cough. "My eyes are not so clear as they were, or it is not your cloak +and your flap-hat that would blind me." + +Thinking it best to get rid of her, even at a slight risk--and the +chance that among the travelers present there would be one able to +recognize me was small indeed--I uncovered. She shot a piercing glance +at my face, and looking down on the floor, traced hurriedly a figure +with her stick. She studied the phantom lines a moment, and then +looked up. + +"Listen!" she said solemnly, and waving her stick round me, she +quavered out in tones which filled me with a strange tremor: + + + "The man goes east, and the wind blows west, + Wood to the head, and steel to the breast! + The man goes west, and the wind blows east, + The neck twice doomed the gallows shall feast! + + +"Beware!" she went on more loudly, and harshly, tapping with her stick +on the floor, and snaking her palsied head at me. "Beware, unlucky +shoot of a crooked branch! Go no farther with it! Go back! The sword +may miss or may not fall, but the cord is sure!" + +If Master Bertie had not held my arm tightly, I should have recoiled, +as most of those within hearing had already done. The strange +allusions to my past, which I had no difficulty in detecting, and the +witch's knowledge of the risks of our present enterprise, were enough +to startle and shake the most constant mind; and in the midst of +enterprises secret and dangerous, few minds are so firm or so reckless +as to disdain omens. That she was one of those unhappy beings who buy +dark secrets at the expense of their souls, seemed certain; and had I +been alone, I should have, I am not ashamed to say it, given back. + +But I was lucky in having for my companion a man of rare mind, and +besides of so single a religious belief that to the end of his life he +always refused to put faith in a thing of the existence of which I +have no doubt myself--I mean witchcraft. + +He showed at this moment the courage of his opinions. "Peace, peace, +woman!" he said compassionately. "We shall live while God wills it, +and die when he wills it. And neither live longer nor die earlier! So +let us by." + +"Would you perish?" she quavered. + +"Ay! If so God wills," he answered undaunted. + +At that she seemed to shake all over, and hobbled aside, muttering, +"Then go on! Go on! God wills it!" + +Master Bertie gave me no time for hesitation, but, holding my arm, +urged me on to where the ostler stood awaiting the event with a face +of much discomposure. He opened the door for us, however, and led the +way up a narrow and not too clean staircase. On the landing at the +head of this he paused, and raised his lantern so as to cast the light +on our faces. "She has overlooked me, the old witch!" he said +viciously; "I wish I had never meddled in this business." + +"Man!" Master Bertie replied sternly; "do you fear that weak old +woman?" + +"No; but I fear her master," retorted the ostler, "and that is the +devil!" + +"Then I do not," Master Bertie answered bravely. "For my Master is as +good a match for him as I am for that old woman. When he wills it, +man, you will die, and not before. So pluck up spirit." + +Master Bertie did not look at me, though I needed his encouragement as +much as the ostler, having had better proofs of the woman's strange +knowledge. But, seeing that his exhortation had emboldened this +ignorant man, I was ashamed to seem to hesitate. When the ostler +knocked at the door--not of 32, but of 15--and it presently opened, I +went in without more ado. + +The room was a bare inn-chamber. A pallet without coverings lay in one +corner. In the middle were a couple of stools, and on one of them a +taper. + +The person who had opened to us stood eying us attentively; a bluff, +weather-beaten man with a thick beard and the air of a sailor. "Well," +he said, "what now?" + +"These gentlemen want to buy some lace," the ostler explained. + +"What lace do they want?" was the retort. + +"French lace," I answered. + +"You have come to the right shop, then," the man answered briskly. +Nodding to our conductor to depart, he carefully let him out. Then, +barring the door behind him, he as rapidly strode to the pallet and +twitched it aside, disclosing a trap door. He lifted this, and we saw +a narrow shaft descending into darkness. He brought the taper and held +it so as to throw a faint light into the opening. There was no ladder, +but blocks of wood nailed alternately against two of the sides, at +intervals of a couple of feet or so, made the descent pretty easy for +an active man. "The door is on this side," he said, pointing out the +one. "Knock loudly once and softly twice. The word is the same." + +We nodded and while he held the taper above, we descended, one by one, +without much difficulty, though I admit that half-way down the old +woman's words "Go on and perish" came back disquietingly to my mind. +However, my foot struck the bottom before I had time to digest them, +and a streak of light which seemed to issue from under a door forced +my thoughts the next moment into a new channel. Whispering to Master +Bertie to pause a minute, for there was only room for one of us to +stand at the bottom of the shaft, I knocked in the fashion prescribed. + +The sound of loud voices, which I had already detected, ceased on a +sudden, and I heard a shuffling on the other side of the boards. This +was followed by silence, and then the door was flung open, and, +blinded for the moment by a blaze of light, I walked mechanically +forward into a room. I made out as I advanced a group of men standing +round a rude table, their figures thrown into dark relief by flares +stuck in sconces on the walls behind them. Some had weapons in their +hands and others had partly risen from their seats and stood in +postures of surprise. "What do you seek?" cried a threatening voice +from among them. + +"Lace," I answered. + +"What lace?" + +"French lace." + +"Then you are welcome--heartily welcome!" was the answer given in a +tone of relief. "But who comes with you?" + +"Master Richard Bertie, of Lincolnshire," I answered promptly; and at +that moment he emerged from the shaft. + +A still more hearty murmur of welcome hailed his name and appearance, +and we were borne forward to the table amid a chorus of voices, the +greeting given to Master Bertie being that of men who joyfully hail +unlooked-for help. The room, from its vaulted ceiling and stone floor, +and the trams of casks which lay here and there or near the table +serving for seats, appeared to be a cellar. Its dark, gloomy recesses, +the flaring lights, and the weapons on the table, seemed meet and +fitting surroundings for the anxious faces which were gathered about +the board; for there was a something in the air which was not so much +secrecy as a thing more unpleasant--suspicion and mistrust. Almost at +the moment of our entrance it showed itself. One of the men, before +the door had well closed behind us, went toward it, as if to go out. +The leader--he who had questioned me--called sharply to him, bidding +him come back. And he came back, but reluctantly, as it seemed to me. + +I barely noticed this, for Master Bertie, who was known personally to +many and by name to all, was introducing me to two who were apparently +the leaders: Sir Thomas Penruddocke, a fair man as tall as myself, +loose-limbed and untidily dressed, with a reckless eye and a loud +tongue; and Master Walter Kingston, a younger brother, I was told, of +that Sir Anthony Kingston who had suffered death the year before for +conspiracy against the queen--the same in which Lord Devon had showed +the white feather. Kingston was a young man of moderate height and +slender; of a brown complexion, and delicate, almost womanish beauty, +his sleepy dark eyes and dainty mustache suggesting a temper rather +amiable than firm. But the spirit of revenge had entered into him, and +I soon learned that not even Penruddocke, a Cornish knight of longer +lineage than purse, was so vehement a plotter or so devoted to the +cause. Looking at the others my heart sank; it needed no greater +experience than mine to discern that, except three or four whom I +identified as stout professors of religion, they were men rather of +desperate fortunes than good estate. I learned on the instant that +conspiracy makes strange bedfellows, and that it is impossible to do +dirty work even with the purest intentions--in good company! Master +Bertie's face indicated to one who knew him as well as I did something +of the same feeling; and could the clock have been put back awhile, +and we placed with free hands and uncommitted outside the Gatehouse, I +think we should with one accord have turned our backs on it, and given +up an attempt which in this company could scarcely fare any way but +ill. Still, for good or evil, the die was cast now, and retreat was +out of the question. + +We had confronted too many dangers during the last three years not to +be able to face this one with a good courage; and presently Master +Bertie, taking a seat, requested to be told of the strength and plans +of our associates, his businesslike manner introducing at once some +degree of order and method into a conference which before our arrival +had--unless I was much mistaken--been conspicuously lacking in both. + +"Our resources?" Penruddocke replied confidently. "They lie +everywhere, man! We have but to raise the flag and the rest will be a +triumphal march. The people, sick of burnings and torturings, and +heated by the loss of Calais last January, will flock to us. Flock to +us, do I say? I will answer for it they will!" + +"But you have some engagements, some promises from people of +standing?" + +"Oh, yes! But the whole nation will join us. They are weary of the +present state of things." + +"They may be as weary of it as you say," Master Bertie answered +shrewdly; "but is it equally certain that they will risk their necks +to amend it? You have fixed upon some secure base from which we can +act, and upon which, if necessary, we may fall back to concentrate our +strength?" + +"Fall back?" cried Penruddocke, rising from his seat in heat. "Master +Bertie, I hope you have not come among us to talk of falling back! Let +us have no talk of that. If Wyatt had held on at once London would +have been his! It was falling back ruined him." + +Master Bertie shook his head. "If you have no secure base, you run the +risk of being crushed in the first half hour," he said. "When a fire +is first lighted the breeze puts it out which afterward but fans it." + +"You will not say that when you hear our plans. There are to be three +risings at once. Lord Delaware will rise in the west." + +"But will he?" said Master Bertie pointedly, disregarding the +threatening looks which were cast at him by more than one. "The late +rebellion there was put down very summarily, and I should have thought +that countryside would not be prone to rise again. _Will_ Lord +Delaware rise?" + +"Oh, yes, he will rise fast enough!" Penruddocke replied carelessly. +"I will answer for him. And on the same day, while we do the London +business, Sir Richard Bray will gather his men in Kent." + +"Do not count on him!" said Master Bertie. "A prisoner, muffled and +hoodwinked, was taken to the Tower by water this afternoon. And rumor +says it was Sir Richard Bray." + +There was a pause of consternation, during which one looked at +another, and swarthy faces grew pale. Penruddocke was the first to +recover himself. "Bah!" he exclaimed, "a fig for rumor! She is ever a +lying jade! I will bet a noble Richard Bray is supping in his own +house at this minute." + +"Then you would lose," Master Bertie rejoined sadly, and with no show +of triumph. "On hearing the report I sent a messenger to Sir Richard's +house. He brought word back that Sir Richard Bray had been fetched +away unexpectedly by four men, and that the house was in confusion." + +A murmur of dismay broke out at the lower end of the table. But the +Cornishman rose to the situation. "What matter?" he cried +boisterously. "What we have lost in Bray we have gained in Master +Bertie. He will raise Lincolnshire for us, and the Duchess's tenants. +There should be five hundred stout men of the latter, and two-thirds +of them Protestants at heart. If Bray has been seized there is the +more call for haste that we may release him." + +This appeal was answered by an outburst of cries. One or two even +rose, and waving their weapons swore a speedy vengeance. But Master +Bertie sat silent until the noise had subsided. Then he spoke. "You +must not count on them either, Sir Thomas," he said firmly. "I cannot +find it in my conscience to bring my wife's tenants into a plan so +desperate as this appears to be. To appeal to the people generally is +one thing; to call on those who are bound to us and who cannot in +honor refuse is another. And I will not risk in a hopeless struggle +the lives of men whose fathers looked for guidance to me and mine." + +A silence, the silence of utter astonishment, fell upon the plotters +round the table. In every face--and they were all turned upon my +companion--I read rage and distrust and dismay. They had chafed under +his cold criticisms and his calm reasonings. But this went beyond all, +and there were hands which stole instinctively to daggers, and eyes +which waited scowling for a signal. But Penruddocke, sanguine by +nature and rendered reckless by circumstances, had still the feelings +of a gentleman, and something in him responded to the appeal which +underlay Master Bertie's words. He remained silent, gazing gloomily at +the table, his eyes perhaps opened at this late hour to the +hopelessness of the attempt he meditated. + +It was Walter Kingston who came to the fore, and put into words the +thoughts of the coarser and more selfish spirits round him. Leaping +from his seat he dashed his slender hand on the table. "What does this +mean?" he sneered, a dangerous light in his dark eyes. "Those only are +here or should be here who are willing to stake all--all, mind you--on +the cause. Let us have no sneaks! Let us have no men with a foot on +either bank! Let us have no Courtenays nor cowards! Such men ruined +Wyatt and hanged my brother! A curse on them!" he cried, his voice +rising almost to a scream. + +"Master Kingston! do you refer to me?" Bertie rejoined in haughty +surprise. + +"Ay, I do!" cried the young man hotly. + +"Then I must beg leave of these gentlemen to explain my position." + +"Your position? So! More words?" quoth the other mockingly. + +"Ay! as many words as I please," retorted Master Bertie, his color +rising. "Afterward I will be as ready with deeds, I dare swear, as any +other! My tenants and my wife's I will not draw into an almost +hopeless struggle. But my own life and my friend's, since we have +obtained your secrets, I must risk, and I will do so in honor to the +death. For the rest, who doubts my courage may test it below ground or +above." + +The young man laughed rudely. "You will risk your life, but not your +lands, Master Bertie? That is the position, is it?" + +My companion was about to utter a rejoinder, fierce for him, when I, +who had hitherto sat silent, interposed. "The old witch told the +truth," I cried bitterly. "She said if we came hither we should +perish. And perish we shall, through being linked to a dozen men as +brave as I could wish, but the biggest fools under heaven!" + +"Fools?" shouted Kingston. + +"Ay, fools!" I repeated. "For who but fools, being at sea in a boat in +which all must sink or swim, would fall a-quarreling? Tell me that!" I +cried, slapping the table. + +"You are about right," Penruddocke said, and half a dozen voices +muttered assent. + +"About right, is he?" shrieked Kingston. "But who knows we are in a +boat together? Who knows that, I'd like to hear?" + +"I do!" I said, standing up and overtopping him by eight inches. "And +if any man hints that Master Bertie is here for any other purpose or +with any other intent than to honestly risk his life in this endeavor +as becomes a gentleman, let him stand out--let him stand out, and I +will break his neck! Fie, gentlemen, fie!" I continued, after a short +pause, which I did not make too long lest Master Kingston's passion +should get the better of his prudence. "Though I am young I have seen +service. But I never saw battle won yet with dissension in the camp. +For shame! Let us to business, and make the best dispositions we may." + +"You talk sense, Master Carey!" Penruddocke cried, with a great oath. +"Give me your hand. And do you, Kingston, hold your peace. If Master +Bertie will not raise his men to save his own skin, he will hardly do +it for ours. Now, Sir Richard Bray being taken, what is to be done, my +lads? Come, let us look to that." + +So the storm blew over. But it was with heavy hearts that two of us +fell to the discussion which followed, counting over weapons and +assigning posts, and debating this one's fidelity and that one's +lukewarmness. Our first impressions had not deceived us. The +plot was desperate, and those engaged in it were wanting in every +element which should command success--in information, forethought, +arrangement--everything save sheer audacity. When after a prolonged +and miserable sitting it was proposed that all should take the oath of +association on the Gospels, Master Bertie and I assented gloomily. It +would make our position no worse, for already we were fully committed. +The position was indeed bad enough. We had only persuaded the others +to a short delay; and even this meant that we must remain in hiding in +England, exposed from day to day to all the chances of detection and +treachery. + +Sir Thomas brought out from some secret place about him a tiny roll of +paper wrapped in a quill, and while we stood about him looking over +his shoulders, he laboriously added, letter by letter, three or four +names. The stern, anxious faces which peered the while at the document +or scanned each other only to find their anxiety reflected, the +flaring lights behind us, the recklessness of some and the distrust of +others, the cloaks in which many were wrapped to the chin, and the +occasional gleam of hidden weapons, made up a scene very striking. The +more as it was no mere show, but some of us saw only too distinctly +behind it the figure of the headsman and the block. + +"Now," said Penruddocke, who himself I think took a certain grim +pleasure in the formality, "be ready to swear, gentlemen, in pairs, as +I call the names. Kingston and Matthewson!" + +Lolling against the wall under one of the sconces I looked at Master +Bertie, expecting to be called up with him. He smiled as our eyes met; +and I thought with a rush of tenderness how lightly I could have dared +the worst had all my associates been like him. But repining came too +late, and in a moment Penruddocke surprised me by calling out +"Crewdson and Carey!" + +So Master Bertie was not to be my companion! I learned afterward that +men who were strangers to one another were purposely associated, the +theory being that each should keep an eye upon his oath-fellow. I went +forward to the end of the table, and took the book. + +There was a slight pause. + +"Crewdson!" called Penruddocke sharply; "did you not hear, man?" + +There was a little stir at the farther end of the room, and he came +forward, moving slowly and reluctantly. I saw that he was the man whom +Penruddocke had called back when we entered, a man of great height, +though slender, and closely cloaked. A drooping gray mustache covered +his mouth, and that was almost all I made out before Sir Thomas, with +some sharpness, bade him uncover. He did so with an abrupt gesture, +and reaching out his hand grasped the other end of the book as though +he would take it from me. His manner was so strange that I looked hard +at him, and he, jerking up his head with a gesture of defiance, looked +at me too, his face very pale. + +I heard Penruddocke's voice droning the words of the oath, but I paid +no attention to them--I was busied with something else. Where had I +seen the sinister gleam in those eyes before, and that forehead high +and narrow, and those lean, swarthy cheeks? Where had I before +confronted that very face which now glared into mine across the book? +Its look was bold and defiant, but low down in the cheek I saw a +little pulse beating furiously, a pulse which told of anxiety, and the +jaws, half veiled by the ragged mustache, were set in an iron grip. +Where? Ha! I knew. I dropped my end of the book and stepped back. + +"Look to the door!" I cried, my voice sounding harsh and strange in my +own ears. "Let no one leave! I denounce that man!" And raising my hand +I pointed pitilessly at my oath-fellow. "I denounce him--he is a spy +and traitor!" + +"I a spy?" the man shouted fiercely--with the fierceness of despair. + +"Ay, you! you! Clarence, or Crewdson, or whatever you call yourself, I +denounce you! My time has come!" + + +[Illustration: ". . . HE IS A SPY AND A TRAITOR!"] + + + + + CHAPTER XIX. + + FERDINAND CLUDDE. + + +The bitterness of that hour long past, when he had left me for death, +when he had played with the human longing for life, and striven +without a thought of pity to corrupt me by hopes and fears the most +awful that mortals know, was in my voice as I spoke. I rejoiced that +vengeance had come upon him at last, and that I was its instrument. I +saw the pallor of a great fear creep into his dark cheek, and read in +his eyes the vicious passion of a wild beast trapped, and felt no +pity. "Master Clarence!" I said, and laughed--laughed mockingly. "You +do not look pleased to see your friends. Or perhaps you do not +remember me. Stand forward, Master Bertie! Maybe he will recognize +you." + +But though Master Bertie came forward and stood by my side gazing at +him, the villain's eyes did not for an instant shift from mine. "It is +the man!" my companion said after a solemn pause--for the other, +breathing fast, made no answer. "He was a spy in the pay of Bishop +Gardiner, when I knew him. At the Bishop's death I heard that he +passed into the service of the Spanish Ambassador, the Count de Feria. +He called himself at that time Clarence. I recognize him." + +The quiet words had their effect. From full one-half of the savage +crew round us a fierce murmur rose more terrible than any loud outcry. +Yet this seemed a relief to the doomed man; he forced himself to look +away from me and to confront the dark ring of menacing faces which +hemmed him in. The moment he did so he appeared to find courage and +words. "They take me for another man!" he cried in hoarse accents. "I +know nothing of them!" and he added a fearful oath. "He knows me. Ask +him!" + +He pointed to Walter Kingston, who was sitting moodily on a tram +outside the ring, and who alone had not risen under the excitement of +my challenge. On being thus appealed to he looked up suddenly. "If I +am to choose between you," he said bitterly, "and say which is the +true man, I know which I shall pick." + +"Which?" Clarence murmured. "Which?" This time his tone was different. +In his voice was the ring of hope. + +"I should give my vote for you," Kingston replied, looking +contemptuously at him. "I know something about you, but of the other +gentleman I know nothing!" + +"And not much of the person you call Crewdson," I retorted fiercely, +"since you do not know his real name." + +"I know this much," the young man answered, tapping his boot with his +scabbard with studied carelessness, "that he lent me some money, and +seemed a good fellow and one that hated a mass priest. That is enough +for me. As for his name, it is his fancy perhaps. You call yourself +Carey. Well, I know a good many Careys, but I do not know you, nor +ever heard of you!" + +I swung round on him with a hot cheek. But the challenge which was +upon my tongue was anticipated by Master Bertie, who drew me forcibly +back. "Leave this to me, Francis," he said, "and do you watch that +man. Master Kingston and gentlemen," he continued, turning again to +them, and drawing himself to his full height as he addressed them, +"listen, if you please! You know me, if you do not know my friend. The +honor of Richard Bertie has never been challenged until to-night, nor +ever will be with impunity. Leave my friend out of the question and +put me in it. I, Richard Bertie, say that that man is a paid spy and +informer, come here in quest of blood-money! And he, Crewdson, a +nameless man, says that I lie. Choose between us. Or look at him and +judge! Look!" + +He was right to bid them look. As the savage murmur rose again and +took from the wretched man his last hope, as the ugliness of despair +and wicked, impotent passion distorted his face, he was indeed the +most deadly witness against himself. + +The lights which shone on treacherous weapons half hidden, or on the +glittering eyes of cruel men whose blood was roused, fell on nothing +so dangerous as the livid, despairing face which, unmasked and eyed by +all with aversion, still defied us. Traitor and spy as he was, he had +the merit of courage at least; he would die game. And even as I, with +a first feeling of pity for him, discerned this, his sword was out, +and with a curse he lunged at me. + +Penruddocke saved me by a buffet which sent me reeling against the +wall, so that the villain's thrust was spent on air. Before he could +repeat it, four or five men flung themselves upon him from behind. For +a moment there was a great uproar, while the group surrounding him +swayed to and fro as he dragged his captors up and down with a +strength I should not have expected. But the end was certain, and we +stood looking on quietly. In a minute or two they had him down, and +disarming him, bound his hands. + +For me he seemed to have a special hatred. "Curse you!" he panted, +glaring at me as he lay helpless. "You have been my evil angel! From +the first day I saw you, you have thwarted me in every plan, and now +you have brought me to this!" + +"Not I, but yourself," I answered. + +"My curse upon you!" he cried again, the rage and hate in his face so +terrible that I turned away shuddering and sick at heart. "If I could +have killed you," he cried, "I would have died contented." + +"Enough!" interposed Penruddocke briskly. "It is well for us that +Master Bertie and his friend came here to-night. Heaven grant it be +not too late! We do not need," he added, looking round, "any more +evidence, I think?" + +The dissent was loud, and, save for Kingston, who still sat sulking +apart, unanimous. + +"Death?" said the Cornishman quietly. + +No one spoke, but each man gave a brief stern nod. + +"Very well," the leader continued; "then I propose----" + +"One moment," said Master Bertie, interrupting him. "A word with you +apart, with our friends' permission. You can repeat it to them +afterward." + +He drew Sir Thomas aside, and they retired into the corner by the +door, where they stood talking in whispers. I had small reason to feel +sympathy for the man who lay there tied and doomed to die like a calf. +Yet even I shuddered--yes, and some of the hardened men round me +shuddered also at the awful expression in his eyes as, without moving +his head, he followed the motions of the two by the door. Some faint +hope springing into being wrung his soul, and brought the perspiration +in great drops to his forehead. I turned away, thinking gravely of the +early morning three years ago when he had tortured me by the very same +hopes and fears which now racked his own spirit. + +Penruddocke came back, Master Bertie following him. + +"It must not be done to-night," he announced quietly, with a nod which +meant that he would explain the reason afterward. "We will meet again +to-morrow at four in the afternoon instead of at eight in the evening. +Until then two must remain on guard with him. It is right he should +have some time to repent, and he shall have it." + +This did not at once find favor. + +"Why not run him through now?" said one bluntly. "And meet to-morrow +at some place unknown to him? If we come here again we shall, likely +enough, walk straight into the trap." + +"Well, have it that way, if you please," answered Sir Thomas, +shrugging his shoulders. "But do not blame me afterward if you find we +have let slip a golden opportunity. Be fools if you like. I dare say +it will not make much difference in the end!" + +He spoke at random, but he knew how to deal with his crew, it seemed, +for on this those who had objected assented reluctantly to the course +he proposed. "Barnes and Walters are here in hiding, so they had +better be the two to guard him," he continued. "There is no fear that +they will be inclined to let him go!" I looked at the men whom the +glances of their fellows singled out, and found them to belong to the +little knot of fanatics I had before remarked: dark, stern men, worth, +if the matter ever came to fighting, all the rest of the band put +together. + +"At four, to-morrow, then, we meet," Sir Thomas concluded lightly. +"Then we will deal with him, never fear! Now it is near midnight, and +we must be going. But not all together, or we shall attract +attention." + + +Half an hour later Master Bertie and I rode softly out of the +courtyard and turned our faces toward the city. The night wind came +sweeping across the valley of the Thames, and met us full in the face +as we reached the brow of the hill. It seemed laden with melancholy +whispers. The wretched enterprise, ill-conceived, ill-ordered, and in +its very nature desperate, to which we were in honor committed, would +have accounted of itself for any degree of foreboding. But the scene +through which we had just passed, and on my part the knowledge that I +had given up a fellow-being to death, had their depressing influences. +For some distance we rode in silence, which I was the first to break. + +"Why did you put off his punishment?" I asked. + +"Because I think he will give us information in the interval," Bertie +answered briefly. "Information which may help us. A spy is generally +ready to betray his own side upon occasion." + +"And you will spare him if he does?" I asked. It seemed to me neither +justice nor mercy. + +"No," he said, "there is no fear of that. Those who go with ropes +round their necks know no mercy. But drowning men will catch at +straws; and ten to one he will babble!" + +I shivered. "It is a bad business," I said. + +He thought I referred to the conspiracy, and he inveighed bitterly +against it, reproaching himself for bringing me into it, and for his +folly in believing the rosy accounts of men who had all to win, and +nothing save their worthless lives to lose. "There is only one thing +gained," he said. "We are likely to pay dearly for that, so we may +think the more of it. We have been the means of punishing a villain." + +"Yes," I said, "that is true. It was a strange meeting and a strange +recognition. Strangest of all that I should be called up to swear with +him." + +"Not strange," Master Bertie answered gravely. "I would rather call it +providential. Let us think of that, and be of better courage, friend. +We have been used; we shall not be cast away before our time." + +I looked back. For some minutes I had thought I heard behind us a +light footstep, more like the pattering of a dog than anything else. I +could see nothing, but that was not wonderful, for the moon was young +and the sky overcast. "Do you hear some one following us?" I said. + +Master Bertie drew rein suddenly, and turning in the saddle we +listened. For a second I thought I still heard the sound. The next it +ceased, and only the wind toying with the November leaves and sighing +away in the distance, came to our ears. "No," he said, "I think it +must have been your fancy. I hear nothing." + +But when we rode on the sound began again, though at first more +faintly, as if our follower had learned prudence and fallen farther +behind. "Do not stop, but listen!" I said softly. "Cannot you hear the +pattering of a naked foot now?" + +"I hear something," he answered. "I am afraid you are right, and that +we are followed." + +"What is to be done?" I said, my thoughts busy. + +"There is Caen wood in front," he answered, "with a little open ground +on this side of it. We will ride under the trees and then stop +suddenly. Perhaps we shall be able to distinguish him as he crosses +the open behind us." We made the experiment; but as if our follower +had divined the plan, his footstep ceased to sound before we had +stopped our horses. He had fallen farther behind. "We might ride +quickly back," I suggested, "and surprise him." + +"It would be useless," Bertie answered. "There is too much cover close +to the road. Let us rather trot on and outstrip him." + +We did trot on; and what with the tramp of our horses as they swung +along the road, and the sharp passage of the wind by our ears, we +heard no more of the footstep behind. But when we presently pulled up +to breathe our horses--or rather within a few minutes of our doing +so--there it was behind us, nearer and louder than before. I shivered +as I listened; and presently, acting on a sudden impulse, I wheeled my +horse round and spurred him back a dozen paces along the road. + +I pulled up. + +There was a movement in the shadow of the trees on my right, and I +leaned forward, peering in that direction. Gradually, I made out the +lines of a figure standing still as though gazing at me; a strange, +distorted figure, crooked, short, and in some way, though no lineament +of the face was visible, expressive of a strange and weird +malevolence. It was the witch! The witch whom I had seen in the +kitchen at the Gatehouse. How, then, had she come hither? How had she, +old, lame, decrepit, kept up with us? + +I trembled as she raised her hand, and, standing otherwise motionless, +pointed at me out of the gloom. The horse under me was trembling too, +trembling violently, with its ears laid back, and, as she moved, its +terror increased, it plunged wildly. I had to give for a moment all my +attention to it, and though I tried, in mere revolt against the fear +which I felt was overcoming me, to urge it nearer, my efforts were +vain. After nearly unseating me, the beast whirled round and, getting +the better of me, galloped down the road toward London. + +"What is it?" cried Master Bertie, as I came speedily up with him; he +had ridden slowly on. "What is the matter?" + +"Something in the hedge startled it," I explained, trying to soothe +the horse. "I could not clearly see what it was." + +"A rabbit, I dare say," he remarked, deceived by my manner. + +"Perhaps it was," I answered. Some impulse, not unnatural, led me to +say nothing about what I had seen. I was not quite sure that my eyes +had not deceived me. I feared his ridicule, too, though he was not +very prone to ridicule. And above all I shrank from explaining the +medley of superstitious fear, distrust, and abhorrence in which I held +the creature who had shown so strange a knowledge of my life. + +We were already near Holborn, and reaching without further adventure a +modest inn near the Bars, we retired to a room we had engaged, and lay +down with none of the gallant hopes which had last night formed the +subject of our talk. Yet we slept well, for depression goes better +with sleep than does the tumult of anticipation; and I was up early, +and down in the yard looking to the horses before London was well +awake. As I entered the stable a man lying curled up in the straw +rolled lazily over and, shading his eyes, glanced up. Apparently he +recognized me, for he got slowly to his feet. "Morning!" he said +gruffly. + +I stood staring at him, wondering if I had made a mistake. + +"What are you doing here, my man?" I said sharply, when I had made +certain I knew him, and that he was really the surly ostler from the +Gatehouse tavern at Highgate. "Why did you come here? Why have you +followed us?" + +"Come about your business," he answered. "To give you that." + +I took the note he held out to me. "From whom?" I said. "Who sent it +by you?" + +"Cannot tell," he replied, shaking his head. + +"Cannot, or will not?" I retorted. + +"Both," he said doggedly. "But there, if you want to know what sort of +a kernel is in a nut, you don't shake the tree, master--you crack the +nut." + +I looked at the note he had given me. It was but a slip of paper +folded thrice. The sender had not addressed, or sealed, or fastened it +in anyway; had taken no care either to insure its reaching its +destination or to prevent prying eyes seeing the contents. If one of +our associates had sent it, he had been guilty of the grossest +carelessness. "You are sure it is for me?" I said. + +"As sure as mortal can be," he answered. "Only that it was given me +for a man, and not a mouse! You are not afraid, master?" + +I was not; but he edged away as he spoke, and looked with so much +alarm at the scrap of paper that it was abundantly clear he was very +much afraid himself, even while he derided me. I saw that if I had +offered to return the note he would have backed out of the stable and +gone off there and then as fast as his lame foot would let him. This +puzzled me. However, I read the note. There was nothing in it to +frighten me. Yet, as I read, the color came into my face, for it +contained one name to which I had long been a stranger. + +"To Francis Cludde," it ran. "If you would not do a thing of which you +will miserably repent all your life, and which will stain you in the +eyes of all Christian men, meet me two hours before noon at the cross +street by St. Botolph's, where you first saw Mistress Bertram. And +tell no one. Fail not to come. In Heaven's name, fail not!" + +The note had nothing to do with the conspiracy, then, on the face of +it; mysterious as it was, and mysteriously as it came. "Look here!" I +said to the man. "Tell me who sent it, and I will give you a crown." + +"I would not tell you," he answered stubbornly, "if you could make me +King of England! No, nor King of Spain too! You might rack me and you +would not get it from me!" + +His one eye glowed with so obstinate a resolve that I gave up the +attempt to persuade him, and turned to examine the message itself. But +here I fared no better. I did not know the handwriting, and there was +no peculiarity in the paper. I was no wiser than before. "Are you to +take back any answer?" I said. + +"No," he replied, "the saints be thanked for the same! But you will +bear me witness," he went on anxiously, "that I gave you the letter. +You will not forget that, or say that you have not had it? But there!" +he added to himself as he turned away, speaking in a low voice, so +that I barely caught the sense of the words, "what is the use? she +will know!" + +She will know! It had something to do with a woman then, even if a +woman were not the writer. I went in to breakfast in two minds about +going. I longed to tell Master Bertie and take his advice, though the +unknown had enjoined me not to do so. But for the time I refrained, +and explaining my absence of mind as well as I could, I presently +stole away on some excuse or other, and started in good time, and on +foot, into the city. I reached the rendezvous a quarter of an hour +before the time named, and strolling between the church and the +baker's shop, tried to look as much like a chance passer-by as I +could, keeping the while a wary lookout for any one who might turn out +to be my correspondent. + + +The morning was cold and gray. A drizzling rain was falling. The +passers were few, and the appearance of the streets dirty and, with +littered kennels, was dreary indeed. I found it hard at once to keep +myself warm and to avoid observation as I hung about. Ten o'clock had +rung from more than one steeple, and I was beginning to think myself a +fool for my pains, when a woman of middle height, slender and young in +figure, but wearing a shabby brown cloak, and with her head muffled in +a hood, as though she had the toothache or dreaded the weather more +than ordinary, turned the corner of the belfry and made straight +toward me. She drew near, and seemed about to pass me without notice. +But when abreast of me she glanced up suddenly, her eyes the only +features I could see. + +"Follow me to the church!" she murmured gently. And she swept on to +the porch. + +I obeyed reluctantly; very reluctantly, my feet seeming like lead. For +I knew who she was. Though I had only seen her eyes, I had recognized +them, and guessed already what her business with me was. She led the +way resolutely to a quiet corner. The church was empty and still, with +only the scent of incense in the air to tell of a recent service. It +was no surprise to me when she turned abruptly, and, removing her +hood, looked me in the face. + +"What have you done with him?" she panted, laying her hand on my arm. +"Speak! Tell me what you have done with him?" + +The question, the very question, I had foreseen! Yet I tried to fence +with her. I said, "With whom?" + +"With whom?" she repeated bitterly. "You know me! I am not so changed +in three years that you do not recognize me?" + +"No; I know you," I said. + +There was a hectic flush on her cheeks, and it seemed to me that the +dark hair was thinner on her thin temples than when I had seen her +last. But the eyes were the same. + +"Then why ask with whom?" she cried passionately. "What have you done +with the man you called Clarence?" + +"Done with him?" I said feebly. + +"Ay, done with him? Come, speak and tell me!" she repeated in fierce +accents, her hand clutching my wrist, her eyes probing my face with +merciless glances. "Have you killed him? Tell me!" + +"Killed him, Mistress Anne?" I said sullenly. "No, I have not killed +him." + +"He is alive?" she cried. + +"For all I know, he is alive." + +She glared at me for some seconds to assure herself that I was telling +the truth. Then she heaved a great sigh; her hands fell from my +wrists, the color faded out of her face, and she lowered her eyes. I +glanced round with a momentary idea of escape--I so shrank from that +which was to come. But before I had well entertained the notion she +looked up, her face grown calm. + +"Then what have you done with him?" she asked. + +"I have done nothing with him," I answered. + +She laughed; a mirthless laugh. "Bah!" she said, "do not tell me lies! +That is your honor, I suppose--your honor to your friends down in the +cellar there! Do you think that I do not know all about them? Shall I +give you the list? He is a very dangerous conspirator, is Sir Thomas +Penruddocke, is he not? And that scented dandy Master Kingston! Or +Master Crewdson--tell me of him! Tell me of him, I say!" she +exclaimed, with a sudden return from irony to a fierce eagerness, a +breathless impatience. "Why did he not come up last night? What have +you done with him?" + +I shook my head, sick and trembling. How could I tell her? + +"I see," she said. "You will not tell me. But you swear he is yet +alive, Master Cludde? Good. Then you are holding him for a hostage? Is +that it?" with a piercing glance at my face. "Or, you have condemned +him, but for some reason the sentence has not been executed!" She drew +a long, deep breath, for I fear my face betrayed me. "That is it, is +it? Then there is still time." + +She turned from me and looked toward the end of the aisle, where a +dull red lamp hanging before the altar glowed feebly in the warm +scented air. She seemed so to turn and so to look in thankfulness, as +if the news she had learned were good instead of what it was. "What is +the hour fixed?" she asked suddenly. + +I shook my head. + +"You will not tell me? Well, it matters not," she answered briskly. +"He must be saved. Do you hear? He must be saved, Master Cludde. That +is your business." + +I shook my head. + +"You think it is not?" she said. "Well, I can show you it is! Listen!" + +She raised herself on a step of the font, and looked me harshly in the +face. "If he be not given up to me safe and sound by sunset this +evening, I will betray you all! All! I have the list here," she +muttered sternly, touching her bosom. "You, Master Bertie, +Penruddocke, Fleming, Barnes--all. All, do you hear? Give him up or +you shall hang!" + +"You would not do it!" I cried aghast, peering into her burning eyes. + +"Would not do it? Fool!" she hissed. "If all the world but he had one +head, I would cut it off to save his! He is my husband! Do you hear? +He is my husband--my all! Do you think I have given up everything, +friends and honor and safety, for him, to lose him now? No! You say I +would not do it? Do you know what I have done? You have a scar there." + +She touched me lightly on the breast. "I did it," she said. + +"You?" I muttered. + +"Yes, I, you blind fool! I did it," she answered. "You escaped then, +and I was glad of it, since the wound answered my purpose. But you +will not escape again. The cord is surer." + +Something in her last words crossed my memory and enlightened me. + +"You were the woman I saw last night," I said. "You followed us from +High gate." + +"What matter! What matter!" she exclaimed impatiently. "Better be +footsore than heartsore. Will you do now what I want? Will you answer +for his life?" + +"I can do nothing without the others," I said. + +"But the others know nothing," she answered. "They do not know their +own danger. Where will you find them?" + +"I shall find them," I replied resolutely. "And in any case I must +consult Master Bertie. Will you come and see him?" + +"And be locked up too?" she said sternly, and in a different tone. +"No. It is you must do this, and you must answer for it, Francis +Cludde. You, and no one else." + +"I can do nothing by myself," I repeated. + +"Ay, but you can--you must!" she retorted, "or Heaven's curse will be +upon you! You think me mad to say that. Listen! Listen, fool! The man +whom you have condemned, whom you have left to die, is not only my +husband, wedded to me these three years, but your father--your father, +Ferdinand Cludde!" + + + + + CHAPTER XX. + + THE COMING QUEEN. + + +I stood glaring at her. + +"You were a blind bat or you would have found it out for yourself," +she continued scornfully. "A babe would have guessed it, knowing as +much of your father as you did." + +"Does he know himself?" I muttered hoarsely, looking anywhere but at +her now. The shock had left me dull and confused. I did not doubt her +word, rather I wondered with her that I had not found this out for +myself. But the possibility of meeting my father in that wide world +into which I had plunged to escape from the knowledge of his +existence, had never occurred to me. Had I thought of it, it would +have seemed too unlikely; and though I might have seen in Gardiner a +link between us, and so have identified him, the greatness of the +Chancellor's transactions, and certain things about Clarence which had +seemed, or would have seemed, had I ever taken the point into +consideration, at variance with my ideas of my father, had prevented +me getting upon the track. + +"Does he know that you are his son, do you mean?" she said. "No, he +does not." + +"You have not told him?" + +"No," she answered with a slight shiver. + +I understood. I comprehended that even to her the eagerness with +which, being father and son, we had sought one another's lives during +those days on the Rhine, had seemed so dreadful that she had concealed +the truth from him. + +"When did you learn it?" I asked, trembling too. + +"I knew his right name before I ever saw you," she answered. "Yours I +learned on the day I left you at Santon." Looking back I remembered +the strange horror, then inexplicable, which she had betrayed; and I +understood it. So it was that knowledge which had driven her from us! +"What will you do now?" she said. "You will save him? You must save +him! He is your father." + +Save him? I shuddered at the thought that I had destroyed him! that I, +his son, had denounced him! Save him! The perspiration sprang out in +beads on my forehead. If I could not save him I should live pitied by +my friends and loathed by my enemies! + +"If it be possible," I muttered, "I will save him." + +"You swear it?" she cried. Before I could answer she seized my arm and +dragged me up the dim aisle until we stood together before the Figure +and the Cross. The chimes above us rang eleven. A shaft of cold +sunshine pierced a dusty window, and, full of dancing motes, shot +athwart the pillars. + +"Swear!" she repeated with trembling eagerness, turning her eyes on +mine, and raising her hand solemnly toward the Figure. "Swear by the +Cross!" + +"I swear," I said. + +She dropped her hand. Her form seemed to shrink and grow less. Making +a sign to me to go, she fell on her knees on the step, and drew her +hood over her face. I walked away on tiptoe down the aisle, but +glancing back from the door of the church I saw the small, solitary +figure still kneeling in prayer. The sunshine had died away. The dusty +window was colorless. Only the red lamp glowed dully above her head. I +seemed to see what the end would be. Then I pushed aside the curtain, +and slipped out into the keen air. It was hers to pray. It was mine to +act. + +I lost no time, but on my return I could not find Master Bertie either +in the public room or in the inn yard, so I sought him in his bedroom, +where I found him placidly reading a book; his patient waiting in +striking contrast with the feverish anxiety which had taken hold of +me. "What is it, lad?" he said, closing the volume, and laying it down +on my entrance. "You look disturbed?" + +"I have seen Mistress Anne," I answered. He whistled softly, staring +at me without a word. "She knows all," I continued. + +"How much is all?" he asked after a pause. + +"Our names--all our names, Penruddocke's, Kingston's, the others; our +meeting-place, and that we hold Clarence a prisoner. She was that old +woman whom we saw at the Gatehouse tavern last night." + +He nodded, appearing neither greatly surprised nor greatly alarmed. +"Does she intend to use her knowledge?" he said. "I suppose she does." + +"Unless we let him go safe and unhurt before sunset." + +"They will never consent to it," he answered, shaking his head. + +"Then they will hang!" I cried. + +He looked hard at me a moment, discerning something strange in the +bitterness of my last words. "Come, lad," he said, "you have not told +me all. What else have you learned?" + +"How can I tell you?" I cried wildly, waving him off, and going to the +lattice that my face might be hidden from him. "Heaven has cursed me!" +I added, my voice breaking. + +He came and laid his hand on my shoulder. "Heaven curses no one," he +said. "Most of our curses we make for ourselves. What is it, lad?" + +I covered my face with my hands. "He--he is my father," I muttered. +"Do you understand? Do you see what I have done? He is my father!" + +"Ha!" Master Bertie uttered that one exclamation in intense +astonishment; then he said no more. But the pressure of his hand told +me that he understood, that he felt with me, that he would help me. +And that silent comprehension, that silent assurance, gave the +sweetest comfort. "He must be allowed to go, then, for this time," he +resumed gravely, after a pause in which I had had time to recover +myself. "We will see to it. But there will be difficulties. You must +be strong and brave. The truth must be told. It is the only way." + +I saw that it was, though I shrank exceedingly from the ordeal before +me. Master Bertie advised, when I grew more calm, that we should be +the first at the rendezvous, lest by some chance Penruddocke's orders +should be anticipated; and accordingly, soon after two o'clock, we +mounted, and set forth. I remarked that my companion looked very +carefully to his arms, and, taking the hint, I followed his example. + +It was a silent, melancholy, anxious ride. However successful we might +be in rescuing my father--alas! that I should have to-day and always +to call that man father--I could not escape the future before me. I +had felt shame while he was but a name to me; how could I endure to +live, with his infamy always before my eyes? Petronilla, of whom I had +been thinking so much since I returned to England, whose knot of +velvet had never left my breast nor her gentle face my heart--how +could I go back to her now? I had thought my father dead, and his name +and fame old tales. But the years of foreign life which yesterday had +seemed a sufficient barrier between his past and myself--of what use +were they now? Or the foreign service I had fondly regarded as a kind +of purification? + +Master Bertie broke in on my reverie much as if he had followed its +course. "Understand one thing, lad!" he said, laying his hand on the +withers of my horse. "Yours must not be the hand to punish your +father. But after to-day you will owe him no duty. You will part from +him to-day and he will be a stranger to you. He deserted you when you +were a child; and if you owe reverence to any one, it is to your uncle +and not to him. He has himself severed the ties between you." + +"Yes," I said. "I will go abroad. I will go back to Wilna." + +"If ill comes of our enterprise--as I fear ill will come--we will both +go back, if we can," he answered. "If good by any chance should come +of it, then you shall be my brother, our family shall be your family. +The Duchess is rich enough," he added with a smile, "to allow you a +younger brother's portion." + +I could not answer him as I desired, for we passed at that moment +under the archway, and became instantly involved in the bustle going +forward in the courtyard. Near the principal door of the inn stood +eight or nine horses gayly caparisoned and in the charge of three +foreign-looking men, who, lounging in their saddles, were passing a +jug from hand to hand. They turned as we rode in and looked at us +curiously, but not with any impertinence. Apparently they were waiting +for the rest of their party, who were inside the house. Civilly +disposed as they seemed, the fact that they were armed, and wore rich +liveries of black and gold, caused me, and I think both of us, a +momentary alarm. + +"Who are they?" Master Bertie asked in a low voice, as he rode to the +opposite door and dismounted with his back to them. + +"They are Spaniards, I fancy," I said, scanning them over the +shoulders of my horse as I too got off. "Old friends, so to speak." + +"They seem wonderfully subdued for them," he answered, "and on their +best behavior. If half the tales we heard this morning be true, they +are not wont to carry themselves like this." + +Yet they certainly were Spanish, for I overheard them speaking to one +another in that language; and before we had well dismounted, their +leader--whom they received with great respect, one of them jumping +down to hold his stirrup--came out with three or four more and got to +horse again. Turning his rein to lead the way out through the north +gate he passed near us, and as he settled himself in his saddle took a +good look at us. The look passed harmlessly over me, but reaching +Master Bertie became concentrated. The rider started and smiled +faintly. He seemed to pause, then he raised his plumed cap and bowed +low--covered himself again and rode on. His train all followed his +example and saluted us as they passed. Master Bertie's face, which had +flushed a fiery red under the other's gaze, grew pale again. He looked +at me, when they had gone by, with startled eyes. + +"Do you know who that was?" he said, speaking like one who had +received a blow and did not yet know how much he was hurt. + +"No," I said. + +"It was the Count de Feria, the Spanish Ambassador," he answered. "And +he recognized me. I met him often, years ago. I knew him again as soon +as he came out, but I did not think he would by any chance recognize +me in this dress." + +"Are you sure," I asked in amazement, "that it was he?" + +"Quite sure," he answered. + +"But why did he not have you arrested, or at least detained? The +warrants are still out against you." + +Master Bertie shook his head. "I cannot tell," he said darkly. "He is +a Spaniard. But come, we have the less time to lose. We must join our +friends and take their advice; we seem to be surrounded by pitfalls." + +At this moment the lame ostler came up, and grumbling at us as if he +had never seen us in his life before, and never wished to see us +again, took our horses. We went into the kitchen, and taking the first +chance of slipping upstairs to No. 15, we were admitted with the same +precautions as before, and descending the shaft gained the cellar. + + +Here we were not, as we had looked to be, the first on the scene. I +suppose a sense of the insecurity of our meeting-place had led every +one to come early, so as to be gone early. Penruddocke indeed was not +here yet, but Kingston and half a score of others were sitting about +conversing in low tones. It was plain that the distrust and suspicion +which we had remarked on the previous day had not been allayed by the +discovery of Clarence's treachery. + +Indeed, it was clear that the distrust and despondency had to-day +become a panic. Men glared at one another and at the door, and talked +in whispers and started at the slightest sound. I glanced round. The +one I sought for with eager yet shrinking eyes was not to be seen. I +turned to Master Bertie, my face mutely calling on him to ask the +question. "Where is the prisoner?" he said sharply. + +A moment I hung in suspense. Then one of the men said, "He is in +there. He is safe enough!" He pointed, as he spoke, to a door which +seemed to lead to an inner cellar. + +"Right," said Master Bertie, still standing. "I have two pieces of bad +news for you nevertheless. Firstly I have just been recognized by the +Spanish Ambassador, whom I met in the courtyard above." + +Half the men rose to their feet. "What is he doing here?" they cried, +one boldly, the others with the quaver very plain in their voices. + +"I do not know; but he recognized me. Why he took no steps to detain +or arrest me I cannot tell. He rode away by the north road." + +They gazed at one another and we at them. The wolfish look which fear +brings into some faces grew stronger in theirs. + +"What is your other bad news?" said Kingston, with an oath. + +"A person outside, a friend of the prisoner, has a list of our names, +and knows our meeting-place and our plans. She threatens to use the +knowledge unless the man Clarence or Crewdson be set free." + +There was a loud murmur of wrath and dismay, amid which Kingston alone +preserved his composure. "We might have been prepared for that," he +said quietly. "It is an old precaution of such folk. But how did you +come to hear of it?" + +"My friend here saw the messenger and heard the terms. The man must be +set free by sunset." + +"And what warranty have we that he will not go straight with his plans +and his list to the Council?" + +Master Bertie could not answer that, neither could I; we had no +surety, and if we set him free could take none save his word. _His +word!_ Could even I ask them to accept that? To stake the life of the +meanest of them on it? + +I saw the difficulties of the position, and when Master Kingston +pronounced coolly that this was a waste of time, and that the only +wise course was to dispose of the principal witness, both in the +interests of justice and our own safety, and then shift for ourselves +before the storm broke, I acknowledged in my heart the wisdom of the +course, and felt that yesterday it would have received my assent. + +"The risk is about the same either way," Master Bertie said. + +"Not at all," Kingston objected, a sparkle of malice in his eye. Last +night we had thwarted him. To-night it was his turn; and the dark +lowering looks of those round him showed that numbers were with him. +"This fellow can hang us all. His accomplice who escapes can know +nothing save through him, and could give only vague and uncertain +evidence. No, no. Let us cast lots who shall do it, get it done +quickly, and begone." + +"We must wait at least," Bertie urged, "until Sir Thomas comes." + +"No!" retorted Kingston, with heat. "We are all equal here. Besides +the man was condemned yesterday, with the full assent of all. It only +remains to carry out the sentence. Surely this gentleman," he +continued, turning suddenly upon me, "who was so ready to accuse him +yesterday, does not wish him spared to-day?" + +"I do wish it," I said, in a low tone. + +"Ho! ho!" he cried, folding his arms and throwing back his head, +astonished at the success of his own question. "Then may we ask for +your reasons, sir? Last night you could not lay your tongue to words +too bad for him. Tonight you wish to spare him, and let him go?" + +"I do," I said. I felt that every eye was upon me, and that, Master +Bertie excepted, not one there would feel sympathy with me in my +humiliation. They were driven to the wall. They had no time for fine +feeling, for sympathy, for appreciation of the tragic, unless it +touched themselves. What chance had I with them, though I was a son +pleading for a father? Nay, what argument had I save that I was his +son, and that I had brought him to this? No argument. Only the appeal +to them that they would not make me a parricide! And I felt that at +this they would mock. + +And so, in view of those stern, curious faces, a new temptation seized +me--the temptation to be silent. Why should I not stand by and let +things take their course? Why should I not spare myself the shame +which I already saw would be fruitless? When Master Kingston, with a +cynical bow, said, "Your reasons, sir?" I stood mute and trembling. If +I kept silence, if I refused to give my reasons, if I did not +acknowledge the prisoner, but merely begged his life, he would die, +and the connection between us would be known only to one or two. I +should be freed from him and might go my own way. The sins of +Ferdinand Cludde were well-nigh forgotten--why take to myself the sins +of Clarence, which would otherwise never stain my name, would never be +associated with my father or myself? + +Why, indeed? It was a great and sore temptation, as I stood there +before all those eyes. He had deserved death. I had given him up in +perfect innocence. Had I any right to call on them to risk their lives +that I might go harmless in conscience, and he in person? Had I---- + +What, was there after all some taint in my blood? Was I going to +become like him--to take to myself a shame of my own earning, in the +effort to escape from the burden of his ill-fame? I remembered in time +the oath I had sworn, and when Kingston repeated his question, I +answered him quickly. "I did not know yesterday who he was," I said. +"I have discovered since that he is my father. I ask nothing on his +account. Were he only my father I would not plead for him. I plead for +myself," I murmured. "If you show no pity, you make me a parricide." + +I had done them wrong. There was something in my voice, I suppose, as +I said the words which cost me so much, which wrought with almost all +of them in a degree. They gazed at me with awed, wondering faces, and +murmured "His father!" in low tones. They were recalling the scene of +last night, the moment when I had denounced him, the curse he had +hurled at me, the half-told story of which that had seemed the climax. +I had wronged them. They did see the tragedy of it. + +Yes, they pitied me; but they showed plainly that they would still do +what perhaps I should have done in their place--justice. "He knows too +much!" said one. "Our lives are as good as his," muttered another--the +first to become thoroughly himself again--"why should we all die for +him?" The wolfish glare came back fast to their eyes. They handled +their weapons impatiently. They were longing to be away. At this +moment, when I saw I had indeed made my confession in vain, Master +Bertie struck in. "What," he said, "if Master Carey and I take charge +of him, and escorting him to his agent without, be answerable for both +of them?" + +"You would be only putting your necks into the noose!" said Kingston. + +"We will risk that!" replied my friend--and what a friend and what a +man he seemed amid that ignoble crew!--"I will myself promise you that +if he refuse to remain with us until midnight, or tries wherever we +are to raise an alarm or communicate with any one, I will run him +through with my own hand? Will not that satisfy you?" + +"No," Master Kingston retorted, "it will not! A bird in the hand is +worth two in the bush!" + +"But the woman outside?" said one timidly. + +"We must run that risk!" quoth he. "In an hour or two we shall be in +hiding. Come, the lot must be drawn. For this gentleman, let him stand +aside." + +I leaned against the wall, dazed and horror-stricken. Now that I had +identified myself with him I felt a great longing to save him. I +scarcely noticed the group drawing pieces of paper at the table. My +every thought was taken up with the low door over there, and the +wretched man lying bound in the darkness behind it. What must be the +horror, the black despair, the hate and defiance of his mind as he lay +there, trapped at last like any beast of prey? It was horrible! +horrible! horrible! + +I covered my face and could not restrain the cry of unutterable +distress which rose to my lips. They looked round, two or three of +them, from the table. But the impression my appeal had made upon them +had faded away already, and they only shrugged their shoulders and +turned again to their task. Master Bertie alone stood apart, his arms +folded, his face grave and dark. He too had abandoned hope. There +seemed no hope, when suddenly there came a knocking at the door. The +papers were dropped, and while some stood as if stiffened into stone, +others turned and gazed at their neighbors. It was a knocking more +hasty and imperative than the usual summons, though given in the same +fashion. At last a man found tongue. "It is Sir Thomas," he suggested, +with a sigh of relief. "He is in a hurry and brings news. I know his +knock." + +"Then open the door, fool," cried Kingston. "If you can see through a +two-inch plank, why do you stand there like a gaby?" + +Master Bertie anticipated the man, and himself opened the door and +admitted the knocker. Penruddocke it was; he came in, still drumming +on the door with his fist, his eyes sparkling, his ruddy cheeks aglow. +He crossed the threshold with a swagger, and looking at us all burst +into a strange peal of laughter. "Yoicks! Gone to earth!" he shouted, +waving his hand as if he had a whip in it. "Gone to earth--gone +forever! Did you think it was the Lords of the Council, my lads?" + +He had left the door wide open behind him, and we now saw in the +doorway the seafaring man who usually guarded the room above. "What +does this mean, Sir Thomas?" Kingston said sternly. He thought, I +fancy, as many of us did, that the knight was drunk. "Have you given +that man permission to leave his post?" + +"Post? There are no more posts," cried Sir Thomas, with a strange +jollity. He certainly was drunk, but perhaps not with liquor. "Except +good fat posts," he continued, smacking Master Bertie on the shoulder, +"for loyal men who have done the state service, and risked their lives +in evil times! Posts? I shall get so drunk to-night that the stoutest +post on Ludgate will not hold me up!" + +"You seem to have gone far that way already," my friend said coldly. + +"So will you, when you hear the news!" Penruddocke replied more +soberly. "Lads, the Queen is dying!" + +In the vaulted room his statement was received in silence; a silence +dictated by no feeling for the woman going before her Maker--how +should we who were plotting against her feel for her, we who were for +the most part homeless and proscribed through her?--but the silence of +men in doubt, in doubt whether this might mean all that from Sir +Thomas's aspect it seemed to mean. + +"She cannot live a week!" Penruddocke continued. "The doctors have +given up hope, and at the palace all is in confusion. She has named +the Princess Elizabeth her successor, and even now Cecil is drawing up +the proclamations. To show that the game is really up, the Count de +Feria, the Spanish Ambassador, has gone this very day to Hatfield to +pay his respects to the coming queen." + +Then indeed the vaulted roof did ring--ring and ring again with shouts +of "The Coming Queen!" Men over whom the wings of death had seemed a +minute ago to be hovering, darkening all things to them, looked up and +saw the sun. "The Coming Queen!" they cried. + +"You need fear nothing!" continued Penruddocke wildly. "No one will +dare to execute the warrants. The Bishops are shaking in their miters. +Pole is said to be dying. Bonner is more likely to hang himself than +burn others. Up and out and play the man! Away to your counties and +get ready your tar-barrels! Now we will give them a taste of the Cujus +Regio! Ho! drawer, there! A cup of ale!" + +He turned, and shouting a scrap of a song, swaggered back into the +shaft and began to ascend. They all trooped after him, talking and +laughing, a reckless, good-natured crew, looking to a man as if they +had never known fear or selfishness--as if distrust were a thing +impossible to them. Master Kingston alone, whom his losses had soured +and who still brooded over his revenge, went off moodily. + +I was for stopping one of them; but Master Bertie directed my eyes by +a gesture of his hand to the door at the far end of the cellar, and I +saw that the key was in the lock. He wrung my hand hard. "Tell him +all," he muttered. "I will wait above." + + + + + CHAPTER XXI. + + MY FATHER. + + +Tell him all? I stood thinking, my hand on the key. The voices of the +rearmost of the conspirators sounded more and more faintly as they +passed up the shaft, until their last accents died in the room above, +and silence followed; a silence in strange contrast with the bright +glare of the torches which burned round me and lit up the empty cellar +as for a feast. I was wondering what he would say when I told him +all--when I said "I am your son! I, whom Providence has used to thwart +your plans, whose life you sought, whom, without a thought of pity, +you left to perish! I am your son!" + +Infinitely I dreaded the moment when I should tell him this, and hear +his answer; and I lingered with my hand on the key until an abrupt +knocking on the other side of the door brought the blood to my face. +Before I could turn the key the hasty summons was repeated, and grew +to a frantic, hurried drumming on the boards--a sound which plainly +told of terror suddenly conceived and in an instant full-grown. A +hoarse cry followed, coming dully to my ears through the thickness of +the door, and the next moment the stout planks shook as a heavy weight +fell against them. + +I turned the key, and the door was flung open from within. My father +stumbled out. + +The strong light for an instant blinded him, and he blinked as an owl +does brought to the sunshine. Even in him the long hours passed in +solitude and the blackness of despair had worked changes. His hair was +grayer; in patches it was almost white, and then again dark. He had +gnawed his lower lip, and there were bloodstains on it. His mustache, +too, was ragged and torn, as if he had gnawed that also. His eyes were +bloodshot, his lean face was white and haggard and fierce. + +"Ha!" he cried, trembling, as he peered round, "I thought they had +left me to starve! There were rats in there! I thought----" + +He stopped. He saw me standing holding the edge of the door. He saw +that otherwise the room was empty, the farther door leading to the +shaft open. An open door! To him doubtless it seemed of all sights the +most wonderful, the most heavenly! His knees began to shake under him. + +"What is it?" he muttered. "What were they shouting about? I heard +them shouting." + +"The queen is dying," I answered simply, "or dead, and you can do us +no more harm. You are free." + +"Free?" He repeated the word, leaning against the wall, his eyes wild +and glaring, his lips parted. + +"Yes, free," I answered, in a lower voice--"free to go out into the +air of heaven a living man!" I paused. For a moment I could not +continue. Then I added solemnly, "Sir, Providence has saved you from +death, and me from a crime." + +He leaned still against the wall, dazed, thunderstruck, almost +incredulous, and looked from me to the open door and back again as if +without this constant testimony of his eyes he could not believe in +his escape. + +"It was not Anne?" he murmured. "She did not----" + +"She tried to save your life," I answered; "but they would not listen +to her." + +"Did she come here?" + +As he spoke, he straightened himself with an effort and stood up. He +was growing more like himself. + +"No," I answered. "She sent for me and told me her terms. But Kingston +and the others would not listen to them. You would have been dead now, +though I did all I could to save you, if Penruddocke had not brought +this news of the queen." + +"She is dead?" + +"She is dying. The Spanish Ambassador," I added, to clinch the matter, +for I saw he doubted, "rode through here this afternoon to pay his +court to the Princess Elizabeth at Hatfield." + +He looked down at the ground, thinking deeply. Most men would have +been unable to think at all, unable to concentrate their thoughts on +anything save their escape from death. But a life of daily risk and +hazard had so hardened this man that I was certain, as I watched him, +that he was not praying nor giving thanks. He was already pondering +how he might make the most out of the change; how he might to the best +advantage sell his knowledge of the government whose hours were +numbered to the government which soon would be. The life of intrigue +had become second nature to him. + +He looked up and our eyes met. We gazed at one another. + +"Why are you here?" he said curiously. "Why did they leave you? Why +were you the one to stop to set me free, Master Carey?" + +"My name is not Carey," I answered. + +"What is it, then?" he asked carelessly. + +"Cludde," I answered softly. + +"Cludde!" He called it out. Even his self-mastery could not cope with +this surprise. "Cludde," he said again--said it twice in a lower +voice. + +"Yes, Cludde," I answered, meeting and yet shrinking from his +questioning eyes, "my name is Cludde. So is yours. I tried to save +your life, because I learned from Mistress Anne----" + +I paused. I shrank from telling him that which, as it seemed to me, +would strike him to the ground in shame and horror. But he had no +fear. + +"What?" he cried. "What did you learn?" + +"That you are my father," I answered slowly. "I am Francis Cludde, the +son whom you deserted many years ago, and to whom Sir Anthony gave a +home at Coton." + +I expected him to do anything except what he did. He stared at me with +astonished eyes for a minute, and then a low whistle issued from his +lips. + +"My son, are you! My son!" he said coolly. "And how long have you +known this, young sir?" + +"Since yesterday," I murmured. The words he had used on that morning +at Santon, when he had bidden me die and rot, were fresh in my +memory--in my memory, not in his. I recalled his treachery to the +Duchess, his pursuit of us, his departure with Anne, the words in +which he had cursed me. He remembered apparently none of these things, +but simply gazed at me with a thoughtful smile. + +"I wish I had known it before," he said at last. "Things might have +been different. A pretty dutiful son you have been!" + +The sneer did me good. It recalled to my mind what Master Bertie had +said. + +"There can be no question of duty between us," I answered firmly. +"What duty I owe to any one of my family, I owe to my uncle." + +"Then why have you told me this?" + +"Because I thought it right you should know it," I answered, "were it +only that, knowing it, we may go different ways. We have nearly done +one another a mischief more than once," I added gravely. + +He laughed. He was not one whit abashed by the discovery, nor awed, +nor cast down. There was even in his cynical face a gleam of +kindliness and pride as he scanned me. We were almost of a height--I +the taller by an inch or two; and in our features I believe there was +a likeness, though not such as to invite remark. + +"You have grown to be a chip of the old block," he said coolly. "I +would as soon have you for a son as another. I think on the whole I am +pleased. You talked of Providence just now"--this with a laugh of +serene amusement--"and perhaps you were right. Perhaps there is such a +thing. For I am growing old, and lo! it gives me a son to take care of +me." + +I shook my head. I could never be that kind of son to him. + +"Wait a bit," he said, frowning slightly. "You think your side is up +and mine is down, and I can do you no good now, but only harm. You are +ashamed of me. Well, wait," he continued, nodding confidently. "Do not +be too sure that I cannot help you. I have been wrecked a dozen times, +but I never yet failed to find a boat that would take me to shore." + +Yes, he was so arrogant in the pride of his many deceits that an hour +after Heaven had stretched out its hand to save him, he denied its +power and took the glory to himself. I did not know what to say to +him, how to undeceive him, how to tell him that it was not the failure +of his treachery which shamed me, but the treachery itself. I could +only remain silent. + +And so he mistook me; and, after pondering a moment with his chin in +his hand, he continued: + +"I have a plan, my lad. The Queen dies. Well--I am no bigot--long live +the Queen and the Protestant religion! The down will be up and the up +down, and the Protestants will be everything. It will go hard then +with those who cling to the old faith." + +He looked at me with a crafty smile, his head on one side. + +"I do not understand," I said coldly. + +"Then listen. Sir Anthony, will hold by his religion. He used to be a +choleric gentleman, and as obstinate as a mule. He will need but to be +pricked up a little, and he will get into trouble with the authorities +as sure as eggs are eggs. I will answer for it. And then----" + +"Well?" I said grimly. How was I to observe even a show of respect for +him when I was quivering with fierce wrath and abhorrence? "Do you +think that will benefit _you?_" I cried. "Do you think that you are so +high in favor with Cecil and the Protestants that they will set you in +Sir Anthony's place? You!" + +He looked at me still more craftily, not put out by my indignation, +but rather amused by it. + +"No, lad, not me," he replied, with tolerant good-nature. "I am +somewhat blown upon of late. But Providence has not given me back my +son for nothing. I am not alone in the world now. I must remember my +family. I must think a little of others as well as of myself." + +"What do you mean?" I said, recoiling. + +He scanned me for a moment, with his eyes half-shut, his head on one +side. Then he laughed, a cynical, jarring laugh. + +"Good boy!" he said. "Excellent boy! He knows no more than he is told. +His hands are clean, and he has friends upon the winning side who will +not see him lose a chance, should a chance turn up. Be satisfied. Keep +your hands clean if you like, boy. We understand one another." + +He laughed again and turned away; and, much as I dreaded and disliked +him, there was something in the indomitable nature of the man which +wrung from me a meed of admiration. Could the best of men have +recovered more quickly from despair? Could the best of men, their +plans failing, have begun to spin fresh webs with equal patience? +Could the most courageous and faithful of those who have tried to work +the world's bettering, have faced the downfall of their hopes with +stouter hearts, with more genuine resignation? Bad as he was, he had +courage and endurance beyond the common. + +He came back to me when he had gone a few paces. + +"Do you know where my sword is?" he asked in a matter-of-fact tone, as +one might ask a question of an old comrade. + +I found it cast aside behind the door. He took it from me, grumbling +over a nick in the edge, which he had caused by some desperate blow +when he was seized. He fastened it on with an oath. I could not look +at the sword without remembering how nearly he had taken my life with +it. The recollection did not trouble him in the slightest. + +"Now farewell!" he said carelessly, "I am going to turn over a new +leaf, and begin returning good for evil. Do you go to your friends and +do your work, and I will go to my friends and do mine." + +Then with a nod he walked briskly away, and I heard him climb the +ladder and depart. + +What was he going to do? I was so deeply amazed by the interview that +I did not understand. I had thought him a wicked man, but I had not +conceived the hardness of his nature. As I stood alone looking round +the vault, I could hardly believe that I had met and spoken to my +father, and told him I was his son--and this was all! I could hardly +believe that he had gone away with this knowledge, unmoved and +unrepentant; alike unwarned by the Providence which had used me to +thwart his schemes, and untouched by the beneficence which had thrice +held him back from the crime of killing me--ay, proof even against the +long-suffering which had plucked him from the abyss and given him one +more chance of repentance. + + +I found Master Bertie in the stables waiting for me with some +impatience. Of which, upon the whole, I was glad. For I had no wish to +be closely questioned, and the account I gave him of the interview +might at another time have seemed disjointed and incoherent. He +listened to it, however, without remark; and his next words made it +clear that he had other matters in his mind. + +"I do not know what to do about fetching the Duchess over," he said. +"This news seems to be true, and she ought to be here." + +"Certainly," I agreed. + +"The country in general is well affected to the Princess Elizabeth," +he continued. "Yet the interests of the Bishops, of the Spanish +faction, and of some of the council, will lie in giving trouble. To +avoid this, we should show our strength. Therefore I want the Duchess +to come over with all speed. Will you fetch her?" he added sharply, +turning to me. + +"Will I?" I cried in surprise. + +"Yes, you. I cannot well go myself at this crisis. Will you go +instead?" + +"Of course I will," I answered. + +And the prospect cheered me wonderfully. It gave me something to do, +and opened my eyes to the great change of which Penruddocke had been +the herald, a change which was even then beginning. As we rode down +Highgate Hill that day, messengers were speeding north and south and +east and west, to Norwich and Bristol and Canterbury and Coventry and +York, with the tidings that the somber rule under which England had +groaned for five years and more was coming to an end. If in a dozen +towns of England they roped their bells afresh; if in every county, as +Penruddocke had prophesied, they got their tar-barrels ready; if all, +save a few old-fashioned folk and a few gloomy bigots and hysterical +women, awoke as from an evil dream; if even sensible men saw in the +coming of the young queen a panacea for all their ills--a quenching of +Smithfield fires, a Calais recovered, a cure for the worthless coinage +which hampered trade, and a riddance of worthless foreigners who +plundered it--with better roads, purer justice, a fuller Exchequer, +more favorable seasons--if England read all this in that news of +Penruddocke's, was it not something to us also? + +It was indeed. We were saved at the last moment from the dangerous +enterprise on which we had rashly embarked. We had now such prospects +before us as only the success of that scheme could have ordinarily +opened. Ease and honor instead of the gallows, and to lie warm instead +of creaking in the wind! Thinking of this, I fell into a better frame +of mind as I jogged along toward London. For what, after all, was my +father to me, that his existence should make me unhappy, or rob mine +of all pleasure? I had made a place for myself in the world. I had +earned friends for myself. He might take away my pride in the one, but +he could never rob me of the love of the others--of those who had +eaten and drunk and fought and suffered beside me, and for whom I too +had fought and suffered! + + * * * * * + +"A strange time for the swallows to come back," said my lady, turning +to smile at me, as I rode on her off-side. + + +It would have been strange, indeed, if there had been swallows in the +air. For it was the end of December. The roads were frost-bound and +the trees leafless. The east wind, gathering force in its rush across +the Essex marshes, whirled before it the last trophies of Hainault +Forest, and seemed, as it whistled by our ears and shaved our faces, +to grudge us the shelter to which we were hastening. The long train +behind us--for the good times of which we had talked so often had +come--were full of the huge fire we expected to find at the inn at +Barking--our last stage on the road to London. And if the Duchess and +I bore the cold more patiently, it was probably because we had more +food for thought--and perhaps thicker raiment. + +"Do not shake your head," she continued, glancing at me with mischief +in her eyes, "and flatter yourself you will not go back, but will go +on making yourself and some one else unhappy. You will do nothing of +the kind, Francis. Before the spring comes you and I will ride over +the drawbridge at Coton End, or I am a Dutchwoman!" + +"I cannot see that things are changed," I said. + +"Not changed?" she replied. "When you left, you were nobody. Now +you are somebody, if it be only in having a sister with a dozen +serving-men in her train. Leave it to me. And now, thank Heaven, we +are here! I am so stiff and cold, you must lift me down. We have not +to ride far after dinner, I hope." + +"Only seven miles," I answered, as the host, who had been warned by an +outrider to expect us, came running out with a tail at his heels. + +"What news from London, Master Landlord?" I said to him as he led us +through the kitchen, where there was indeed a great fire, but no +chimney, and so to a smaller room possessing both these luxuries. "Is +all quiet?" + +"Certainly, your worship," he replied, bowing and rubbing his hands. +"There never was such an accession, nor more ale drunk, nor powder +burned--and I have seen three--and there was pretty shouting at old +King Harry's, but not like this. Such a fair young queen, men report, +with a look of the stout king about her, and as prudent and discreet +as if she had changed heads with Sir William Cecil. God bless her, say +I, and send her a wise husband!" + +"And a loving one," quoth my lady prettily. "Amen." + +"I am glad all has gone off well," I continued, speaking to the +Duchess, as I turned to the blazing hearth. "If there had been blows, +I would fain have been here to strike one." + +"Nay, sir, not a finger has wagged against her," the landlord +answered, kicking the logs together--"to speak of, that is, your +worship. I do hear to-day of a little trouble down in Warwickshire. +But it is no more than a storm in a wash-tub, I am told." + +"In Warwickshire?" I said, arrested, in the act of taking off my +cloak, by the familiar name. "In what part, my man?" + +"I am not clear about that, sir, not knowing the country," he replied. +"But I heard that a gentleman there had fallen foul of her Grace's +orders about church matters, and beaten the officers sent to see them +carried out; and that, when the sheriff remonstrated with him, he beat +him too. But I warrant they will soon bring him to his senses." + +"Did you hear his name?" I asked. There was a natural misgiving in my +mind. Warwickshire was large; and yet something in the tale smacked of +Sir Anthony. + +"I did hear it," the host answered, scratching his head, "but I cannot +call it to mind. I think I should know it if I heard it." + +"Was it Sir Anthony Cludde?" + +"It was that very same name!" he exclaimed, clapping his hands in +wonder. "To be sure! Your worship has it pat!" + +I slipped back into my cloak again, and snatched up my hat and whip. +But the Duchess was as quick. She stepped between me and the door. + +"Sit down, Francis!" she said imperiously. "What would you be at?" + +"What would I be at?" I cried with emotion. "I would be with my uncle. +I shall take horse at once and ride Warwickshire way with all speed. +It is possible that I may be in time to avert the consequences. At +least I can see that my cousin comes to no harm." + +"Good lad," she said placidly. "You shall start tomorrow." + +"To-morrow!" I cried impatiently. "But time is everything, madam." + +"You shall start to-morrow," she repeated. "Time is not everything, +firebrand! If you start to-day what can you do? Nothing! No more than +if the thing had happened three years ago, before you met me. But +to-morrow--when you have seen the Secretary of State, as I promise you +you shall, this evening if he be in London--to-morrow you shall go in +a different character, and with credentials." + +"You will do this for me?" I exclaimed, leaping up and taking her +hand, for I saw in a moment the wisdom of the course she proposed. +"You will get me----" + +"I will get you something to the purpose," my lady answered roundly. +"Something that shall save your uncle if there be any power in England +can save him. You shall have it, Frank," she added, her color rising, +and her eyes filling, as I kissed her hand, "though I have to take +Master Secretary by the beard!" + + + + + CHAPTER XXII. + + SIR ANTHONY'S PURPOSE. + + +Late, as I have heard, on the afternoon of November 20, 1558, a man +riding between Oxford and Worcester, with the news of the queen's +death, caught sight of the gateway tower at Coton End, which is +plainly visible from the road. Though he had already drunk that day as +much ale as would have sufficed him for a week when the queen was +well, yet much wants more. He calculated he had time to stop and taste +the Squire's brewing, which he judged, from the look of the tower, +might be worth his news; and he rode through the gate and railed at +his nag for stumbling. + +Half way across the Chase he met Sir Anthony. The old gentleman was +walking out, with his staff in his hand and his dogs behind him, to +take the air before supper. The man, while he was still a hundred +paces off, began to wave his hat and shout something, which ale and +excitement rendered unintelligible. + +"What is the matter?" said Sir Anthony to himself. And he stood still. + +"The queen is dead!" shouted the messenger, swaying in his saddle. + +The knight stared. + +"Ay, sure!" he ejaculated after a while. And he took off his hat. "Is +it true, man?" + +"As true as that I left London yesterday afternoon and have never +drawn rein since!" swore the knave, who had been three days on the +road, and had drunk at every hostel and at half the manor-houses +between London and Oxford. + +"God rest her soul!" said Sir Anthony piously, still in somewhat of a +maze. "And do you come in! Come in, man, and take something." + +But the messenger had got his formula by heart, and was not to be +defrauded of any part of it. + +"God save the queen!" he shouted. And out of respect for the knight, +he slipped from his saddle and promptly fell on his back in the road. + +"Ay, to be sure, God save the queen!" echoed Sir Anthony, taking off +his hat again. "You are right, man!" Then he hurried on, not noticing +the messenger's mishap. The tidings he had heard seemed of such +importance, and he was so anxious to tell them to his household--for +the greatest men have weaknesses, and news such as this comes seldom +in a lifetime--that he strode on to the house, and over the drawbridge +into the courtyard, without once looking behind him. + +He loved order and decent observance. But there are times when a cat, +to get to the cream-pan, will wet its feet. He stood now in the middle +of the courtyard, and raising his voice, shouted for his daughter. +"Ho, Petronilla! do you hear, girl! Father! Father Carey! Martin +Luther! Baldwin!" and so on, until half the household were collected. +"Do you hear, all of you? The queen is dead! God rest her soul!" + +"Amen!" said Father Carey, as became him, putting in his word amid the +wondering silence which followed; while Martin Luther and Baldwin, who +were washing themselves at the pump, stood with their heads dripping +and their mouths agape. + +"Amen!" echoed the knight. "And long live the queen! Long live Queen +Elizabeth!" he continued, having now got his formula by heart. And he +swung his hat. + +There was a cheer, a fairly loud cheer. But there was one who did not +join in it, and that was Petronilla. She, listening at her lattice +upstairs, began at once to think, as was her habit when any matter +great or small fell out, whether this would affect the fortunes of a +certain person far away. It might, it might not; she did not know. But +the doubt so far entertained her that she came down to supper with a +heightened color, not thinking in the least, poor girl, that the event +might have dire consequences for others almost as dear to her, and +nearer home. + +Every year since his sudden departure a letter from Francis Cludde had +come to Coton; a meager letter, which had passed through many hands, +and reached Sir Anthony now through one channel, now through another. +The knight grumbled and swore over these letters, which never +contained an address to which an answer could be forwarded, nor said +much, save that the writer was well and sent his love and duty, and +looked to return, all being well. But, meager as they were, and loud +as he swore over them, he put them religiously away in an oak-chest in +his parlor; and another always put away for her share something else, +which was invariably inclosed--a tiny swallow's feather. The knight +never said anything about the feather; neither asked the meaning of +its presence, nor commented upon its absence when Petronilla gave him +back the letter. But for days after each of these arrivals he would +look much at his daughter, would follow her about with his eyes, be +more regular in bidding her attend him in his walk, and more +particular in seeing that she had the tidbits of the joint. + +For Petronilla, it cannot be said, though I think in after times she +would have liked to make some one believe it, that she wasted away. +But she did take a more serious and thoughtful air in these days, +which she never, God bless her, lost afterward. There came from +Wootton Wawen and from Henley in Arden and from Cookhill gentlemen of +excellent estate, to woo her. But they all went away disconsolate +after drinking very deeply of Sir Anthony's ale and strong waters. And +some wondered that the good knight did not roundly take the jade to +task and see her settled. + +But he did not; so possibly even in these days he had other views. I +have been told that, going up once to her little chamber to seek her, +he found a very singular ornament suspended inside her lattice. It was +no other than a common clay house-martin's nest. But it was so deftly +hung in a netted bag, and so daintily swathed in moss always green, +and the Christmas roses and snowdrops and violets and daffodils which +decked it in turn were always so pure and fresh and bright--as the +knight learned by more than one stealthy visit afterward--that, coming +down the steep steps, he could not see clearly, and stumbled against a +cook-boy, and beat him soundly for getting in his way. + + +To return, however. The news of the queen's death had scarcely been +well digested at Coton, nor the mass for her soul, which Father Carey +celebrated with much devotion, been properly criticised, before +another surprise fell upon the household. Two strangers arrived, +riding late one evening, and rang the great bell while all were at +supper. Baldwin and the porter went to see what it was, and brought +back a message which drew the knight from his chair, as a terrier +draws a rat. + +"You are drunk!" he shouted, purple in the face, and fumbling for the +stick which usually leaned against his seat ready for emergencies. +"How dare you bring cock-and-bull stories to me?" + +"It is true enough!" muttered Baldwin sullenly: a stout, dour man, not +much afraid of his master, but loving him exceedingly. "I knew him +again myself." + +Sir Anthony strode firmly out of the room, and in the courtyard near +the great gate found a man and a woman standing in the dusk. He walked +up to the former and looked him in the face. "What do you here?" he +said, in a strange, hard voice. + +"I want shelter for a night for myself and my wife; a meal and some +words with you--no more," was the answer. "Give me this," the stranger +continued, "which every idle passer-by may claim at Coton End, and you +shall see no more of me, Anthony." + +For a moment the knight seemed to hesitate. Then he answered, pointing +sternly with his hand, "There is the hall and supper. Go and eat and +drink. Or, stay!" he resumed. And he turned and gave some orders to +Baldwin, who went swiftly to the hall, and in a moment came again. +"Now go! What you want the servants will prepare for you." + +"I want speech of you," said the newcomer. + +Sir Anthony seemed about to refuse, but thought better of it. "You can +come to my room when you have supped," he said, in the same ungracious +tone, speaking with his eyes averted. + +"And you--do you not take supper?" + +"I have finished," said the knight, albeit he had eaten little. And he +turned on his heel. + +Very few of those who sat round the table and watched with +astonishment the tall stranger's entrance knew him again. It was +thirteen years since Ferdinand Cludde had last sat there; sitting +there of right. And the thirteen years had worked much change in him. +When he found that Petronilla, obeying her father's message, had +disappeared, he said haughtily that his wife would sup in her own +room; and with a flashing eye and curling lip, bade Baldwin see to it. +Then, seating himself in a place next Sir Anthony's, he looked down +the board at which all sat silent. His sarcastic eye, his high +bearing, his manner--the manner of one who had gone long with his life +in his hand--awed these simple folk. Then, too, he was a Cludde. +Father Carey was absent that evening. Martin Luther had one of those +turns, half-sick, half-sullen, which alternated with his moods of +merriment; and kept his straw pallet in some corner or other. There +was no one to come between the servants and this dark-visaged +stranger, who was yet no stranger. + +He had his way and his talk with Sir Anthony; the latter lasting far +into the night and producing odd results. In the first place, the +unbidden guest and his wife stayed on over next day, and over many +days to come, and seemed gradually to grow more and more at home. The +knight began to take long walks and rides with his brother, and from +each walk and ride came back with a more gloomy face and a curter +manner. Petronilla, his companion of old, found herself set aside for +her uncle, and cast, for society, on Ferdinand's wife, the strange +young woman with the brilliant eyes, whose odd changes from grave to +gay rivaled Martin Luther's; and who now scared the girl by wild +laughter and wilder gibes, and now moved her to pity by fits of +weeping or dark moods of gloom. That Uncle Ferdinand's wife stood in +dread of her husband, Petronilla soon learned, and even began to share +this dread, to shrink from his presence, and to shut herself up more +and more closely in her own chamber. + +There was another, too, who grew to be troubled about this time, and +that was Father Carey. The good-natured, easy priest received with joy +and thankfulness the news that Ferdinand Cludde had seen his errors +and re-entered the fold. But when he had had two or three interviews +with the convert, his brow, too, grew clouded, and his mind troubled. +He learned to see that the accession of the young Protestant queen +must bear fruit for which he had a poor appetite. He began to spend +many hours in the church--the church which he had known all his +life--and wrestled much with himself--if his face were any index to +his soul. Good, kindly man, he was not of the stuff of which martyrs +are made; and to be forced, pushed on, and goaded into becoming a +martyr against one's will--well, the Father's position was a hard one. +As was that in those days of many a good and learned clergyman bred in +one church, and bidden suddenly, on pain of losing his livelihood, if +not his life, to migrate to another. + +The visitors had been in the house a month--and in that month an +observant eye might have noted much change, though all things in +seeming went on as before--when the queen's orders enjoining all +priests to read the service, or a great part of it, in English, came +down, being forwarded by the sheriff to Father Carey. The missive +arrived on a Friday, and had been indeed long expected. + +"What shall you do?" Ferdinand asked Sir Anthony. + +"As before!" the tall old man replied, gripping his staff more firmly. +It was no new subject between them. A hundred times they had discussed +it already, even as they were now discussing it on the terrace by the +fish-pool, with the church which adjoins the house full in view across +the garden. "I will have no mushroom faith at Coton End," the knight +continued warmly. "It sprang up under King Henry, and how long did it +last? A year or two. It came in again under King Edward, and how long +did it last? A year or two. So it will be again. It will not last, +Ferdinand." + +"I am of that mind," the younger man answered, nodding his head +gravely. + +"Of course you are!" Sir Anthony rejoined, as he rested one hand on +the sundial. "For ten generations our forefathers have worshiped in +that church after the old fashion--and shall it be changed in my day? +Heaven forbid! The old fashion did for my fathers; it shall do for me. +Why, I would as soon expect that the river yonder should flow backward +as that the church which has stood for centuries, and more years to +the back of them than I can count, should be swept away by these Hot +Gospelers! I will have none of them! I will have no new-fangled ways +at Coton End!" + +"Well, I think you are right!" the younger brother said. By what means +he had brought the knight to this mind without committing himself more +fully, I cannot tell. Yet so it was. Ferdinand showed himself always +the cautious doubter. Father Carey even must have done him that +justice. But--and this was strange--the more doubtful he showed +himself, the more stubborn grew his brother. There are men so shrewd +as to pass off stones for bread; and men so simple-minded as to take +something less than the word for the deed. + +"Why should it come in our time?" cried Sir Anthony fractiously. + +"Why indeed?" quoth the subtle one. + +"I say, why should it come now? I have heard and read of the sect +called Lollards who gave trouble a while ago. But they passed, and the +church stood. So will these Gospelers pass, and the church will +stand." + +"That is our experience certainly," said Ferdinand. + +"I hate change!" the old man continued, his eyes on the old church, +the old timbered house--for only the gateway tower at Coton is of +stone--the old yew trees in the churchyard. "I do not believe in it, +and, what is more, I will not have it. As my fathers have worshiped, +so will I, though it cost me every rood of land! A fig for the Order +in Council!" + +"If you really will not change with the younger generations----" + +"I will not!" replied the old knight sharply. "There is an end of it!" + +To-day the Reformed Church in England has seen many an anniversary, +and grown stronger with each year; and we can afford to laugh at Sir +Anthony's arguments. We know better than he did, for the proof of the +pudding is in the eating. But in him and his fellows, who had only the +knowledge of their own day, such arguments were natural enough. All +time, all experience, all history and custom and habit, as known to +them, were on their side. Only it was once again to be the battle of +David and the Giant of Gath. + +Sir Anthony had said, "There is an end of it!" But his companion, as +he presently strolled up to the house with a smile on his saturnine +face, well knew that this was only the beginning of it. This was +Friday. + + +On the Sunday, a rumor of the order having gone abroad, a larger +congregation than usual streamed across the Chase to church, prepared +to hear some new thing. They were disappointed. Sir Anthony stalked in +as of old, through the double ranks of people waiting at the door to +receive him; and after him Ferdinand and his wife, and Petronilla and +Baldwin, and every servant from the house save a cook or two and the +porter. The church was full. Seldom had such a congregation been seen +in it. But all passed as of old. Father Carey's hand shook, indeed, +and his voice quavered; but he went through the ceremony of the mass, +and all was done in Latin. A little change would have been pleasant, +some thought. But no one in this country place on the borders of the +forest held very strong views. No bishop had come heretic-hunting to +Coton End. No abbey existed to excite dislike by its extravagance or +by its license or by the swarm of ragged idlers it supported. Father +Carey was the most harmless and kindest of men. The villagers did not +care one way or the other. To them Sir Anthony was king. And if any +one felt tempted to interfere, the old knight's face, as he gazed +steadfastly at the brass effigy of a Cludde, who had fallen in Spain +fighting against the Moors, warned the meddler to be silent. + +And so on that Sunday all went well. But some one must have told +tales, for early in the week there came a strong letter of +remonstrance from the sheriff, who was an old friend of Sir Anthony, +and of his own free will, I fancy, would have winked. But he was +committed to the Protestants, and bound to stand or fall with them. +The choleric knight sent back an answer by the same messenger. The +sheriff replied, the knight rejoined--having his brother always at his +elbow. The upshot of the correspondence was an announcement on the +part of the sheriff that he should send his officers to the next +service, to see that the queen's order was obeyed; and a reply on the +part of Sir Anthony that he should as certainly put the men in the +duck-pond. Some inkling of this state of things got abroad, and spread +as a September fire flies through a wood; so that there was like to be +such a congregation at the next service to witness the trial of +strength, as would throw the last Sunday's gathering altogether into +the shade. + +It was clear at last that Sir Anthony himself did not think that here +was the end of it. For on that Saturday afternoon he took a remarkable +walk. He called Petronilla after dinner, and bade her get her hood +and come with him. And the girl, who had seen so little of her father +in the last month, and who, what with rumors and fears and surmises, +was eating her heart out, obeyed him with joy. It was a fine frosty +day near the close of December. Sir Anthony led the way over the +plank-bridge which crossed the moat in the rear of the house, and +tramped steadily through the home farm toward a hill called the +Woodman's View, which marked the border of the forest. He did not +talk, but neither was he sunk in reverie. As he entered each field he +stood and scanned it, at times merely nodding, at times smiling, or +again muttering a few words such as, "The three-acre piece! My father +inclosed it!" or, "That is where Ferdinand killed the old mare!" or, +"The best land for wheat on this side of the house!" The hill climbed, +he stood a long time gazing over the landscape, eying first the fields +and meadows which stretched away from his feet toward the house; the +latter, as seen from this point, losing all its stateliness in the +mass of stacks and ricks and barns and granaries which surrounded it. +Then his eyes traveled farther in the same line to the broad expanse +of woodland--Coton Chase--through which the road passed along a ridge +as straight as an arrow. To the right were more fields, and here and +there amid them a homestead with its smaller ring of stacks and barns. +When he turned to the left, his eyes, passing over the shoulders of +Barnt Hill and Mill Head Copse and Beacon Hill, all bulwarks of the +forest, followed the streak of river as it wound away toward Stratford +through luscious flood meadows, here growing wide, and there narrow, +as the woodland advanced or retreated. + +"It is all mine," he said, as much to himself as to the girl. "It is +all Cludde land as far as you can see." + +There were tears in her eyes, and she had to turn away to conceal +them. Why, she hardly knew. For he said nothing more, and he walked +down the hill dry-eyed. But all the way home he still looked sharply +about, noting this or that, as if he were bidding farewell to the old +familiar objects, the spinneys and copses--ay, and the very gates and +gaps and the hollow trees where the owls built. It was the saddest and +most pathetic walk the girl had ever taken. Yet there was nothing +said. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIII. + + THE LAST MASS. + + +The north wall of the church at Coton End is only four paces from the +house, the church standing within the moat. Isolated as the sacred +building, therefore, is from the outer world by the wide-spreading +Chase, and close-massed with the homestead, Sir Anthony had some +excuse for considering it as much a part of his demesne as the mill or +the smithy. In words he would have been willing to admit a +distinction; but in thought I fancy he lumped it with the rest of his +possessions. + +It was with a lowering eye that on this Sunday morning he watched from +his room over the gateway the unusual stream of people making for the +church. Perchance he had in his mind other Sundays--Sundays when he +had walked out at this hour, light of heart and kind of eye, with his +staff in his fist and his glove dangling, and his dog at his heels; +and, free from care, had taken pleasure in each bonnet doffed and +each old wife's "God bless ye, Sir Anthony!" Well, those days were +gone. Now the rain dripped from the eaves--for a thaw had come in the +night--and the bells, that could on occasion ring so cheerily, sounded +sad and forlorn. His daughter, when she came, according to custom, +bringing his great service-book, could scarcely look him in the face. +I know not whether even then his resolution to dare all might not, at +sound of a word from her, or at sight of her face, have melted like +yesterday's ice. But before the word could be spoken, or the eyes +meet, another step rang on the stone staircase and brother Ferdinand +entered. + +"They are here!" he said in a low voice. "Six of them, Anthony, and +sturdy fellows, as all Clopton's men are. If you do not think your +people will stand by you----" + +The knight fired at this suggestion. "What!" he burst out, turning +from the window, "if Cludde men cannot meet Clopton men the times are +indeed gone mad! Make way and let me come! Though the mass be never +said again in Coton church, it shall be said to-day!" And he swore a +great oath. + +He strode down the stairs and under the gateway, where were arranged, +according to the custom of the house on wet days, all the servants, +with Baldwin and Martin Luther at their head. The knight stalked +through them with a gloomy brow. His brother followed him, a faint +smile flickering about the corners of his mouth. Then came Ferdinand's +wife and Petronilla, the latter with her hood drawn close about her +face, Anne with her chin in the air and her eyes aglow. "It is not a +bit of a bustle will scare her!" Baldwin muttered, as he fell in +behind her, and eyed her back with no great favor. + +"No--so long as it does not touch her," Martin replied in a cynical +whisper. "She is well mated! Well mated and ill fated! Ha! ha!" + +"Silence, fool," growled his companion angrily. "Is this a time for +antics?" + +"Ay, it is!" Martin retorted swiftly, though with the same caution. +"For when wise men turn fools, fools are put to it to act up to their +profession! You see, brother?" And he deliberately cut a caper. His +eyes were glittering, and the nerves on one side of his face twitched +oddly. Baldwin looked at him, and muttered that Martin was going to +have one of his mad fits. What had grown on the fool of late? + +The knight reached the church porch and passed through the crowd which +awaited him there. Save for its unusual size and some strange faces to +be seen on its skirts, there was no indication of trouble. He walked, +tapping his stick on the pavement a little more loudly than usual, to +his place in the front pew. The household, the villagers, the +strangers, pressed in behind him until every seat was filled. Even the +table monument of Sir Piers Cludde, which stood lengthwise in the +aisle, was seized upon, and if the two similar monuments which stood +to right and left below the chancel steps had not been under the +knight's eyes, they too would have been invaded. Yet all was done +decently and in order, with a clattering of rustic boots indeed, but +no scrambling or ill words. The Clopton men were there. Baldwin had +marked them well, and so had a dozen stout fellows, sons of Sir +Anthony's tenants. But they behaved, discreetly, and amid such a +silence as Father Carey never remembered to have faced, he began the +Roman service. + + +The December light fell faintly through the east window on the Father +at his ministrations, on his small acolytes, on the four Cludde +brasses before the altar. It fell everywhere--on gray dusty walls +buttressed by gray tombs which left but a narrow space in the middle +of the chancel. The marble crusader to the left matched the canopied +bed of Sir Anthony's parents on the right; the Abbess's tomb in the +next row faced the plainer monument of Sir Anthony's wife, a vacant +place by her side awaiting his own effigy. And there were others. The +chancel was so small--nay, the church too--so small and old and gray +and solid, and the tombs were so massive, that they elbowed one +another. The very dust which rose as men stirred was the dust of +Cluddes. Sir Anthony's brow relaxed. He listened gravely and sadly. + +And then the interruption came. "I protest!" a rough voice in rear of +the crowd cried suddenly, ringing harshly and strangely above the +Father's accents and the solemn hush. "I protest against this +service!" + +A thrill of astonishment ran through the crowd, and all rose. Every +man in the church turned round, Sir Anthony among the first, and +looked in the direction of the voice. Then it was seen that the +Clopton men had massed themselves about the door in the southwest +corner--a strong position, whence retreat was easy. Father Carey, +after a momentary glance, went on as if he had not heard; but his +voice shook, and all still waited with their faces turned toward the +west end. + +"I protest in the name of the Queen!" the same man cried sharply, +while his fellows raised a murmur so that the priest's voice was +drowned. + +Sir Anthony stepped into the aisle, his face inflamed with anger. The +interruption taking place there, in that place, seemed to him a double +profanation. + +"Who is that brawler?" he said, his hand trembling on his staff; and +all the old dames trembled too. "Let him stand out." + +The sheriff's spokesman was so concealed by his fellows that he could +not be seen; but he answered civilly enough. + +"I am no brawler," he said. "I only require the law to be observed; +and that you know, sir. I am here on behalf of the sheriff; and I warn +all present that a continuation of this service will expose them to +grievous pains and penalties. If you desire it, I will read the royal +order to prove that I do not speak without warrant." + +"Begone, knave, you and your fellows!" Sir Anthony cried. A loyal man +in all else, and the last to deny the queen's right or title, he had +no reasonable answer to give, and could only bluster. "Begone, do you +hear?" he repeated; and he rapped his staff on the pavement, and then, +raising it, pointed to the door. + +All Coton thought the men must go; but the men, perhaps, because they +were Clopton, did not go. And Sir Anthony had not so completely lost +his head as to proceed to extremities except in the last resort. +Affecting to consider the incident at an end, he stepped back into his +pew without waiting to see whether the man obeyed him or no, and +resumed his devotions. Father Carey, at a nod from him, went on with +the interrupted service. + +But again the priest had barely read a dozen lines before the same man +made the congregation start by crying loudly, "Stop!" + +"Go on!" shouted Sir Anthony in a voice of thunder. + +"At your peril!" retorted the intervener. + +"Go on!" from Sir Anthony again. + +Father Carey stood silent, trembling and looking from one to the +other. Many a priest of his faith would have risen on the storm and in +the spirit of Hildebrand hurled his church's curse at the intruder. +But the Father was not of these, and he hesitated, fumbling with his +surplice with his feeble white hands. He feared as much for his patron +as for himself; and it was on the knight that his eyes finally rested. +But Sir Anthony's brow was black; he got no comfort there. So the +Father took courage and a long breath, opened his mouth and read on, +amid the hush of suppressed excitement, and of such anger and stealthy +defiance as surely English church had never seen before. As he read, +however, he gathered courage, and his voice strength. The solemn +words, so ancient, so familiar, fell on the stillness of the church, +and awed even the sheriff's men. To the surprise of nearly every one, +there was no further interruption; the service ended quietly. + +So after all Sir Anthony had his way, and stalked out, stiff and +unbending. Nor was there any falling off, but rather an increase in +the respect with which his people rose, according to custom, as he +passed. Yet under that increase of respect lay a something which cut +the old man to the heart. He saw that his dependents pitied him while +they honored him; that they thought him a fool for running his head +against a stone wall--as Martin Luther put it--even while they felt +that there was something grand in it too. + +During the rest of the day he went about his usual employments, but +probably with little zest. He had done what he had done without any +very clear idea how he was going to proceed. Between his loyalty in +all else and his treason in this, it would not have been easy for a +Solomon to choose a consistent path. And Sir Anthony was no Solomon. +He chose at last to carry himself as if there were no danger--as if +the thing which had happened were unimportant. He ordered no change +and took no precautions. He shut his ears to the whispering which went +on among the servants, and his eyes to the watch which by some secret +order of Baldwin was kept upon the Ridgeway. + +It was something of a shock to him, therefore, when his daughter came +to him after breakfast next morning, looking pale and heavy-eyed, and, +breaking through the respect which had hitherto kept her silent, +begged him to go away. + +"To go away?" he cried. He rose from his oak chair and glared at her. +Then his feelings found their easiest vent in anger. "What do you +mean, girl?" he blustered, "Go away? Go where?" + +But she did not quail. Indeed she had her suggestion ready. + +"To the Mere Farm in the Forest, sir," she answered earnestly. "They +will not look for you there; and Martin says----" + +"Martin? The fool!" + +His face grew redder and redder. This was too much. He loved order and +discipline; and to be advised in such matters by a woman and a fool! +It was intolerable! + +"Go to, girl!" he cried, fuming. "I wondered where you had got your +tale so pat. So you and the fool have been putting your heads +together! Go! Go and spin, and leave these maters to men! Do you think +that my brother, after traveling the world over, has not got a head on +his shoulders? Do you think, if there were danger, he and I would not +have foreseen it?" + +He waved his hand and turned away expecting her to go. But Petronilla +did not go. She had something else to say and though the task was +painful she was resolved to say it. + +"Father, one word," she murmured. "About my uncle." + +"Well, well! What about him?" + +"I distrust him, sir," she ventured, in a low tone, her color rising. +"The servants do not like him. They fear him, and suspect him of I +know not what." + +"The servants!" Sir Anthony answered in an awful tone. + +Indeed it was not the wisest thing she could have said; but the +consequences were averted by a sudden alarm and shouting outside. Half +a dozen voices, shrill or threatening, seemed to rise at once. The +knight strode to the window, but the noise appeared to come, not from +the Chase upon which it looked, but from the courtyard or the rear of +the house. Sir Anthony caught up his stick, and, followed by the girl, +ran down the steps. He pushed aside half a dozen women who had +likewise been attracted by the noise, and hastened through the narrow +passage which led to the wooden bridge in the rear of the buildings. + +Here, in the close on the far side of the moat, a strange scene was +passing. A dozen horsemen were grouped in the middle of the field +about a couple of prisoners, while round the gate by which they had +entered stood as many stout men on foot, headed by Baldwin and armed +with pikes and staves. These seemed to be taunting the cavaliers and +daring them to come on. On the wooden bridge by which the knight stood +were half a dozen of the servants, also armed. Sir Anthony recognized +in the leading horseman Sir Philip Clopton, and in the prisoners +Father Carey and one of the woodmen; and in a moment he comprehended +what had happened. + +The sheriff, in the most unneighborly manner, instead of challenging +his front door, had stolen up to the rear of the house, and, without +saying with your leave or by your leave, had snapped up the poor +priest, who happened to be wandering in that direction. Probably he +had intended to force an entrance; but he had laid aside the plan when +he saw his only retreat menaced by the watchful Baldwin, who was not +to be caught napping. The knight took all this in at a glance, and his +gorge rose as much at the Clopton men's trick as at the danger in +which Father Carey stood. So he lost his head, and made matters worse. +"Who are these villains," he cried in a rage, his face aflame, "who +come attacking men's houses in time of peace? Begone, or I will have +at ye!" + +"Sir Anthony!" Clopton cried, interrupting him, "in Heaven's name do +not carry the thing farther! Give me way in the Queen's name, and I +will----" + + +What he would do was never known, for at that last word, away at the +house, behind Sir Anthony, there was a puff of smoke, and down went +the sheriff headlong, horse and man, while the report of an arquebuse +rang dully round the buildings. The knight gazed horrified; but the +damage was done and could not be undone. Nay, more, the Coton men took +the sound for a signal. With a shout, before Sir Anthony could +interfere, they made a dash for the group of horsemen. The latter, +uncertain and hampered by the fall of their leader, who was not hit, +but was stunned beyond giving orders, did the best they could. They +let their prisoners go with a curse, and then, raising Sir Philip and +forming a rough line, they charged toward the gate by which they had +entered. + +The footmen stood the brunt gallantly, and for a moment the sharp +ringing of quarter-staves and the shivering of steel told of as pretty +a combat as ever took place on level sward in full view of an English +home. The spectators could see Baldwin doing wonders. His men backed +him up bravely. But in the end the impetus of the horses told, the +footmen gave way and fled aside, and the strangers passed them. A +little more skirmishing took place at the gateway, Sir Anthony's men +being deaf to all his attempts to call them off; and then the Clopton +horse got clear, and, shaking their fists and vowing vengeance, rode +off toward the forest. They left two of their men on the field, +however, one with a broken arm and one with a shattered knee-cap; +while the house party, on their side, beside sundry knocks and +bruises, could show one deep sword-cut, a broken wrist, and half a +dozen nasty wounds. + +"My poor little girl!" Sir Anthony whispered to himself, as he gazed +with scared eyes at the prostrate men and the dead horse, and +comprehended what had happened. "This is a hanging business! In arms +against the Queen! What am I to do?" And as he went back to the house +in a kind of stupor, he muttered again, "My little girl! my poor +little girl!" + +I fancy that in this terrible crisis he looked to get support and +comfort from his brother--that old campaigner, who had seen so many +vicissitudes and knew by heart so many shifts. But Ferdinand, though +he thought the event unlucky, had little to say and less to suggest; +and seemed, indeed, to have become on a sudden flaccid and lukewarm. +Sir Anthony felt himself thrown on his own resources. "Who fired the +shot?" he asked, looking about the room in a dazed fashion. "It was +that which did the mischief," he continued, forgetting his own hasty +challenge. + +"I think it must have been Martin Luther," Ferdinand answered. + +But Martin Luther, when he was accused, denied this stoutly. He had +been so far along the Ridgeway, he said, that though he had returned +at once on hearing the shot fired, he had arrived too late for the +fight. The fool's stomach for a fight was so well known that this +seemed probable enough, and though some still suspected him, the +origin of the unfortunate signal was never clearly determined, though +in after days shrewd guesses were made by some. + +For a few hours it seemed as if Sir Anthony had sunk into his former +state of indecision. But when Petronilla came again to him soon after +noon to beg him to go into hiding, she found his mood had altered. "Go +to the Mere Farm?" he said, not angrily now, but firmly and quietly. +"No, girl, I cannot. I have been in fault, and I must stay and pay for +it. If I left these poor fellows to bear the brunt, I could never hold +up my head again. But do you go now and tell Baldwin to come to me." + +She went and told the stern, down-looking steward, and he came up. + +"Baldwin," said the knight when the door was shut, and the two were +alone, "you are to dismiss to their homes all the tenants--who have +indeed been called out without my orders. Bid them go and keep the +peace, and I hope they will not be molested. For you and Father Carey, +you must go into hiding. The Mere Farm will be best." + +"And what of you, Sir Anthony?" the steward asked, amazed at this act +of folly. + +"I shall remain here," the knight replied with dignity. + +"You will be taken," said Baldwin, after a pause. + +"Very well," said the knight. + +The man shrugged his shoulders, and was silent. + +"What do you mean?" asked Sir Anthony in anger. + +"Why, just that I cannot do it," Baldwin answered, glowering at him +with a flush on his dark cheek. "That is what I mean. Let the priest +go. I cannot go, and will not." + +"Then you will be hanged!" quoth the knight warmly. "You have been in +arms against the Queen, you fool! You will be hanged as sure as you +stay here!" + +"Then I shall be hanged," replied the steward sullenly. "There never +was a Cludde hanged yet without one to keep him company. To hear of it +would make my grandsire turn in his grave out there. I dare not do it, +Sir Anthony, and that is the fact. But for the rest I will do as you +bid me." + +And he had his way. But never had evening fallen more strangely and +sadly at Coton before. The rain pattered drearily in the courtyard. +The drawbridge, by Baldwin's order, had been pulled up, and the planks +over the moat in the rear removed. + +"They shall not steal upon us again!" he muttered. "And if we must +surrender, they shall see we do it willingly." + +The tenants had gone to their homes and their wives. Only the servants +remained. They clustered, solemn and sorrowful, about the hearth in +the great hall, starting if a dog howled without or a coal flew from +the fire within. Sir Anthony remained brooding in his own room, +Petronilla sitting beside him silent and fearful, while Ferdinand and +his wife moved restlessly about, listening to the wind. But the +evening and the night wore peacefully away, and so, to the surprise of +everybody, did the next day and the next. Could the sheriff be going +to overlook the matter? Alas! on the third day the doubt was resolved. +Two or three boys, who had been sent out as scouts, came in with news +that there was a strong watch set on the Ridgeway, that the paths +through the forest were guarded, that bodies of armed men were +arriving in the neighboring villages, and that soldiers had been +demanded--or so it was said--from Warwick and Worcester, and even from +a place as far away as Oxford. Probably it was only the sheriff's +prudence which had postponed the crisis; and now it had come. The net +was drawn all round. As the day closed in on Coton and the sun set +angrily among the forest trees, the boys' tale, which grew no doubt in +the telling, passed from one to another, and men swore and looked out +of window, and women wept in corners. In the Tower-room Sir Anthony +sat awaiting the summons, and wondered what he could to save his +daughter from possible rudeness, or even hurt, at the hands of these +strangers. + +There was one man missing from hall and kitchen, but few in the +suspense noticed his absence. The fool had heard the boys' story, and, +unable to remain inactive under such excitement, he presently stole +off in the dusk to the rear of the house. Here he managed to cross the +moat by means of a plank, which he then drew over and hid in the +grass. This quietly managed--Baldwin, be it said, had strictly +forbidden any one to leave the house--Martin made off with a grim +chuckle toward the forest, and following the main track leading toward +Wootton Wawen, presently came among the trees upon a couple of +sentinels. They heard him, saw him indistinctly, and made a rush for +him. But this was just the sport Martin liked, and the fun he had come +for. His quick ear apprised him of the danger, and in a second he was +lost in the underwood, his mocking laugh and shrill taunts keeping the +poor men on the shudder for the next ten minutes. Then the uncanny +accents died away, and, satisfied with his sport and the knowledge he +had gained, the fool made for home. As he sped quickly across the last +field, however, he was astonished by the sight of a dark figure in the +very act of launching his--Martin's--plank across the moat. + +"Ho, ho!" the fool muttered in a fierce undertone. "That is it, is it? +And only one! If they will come one by one, like the plums in the +kitchen porridge, I shall make a fine meal!" + +He stood back, crouching down on the grass, and watched the unknown, +his eyes glittering. The stranger was a tall, big fellow, a formidable +antagonist. But Martin cared nothing for that. Had he not his long +knife, as keen as his wits--when they were at home, which was not +always. He drew it out now, and under cover of the darkness crept +nearer and nearer, his blood glowing pleasantly, though the night was +cold. How lucky it was he had come out! He could hardly restrain the +"Ho, ho!" which rose to his lips. He meant to leap upon the man on +this side of the water, that there might be no tell-tale traces on the +farther bank. + +But the stranger was too quick for him in this. He got his bridge +fixed, and began to cross before Martin could crawl near enough. As he +crossed, however, his feet made a slight noise on the plank, and under +cover of it the fool rose and ran forward, then followed him over with +the stealthiness of a cat. And like a cat too, the moment the +stranger's foot touched the bank, Martin sprang on him with his knife +raised--sprang on him silently, with his teeth grinning and his eyes +aflame. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIV. + + AWAITING THE BLOW. + + +A moment later the servants in the hall heard a scream--a scream of +such horror and fear that they scarcely recognized a human voice in +the sound. They sprang to their feet scared and trembling, and for a +few seconds looked into one another's faces. Then, as curiosity got +the upper hand, the boldest took the lead and all hurried pell-mell to +the door, issuing in a mob into the courtyard, where Ferdinand Cludde, +who happened to be near and had also heard the cry, joined them. +"Where was it, Baldwin?" he exclaimed. + +"At the back, I think," the steward answered. He alone had had the +coolness to bring out a lantern, and he now led the way toward the +rear of the house. Sure enough, close to the edge of the moat, they +found Martin, stooping with his hands on his knees, a great wound, +half bruise, half cut, upon his forehead. "What is it?" Ferdinand +cried sharply. "Who did it, man?" + +Baldwin had already thrown his light on the fool's face, and Martin, +seeming to become conscious of their presence, looked at them, but in +a dazed fashion. "What?" he muttered, "what is what?" + +By this time nearly every one in the house had hurried to the spot; +among them not only Petronilla, clinging to her father's arm, but +Mistress Anne, her face pale and gloomy, and half a dozen womenfolk +who clutched one another tightly, and screamed at regular intervals. + +"What is it?" Baldwin repeated roughly, laying his hand on Martin's +arm and slightly shaking him. "Come, who struck you, man?" + +"I think," the fool answered slowly, gulping down something and +turning a dull eye on the group; "a--a swallow flew by--and hit me!" + +They shrank away from him instinctively and some crossed themselves. +"He is in one of his mad fits," Baldwin muttered. Still the steward +showed no fear. "A swallow, man!" he cried aloud. "Come, talk sense. +There are no swallows flying at this time of year. And if there were, +they do not fly by night, nor give men wounds like that. What was it? +Out with it, now. Do you not see, man," he added, giving Martin an +impatient shake, "that Sir Anthony is waiting?" + +The fool nodded stupidly. "A swallow," he muttered. "Ay, 'twas a +swallow, a great big swallow. I--I nearly put my foot on him." + +"And he flew up and hit you in the face?" Baldwin said, with huge +contempt in his tone. + +Martin accepted the suggestion placidly. "Ay, 'twas so. A great big +swallow, and he flew in my face," he repeated. + +Sir Anthony looked at him compassionately. "Poor fellow!" he said; +"Baldwin, see to him. He has had one of his fits and hurt himself." + +"I never knew him hurt _himself_," Baldwin muttered darkly. + +"Let somebody see to him," the knight said, disregarding the +interruption. "And now come, Petronilla. Why--where has the girl +gone?" + + +Not far. Only round to the other side of him, that she might be a +little nearer to Martin. The curiosity in the other women's faces was +a small thing in comparison with the startled, earnest look in hers. +She gazed at the man with eyes not of affright, but of eager, avid +questioning, while through her parted lips her breath came in gasps. +Her cheek was red and white by turns, and, for her heart--well, it had +seemed to stand still a moment, and now was beating like the heart of +some poor captured bird held in the hand. She did not seem to hear her +father speak to her, and he had to touch her sleeve. Then she started +as though she were awakening from a dream, and followed him sadly into +the house. + +Sadly, and yet there was a light in her eyes which had not been there +five minutes before. A swallow? A great big swallow? And this was +December, when the swallows were at the bottom of the horse-ponds. She +only knew of one swallow whose return was possible in winter. But then +that one swallow--ay, though the snow should lie inches deep in the +chase, and the water should freeze in her room--would make a summer +for her. Could it be that one? Could it be? Petronilla's heart was +beating so loudly as she went upstairs after her father, that she +wondered he did not hear it. + + +The group left round Martin gradually melted away. Baldwin was the +only man who could deal with him in his mad fits, and the other +servants, with a shudder and a backward glance, gladly left him to the +steward. Mistress Anne had gone in some time. Only Ferdinand Cludde +remained, and he stood a little apart, and seemed more deeply engaged +in listening for any sound which might betoken the sheriff's approach +than in hearkening to their conversation. Listen as he might he would +have gained little from the latter, for it was made up entirely of +scolding on one side and stupid reiteration on the other. Yet +Ferdinand, ever suspicious and on his guard, must have felt some +interest in it, for he presently called the steward to him. "Is he +more fool or knave?" he muttered, pointing under hand at Martin, who +stood in the gloom a few paces away. + +Baldwin shrugged his shoulders, but remained silent. "What happened? +What is the meaning of it all?" Ferdinand persisted, his keen eyes on +the steward's face. "Did he do it himself? Or who did it?" + +Baldwin turned slowly and nodded toward the moat. "I expect you will +find him who did it there," he said grimly. "I never knew a man save +Sir Anthony or Master Francis hit Martin yet, but he paid for it. And +when his temper is up, he is mad, or as good as mad; and better than +two sane men!" + +"He is a dangerous fellow," Ferdinand said thoughtfully, shivering a +little. It was unlike him to shiver and shake. But the bravest have +their moods. + +"Dangerous?" the steward answered. "Ay, he is to some, and sometimes." + +Ferdinand Cludde looked sharply at the speaker, as if he suspected him +of a covert sneer. But Baldwin's gloomy face betrayed no glint of +intelligence or amusement, and the knight's brother, reassured and yet +uneasy, turned on his heel and went into the house, meeting at the +door a servant who came to tell him that Sir Anthony was calling for +him. Baldwin Moor, left alone, stood a moment thinking, and then +turned to speak to Martin. But Martin was gone, and was nowhere to be +seen. + +The lights in the hall windows twinkled cheerily, and the great fire +cast its glow half way across the courtyard, as lights and fire had +twinkled and glowed at Coton End on many a night before. But neither +in hall nor chamber was there any answering merriment. Baldwin, coming +in, cursed the servants who were in his way, and the men moved meekly +and without retort, taking his oaths for what they were--a man's +tears. The women folk sat listening pale and frightened, and one or +two of the grooms, those who had done least in the skirmish, had +visions of a tree and a rope, and looked sickly. The rest scowled and +blinked at the fire, or kicked up a dog if it barked in its sleep. + +"Hasn't Martin come in?" Baldwin growled presently, setting his heavy +wet boot on a glowing log, which hissed and sputtered under it. "Where +is he?" + +"Don't know!" one of the men took on himself to answer. "He did not +come in here." + +"I wonder what he is up to now?" Baldwin exclaimed, with gloomy +irritation; for which, under the circumstances, he had ample excuse. +He knew that resistance was utterly hopeless, and could only make +matters worse, and twist the rope more tightly about his neck, to put +the thought as he framed it. The suspicion, therefore, that this +madman--for such in his worst fits the fool became--might be hanging +round the place in dark corners, doing what deadly mischief he could +to the attacking party, was not a pleasant one. + +A gray-haired man in the warmest nook by the fire seemed to read his +thoughts. "There is one in the house," he said slowly and oracularly, +his eyes on Baldwin's boot, "whom he has just as good a mind to hurt, +has our Martin, as any of them Clopton men. Ay, that has he, Master +Baldwin." + +"And who is that, gaffer?" Baldwin asked contemptuously. + +But the old fellow turned shy. "Well, it is not Sir Anthony," he +answered, nodding his head, and stooping forward to caress his +toasting shins. "Be you very sure of that. Nor the young mistress, nor +the young master as was, nor the new lady that came a month ago. No, +nor it is not you, Master Baldwin." + +"Then who is it?" cried the steward impatiently. + +"He is shrewd, is Martin--when the saints have not got their backs to +him," said the old fellow slyly. + +"Who is it?" thundered the steward, well used to this rustic method of +evasion. "Answer, you dolt!" + +But no answer came, and Baldwin never got one; for at this moment a +man who had been watching in front of the house ran in. + +"They are here!" he cried, "a good hundred of them, and torches enough +for St. Anthony's Eve. Get you to the gate, porter, Sir Anthony is +calling for you. Do you hear?" + +There was a great uprising, a great clattering of feet and barking of +dogs, and some wailing among the women. As the messenger finished +speaking, a harsh challenge which penetrated even the courtyard arose +from many voices without, and was followed by the winding of a horn. +This sufficed. All hurried with one accord into the court, where the +porter looked to Baldwin for instructions. + +"Hold a minute!" cried the steward, silencing the loudest hound by a +sound kick, and disregarding Sir Anthony's voice, which came from the +direction of the gateway. "Let us see if they are at the back too." + +He ran through the passage and, emerging on the edge of the moat, was +at once saluted by a dozen voices warning him back. There were a score +of dark figures standing in the little close where the fight had taken +place. "Right," said Baldwin to himself. "Needs must when the old +gentleman drives! Only I thought I would make sure." + +He ran back at once, nearly knocking down Martin, who with a companion +was making, but at a slower pace, for the front of the house. + +"Well, old comrade!" cried the steward, smiting the fool on the back +as he passed, "you are here, are you? I never thought that you and I +would be in at our own deaths!" + +He did not notice, in the wild humor which had seized him, who +Martin's companion was, though probably at another time it would have +struck him that there was no one in the house quite so tall. He sped +on with scarcely a glance, and in a moment was under the gateway, +where Sir Anthony was soundly rating everybody, and particularly the +porter, who with his key in the door found or affected to find the +task of turning it a difficult one. As the steward came up, however, +the big doors at some sign from him creaked on their hinges, and the +knight, his staff in his hand, and the servants clustering behind him +with lanterns, walked forward a pace or two to the end of the bridge, +bearing himself with some dignity. + +"Who disturbs us at this hour?" he cried, peering across the moat, and +signing to Baldwin to hold up his large lantern, since the others, +uncertain of their reception, had put out their torches. By its light +he and those behind him could make out a group of half a dozen figures +a score of yards away, while in support of these there appeared a +bowshot off, and still in the open ground, a clump of, it might be, a +hundred men. Beyond all lay the dark line of trees, above which the +moon, new-risen, was sailing through a watery wrack of clouds. "Who +are ye?" the knight repeated. + +"Are you Sir Anthony Cludde?" came the answer. + +"I am." + +"Then in the Queen's name, Sir Anthony," the leader of the troop cried +solemnly, "I call on you to surrender. I hold a warrant for your +arrest, and also for the arrest of James Carey, a priest, and Baldwin +Moor, who, I am told, is your steward. I am backed by forces which it +will be vain to resist." + +"Are you Sir Philip Clopton?" the knight asked. For at that distance +and in that light it was impossible to be sure. + +"I am," the sheriff answered earnestly. "And, as a friend, I beg you, +Sir Anthony, to avoid useless bloodshed and further cause for offense. +Sir Thomas Greville, the governor of Warwick Castle, and Colonel +Bridgewater are with me. I implore you, my friend, to surrender, and I +will do you what good offices I may." + +The knight, as we know, had made up his mind. And yet for a second he +hesitated. There were stern, grim faces round him, changed by the +stress of the moment into the semblance of dark Baldwin's; the faces +of men, who though they numbered but a dozen were his men, bound to +him by every tie of instinct, and breeding, and custom. And he had +been a soldier, and knew the fierce joy of a desperate struggle +against odds. Might it not be better after all? + +But then he remembered his womenkind; and after all, why endanger +these faithful men? He raised his voice and cried clearly, "I accept +your good offices, Sir Philip, and I take your advice. I will have the +drawbridge lowered, only I beg you will keep your men well in hand, +and do my poor house as little damage as may be." + +Giving Baldwin the order, and bidding him as soon as it was performed +come to him, the knight walked steadily back into the courtyard and +took his stand there. He dispatched the women and some of the servants +to lay out a meal in the hall. But it was noticeable that the men went +reluctantly, and that all who could find any excuse to do so lingered +round Sir Anthony as if they could not bear to abandon him; as if, +even at the last moment, they had some vague notion of protecting +their master at all hazards. A score of lanterns shed a gloomy, +uncertain light--only in places reinforced by the glow, from the hall +windows--upon the group. Seldom had a Coton moon peeped over the +gables at a scene stranger than that which met the sheriff's eyes, as +with his two backers he passed under the gateway. + + +"I surrender to you, Sir Philip," the knight said with dignity, +stepping forward a pace or two, "and call you to witness that I might +have made resistance and have not. My tenants are quiet in their +homes, and only my servants are present. Father Carey is not here, nor +in the house. This is Baldwin Moor, my steward, but I beg for him your +especial offices, since he has done nothing save by my command." + +"Sir Anthony, believe me that I will do all I can," the sheriff +responded gravely, "but----" + +"But to set at naught the Queen's proclamation and order!" struck in a +third voice harshly--it was Sir Thomas Greville's--"and she but a +month on the throne! For shame, Sir Anthony! It smacks to me of high +treason. And many a man has suffered for less, let me tell you." + +"Had she been longer on the throne," the sheriff put in more gently, +"and were the times quiet, the matter would have been of less moment, +Sir Anthony, and might not have become a state matter. But just +now----" + +"Things are in a perilous condition," Greville said bluntly, "and you +have done your little to make them worse!" + +The knight by a great effort swallowed his rage and humiliation. "What +will you do with me, gentlemen?" he asked, speaking with at least the +appearance of calmness. + +"That is to be seen," Greville said, roughly over-riding his +companion. "For to-night we must make ourselves and our men +comfortable here." + +"Certainly--with Sir Anthony's leave, Sir Thomas Greville," quoth a +voice from behind. "But only so!" + + +More than one started violently, while the Cludde servants almost to a +man spun round at the sound of the voice--my voice, Francis Cludde's, +though in the darknesss no one knew me. How shall I ever forget the +joy and lively gratitude which filled my heart as I spoke; which +turned the night into day, and that fantastic scene of shadows into a +festival, as I felt that the ambition of the last four years was about +to be gratified. Sir Anthony, who was one of the first to turn, peered +among the servants. "Who spoke?" he cried, a sudden discomposure in +his voice and manner. "Who spoke there?" + +"Ay, Sir Anthony, who did?" Greville said haughtily. "Some one +apparently who does not quite understand his place or the state of +affairs here. Stand back, my men, and let me see him. Perhaps we may +teach him a useful lesson." + +The challenge was welcome, for I feared a scene, and to be left face +to face with my uncle more than anything. Now, as the servants with a +loud murmur of surprise and recognition fell back and disclosed me +standing by Martin's side, I turned a little from Sir Anthony and +faced Greville. "Not this time, I think, Sir Thomas," I said, giving +him back glance for glance. "I have learned my lesson from some who +have fared farther and seen more than you, from men who have stood by +their cause in foul weather as well as fair; and were not for mass one +day and a sermon the next." + +"What is this?" he cried angrily. "Who are you?" + +"Sir Anthony Cludde's dutiful and loving nephew," I answered, with a +courteous bow. "Come back, I thank Heaven, in time to do him a +service, Sir Thomas." + +"Master Francis! Master Francis!" Clopton exclaimed in remonstrance. +He had known me in old days. My uncle, meanwhile, gazed at me in the +utmost astonishment, and into the servants' faces there flashed a +strange light, while many of them hailed me in a tone which told me +that I had but to give the word, and they would fall on the very +sheriff himself. "Master Francis," Sir Philip Clopton repeated +gravely, "if you would do your uncle a service, this is not the way to +go about it. He has surrendered and is our prisoner. Brawling will not +mend matters." + +I laughed out loudly and merrily. "Do you know, Sir Philip," I said, +with something of the old boyish ring in my voice, "I have been, since +I saw you last, to Belgium and Germany, ay, and Poland and Hamburg! Do +you think I have come back a fool?" + +"I do not know what to think of you," he replied dryly, "but you had +best----" + +"Keep a civil tongue in your head, my friend!" said Greville with +harshness, "and yourself out of this business." + +"It is just this business I have come to get into, Sir Thomas," I +answered, with increasing good humor. "Sir Anthony, show them that!" I +continued, and I drew out a little packet of parchment with a great +red seal hanging from it by a green ribbon; just such a packet as that +which I had stolen from the Bishop's apparitor nearly four years back. +"A lantern here!" I cried. "Hold it steady, Martin, that Sir Anthony +may read. Master Sheriff wants his rere-supper." + +I gave the packet into the knight's hand, my own shaking. Ay, shaking, +for was not this the fulfillment of that boyish vow I had made in my +little room in the gable yonder, so many years ago? A fulfillment +strange and timely, such as none but a boy in his teens could have +hoped for, nor any but a man who had tried the chances and mishaps of +the world could fully enjoy as I was enjoying it. I tingled with the +rush through my veins of triumph and gratitude. Up to the last moment +I had feared lest anything should go wrong, lest this crowning +happiness should be withheld from me. Now I stood there smiling, +watching Sir Anthony, as with trembling fingers he fumbled with the +paper. And there was only one thing, only one person, wanting to my +joy. I looked, and looked again, but I could not anywhere see +Petronilla. + +"What is it?" Sir Anthony said feebly, turning the packet over and +over. "It is for the sheriff; for the sheriff, is it not?" + +"He had better open it then, sir," I answered gayly. + +Sir Philip took the packet and after a glance at the address tore it +open. "It is an order from Sir William Cecil," he muttered. Then he +ran his eye down the brief contents, while all save myself pricked +their ears and pressed closer, and I looked swiftly from face to face, +as the wavering light lit up now one and now another. Old familiar +faces for the most part. + +"Well, Sir Philip, will you stop to supper?" I cried with a laugh, +when he had had time, as I judged, to reach the signature. + +"Go to!" he grunted, looking at me. "Nice fools you have made of us, +young man!" He passed the letter to Greville. "Sir Anthony," he +continued, a mixture of pleasure and chagrin in his voice, "you are +free! I congratulate you on your luck. Your nephew has brought an +amnesty for all things done up to the present time save for any life +taken, in which case the matter is to be referred to the Secretary. +Fortunately my dead horse is the worst of the mischief, so free you +are, and amnestied, though nicely Master Cecil has befooled us!" + +"We will give you another horse, Sir Philip," I answered. + +But the words were wasted on the air. They were drowned in a great +shout of joy and triumph which rang from a score of Cludde throats the +moment the purport of the paper was understood; a shout which made the +old house shake again, and scared the dogs so that they fled away into +corners and gazed askance at us, their tails between their legs; a +shout that was plainly heard a mile away in half a dozen homesteads +where Cludde men lay gloomy in their beds. + +By this time my uncle's hand was in mine. With his other he took off +his hat. "Lads!" he cried huskily, rearing his tall form in our midst; +"a cheer for the Queen! God keep her safe, and long may she reign!" + +This was universally regarded as the end of what they still proudly +call in those parts "the Coton Insurrection!" When silence came again, +every dog, even the oldest and wisest, had bayed himself hoarse and +fled to kennel, thinking the end of the world was come. My heart, as I +joined roundly in, swelled high with pride, and there were tears in my +eyes as well as in my uncle's. But there is no triumph after all +without its drawback, no fruition equal to the anticipation. Where was +Petronilla? I could see her nowhere. I looked from window to window, +but she was at none. I scanned the knot of maids, but could not find +her. Even the cheering had not brought her out. + +It was wonderful, though, how the cheers cleared the air. Even Sir +Thomas Greville regained good humor, and deigned to shake me by the +hand and express himself pleased that the matter had ended so happily. +Then the sheriff drew him and Bridgewater away, to look to their men's +arrangements, seeing, I think, that my uncle and I would fain be alone +awhile; and at last I asked with a trembling voice after Petronilla. + + +"To be sure," Sir Anthony answered, furtively wiping his eyes. "I had +forgotten her, dear lad. I wish now that she had stayed. But tell me, +Francis, how came you back to-night, and how did you manage this?" + +Something of what he asked I told him hurriedly. But then--be sure I +took advantage of the first opening--I asked again after Petronilla. +"Where has she gone, sir?" I said, trying to conceal my impatience. "I +thought that Martin told me she was here; indeed, that he had seen her +after I arrived." + +"I am not sure, do you know," Sir Anthony answered, eying me absently, +"that I was wise, but I considered she was safer away, Francis. And +she can be fetched back in the morning. I feared there might be some +disturbance in the house--as indeed there well might have been--and +though she begged very hard to stay with me, I sent her off." + +"This evening, sir?" I stammered, suddenly chilled. + +"Yes, an hour ago." + +"But an hour ago every approach was guarded, Sir Anthony," I cried in +surprise. "I had the greatest difficulty in slipping through from the +outside myself, well as I know every field and tree. To escape from +within, even for a man, much less a woman, would have been impossible. +She will have been stopped." + +"I think not," he said, with a smile at once sage and indulgent--which +seemed to add, "You think yourself a clever lad, but you do not know +everything yet." + +"I sent her out by the secret passage to the mill-house, you see," he +explained, "as soon as I heard the sheriff's party outside. I could +have given them the slip myself, had I pleased." + +"The mill house?" I answered. The mill stood nearly a quarter of a +mile from Coton End, beyond the gardens, and in the direction of the +village. I remembered vaguely that I had heard from the servants in +old days some talk of a secret outlet leading from the house to it. +But they knew no particulars, and its existence was only darkly +rumored among them. + +"You did not know of the passage," Sir Anthony said, chuckling at my +astonishment. "No, I remember. But the girl did. Your father and his +wife went with her. He quite agreed in the wisdom of sending her away, +and indeed advised it. On reaching the mill, if they found all quiet +they were to walk across to Watney's farm. There they could get horses +and might ride at their leisure to Stratford and wait the event. I +thought it best for her; and Ferdinand agreed." + +"And my father--went with her?" I muttered hoarsely, feeling myself +growing chill to the heart. Hardly could I restrain my indignation at +Sir Anthony's folly, or my own anger and disappointment--and fear. For +though my head seemed on fire and there was a tumult in my brain, I +was cool enough to trace clearly my father's motives, and discern with +what a deliberate purpose he had acted. "He went with her?" + +"Yes, he and his wife," the knight answered, noticing nothing in his +obtuseness. + +"You have been fooled, sir," I said bitterly. "My father you should +have known, and for his wife, she is a bad, unscrupulous woman! Oh, +the madness of it, to put my cousin into their hands!" + +"What do you mean?" the knight cried, beginning to tremble. "Your +father is a changed man, lad. He has come back to the old faith and in +a dark hour too. He----" + +"He is a hypocrite and a villain!" I retorted, stung almost to madness +by this wound in my tenderest place; stung indeed beyond endurance. +Why should I spare him, when to spare him was to sacrifice the +innocent? Why should I pick my words, when my love was in danger? He +had had no mercy and no pity. Why should I shrink from exposing him? +Heaven had dealt with him patiently and given him life; and he did but +abuse it. I could keep silence no longer, and told Sir Anthony all +with a stinging tongue and in gibing words; even, at last, how my +father had given me a hint of the very plan he had now carried out, of +coming down to Coton, and goading his brother into some offense which +might leave his estate at the mercy of the authorities. + +"I did not think he meant it," I said bitterly. "But I might have +known that the leopard does not change its spots. How you, who knew +him years ago, and knew that he had plotted against you since, came to +trust him again--to trust your daughter to him--passes my fancy!" + +"He was my brother," the knight murmured, leaning white and stricken +on my shoulder. + +"And my father--heaven help us!" I rejoined. + + + + + CHAPTER XXV. + + IN HARBOR AT LAST. + + +"We must first help ourselves," Sir Anthony answered sharply; rousing +himself with wonderful energy from the prostration into which my story +had thrown him. "I will send after her. She shall be brought back. Ho! +Baldwin! Martin!" he cried loudly. "Send Baldwin hither! Be quick +there!" + +Out of the ruck of servants in and about the hall, Baldwin came +rushing presently, wiping his lips as he approached. A single glance +at our faces sobered him. "Send Martin down to the mill!" Sir Anthony +ordered curtly. "Bid him tell my daughter if she be there to come +back. And do you saddle a couple of horses, and be ready to ride with +Master Francis to Watney's farm, and on to Stratford, if it be +necessary. Lose not a minute; my daughter is with Master Ferdinand. My +order is that she return." + +The fool had come up only a pace or two behind the steward. "Do you +hear, Martin?" I added eagerly, turning to him. My thoughts, busy with +the misery which might befall her in their hands, maddened me. "You +will bring her back if you find her, mind you." + +He did not answer, but his eyes glittered as they met mine, and I knew +that he understood. As he flitted silently across the court and +disappeared under the gateway, I knew that no hound could be more +sure, I knew that he would not leave the trail until he had found +Petronilla, though he had to follow her for many a mile. We might have +to pursue the fugitives to Stratford, but I felt sure that Martin's +lean figure and keen dark face would be there to meet us. + +Us? No. Sir Anthony indeed said to me, "You will go of course?" +speaking as if only one answer were possible. + +But it was not to be so. "No," I said, "you had better go, sir. Or +Baldwin can be trusted. He can take two or three of the grooms. They +should be armed," I added, in a lower tone. + +My uncle looked hard at me, and then gave his assent, no longer +wondering why I did not go. Instead he bade Baldwin do as I had +suggested. In truth my heart was so hot with wrath and indignation +that I dared not follow, lest my father, in his stern, mocking way, +should refuse to let her go, and harm should happen between us. If I +were right in my suspicions, and he had capped his intrigue by +deliberately getting the girl I loved into his hands as a hostage, +either as a surety that I would share with him if I succeeded to the +estates, or as a means of extorting money from his brother, then I +dared not trust myself face to face with him. If I could have mounted +and ridden after my love, I could have borne it better. But the curse +seemed to cling to me still. My worst foe was one against whom I could +not lift my hand. + +"But what," my uncle asked, his voice quavering, though his words +seemed intended to combat my fears, "what can he do, lad? She is his +niece." + +"What?" I answered, with a shudder. "I do not know, but I fear +everything. If he should elude us and take her abroad with him--heaven +help her, sir! He will use her somehow to gain his ends--or kill her." + +Sir Anthony wiped his brow with a trembling hand. "Baldwin will +overtake them," he said. + +"Let us hope so," I answered. Alas, how far fell fruition short of +anticipation. This was my time of triumph! "You had better go in, +sir," I said presently, gaining a little mastery over myself. "I see +Sir Philip has returned; from settling his men for the night. He and +Greville will be wondering what has happened." + +"And you?" he said. + +"I cannot," I answered, shaking my head. + + +After he had gone I stood a while in the shadow on the far side of the +court, listening to the clatter of knives and dishes, the cheerful hum +of the servants as they called to one another, the hurrying footsteps +of the maids. A dog crept out, and licked my hand as it hung nerveless +by my side. Surely Martin or Baldwin would overtake them. Or if not, +it still was not so easy to take a girl abroad against her will. + +But would that be his plan? He must have hiding-places in England to +which he might take her, telling her any wild story of her father's +death or flight, or even perhaps of her own danger if her whereabouts +were known. I had had experience of his daring, his cunning, his +plausibility. Had he not taken in all with whom he had come into +contact, except, by some strange fate, myself. To be sure Anne was not +altogether without feeling or conscience. But she was his--his +entirely, body and soul. Yes, if I could have followed, I could have +borne it better. It was this dreadful inaction which was killing me. + +The bustle and voices of the servants, who were in high spirits, so +irritated me at last that I wandered away, going first to the dark, +silent gardens, where I walked up and down in a fever of doubt and +fear, much as I had done on the last evening I had spent at Coton. +Then a fancy seized me, and turning from the fish-pond I walked toward +the house. Crossing the moat I made for the church door and tried it. +It was unlocked. I went in. Here at least in the sacred place I should +find quietness; and unable to help myself in this terrible crisis, +might get help from One to whom my extremity was but an opportunity. + +I walked up the aisle and, finding all in darkness, the moon at the +moment being obscured, felt my way as far as Sir Piers' flat monument, +and sat down upon it. I had been there scarcely a minute when a faint +sound, which seemed rather a sigh or an audible shudder than any +articulate word, came out of the darkness in front of me. My great +trouble had seemed to make superstitious fears for the time +impossible, but at this sound I started and trembled; and holding my +breath felt a cold shiver run down my back. Motionless I peered before +me, and yet could see nothing. All was gloom, the only distinguishable +feature being the east window. + +What was that? A soft rustle as of ghostly garments moving in the +aisle was succeeded by another sigh which made me rise from my seat, +my hair stiffening. Then I saw the outline of the east window growing +brighter and brighter, and I knew that the moon was about to shine +clear of the clouds, and longed to turn and fly, yet did not dare to +move. + +Suddenly the light fell on the altar steps and disclosed a kneeling +form which seemed to be partly turned toward me as though watching me. +The face I could not see--it was in shadow--and I stood transfixed, +gazing at the figure, half in superstitious terror and half in wonder; +until a voice I had not heard for years, and yet should have known +among a thousand, said softly, "Francis!" + +"Who calls me?" I muttered hoarsely, knowing and yet disbelieving, +hoping and yet with a terrible fear at heart. + +"It is I, Petronilla!" said the same voice gently. And then the form +rose and glided toward me through the moonlight. "It is I, Petronilla. +Do you not know me?" said my love again; and fell upon my breast. + + * * * * * + +She had been firmly resolved all the time not to quit her father, and +on the first opportunity had given the slip to her company, while the +horses were being saddled at Watney's farm. Stealing back through the +darkness she had found the house full of uproar, and apparently +occupied by strange troopers. Aghast and not knowing what to do, she +had bethought herself of the church and there taken refuge. On my +first entrance she was horribly alarmed. But as I walked up the +aisle, she recognized--so she has since told me a thousand times with +pride--my footstep, though it had long been a stranger to her ear, and +she had no thought at the moment of seeing me, or hearing the joyful +news I brought. + + +And so my story is told. For what passed then between Petronilla and +me lies between my wife and myself. And it is an old, old story, and +one which our children have no need to learn, for they have told it, +many of them for themselves, and their children are growing up to tell +it. I think in some odd corner of the house there may still be found a +very ancient swallow's nest, which young girls bring out and look at +tenderly; but for my sword-knot I fear it has been worn out these +thirty years. What matter, even though it was velvet of Genoa? He that +has the substance, lacks not the shadow. + +I never saw my father again, nor learned accurately what passed at +Watney's farm after Petronilla was missed by her two companions. But +one man, whom I could ill spare, was also missing on that night, whose +fate is still something of a mystery. That was Martin Luther. I have +always believed that he fell in a desperate encounter with my father, +but no traces of the struggle, or his body were ever found. The track +between Watney's farm and Stratford, however, runs for a certain +distance by the river; and at some point on this road I think Martin +must have come up with the refugees, and failing either to find +Petronilla with them, or to get any satisfactory account of her, must +have flung himself on my father and been foiled and killed. The exact +truth I have said was never known, though Baldwin and I talked over it +again and again; and there were even some who said that a servant much +resembling Martin Luther was seen with my father in the Low Countries +not a month before his death. I put no credence in this, however, +having good reason to think that the poor fool--who was wiser in his +sane moments than most men--would never have left my service while the +breath remained in his body. + +I have heard it said that blood washes out shame. My father was killed +in a skirmish in the Netherlands shortly before the peace of Chateau +Cambrésis, and about three months after the events here related. I +have no doubt that he died as a brave man should; for he had that +virtue. He held no communication with me or with any at Coton End +later than that which I have here described; but would appear to have +entered the service of Cardinal Granvelle, the governor of the +Netherlands, for after his death word came to the Duchess of Suffolk +that Mistress Anne Cludde had entered a nunnery at Bruges under the +Cardinal's auspices. Doubtless she is long since dead. + +And so are many others of whom I have spoken--Sir Anthony, the +Duchess, Master Bertie, and Master Lindstrom. For forty years have +passed since these things happened--years of peaceful, happy life, +which have gone by more swiftly, as it seems to me in the retrospect, +than the four years of my wanderings. The Lindstroms sought refuge in +England in the second year of the Queen, and settled in Lowestoft +under the Duchess of Suffolk's protection, and did well and flourished +as became them; nor indeed did they find, I trust, others ungrateful, +though I experienced some difficulty in inducing Sir Anthony to treat +the Dutch burgher as on an equality with himself. Lord Willoughby de +Eresby, the Peregrine to whom I stood godfather in St. Willibrod's +church at Wesel, is now a middle-aged man and my very good friend, the +affection which his mother felt for me having descended to him in full +measure. She was indeed such a woman as Her Majesty; large-hearted and +free-tongued, of masculine courage and a wonderful tenderness. And of +her husband what can I say save that he was a brave Christian--and in +peaceful times--a studious gentleman. + +But it is not only in vacant seats and gray hairs that I trace the +progress of forty years. They have done for England almost all that +men hoped they might do in the first dawn of the reign. We have seen +great foes defeated, and strong friends gained. We have seen the +coinage amended, trade doubled, the Exchequer filled, the roads made +good, the poor provided for in a Christian manner, the Church grown +strong; all this in these years. We have seen Holland rise and Spain +decline, and well may say in the words of the old text, which my +grandfather set up over the hall door at Coton, "_Frustra, nisi +Dominus_." + + + + + THE END. + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Story of Francis Cludde, by Stanley J. 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Weyman"> + +<meta name="Publisher" content="Longmans, Green, and Co."> +<meta name="Date" content="1898"> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> +<style type="text/css"> +body {margin-left:10%; + margin-right:10%; background-color:#FFFFFF;} + + +p.normal {text-indent:.25in; text-align: justify;} +.center {margin: auto; text-align:center; margin-top:24pt; margin-bottom:24pt} + + + +p.right {text-align:right; margin-right:20%;} + +p.continue {text-indent: 0in; margin-top:9pt;} +.text10 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:10%; margin-right:0px; font-size:90%;} +.text20 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:20%; margin-right:0px; font-size:90%;} + + +.poem0 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 0%; + margin-right: 0%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + +.poem1 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 2em; + margin-right: 10%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + +.poem2 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + +.poem3 { + margin-top: 24pt; margin-left: 30%; + margin-right: 30%; text-align: left; + margin-bottom: 24pt; font-size:90%} + + + + + +figcenter {margin:auto; text-align:center; margin-top:9pt;} + +.t0 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:0em; margin-right:0px;} +.t1 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:1em; margin-right:0px;} +.t2 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:2em; margin-right:0px;} +.t3 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:3em; margin-right:0px;} +.t4 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:4em; margin-right:0px;} +.t5 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:5em; margin-right:0px;} +.t6 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:6em; margin-right:0px;} +.t7 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:7em; margin-right:0px;} +.t8 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:8em; margin-right:0px;} +.t9 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:9em; margin-right:0px;} +.t10 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:10em; margin-right:0px;} +.t11 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:11em; margin-right:0px;} +.t12 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:12em; margin-right:0px;} +.t13 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:13em; margin-right:0px;} +.t14 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:14em; margin-right:0px;} +.t15 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:15em; margin-right:0px;} +.t16 {margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0px; margin-left:16em; margin-right:0px;} + + +.quote {text-indent:.25in; text-align: justify; font-size:90%; margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:36pt} +.ctrquote {text-align: center; font-size:90%; margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:36pt} + +.dateline {text-align:right; font-size:90%; margin-right:10%; margin-top:24pt; margin-bottom:24pt} + +h1,h2,h3,h4,h5 {text-align: center;} + +span.sc {font-variant: small-caps; font-size:110%;} +span.sc2 {font-variant: small-caps; font-size:90%;} + +hr.W10 {width:10%; color:black; margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt} + +hr.W20 {width:20%; color:black; margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt} + +hr.W50 {width:50%; color:black;} +hr.W90 {width:90%; color:black;} + +p.hang1 {margin-left:3em; text-indent:-3em;} +p.hang2 {margin-left:3em; text-indent:0em;} + + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's The Story of Francis Cludde, by Stanley J. Weyman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Story of Francis Cludde + +Author: Stanley J. Weyman + +Release Date: March 29, 2012 [EBook #39296] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the +Web Archive (University of California Libraries) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<p class="hang1">Transcriber's Notes:<br> +<br> +1. Page scan source:<br> +<br> +http://www.archive.org/details/storyoffranciscl00weymiala<br> +(University of California Libraries)</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE</h2> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h4>BY STANLEY J. WEYMAN</h4> + +<hr class="W10"> + +<p class="hang1">THE HOUSE OF THE WOLF. A Romance. With Frontispiece and Vignette. +Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25.</p> + +<p class="hang1">THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE. A Romance. With four Illustrations. Crown +8vo, $1.25.</p> + +<p class="hang1">A GENTLEMAN OF FRANCE. Being the Memoirs of Gaston de Bonne, Sieur de +Marsac. With Frontispiece and Vignette. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25.</p> + +<p class="hang1">UNDER THE RED ROBE. With twelve full-page Illustrations. Crown 8vo, +cloth, $1.25.</p> + +<p class="hang1">MY LADY ROTHA. A Romance of the Thirty Years' War. With eight +Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25.</p> + +<p class="hang1">FROM THE MEMOIRS OF A MINISTER OF FRANCE. With thirty-six +Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25.</p> + +<p class="hang1">SHREWSBURY. A Romance. With twenty-four illustrations. Crown 8vo, +$1.50.</p> + +<p class="hang1">THE RED COCKADE. A Novel. With 48 illustrations by R. Caton Woodville. +Crown 8vo, $1.50.</p> + +<hr class="W10"> + +<h5><span class="sc">New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.</span></h5> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>THE STORY</h2> +<br> +<h5>OF</h5> +<br> +<h1>FRANCIS CLUDDE</h1> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h5>BY</h5> +<h2>STANLEY J. WEYMAN</h2> + +<h5>AUTHOR OF "A GENTLEMAN OF FRANCE," "UNDER THE RED ROBE,"<br> +"MY LADY ROTHA," ETC., ETC.</h5> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h4><i>ILLUSTRATED</i></h4> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h4>NEW YORK</h4> +<h3>LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.</h3> +<h4>1898</h4> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<p class="center"><span class="sc2">Copyright, 1891, by</span><br> +<span class="sc">CASSELL PUBLISHING COMPANY</span></p> + +<hr class="W10"> + +<p class="center"><span class="sc2">Copyright, 1897, by</span><br> +<span class="sc">LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.</span></p> + +<p class="center"><i>All rights reserved</i></p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> + +<table cellpadding="10" style="width:60%; margin-left:20%; font-weight:bold"> +<colgroup><col style="width:10%; text-align:right"><col style="width:90%"></colgroup> +<tr> +<td><span class="sc2">CHAPTER</span></td> +<td> </td> +</tr><tr> +<td>I.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_01" href="#div1_01"><span class="sc">"Hé, Sire Ane, Hé,"</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>II.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_02" href="#div1_02"><span class="sc">In the Bishop's Room,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>III.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_03" href="#div1_03"><span class="sc">"Down with Purveyors!"</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>IV.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_04" href="#div1_04"><span class="sc">Two Sisters of Mercy,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>V.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_05" href="#div1_05"><span class="sc">Mistress Bertram,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>VI.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_06" href="#div1_06"><span class="sc">Master Clarence,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>VII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_07" href="#div1_07"><span class="sc">On Board the "Framlingham,"</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>VIII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_08" href="#div1_08"><span class="sc">A House of Peace,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>IX.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_09" href="#div1_09"><span class="sc">Playing with Fire,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>X.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_10" href="#div1_10"><span class="sc">The Face in the Porch,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XI.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_11" href="#div1_11"><span class="sc">A Foul Blow,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_12" href="#div1_12"><span class="sc">Anne's Petition,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XIII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_13" href="#div1_13"><span class="sc">A Willful Man's Way,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XIV.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_14" href="#div1_14"><span class="sc">At Bay in the Gatehouse,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XV.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_15" href="#div1_15"><span class="sc">Before the Court,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XVI.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_16" href="#div1_16"><span class="sc">In the Duke's Name,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XVII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_17" href="#div1_17"><span class="sc">A Letter that had Many Escapes,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XVIII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_18" href="#div1_18"><span class="sc">The Witch's Warning</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XIX.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_19" href="#div1_19"><span class="sc">Ferdinand Cludde,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XX.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_20" href="#div1_20"><span class="sc">The Coming Queen,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXI.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_21" href="#div1_21"><span class="sc">My Father,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_22" href="#div1_22"><span class="sc">Sir Anthony's Purpose,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXIII.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_23" href="#div1_23"><span class="sc">The Last Mass,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXIV.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_24" href="#div1_24"><span class="sc">Awaiting the Blow,</span></a></td> +</tr><tr> +<td>XXV.</td> +<td><a name="div1Ref_25" href="#div1_25"><span class="sc">In Harbor at Last,</span></a></td> +</tr></table> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h1>THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE.</h1> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER I.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_01" href="#div1Ref_01">"HÉ, SIRE ANE, HÉ!"</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">On the boundary line between the two counties of Warwick and Worcester +there is a road very famous in those parts, and called the Ridgeway. +Father Carey used to say--and no better Latinist could be found for a +score of miles round in the times of which I write--that it was made +by the Romans. It runs north and south along the narrow spine of the +country, which is spread out on either side like a map, or a picture. +As you fare southward you see on your right hand the green orchards +and pastures of Worcestershire stretching as far as the Malvern Hills. +You have in front of you Bredon Hill, which is a wonderful hill, for +if a man goes down the Avon by boat it goes with him--now before, and +now behind--a whole day's journey--and then stands in the same place. +And on the left hand you have the great Forest of Arden, and not much +besides, except oak trees, which grow well in Warwickshire.</p> + +<p class="normal">I describe this road, firstly, because it is a notable one, and forty +years ago was the only Queen's highway, to call a highway, in that +country. The rest were mere horse-tracks. Secondly, because the chase +wall of Coton End runs along the side of it for two good miles; and +the Cluddes--I am Francis Cludde--have lived at Coton End by the +Ridgeway time out of mind, probably--for the name smacks of the +soil--before the Romans made the road. And thirdly, because forty +years ago, on a drizzling February day in 1555--second year of Mary, +old religion just reestablished--a number of people were collected on +this road, forming a group of a score or more, who stood in an ordered +kind of disorder about my uncle's gates and looked all one way, as if +expecting an arrival, and an arrival of consequence.</p> + +<p class="normal">First, there was my uncle Sir Anthony, tall and lean. He wore his best +black velvet doublet and cloak, and had put them on with an air of +huge importance. This increased each time he turned, staff in hand, +and surveyed his following, and as regularly gave place to a "Pshaw!" +of vexation and a petulant glance when his eye rested on me. Close +beside him, looking important too, but anxious and a little frightened +as well, stood good Father Carey. The priest wore his silk cassock, +and his lips moved from time to time without sound, as though he +were trying over a Latin oration--which, indeed, was the fact. At a +more respectful distance were ranged Baldwin Moor, the steward, +and a dozen servants; while still farther away lounged as many +ragamuffins--landless men, who swarmed about every gentleman's door +in those times, and took toll of such abbey lands as the king might +have given him. Against one of the stone gate-pillars I leaned +myself--nineteen years and six months old, and none too wise, though +well grown, and as strong as one here and there. And perched on the +top of the twin post, with his chin on his knees, and his hands +clasped about them, was Martin Luther, the fool.</p> + +<p class="normal">Martin had chosen this elevated position partly out of curiosity, and +partly, perhaps, under a strong sense of duty. He knew that, whether +he would or no, he must needs look funny up there. His nose was red, +and his eyes were running, and his teeth chattering; and he did look +funny. But as he felt the cold most his patience failed first. The +steady, silent drizzle, the mist creeping about the stems of the oak +trees, the leaden sky proved too much for him in the end. "A watched +pot never boils!" he grumbled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Silence, sirrah!" commanded my uncle angrily. "This is no time for +your fooling. Have a care how you talk in the same breath of pots and +my Lord Bishop!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"<i>Sanctæ ecclesiæ</i>," Father Carey broke out, turning up his eyes in a +kind of ecstasy, as though he were knee to knee with the prelate--"<i>te +defensorem inclytum atque ardentem----</i>"</p> + +<p class="normal">"<i>Pottum!</i>" cried I, laughing loudly at my own wit.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was an ill-mannered word, but I was cold and peevish. I had been +forced to this function against my will. I had never seen the guest +whom we were expecting, and who was no other than the Queen's +Chancellor, Stephen Gardiner, but I disliked him as if I had. In +truth, he was related to us in a peculiar fashion, which my uncle and +I naturally looked at from different standpoints. Sir Anthony viewed +with complacence, if not with pride, any connection with the powerful +Bishop of Winchester, for the knight knew the world, and could +appreciate the value it sets on success, and the blind eyes it has for +spots if they do but speckle the risen sun. I could make no such +allowance, but, with the pride of youth and family, at once despised +the great Bishop for his base blood, and blushed that the shame lay on +our side. I hated this parade of doing honor to him, and would fain +have hidden at home with Petronilla, my cousin, Sir Anthony's +daughter, and awaited our guest there. The knight, however, had not +permitted this, and I had been forced out, being in the worst of +humors.</p> + +<p class="normal">So I said "<i>Pottum!</i>" and laughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Silence, boy!" cried Sir Anthony fiercely. He loved an orderly +procession, and to arrange things decently. "Silence!" he repeated, +darting an angry glance first at me and then at his followers, "or I +will warm that jacket of yours, lad! And you, Martin Luther, see to +your tongue for the next twenty-four hours, and keep it off my Lord +Bishop! And, Father Carey, hold yourself ready----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"For here Sir Hot-Pot cometh!" cried the undaunted Martin, skipping +nimbly down from his post of vantage; "and a dozen of London saucepans +with him, or may I never lick the inside of one again!"</p> + +<p class="normal">A jest on the sauciness of London serving-men was sure to tell with +the crowd, and there was a great laugh at this, especially among the +landless men, who were on the skirts of the party, and well sheltered +from Sir Anthony's eye. He glared about him, provoked to find at this +critical moment smiles where there should have been looks of +deference, and a ring round a fool where he had marshaled a +procession. Unluckily, he chose to visit his displeasure upon me. "You +won't behave, won't you, you puppy!" he cried. "You won't, won't you!" +and stepping forward he aimed a blow at my shoulders, which would have +made me rub myself if it had reached me. But I was too quick. I +stepped back, the stick swung idly, and the crowd laughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">And there the matter would have ended, for the Bishop's party were now +close upon us, had not my foot slipped on the wet grass and I fallen +backward. Seeing me thus at his mercy, the temptation proved too much +for the knight. He forgot his love of seemliness and even that his +visitors were at his elbow--and, stooping a moment to plant home a +couple of shrewd cuts, cried, "Take that! Take that, my lad!" in a +voice that rang as crisply as his thwacks.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was up in an instant; not that the pain was anything, and before our +own people I should have thought as little of shame, for if the old +may not lay hand to the young, being related, where is to be any +obedience? Now, however, my first glance met the grinning faces of +strange lackeys, and while my shoulders still smarted, the laughter of +a couple of soberly-clad pages stung a hundred times more sharply. I +glared furiously round, and my eyes fell on one face--a face long +remembered. It was that of a man who neither smiled nor laughed; a man +whom I recognized immediately, not by his sleek hackney or his purple +cassock, which a riding-coat partially concealed, or even by his +jeweled hand, but by the keen glance of power which passed over me, +took me in, and did not acknowledge me; which saw my humiliation +without interest or amusement. The look hurt me beyond smarting of +shoulders, for it conveyed to me in the twentieth part of a second how +very small a person Francis Cludde was, and how very great a personage +was Stephen Gardiner, whom in my thoughts I had presumed to belittle.</p> + +<p class="normal">I stood irresolute a moment, shifting my feet and glowering at him, my +face on fire. But when he raised his hand to give the Benediction, and +the more devout, or those with mended hose, fell on their knees in the +mud, I turned my back abruptly, and, climbing the wall, flung away +across the chase.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What, Sir Anthony!" I heard him say as I stalked off, his voice +ringing clear and incisive amid the reverential silence which followed +the Latin words; "have we a heretic here, cousin? How is this? So near +home too!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is my nephew, my Lord Bishop," I could hear Sir Anthony answer, +apology in his tone; "and a willful boy at times. You know of him; he +has queer notions of his own, put into his head long ago."</p> + +<p class="normal">I caught no more, my angry strides carrying me out of earshot. Fuming, +I hurried across the long damp grass, avoiding here and there the +fallen limb of an elm or a huge round of holly. I wanted to get out of +the way, and be out of the way; and made such haste that before the +slowly moving cavalcade had traversed one-half of the interval between +the road and the house I had reached the bridge which crossed the +moat, and, pushing my way impatiently through the maids and scullions +who had flocked to it to see the show, had passed into the courtyard.</p> + +<p class="normal">The light was failing, and the place looked dark and gloomy in spite +of the warm glow of burning logs which poured from the lower windows, +and some show of green boughs which had been placed over the doorways +in honor of the occasion. I glanced up at a lattice in one of the +gables--the window of Petronilla's little parlor. There was no face at +it, and I turned fretfully into the hall--and yes, there she was, +perched up in one of the high window-seats. She was looking out on the +chase, as the maids were doing.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yes, as the maids were doing. She too was watching for his High +Mightiness, I muttered, and that angered me afresh. I crossed the +rushes in silence, and climbed up beside her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," I said ungraciously, as she started, hearing me at her +shoulder, "well, have you seen enough of him yet, cousin? You will, I +warrant you, before he leaves. A little of him goes far."</p> + +<p class="normal">"A little of whom, Francis?" she asked simply.</p> + +<p class="normal">Though her voice betrayed some wonder at my rough tone, she was so +much engaged with the show that she did not look at me immediately. +This of course kept my anger warm, and I began to feel that she was in +the conspiracy against me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of my Lord of Winchester, of course," I answered, laughing rudely; +"of Sir Hot-Pot!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why do you call him that?" she remonstrated in gentle wonder. And +then she did turn her soft dark eyes upon me. She was a slender, +willowy girl in those days, with a complexion clear yet pale--a maiden +all bending and gracefulness, yet with a great store of secret +firmness, as I was to learn. "He seems as handsome an old man," she +continued, "as I have ever met, and stately and benevolent, too, as I +see him at this distance. What is the matter with you, Francis? What +has put you out?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Put me out!" I retorted angrily. "Who said anything had put me out?"</p> + +<p class="normal">But I reddened under her eyes; I was longing to tell her all, and be +comforted, while at the same time I shrank with a man's shame from +saying to her that I had been beaten.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can see that something is the matter," she said sagely, with her +head on one side, and that air of being the elder which she often +assumed with me, though she was really the younger by two years. "Why +did you not wait for the others? Why have you come home alone? +Francis," [with sudden conviction] "you have vexed my father! That is +it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He has beaten me like a dog!" I blurted out passionately; "and before +them all! Before those strangers he flogged me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She had her back to the window, and some faint gleam of wintry +sunshine, passing through the gules of the shield blazoned behind her, +cast a red stain on her dark hair and shapely head. She was silent, +probably through pity or consternation; but I could not see her face, +and misread her. I thought her hard, and, resenting this, bragged on +with a lad's empty violence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He did; but I will not stand it! I give you warning, I won't stand +it, Petronilla!" and I stamped, young bully that I was, until the dust +sprang out of the boards, and the hounds by the distant hearth jumped +up and whined. "No! not for all the base bishops in England!" I +continued, taking a step this way and that. "He had better not do it +again! If he does, I tell you it will be the worse for some one!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Francis," she exclaimed abruptly, "you must not speak in that way!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But I was too angry to be silenced, though instinctively I changed my +ground.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stephen Gardiner!" I cried furiously. "Who is Stephen Gardiner, I +should like to know? He has no right to call himself Gardiner at all! +Dr. Stephens he used to call himself, I have heard. A child with no +name but his godfather's; that is what he is, for all his airs and his +bishopric! Who is he to look on and see a Cludde beaten? If my uncle +does not take care----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Francis!" she cried again, cutting me short ruthlessly. "Be silent, +sir!" [and this time I was silent], "You unmanly boy," she continued, +her face glowing with indignation, "to threaten my father before my +face! How dare you, sir? How dare you? And who are you, you poor +child," she exclaimed, with a startling change from invective to +sarcasm--"who are you to talk of bishops, I should like to know?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"One," I said sullenly, "who thinks less of cardinals and bishops than +some folk, Mistress Petronilla!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, I know," she retorted scathingly--"I know that you are a kind of +half-hearted Protestant--neither fish, flesh, nor fowl!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am what my father made me!" I muttered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At any rate," she replied, "you do not see how small you are, or you +would not talk of bishops. Heaven help us! That a boy who has done +nothing and seen nothing, should talk of the Queen's Chancellor! Go! +Go on, you foolish boy, and rule a country, or cut off heads, and then +you may talk of such men--men who could unmake you and yours with a +stroke of the pen! You, to talk so of Stephen Gardiner! Fie, fie, I +say! For shame!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked at her, dazed and bewildered, and had long afterward in my +mind a picture of her as she stood above me, in the window bay, her +back to the light, her slender figure drawn to its full height, her +hand extended toward me. I could scarcely understand or believe that +this was my gentle cousin. I turned without a word and stole away, not +looking behind me. I was cowed.</p> + +<p class="normal">It happened that the servants came hurrying in at the moment with a +clatter of dishes and knives, and the noise covered my retreat. I had +a fancy afterward that, as I moved away, Petronilla called to me. But +at the time, what with the confusion and my own disorder, I paid no +heed to her, but got myself blindly out of the hall, and away to my +own attic.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was a sharp lesson. But my feelings when, being alone, I had time +to feel, need not be set down. After events made them of no moment, +for I was even then on the verge of a change so great that all the +threats and misgivings, the fevers and agues, of that afternoon, real +as they seemed at the time, became in a few hours as immaterial as the +dew which fell before yesterday's thunderstorm.</p> + +<p class="normal">The way the change began to come about was this. I crept in late to +supper, facing the din and lights, the rows of guests and the hurrying +servants, with a mixture of shame and sullenness. I was sitting down +with a scowl next the Bishop's pages--my place was beside them, +half-way down the table, and I was not too careful to keep my feet +clear of their clothing--when my uncle's voice, raised in a harsher +tone than was usual with him, even when he was displeased, summoned +me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come here, sirrah!" he cried roundly. "Come here, Master Francis! I +have a word to speak to you!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I went slowly, dragging my feet, while all looked up, and there was a +partial silence. I was conscious of this, and it nerved me. For a +moment indeed, as I stepped on to the dais I had a vision of scores of +candles and rushlights floating in mist, and of innumerable bodiless +faces all turned up to me. But the vision and the mistiness passed +away, and left only my uncle's long, thin face inflamed with anger, +and beside it, in the same ring of light, the watchful eyes and stern, +impassive features of Stephen Gardiner. The Bishop's face and his eyes +were all I saw then; the same face, the same eyes, I remembered, which +had looked unyielding into those of the relentless Cromwell and had +scarce dropped before the frown of a Tudor. His purple cap and +cassock, the lace and rich fur, the chain of office, I remembered +afterward.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now, boy," thundered Sir Anthony, pointing out the place where I +should stand, "what have you to say for yourself? why have you so +misbehaved this afternoon? Let your tongue speak quickly, do you hear, +or you will smart for it. And let it be to the purpose, boy!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I was about to answer something--whether it was likely to make things +worse or better, I cannot remember--when Gardiner stayed me. He laid +his hand gently on Sir Anthony's sleeve, and interposed. "One moment," +he said mildly, "your nephew did not stay for the Church's blessing, I +remember. Perhaps he has scruples. There are people nowadays who have. +Let us hear if it be so."</p> + +<p class="normal">This time it was Sir Anthony who did not let me answer.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no," he cried hastily; "no, no; it is not so. He conforms, my +lord, he conforms. You conform, sir," he continued, turning fiercely +upon me, "do you not? Answer, sir."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" the Bishop put in with a sneer, "you conform, do you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I attend mass--to please my uncle," I replied boldly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He was ill brought up as a child," Sir Anthony said hastily, speaking +in a tone which those below could not hear. "But you know all that, my +lord--you know all that. It is an old story to you. So I make, and I +pray you to make for the sake of the house, some allowance. He +conforms; he undoubtedly conforms."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Enough!" Gardiner assented. "The rest is for the good priest here, +whose ministrations will no doubt in time avail. But a word with this +young gentleman, Sir Anthony, on another subject. If it was not to the +holy office he objected, perhaps it was to the Queen's Chancellor, or +to the Queen?" He raised his voice with the last words and bent his +brows, so that I could scarcely believe it was the same man speaking. +"Eh, sir, was that so?" he continued severely, putting aside Sir +Anthony's remonstrance and glowering at me. "It may be that we have a +rebel here instead of a heretic."</p> + +<p class="normal">"God forbid!" cried the knight, unable to contain himself. It was +clear that he repented already of his ill-timed discipline. "I will +answer for it that we have no Wyatts here, my lord."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is well!" the Chancellor replied. "That is well!" he repeated, +his eyes leaving me and roving the hall with so proud a menace in +their glance that all quailed, even the fool. "That is very well," he +said, drumming on the table with his fingers; "but let Master Francis +speak for himself."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I never heard," said I boldly--I had had a moment for thought--"that +Sir Thomas Wyatt had any following in this country. None to my +knowledge. As for the Queen's marriage with the Prince of Spain, which +was the ground, as we gathered here, of Wyatt's rising with the +Kentish folk, it seems a matter rather for the Queen's grace than her +subjects. But if that be not so, I, for my part, would rather have +seen her married to a stout Englishman--ay, or to a Frenchman."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And why, young gentleman?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because I would we kept at peace with France. We have more to gain by +fighting Spain than fighting France," I answered bluntly.</p> + +<p class="normal">My uncle held up his hands. "The boy is clean mad!" he groaned. "Who +ever heard of such a thing? With all France, the rightful estate of +her Majesty, waiting to be won back, he talks of fighting Spain! And +his own grandmother was a Spaniard!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am none the less an Englishman for that!" I said; whereon there was +a slight murmur of applause in the hall below. "And for France," I +continued, carried away by this, "we have been fighting it, off and +on, as long as men remember; and what are we the better? We have only +lost what we had to begin. Besides, I am told that France is five +times stronger than it was in Henry the Fifth's time, and we should +only spend our strength in winning what we could not hold. While as to +Spain----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, as to Spain?" grumbled Sir Anthony, forgetting his formidable +neighbor, and staring at me with eyes of wonder. "Why, my father +fought the French at Guinegate, and my grandfather at Cherbourg, and +his father at Agincourt! But there! As to Spain, you popinjay?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why, she is conquering here," I answered warmly, "and colonizing +there among the newly-discovered countries of the world, and getting +all the trade and all the seaports and all the gold and silver; and +Spain after all is a nation with no greater strength of men than +England. Ay, and I hear," I cried, growing more excited and raising my +voice, "that now is our time or never! The Spaniards and the +Portuguese have discovered a new world over seas.</p> +<div class="poem2"> +<p class="t0" style="text-indent:-6pt"> +"A Castilla y á Leon<br> +Nuevo mundo dió Coton!</p> +</div> + +<p class="continue">say they; but depend upon it, every country that is to be rich and +strong in the time that is coming must have part in it. We cannot +conquer either Spain or France; we have not men enough. But we have +docks and sailors, and ships in London and Fowey, and Bristol and the +Cinque Ports, enough to fight Spain over the great seas, and I say, +'Have at her!'"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What next?" groaned Sir Anthony piteously. "Did man ever hear such +crackbrained nonsense?"</p> + +<p class="normal">But I think it was not nonsense, for his words were almost lost in the +cry which ran through the hall as I ceased speaking--a cry of English +voices. One moment my heart beat high and proudly with a new sense of +power; the next, as a shadow of a cloud falls on a sunny hillside, the +cold sneer on the statesman's face fell on me and chilled me. His set +look had neither thawed nor altered, his color had neither come nor +gone. "You speak your lesson well, lad," he said. "Who taught you +statecraft?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I grew smaller, shrinking with each word he uttered; and faltered, and +was dumb.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come," he said, "you see but a little way; yet country lads do not +talk of Fowey and Bristol! Who primed you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I met a Master Sebastian Cabot," I said reluctantly at last, when he +had pressed me more than once, "who stayed a while at a house not far +from here, and had been Inspector of the Navy to King Edward. He had +been a seaman seventy years, and he talked----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Too fast!" said Gardiner, with a curt nod. "But enough, I understand. +I know the man. He is dead."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was silent then, and seemed to have fallen suddenly into thought, +as a man well might who had the governing of a kingdom on his +shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">Seemingly he had done with me. I looked at Sir Anthony. "Ay, go!" he +said irritably, waving me off. "Go!"</p> + +<p class="normal">And I went. The ordeal was over, and over so successfully that I felt +the humiliation of the afternoon cheap at the price of this triumph; +for, as I stepped down, there was a buzz around me, a murmur of +congratulation and pride and excitement. On every Coton face I marked +a flush, in every Coton eye I read a sparkle, and every flush and +every sparkle was for me. Even the Chancellor's secretaries, grave, +down-looking men, all secrecy and caution, cast curious glances at me, +as though I were something out of the common; and the Chancellor's +pages made way for me with new-born deference. "There is for country +wits!" I heard Baldwin Moor cry gleefully, while the man who put food +before me murmured of "the Cludde bull-pup!" If I read in Father +Carey's face, as indeed I did, solicitude as well as relief and +gladness, I marked the latter only, and hugged a natural pride to my +breast. When Martin Luther said boldly that it was not only Bishop +could fill a bowl, it was by an effort I refrained from joining in the +laugh which followed.</p> + +<p class="normal">For an hour I enjoyed this triumph, and did all but brag of it. +Especially I wished Petronilla had witnessed it. At the end of that +time--<i>Finis</i>, as the book says. I was crossing the courtyard, +one-half of which was bathed in a cold splendor of moonlight, and was +feeling the first sobering touch of the night air on my brow, when I +heard some one call out my name. I turned, to find one of the +Chancellor's servants, a sleek, substantial fellow, with a smug mouth, +at my elbow.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am bidden to fetch you at once, Master Cludde," he answered, a +gleam of sly malice peeping through the gravity of his demeanor. "The +Chancellor would see you in his room, young sir."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER II.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_02" href="#div1Ref_02">IN THE BISHOP'S ROOM.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Chancellor was lodged in the great chamber on the southern side of the +courtyard, a room which we called the Tapestried Chamber, and in which +tradition said that King Henry the Sixth had once slept. It was on the +upper floor, and for this reason free from the damp air which in +autumn and winter rose from the moat and hung about the lower range of +rooms. It was besides, of easy access from the hall, a door in the +gallery of the latter leading into an anteroom, which again opened +into the Tapestried Chamber; while a winding staircase, starting from +a dark nook in the main passage of the house, also led to this state +apartment, but by another and more private door.</p> + +<p class="normal">I reached the antechamber with a stout heart in my breast, though a +little sobered by my summons, and feeling such a reaction from the +heat of a few minutes before as follows a plunge into cold water. In +the anteroom I was bidden to wait while the great man's will was +taken, which seemed strange to me, then unused to the mummery of Court +folk. But before I had time to feel much surprise, the inner door was +opened, and I was told to enter.</p> + +<p class="normal">The great room, which I had seldom seen in use, had now an appearance +quite new to me. A dull red fire was glowing comfortably on the +hearthstone, before which a posset stool was standing. Near this, +seated at a table strewn with a profusion of papers and documents, was +a secretary writing busily. The great oaken bedstead, with its nodding +tester, lay in a background of shadows, which played about the figures +broidered on the hangings, or were lost in the darkness of the +corners; while near the fire, in the light cast by the sconces fixed +above the hearth, lay part of the Chancellor's equipment. The fur rugs +and cloak of sable, the saddle-bags, the dispatch-boxes, and the +silver chafing-dish, gave an air of comfort to this part of the room. +Walking up and down in the midst of these, dictating a sentence at +every other turn, was Stephen Gardiner.</p> + +<p class="normal">As I entered the clerk looked up, holding his pen suspended. His +master, by a quick nod, ordered him to proceed. Then, signaling to me +in a like silent fashion his command that I should stand by the +hearth, the Bishop resumed his task of composition.</p> + +<p class="normal">For some minutes my interest in the man, whom I had now an opportunity +of scrutinizing unmarked and at my leisure, took up all my attention. +He was at this time close on seventy, but looked, being still tall and +stout, full ten years younger. His face, square and sallow, was indeed +wrinkled and lined; his eyes lay deep in his head, his shoulders were +beginning to bend, the nape of his neck to become prominent. He had +lost an inch of his full height. But his eyes still shone brightly, +nor did any trace of weakness mar the stern character of his mouth, or +the crafty wisdom of his brow. The face was the face of a man austere, +determined, perhaps cruel; of a man who could both think and act.</p> + +<p class="normal">My curiosity somewhat satisfied, I had leisure, first to wonder why I +had been sent for, and then to admire the prodigious number of books +and papers which lay about, more, indeed, than I had ever seen +together in my life. From this I passed to listening, idly at first, +and with interest afterward, to the letter which the Chancellor was +dictating. It seemed from its tenor to be a letter to some person in +authority, and presently one passage attracted my attention, so that I +could afterward recall it word for word.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not think"--the Chancellor pronounced, speaking in a sonorous +voice, and the measured tone of one whose thoughts lie perfectly +arranged in his head--"that the Duchess Katherine will venture to take +the step suggested as possible. Yet Clarence's report may be of +moment. Let the house, therefore, be watched if anything savoring of +flight be marked, and take notice whether there be a vessel in the +Pool adapted to her purpose. A vessel trading to Dunquerque would be +most likely. Leave her husband till I return, when I will deal with +him roundly."</p> + +<p class="normal">I missed what followed. It was upon another subject, and my thoughts +lagged behind, being wholly taken up with the Duchess Katherine and +her fortunes. I wondered who she was, young or old, and what this step +could be she was said to meditate, and what the jargon about the Pool +and Dunquerque meant. I was still thinking of this when I was aroused +by an abrupt silence, and looking up found that the Chancellor was +bending over the papers on the table. The secretary was leaving the +room.</p> + +<p class="normal">As the door closed behind him, Gardiner rose from his stooping posture +and came slowly toward me, a roll of papers in his hand. "Now," he +said tranquilly, seating himself in an elbow-chair which stood in +front of the hearth, "I will dispose of your business, Master Cludde."</p> + +<p class="normal">He paused, looking at me in a shrewd, masterful way, much as if--I +thought at the time, little knowing how near the truth my fancy +went--I were a beast he was about to buy; and then he went on. "I have +sent for you, Master Francis," he said dryly, fixing his piercing eyes +on mine, "because I think that this country does not suit your health. +You conform, but you conform with a bad grace, and England is no +longer the place for such. You incite the commonalty against the +Queen's allies, and England is not the place for such. Do not +contradict me; I have heard you myself. Then," he continued, grimly +thrusting out his jaw in a sour smile, "you misname those whom the +Queen honors; and were Dr. Stephens--you take me, Master Malapert? +such a man as his predecessors, you would rue the word. For a trifle +scarce weightier Wolsey threw a man to rot six years in a dungeon, +boy!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I changed color, yet not so much in fear--though it were vain to say I +did not tremble--as in confusion. I had called him Dr. Stephens +indeed, but it had been to Petronilla only. I stood, not knowing what +to say, until he, after lingering on his last words to enjoy my +misery, resumed his subject. "That is one good and sufficient +reason--mind you, sufficient, boy--why England is no place for you. +For another, the Cluddes have always been soldiers; and you--though +readier-witted than some, which comes of your Spanish grandmother--are +quicker with a word than a thought, and a blow than either. Of which +afterward. Well, England is going to be no place for soldiers. Please +God, we have finished with wars at home. A woman's reign should be a +reign of peace."</p> + +<p class="normal">I hardened my heart at that. A reign of peace, forsooth, when the week +before we had heard of a bishop burned at Gloucester! I hardened my +heart. I would not be frightened, though I knew his power, and knew +how men in those days misused power. I would put a bold face on the +matter.</p> + +<p class="normal">He had not done with me yet, however. "One more reason I have," he +continued, stopping me as I was about to speak, "for saying that +England will not suit your health, Master Cludde. It is that I do not +want you here. Abroad, you may be of use to me, and at the same time +carve out your own fortune. You have courage and can use a sword, I +hear. You understand--and it is a rare gift with Englishmen--some +Spanish, which I suppose your father or your uncle taught you. You +can--so Father Carey says--construe a Latin sentence if it be not too +difficult. You are scarcely twenty, and you will have me for your +patron. Why, were I you, boy, with your age and your chances, I would +die Prince or Pope! Ay, I would!" He stopped speaking, his eyes on +fire. Nay, a ring of such real feeling flashed out in his last words +that, though I distrusted him, though old prejudices warned me against +him, and, at heart a Protestant, I shuddered at things I had heard of +him, the longing to see the world and have adventures seized upon me. +Yet I did not speak at once. He had told me that my tongue outran my +thoughts, and I stood silent until he asked me curtly, "Well, sirrah, +what do you say?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I say, my Lord Bishop," I replied respectfully, "that the prospect +you hold out to me would tempt me were I a younger son, or without +those ties of gratitude which hold me to my uncle. But, my father +excepted, I am Sir Anthony's only heir."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah, your father!" he said contemptuously. "You do well to remind me +of him, for I see you are forgetting the first part of my speech in +thinking of the last! Should I have promised first and threatened +later? You would fain, I expect, stay here and woo Mistress +Petronilla? Do I touch you there? You think to marry the maid and be +master of Coton End in God's good time, do you? Then listen, Francis +Cludde. Neither one nor the other, neither maid nor meadow will be +yours should you stay here till Doomsday!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I started, and stood glowering on him, speechless with anger and +astonishment.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You do not know who you are," he continued, leaning forward with a +sudden movement, and speaking with one claw-like finger extended, and +a malevolent gleam in his eyes. "You called me a nameless child a +while ago, and so I was; yet have I risen to be ruler of England, +Master Cludde! But you--I will tell you which of us is base-born. I +will tell you who and what your father, Ferdinand Cludde, was. He was, +nay, he is, my tool, spy, jackal! Do you understand, boy? Your father +is one of the band of foul creatures to whom such as I, base-born +though I be, fling the scraps from their table! He is the vilest of +the vile men who do my dirty work, my lad."</p> + +<p class="normal">He had raised his voice and hand in passion, real or assumed. He +dropped them as I sprang forward. "You lie!" I cried, trembling all +over.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Easy! easy!" he said. He stopped me where I was by a gesture of stern +command. "Think!" he continued, calmly and weightily. "Has any one +ever spoken to you of your father since the day seven years ago, when +you came here, a child, brought by a servant? Has Sir Anthony talked +of him? Has any servant named his name to you. Think, boy. If +Ferdinand Cludde be a father to be proud of, why does his brother make +naught of him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is a Protestant," I said faintly. Faintly, because I had asked +myself this very question not once but often. Sir Anthony so seldom +mentioned my father that I had thought it strange myself. I had +thought it strange, too, that the servants, who must well remember +Ferdinand Cludde, never talked to me about him. Hitherto I had always +been satisfied to answer, "He is a Protestant"; but face to face with +this terrible old man and his pitiless charge, the words came but +faintly from my lips.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A Protestant," he replied solemnly. "Yes, this comes of schism, that +villains cloak themselves in it, and parade for true men. A Protestant +you call him, boy? He has been that, ay, and all things to all men; +and he has betrayed all things and all men. He was in the great +Cardinal's confidence, and forsook him, when he fell, for Cromwell. +Thomas Cromwell, although they were of the same persuasion, he +betrayed to me. I have here, here"--and he struck the letters in his +hand a scornful blow--"the offer he made to me, and his terms. Then +eight years back, when the late King Edward came to the throne, I too +fell on evil days, and Master Cludde abandoned me for my Lord +Hertford, but did me no great harm. But he did something which blasted +him--blasted him at last."</p> + +<p class="normal">He paused. Had the fire died down, or was it only my imagination +that the shadows thickened round the bed behind him, and closed in +more nearly on us, leaving his pale grim face to confront me--his +face, which seemed the paler and grimmer, the more saturnine and +all-mastering, for the dark frame which set it off?</p> + +<p class="normal">"He did this," he continued slowly, "which came to light and blasted +him. He asked, as the price of his service in betraying me, his +brother's estate."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Impossible!" I stammered. "Why, Sir Anthony----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What of Sir Anthony, you would ask?" the Chancellor replied, +interrupting me with savage irony. "Oh, he was a Papist! an obstinate +Papist! He might go hang--or to Warwick Jail!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nay, but this at least, my lord, is false!" I cried. "Palpably false! +If my father had so betrayed his own flesh and blood, should I be +here? Should I be at Coton End? You say this happened eight years ago. +Seven years ago I came here. Would Sir Anthony----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"There are fools everywhere," the old man sneered. "When my Lord +Hertford refused your father's suit, Ferdinand began--it is his +nature--to plot against him. He was found out, and execrated by +all--for he had been false to all--he fled for his life. He left you +behind, and a servant brought you to Coton End, where Sir Anthony took +you in."</p> + +<p class="normal">I covered my face. Alas! I believed him; I, who had always been so +proud of my lineage, so proud of the brave traditions of the house and +its honor, so proud of Coton End and all that belonged to it! Now, if +this were true, I could never again take pleasure in one or the other. +I was the son of a man branded as a turncoat and an informer, of one +who was the worst of traitors! I sank down on the settle behind me and +hid my face. Another might have thought less of the blow, or, with +greater knowledge of the world, might have made light of it as a thing +not touching himself. But on me, young as I was, and proud, and as yet +tender, and having done nothing myself, it fell with crushing force.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was years since I had seen my father, and I could not stand forth +loyally and fight his battle, as a son his father's friend and +familiar for years might have fought it. On the contrary, there was so +much which seemed mysterious in my past life, so much that bore out +the Chancellor's accusation, that I felt a dread of its truth even +before I had proof. Yet I would have proof. "Show me the letters!" I +said harshly; "show me the letters, my lord!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You know your father's handwriting?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do."</p> + +<p class="normal">I knew it, not from any correspondence my father had held with me, but +because I had more than once examined with natural curiosity the +wrappers of the dispatches which at intervals of many months, +sometimes of a year, came from him to Sir Anthony. I had never known +anything of the contents of the letters, all that fell to my share +being certain formal messages, which Sir Anthony would give me, +generally with a clouded brow and a testy manner that grew genial +again only with the lapse of time.</p> + +<p class="normal">Gardiner handed me the letters, and I took them and read one. One was +enough. That my father! Alas! alas! No wonder that I turned my face to +the wall, shivering as with the ague, and that all about me--except +the red glow of the fire, which burned into my brain--seemed darkness! +I had lost the thing I valued most. I had lost at a blow everything of +which I was proud. The treachery that could flush that worn face +opposite to me, lined as it was with statecraft, and betray the wily +tongue into passion, seemed to me, young and impulsive, a thing so +vile as to brand a man's children through generations.</p> + +<p class="normal">Therefore I hid my face in the corner of the settle, while the +Chancellor gazed at me a while in silence, as one who had made an +experiment might watch the result.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You see now, my friend," he said at last, almost gently, "that you +may be base-born in more ways than one. But be of good cheer; you are +young, and what I have done you may do. Think of Thomas Cromwell--his +father was naught. Think of the old Cardinal--my master. Think of the +Duke of Suffolk--Charles Brandon, I mean. He was a plain gentleman, +yet he married a queen. More, the door which they had to open for +themselves I will open for you--only, when you are inside, play the +man, and be faithful."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What would you have me do?" I whispered hoarsely.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I would have you do this," he answered. "There are great things +brewing in the Netherlands, boy--great changes, unless I am mistaken. +I have need of an agent there, a man, stout, trusty, and, in +particular, unknown, who will keep me informed of events. If you will +be that agent, I can procure for you--and not appear in the matter +myself--a post of pay and honor in the Regent's Guards. What say you +to that, Master Cludde? A few weeks and you will be making history, +and Coton End will seem a mean place to you. Now, what do you say?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I was longing to be away and alone with my misery, but I forced myself +to reply patiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"With your leave I will give you my answer to-morrow, my lord," I +said, as steadily as I could; and I rose, still keeping my face turned +from him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," he replied, with apparent confidence. But he watched me +keenly, as I fancied. "I know already what your answer will be. Yet +before you go I will give you a piece of advice which in the new +life you begin to-night will avail you more than silver, more than +gold--ay, more than steel, Master Francis. It is this: Be prompt to +think, be prompt to strike, be slow to speak! Mark it well! It is a +simple recipe, yet it has made me what I am, and may make you greater. +Now go!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He pointed to the little door opening on the staircase, and I bowed +and went out, closing it carefully behind me. On the stairs, moving +blindly in the dark, I fell over some one who lay sleeping there, and +who clutched at my leg. I shook him off, however, with an exclamation +of rage, and, stumbling down the rest of the steps, gained the open +air. Excited and feverish, I shrank with aversion from the confinement +of my room, and, hurrying over the drawbridge, sought at random the +long terrace by the fish-pools, on which the moonlight fell, a sheet +of silver, broken only by the sundial and the shadows of the rose +bushes. The night air, weeping chill from the forest, fanned my cheeks +as I paced up and down. One way I had before me the manor-house--the +steep gable-ends, the gateway tower, the low outbuildings and +cornstacks and stables--and flanking these the squat tower and nave of +the church. I turned. Now I saw only the water and the dark line of +trees which fringed the further bank. But above these the stars were +shining.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet in my mind there was no starlight. There all was a blur of wild +passions and resolves. Shame and an angry resentment against those who +had kept me so long in ignorance--even against Sir Anthony--were my +uppermost feelings. I smarted under the thought that I had been living +on his charity. I remembered many a time when I had taken much on +myself, and he had smiled, and the remembrance stung me. I longed to +assert myself and do something to wipe off the stain.</p> + +<p class="normal">But should I accept the Bishop's offer? It never crossed my mind to do +so. He had humiliated me, and I hated him for it. Longing to cut +myself off from my old life, I could not support a patron who would +know, and might cast in my teeth the old shame. A third reason, too, +worked powerfully with me as I became cooler. This was the conviction +that, apart from the glitter which the old man's craft had cast about +it, the part he would have me play was that of a spy--an informer! A +creature like--I dared not say like my father, yet I had him in my +mind. And from this, from the barest suspicion of this, I shrank as +the burned puppy from the fire--shrank with fierce twitching of nerve +and sinew.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet if I would not accept his offer it was clear I must fend for +myself. His threats meant as much as that, and I smiled sternly as I +found necessity at one with inclination. I would leave Coton End at +once, and henceforth I would fight for my own hand. I would have no +name until I had made for myself a new one.</p> + +<p class="normal">This resolve formed, I turned and went back to the house, and felt my +way to my own chamber. The moonlight poured through the lattice and +fell white on my pallet. I crossed the room and stood still. Down the +middle of the coverlet--or my eyes deceived me--lay a dark line.</p> + +<p class="normal">I stooped mechanically to see what this was and found my own sword +lying there; the sword which Sir Anthony had given me on my last +birthday. But how had it come there? As I took it up something soft +and light brushed my hand and drooped from the hilt. Then I +remembered. A week before I had begged Petronilla to make me a +sword-knot of blue velvet for use on state occasions. No doubt she had +done it, and had brought the sword back this evening, and laid it +there in token of peace.</p> + +<p class="normal">I sat down on my bed, and softer and kindlier thoughts came to me; +thoughts of love and gratitude, in which the old man who had been a +second father to me had part. I would go as I had resolved, but I +would return to them when I had done a thing worth doing; something +which should efface the brand that lay on me now.</p> + +<p class="normal">With gentle fingers I disengaged the velvet knot and thrust it into my +bosom. Then I tied about the hilt the old leather thong, and began to +make my preparations; considering this or that route while I hunted +for my dagger and changed my doublet and hose for stouter raiment and +long, untanned boots. I was yet in the midst of this, when a knock at +the door startled me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who is there?" I asked, standing erect.</p> + +<p class="normal">For answer Martin Luther slid in, closing the door behind him. The +fool did not speak, but turning his eyes first on one thing and then +on another nodded sagely.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" I growled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are off, master," he said, nodding again. "I thought so."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why did you think so?" I retorted impatiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is time for the young birds to fly when the cuckoo begins to +stir," he answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">I understood him dimly and in part. "You have been listening," I said +wrathfully, my cheeks burning.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And been kicked in the face like a fool for my pains," he answered. +"Ah, well, it is better to be kicked by the boot you love than kissed +by the lips you hate. But Master Francis, Master Francis!" he +continued in a whisper.</p> + +<p class="normal">He said no more, and I looked up. The man was stooping slightly +forward, his pale face thrust out. There was a strange gleam in his +eyes, and his teeth grinned in the moonlight. Thrice he drew his +finger across his lean knotted throat. "Shall I?" he hissed, his hot +breath reaching me, "shall I?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I recoiled from him shuddering. It was a ghastly pantomime, and it +seemed to me that I saw madness in his eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"In Heaven's name, no!" I cried--"No! Do you hear, Martin? No!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He stood back on the instant, as a dog might have done being reproved. +But I could hardly finish in comfort after that with him standing +there, although when I next turned to him he seemed half asleep and +his eyes were dull and fishy as ever.</p> + +<p class="normal">"One thing you can do," I said brusquely. Then I hesitated, looking +round me. I wished to send something to Petronilla, some word, some +keepsake. But I had nothing that would serve a maid's purpose, and +could think of nothing until my eye lit on a house-martin's nest, +lying where I had cast it on the window-sill. I had taken it down that +morning because the droppings during the last summer had fallen on the +lead work, and I would not have it used when the swallows returned. It +was but a bit of clay, and yet it would serve. She would guess its +meaning.</p> + +<p class="normal">I gave it into his hands. "Take this," I said, "and give it privately +to Mistress Petronilla. Privately, you understand. And say nothing to +any one, or the Bishop will flay your back, Martin."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER III.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_03" href="#div1Ref_03">"DOWN WITH PURVEYORS!"</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The first streak of daylight found me already footing it through the +forest by paths known to few save the woodcutters, but with which many +a boyish exploration had made me familiar. From Coton End the London +road lies plain and fair through Stratford-on-Avon and Oxford. But my +plan, the better to evade pursuit, was, instead, to cross the forest +in a northeasterly direction, and, passing by Warwick, to strike the +great north road between Coventry and Daventry, which, running thence +southeastward, would take me as straight as a bird might fly through +Dunstable, St. Albans, and Barnet, to London. My baggage consisted +only of my cloak, sword, and dagger; and for money I had but a gold +angel, and a few silver bits of doubtful value. But I trusted that +this store, slender as it was, would meet my charges as far as London. +Once there I must depend on my wits either for providence at home or a +passage abroad.</p> + +<p class="normal">Striding steadily up and down hill, for Arden Forest is made up of +hills and dells which follow one another as do the wave and trough of +the sea, only less regularly, I made my way toward Wootton Wawen. As +soon as I espied its battlemented church lying in a wooded bottom +below me, I kept a more easterly course, and, leaving Henley-in-Arden +far to the left, passed down toward Leek Wootton. The damp, dead +bracken underfoot, the leafless oaks and gray sky overhead, nay the +very cry of the bittern fishing in the bottoms, seemed to be at one +with my thoughts; for these were dreary and sad enough.</p> + +<p class="normal">But hope and a fixed aim form no bad makeshifts for happiness. +Striking the broad London road as I had purposed I slept that +night at Ryton Dunsmoor, and the next at Towcester; and the third day, +which rose bright and frosty, found me stepping gayly southward, +travel-stained indeed, but dry and whole. My spirits rose with the +temperature. For a time I put the past behind me, and found amusement +in the sights of the road; in the heavy wagons and long trains of +pack-horses, and the cheery greetings which met me with each mile. +After all, I had youth and strength, and the world before me; and +particularly Stony Stratford, where I meant to dine.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was one trouble common among wayfarers which did not touch me; +and that was the fear of robbers, for he would be a sturdy beggar who +would rob an armed foot-passenger for the sake of an angel; and the +groats were gone. So I felt no terrors on that account, and even when +about noon I heard a horseman trot up behind me, and rein in his horse +so as to keep pace with me at a walk, step for step--a thing which +might have seemed suspicious to some--I took no heed of him. I was +engaged with my first view of Stratford, and did not turn my head. We +had walked on so for fifty paces or more, before it struck me as odd +that the man did not pass me.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then I turned, and shading my eyes from the sun, which stood just over +his shoulder, said, "Good-day, friend."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good-day, master," he answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">He was a stout fellow, looking like a citizen, although he had a sword +by his side, and wore it with an air of importance which the sunshine +of opportunity might have ripened into a swagger. His dress was plain; +and he sat a good hackney as a miller's sack might have sat it. His +face was the last thing I looked at. When I raised my eyes to it, I +got an unpleasant start. The man was no stranger. I knew him in a +moment for the messenger who had summoned me to the Chancellor's +presence.</p> + +<p class="normal">The remembrance did not please me; and reading in the fellow's sly +look that he recognized me, and thought he had made a happy discovery +on finding me, I halted abruptly. He did the same.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is a fine morning," he said, taken aback by my sudden movement, +but affecting an indifference which the sparkle in his eye belied. "A +rare day for the time of year."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is," I answered, gazing steadily at him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Going to London? Or may be only to Stratford?" he hazarded. He +fidgeted uncomfortably under my eye, but still pretended ignorance of +me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is as may be," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No offense, I am sure," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">I cast a quick glance up and down the road. There happened to be no +one in sight. "Look here!" I replied, stepping forward to lay my hand +on the horse's shoulder--but the man reined back and prevented me, +thereby giving me a clew to his character--"you are in the service of +the Bishop of Winchester?"</p> + +<p class="normal">His face fell, and he could not conceal his disappointment at being +recognized. "Well, master," he answered reluctantly, "perhaps I am, +and perhaps I am not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is enough," I said shortly. "And you know me. You need not lie +about it, man, for I can see you do. Now, look here, Master Steward, +or whatever your name may be----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is Master Pritchard," he put in sulkily; "and I am not ashamed of +it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well. Then let us understand one another. Do you mean to +interfere with me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He grinned. "Well, to be plain, I do," he replied, reining his horse +back another step. "I have orders to look out for you, and have you +stopped if I find you. And I must do my duty, sir; I am sworn to it, +Master Cludde."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Right," said I calmly; "and I must do mine, which is to take care of +my skin." And I drew my sword and advanced upon him with a flourish. +"We will soon decide this little matter," I added grimly, one eye on +him and one on the empty road, "if you will be good enough to defend +yourself."</p> + +<p class="normal">But there was no fight in the fellow. By good luck, too, he was so +startled that he did not do what he might have done with safety; +namely, retreat, and keep me in sight until some passers-by came up. +He did give back, indeed, but it was against the bank. "Have a care," +he cried in a fume, his eye following my sword nervously; he did not +try to draw his own. "There is no call for fighting, I say."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But I say there is," I replied bluntly. "Call and cause! Either you +fight me, or I go where I please."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You may go to Bath for me!" he spluttered, his face the color of a +turkey-cock's wattles with rage.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you mean it, my friend?" I said, and I played my point about his +leg, half-minded to give him a little prod by way of earnest. "Make up +your mind."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes!" he shrieked out, suspecting my purpose, and bouncing about in +his saddle like a parched pea. "Yes, I say!" he roared. "Do you hear +me? You go your way, and I will go mine."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is a bargain," I said quietly; "and mind you keep to it."</p> + +<p class="normal">I put up my sword with my face turned from him, lest he should see the +curl of my lip and the light in my eyes. In truth, I was uncommonly +well pleased with myself, and was thinking that if I came through all +my adventures as well, I should do merrily. Outwardly, however, I +tried to ignore my victory, and to make things as easy as I could for +my friend--if one may call a man who will not fight him a friend, a +thing I doubt. "Which way are you going?" I asked amicably; "to +Stratford?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He nodded, for he was too sulky to speak.</p> + +<p class="normal">"All right!" I said cheerfully, feeling that my dignity could take +care of itself now. "Then so far we may go together. Only do you +remember the terms. After dinner each goes his own way."</p> + +<p class="normal">He nodded again, and we turned, and went on in silence, eying one +another askance, like two ill-matched dogs coupled together. But, +luckily, our forced companionship did not last long, a quarter of a +mile and a bend in the road bringing us to the first low, gray houses +of Stratford; a long, straggling village it seemed, made up of inns +strewn along the road, like beads threaded on a rosary. And to be +sure, to complete the likeness, we came presently upon an ancient +stone cross standing on the green. I pulled up in front of this with a +sigh of pleasure, for on either side of it, one facing the other, was +an inn of the better class.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," I said, "which shall it be? The Rose and Crown, or the Crown +without the Rose?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Choose for yourself," he answered churlishly. "I go to the other."</p> + +<p class="normal">I shrugged my shoulders. After all, you cannot make a silk purse out +of a sow's ear, and if a man has not courage he is not likely to have +good-fellowship. But the words angered me, nevertheless, for a shabby, +hulking fellow lounging at my elbow overheard them and grinned; a +hiccoughing, blear-eyed man he was as I had ever met, with a red nose +and the rags of a tattered cassock about him. I turned away in +annoyance, and chose the "Crown" at hazard; and pushing my way through +a knot of horses that stood tethered at the door, went in, leaving the +two to their devices.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I found a roaring fire in the great room, and three or four yeomen +standing about it, drinking ale. But I was hot from walking, so, after +saluting them and ordering my meal, I went and sat for choice on a +bench by the window away from the fire. The window was one of a kind +common in Warwickshire houses; long and low and beetle-browed, the +story above projecting over it. I sat here a minute looking idly out +at the inn opposite, a heavy stone building with a walled courtyard +attached to it; such an inn as was common enough about the time of the +Wars of the Roses when wayfarers looked rather for safety than +comfort. Presently I saw a boy come out of it and start up the road at +a run. Then, a minute later, the ragged fellow I had seen on the green +came out and lurched across the road. He seemed to be making, though +uncertainly, for my inn, and, sure enough, just as my bread and +bacon--the latter hot and hissing--were put before me, he staggered +into the room, bringing a strong smell of ale and onions with him. +"<i>Pax vobiscum!</i>" he said, leering at me with tipsy solemnity.</p> + +<p class="normal">I guessed what he was--a monk, one of those unfortunates still to be +found here and there up and down the country, whom King Henry, when he +put down the monasteries, had made homeless. I did not look on the +class with much favor, thinking that for most of them the cloister, +even if the Queen should succeed in setting the abbeys on their legs +again, would have few attractions. But I saw that the simple farmers +received his scrap of Latin with respect, and I nodded civilly as I +went on with my meal.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was not to get off so easily, however. He came and planted himself +opposite to me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"<i>Pax vobiscum</i>, my son," he repeated. "The ale is cheap here, and +good."</p> + +<p class="normal">"So is the ham, good father," I replied cheerfully, not pausing in my +attack on the victuals. "I will answer for so much."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, well," the knave replied with ready wit, "I breakfasted early. +I am content. Landlord, another plate and a full tankard. The young +gentleman would have me dine with him."</p> + +<p class="normal">I could not tell whether to be angry or to laugh at his impudence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The gentleman says he will answer for it!" repeated the rascal, with +a twinkle in his eye, as the landlord hesitated. He was by no means so +drunk as he looked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no, father," I cried, joining in the general laugh into which the +farmers by the fire broke. "A cup of ale is in reason, and for that I +will pay, but for no more. Drink it, and wish me Godspeed."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will do more than that, lad," he answered. Swaying to and fro +my cup, which he had seized in his grasp, he laid his hand on the +window-ledge beside me, as though to steady himself, and stooped until +his coarse, puffy face was but a few inches from mine. "More than +that," he whispered hoarsely; and his eyes, peering into mine, were +now sober and full of meaning. "If you do not want to be put in the +stocks or worse, make tracks! Make tracks, lad!" he continued. "Your +friend over there--he is a niggardly oaf--has sent for the hundredman +and the constable, and you are the quarry. So the word is, Go! That," +he added aloud, standing erect again, with a drunken smile, "is for +your cup of ale; and good coin too!"</p> + +<p class="normal">For half a minute I sat quite still; taken aback, and wondering, while +the bacon cooled on the plate before me, what I was to do. I did not +doubt the monk was telling the truth. Why should he lie to me? And I +cursed my folly in trusting to a coward's honor or a serving-man's +good faith. But lamentations were useless. What was I to do? I had no +horse, and no means of getting one. I was in a strange country, and to +try to escape on foot from pursuers who knew the roads, and had the +law on their side, would be a hopeless undertaking. Yet to be haled +back to Coton End a prisoner--I could not face that. Mechanically I +raised a morsel of bacon to my lips, and as I did so, a thought +occurred to me--an idea suggested by some talk I had heard the evening +before at Towcester.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fanciful as the plan was, I snatched at it; and knowing each instant +to be precious, took my courage in my hand--and my tankard. "Here," I +cried, speaking suddenly and loudly, "here is bad luck to purveyors, +Master Host!"</p> + +<p class="normal">There were a couple of stablemen within hearing, lounging in the +doorway, besides the landlord and his wife and the farmers. A villager +or two also had dropped in, and there were two peddlers lying half +asleep in the corner. All these pricked up their ears more or less at +my words. But, like most country folk, they were slow to take in +anything new or unexpected; and I had to drink afresh and say again, +"Here is bad luck to purveyors!" before any one took it up.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then the landlord showed he understood.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, so say I!" he cried, with an oath. "Purveyors, indeed! It is such +as they give the Queen a bad name."</p> + +<p class="normal">"God bless her!" quoth the monk loyally.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And drown the purveyors!" a farmer exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They were here a year ago, and left us as bare as a shorn sheep," +struck in a strapping villager, speaking at a white heat, but telling +me no news; for this was what I had heard at Towcester the night +before. "The Queen should lie warm if she uses all the wool they took! +And the pack-horses they purveyed to carry off the plunder--why, the +packmen avoid Stratford ever since as though we had the Black Death! +Oh, down with the purveyors, say I! The first that comes this way I +will show the bottom of the Ouse. Ay, that I will, though I hang for +it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Easy! easy, Tom Miller!" the host interposed, affecting an air of +assurance, even while he cast an eye of trouble at his flitches. "It +will be another ten years before they harry us again. There is +Potter's Pury! They never took a tester's worth from Potter's Pury! +No, nor from Preston Gobion! But they will go to them next, depend +upon it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I hope they will," I said, with a world of gloomy insinuation in my +words. "But I doubt it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">And this time my hint was not wasted. The landlord changed color. +"What are you driving at, master?" he asked mildly, while the others +looked at me in silence and waited for more.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What if there be one across the road now!" I said, giving way to the +temptation, and speaking falsely--for which I paid dearly afterward. +"A purveyor, I mean, unless I am mistaken in him, or he tells lies. He +has come straight from the Chancellor, white wand, warrant, and all. +He is taking his dinner now, but he has sent for the hundredman, so I +guess he means business."</p> + +<p class="normal">"For the hundredman?" repeated the landlord, his brows meeting.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; unless I am mistaken."</p> + +<p class="normal">There was silence for a moment. Then the man they called Tom Miller +dashed his cap on the floor and, folding his arms defiantly, looked +round on his neighbors. "He has come, has he!" he roared, his face +swollen, his eyes bloodshot. "Then I will be as good as my word! Who +will help? Shall we sit down and be shorn like sheep, as we were +before, so that our children lay on the bare stones, and we pulled the +plow ourselves? Or shall we show that we are free Englishmen, and not +slaves of Frenchmen? Shall we teach Master Purveyor not to trouble us +again? Now, what say you, neighbors?"</p> + +<p class="normal">So fierce a growl of impatience and anger rose round me as at once +answered the question. A dozen red faces glared at me and at one +another, and from the very motion and passion of the men as they +snarled and threatened, the room seemed twice as full as it was. Their +oaths and cries of encouragement, not loud, but the more dangerous for +that, the fresh burst of fury which rose as the village smith and +another came in and learned the news, the menacing gestures of a score +of brandished fists--these sights, though they told of the very effect +at which I had aimed, scared as well as pleased me. I turned red and +white, and hesitated, fearing that I had gone too far.</p> + +<p class="normal">The thing was done, however; and, what was more, I had soon to take +care of myself. At the very moment when the hubbub was at its loudest +I felt a chill run down my back as I met the monk's eye, and, reading +in it whimsical admiration, read in it something besides, and that was +an unmistakable menace. "Clever lad!" the eye said. "I will expose +you," it threatened.</p> + +<p class="normal">I had forgotten him--or, at any rate, that my acting would be +transparent enough to him holding the clew in his hand--and his look +was like the shock of cold water to me. But it is wonderful how keen +the wits grow on the grindstone of necessity. With scarcely a second's +hesitation I drew out my only piece of gold, and unnoticed by the +other men, who were busy swearing at and encouraging one another, I +disclosed a morsel of it. The monk's crafty eye glistened. I laid my +finger on my lips.</p> + +<p class="normal">He held up two fingers.</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head and showed an empty palm. I had no more. He nodded; +and the relief that nod gave me was great. Before I had time, however, +to consider the narrowness of my escape, a movement of the crowd--for +the news had spread with strange swiftness, and there was now a crowd +assembled which more than filled the room--proclaimed that the +purveyor had come out, and was in the street.</p> + +<p class="normal">The room was nearly emptied at a rush. Though I prudently remained +behind, I could, through the open window, hear as well as see what +passed. The leading spirits had naturally struggled out first, and +were gathered, sullen and full of dangerous possibilities, about the +porch.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I suppose the Bishop's messenger saw in them nothing but a crowd of +country clowns, for he came hectoring toward the door, smiting his +boot with his whip, and puffing out his red cheeks mightily. He felt +brave enough, now that he had dined and had at his back three stout +constables sworn to keep the Queen's peace.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Make way! Make way, there, do you hear?" he cried in a husky, pompous +voice. "Make way!" he repeated, lightly touching the nearest man with +his switch. "I am on the Queen's service, boobies, and must not be +hindered."</p> + +<p class="normal">The man swore at him, but did not budge, and the bully, brought up +thus sharply, awoke to the lowering faces and threatening looks which +confronted him. He changed color a little. But the ale was still in +him, and, forgetting his natural discretion, he thought to carry +matters with a high hand. "Come! come!" he exclaimed angrily. "I have +a warrant, and you resist me at your peril. I have to enter this +house. Clear the way, Master Hundredman, and break these fellows' +heads if they withstand you."</p> + +<p class="normal">A growl as of a dozen bulldogs answered him, and he drew back, as a +child might who has trodden on an adder. "You fools!" he spluttered, +glaring at them viciously. "Are you mad? Do you know what you are +doing? Do you see this?" He whipped out from some pocket a short white +staff and brandished it. "I come direct from the Lord Chancellor and +upon his business, do you hear, and if you resist me it is treason. +Treason, you dogs!" he cried, his rage getting the better of him, "and +like dogs you will hang for it. Master Hundredman, I order you to take +in your constables and arrest that man!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What man?" quoth Tom Miller, eying him fixedly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The stranger who came in an hour ago, and is inside the house."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Him, he means, who told about the purveyor across the road," +explained the monk with a wink.</p> + +<p class="normal">That wink sufficed. There was a roar of execration, and in the +twinkling of an eye the Jack-in-office, tripped up this way and shoved +that, was struggling helplessly in the grasp of half a dozen men, who +fought savagely for his body with the Hundredman and the constables.</p> + +<p class="normal">"To the river! To the Ouse with him!" yelled the mob. "In the Queen's +name!" shouted the officers. But these were to those as three to a +score, and taken by surprise besides, and doubtful of the rights of +the matter. Yet for an instant, as the crowd went reeling and fighting +down the road, they prevailed; the constables managed to drag their +leader free, and I caught a glimpse of him, wild-eyed and frantic with +fear, his clothes torn from his back, standing at bay like some +animal, and brandishing his staff in one hand, a packet of letters in +the other.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have letters, letters of state!" he screamed shrilly. "Let me +alone, I tell you! Let me go, you curs!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But in vain. The next instant the mob were upon him again. The packet +of letters went one way, the staff was dashed another. He was thrown +down and plucked up again, and hurried, bruised and struggling, toward +the river, his screams for mercy and furious threats rising shrilly +above the oaths and laughter.</p> + +<p class="normal">I felt myself growing pale as scream followed scream. "They will kill +him!" I exclaimed trembling, and prepared to follow. "I cannot see +this done."</p> + +<p class="normal">But the monk, who had returned to my side, grasped my arm. "Don't be a +fool," he said sharply. "I will answer for it they will not kill him. +Tom Miller is not a fool, though he is angry. He will duck him, and +let him go. But I will trouble you for that bit of gold, young +gentleman."</p> + +<p class="normal">I gave it to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now," he continued with a leer, "I will give you a hint in return. If +you are wise, you will be out of this county in twelve hours. Tethered +to the gate over there is a good horse which belongs to a certain +purveyor now in the river. Take it! There is no one to say you nay. +And begone!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked hard at him for a minute, my heart beating fast. This was +horse-stealing. And horse-stealing was a hanging matter. But I had +done so much already that I felt I might as well be hanged for a sheep +as for a lamb. I was not sure that I had not incited to treason, and +what was stealing a horse beside that? "I will do it!" I said +desperately.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Don't lose time, then," quoth my mentor.</p> + +<p class="normal">I went out then and there, and found he had told the truth. Every soul +in the place had gone to see the ducking, and the street was empty. +Kicked aside in the roadway lay the bundle of letters, soiled but not +torn, and in the gutter was the staff. I stooped and picked up one and +the other--in for a lamb, in for a sheep! and they might be useful +some day. Then I jumped into the saddle, and twitched the reins off +the hook.</p> + +<p class="normal">But before I could drive in the spurs, a hand fell on the bridle, and +the monk's face appeared at my knee. "Well?" I said, glaring down at +him--I was burning to be away.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is a good cloak you have got there," he muttered hurriedly. +"There, strapped to the saddle, you fool. You do not want that, give +it me. Do you hear? Quick, give it me," he cried, raising his voice +and clutching at it fiercely, his face dark with greed and fear.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I see," I replied, as I unstrapped it. "I am to steal the horse that +you may get the cloak. And then you will lay the lot on my shoulders. +Well, take it!" I cried, "and go your way as fast as you can."</p> + +<p class="normal">Throwing it at him as hard as I could, I shook up the reins and went +off down the road at a gallop. The wind whistled pleasantly past my +ears. The sounds of the town grew faint and distant. Each bound of the +good hack carried me farther and farther from present danger, farther +and farther from the old life. In the exhilaration and excitement of +the moment I forgot my condition; forgot that I had not a penny-piece +in my pocket, and that I had left an unpaid bill behind me; forgot +even that I rode a--well, a borrowed horse.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IV.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_04" href="#div1Ref_04">TWO SISTERS OF MERCY.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">A younger generation has often posed me finely by asking, "What, Sir +Francis! Did you not see <i>one</i> bishop burned? Did you not know <i>one</i> +of the martyrs? Did you <i>never</i> come face to face with Queen Mary?" To +all which questions I have one answer, No, and I watch small eyes grow +large with astonishment. But the truth is, a man can only be at one +place at a time. And though, in this very month of February, 1555, +Prebendary Rogers--a good, kindly man, as I have heard, who had a wife +and nine children--was burned in Smithfield in London for religion, +and the Bishop of Gloucester suffered in his own city, and other +inoffensive men were burned to death, and there was much talk of these +things, and in thousands of breasts a smoldering fire was kindled +which blazed high enough by and by--why, I was at Coton End, or on the +London Road, at the time, and learned such things only dimly and by +hearsay.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the rill joins the river at last; and ofttimes suddenly and at a +bound, as it were. On this very day, while I cantered easily southward +with my face set toward St. Albans, Providence was at work shaping a +niche for me in the lives of certain people who were at the time as +unconscious of my existence as I was of theirs. In a great house in +the Barbican in London there was much stealthy going and coming on +this February afternoon and evening. Behind locked doors, and in fear +and trembling, mails were being packed and bags strapped, and fingers +almost too delicate for the task were busy with nails and hammers, +securing this and closing that. The packers knew nothing of me, nor I +of them. Yet but for me all that packing would have been of no avail; +and but for them my fate might have been very different. Still, the +sound of the hammer did not reach my ears, or, doing so, was covered +by the steady tramp of the roadster; and no vision, so far as I ever +heard, of a dusty youth riding Londonward came between the secret +workers and their task.</p> + +<p class="normal">I had made up my mind to sleep at St. Albans that night, and for this +reason, and for others relating to the Sheriff of Buckinghamshire, in +which county Stony Stratford lies, I pushed on briskly. I presently +found time, however, to examine the packet of letters of which I had +made spoil. On the outer wrapper I found there was no address, only an +exhortation to be speedy. Off this came, therefore, without ceremony, +and was left in the dirt. Inside I found two sealed epistles, each +countersigned on the wrapper, "Stephen Winton."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ho! ho!" said I. "I did well to take them."</p> + +<p class="normal">Over the signature on the first letter--it seemed to be written on +parchment--were the words, "Haste! haste! haste!" This was the thicker +and heavier of the two, and was addressed to Sir Maurice Berkeley, at +St. Mary Overy's, Southwark, London. I turned it over and over in my +hands, and peeped into it, hesitating. Twice I muttered, "All is fair +in love and war!" And at last, with curiosity fully awake, and a +glance behind me to make sure that the act was unobserved, I broke the +seal. The document proved to be as short and pithy as it was +startling. It was an order commanding Sir Maurice Berkeley forthwith +in the Queen's name, and by the authority of the Council, and so on, +and so on, to arrest Katherine Willoughby de Eresby, Duchess of +Suffolk, and to deliver her into the custody of the Lieutenant of the +Tower, "These presents to be his waranty for the detention of the said +Duchess of Suffolk until her Grace's pleasure in the matter be known."</p> + +<p class="normal">When it was too late I trembled to think what I had done. To meddle +with matters of state might be more dangerous a hundred times than +stealing horses, or even than ducking the Chancellor's messenger! +Seeing at this moment a party of travelers approach, I crammed the +letter into my pocket, and rode by them with a red face, and a tongue +that stuttered so feebly that I could scarcely return their greetings. +When they had gone by I pulled out the warrant again, having it in my +mind to tear it up without a moment's delay--to tear it into the +smallest morsels, and so get rid of a thing most dangerous. But the +great red seal dangling at the foot of the parchment caught my eye, +and I paused to think. It was so red, so large, so imposing, it seemed +a pity to destroy it. It must surely be good for something. I folded +up the warrant again, and put it away in my safest pocket. Yes, it +might be good for something.</p> + +<p class="normal">I took out the other letter. It was bound with green ribbon and sealed +with extreme care, being directed simply to Mistress Clarence--there +was no address. But over Gardiner's signature on the wrapper were the +words, "These, on your peril, very privately."</p> + +<p class="normal">I turned it over and over, and said the same thing about love and war, +and even repeated to myself my old proverb about a sheep and a lamb. +But somehow I could not do it. The letter was a woman's letter; the +secret, her secret; and though my fingers itched as they hovered about +the seals, my cheek tingled too. So at last, with a muttered, "What +would Petronilla say?" I put it away unopened in the pocket where the +warrant lay. The odds were immense that Mistress Clarence would never +get it; but at least her secret should remain hers, my honor mine!</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It was dark when I rode, thoroughly jaded, into St. Albans. I was +splashed with mud up to the waist and wetted by a shower, and looked, +I have no doubt, from the effect of my journeying on foot and +horseback, as disreputable a fellow as might be. The consciousness too +that I was without a penny, and the fear lest, careful as I had been +to let no one outsrip me, the news of the riot at Stratford might have +arrived, did not tend to give me assurance. I poked my head timidly +into the great room, hoping that I might have it to myself. To my +disgust it was full of people. Half-a-dozen travelers and as many +townsfolk were sitting round the fire, talking briskly over their +evening draught. Yet I had no choice. I was hungry, and the thing had +to be done, and I swaggered in, something of the sneak, no doubt, +peeping through my bravado. I remarked, as I took my seat by the fire +and set to drying myself, that I was greeted by a momentary silence, +and that two or three of the company began to eye me suspiciously.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was one man, who sat on the settle in the warmest corner of the +chimney, who seemed in particular to resent my damp neighborhood. His +companions treated him with so much reverence, and he snubbed them so +regularly, that I wondered who he was; and presently, listening to the +conversation which went on round me, I had my curiosity satisfied. He +was no less a personage than the Bailiff of St. Albans, and his manner +befitted such a man; for it seemed to indicate that he thought himself +heir to all the powers of the old Abbots under whose broad thumb his +father and grandfather had groaned.</p> + +<p class="normal">My conscience pricking me, I felt some misgiving when I saw him, after +staring at me and whispering to two or three of his neighbors, beckon +the landlord aside. His big round face and burly figure gave him a +general likeness to bluff King Hal and he appeared to be aware of this +himself, and to be inclined to ape the stout king's ways, which, I +have heard my uncle say, were ever ways heavy for others' toes. For a +while, however, seeing my supper come in, I forgot him. The bare-armed +girl who brought it to me, and in whom my draggled condition seemed to +provoke feelings of a different nature, lugged up a round table to the +fire. On this she laid my meal, not scrupling to set aside some of the +snug dry townsfolk. Then she set a chair for me well in the blaze, and +folding her arms in her apron stood to watch me fall to. I did so with +a will, and with each mouthful of beef and draught of ale, spirit and +strength came back to me. The cits round me might sneer and shake +their heads, and the travelers smile at my appetite. In five minutes I +cared not a whit! I could give them back joke for joke, and laugh with +the best of them.</p> + +<p class="normal">Indeed, I had clean forgotten the Bailiff, when he stalked back to his +place. But the moment our eyes met, I guessed there was trouble afoot. +The landlord came with him and stood looking at me, sending off the +wench with a flea in her ear; and I felt under his eye an +uncomfortable consciousness that my purse was empty. Two or three late +arrivals, to whom I suppose Master Bailiff had confided his +suspicions, took their stand also in a half-circle and scanned me +queerly. Altogether it struck me suddenly that I was in a tight place, +and had need of my wits.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ahem!" said the Bailiff abruptly, taking skillful advantage of a lull +in the talk. "Where from last, young man?" He spoke in a deep choky +voice, and, if I was not mistaken, he winked one of his small eyes in +the direction of his friends, as though to say, "Now see me pose him!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But I only put another morsel in my mouth. For a moment indeed the +temptation to reply "Towcester," seeing that such a journey over a +middling road was something to brag of before the Highway Law came in, +almost overcame me. But in time I bethought me of Stephen Gardiner's +maxim, "Be slow to speak!" and I put another morsel in my mouth.</p> + +<p class="normal">The Bailiff's face grew red, or rather, redder. "Come, young man, did +you hear me speak?" he said pompously. "Where from last?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"From the road, sir," I replied, turning to him as if I had not heard +him before. "And a very wet road it was."</p> + +<p class="normal">A man who sat next me chuckled, being apparently a stranger like +myself. But the Bailiff puffed himself into a still more striking +likeness to King Henry, and including him in his scowl shouted at me, +"Sirrah! don't bandy words with me! Which way did you come along the +road, I asked."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was on the tip of my tongue to answer saucily, "The right way!" But +I reflected that I might be stopped; and to be stopped might mean to +be hanged at worst, and something very unpleasant at best. So I +controlled myself, and answered--though the man's arrogance was +provoking enough--"I have come from Stratford, and I am going to +London. Now you know as much as I do."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do I?" he said, with a sneer and a wink at the landlord.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I think so," I answered patiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I don't!" he retorted, in vulgar triumph. "I don't. It is my +opinion that you have come from London."</p> + +<p class="normal">I went on with my supper.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you hear?" he asked pompously, sticking his arms akimbo and +looking round for sympathy. "You will have to give an account of +yourself, young man. We will have no penniless rogues and sturdy +vagabonds wandering about St. Albans."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Penniless rogues do not go a-horseback," I answered. But it was +wonderful how my spirits sank again under that word "penniless." It +hit me hard.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Wait a bit," he said, raising his finger to command attention for his +next question. "What is your religion, young man?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh!" I replied, putting down my knife and looking open scorn at him, +"you are an inquisitor, are you?" At which words of mine there was a +kind of stir. "You would burn me as I hear they burned Master Sandars +at Coventry last week, would you? They were talking about it down the +road."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will come to a bad end, young man!" he retorted viciously, his +outstretched finger shaking as if the palsy had seized him. For this +time my taunt had gone home, and more than one of the listeners +standing on the outer edge of the group, and so beyond his ken, had +muttered "shame." More than one face had grown dark. "You will come to +a bad end!" he repeated. "If it be not here, then somewhere else! It +is my opinion that you have come from London, and that you have been +in trouble. There is a hue-and-cry out for a young fellow just your +age, and a cock of your hackle, I judge, who is wanted for heresy. A +Londoner too. You do not leave here until you have given an account of +yourself, Master Jack-a-Dandy!" The party had all risen round me, and +some of the hindmost had got on benches to see me the better. Among +these, between two bacon flitches, I caught a glimpse of the +serving-maid's face as she peered at me, pale and scared, and a queer +impulse led me to nod to her--a reassuring little nod. I found myself +growing cool and confident, seeing myself so cornered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Easy! easy!" I said, "let a man finish his supper and get warmed in +peace."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Bishop Bonner will warm you!" cried the Bailiff.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I dare say--as they warm people in Spain!" I sneered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He will be Bishop Burner to you!" shrieked the Bailiff, almost beside +himself with rage at being so bearded by a lad.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Take care!" I retorted. "Do not you speak evil of dignitaries, or you +will be getting into trouble!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He fairly writhed under this rejoinder.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Landlord!" he spluttered. "I shall hold you responsible! If this +person leaves your house, and is not forthcoming when wanted, you will +suffer for it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The landlord scratched his head, being a good-natured fellow; but a +bailiff is a bailiff, especially at St. Albans. And I was muddy and +travel-stained, and quick of my tongue for one so young; which the +middle-aged never like, though the old bear it better. He hesitated.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do not be a fool, Master Host!" I said. "I have something +here----" and I touched my pocket, which happened to be near my +sword-hilt--"that will make you rue it if you interfere with me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ho! ho!" cried the Bailiff, in haste and triumph. "So that is his +tone! We have a tavern-brawler here, have we! A young swashbuckler! +His tongue will not run so fast when he finds his feet in the stocks. +Master landlord, call the watch! Call the watch at once, I command +you!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will do so at your peril!" I said sternly. Then, seeing that my +manner had some effect upon all save the angry official, I gave way to +the temptation to drive the matter home and secure my safety by the +only means that seemed possible. It is an old story that one deception +leads inevitably to another. I solemnly drew out the white staff I had +taken from the apparitor. "Look here!" I continued, waving it. "Do you +see this, you booby? I am traveling in the Queen's name, and on her +service. By special commission, too, from the Chancellor! Is that +plain speaking enough for you? And let me tell you, Master Bailiff," I +added, fixing my eye upon him, "that my business is private, and that +my Lord of Winchester will not be best pleased when he hears how I +have had to declare myself. Do you think the Queen's servants go +always in cloth of gold, you fool? The stocks indeed!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I laughed out loudly and without effort, for there never was anything +so absurd as the change in the Bailiff's visage. His color fled, his +cheeks grew pendulous, his lip hung loose. He stared at me, gasping +like a fish out of water, and seemed unable to move toe or finger. The +rest enjoyed the scene, as people will enjoy a marvelous sudden stroke +of fortune. It was as good as a stage pageant to them. They could not +take their eyes from the pocket in which I had replaced my wand, and +continued, long after I had returned to my meal, to gaze at me in +respectful silence. The crestfallen Bailiff presently slipped out, and +I was left cock of the walk, and for the rest of the evening enjoyed +the fruits of victory.</p> + +<p class="normal">They proved to be more substantial than I had expected, for, as I was +on my way upstairs to bed, the landlord preceding me with a light, a +man accosted me, and beckoned me aside mysteriously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The Bailiff is very much annoyed," he said, speaking in a muffled +voice behind his hand, while his eyes peered into mine.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, what is that to me?" I replied, looking sternly at him. I was +tired and sleepy after my meal. "He should not make such a fool of +himself."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tut, tut, tut, tut! You misunderstood me, young sir," the man +answered, plucking my sleeve as I turned away. "He regrets the +annoyance he has caused you. A mistake, he says, a pure mistake, and +he hopes you will have forgotten it by morning." Then, with a skillful +hand, which seemed not unused to the task, he slid two coins into my +palm. I looked at them, for a moment not perceiving his drift. Then I +found they were two gold angels, and I began to understand. "Ahem!" I +said, fingering them uneasily. "Yes. Well, well, I will look over it, +I will look over it! Tell him from me," I continued, gaining +confidence as I proceeded with my new rôle, "that he shall hear no +more about it. He is zealous--perhaps over zealous!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is it!" muttered the envoy eagerly; "that is it, my dear sir! +You see perfectly how it is. He is zealous. Zealous in the Queen's +service!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"To be sure; and so I will report him. Tell him that so I will report +him. And here, my good friend, take one of these for yourself," I +added, magnificently giving him back half my fortune--young donkey +that I was. "Drink to the Queen's health; and so good-night to you."</p> + +<p class="normal">He went away, bowing to the very ground, and, when the landlord +likewise had left me, I was very merry over this, being in no mood for +weighing words. The world seemed--to be sure, the ale was humming in +my head, and I was in the landlord's best room--easy enough to +conquer, provided one possessed a white staff. The fact that I had no +right to mine only added--be it remembered I was young and foolish--to +my enjoyment of its power. I went to bed in all comfort with it under +my pillow, and slept soundly, untroubled by any dream of a mischance. +But when did a lie ever help a man in the end?</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">When I awoke, which I seemed to do on a sudden, it was still dark. I +wondered for a moment where I was, and what was the meaning of the +shouting and knocking I heard. Then, discerning the faint outline of +the window, I remembered the place in which I had gone to bed, and I +sat up and listened. Some one--nay, several people--were drumming and +kicking against the wooden doors of the inn-yard, and shouting +besides, loud enough to raise the dead. In the next room to mine I +caught the grumbling voices of persons disturbed, like myself, from +sleep. And by and by a window was opened, and I heard the landlord ask +what was the matter.</p> + +<p class="normal">"In the Queen's name!" came the loud, impatient answer, given in a +voice that rose above the ring of bridles and the stamping of iron +hoofs, "open! and that quickly, Master Host. The watch are here, and +we must search."</p> + +<p class="normal">I waited to hear no more. I was out of bed, and huddling on my +clothes, and thrusting my feet into my boots, like one possessed. My +heart was beating as fast as if I had been running in a race, and my +hands were shaking with the shock of the alarm. The impatient voice +without was Master Pritchard's, and it rang with all the vengeful +passion which I should have expected that gentleman, duped, ducked, +and robbed, to be feeling. There would be little mercy to be had at +his hands. Moreover, my ears, grown as keen for the moment as the +hunted hare's, distinguished the tramping of at least half-a-dozen +horses, so that it was clear that he had come with a force at his +back. Resistance would be useless. My sole chance lay in flight--if +flight should still be possible.</p> + +<p class="normal">Even in my haste I did not forsake the talisman which had served me so +well, but stayed an instant to thrust it into my pocket. The Cluddes +have, I fancy, a knack of keeping cool in emergencies, getting, +indeed, the cooler the greater the stress.</p> + +<p class="normal">By this time the inn was thoroughly aroused. Doors were opening and +shutting on all sides of me, and questions were being shouted in +different tones from room to room. In the midst of the hubbub I heard +the landlord come out muttering, and go downstairs to open the door. +Instantly I unlatched mine, slipped through it stealthily, sneaked a +step or two down the passage, and then came plump in the dark against +some one who was moving as softly as myself. The surprise was +complete, and I should have cried out at the unexpected collision, had +not the unknown laid a cold hand on my mouth, and gently pushed me +back into my room.</p> + +<p class="normal">Here there was now a faint glimmer of dawn, and by this I saw that my +companion was the serving-maid. "Hist!" she said, speaking under her +breath, "Is it you they want?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I nodded.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought so," she muttered. "Then you must get out through your +window. You cannot pass them. They are a dozen or more, and armed. +Quick! knot this about the bars. It is no great depth to the bottom, +and the ground is soft from the rain."</p> + +<p class="normal">She tore, as she spoke, the coverlet from the bed, and, twisting it +into a kind of rope, helped me to secure one corner of it about the +window-bar. "When you are down," she whispered, "keep along the wall +to the right until you come to a haystack. Turn to the left there--you +will have to ford the water--and you will soon be clear of the town. +Look about you then, and you will see a horse-track, which leads to +Elstree, running in a line with the London Road, but a mile from it +and through woods. At Elstree any path to the left will take you to +Barnet, and not two miles lost."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Heaven bless you!" I said, turning from the gloom, the dark sky, and +driving scud without to peer gratefully at her. "Heaven bless you for +a good woman!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And God keep you for a bonny boy," she whispered.</p> + +<p class="normal">I kissed her, forcing into her hands--a thing the remembrance of which +is very pleasant to me to this day--my last piece of gold.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">A moment more, and I stood unhurt, but almost up to my knees in mud, +in an alley bounded on both sides, as far as I could see, by blind +walls. Stopping only to indicate by a low whistle that I was safe, I +turned and sped away as fast as I could run in the direction which she +had pointed out. There was no one abroad, and in a shorter time than I +had expected I found myself outside the town, traveling over a kind of +moorland tract bounded in the distance by woods.</p> + +<p class="normal">Here I picked up the horse-track easily enough, and without stopping, +save for a short breathing space, hurried along it, to gain the +shelter of the trees. So far so good! I had reason to be thankful. But +my case was still an indifferent one. More than once in getting out of +the town I had slipped and fallen. I was wet through, and plastered +with dirt owing to these mishaps; and my clothes were in a woeful +plight. For a time excitement kept me up, however, and I made good +way, warmed by the thought that I had again baffled the great Bishop. +It was only when the day had come, and grown on to noon, and I saw no +sign of any pursuers, that thought got the upper hand. Then I began to +compare, with some bitterness of feeling, my present condition--wet, +dirty, and homeless--with that which I had enjoyed only a week before; +and it needed all my courage to support me. Skulking, half famished, +between Barnet and Tottenham, often compelled to crouch in ditches or +behind walls while travelers went by, and liable each instant to have +to leave the highway and take to my heels, I had leisure to feel; and +I did feel, more keenly, I think, that afternoon than at any later +time, the bitterness of fortune. I cursed Stephen Gardiner a dozen +times, and dared not let my thoughts wander to my father. I had said +that I would build my house afresh. Well, truly I was building it from +the foundation.</p> + +<p class="normal">It added very much to my misery that it rained all day a cold, +half-frozen rain. The whole afternoon I spent in hiding, shivering and +shaking in a hole under a ledge near Tottenham; being afraid to go +into London before nightfall, lest I should be waited for at the gate +and be captured. Chilled and bedraggled as I was, and weak through +want of food which I dared not go out to beg, the terrors of capture +got hold of my mind and presented to me one by one every horrible form +of humiliation, the stocks, the pillory, the cart-tail; so that even +Master Pritchard, could he have seen me and known my mind, might have +pitied me; so that I loathe to this day the hours I spent in that foul +hiding-place. Between a man's best and worse, there is little but a +platter of food.</p> + +<p class="normal">The way this was put an end to, I well remember. An old woman came +into the field where I lay hid, to drive home a cow. I had had my eyes +on this cow for at least an hour, having made up my mind to milk it +for my own benefit as soon as the dusk fell. In my disappointment at +seeing it driven off, and also out of a desire to learn whether the +old dame might not be going to milk it in a corner of the pasture, in +which case I might still get an after taste, I crawled so far out of +my hole that, turning suddenly, she caught sight of me. I expected to +see her hurry off, but she did not. She took a long look, and then +came back toward me, making, however, as it seemed to me, as if she +did not see me. When she had come within a few feet of me, she looked +down abruptly, and our eyes met. What she saw in mine I can only +guess. In hers I read a divine pity. "Oh, poor lad!" she murmured; +"oh, you poor, poor lad!" and there were tears in her voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was so weak--it was almost twenty-four hours since I had tasted +food, and I had come twenty-four miles in the time--that at that I +broke down, and cried like a child.</p> + +<p class="normal">I learned later that the old woman took me for just the same person +for whom the Bailiff at St. Albans had mistaken me, a young apprentice +named Hunter, who had got into trouble about religion, and was at this +time hiding up and down the country; Bishop Bonner having clapped his +father into jail until the son should come to hand. But her kind heart +knew no distinction of creeds. She took me to her cottage as soon as +night fell, and warmed, and dried, and fed me. She did not dare to +keep me under her roof for longer than an hour or two, neither would I +have stayed to endanger her. But she sent me out a new man, with a +crust, moreover, in my pocket. A hundred times between Tottenham and +Aldersgate I said "God bless her!" And I say so now.</p> + +<p class="normal">So twice in one day, and that the gloomiest day of my life, I was +succored by a woman. I have never forgotten it. I have tried to keep +it always in mind; remembering too a saying of my uncle's, that "there +is nothing on earth so merciful as a good woman, or so pitiless as a +bad one!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER V.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_05" href="#div1Ref_05">MISTRESS BERTRAM.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"Ding! ding! ding! Aid ye the poor! Pray for the dead! Five o'clock and +a murky morning."</p> + +<p class="normal">The noise of the bell, and the cry which accompanied it, roused me +from my first sleep in London, and that with a vengeance; the bell +being rung and the words uttered within three feet of my head. Where +did I sleep, then? Well, I had found a cozy resting-place behind some +boards which stood propped against the wall of a baker's oven in a +street near Moorgate. The wall was warm and smelt of new bread, and +another besides myself had discovered its advantages. This was the +watchman, who had slumbered away most of his vigil cheek by jowl with +me, but, morning approaching, had roused himself, and before he was +well out of his bed, certainly before he had left his bedroom, had +begun--the ungrateful wretch--to prove his watchfulness by disturbing +every one else.</p> + +<p class="normal">I sat up and rubbed my eyes, grinding my shoulders well against the +wall for warmth. I had no need to turn out yet, but I began to think, +and the more I thought the harder I stared at the planks six inches +before my nose. My thoughts turned upon a very knotty point; one that +I had never seriously considered before. What was I going to do next? +How was I going to live or to rear the new house of which I have made +mention? Hitherto I had aimed simply at reaching London. London had +paraded itself before my mind--though my mind should have known +better--not as a town of cold streets and dreary alleys and shops open +from seven to four with perhaps here and there a vacant place for an +apprentice; but as a gilded city of adventure and romance, in which a +young man of enterprise, whether he wanted to go abroad or to rise at +home, might be sure of finding his sword weighed, priced, and bought +up on the instant, and himself valued at his own standard.</p> + +<p class="normal">But London reached, the hoarding in Moorgate reached, and five o'clock +in the morning reached, somehow these visions faded rapidly. In the +cold reality left to me I felt myself astray. If I would stay at home, +who was going to employ me? To whom should I apply? What patron had I? +Or if I would go abroad, how was I to set about it? how find a vessel, +seeing that I might expect to be arrested the moment I showed my face +in daylight?</p> + +<p class="normal">Here all my experience failed me. I did not know what to do, though +the time had come for action, and I must do or starve. It had been all +very well when I was at Coton, to propose that I would go up to +London, and get across the water--such had been my dim notion--to the +Courtenays and Killigrews, who, with other refugees, Protestants for +the most part, were lying on the French coast, waiting for better +times. But now that I was in London, and as good as an outlaw myself, +I saw no means of going to them. I seemed farther from my goal than I +had been in Warwickshire.</p> + +<p class="normal">Thinking very blankly over this I began to munch the piece of bread +which I owed to the old dame at Tottenham; and had solemnly got +through half of it, when the sound of rapid footsteps--the footsteps +of women, I judged from the lightness of the tread--caused me to hold +my hand and listen. Whoever they were--and I wondered, for it was +still early, and I had heard no one pass since the watchman left +me--they came to a stand in front of my shelter, and one of them +spoke. Her words made me start; unmistakably the voice was a +gentlewoman's, such as I had not heard for almost a week. And at this +place and hour, on the raw borderland of day and night, a gentlewoman +was the last person I expected to light upon. Yet if the speaker were +not some one of station, Petronilla's lessons had been thrown away +upon me.</p> + +<p class="normal">The words were uttered in a low voice; but the planks in front of me +were thin, and the speaker was actually leaning against them. I caught +every accent of what seemed to be the answer to a question. "Yes, yes! +It is all right!" she said, a covert ring of impatience in her tone. +"Take breath a moment. I do not see him now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank Heaven!" muttered another voice. As I had fancied, there were +two persons. The latter speaker's tone smacked equally of breeding +with the former's, but was rounder and fuller, and more masterful; and +she appeared to be out of breath. "Then perhaps we have thrown him off +the trail," she continued, after a short pause, in which she seemed to +have somewhat recovered herself. "I distrusted him from the first, +Anne--from the first. Yet, do you know, I never feared him as I did +Master Clarence; and as it was too much to hope that we should be rid +of both at once--they took good care of that--why, the attempt had to +be made while he was at home. But I always felt he was a spy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who? Master Clarence?" asked she who had spoken first.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, he certainly. But I did not mean him, I meant Philip."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I--I said at first, you remember, that it was a foolhardy +enterprise, mistress!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Tut, tut, girl!" quoth the other tartly--this time the impatience lay +with her, and she took no pains to conceal it--"we are not beaten yet. +Come, look about! Cannot you remember where we are, nor which way the +river should be? If the dawn were come, we could tell."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But with the dawn----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"The streets would fill. True, and, Master Philip giving the alarm, we +should be detected before we had gone far. The more need, girl, to +lose no time. I have my breath again, and the child is asleep. Let us +venture one way or the other, and Heaven grant it be the right one!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let me see," the younger woman answered slowly, as if in doubt. "Did +we come by the church? No; we came the other way. Let us try this +turning, then."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why, child, we came that way," was the decided answer. "What are you +thinking of? That would take us straight back into his arms, the +wretch! Come, come! you loiter," continued this, the more masculine +speaker, "and a minute may make all the difference between a prison +and freedom. If we can reach the Lion Wharf by seven--it is like to be +a dark morning and foggy--we may still escape before Master Philip +brings the watch upon us."</p> + +<p class="normal">They moved briskly away as she spoke, and her words were already +growing indistinct from distance, while I remained still, idly seeking +the clew to their talk and muttering over and over again the name +Clarence, which seemed familiar to me, when a cry of alarm, in which I +recognized one of their voices, cut short my reverie. I crawled with +all speed from my shelter, and stood up, being still in a line with +the boards, and not easily distinguishable. As she had said, it was a +dark morning; but the roofs of the houses--now high, now low--could be +plainly discerned against a gray, drifting sky wherein the first signs +of dawn were visible; and the blank outlines of the streets, which met +at this point, could be seen. Six or seven yards from me, in the +middle of the roadway, stood three dusky figures, of whom I judged the +nearer, from their attitudes, to be the two women. The farthest seemed +to be a man.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was astonished to see that he was standing cap in hand; nay, I was +disgusted as well, for I had crept out hot-fisted, expecting to be +called upon to defend the women. But, despite the cry I had heard, +they were talking to him quietly enough, as far as I could hear. And +in a minute or so I saw the taller woman give him something.</p> + +<p class="normal">He took it with a low bow, and appeared almost to sweep the dirt with +his bonnet. She waved her hand in dismissal, and he stood back still +uncovered. And--hey, presto! the women tripped swiftly away.</p> + +<p class="normal">By this time my curiosity was intensely excited, but for a moment I +thought it was doomed to disappointment. I thought that it was all +over. It was not, by any means. The man stood looking after them until +they reached the corner, and the moment they had passed it, he +followed. His stealthy manner of going, and his fashion of peering +after them, was enough for me. I guessed at once that he was dogging +them, following them unknown to them and against their will; and with +considerable elation I started after him, using the same precautions. +What was sauce for the geese was sauce for the gander! So we went, +two--one--one, slipping after one another through half a dozen dark +streets, tending generally southward.</p> + +<p class="normal">Following him in this way I seldom caught a glimpse of the women. The +man kept at a considerable distance behind them, and I had my +attention fixed on him. But once or twice, when, turning a corner, I +all but trod on his heels, I saw them; and presently an odd point +about them struck me. There was a white kerchief or something attached +apparently to the back of the one's cloak, which considerably assisted +my stealthy friend to keep them in view. It puzzled me. Was it a +signal to him? Was he really all the time acting in concert with them; +and was I throwing away my pains? Or was the white object which so +betrayed them merely the result of carelessness, and the lack of +foresight of women grappling with a condition of things to which they +were unaccustomed? Of course I could not decide this, the more as, at +that distance, I failed to distinguish what the white something was, +or even which of the two wore it.</p> + +<p class="normal">Presently I got a clew to our position, for we crossed Cheapside close +to Paul's Cross, which my childish memories of the town enabled me to +recognize, even by that light. Here my friend looked up and down, and +hung a minute on his heel before he followed the women, as if +expecting or looking for some one. It might be that he was trying to +make certain that the watch were not in sight. They were not, at any +rate. Probably they had gone home to bed, for the morning was growing. +And, after a momentary hesitation, he plunged into the narrow street +down which the women had flitted.</p> + +<p class="normal">He had only gone a few yards when I heard him cry out. The next +instant, almost running against him myself, I saw what had happened. +The women had craftily lain in wait for him in the little court into +which the street ran and had caught him as neatly as could be. When I +came upon them the taller woman was standing at bay with a passion +that was almost fury in her pose and gesture. Her face, from which the +hood of a coarse cloak had fallen back, was pale with anger; her gray +eyes flashed, her teeth glimmered. Seeing her thus, and seeing the +burden she carried under her cloak--which instinct told me was her +child--I thought of a tigress brought to bay.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You lying knave!" she hissed. "You Judas!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The man recoiled a couple of paces, and in recoiling nearly touched +me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What would you?" she continued. "What do you want? What would you do? +You have been paid to go. Go, and leave us!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I dare not," he muttered, keeping away from her as if he dreaded a +blow. She looked a woman who could deal a blow, a woman who could both +love and hate fiercely and openly--as proud and frank and haughty a +lady as I had ever seen in my life. "I dare not," he muttered +sullenly; "I have my orders."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh!" she cried, with scorn. "You have your orders, have you! The +murder is out. But from whom, sirrah? Whose orders are to supersede +mine? I would King Harry were alive, and I would have you whipped to +Tyburn. Speak, rogue; who bade you follow me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">She looked about her wildly, passionately, and I saw that she was at +her wits' end what to do, or how to escape him. But she was a woman. +When she next spoke there was a marvelous change in her. Her face had +grown soft, her voice low. "Philip," she said gently, "the purse was +light. I will give you more. I will give you treble the amount within +a few weeks, and I will thank you on my knees, and my husband shall be +such a friend to you as you have never dreamed of, if you will only go +home and be silent. Only that--or, better still, walk the streets an +hour, and then report that you lost sight of us. Think, man, think!" +she cried with energy--"the times may change. A little more, and Wyatt +had been master of London last year. Now the people are fuller of +discontent than ever, and these burnings and torturings, these +Spaniards in the streets--England will not endure them long. The times +will change. Let us go, and you will have a friend--when most you need +one."</p> + +<p class="normal">He shook his head sullenly. "I dare not do it," he said. And somehow I +got the idea that he was telling the truth, and that it was not the +man's stubborn nature only that withstood the bribe and the plea. He +spoke as if he were repeating a lesson and the master were present.</p> + +<p class="normal">When she saw that she could not move him, the anger, which I think +came more naturally to her, broke out afresh. "You will not, you +hound!" she cried. "Will neither threats nor promises move you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Neither," he answered doggedly; "I have my orders."</p> + +<p class="normal">So far, I had remained a quiet listener, standing in the mouth of the +lane which opened upon the court where they were. The women had taken +no notice of me; either because they did not see me, or because, +seeing me, they thought that I was a hanger-on of the man before them. +And he, having his back to me, and his eyes on them, could not see me. +It was a surprise to him--a very great surprise, I think--when I took +three steps forward, and gripped him by the scruff of his neck.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have your orders, have you?" I muttered in his ear, as I shook +him to and fro, while the taller woman started back and the younger +uttered a cry of alarm at my sudden appearance. "Well, you will not +obey them. Do you hear? Your employer may go hang! You will do just +what these ladies please to ask of you."</p> + +<p class="normal">He struggled an instant; but he was an undersized man, and he could +not loosen the hold which I had secured at my leisure. Then I noticed +his hand going to his girdle in a suspicious way. "Stop that!" I said, +flashing before his eyes a short, broad blade, which had cut many a +deer's throat in Old Arden Forest. "You had better keep quiet, or it +will be the worse for you! Now, mistress," I continued, "you can +dispose of this little man as you please."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who are you?" she said, after a pause; during which she had stared at +me in open astonishment. No doubt I was a wild-looking figure.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A friend," I replied. "Or one who would be such. I saw this fellow +follow you, and I followed him. For the last five minutes I have been +listening to your talk. He was not amenable to reason then, but I +think he will be now. What shall I do with him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">She smiled faintly, but did not answer at once, the coolness and +resolution with which she had faced him before failing her now, +possibly in sheer astonishment, or because my appearance at her side, +by removing the strain, sapped the strength. "I do not know," she said +at length, in a vague, puzzled tone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," I answered, "you are going to the Lion Wharf, and----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, you fool!" she screamed out loud. "Oh, you fool!" she repeated +bitterly. "Now you have told him all."</p> + +<p class="normal">I stood confounded. My cheeks burned with shame, and her look of +contempt cut me like a knife. That the reproach was deserved I knew at +once, for the man in my grasp gave a start, which proved that the +information was not lost upon him. "Who told you?" the woman went on, +clutching the child jealously to her breast, as though she saw herself +menaced afresh. "Who told you about the Lion Wharf?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Never mind," I answered gloomily. "I have made a mistake, but it is +easy to remedy it." And I took out my knife again. "Do you go on and +leave us."</p> + +<p class="normal">I hardly know whether I meant my threat or no. But my prisoner had no +doubts. He shrieked out--a wild cry of fear which rang round the empty +court--and by a rapid blow, despair giving him courage, he dashed the +hunting-knife from my hand. This done he first flung himself on me, +then tried by a sudden jerk to free himself. In a moment we were down +on the stones, and tumbling over one another in the dirt, while he +struggled to reach his knife, which was still in his girdle, and I +strove to prevent him. The fight was sharp, but it lasted barely a +minute. When the first effort of his despair was spent, I came +uppermost, and he was but a child in my hands. Presently, with my knee +on his chest, I looked up. The women were still there, the younger +clinging to the other.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go! go!" I cried impatiently. Each second I expected the court to be +invaded, for the man had screamed more than once.</p> + +<p class="normal">But they hesitated. I had been forced to hurt him a little, and he was +moaning piteously. "Who are you?" the elder woman asked--she who had +spoken all through.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nay, never mind that!" I answered. "Do you go! Go, while you can. You +know the way to the Wharf."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," she answered. "But I cannot go and leave him at your mercy. +Remember he is a man, and has----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is a treacherous scoundrel," I answered, giving his throat a +squeeze. "But he shall have one more chance. Listen, sirrah!" I +continued to the man, "and stop that noise or I will knock out your +teeth with my dagger-hilt. Listen and be silent. I shall go with these +ladies, and I promise you this: If they are stopped or hindered on +their way, or if evil happen to them at that wharf, whose name you had +better forget, it will be the worse for you. Do you hear? You will +suffer for it, though there be a dozen guards about you! Mind you," I +added, "I have nothing to lose myself, for I am desperate already."</p> + +<p class="normal">He vowed--the poor craven--with his stuttering tongue, that he would +be true, and vowed it again and again. But I saw that his eyes did not +meet mine. They glanced instead at the knife-blade, and I knew, even +while I pretended to trust him, that he would betray us. My real hope +lay in his fears, and in this, that as the fugitives knew the way to +the wharf, and it could not now be far distant, we might reach it, +and go on board some vessel--I had gathered they were flying the +country--before this wretch could recover himself and get together a +force to stop us. That was my real hope, and in that hope only I left +him.</p> + +<p class="normal">We went as fast as the women could walk. I did not trouble them with +questions; indeed, I had myself no more leisure than enabled me to +notice their general appearance, which was that of comfortable +tradesmen's womenfolk. Their cloaks and hoods were plainly fashioned, +and of coarse stuff, their shoes were thick, and no jewel or scrap of +lace, peeping out, betrayed them. Yet there was something in their +carriage which could not be hidden, something which, to my eye, told +tales; so that minute by minute I became more sure that this was +really an adventure worth pursuing, and that London had kept a reward +in store for me besides its cold stones and inhospitable streets.</p> + +<p class="normal">The city was beginning to rouse itself. As we flitted through the +lanes and alleys which lie between Cheapside and the river, we met +many people, chiefly of the lower classes, on their way to work. Yet +in spite of this, we had no need to fear observation, for, though the +morning was fully come, with the light had arrived such a thick, +choking, yellow fog as I, being for the most part country-bred, had +never experienced. It was so dense and blinding that we had a +difficulty in keeping together, and even hand in hand could scarcely +see one another. In my wonder how my companions found their way, I +presently failed to notice their condition, and only remarked the +distress and exhaustion which one of them was suffering, when she +began, notwithstanding all her efforts, to lag behind. Then I sprang +forward, blaming myself much. "Forgive me," I said. "You are tired, +and no wonder. Let me carry the child, mistress."</p> + +<p class="normal">Exhausted as she was, she drew away from me jealously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she panted. "We are nearly there. I am better now." And she +strained the child closer to her, as though she feared I might take it +from her by force.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, if you will not trust me," I answered, "let your friend carry +it for a time. I can see you are tired out."</p> + +<p class="normal">Through the mist she bent forward, and peered into my face, her eyes +scarcely a foot from mine. The scrutiny seemed to satisfy her. She +drew a long breath and held out her burden. "No," she said; "you shall +take him. I will trust you."</p> + +<p class="normal">I took the little wrapped-up thing as gently as I could. "You shall +not repent it, if I can help it, Mistress----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Bertram," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mistress Bertram," I repeated. "Now let us get on and lose no time."</p> + +<p class="normal">A walk of a hundred yards or so brought us clear of the houses, and +revealed before us, in place of all else, a yellow curtain of fog. +Below this, at our feet, yet apparently a long way from us, was a +strange, pale line of shimmering light, which they told me was the +water. At first I could hardly believe this. But, pausing a moment +while my companions whispered together, dull creakings and groanings +and uncouth shouts and cries, and at last the regular beat of oars, +came to my ears out of the bank of vapor, and convinced me that we +really had the river before us.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Bertram turned to me abruptly. "Listen," she said, "and +decide for yourself, my friend. We are close to the wharf now, and in +a few minutes shall know our fate. It is possible that we may be +intercepted at this point, and if that happen, it will be bad for me +and worse for any one aiding me. You have done us gallant service, but +you are young; and I am loath to drag you into perils which do not +belong to you. Take my advice, then, and leave us now. I would I could +reward you," she added hastily, "but that knave has my purse."</p> + +<p class="normal">I put the child gently back into her arms. "Good-by," she said, with +more feeling. "We thank you. Some day I may return to England, and +have ample power----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not so fast," I answered stiffly. "Did you think it possible, +mistress, that I would desert you now? I gave you back the child only +because it might hamper me, and will be safer with you. Come, let us +on at once to the wharf."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You mean it?" she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of a certainty!" I answered, settling my cap on my head with perhaps +a boyish touch of the braggart.</p> + +<p class="normal">At any rate, she did not take me at once at my word; and her thought +for me touched me the more because I judged her--I know not exactly +why--to be a woman not over prone to think of others. "Do not be +reckless," she said slowly, her eyes intently fixed on mine. "I should +be sorry to bring evil upon you. You are but a boy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And yet," I answered, smiling, "there is as good as a price upon my +head already. I should be reckless if I stayed here. If you will take +me with you, let us go. We have loitered too long already."</p> + +<p class="normal">She turned then, asking no questions; but she looked at me from time +to time in a puzzled way, as though she thought she ought to know +me--as though I reminded her of some one. Paying little heed to this +then, I hurried her and her companion down to the water, traversing a +stretch of foreshore strewn with piles of wood and stacks of barrels +and old rotting boats, between which the mud lay deep. Fortunately it +was high tide, and so we had not far to go. In a minute or two I +distinguished the hull of a ship looming large through the fog; and a +few more steps placed us safely on a floating raft, on the far side of +which the vessel lay moored.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was only one man to be seen lounging on the raft, and the +neighborhood was quiet. My spirits rose as I looked round. "Is this +the <i>Whelp?</i>" the tall lady asked. I had not heard the other open her +mouth since the encounter in the court.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, it is the <i>Whelp</i>, madam," the man answered, saluting her and +speaking formally, and with a foreign accent. "You are the lady who is +expected?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am," she answered, with authority. "Will you tell the captain that +I desire to sail immediately, without a moment's delay? Do you +understand?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, the tide is going out," quoth the sailor, dubiously, looking +steadily into the fog, which hid the river. "It has just turned, it is +true. But as to sailing----"</p> + +<p class="normal">She cut him short. "Go, go! man. Tell your captain what I say. And let +down a ladder for us to get on board."</p> + +<p class="normal">He caught a rope which hung over the side, and, swinging himself up, +disappeared. We stood below, listening to the weird sounds which came +off the water, the creaking and flapping of masts and canvas, the whir +of wings and shrieks of unseen gulls, the distant hail of boatmen. A +bell in the city solemnly tolled eight. The younger woman shivered. +The elder's foot tapped impatiently on the planks. Shut in by the +yellow walls of fog, I experienced a strange sense of solitude; it was +as if we three were alone in the world--we three who had come together +so strangely.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VI.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_06" href="#div1Ref_06">MASTER CLARENCE.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">We had stood thus for a few moments when a harsh voice, hailing us +from above, put an end to our several thoughts and forebodings. We +looked up and I saw half a dozen night-capped heads thrust over the +bulwarks. A rope ladder came hurtling down at our feet, and a man, +nimbly descending, held it tight at the bottom. "Now, madame!" he said +briskly. They all, I noticed, had the same foreign accent, yet all +spoke English; a singularity I did not understand, until I learned +later that the boat was the <i>Lions Whelp</i>, trading between London and +Calais, and manned from the latter place.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Bertram ascended quickly and steadily, holding the baby in +her arms. The other made some demur, lingering at the foot of the +ladder and looking up as if afraid, until her companion chid her +sharply. Then she too went up, but as she passed me--I was holding one +side of the ladder steady--she shot at me from under her hood a look +which disturbed me strangely.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was the first time I had seen her face, and it was such a face as a +man rarely forgets. Not because of its beauty; rather because it was a +speaking face, a strange and expressive one, which the dark waving +hair, swelling in thick clusters upon either temple, seemed to +accentuate. The features were regular, but, the full red lips +excepted, rather thin than shapely. The nose, too, was prominent. But +the eyes! The eyes seemed to glorify the dark brilliant thinness of +the face, and to print it upon the memory. They were dark flashing +eyes, and their smile seemed to me perpetually to challenge, to allure +and repulse, and even to goad. Sometimes they were gay, more rarely +sad, sometimes soft, and again hard as steel. They changed in a moment +as one or another approached her. But always at their gayest, there +was a suspicion of weariness and fatigue in their depths. Or so I +thought later.</p> + +<p class="normal">Something of this flashed through my mind as I followed her up the +side. But once on board I glanced round, forgetting her in the novelty +of my position. The <i>Whelp</i> was decked fore and aft only, the +blackness of the hold gaping amidships, spanned by a narrow gangway, +which served to connect the two decks. We found ourselves in the +forepart, amid coils of rope and windlasses and water-casks; +surrounded by half a dozen wild-looking sailors wearing blue knitted +frocks and carrying sheath-knives at their girdles.</p> + +<p class="normal">The foremost and biggest of these seemed to be the captain, although, +so far as outward appearances went, the only difference between him +and his crew lay in a marlin-spike which he wore slung to a thong +beside his knife. When I reached the deck he was telling a long story +to Mistress Bertram, and telling it very slowly. But the drift of it I +soon gathered. While the fog lasted he could not put to sea.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nonsense!" cried my masterful companion, chafing at his slowness of +speech. "Why not? Would it be dangerous?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, madam, it would be dangerous," he answered, more slowly than +ever. "Yes, it would be dangerous. And to put to sea in a fog? That is +not seamanship. And your baggage has not arrived."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Never mind my baggage!" she answered imperiously. "I have made other +arrangements for it. Two or three things I know came on board last +night. I want to start--to start at once, do you hear?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The captain shook his head, and said sluggishly that it was +impossible. Spitting on the deck he ground his heel leisurely round in +a knothole. "Impossible," he repeated; "it would not be seamanship to +start in a fog. When the fog lifts we will go. 'Twill be all the same +to-morrow. We shall lie at Leigh to-night, whether we go now or go +when the fog lifts."</p> + +<p class="normal">"At Leigh?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is it, madam."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And when will you go from Leigh?" she cried indignantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Daybreak to-morrow," he answered. "You leave it to me, mistress," he +continued, in a tone of rough patronage, "and you will see your good +man before you expect it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But, man!" she exclaimed, trembling with impotent rage. "Did not +Master Bertram engage you to bring me across whenever I might be +ready? Ay, and pay you handsomely for it? Did he not, sirrah?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"To be sure, to be sure!" replied the giant unmoved. "Using +seamanship, and not going to sea in a fog, if it please you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It does not please me!" she retorted. "And why stay at Leigh?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked up at the rigging, then down at the deck. He set his heel in +the knothole, and ground it round again. Then he looked at his +questioner with a broad smile. "Well, mistress, for a very good +reason. It is there your good man is waiting for you. Only," added +this careful keeper of a secret, "he bade me not tell any one."</p> + +<p class="normal">She uttered a low cry, which might have been an echo of her baby's +cooing, and convulsively clasped the child more tightly to her. "He is +at Leigh!" she murmured, flushing and trembling, another woman +altogether. Even her voice was wonderfully changed. "He is really at +Leigh, you say?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"To be sure!" replied the captain, with a portentous wink and a +mysterious roll of the head. "He is there safe enough! Safe enough, +you may bet your handsome face to a rushlight. And we will be there +to-night."</p> + +<p class="normal">She started up with a wild gesture. For a moment she had sat down on a +cask standing beside her, and forgotten our peril, and the probability +that we might never see Leigh at all. Now, I have said, she started +up. "No, no!" she cried, struggling for breath and utterance. "Oh, no! +no! Let us go at once. We must start at once!" Her voice was +hysterical in its sudden anxiety and terror, as the consciousness of +our position rolled back upon her. "Captain! listen, listen!" she +pleaded. "Let us start now, and my husband will give you double. I +will promise you double whatever he said if you will chance the fog."</p> + +<p class="normal">I think all who heard her were moved, save the captain only. He rubbed +his head and grinned. Slow and heavy, he saw nothing in her prayer +save the freak of a woman wild to get to her man. He did not weigh her +promise at a groat; she was but a woman. And being a foreigner, he did +not perceive a certain air of breeding which might have influenced a +native. He was one of those men against whose stupidity Father Carey +used to say the gods fight in vain. When he answered good-naturedly, +"No, no, mistress, it is impossible. It would not be seamanship," I +felt that we might as well try to stop the ebbing tide as move him +from his position.</p> + +<p class="normal">The feeling was a maddening one. The special peril which menaced my +companions I did not know; but I knew they feared pursuit, and I had +every reason to fear it for myself. Yet at any moment, out of the +fog which encircled us so closely that we could barely see the raft +below--and the shore not at all--might come the tramp of hurrying feet +and the stern hail of the law. It was maddening to think of this, and +to know that we had only to cast off a rope or two in order to escape; +and to know also that we were absolutely helpless.</p> + +<p class="normal">I expected that Mistress Bertram, brave as she had shown herself, +would burst into a passion of rage or tears. But apparently she had +one hope left. She looked at me.</p> + +<p class="normal">I tried to think--to think hard. Alas, I seemed only able to listen. +An hour had gone by since we parted from that rascal in the court, and +we might expect him to appear at any moment, vengeful and exultant, +with a posse at his back. Yet I tried hard to think; and the fog +presently suggested a possible course. "Look here," I said suddenly, +speaking for the first time, "if you do not start until the fog lifts, +captain, we may as well breakfast ashore, and return presently."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is as you please," he answered indifferently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you think?" I said, turning to my companions with as much +carelessness as I could command. "Had we not better do that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Bertram did not understand, but in her despair she obeyed the +motion of my hand mechanically, and walked to the side. The younger +woman followed more slowly, so that I had to speak to her with some +curtness, bidding her make haste; for I was in a fever until we were +clear of the <i>Whelp</i> and the Lion Wharf. It had struck me that, if the +ship were not to leave at once, we were nowhere in so much danger as +on board. At large in the fog we might escape detection for a time. +Our pursuers might as well look for a needle in a haystack as seek us +through it when once we were clear of the wharf. And this was not the +end of my idea. But for the present it was enough. Therefore I took up +Mistress Anne very short. "Come!" I said, "be quick! Let me help you."</p> + +<p class="normal">She obeyed, and I was ashamed of my impatience when at the foot of the +ladder she thanked me prettily. It was almost with good cheer in my +voice and a rebound of spirits that I explained, as I hurried my +companions across the raft, what my plan was.</p> + +<p class="normal">The moment we were ashore I felt safer. The fog swallowed us up quick, +as the Bible says. The very hull of the ship vanished from sight +before we had gone half a dozen paces. I had never seen a London fog +before, and to me it seemed portentous and providential; a marvel as +great as the crimson hail which fell in the London gardens to mark her +Majesty's accession.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet after all, without my happy thought, the fog would have availed us +little. We had scarcely gone a score of yards before the cautious +tread of several people hastening down the strand toward the wharf +struck my ear. They were proceeding in silence, and we might not have +noticed their approach if the foremost had not by chance tripped and +fallen; whereupon one laughed and another swore. With a warning hand I +grasped my companions' arms, and hurried them forward some paces until +I felt sure that our figures could not be seen through the mist. Then +I halted, and we stood listening, gazing into one another's strained +eyes, while the steps came nearer and nearer, crossed our track and +then with a noisy rush thundered on the wooden raft. My ear caught the +jingle of harness and the clank of weapons.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is the watch," I muttered. "Come, and make no noise. What I want +is a little this way. I fancy I saw it as we passed down to the +wharf."</p> + +<p class="normal">They turned with me, but we had not taken many steps before Mistress +Anne, who was walking on my left side, stumbled over something. She +tried to save herself, but failed and fell heavily, uttering as she +did so a loud cry. I sprang to her assistance, and even before I +raised her I laid my hand lightly on her mouth. "Hush!" I said softly, +"for safety's sake, make no noise. What is the matter?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh!" she moaned, making no effort to rise, "my ankle! my ankle! I am +sure I have broken it."</p> + +<p class="normal">I muttered my dismay, while Mistress Bertram, stooping anxiously, +examined the injured limb. "Can you stand?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">But it was no time for questioning, and I put her aside. The troop +which had passed were within easy hearing, and if there should be one +among them familiar with the girl's voice, we might be pounced upon, +fog or no fog. I felt that it was no time for ceremony, and picked +Mistress Anne up in my arms, whispering to the elder woman: "Go on +ahead! I think I see the boat. It is straight before you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Luckily I was right, it was the boat; and so far well. But at the +moment I spoke I heard a sudden outcry behind us, and knew the hunt +was up. I plunged forward with my burden, recklessly and blindly, +through mud and over obstacles. The wherry for which I was making was +moored in the water a few feet from the edge. I had remarked it idly +and without purpose as we came down to the wharf, and had even noticed +that the oars were lying in it. Now, if we could reach it and start +down the river for Leigh, we might by possibility gain that place, and +meet Mistress Bertram's husband.</p> + +<p class="normal">At any late, nothing in the world seemed so desirable to me at the +moment as the shelter of that boat. I plunged through the mud, and +waded desperately through the water to it, Mistress Bertram scarce a +whit behind me. I reached it, but reached it only as the foremost +pursuer caught sight of us. I heard his shout of triumph, and somehow +I bundled my burden into the boat--I remember that she clung about my +neck in fear, and I had to loosen her hands roughly. But I did loosen +them--in time. With one stroke of my hunting-knife, I severed the +rope, and pushing off the boat with all my strength, sprang into it as +it floated away--and was in time. But one second's delay would have +undone us. Two men were already in the water up to their knees, and +their very breath was hot on my face as we swung out into the stream.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fortunately, I had had experience of boats on the Avon, at Bidford and +Stratford, and could pull a good oar. For a moment indeed the wherry +rolled and dipped as I snatched up the sculls; but I quickly got her +in hand, and, bending to my work, sent her spinning through the mist, +every stroke I pulled increasing the distance between us and our now +unseen foes. Happily we were below London Bridge, and had not that +dangerous passage to make. The river, too, was nearly clear of craft, +and though once and again in the Pool a huge hulk loomed suddenly +across our bows, and then faded behind us into the mist like some +monstrous phantom, and so told of a danger narrowly escaped, I thought +it best to run all risks, and go ahead as long as the tide should ebb.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was strange how suddenly we had passed from storm into calm. +Mistress Anne had bound her ankle with a handkerchief, and bravely +made light of the hurt; and now the two women sat crouching in the +stern watching me, their heads together, their faces pale. The mist +had closed round us, and we were alone again, gliding over the bosom +of the great river that runs down to the sea. I was oddly struck by +the strange current of life which for a week had tossed me from one +adventure to another, only to bring me into contact at length with +these two, and sweep me into the unknown whirlpool of their fortunes.</p> + +<p class="normal">Who were they? A merchant's wife and her sister flying from Bishop +Bonner's inquisition? I thought it likely. Their cloaks and hoods +indeed, and all that I could see of their clothes, fell below such a +condition; but probably they were worn as a disguise. Their speech +rose as much above it, but I knew that of late many merchant's wives +had become scholars, and might pass in noblemen's houses; even as in +those days when London waxed fat, and set up and threw down +governments, every alderman had come to ride in mail.</p> + +<p class="normal">No doubt the women, watching me in anxious silence, were as curious +about me. I still bore the stains of country travel. I was unwashen, +unkempt, my doublet was torn, the cloak I had cast at my feet was the +very wreck of a cloak. Yet I read no distrust in their looks. The +elder's brave eyes seemed ever thanking me. I never saw her lips move +silently that they did not shape "Well done!" And though I caught +Mistress Anne scanning me once or twice with an expression I could ill +interpret, a smile took its place the moment her gaze met mine.</p> + +<p class="normal">We had passed, but were still in sight of, Greenwich Palace--as they +told me--when the mist rose suddenly like a curtain rolled away, and +the cold, bright February sun, shining out, disclosed the sparkling +river with the green hills rising on our right hand. Here and there on +its surface a small boat such as our own moved to and fro, and in the +distant Pool from which we had come rose a little forest of masts. I +hung on the oars a moment, and my eyes were drawn to a two-masted +vessel which, nearly half a mile below us, was drifting down, gently +heeling over with the current as the crew got up the sails. "I wonder +whither she is bound," I said thoughtfully, "and whether they would +take us on board by any chance."</p> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Bertram shook her head. "I have no money," she answered +sadly. "I fear we must go on to Leigh, if it be any way possible. You +are tired, and no wonder. But what is it?" with a sudden change of +voice. "What is the matter?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I had flashed out the oars with a single touch, and begun to pull as +fast as I could down the stream. No doubt my face, too, proclaimed my +discovery and awoke her fears. "Look behind!" I muttered between my +set teeth.</p> + +<p class="normal">She turned, and on the instant uttered a low cry. A wherry like our +own, but even lighter--in my first glance up the river I had not +noticed it--had stolen nearer to us, and yet nearer, and now throwing +aside disguise was in hot pursuit of us. There were three men on +board, two rowing and one steering. When they saw that we had +discovered them they hailed us in a loud voice, and I heard the +steersman's feet rattle on the boards, as he cried to his men to give +way, and stamped in very eagerness. My only reply was to take a longer +stroke, and, pulling hard, to sweep away from them.</p> + +<p class="normal">But presently my first strength died away, and the work began to tell +upon me, and little by little they overhauled us. Not that I gave up +at once for that. They were still some sixty yards behind, and for a +few minutes at any rate I might put off capture. In that time +something might happen. At the worst they were only three to one, and +their boat looked light and cranky and easy to upset.</p> + +<p class="normal">So I pulled on, savagely straining at the oars. But my chest heaved +and my arms ached more and more with each stroke. The banks slid by +us; we turned one bend, then another, though I saw nothing of them. I +saw only the pursuing boat, on which my eyes were fixed, heard only +the measured rattle of the oars in the rowlocks. A minute, two +minutes, three minutes passed. They had not gained on us, but the +water was beginning to waver before my eyes, their boat seemed +floating in the air, there was a pulsation in my ears louder than that +of the oars, I struggled and yet I flagged. My knees trembled. Their +boat shot nearer now, nearer and nearer, so that I could read the +smile of triumph on the steersman's dark face and hear his cry of +exultation. Nearer! and then with a cry I dropped the oars.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quick!" I panted to my companions. "Change places with me! So!" +Trembling and out of breath as I was, I crawled between the women and +gained the stern sheets of the boat. As I passed Mistress Bertram she +clutched my arm. Her eyes, as they met mine, flashed fire, her lips +were white. "The man steering!" she hissed between her teeth. "Leave +the others. He is Clarence, and I fear him!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I nodded; but still, as the hostile boat bore swiftly down upon us, I +cast a glance round to see if there were any help at hand. I saw no +sign of any. I saw only the pale blue sky overhead, and the stream +flowing swiftly under the boat. I drew my sword. The case was one +rather for despair than courage. The women were in my charge, and if I +did not acquit myself like a man now, when should I do so? Bah! it +would soon be over.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was an instant's confusion in the other boat, as the crew ceased +rowing, and, seeing my attitude and not liking it, changed their +seats. To my joy the man, who had hitherto been steering, flung a +curse at the others and came forward to bear the brunt of the +encounter. He was a tall, sinewy man, past middle age, with a +clean-shaven face, a dark complexion, and cruel eyes. So he was Master +Clarence! Well, he had the air of a swordsman and a soldier. I +trembled for the women.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Surrender, you fool!" he cried to me harshly. "In the Queen's +name--do you hear? What do you in this company?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I answered nothing, for I was out of breath. But softly, my eyes on +his, I drew out with my left hand my hunting-knife. If I could beat +aside his sword, I would spring upon him and drive the knife home with +that hand. So, standing erect in bow and stern we faced one another, +the man and the boy, the flush of rage and exertion on my cheek, a +dark shade on his. And silently the boats drew together.</p> + +<p class="normal">Thought is quick, quicker than anything else in the world I suppose, +for in some drawn-out second before the boats came together I had time +to wonder where I had seen his face before, and to rack my memory. I +knew no Master Clarence, yet I had seen this man somewhere. Another +second, and away with thought! He was crouching for a spring. I drew +back a little, then lunged--lunged with heart and hand. Our swords +crossed and whistled--just crossed--and even as I saw his eyes gleam +behind his point, the shock of the two boats coming together flung us +both backward and apart. A moment we reeled, staggering and throwing +out wild hands. I strove hard to recover myself, nay, I almost did so; +then I caught my foot in Mistress Anne's cloak, which she had left in +her place, and fell heavily back into the boat.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was up in a moment--on my knees at least--and unhurt. But another +was before me. As I stooped half-risen, I saw one moment a dark shadow +above me, and the next a sheet of flame shone before my eyes, and a +tremendous shock swept all away. I fell senseless into the bottom of +the boat, knowing nothing of what had happened to me.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_07" href="#div1Ref_07">ON BOARD THE "FRAMLINGHAM."</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I am told by people who have been seasick that the sound of the waves +beating against the hull comes in time to be an intolerable torment. +But bad as this may be, it can be nothing in comparison with the pains +I suffered from the same cause, as I recovered my senses. My brain +seemed to be a cavern into which each moment, with a rhythmical +regularity which added the pangs of anticipation to those of reality, +the sea rushed, booming and thundering, jarring every nerve and +straining the walls to bursting, and making each moment of +consciousness a vivid agony. And this lasted long; how long I cannot +say. But it had subsided somewhat when I first opened my eyes, and +dully, not daring to move my head, looked up.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was lying on my back. About a foot from my eyes were rough beams of +wood disclosed by a smoky yellow light, which flickered on the +knotholes and rude joists. The light swayed to and fro regularly; and +this adding to my pain, I closed my eyes with a moan. Then some one +came to me, and I heard voices which sounded a long way off, and +promptly fell again into a deep sleep, troubled still, but less +painfully, by the same rhythmical shocks, the same dull crashings in +my brain.</p> + +<p class="normal">When I awoke again I had sense to know what caused this, and where I +was--in a berth on board ship. The noise which had so troubled me was +that of the waves beating against her forefoot. The beams so close to +my face formed the deck, the smoky light came from the ship's lantern +swinging on a hook. I tried to turn. Some one came again, and with +gentle hands arranged my pillow and presently began to feed me with a +spoon. When I had swallowed a few mouthfuls I gained strength to turn.</p> + +<p class="normal">Who was this feeding me? The light was at her back and dazzled me. +For a short while I took her for Petronilla, my thoughts going back at +one bound to Coton, and skipping all that had happened since I left +home. But as I grew stronger I grew clearer, and recalling bit by bit +what had happened in the boat, I recognized Mistress Anne. I tried to +murmur thanks, but she laid a cool finger on my lips and shook her +head, smiling on me. "You must not talk," she murmured, "you are +getting well. Now go to sleep again."</p> + +<p class="normal">I shut my eyes at once as a child might. Another interval of +unconsciousness, painless this time, followed, and again I awoke. I +was lying on my side now, and without moving could see the whole of +the tiny cabin. The lantern still hung and smoked. But the light was +steady now, and I heard no splashing without, nor the dull groaning +and creaking of the timbers within. There reigned a quiet which seemed +bliss to me; and I lay wrapped in it, my thoughts growing clearer and +clearer each moment.</p> + +<p class="normal">On a sea-chest at the farther end of the cabin were sitting two people +engaged in talk. The one, a woman, I recognized immediately. The gray +eyes full of command, the handsome features, the reddish-brown hair +and gracious figure left me in no doubt, even for a moment, that I +looked on Mistress Bertram. The sharer of her seat was a tall, thin +man with a thoughtful face and dreamy, rather melancholy eyes. One of +her hands rested on his knee, and her lips as she talked were close to +his ear. A little aside, sitting on the lowest step of the ladder +which led to the deck, her head leaning against the timbers, and a +cloak about her, was Mistress Anne.</p> + +<p class="normal">I tried to speak, and after more than one effort found my voice. +"Where am I?" I whispered. My head ached sadly, and I fancied, though +I was too languid to raise my hand to it, that it was bandaged. My +mind was so far clear that I remembered Master Clarence and his +pursuit and the fight in the boats, and knew that we ought to be on +our way to prison. Who, then, was the mild, comely gentleman whose +length of limb made the cabin seem smaller than it was? Not a jailer, +surely? Yet who else?</p> + +<p class="normal">I could compass no more than a whisper, but faint as my voice was they +all heard me, and looked up. "Anne!" the elder lady cried sharply, +seeming by her tone to direct the other to attend to me. Yet was she +herself the first to rise, and come and lay her hand on my brow. "Ah! +the fever is gone!" she said, speaking apparently to the gentleman, +who kept his seat. "His head is quite cool. He will do well now, I am +sure. Do you know me?" she continued, leaning over me.</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked up into her eyes, and read only kindness. "Yes," I muttered. +But the effort of looking was so painful that I closed my eyes again +with a sigh. Nevertheless, my memory of the events which had gone +before my illness grew clearer, and I fumbled feebly for something +which should have been at my side. "Where is--where is my sword?" I +made shift to whisper.</p> + +<p class="normal">She laughed. "Show it to him, Anne," she said; "what a never-die it +is! There, Master Knight Errant, we did not forget to bring it off the +field, you see!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"But how," I murmured, "how did you escape?" I saw that there was no +question of a prison. Her laugh was gay, her voice full of content.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is a long story," she answered kindly. "Are you well enough to +hear it? You think you are? Then take some of this first. You remember +that knave Philip striking you on the head with an oar as you got up? +No? Well, it was a cowardly stroke, but it stood him in little stead, +for we had drifted, in the excitement of the race, under the stern of +the ship which you remember seeing a little before. There were English +seamen on her; and when they saw three men in the act of boarding two +defenseless women, they stepped in, and threatened to send Clarence +and his crew to the bottom unless they sheered off."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ha!" I murmured. "Good!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And so we escaped. I prayed the captain to take us on board his ship, +the <i>Framlingham</i>, and he did so. More, putting into Leigh on his way +to the Nore, he took off my husband. There he stands, and when you are +better he shall thank you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nay, he will thank you now," said the tall man, rising and stepping +to my berth with his head bent. He could not stand upright, so low was +the deck. "But for you," he continued, his earnestness showing in his +voice and eyes--the latter were almost too tender for a man's--"my +wife would be now lying in prison, her life in jeopardy, and her +property as good as gone. She has told me how bravely you rescued her +from that cur in Cheapside, and how your presence of mind baffled the +watch at the riverside. It is well, young gentleman. It is very well. +But these things call for other returns than words. When it lies in +her power my wife will make them; if not to-day, to-morrow, and if not +to-morrow, the day after."</p> + +<p class="normal">I was very weak, and his words brought the tears to my eyes. "She has +saved my life already," I murmured.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You foolish boy!" she cried, smiling down on me, her hand on her +husband's shoulder. "You got your head broken in my defense. It was a +great thing, was it not, that I did not leave you to die in the boat? +There, make haste and get well. You have talked enough now. Go to +sleep, or we shall have the fever back again."</p> + +<p class="normal">"One thing first," I pleaded. "Tell me whither we are going."</p> + +<p class="normal">"In a few hours we shall be at Dort in Holland," she answered. "But be +content. We will take care of you, and send you back if you will, or +you shall still come with us; as you please. Be content. Go to sleep +now and get strong. Presently, perhaps, we shall have need of your +help again."</p> + +<p class="normal">They went and sat down then on their former seat and talked in +whispers, while Mistress Anne shook up my pillows, and laid a fresh +cool bandage on my head. I was too weak to speak my gratitude, but I +tried to look it and so fell asleep again, her hand in mine, and the +wondrous smile of those lustrous eyes the last impression of which I +was conscious.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">A long dreamless sleep followed. When I awoke once more the light +still hung steady, but the peacefulness of night was gone. We lay in +the midst of turmoil. The scampering of feet over the deck above me, +the creaking of the windlass, the bumping and clattering of barrels +hoisted in or hoisted out, the harsh sound of voices raised in a +foreign tongue and in queer keys, sufficed as I grew wide-awake to +tell me we were in port.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the cabin was empty, and I lay for some time gazing at its dreary +interior, and wondering what was to become of me. Presently an uneasy +fear crept into my mind. What if my companions had deserted me? Alone, +ill, and penniless in a foreign land, what should I do? This fear in +my sick state was so terrible that I struggled to get up, and with +reeling brain and nerveless hands did get out of my berth. But this +feat accomplished I found that I could not stand. Everything swam +before my eyes. I could not take a single step, but remained, clinging +helplessly to the edge of my berth, despair at my heart. I tried to +call out, but my voice rose little above a whisper, and the banging +and shrieking, the babel without went on endlessly. Oh, it was cruel! +cruel! They had left me!</p> + +<p class="normal">I think my senses were leaving me too, when I felt an arm about my +waist, and found Mistress Anne by my side guiding me to the chest. I +sat down on it, the certainty of my helplessness and the sudden relief +of her presence bringing the tears to my eyes. She fanned me, and gave +me some restorative, chiding me the while for getting out of my berth.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought that you had gone and left me," I muttered. I was as weak +as a child.</p> + +<p class="normal">She said cheerily: "Did you leave us when we were in trouble? Of +course you did not. There, take some more of this. After all, it is +well you are up, for in a short time we must move you to the other +boat."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The other boat?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, we are at Dort, you know. And we are going by the Waal, a branch +of the Rhine, to Arnheim. But the boat is here, close to this one, +and, with help, I think you will be able to walk to it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am sure I shall if you will give me your arm," I answered +gratefully.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But you will not think again," she replied, "that we have deserted +you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I said. "I will trust you always."</p> + +<p class="normal">I wondered why a shadow crossed her face at that. But I had no time to +do more than wonder, for Master Bertram, coming down, brought our +sitting to an end. She bustled about to wrap me up, and somehow, +partly walking, partly carried, I was got on deck. There I sat down on +a bale to recover myself, and felt at once much the better for the +fresh, keen air, the clear sky and wintry sunshine which welcomed me +to a foreign land.</p> + +<p class="normal">On the outer side of the vessel stretched a wide expanse of turbid +water, five or six times as wide as the Thames at London, and +foam-flecked here and there by the up-running tide. On the other side +was a wide and spacious quay, paved neatly with round stones, and +piled here and there with merchandise; but possessing, by virtue of +the lines of leafless elms which bordered it, a quaint air of +rusticity in the midst of bustle. The sober bearing of the sturdy +landsmen, going quietly about their business, accorded well with the +substantial comfort of the rows of tall, steep-roofed houses I saw +beyond the quay, and seemed only made more homely by the occasional +swagger and uncouth cry of some half-barbarous seaman, wandering +aimlessly about. Above the town rose the heavy square tower of a +church, a notable landmark where all around, land and water, lay so +low, where the horizon seemed so far, and the sky so wide and breezy.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So you have made up your mind to come with us," said Master Bertram, +returning to my side--he had left me to make some arrangements. "You +understand that if you would prefer to go home I can secure your +tendance here by good, kindly people, and provide for your passage +back when you feel strong enough to cross. You understand that? And +that the choice is entirely your own? So which will you do?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I changed color and felt I did. I shrunk, as being well and strong I +should not have shrunk, from losing sight of those three faces which I +had known for so short a time, yet which alone stood between myself +and loneliness. "I would rather come with you," I stammered. "But I +shall be a great burden to you now, I fear."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is not that," he replied, with hearty assurance in his voice. "A +week's rest and quiet will restore you to strength, and then the +burden will be on the other shoulder. It is for your own sake I give +you the choice, because our future is for the time uncertain. Very +uncertain," he repeated, his brow clouding over; "and to become our +companion may expose you to fresh dangers. We are refugees from +England; that you probably guess. Our plan was to go to France, where +are many of our friends, and where we could live safely until better +times. You know how that plan was frustrated. Here the Spaniards are +masters--Prince Philip's people; and if we are recognized, we shall be +arrested and sent back to England. Still, my wife and I must make the +best of it. The hue and cry will not follow us for some days, and +there is still a degree of independence in the cities of Holland which +may, since I have friends here, protect us for a time. Now you know +something of our position, my friend. You can make your choice with +your eyes open. Either way we shall not forget you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will go on with you, if you please," I answered at once. "I, too, +cannot go home." And as I said this, Mistress Bertram also came up, +and I took her hand in mine--which looked, by the way, so strangely +thin I scarcely recognized it--and kissed it. "I will come with you, +madam, if you will let me," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good!" she replied, her eyes sparkling. "I said you would! I do not +mind telling you now that I am glad of it. And if ever we return to +England, as God grant we may and soon, you shall not regret your +decision. Shall he, Richard?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"If you say he shall not, my dear," he responded, smiling at her +enthusiasm, "I think I may answer for it he will not."</p> + +<p class="normal">I was struck then, as I had been before, by a certain air of deference +which the husband assumed toward the wife. It did not surprise me, for +her bearing and manner, as well as such of her actions as I had seen, +stamped her as singularly self-reliant and independent for a woman; +and to these qualities, as much as to the rather dreamy character of +the husband, I was content to set down the peculiarity. I should add +that a rare and pretty tenderness constantly displayed on her part +toward him robbed it of any semblance of unseemliness.</p> + +<p class="normal">They saw that the exertion of talking exhausted me, and so, with an +encouraging nod, left me to myself. A few minutes later a couple of +English sailors, belonging to the <i>Framlingham</i>, came up, and with +gentle strength transported me, under Mistress Anne's directions, to a +queer-looking wide-beamed boat which lay almost alongside. She was +more like a huge Thames barge than anything else, for she drew little +water, but had a great expanse of sail when all was set. There was a +large deck-house, gay with paint and as clean as it could be; and in a +compartment at one end of this--which seemed to be assigned to our +party--I was soon comfortably settled.</p> + +<p class="normal">Exhausted as I was by the excitement of sitting up and being moved, I +knew little of what passed about me for the next two days, and +remember less. I slept and ate, and sometimes awoke to wonder where I +was. But the meals and the vague attempts at thought made scarcely +more impression on my mind than the sleep. Yet all the while I was +gaining strength rapidly, my youth and health standing me in good +stead. The wound in my head, which had caused great loss of blood, +healed all one way, as we say in Warwickshire; and about noon, on the +second day after leaving Dort, I was well enough to reach the deck +unassisted, and sit in the sunshine on a pile of rugs which Mistress +Anne, my constant nurse, had laid for me in a corner sheltered from +the wind.</p> + +<p style="text-align:center; letter-spacing:20pt">* * * * *</p> + +<p class="normal">Fortunately the weather was mild and warm, and the sunshine +fell +brightly on the wide river and the wider plain of pasture which +stretched away on either side of the horizon, dotted, here and there +only, by a windmill, a farmhouse, the steeple of a church, the brown +sails of a barge, or at most broken by a low dike or a line of +sand-dunes. All was open, free; all was largeness, space, and +distance. I gazed astonished.</p> + +<p class="normal">The husband and wife, who were pacing the deck forward, came to me. He +noticed the wondering looks I cast round. "This is new to you?" he +said smiling.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quite--quite new," I answered. "I never imagined anything so flat, +and yet in its way so beautiful."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You do not know Lincolnshire?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah, that is my native county," he answered. "It is much like this. +But you are better, and you can talk again. Now I and my wife have +been discussing whether we shall tell you more about ourselves. And +since there is no time like the present I may say that we have decided +to trust you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"All in all or not at all," Mistress Bertram added brightly.</p> + +<p class="normal">I murmured my thanks.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then, first to tell you who we are. For myself I am plain Richard +Bertie of Lincolnshire, at your service. My wife is something more +than appears from this, or"--with a smile--"from her present not too +graceful dress. She is----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stop, Richard! This is not sufficiently formal," my lady cried +prettily. "I have the honor to present to you, young gentleman," she +went on, laughing merrily and making a very grand courtesy before me, +"Katherine, Duchess of Suffolk."</p> + +<p class="normal">I made shift to get to my feet, and bowed respectfully, but she forced +me to sit down again. "Enough of that," she said lightly, "until we go +back to England. Here and for the future we are Master Bertram and his +wife. And this young lady, my distant kinswoman, Anne Brandon, must +pass as Mistress Anne. You wonder how we came to be straying in the +streets alone and unattended when you found us?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I did wonder, for the name of the gay and brilliant Duchess of +Suffolk was well known even to me, a country lad. Her former husband, +Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, had been not only the one trusted +and constant friend of King Henry the Eighth, but the king's +brother-in-law, his first wife having been Mary, Princess of England +and Queen Dowager of France. Late in his splendid and prosperous +career the Duke had married Katherine, the heiress of Lord Willoughby +de Eresby, and she it was who stood before me, still young and +handsome. After her husband's death she had made England ring with her +name, first by a love match with a Lincolnshire squire, and secondly +by her fearless and outspoken defense of the reformers. I did wonder +indeed how she had come to be wandering in the streets at daybreak, an +object of a chance passer's chivalry and pity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is simple enough," she said dryly; "I am rich, I am a Protestant, +and I have an enemy. When I do not like a person I speak out. Do I +not, Richard?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You do indeed, my dear," he answered smiling.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And once I spoke out to Bishop Gardiner. What! Do you know Stephen +Gardiner?"</p> + +<p class="normal">For I had started at the name, after which I could scarcely have +concealed my knowledge if I would. So I answered simply, "Yes, I have +seen him." I was thinking how wonderful this was. These people had +been utter strangers to me until a day or two before, yet now we were +all looking out together from the deck of a Dutch boat on the low +Dutch landscape, united by one tie, the enmity of the same man.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is a man to be dreaded," the Duchess continued, her eyes resting +on her baby, which lay asleep on my bundle of rugs--and I guessed what +fear it was had tamed her pride to flight. "His power in England is +absolute. We learned that it was his purpose to arrest me, and +determined to leave England. But our very household was full of spies, +and though we chose a time when Clarence, our steward, whom we had +long suspected of being Gardiner's chief tool, was away, Philip, his +deputy, gained a clew to our design, and watched us. We gave him the +slip with difficulty, leaving our luggage, but he dogged and overtook +us, and the rest you know."</p> + +<p class="normal">I bowed. As I gazed at her, my admiration, I know, shone in my eyes. +She looked, as she stood on the deck, an exile and fugitive, so gay, +so bright, so indomitable, that in herself she was at once a warranty +and an omen of better times. The breeze had heightened her color and +loosened here and there a tress of her auburn hair. No wonder Master +Bertie looked proudly on his Duchess.</p> + +<p class="normal">Suddenly a thing I had clean forgotten flashed into my mind, and I +thrust my hand into my pocket. The action was so abrupt that it +attracted their attention, and when I pulled out a packet--two +packets--there were three pairs of eyes upon me. The seal dangled from +one missive. "What have you there?" the Duchess asked briskly, for she +was a woman, and curious. "Do you carry the deeds of your property +about with you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I said, not unwilling to make a small sensation. "This touches +your Grace."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hush!" she cried, raising one imperious finger. "Transgressing +already? From this time forth I am Mistress Bertram, remember. But +come," she went on, eying the packet with the seal inquisitively, "how +does it touch me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I put it silently into her hands, and she opened it and read a few +lines, her husband peeping over her shoulder. As she read her brow +darkened, her eyes grew hard. Master Bertie's face changed with hers, +and they both peeped suddenly at me over the edge of the parchment, +suspicion and hostility in their glances. "How came you by this, young +sir?" he said slowly, after a long pause. "Have we escaped Peter to +fall into the hands of Paul?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no!" I cried hurriedly. I saw that I had made a greater sensation +than I had bargained for. I hastened to tell them how I had met with +Gardiner's servant at Stony Stratford, and how I had become possessed +of his credentials. They laughed of course--indeed they laughed so +loudly that the placid Dutchmen, standing aft with their hands in +their breeches-pockets, stared open-mouthed at us, and the kindred +cattle on the bank looked mildly up from the knee-deep grass.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And what was the other packet?" the Duchess asked presently. "Is that +it in your hand?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," I answered, holding it up with some reluctance. "It seems to be +a letter addressed to Mistress Clarence."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Clarence!" she cried. "Clarence!" arresting the hand she was +extending. "What! Here is our friend again then. What is in it? You +have opened it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have not? Then quick, open it!" she exclaimed. "This too touches +us, I will bet a penny. Let us see at once what it contains. Clarence +indeed! Perhaps we may have him on the hip yet, the arch-traitor!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But I held the pocket-book back, though my cheeks reddened and I knew +I must seem foolish. They made certain that this letter was a +communication to some spy, probably to Clarence himself under cover of +a feminine address. Perhaps it was, but it bore a woman's name and it +was sealed; and foolish though I might be, I would not betray the +woman's secret.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, madam," I said confused, awkward, stammering, yet withholding it +with a secret obstinacy; "pardon me if I do not obey you--if I do not +let this be opened. It may be what you say," I added with an effort; +"but it may also contain an honest secret, and that a woman's."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you say?" cried the Duchess; "here are scruples!" At that her +husband smiled, and I looked in despair from him to Mistress Anne. +Would she sympathize with my feelings? I found that she had turned her +back on us, and was gazing over the side. "Do you really mean," +continued the Duchess, tapping her foot sharply on the deck, "that you +are not going to open that, you foolish boy?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do--with your Grace's leave," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Or without my Grace's leave! That is what you mean," she retorted +pettishly, a red spot in each cheek. "When people will not do what I +ask, it is always, Grace! Grace! Grace! But I know them now."</p> + +<p class="normal">I dared not smile; and I would not look up, lest my heart should fail +me and I should give her her way.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You foolish boy!" she again said, and sniffed. Then with a toss of +her head she went away, her husband following her obediently.</p> + +<p class="normal">I feared that she was grievously offended, and I got up restlessly and +went across the deck to the rail on which Mistress Anne was leaning, +meaning to say something which should gain for me her sympathy, +perhaps her advice. But the words died on my lips, for as I approached +she turned her face abruptly toward me, and it was so white, so +haggard, so drawn, that I uttered a cry of alarm. "You are ill!" I +exclaimed. "Let me call the Duchess!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She gripped my sleeve almost fiercely, "Hush!" she muttered. "Do +nothing of the kind. I am not well. It is the water. But it will pass +off, if you do not notice it. I hate to be noticed," she added, with +an angry shrug.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was full of pity for her and reproached myself sorely. "What a +selfish brute I have been!" I said. "You have watched by me night +after night, and nursed me day after day, and I have scarcely thanked +you. And now you are ill yourself. It is my fault!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She looked at me, a wan smile on her face. "A little, perhaps," she +answered faintly. "But it is chiefly the water. I shall be better +presently. About that letter--did you not come to speak to me about +it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Never mind it now," I said anxiously. "Will you not lie down on the +rugs awhile? Let me give you my place," I pleaded.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no!" she cried impatiently; and seeing I vexed her by my +importunity, I desisted. "The letter," she went on; "you will open it +by and by?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I said slowly, considering, to tell the truth, the strength of +my resolution, "I think I shall not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will! you will!" she repeated, with a kind of scorn. "The Duchess +will ask you again, and you will give it to her. Of course you will!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Her tone was strangely querulous, and her eyes continually flashed +keen, biting glances at me. But I thought only that she was ill and +excited, and I fancied it was best to humor her. "Well, perhaps I +shall," I said soothingly. "Possibly. It is hard to refuse her +anything. And yet I hope I may not. The girl--it may be a girl's +secret."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" she asked, interrupting me abruptly, her voice harsh and +unmusical. "What of her?" She laid her hand on her bosom as though to +still some secret pain. I looked at her, anxious and wondering, but +she had again averted her face. "What of her?" she repeated.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Only that--I would not willingly hurt her!" I blurted out.</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not answer. She stood a moment, then to my surprise she turned +away without a word, and merely commanding me by a gesture of the hand +not to follow, walked slowly away. I watched her cross the deck and +pass through the doorway into the deck-house. She did not once turn +her face, and my only fear was that she was ill; more seriously ill, +perhaps, than she had acknowledged.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_08" href="#div1Ref_08">A HOUSE OF PEACE.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">As the day went on, therefore, I looked eagerly for Mistress Anne's +return, but she appeared no more, though I maintained a close watch +on the cabin-door. All the afternoon, too, the Duchess kept away from +me, and I feared that I had seriously offended her; so that it was +with no very pleasant anticipations that, going into that part of the +deck-house which served us for a common room, to see if the evening +meal was set, I found only the Duchess and Master Bertie prepared to +sit down to it. I suppose that something of my feeling was expressed +in my face, for while I was yet half-way between door and table, my +lady gave way to a peal of merriment.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come, sit down, and do not be afraid!" she cried pleasantly, her gray +eyes still full of laughter. "I vow the lad thinks I shall eat him. +Nay, when all is said and done, I like you the better, Sir Knight +Errant, for your scruples. I see that you are determined to act up to +your name. But that reminds me," she added in a more serious vein. "We +have been frank with you. You must be equally frank with us. What are +we to call you, pray?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked down at my plate and felt my face grow scarlet. The wound +which the discovery of my father's treachery had dealt me had begun to +heal. In the action, the movement, the adventure of the last +fortnight, I had well-nigh lost sight of the blot on my escutcheon, of +the shame which had driven me from home. But the question, "What are +we to call you?" revived the smart, and revived it with an added pang. +It had been very well, in theory, to proudly discard my old name. It +was painful, in practice, to be unable to answer the Duchess, "I am a +Cludde of Coton, nephew to Sir Anthony, formerly esquire of the body +to King Henry. I am no unworthy follower and associate even for you," +and to have instead to reply, "I have no name. I am nobody. I have all +to make and win." Yet this was my ill-fortune.</p> + +<p class="normal">Her woman's eye saw my trouble as I hesitated, confused and doubting +what I should reply. "Come!" she said good-naturedly, trying to +reassure me. "You are of gentle birth. Of that we feel sure."</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head. "Nay, I am of no birth, madam," I answered hurriedly. +"I have no name, or at any rate no name that I can be proud of. Call +me--call me, if it please you, Francis Carey."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is a good name," quoth Master Bertie, pausing with his knife +suspended in the air. "A right good Protestant name!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"But I have no claim to it," I rejoined, mere and more hurt. "I have +all to make. I am a new man. Yet do not fear!" I added quickly, as I +saw what I took to be a cloud of doubt cross my lady's face. "I will +follow you no less faithfully for that!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," said the Duchess, a smile again transforming her open +features, "I will answer for that, Master Carey. Deeds are better than +names, and as for being a new man, what with Pagets and Cavendishes +and Spencers, we have nought but new men nowadays. So, cheer up!" she +continued kindly. "And we will poke no questions at you, though I +doubt whether you do not possess more birth and breeding than you +would have us think. And if, when we return to England, as I trust we +may before we are old men and women, we can advance your cause, then +let us have your secret. No one can say that Katherine Willoughby ever +forgot her friend."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Or forgave her enemy over quickly," quoth her husband naïvely.</p> + +<p class="normal">She rapped his knuckles with the back of her knife for that; and under +cover of this small diversion I had time to regain my composure. But +the matter left me sore at heart, and more than a little homesick. And +I sought leave to retire early.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are right!" said the Duchess, rising graciously. "To-night, after +being out in the air, you will sleep soundly, and to-morrow you will +be a new man," with a faint smile. "Believe me, I am not ungrateful, +Master Francis, and I will diligently seek occasion to repay both your +gallant defense of the other day and your future service." She gave me +her hand to kiss, and I bent over it. "Now," she continued, "do homage +to my baby, and then I shall consider that you are really one of us, +and pledged to our cause."</p> + +<p class="normal">I kissed the tiny fist held out to me, a soft pink thing looking like +some dainty sea-shell. Master Bertie cordially grasped my hand. And so +under the oil-lamp in the neat cabin of that old Dutch boat, somewhere +on the Waal between Gorcum and Nimuegen, we plighted our troth to one +another, and in a sense I became one of them.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I went to my berth cheered and encouraged by their kindness. But the +interview, satisfactory as it was, had set up no little excitement in +my brain, and it was long before I slept. When I did I had a strange +dream. I dreamed that I was sitting in the hall at Coton, and that +Petronilla was standing on the dais looking fixedly at me with gentle, +sorrowful eyes. I wanted to go to her, but I could not move; every +dreamer knows the sensation. I tried to call to her, to ask her what +was the matter, and why she so looked at me. But I could utter no +sound. And still she continued to fix me with the same sad, +reproachful eyes, in which I read a warning, yet could not ask its +meaning.</p> + +<p class="normal">I struggled so hard that at last the spell was in a degree broken. +Following the direction of her eyes I looked down at myself, and saw +fastened to the breast of my doublet the knot of blue velvet which she +had made for my sword-hilt, and which I had ever since carried in my +bosom. More, I saw, with a singular feeling of anger and sorrow, that +a hand which came over my shoulder was tugging hard at the ribbon in +the attempt to remove it.</p> + +<p class="normal">This gave me horrible concern, yet at the moment I could not move nor +do anything to prevent it. At last, making a stupendous effort, I +awoke, my last experience, dreaming, being of the strange hand working +at my breast. My first waking idea was the same, so that I threw out +my arms, and cried aloud, and sat up. "Ugh!" I exclaimed, trembling in +the intensity of my relief, as I looked about and welcomed the now +familiar surroundings. "It was only a dream. It was----"</p> + +<p class="normal">I stopped abruptly, my eyes falling on a form lurking in the doorway. +I could see it only dimly by the light of a hanging lamp, which smoked +and burned redly overhead. Yet I could see it. It was real, +substantial--a waking figure; nevertheless, a faint touch of +superstitious terror still clung to me. "Speak, please!" I asked. "Who +is it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is only I," answered a soft voice, well known to me--Mistress +Anne's. "I came in to see how you were," she continued, advancing a +little, "and whether you were sleeping. I am afraid I awoke you. But +you seemed," she added, "to be having such painful dreams that perhaps +it was as well I did."</p> + +<p class="normal">I was fumbling in my breast while she spoke; and certainly, whether in +my sleep I had undone the fastenings or had loosened them +intentionally before I lay down (though I could not remember doing +so), my doublet and shirt were open at the breast. The velvet knot was +safe, however, in that tiny inner pocket beside the letter, and I +breathed again. "I am very glad you did awake me!" I replied, looking +gratefully at her. "I was having a horrible dream. But how good it was +of you to think of me--and when you are not well yourself, too."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, I am better," she murmured, her eyes, which glistened in the +light, fixed steadily on me. "Much better. Now go to sleep again, and +happier dreams to you. After to-night," she added pleasantly, "I shall +no longer consider you as an invalid, nor intrude upon you."</p> + +<p class="normal">And she was gone before I could reiterate my thanks. The door fell to, +and I was alone, full of kindly feelings toward her, and of +thankfulness that my horrible vision had no foundation. "Thank +Heaven!" I murmured more than once, as I lay down; "it was only a +dream."</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Next day we reached Nimuegen, where we stayed a short time. Leaving +that place in the afternoon, twenty-four hours' journeying, partly by +river, partly, if I remember rightly, by canal, brought us to the +neighborhood of Arnheim on the Rhine. It was the 1st of March, but the +opening month belied its reputation. There was a brightness, a +softness in the air, and a consequent feeling as of spring which would +better have befitted the middle of April. All day we remained on deck +enjoying the kindliness of nature, which was especially grateful to +me, in whom the sap of health was beginning to spring again; and we +were still there when one of those gorgeous sunsets which are peculiar +to that country began to fling its hues across our path. We turned a +jutting promontory, the boat began to fall off, and the captain came +up, his errand to tell us that our journey was done.</p> + +<p class="normal">We went eagerly forward at the news, and saw in a kind of bay, formed +by a lake-like expansion of the river, a little island green and low, +its banks trimly set with a single row of poplars. It was perhaps a +quarter of a mile every way, and a channel one-fourth as wide +separated it from the nearer shore of the river; to which, however, a +long narrow bridge of planks laid on trestles gave access. On the +outer side of the island, facing the river's course, stood a low white +house, before which a sloping green terrace, also bordered with +poplars, led down to a tiny pier. Behind and around the house were +meadows as trim and neat as a child's toys, over which the eye roved +with pleasure until it reached the landward side of the island, and +there detected, nestling among gardens, a tiny village of half a dozen +cottages. It was a scene of enchanting peace and quietude. As we +slowly plowed our way up to the landing-place, I saw the rabbits stand +to gaze at us, and then with a flick of their heels dart off to their +holes. I marked the cattle moving homeward in a string, and heard the +wild fowl rise in creek and pool with a whir of wings. I turned with a +full heart to my neighbor. "Is it not lovely?" I cried with +enthusiasm. "Is it not a peaceful place--a very Garden of Eden?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked to see her fall into raptures such as women are commonly more +prone to than men. But all women are not the same. Mistress Anne was +looking, indeed, when I turned and surprised her, at the scene which +had so moved me, but the expression of her face was sad and bitter and +utterly melancholy. The weariness and fatigue I had often seen lurking +in her eyes had invaded all her features. She looked five years older; +no longer a girl, but a gray-faced, hopeless woman whom the sight of +this peaceful haven rather smote to the heart than filled with +anticipations of safety and repose.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was but for a moment I saw her so. Then she dashed her hand across +her eyes--though I saw no tears in them--and with a pettish +exclamation turned away. "Poor girl!" I thought. "She, too, is +homesick. No doubt this reminds her of some place at home, or of some +person." I thought this the more likely, as Master Bertie came from +Lincolnshire, which he said had many of the features of this strange +land. And it was conceivable enough that she should know Lincolnshire +too, being related to his wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">I soon forgot the matter in the excitement of landing. A few minutes +of bustle and it was over. The boat put out again; and we four were +left face to face with two strangers, an elderly man and a girl, who +had come down to the pier to meet us. The former, stout, bluff, and +red-faced, with a thick gray beard and a gold chain about his neck, +had the air of a man of position. He greeted us warmly. His companion, +who hung behind him, somewhat shyly, was as pretty a girl as one could +find in a month. A second look assured me of something more--that she +formed an excellent foil to the piquant brightness and keen vivacity, +the dark hair and nervous features of Mistress Anne. For the Dutch +girl was fair and plump and of perfect complexion. Her hair was very +light, almost flaxen indeed, and her eyes were softly and limpidly +blue; grave, innocent, wondering eyes they were, I remember. I guessed +rightly that she was the elderly man's daughter. Later I learned that +she was his only child, and that her name was Dymphna.</p> + +<p class="normal">He was a Master Lindstrom, a merchant of standing in Arnheim. He had +visited England and spoke English fairly, and being under some +obligations, it appeared, to the Duchess Katherine, was to be our +host.</p> + +<p class="normal">We all walked up the little avenue together. Master Lindstrom talking +as he went to husband or wife, while his daughter and Mistress Anne +came next, gazing each at each in silence, as women when they first +meet will gaze, taking stock, I suppose, of a rival's weapons. I +walked last, wondering why they had nothing to say to one another.</p> + +<p class="normal">As we entered the house the mystery was explained. "She speaks no +English," said Mistress Anne, with a touch of scorn.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And we no Dutch," I answered, smiling. "Here in Holland I am afraid +that she will have somewhat the best of us. Try her with Spanish."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Spanish! I know none."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I do, a little."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What, you know Spanish?" Mistress Anne's tone of surprise amounted +almost to incredulity, and it flattered me, boy that I was. I dare say +it would have flattered many an older head than mine. "You know +Spanish? Where did you learn it?" she continued sharply.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At home."</p> + +<p class="normal">"At home! Where is that?" And she eyed me still more closely. "Where +is your home, Master Carey? You have never told me."</p> + +<p class="normal">But I had said already more than I intended, and I shook my head. "I +mean," I explained awkwardly, "that I learned it in a home I once had. +Now my home is here. At any rate I have no other."</p> + +<p class="normal">The Dutch girl, standing patiently beside us, had looked first at one +face and then at the other as we talked. We were all by this time in a +long, low parlor, warmed by a pretty closed fireplace covered with +glazed tiles. On the shelves of a great armoire, or dresser, at one +end of the room appeared a fine show of silver plate. At the other end +stood a tall linen-press of walnut-wood, handsomely carved; and even +the gratings of the windows and the handles of the doors were of +hammered iron-work. There were no rushes on the floor, which was made +of small pieces of wood delicately joined and set together and +brightly polished. But everything in sight was clean and trim to a +degree which would have shamed our great house at Coton, where the +rushes sometimes lay for a week unchanged. With each glance round I +felt a livelier satisfaction. I turned to Mistress Dymphna.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Señorita!" I said, mustering my noblest accent. "Beso los pies de +usted! Habla usted Castillano?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Anne stared, while the effect on the girl whom I addressed +was greater than I had looked for, but certainly of a different kind. +She started and drew back, an expression of offended dignity and of +something like anger ruffling her placid face. Did she not understand? +Yes, for after a moment's hesitation, and with a heightened color, she +answered, "Si, Señor."</p> + +<p class="normal">Her constrained manner was not promising, but I was going on to open a +conversation if I could--for it looked little grateful of us to stand +there speechless and staring--when Mistress Anne interposed. "What did +you say to her? What was it?" she asked eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I asked her if she spoke Spanish. That was all," I replied, my eyes +on Dymphna's face, which still betrayed trouble of some kind, "except +that I paid her the usual formal compliment. But what is she saying to +her father?"</p> + +<p class="normal">It was like the Christmas game of cross-questions. The girl and I had +spoken in Spanish. I translated what we had said into English for +Mistress Anne, and Mistress Dymphna turned it into Dutch for her +father; an anxious look on her face which needed no translation.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" asked Master Bertie, observing that something was wrong.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is nothing--nothing!" replied the merchant apologetically, though, +as he spoke, his eyes dwelt on me curiously. "It is only that I did +not know that you had a Spaniard in your company."</p> + +<p class="normal">"A Spaniard?" Master Bertie answered. "We have none. This," pointing +to me, "is our very good friend and faithful follower, Master +Carey--an Englishman."</p> + +<p class="normal">"To whom," added the Duchess, smiling gravely, "I am greatly +indebted."</p> + +<p class="normal">I hurriedly explained the mistake, and brought at once a smile of +relief to the Mynheer's face. "Ah! pardon me, I beseech you," he said. +"My daughter was in error." And he added something in Dutch which +caused Mistress Dymphna to blush. "You know," he continued--"I may +speak freely to you, since our enemies are in the main the same--you +know that our Spanish rulers are not very popular with us, and grow +less popular every day, especially with those who are of the reformed +faith. We have learned some of us to speak their language, but we love +them none the better for that."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can sympathize with you, indeed," cried the Duchess impulsively. +"God grant that our country may never be in the same plight: though it +looks as if this Spanish marriage were like to put us in it. It is +Spain! Spain! Spain! and nothing else nowadays!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nevertheless, the Emperor is a great and puissant monarch," rejoined +the Arnheimer thoughtfully; "and could he rule us himself, we might do +well. But his dominions are so large, he knows little of us. And +worse, he is dying, or as good as dying. He can scarcely sit his +horse, and rumor says that before the year is out he will resign the +throne. Then we hear little good of his successor, your queen's +husband, and look to hear less. I fear that there is a dark time +before us, and God only knows the issue."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And alone will rule it," Master Bertie rejoined piously.</p> + +<p class="normal">This saying was in a way the keynote to the life we found our host +living on his island estate. Peace, but peace with constant fear for +an assailant, and religion for a supporter. Several times a week +Master Lindstrom would go to Arnheim to superintend his business, and +always after his return he would shake his head, and speak gravely, +and Dymphna would lose her color for an hour or two. Things were going +badly. The reformers were being more and more hardly dealt with. The +Spaniards were growing more despotic. That was his constant report. +And then I would see him, as he walked with us in orchard or garden, +or sat beside the stove, cast wistful glances at the comfort and +plenty round him. I knew that he was asking himself how long they +would last. If they escaped the clutches of a tyrannical government, +would they be safe in the times that were coming from the violence of +an ill-paid soldiery? The answer was doubtful, or rather it was too +certain.</p> + +<p class="normal">I sometimes wondered how he could patiently foresee such +possibilities, and take no steps, whatever the risk, to prevent them. +At first I thought his patience sprang from the Dutch character. Later +I traced its deeper roots to a simplicity of faith and a deep +religious feeling, which either did not at that time exist in England, +or existed only among people with whom I had never come into contact. +Here they seemed common enough and real enough. These folks' faith +sustained them. It was a part of their lives; a bulwark against the +fear that otherwise would have overwhelmed them. And to an extent, +too, which then surprised me, I found, as time went on, that the +Duchess and Master Bertie shared this enthusiasm, although with them +it took a less obtrusive form.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was led at the time to think a good deal about this; and just a word +I may say of myself, and of those days spent on the Rhine inland--that +whereas before I had taken but a lukewarm interest in religious +questions, and, while clinging instinctively to the teaching of my +childhood, had conformed with a light heart rather than annoy my +uncle, I came to think somewhat differently now; differently and more +seriously. And so I have continued to think since, though I have never +become a bigot; a fact I owe, perhaps, to Mistress Dymphna, in whose +tender heart there was room for charity as well as faith. For she was +my teacher.</p> + +<p class="normal">Of necessity, since no other of our party could communicate with her, +I became more or less the Dutch girl's companion. I would often, of an +evening, join her on a wooden bench which stood under an elm on a +little spit of grass looking toward the city, and at some distance +from the house. Here, when the weather was warm, she would watch for +her father's return; and here one day, while talking with her, I had +the opportunity of witnessing a sight unknown in England, but which +year by year was to become more common in the Netherlands, more +heavily fraught with menace in Netherland eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">We happened to be so deeply engaged in watching the upper end of the +reach at the time in question, where we expected each moment to see +Master Lindstrom's boat round the point, that we saw nothing of a boat +coming the other way, until the flapping of its sails, as it tacked, +drew our eyes toward it. Even then in the boat itself I saw nothing +strange, but in its passengers I did. They were swarthy, mustachioed +men, who in the hundred poses they assumed, as they lounged on deck or +leaned over the side, never lost a peculiar air of bravado. As they +drew nearer to us the sound of their loud voices, their oaths and +laughter reached us plainly, and seemed to jar on the evening +stillness. Their bold, fierce eyes, raking the banks unceasingly, +reached us at last. The girl by my side uttered a cry of alarm, and +rose as if to retreat. But she sat down again, for behind us was an +open stretch of turf, and to escape unseen was impossible. Already a +score of eyes had marked her beauty, and as the boat drew abreast of +us, I had to listen to the ribald jests and laughter of those on +board. My ears tingled and my cheeks burned. But I could do nothing. I +could only glare at them, and grind my teeth.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who are they?" I muttered. "The cowardly knaves!'</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, hush! hush!" the girl pleaded. She had retreated behind me. And +indeed I need not have put my question, for though I had never seen +the Spanish soldiery, I had heard enough about them to recognize them +now. In the year 1555 their reputation was at its height. Their +fathers had overcome the Moors after a contest of centuries, and they +themselves had overrun Italy and lowered the pride of France. As a +result they had many military virtues and all the military vices. +Proud, bloodthirsty, and licentious everywhere, it may be imagined +that in the subject Netherlands, with their pay always in arrear, they +were, indeed, people to be feared. It was seldom that even their +commanders dared to check their excesses.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet, when the first flush of my anger had subsided, I looked after +them, odd as it may seem, with mingled feelings. With all their faults +they were few against many, a conquering race in a foreign land. They +could boast of blood and descent. They were proud to call themselves +the soldiers and gentlemen of Europe. I was against them, yet I +admired them with a boy's admiration for the strong and reckless.</p> + +<p class="normal">Of course I said nothing of this to my companion. Indeed, when she +spoke to me I did not hear her. My thoughts had flown far from the +burgher's daughter sitting by me, and were with my grandmother's +people. I saw, in imagination, the uplands of Old Castile, as I had +often heard them described, hot in summer and bleak in winter. I +pictured the dark, frowning walls of Toledo, with its hundred Moorish +trophies, the castles that crowned the hills around, the gray olive +groves, and the box-clad slopes. I saw Palencia, where my grandmother, +Petronilla de Vargas, was born; Palencia, dry and brown and sun-baked, +lying squat and low on its plain, the eaves of its cathedral a man's +height from the ground. All this I saw. I suppose the Spanish blood in +me awoke and asserted itself at sight of those other Spaniards. And +then--then I forgot it all as I heard behind me an alien voice, and I +turned and found Dymphna had stolen from me and was talking to a +stranger.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IX.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_09" href="#div1Ref_09">PLAYING WITH FIRE.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">He was a young man, and a Dutchman, but not a Dutchman of the stout, +burly type which I had most commonly seen in the country. He had, it +is true, the usual fair hair and blue eyes, and he was rather short +than tall; but his figure was thin and meager, and he had a pointed +nose and chin, and a scanty fair beard. I took him to be nearsighted: +at a second glance I saw that he was angry. He was talking fast to +Dymphna--of course in Dutch--and my first impulse, in face of his +excited gestures and queer appearance, was to laugh. But I had a +notion what his relationship to the girl was, and I smothered this, +and instead asked, as soon as I could get a word in, whether I should +leave them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, no!" Dymphna answered, blushing slightly, and turning to me with +a troubled glance. I believe she had clean forgotten my presence. +"This is Master Jan Van Tree, a good friend of ours. And this," she +continued, still in Spanish, but speaking to him, "is Master Carey, +one of my father's guests."</p> + +<p class="normal">We bowed, he formally, for he had not recovered his temper, and I--I +dare say I still had my Spanish ancestors in my head--with +condescension. We disliked one another at sight, I think. I dubbed him +a mean little fellow, a trader, a peddler; and, however he classed me, +it was not favorably. So it was no particular desire to please him +which led me to say with outward solicitude, "I fear you are annoyed +at something, Master Van Tree?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am!" he said bluntly, meeting me half-way.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And am I to know the cause?" I asked, "or is it a secret?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is no secret!" he retorted. "Mistress Lindstrom should have been +more careful. She should not have exposed herself to the chance of +being seen by those miserable foreigners."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The foreigners--in the boat?" I said dryly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, of course--in the boat," he answered. He was obliged to say +that, but he glared at me across her as he spoke. We had turned and +were walking back to the house, the poplars casting long shadows +across our path.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They were rude," I observed carelessly, my chin very high. "But there +is no particular harm done that I can see, Master Van Tree."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Perhaps not, as far as you can see," he retorted in great excitement. +"But perhaps also you are not very far-sighted. You may not see it +now, yet harm will follow."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Possibly," I said, and I was going to follow up this seemingly candid +admission by something very boorish, when Mistress Dymphna struck in +nervously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My father is anxious," she explained, speaking to me, "that I should +have as little to do with our Spanish governors as possible, Master +Carey. It always vexes him to hear that I have fallen in their way, +and that is why my friend feels annoyed. It was not, of course, your +fault, since you did not know of this. It was I," she continued +hurriedly, "who should not have ventured to the elm tree without +seeing that the coast was clear."</p> + +<p class="normal">I knew that she was timidly trying, her color coming and going, to +catch my eye; to appease me as the greater stranger, and to keep the +peace between her ill-matched companions, who, indeed, stalked along +eying one another much as a wolf-hound and a badger-dog might regard +each other across a choice bone. But the young Dutchman's sudden +appearance had put me out. I was not in love with her, yet I liked to +talk to her, and I grudged her to him, he seemed so mean a fellow. And +so--churl that I was--in answer to her speech I let drop some sneer +about the great fear of the Spaniards which seemed to prevail in these +parts.</p> + +<p class="normal">"<i>You</i> are not afraid of them, then?" Van Tree said, with a smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, I am not," I answered, my lip curling also.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" with much meaning. "Perhaps you do not know them very well."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Perhaps not," I replied. "Still, my grandmother was a Spaniard."</p> + +<p class="normal">"So I should have thought," he retorted swiftly.</p> + +<p class="normal">So swiftly that I felt the words as I should have felt a blow. "What +do you mean?" I blurted out, halting before him, with my cheek +crimson. In vain were all Dymphna's appealing glances, all her signs +of distress. "I will have you explain, Master Van Tree, what you mean +by that?" I repeated fiercely.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I mean what I said," he answered, confronting me stubbornly, and +shaking off Dymphna's hand. His blue eyes twinkled with rage, his thin +beard bristled; he was the color of a turkey-cock's comb. At home we +should have thought him a comical little figure; but he did not seem +so absurd here. For one thing, he looked spiteful enough for anything; +and for another, though I topped him by a head and shoulders, I could +not flatter myself that he was afraid of me. On the contrary, I felt +that in the presence of his mistress, small and short-sighted as he +was, he would have faced a lion without winking.</p> + +<p class="normal">His courage was not to be put to the proof. I was still glaring at +him, seeking some retort which should provoke him beyond endurance, +when a hand was laid on my shoulder, and I turned to find that Master +Bertie and the Duchess had joined us.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So here are the truants," the former said pleasantly, speaking in +English, and showing no consciousness whatever of the crisis in the +middle of which he had come up, though he must have discerned in our +defiant attitudes, and in Dymphna's troubled face, that something was +wrong. "You know who this is, Master Francis," he continued heartily. +"Or have you not been introduced to Master Van Tree, the betrothed of +our host's daughter?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mistress Dymphna has done me that honor," I said stiffly, recovering +myself in appearance, while at heart sore and angry with everybody. +"But I fear the Dutch gentleman has not thanked her for the +introduction, since he learned that my grandmother was Spanish."</p> + +<p class="normal">"<i>Your</i> grandmother, do you mean?" cried the Duchess, much astonished.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, madam."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, to be sure!" she exclaimed, lifting up her hands and appealing +whimsically to the others. "This boy is full of starts and surprises. +You never know what he will produce next. The other day it was a +warrant! To-day it is a grandmother, and a temper!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I could not be angry with her; and perhaps I was not sorry now that my +quarrel with the young Dutchman had stopped where it had. I affected, +as well as I could, to join in the laugh at my expense, and took +advantage of the arrival of our host--who at this moment came up the +slope from the landing-place, his hands outstretched and a smile of +greeting on his kindly face--to slip away unnoticed, and make amends +to my humor by switching off the heads of the withes by the river.</p> + +<p class="normal">But naturally the scene left a degree of ill-feeling behind it; and +for the first time, during the two months we had spent under Master +Lindstrom's roof, the party who sat down to supper were under some +constraint. I felt that the young Dutchman had had the best of the +bout in the garden; and I talked loudly and foolishly in the boyish +attempt to assert myself, and to set myself right at least in my own +estimation. Master Van Tree meanwhile sat silent, eying me from time +to time in no friendly fashion. Dymphna seemed nervous and frightened, +and the Duchess and her husband exchanged troubled glances. Only our +host and Mistress Anne, who was in particularly good spirits, were +unaffected by the prevailing chill.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Anne, indeed, in her ignorance, made matters worse. She had +begun to pick up some Dutch, and was fond of airing her knowledge and +practicing fresh sentences at meal-times. By some ill-luck she +contrived this evening--particularly after, finding no one to +contradict me, I had fallen into comparative silence--to frame her +sentences so as to cause as much embarrassment as possible to all of +us. "Where did you walk with Dymphna this morning?" was the question +put to me. "You are fond of the water; Englishmen are fond of the +water," she said to Dymphna. "Dymphna is tall; Master Francis is tall. +I sit by you to-night; the Dutch lady sat by you last night," and +soon, and so on, with prattle which seemed to amuse our host +exceedingly--he was never tired of correcting her mistakes--but which +put the rest of us out of countenance, bringing the tears to poor +Dymphna's eyes--she did not know where to look--and making her lover +glower at me as though he would eat me.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was in vain that the Duchess made spasmodic rushes into +conversation, and in the intervals nodded and frowned at the +delinquent. Mistress Anne in her innocence saw nothing. She went on +until Van Tree could stand it no longer, and with a half-smothered +threat, which was perfectly intelligible to me, rose roughly from the +table, and went to the door as if to look out at the night.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is the matter?" Mistress Anne said, wonderingly, in English. Her +eyes seemed at length to be opened to the fact that something was +amiss with us.</p> + +<p class="normal">Before I could answer, the Duchess, who had risen, came behind her. +"You little fool!" she whispered fiercely, "if fool you are. You +deserve to be whipped!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why, what have I done?" murmured the girl, really frightened now, and +appealing to me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Done!" whispered the Duchess; and I think she pinched her, for my +neighbor winced. "More harm than you guess, you minx! And for you, +Master Francis, a word with you. Come with me to my room, please."</p> + +<p class="normal">I went with her, half-minded to be angry, and half-inclined to feel +ashamed of myself. She did not give me time, however, to consider +which attitude I should take up, for the moment the door of her room +was closed behind us, she turned upon me, the color high in her +cheeks. "Now, young man," she said in a tone of ringing contempt, "do +you really think that that girl is in love with you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What girl?" I asked sheepishly. The unexpected question and her tone +put me out of countenance.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What girl? What girl?" she replied impatiently. "Don't play with me, +boy! You know whom I mean. Dymphna Lindstrom!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, I thought you meant Mistress Anne," I said, somewhat +impertinently.</p> + +<p class="normal">Her face fell in an extraordinary fashion, as if the suggestion were +not pleasant to her. But she answered on the instant: "Well! The +vanity of the lad! Do you think all the girls are in love with you? +Because you have been sitting with a pretty face on each side of you, +do you think you have only to throw the handkerchief, this way or +that? If you do, open your eyes, and you will find it is not so. My +kinswoman can take care of herself, so we will leave her out of the +discussion, please. And for this pink and white Dutch girl," my lady +continued viciously, "let me tell you that she thinks more of Van +Tree's little finger than of your whole body."</p> + +<p class="normal">I shrugged my shoulders, but still I was mortified. A young man may +not be in love with a girl, yet it displeases him to hear that she is +indifferent to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">The Duchess noticed the movement. "Don't do that," she cried in +impatient scorn. "You do not see much in Master Van Tree, perhaps? I +thought not. Therefore you think a girl must be of the same mind as +yourself. Well," with a fierce little nod, "you will learn some day +that it is not so, that women are not quite what men think them; and +particularly, Master Francis, that six feet of manhood, and a pretty +face on top of it, do not always have their way. But there, I did not +bring you here to tell you that. I want to know whether you are aware +what you are doing?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I muttered something to the effect that I did not know I was doing any +harm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You do not call it harm, then," the Duchess retorted with energy, "to +endanger the safety of every one of us? Cannot you see that if you +insult and offend this young man--which you are doing out of pure +wanton mischief, for you are not in love with the girl--he may ruin +us?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ruin us?" I repeated incredulously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, ruin us!" she cried. "Here we are, living more or less in hiding +through the kindness of Master Lindstrom--living in peace and +quietness. But do you suppose that inquiries are not being made for +us? Why, I would bet a dozen gold angels that Master Clarence is in +the Netherlands, at this moment, tracking us."</p> + +<p class="normal">I was startled by this idea, and she saw I was. "We can trust Master +Lindstrom, were it only for his own sake," she continued more quietly, +satisfied perhaps with the effect she had produced. "And this young +man, who is the son of one of the principal men of Arnheim, is also +disposed to look kindly on us, as I fancy it is his nature to look. +But if you make mischief between Dymphna and him----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have not," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then do not," she replied sharply. "Look to it for the future. And +more, do not let him fancy it possible. Jealousy is as easily awakened +as it is hardly put to sleep. A word from this young man to the +Spanish authorities, and we should be hauled back to England in a +trice, if worse did not befall us here. Now, you will be careful?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will," I said, conscience-stricken and a little cowed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is better," she replied smiling. "I think you will. Now go."</p> + +<p class="normal">I went down again with some food for thought--with some good +intentions, too. But I was to find--the discovery is made by +many--that good resolutions commonly come too late. When I went +downstairs I found my host and Master Bertie alone in the parlor. The +girls had disappeared, so had Van Tree, and I saw at once that +something had happened. Master Bertie was standing gazing at the stove +very thoughtfully, and the Dutchman was walking up and down the room +with an almost comical expression of annoyance and trouble on his +pleasant face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where are the young ladies?" I asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Upstairs," said Master Bertie, not looking at me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And--and Van Tree?" I asked mechanically. Somehow I anticipated the +answer.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Gone!" said the Englishman curtly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, gone, the foolish lad!" the Dutchman struck in, tugging at his +beard. "What has come to him? He is not wont to show temper. I have +never known him and Dymphna have a cross word before. What has come to +the lad, I say, to go off in a passion at this time of night? And no +one knows whither he has gone, or when he will come back again!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He seemed as he spoke hardly conscious of my presence; but Master +Bertie turned and looked at me, and I hung my head, and very shortly +afterward, I slunk out. The thought of what I might have brought upon +us all by my petulance and vanity made me feel sick. I crept up to bed +nervous and fearful of the morrow, listening to every noise without, +and praying inwardly that my alarm might not be justified.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">When the morrow came I went downstairs as anxious to see Van Tree in +the flesh as I had been yesterday disappointed by his appearance. But +no Van Tree was there to be seen. Nothing had been heard of him. +Dymphna moved restlessly about, her cheeks pale, her eyes downcast, +and if I had ever flattered myself that I was anything to the girl, I +was undeceived now. The Duchess shot angry glances at me from time to +time. Master Bertie kept looking anxiously at the door. Every one +seemed to fear and to expect something. But none of them feared and +expected it as I did.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He must have gone home; he must have gone to Arnheim," said our host, +trying to hide his vexation. "He will be back in a day or two. Young +men will be young men."</p> + +<p class="normal">But I found that the Duchess did not share the belief that Van Tree +had gone home; for in the course of the morning she took occasion, +when we were alone, to charge me to be careful not to come into +collision with him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How can I, now he has gone?" I said meekly, feeling I was in +disgrace.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He has not gone far," replied the Duchess meaningly. "Depend upon it, +he will not go far out of sight unless there is more harm done than I +think, or he is very different from English lovers. But if you come +across him, I pray you to keep clear of him, Master Francis."</p> + +<p class="normal">I nodded assent.</p> + +<p class="normal">But of what weight are resolutions, with fate in the other scale! It +was some hours after this, toward two o'clock indeed, when Mistress +Anne came to me, looking flurried and vexed. "Have you seen Dymphna?" +she asked abruptly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I answered. "Why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because she is not in the house," the girl answered, speaking +quickly, "nor in the garden; and the last time I saw her she was +crossing the island toward the footbridge. I think she has gone that +way to be on the lookout--you can guess for whom [with a smile]. But I +am fearful lest she shall meet some one else, Master Francis; she is +wearing her gold chain, and one of the maids says that she saw two of +the Spanish garrison on the road near the end of the footbridge this +morning. That is the way by land to Arnheim, you know."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is bad," I said. "What is to be done?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You must go and look for her," Anne suggested. "She should not be +alone."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let her father go, or Master Bertie," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Her father has gone down the river--to Arnheim, I expect; and Master +Bertie is fishing in a boat somewhere. It will take time to find him. +Why cannot you go? If she has crossed the footbridge she will not be +far away."</p> + +<p class="normal">She seemed so anxious as she spoke for the Dutch girl's safety, that +she infected me with her fears, and I let myself be persuaded. After +all there might be danger, and I did not see what else was to be done. +Indeed, Mistress Anne did not leave me until she had seen me clear of +the orchard and half across the meadows toward the footbridge. "Mind +you bring her back," she cried after me. "Do not let her come alone!" +And those were her last words.</p> + +<p class="normal">After we had separated I did think for a moment that it was a pity I +had not asked her to come with me. But the thought occurred too late, +and I strode on toward the head of the bridge, resolving that, as soon +as I had sighted Dymphna, I would keep away from her and content +myself with watching over her from a distance. As I passed by the +little cluster of cottages on the landward side of the island, I +glanced sharply about me, for I thought it not unlikely that Master +Van Tree might be lurking in the neighborhood. But I saw nothing +either of her or him. All was quiet, the air full of spring sunshine +and warmth and hope and the blossoms of fruit trees; and with an +indefinable pleasure, a feeling of escape from control and restraint, +I crossed the long footbridge, and set foot, almost for the first time +since our arrival--for at Master Lindstrom's desire we had kept very +close--on the river bank.</p> + +<p class="normal">To the right a fair road or causeway along the waterside led to +Arnheim. At the point where I stood, this road on its way from the +city took a turn at right angles, running straight away from the river +to avoid a wide track of swamp and mere which lay on my left--a +quaking marsh many miles round, overgrown with tall rushes and sedges, +which formed the head of the bay in which our island lay. I looked up +the long, straight road to Arnheim, and saw only a group of travelers +moving slowly along it, their backs toward me. The road before me was +bare of passengers. Where, then, was Dymphna, if she had crossed the +bridge? In the last resort I scanned the green expanse of rushes and +willows, which stretched, with intervals of open water, as far as the +eye could reach on my left. It was all rustling and shimmering in the +light breeze, but my eye picked out one or two raised dykes which +penetrated it here and there, and served at once as pathways to islets +in the mere and as breastworks against further encroachments of the +river. Presently, on one of these, of which the course was fairly +defined by a line of willows, I made out the flutter of a woman's +hood. And I remembered that the day before I had heard Dymphna express +a wish to go to the marsh for some herb which grew there.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Right!" I said, seating myself with much satisfaction on the last +post of the bridge. "She is safe enough there! And I will go no +nearer. It is only on the road she is likely to be in danger from our +Spanish gallants!"</p> + +<p class="normal">My eyes, released from duty, wandered idly over the landscape for a +while, but presently returned to the dyke across the mere. I could not +now see Dymphna. The willows hid her, and I waited for her to +reappear. She did not, but some one else did; for by and by, on the +same path and crossing an interval between the willows, there came +into sight a man's form.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ho! ho!" I said, following it with my eyes. "So I may go home! Master +Van Tree is on the track. And now I hope they will make it up!" I +added pettishly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Another second and I started up with a low cry. The sunlight had +caught a part of the man's dress, a shining something which flashed +back a point of intense light. The something I guessed at once was a +corselet, and it needed scarce another thought to apprise me that +Dymphna's follower was not Van Tree at all, but a Spanish soldier!</p> + +<p class="normal">I lost no time; yet it took me a minute--a minute of trembling haste +and anxiety--to discover the path from the causeway on to the dyke. +When once I had stumbled on to the latter I found I had lost sight of +both figures; but I ran along at the top of my speed, calculating that +the two, who could not be far apart, the man being the nearer to me, +were about a quarter of a mile or rather more from the road. I had +gone one-half of this distance perhaps when a shrill scream in front +caused me to redouble my efforts. I expected to find the ruffian in +the act of robbing the girl, and clutched my cudgel--for, alas! I had +left my sword at home--more tightly in my grasp, so that it was an +immense relief to me when, on turning an angle in the dyke, I saw her +running toward me. Her face, still white with fear, however, and her +hair streaming loosely behind her, told how narrow had been her +escape--if escape it could be called. For about ten feet behind her, +the hood he had plucked off still in his grasp, came Master Spaniard, +hot-foot and panting, but gaining on her now with every stride.</p> +<br> + +<p class="center"><img border="0" src="images/stood.png" alt="stood"><br> +I STOOD OVER HIM WATCHING HIM</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">He was a tall fellow, gayly dressed, swarthy, mustachioed, and +fierce-eyed. His corselet and sword-belt shone and jingled as he ran +and swore; but he had dropped his feathered bonnet in the slight +struggle which had evidently taken place when she got by him; and it +lay a black spot in the middle of the grassy avenue behind him. The +sun--it was about three hours after noon--was at my back, and shining +directly into his eyes, and I marked this as I raised my cudgel and +jumped aside to let the girl pass; for she in her blind fear would +have run against me.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was almost the same with him. He did not see me until I was within +a few paces of him, and even then I think he noticed my presence +merely as that of an unwelcome spectator. He fancied I should step +aside; and he cursed me, calling me a Dutch dog for getting in his +way.</p> + +<p class="normal">The next moment--he had not drawn his sword nor made any attempt to +draw it--we came together violently, and I had my hand on his throat. +We swayed as we whirled round one another in the first shock of the +collision. A cry of astonishment escaped him--astonishment at my +hardihood. He tried, his eyes glaring into mine, and his hot breath on +my cheek, to get at his dagger. But it was too late. I brought down my +staff, with all the strength of an arm nerved at the moment by rage +and despair, upon his bare head.</p> + +<p class="normal">He went down like a stone, and the blood bubbled from his lips. I +stood over him watching him. He stretched himself out and turned with +a convulsive movement on his face. His hands clawed the grass. His leg +moved once, twice, a third time faintly. Then he lay still.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a lark singing just over my head, and its clear notes +seemed, during the long, long minute while I stood bending over him in +an awful fascination, to be the only sounds in nature. I looked so +long at him in that dreadful stillness and absorption, I dared not at +last look up lest I should see I knew not what. Yet when a touch fell +on my arm I did not start.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have killed him!" the girl whispered, shuddering.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I have killed him," I answered mechanically.</p> + +<p class="normal">I could not take my eyes off him. It was not as if I had done this +thing after a long conflict, or in a <i>mêlée</i> with others fighting +round me, or on the battle-field. I should have felt no horror then +such as I felt now, standing over him in the sunshine with the lark's +song in my ears. It had happened so quickly, and the waste about us +was so still; and I had never killed a man before, nor seen a man die.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, come away!" Dymphna wailed suddenly. "Come away!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I turned then, and the sight of the girl's wan face and strained eyes +recalled me in some degree to myself. I saw she was ill; and hastily I +gave her my arm, and partly carried, partly supported, her back to the +road. The way seemed long and I looked behind me often. But we reached +the causeway at last, and there in the open I felt some relief. Yet +even then, stopping to cast a backward glance at the marsh, I +shuddered anew, espying a bright white spark gleaming amid the green +of the rushes. It was the dead man's corselet. But if it had been his +eye I could scarcely have shrunk from it in greater dread.</p> + +<p class="normal">It will be imagined that we were not long in crossing the island. +Naturally I was full of what had happened, and never gave a thought to +Van Tree's jealousy, or the incidents of his short visit. I had indeed +forgotten his existence until we reached the porch. There entering +rapidly, with Dymphna clinging to my arm, I was so oblivious of other +matters that when the young Dutchman rose suddenly from the seat on +one side of the door, and at the same moment the Duchess rose from the +bench on the other, I did not understand in the first instant of +surprise what was the matter, though I let Dymphna's hand fall from my +arm. The dark scowling face of the one, however, and the anger and +chagrin written on the features of the other, as they both glared at +us, brought all back to me in a flash. But it was too late. Before I +could utter a word the girl's lover pushed by me with a fierce gesture +and fiercer cry, and disappeared round a corner of the house.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Was ever such folly!" cried the Duchess, stamping her foot, and +standing before us, her face crimson. "Or such fools! You idiot! +You----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hush, madam," I said sternly--had I really grown older in doing the +deed? "something has happened."</p> + +<p class="normal">And Dymphna, with a low cry of "The Spaniard! The Spaniard!" tottered +up to her and fainted in her arms.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER X.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_10" href="#div1Ref_10">THE FACE IN THE PORCH.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"This is a serious matter," said Master Bertie thoughtfully, as we sat +in conclave an hour later round the table in the parlor. Mistress Anne +was attending to Dymphna upstairs, and Van Tree had not returned +again; so that we had been unable to tell him of the morning's +adventure. But the rest of us were there. "It considerably adds to the +danger of our position," Bertie continued.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course it does," his wife said promptly. "But Master Lindstrom +here can best judge of that, and of what course it will be safest to +take."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It depends," our host answered slowly, "upon whether the dead man be +discovered before night. You see if the body be not found----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" said my lady impatiently, as he paused.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then we must some of us go after dark and bury him," he decided. "And +perhaps, though he will be missed at the next roll-call in the city, +his death may not be proved, or traced to this neighborhood. In that +case the storm will blow over, and things be no worse than before."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I fear there is no likelihood of that," I said; "for I am told he had +a companion. One of the maids noticed them lurking about the end of +the bridge more than once this morning."</p> + +<p class="normal">Our host's face fell.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is bad," he said, looking at me in evident consternation. "Who +told you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Mistress Anne. And one of the maids told her. It was that which led +me to follow your daughter."</p> + +<p class="normal">The old man got up for about the fortieth time, and shook my hand, +while the tears stood in his eyes and his lip trembled. "Heaven bless +you, Master Carey!" he said. "But for you, my girl might not have +escaped."</p> + +<p class="normal">He could not finish. His emotion choked him, and he sat down again. +The event of the morning--his daughter's danger, and my share in +averting it--had touched him as nothing else could have touched him. I +met the Duchess's eyes and they too were soft and shining, wearing an +expression very different from that which had greeted me on my return +with Dymphna.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah, well! she is safe," Master Lindstrom resumed, when he had +regained his composure. "Thanks to Heaven and your friend, madam! +Small matter now if house and lands go!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Still, let us hope they will not," Master Bertie said. "Do you think +these miscreants were watching the island on our account? That some +information had been given as to our presence, and they were sent to +learn what they could?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no!" the Dutchman answered confidently. "It was the sight of the +girl and her gewgaws yesterday brought them--the villains! There is +nothing safe from them and nothing sacred to them. They saw her as +they passed up in the boat, you remember."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But then, supposing the worst to come to the worst?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"We must escape across the frontier to Wesel, in the Duchy of Cleves," +replied Lindstrom in a matter-of-fact tone, as if he had long +considered and settled the point. "The distance is not great, and in +Wesel we may find shelter, at any rate for a time. Even there, if +pressure be brought to bear upon the Government to give us up, I would +not trust it. Yet for a time it may do."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you would leave all this?" the Duchess said in wonder, her eyes +traveling round the room, so clean and warm and comfortable, and +settling at length upon the great armoire of plate, which happened to +be opposite to her. "You would leave all this at a moment's notice?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, madam, all we could not carry with us," he answered simply. +"Honor and life, these come first. And I thank Heaven that I live here +within reach of a foreign soil, and not in the interior, where escape +would be hopeless."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But if the true facts were known," the Duchess urged, "would you +still be in danger? Would not the magistrates protect you? The Schout +and Schepen as you call them? They are Dutchmen."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Against a Spanish governor and a Spanish garrison?" he replied with +emphasis. "Ay, they would protect me--as one sheep protects another +against the wolves. No! I dare not risk it. Were I in prison, what +would become of Dymphna?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Master Van Tree?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He has the will to shelter her, no doubt. And his father has +influence; but such as mine--a broken reed to trust to. Then Dymphna +is not all. Once in prison, whatever the charge, there would be +questioning about religion; perhaps," with a faint smile, "questioning +about my guests."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I suppose you know best," said the Duchess, with a sigh. "But I hope +the worst will not come to the worst."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Amen to that!" he answered quite cheerfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">Indeed, it was strange that we seemed to feel more sorrow at the +prospect of leaving this haven of a few weeks, than our host of +quitting the home of a lifetime. But the necessity had come upon us +suddenly, while he had contemplated it for years. So much fear and +humiliation had mingled with his enjoyment of his choicest possessions +that this long-expected moment brought with it a feeling akin to +relief.</p> + +<p class="normal">For myself I had a present trouble that outweighed any calamity of +to-morrow. Perforce, since I alone knew the spot where the man lay, I +must be one of the burying party. My nerves had not recovered from the +blow which the sight of the Spaniard lying dead at my feet had dealt +them so short a time before, and I shrank with a natural repulsion +from the task before me. Yet there was no escaping it, no chance of +escaping it, I saw.</p> + +<p class="normal">None the less, throughout the silent meal to which we four sat down +together, neither the girls nor Van Tree appearing, were my thoughts +taken up with the business which was to follow. I heard our host, who +was to go with me, explaining that there was a waterway right up to +the dyke, and that we would go by boat; and heard him with apathy. +What matter how we went, if such were the object of our journey? +I wondered how the man's face would look when we came to turn him +over, and pictured it in all ghastliest shapes. I wondered whether I +should ever forget the strange spasmodic twitching of his leg, the +gurgle--half oath, half cry--which had come with the blood from his +throat. When Lindstrom said the moon was up and bade me come with him +to the boat, I went mechanically. No one seemed to suspect me of fear. +I suppose they thought that, as I had not feared to kill him, I should +not fear him dead. And in the general silence and moodiness I escaped +notice.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"It is a good night for the purpose," the Dutchman said, looking about +when we were outside. "It is light enough for us, yet not so light +that we run much risk of being seen."</p> + +<p class="normal">I assented, shivering. The moon was almost at the full, and the +weather was dry, but scud after scud of thin clouds, sweeping across +the breezy sky, obscured the light from time to time, and left nothing +certain. We loosed the smallest boat in silence, and getting in, +pulled gently round the lower end of the island, making for the fringe +of rushes which marked the line of division between river and fen. We +could hear the frogs croaking in the marsh, and the water lapping the +banks, and gurgling among the tree-roots, and making a hundred strange +noises to which daylight ears are deaf. Yet as long as I was in the +open water I felt bold enough. I kept my tremors for the moment when +we should brush through the rustling belt of reeds, and the willows +should whisper about our heads, and the rank vegetation, the +mysterious darkness of the mere should shut us in.</p> + +<p class="normal">For a time I was to be spared this. Master Lindstrom suddenly stopped +rowing. "We have forgotten to bring a stone, lad," he said in a low +voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A stone?" I answered, turning. I was pulling the stroke oar, and my +back was toward him. "Do we want a stone?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"To sink the body," he replied. "We cannot bury it in the marsh, and +if we could it were trouble thrown away. We must have a stone."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is to be done?" I asked, leaning on my oar and shivering, as +much in impatience as nervousness. "Must we go back?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, we are not far from the causeway now," he answered, with Dutch +coolness. "There are some big stones, I fancy, by the end of the +bridge. If not, there are some lying among the cottages just across +the bridge. Your eyes are younger than mine, so you had better go. I +will pull on, and land you."</p> + +<p class="normal">I assented, and the boat's course being changed a point or two, three +minutes' rowing laid her bows on the mud, some fifty yards from the +landward bend of the bridge, and just in the shadow of the causeway. I +sprang ashore and clambered up. "Hist!" he cried, warning me as I was +about to start on my errand. "Go about it quietly, Master Francis. The +people will probably be in bed. But be secret."</p> + +<p class="normal">I nodded and moved off, as warily as he could desire. I spent a minute +or two peering about the causeway, but I found nothing that would +serve our purpose. There was no course left then but to cross the +planks, and seek what I wanted in the hamlet. Remembering how the +timbers had creaked and clattered when I went over them in the +daylight, I stole across on tiptoe. I fancied I had seen a pile of +stones near one of the posts at that end, but I could not find them +now, and after groping about a while--for this part was at the moment +in darkness--I crept cautiously past the first hovel, peering to right +and left as I went. I did not like to confess to myself that I was +afraid to be alone in the dark, but that was nearly the truth. I was +feverishly anxious to find what I wanted and return to my companion.</p> + +<p class="normal">Suddenly I paused and held my breath. A slight sound had fallen on my +ears, nervously ready to catch the slightest. I paused and listened. +Yes, there it was again; a whispering of cautious voices close by me, +within a few feet of me. I could see no one. But a moment's thought +told me that the speakers were hidden by the farther corner of the +cottage abreast of which I stood. The sound of human voices, the +assurance of living companionship, steadied my nerves, and to some +extent rid me of my folly. I took a step to one side, so as to be more +completely in the shadow cast by the reed-thatched eaves, and then +softly advanced until I commanded a view of the whisperers.</p> + +<p class="normal">They were two, a man and a woman. And the woman was of all people +Dymphna! She had her back to me, but she stood in the moonlight, and I +knew her hood in a moment. The man--surely the man was Van Tree then, +if the woman was Dymphna? I stared. I felt sure it must be Van Tree. +It was wonderful enough that Dymphna should so far have regained nerve +and composure as to rise and come out to meet him. But in that case +her conduct, though strange, was explicable. If not, however, if the +man were not Van Tree----</p> + +<p class="normal">Well, he certainly was not. Stare as I might, rub my eyes as I might, +I could not alter the man's figure, which was of the tallest, whereas +I have said that the young Dutchman was short. This man's face, too, +though it was obscured as he bent over the girl by his cloak, which +was pulled high up about his throat, was swarthy; swarthy and +beardless, I made out. More, his cap had a feather, and even as he +stood still I thought I read the soldier in his attitude. The soldier +and the Spaniard!</p> + +<p class="normal">What did it mean? On what strange combination had I lit? Dymphna and a +Spaniard! Impossible. Yet a thousand doubts and thoughts ran riot in +my brain, a thousand conjectures jostled one another to get uppermost. +What was I to do? What ought I to do? Go nearer to them, as near as +possible, and listen and learn the truth? Or steal back the way I had +come, and fetch Master Lindstrom? But first, was it certain that the +girl was there of her own free will? Yes, the question was answered as +soon as put. The man laid his hand gently on her shoulder. She did not +draw back.</p> + +<p class="normal">Confident of this, and consequently of Dymphna's bodily safety, I +hesitated, and was beginning to consider whether the best course might +not be to withdraw and say nothing, leaving the question of future +proceedings to be decided after I had spoken to her on the morrow, +when a movement diverted my thoughts. The man at last raised his head. +The moonlight fell cold and bright on his face, displaying every +feature as clearly as if it had been day. And though I had only once +seen his face before, I knew it again.</p> + +<p class="normal">And knew him! In a second I was back in England, looking on a far +different scene. I saw the Thames, its ebb tide rippling in the +sunshine as it ripples past Greenwich, and a small boat gliding over +it, and a man in the bow of the boat, a man with a grim lip and a +sinister eye. Yes, the tall soldier talking to Dymphna in the +moonlight, his cap the cap of a Spanish guard, was Master Clarence! +the Duchess's chief enemy!</p> + +<p style="text-align:center; letter-spacing:20pt">* * * * *</p> + +<p class="normal">I stayed my foot. With a strange settling into resolve of all +my +doubts I felt if my sword, which happily I had brought with me, was +loose in its sheath, and leaned forward scanning him. So he had +tracked us! He was here! With wonderful vividness I pictured all the +dangers which menaced the Duchess, Master Bertie, the Lindstroms, +myself, through his discovery of us, all the evils which would befall +us if the villain went away with his tale. Forgetting Dymphna's +presence, I set my teeth hard together. He should not escape me this +time.</p> + +<p class="normal">But man can only propose. As I took a step forward, I trod on a round +piece of wood which turned under my foot, and I stumbled. My eye left +the pair for a second. When it returned to them they had taken the +alarm. Dymphna had started away, and I saw her figure retreating +swiftly in the direction of the house. The man poised himself a moment +irresolute opposite to me; then dashed aside and disappeared behind +the cottage.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was after him on the instant, my sword out, and caught sight of his +cloak as he whisked round a corner. He dodged me twice round the next +cottage, the one nearer the river. Then he broke away and made for the +bridge, his object evidently to get off the island. But he seemed at +last to see that I was too quick for him--as I certainly was--and +should catch him half way across the narrow planking; and changing his +mind again he doubled nimbly back and rushed into the open porch of a +cottage, and I heard his sword ring out. I had him at bay.</p> + +<p class="normal">At bay indeed! But ready as I was, and resolute to capture or kill +him, I paused. I hesitated to run in on him. The darkness of the porch +hid him, while I must attack with the moonlight shining on me. I +peered in cautiously. "Come out!" I cried. "Come out, you coward!" +Then I heard him move, and for a moment I thought he was coming, and I +stood a-tiptoe waiting for his rush. But he only laughed a derisive +laugh of triumph. He had the odds, and I saw he would keep them.</p> + +<p class="normal">I took another cautious step toward him, and shading my eyes with +my left hand, tried to make him out. As I did so, gradually his face +took dim form and shape, confronting mine in the darkness. I stared +yet more intently. The face became more clear. Nay, with a sudden +leap into vividness, as it were, it grew white against the dark +background--white and whiter. It seemed to be thrust out nearer and +nearer, until it almost touched mine. It--his face? No, it was not his +face! For one awful moment a terror, which seemed to still my heart, +glued me to the ground where I stood, as it flashed upon my brain that +it was another face that grinned at me so close to mine, that it was +another face I was looking on; the livid, bloodstained face and stony +eyes of the man I had killed!</p> + +<p class="normal">With a wild scream I turned and fled. By instinct, for terror had +deprived me of reason, I hied to the bridge, and keeping, I knew not +how, my footing upon the loose clattering planks, made one desperate +rush across it. The shimmering water below, in which I saw that face a +thousand times reflected, the breeze, which seemed the dead man's hand +clutching me, lent wings to my flight. I sprang at a bound from the +bridge to the bank, from the bank to the boat, and overturning, yet +never seeing, my startled companion, shoved off from the shore with +all my might--and fell a-crying.</p> + +<p class="normal">A very learned man, physician to the Queen's Majesty has since told +me, when I related this strange story to him, that probably that burst +of tears saved my reason. It so far restored me at any rate that I +presently knew where I was--cowering in the bottom of the boat, with +my eyes covered; and understood that Master Lindstrom was leaning over +me in a terrible state of mind, imploring me in mingled Dutch and +English to tell him what had happened. "I have seen him!" was all I +could say at first, and I scarcely dared remove my hands from my eyes. +"I have seen him!" I begged my host to row away from the shore, and +after a time was able to tell him what the matter was, he sitting the +while with his arm round my shoulder.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are sure that it was the Spaniard?" he said kindly, after he had +thought a minute.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quite sure," I answered shuddering, yet with less violence. "How +could I be mistaken? If you had seen him----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you are sure--did you feel his heart this morning? Whether it was +beating?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"His heart?" Something in his voice gave me courage to look up, though +I still shunned the water, lest that dreadful visage should rise from +the depths. "No, I did not touch him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you tell me that he fell on his face. Did you turn him over?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No." I saw his drift now. I was sitting erect. My brain began to work +again. "No," I admitted; "I did not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then how----" asked the Dutchman roughly--"how do you know that he +was dead, young sir? Tell me that."</p> + +<p class="normal">When I explained, "Bah!" he cried. "There is nothing in that! You +jumped to a conclusion. I thought a Spaniard's head was harder to +break. As for the blood coming from his mouth, perhaps he bit his +tongue, or did any one of a hundred things--except die, Master +Francis. That you may be sure is just what he did not do."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You think so?" I said gratefully. I began to look about me, yet still +with a tremor in my limbs, and an inclination to start at shadows.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Think?" he rejoined, with a heartiness which brought conviction home +tome; "I am sure of it. You may depend upon it that Master Clarence, +or the man you take for Master Clarence--who no doubt was the other +soldier seen with the scoundrel this morning--found him hurt late in +the evening. Then, seeing him in that state, he put him in the porch +for shelter, either because he could not get him to Arnheim at once, +or because he did not wish to give the alarm before he had made his +arrangements for netting your party."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is possible!" I allowed, with a sigh of relief. "But what of +Master Clarence?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," the old man said; "let us get home first. We will talk of him +afterward."</p> + +<p class="normal">I felt he had more in his mind than appeared, and I obeyed; growing +ashamed now of my panic, and looking forward with no very pleasant +feelings to hearing the story narrated. But when we reached the house, +and found Master Bertie and the Duchess in the parlor waiting for +us--they rose startled at sight of my face--he bade me leave that out, +but tell the rest of the story.</p> + +<p class="normal">I complied, describing how I had seen Dymphna meet Clarence, and what +I had observed to pass between them. The astonishment of my hearers +may be imagined. "The point is very simple," said our host coolly, +when I had, in the face of many exclamations and some incredulity, +completed the tale; "it is just this! The woman certainly was not +Dymphna. In the first place, she would not be out at night. In the +second place, what could she know of your Clarence, an Englishman and +a stranger? In the third place, I will warrant she has been in her +room all the evening. Then if Master Francis was mistaken in the +woman, may he not have been mistaken in the man? That is the point."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I said boldly. "I only saw her back. I saw his face."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Certainly, that is something," Master Lindstrom admitted reluctantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But how many times had you seen him before?" put in my lady very +pertinently. "Only once."</p> + +<p class="normal">In answer to that I could do no more than give further assurance of my +certainty on the point. "It was the man I saw in the boat at +Greenwich," I declared positively. "Why should I imagine it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"All the same, I trust you have," she rejoined. "For, if it was indeed +that arch scoundrel, we are undone."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Imagination plays us queer tricks sometimes," Master Lindstrom said, +with a smile of much meaning. "But come, lad, I will ask Dymphna, +though I think it useless to do so. For whether you are right or wrong +as to your friend, I will answer for it you are wrong as to my +daughter."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was rising to go from them for the purpose, when Mistress Anne +opened the door and came in. She looked somewhat startled at finding +us all in conclave. "I thought I heard your voices," she explained +timidly, standing between us and the door. "I could not sleep."</p> + +<p class="normal">She looked indeed as if that were so. Her eyes were very bright, and +there was a bright spot of crimson in each cheek. "What is it?" she +went on abruptly, looking hard at me and shutting her lips tightly. +There was so much to explain that no one had taken it in hand to +begin.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is just this," the Duchess said, opening her mouth with a snap. +"Have you been with Dymphna all the time?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, of course," was the prompt answer.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is she doing?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Doing?" Mistress Anne repeated in surprise. "She is asleep."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Has she been out since nightfall?" the Duchess continued. "Out of her +room? Or out of the house?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Out? Certainly not. Before she fell asleep she was in no state to go +out, as you know, though I hope she will be all right when she awakes. +Who says she has been out?" Anne added sharply. She looked at me with +a challenge in her eyes, as much as to say, "Is it you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am satisfied," I said, "that I was mistaken as to Mistress Dymphna. +But I am just as sure as before that I saw Clarence."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Clarence?" Mistress Anne repeated, starting violently, and the color +for an instant fleeing from her cheeks. She sat down on the nearest +seat.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You need not be afraid, Anne," my lady said smiling. She had a +wonderfully high courage herself. "I think Master Francis was +mistaken, though he is so certain about it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But where--where did he see him?" the girl asked. She still trembled.</p> + +<p class="normal">Once more I had to tell the tale; Mistress Anne, as was natural, +listening to it with the liveliest emotions. And this time so much of +the ghost story had to be introduced--for she pressed me closely as to +where I had left Clarence, and why I had let him go--that my +assurances got less credence than ever.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think I see how it is," she said, with a saucy scorn that hurt me +not a little. "Master Carey's nerves are in much the same state +to-night as Dymphna's. He thought he saw a ghost, and he did not. He +thought he saw Dymphna, and he did not. And he thought he saw Master +Clarence, and he did not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not so fast, child!" cried the Duchess sharply, seeing me wince. +"Your tongue runs too freely. No one has had better proofs of Master +Carey's courage--for which I will answer myself--than we have!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then he should not say things about Dymphna!" the young lady +retorted, her foot tapping the floor, and the red spots back in her +cheeks. "Such rubbish I never heard!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XI.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_11" href="#div1Ref_11">A FOUL BLOW.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">They none of them believed me, it seemed; and smarting under Mistress +Anne's ridicule, hurt by even the Duchess's kindly incredulity, what +could I do? Only assert what I had asserted already, that it was +undoubtedly Clarence, and that before twenty-four hours elapsed they +would have proof of my words.</p> + +<p class="normal">At mention of this possibility Master Bertie looked up. He had left +the main part in the discussion to others, but now he intervened. "One +moment!" he said. "Take it that the lad is right, Master Lindstrom. Is +there any precaution we can adopt, any back door, so to speak, we can +keep open, in case of an attempt to arrest us being made? What would +be the line of our retreat to Wesel?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"The river," replied the Dutchman promptly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And the boats are all at the landing-stage?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"They are, and for that reason they are useless in an emergency," our +host answered thoughtfully. "Knowing the place, any one sent to +surprise and arrest us would secure them first, and the bridge. Then +they would have us in a trap. It might be well to take a boat round, +and moor it in the little creek in the farther orchard," he added, +rising. "It is a good idea, at any rate. I will go and do it."</p> + +<p class="normal">He went out, leaving us four--the Duchess, her husband, Anne, and +myself--sitting round the lamp.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If Master Carey is so certain that it was Clarence," my lady began, +"I think he ought to----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, Kate?" her husband said. She had paused and seemed to be +listening.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ought to open that letter he has!" she continued impetuously. "I have +no doubt it is a letter to Clarence. Now the rogue has come on the +scene again, the lad's scruples ought not to stand in the way. They +are all nonsense. The letter may throw some light on the Bishop's +schemes and Clarence's presence here; and it should be read. That is +what I think."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you say, Carey?" her husband asked, as I kept silence. "Is +not that reasonable?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Sitting with my elbows on the table, I twisted and untwisted the +fingers of my clasped hands, gazing at them the while as though +inspiration might come of them. What was I to do? I knew that the +three pairs of eyes were upon me, and the knowledge distracted me, and +prevented me really thinking, though I seemed to be thinking so hard. +"Well," I burst out at last, "the circumstances are certainly altered. +I see no reason why I should not----"</p> + +<p class="normal">Crash!</p> + +<p class="normal">I stopped, uttering an exclamation, and we all sprang to our feet. +"Oh, what a pity!" the Duchess cried, clasping her hands. "You clumsy, +clumsy girl! What have you done?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Anne's sleeve as she turned had swept from the table a +Florentine jug, one of Master Lindstrom's greatest treasures, and it +lay in a dozen fragments on the floor. We stood and looked at it, the +Duchess in anger, Master Bertie and I in comic dismay. The girl's lip +trembled, and she turned quite white as she contemplated the ruin she +had caused.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, you have done it now!" the Duchess said pitilessly. What woman +could ever overlook clumsiness in another woman! "It only remains to +pick up the pieces, miss. If a man had done it--but there, pick up the +pieces. You will have to make your tale good to Master Lindstrom +afterward."</p> + +<p class="normal">I went down on my knees and helped Anne, the annoyance her incredulity +had caused me forgotten. She was so shaken that I heard the bits of +ware in her hand clatter together. When we had picked up all, even to +the smallest piece, I rose, and the Duchess returned to the former +subject. "You will open this letter, then?" she said; "I see you will. +Then the sooner the better. Have you got it about you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, it is in my bedroom," I answered. "I hid it away there, and I +must fetch it. But do you think," I continued, pausing as I opened the +door for Mistress Anne to go out with her double handful of fragments, +"it is absolutely necessary to read it, my lady?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Most certainly," she answered, gravely nodding with each syllable, "I +think so. I will be responsible." And Master Bertie nodded also.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So be it," I said reluctantly. And I was about to leave the room to +fetch the letter--my bedroom being in a different part of the house, +only connected with the main building by a covered passage--when our +host returned. He told us that he had removed a boat, and I stayed a +while to hear if he had anything more to report, and then, finding he +had not, went out to go to my room, shutting the door behind me.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The passage I have mentioned, which was merely formed of rough planks, +was very dark. At the nearer end was the foot of the staircase leading +to the upper rooms. Farther along was a door in the side opening into +the garden. Going straight out of the lighted room, I had almost to +grope my way, feeling the walls with my hands. When I had about +reached the middle I paused. It struck me that the door into the +garden must be open, for I felt a cold draught of air strike my brow, +and saw, or fancied I saw, a slice of night sky and the branch of a +tree waving against it. I took a step forward, slightly shivering in +the night air as I did so, and had stretched out my hand with the +intention of closing the door, when a dark form rose suddenly close to +me, I saw a knife gleam in the starlight, and the next moment I reeled +back into the darknesss of the passage, a sharp pain in my breast.</p> + +<p class="normal">I knew at once what had happened to me, and leaned a moment against +the planking with a sick, faint feeling, saying to myself, "I have it +this time!" The attack had been so sudden and unexpected, I had been +taken so completely off my guard, that I had made no attempt either to +strike or to clutch my assailant, and I suppose only the darkness of +the passage saved me from another blow. But was one needed? The hand +which I had raised instinctively to shield my throat was wet with the +warm blood trickling fast down my breast. I staggered back to the door +of the parlor, groped blindly for the latch, seemed to be an age +finding it, found it at last, and walked in.</p> + +<p class="normal">The Duchess sprang up at sight of me. "What," she cried, backing from +me, "what has happened?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have been stabbed," I said, and I sat down.</p> + +<p class="normal">It amused me afterward to recall what they all did. The Dutchman +stared, my lady screamed loudly, Master Bertie whipped out his sword; +he could make up his mind quickly enough at times.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think he has gone," I said faintly.</p> + +<p class="normal">The words brought the Duchess to her knees by my chair. She tore open +my doublet, through which the blood was oozing fast. I made no doubt +that I was a dead man, for I had never been wounded in this way +before, and the blood scared me. I remember my prevailing idea was a +kind of stunned pity for myself. Perhaps later--I hope so--I should +have come to think of Petronilla and my uncle and other people. But +before this stage was readied, the Duchess reassured me. "Courage, +lad!" she cried heartily. "It is all right, Dick. The villain struck +him on the breastbone an inch too low, and has just ripped up a scrap +of skin. It has blooded him for the spring, that is all. A bit of +plaster----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And a drink of strong waters," suggested the Dutchman soberly--his +thoughts were always to the point when they came.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, that too," quoth my lady, "and he will be all right."</p> + +<p class="normal">I thought so myself when I had emptied the cup they offered me. I had +been a good deal shaken by the events of the day. The sight of blood +had further upset me. I really think it possible I might have died of +this slight hurt and my imagination, if I had been left to myself. But +the Duchess's assurance and the draught of schnapps, which seemed to +send new blood through my veins, made me feel ashamed of myself. If +the Duchess would have let me, I would at once have gone to search the +premises; as it was, she made me sit still while she ran to and fro +for hot water and plaster, and the men searched the lower rooms and +secured the door afresh.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And so you could see nothing of him?" our host asked, when he and +Master Bertie returned, weapons in hand. "Nothing of his figure or +face?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing, save that he was short," I answered; "shorter than I am, at +any rate, and I fancy a good deal."</p> + +<p class="normal">"A good deal shorter than you are?" my lady said uneasily; "that is no +clew. In this country nine people out of ten are that. Clarence, now, +is not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I said; "he is about the same height. It was not Clarence."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then who could it be?" she muttered, rising, and then with a quick +shudder sitting down again. "Heaven help us, we seem to be in the +midst of foes! What could be the motive? And why should the villain +have selected you? Why pick you out?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Thereupon a strange thing happened. Three pairs of English eyes met, +and signaled a common message eye to eye. No word passed, but the +message was "Van Tree!" When we had glanced at one another we looked +all of us at our host--looked somewhat guiltily. He was deep in +thought, his eyes on the stove; but he seemed to feel our gaze upon +him, and he looked up abruptly. "Master Van Tree----" he said, and +stopped.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You know him well?" the Duchess said, appealing to him softly. We +felt a kind of sorrow for him, and some delicacy, too, about accusing +one of his countrymen of a thing so cowardly. "Do you think it is +possible," she continued with an effort--"possible that he can have +done this, Master Lindstrom?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have known him from a boy," the merchant said, looking up, a hand +on either knee, and speaking with a simplicity almost majestic, "and +never knew him do a mean thing, madam. I know no more than that." And +he looked round on us.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is a good deal; still, he went off in a fit of jealousy when +Master Carey brought Dymphna home. We must remember that."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I would he knew the rights of that matter," said the Dutchman +heartily.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And he has been hanging about the place all day," my lady persisted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Master Lindstrom rejoined patiently; "yet I do not think he did +this."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then who did?" she said, somewhat nettled.</p> + +<p class="normal">That was the question. I had my opinion, as I saw Master Bertie and +the Duchess had. I did not doubt it was Van Tree. Yet a thought struck +me. "It might be well," I suggested, "that some one should ask +Mistress Anne whether the door was open when she left the room. She +passed out just in front of me."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But she does not go by the door," my lady objected.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, she would turn at once and go upstairs," I agreed. "But she could +see the door from the foot of the stairs--if she looked that way, I +mean."</p> + +<p class="normal">The Duchess assented, and went out of the room to put the question. We +three, left together, sat staring at the dull flame of the lamp, and +were for the most part silent, Master Bertie only remarking that it +was after midnight. The suspicion he and I entertained of Van Tree's +guilt seemed to raise a barrier between us and our host. My wound, +slight as it was, smarted and burned, and my head ached. After +midnight, was it? What a day it had been!</p> + +<p class="normal">When the Duchess came back, as she did in a few minutes, both Anne and +Dymphna came with her. The girls had risen hastily, and were shivering +with cold and alarm. Their eyes were bright, their manner was excited. +They were full of sympathy and horror and wonder, as was natural; of +nervous fear for themselves, too. But my lady cut short their +exclamations. "Anne says she did not notice the door," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," the girl answered, trembling visibly as she spoke. "I went up +straight to bed. But who could it be? Did you see nothing of him as he +struck you? Not a feature? Not an outline?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I murmured.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Did he not say a word?" she continued, with strange insistence. "Was +he tall or short?" Her dark eyes dwelling on mine seemed to probe my +thoughts, as though they challenged me to keep anything back from her. +"Was it the man you hurt this morning?" she suggested.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I answered reluctantly. "This man was short."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Short, was he? Was it Master Van Tree, then?"</p> + +<p class="normal">We, who felt also certain that it was Van Tree, started, nevertheless, +at hearing the charge put into words before Dymphna. I wondered, and I +think the others did, too, at Mistress Anne's harshness. Even my lady, +so blunt and outspoken by nature, had shrunk from trying to question +the Dutch girl about her lover. We looked at Dymphna, wondering how +she would take it.</p> + +<p class="normal">We had forgotten that she could not understand English. But this did +not serve her; for without a pause Mistress Anne turned to her, and +unfalteringly said something in her scanty Dutch which came to the +same thing. A word or two of questioning and explanation followed. +Then the meaning of the accusation dawned at last on Dymphna's mind. I +looked for an outburst of tears or protestations. Instead, with a +glance of wonder and great scorn, with a single indignant widening of +her beautiful eyes, she replied by a curt Dutch sentence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What does she say?" my lady exclaimed eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"She says," replied Master Lindstrom, who was looking on gravely, +"that it is a base lie, madam."</p> + +<p class="normal">On that we became spectators. It seemed to me, and I think to all of +us, that the two girls stood apart from us in a circle of light by +themselves; confronting one another with sharp glances as though a +curtain had been raised from between them, and they saw one another in +their true colors and recognized some natural antagonism, or, it might +be, some rivalry each in the other. I think I was not peculiar in +feeling this, for we all kept silence for a space as though expecting +something to follow. In the middle of this silence there came a low +rapping at the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">One uttered a faint shriek; another stood as if turned to stone. The +Duchess cried for her child. The rest of us looked at one another. +Midnight was past. Who could be abroad, who could want us at this +hour? As a rule we should have been in bed and asleep long ago. We had +no neighbors save the cotters on the far side of the island. We knew +of no one likely to arrive at this time with any good intent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will open," said Master Lindstrom. But he looked doubtfully at the +women-folk as he said it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"One minute," whispered the Duchess. "That table is solid and heavy. +Could you not----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Put it across the door?" concluded her husband. "Yes, we will." And +it was done at once, the two men--my lady would not let me help--so +arranging it that it prevented the door being opened to its full +width.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That will stop a rush," said Master Bertie with satisfaction.</p> + +<p class="normal">It did strengthen the position, yet it was a nervous moment when our +host prepared to lower the bar. "Who is there?" he cried loudly.</p> + +<p class="normal">We waited, listening and looking at one another, the fear of arrest +and the horrors of the Inquisition looming large in the minds of some +of us at least. The answer, when it came, did not reassure us. It was +uttered in a voice so low and muffled that we gained no information, +and rather augured treachery the more. I remember noticing how each +took the crisis; how Mistress Anne's face was set hard, and her breath +came in jerks; how Dymphna, pale and trembling, seemed yet to have +eyes only for her father; how the Duchess faced the entrance like a +queen at bay. All this I took in at a glance. Then my gaze returned to +Master Lindstrom, as he dropped the bar with a jerk. The door was +pushed open at once as far as it would go. A draught of cold air came +in, and with it Van Tree. He shut the door behind him.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Never were six people so taken aback as we were. But the newcomer, +whose face was flushed with haste and excitement, observed nothing. +Apparently he saw nothing unexpected even in our presence downstairs +at that hour, nothing hostile or questioning in the half circle of +astonished faces turned toward him. On the contrary, he seemed +pleased. "Ah!" he exclaimed gutturally. "It is well! You are up! You +have taken the alarm!"</p> + +<p class="normal">It was to me he spoke, and I was so surprised by that, and by his +sudden appearance, so dumfounded by his easy address and the absence +of all self-consciousness on his part, so struck by a change in him, +that I stared in silence. I could not believe that this was the same +half-shy, half-fierce young man who had flung away a few hours before +in a passion of jealousy. My theory that he was the assassin seemed on +a sudden extravagant, though here he was on the spot. When Master +Lindstrom asked, "Alarm! What alarm?" I listened for his answer as I +should have listened for the answer of a friend and ally, without +hesitation, without distrust. For in truth the man was transfigured; +changed by the rise of something to the surface which ordinarily lay +hid in him. Before, he had seemed churlish, awkward, a boor. But in +this hour of our need and of his opportunity he showed himself as he +was. Action and purpose lifted him above his outward seeming. I caught +the generous sparkle in his eye, and trusted him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What!" he said, keeping his voice low. "You do not know? They are +coming to arrest you. Their plan is to surround the house before +daybreak. Already there is a boat lying in the river watching the +landing-stage."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Whom are they coming to arrest?" I asked. The others were silent, +looking at this strange messenger with mingled feelings.</p> + +<p class="normal">"All, I fear," he replied. "You, too, Master Lindstrom. Some one has +traced your English friends hither and informed against you. I know +not on what ground you are included, but I fear the worst. There is +not a moment to be lost if you would escape by the bridge, before the +troop who are on the way to guard it arrives."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The landing-stage, you say, is already watched?" our host asked, his +phlegmatic coolness showing at its best. His eyes roved round the +room, and he tugged, as was his habit when deep in thought, at his +beard. I felt sure that he was calculating which of his possessions he +could remove.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," Van Tree answered. "My father got wind of the plan in Arnheim. +An English envoy arrived there yesterday on his way to Cleves or some +part of Germany. It is rumored that he has come out of his road to +inquire after certain English fugitives whom his Government are +anxious to seize. But come, we have no time to lose! Let us go!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you come too?" Master Lindstrom said, pausing in the act of +turning away. He spoke in Dutch, but by some inspiration born of +sympathy I understood both his question and the answer.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I come. Where Dymphna goes I go, and where she stops I stop, +though it be at Madrid itself," the young man answered gallantly. His +eyes kindled, and he seemed to grow taller and to gain majesty. The +barrier of race, which had hindered me from viewing him fairly before, +fell in a trice. I felt now only a kindly sorrow that he had done this +noble thing, and not I. I went to him and grasped his hand; and though +I said nothing, he seemed, after a single start of surprise, to +understand me fully. He understood me even better, if that were +possible, an hour later, when Dymphna had told him of her adventure +with the Spaniard, and he came to me to thank me.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ordered myself to be idle, I found all busy round me, busy with a +stealthy diligence. Master Lindstrom was packing his plate. Dymphna, +pale, but with soft, happy eyes--for had she not cause to be +proud?--was preparing food and thick clothing. The Duchess had fetched +her child and was dressing it for the journey. Master Bertie was +collecting small matters, and looking to our arms. In one or other of +these occupations--I can guess in which--Van Tree was giving his aid. +And so, since the Duchess would not let me do anything, it chanced +that presently I found myself left alone for a few minutes with Anne.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was not watching her. I was gnawing my nails in a fit of +despondency, reflecting that I was nothing but a hindrance and a +drawback to my friends, since whenever a move had to be made I was +sure to be invalided, when I became aware, through some mysterious +sense, that my companion, who was kneeling on the floor behind me, +packing, had desisted from her work and was gazing fixedly at me. I +turned. Yes, she was looking at me; her eyes, in which a smoldering +fire seemed to burn, contrasting vividly with her pale face and +contracted brows. When she saw that I had turned--of which at first +she did not seem aware--she rose and came to me, and laid a hand on my +shoulder and leaned over me. A feeling that was very like fright fell +upon me, her manner was so strange. "What is it?" I stammered, as she +still pored on me in silence, still maintained her attitude. "What is +the matter, Anne?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you <i>quite</i> a fool?" she whispered, her voice almost a hiss, her +hot breath on my cheek. "Have you no sense left, that you trust that +man?"</p> + +<p class="normal">For a moment I failed to understand her. "What man?" I said. "Oh, Van +Tree!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, Van Tree! Who else? Will you go straight into the trap he has +laid for you?" She moistened her lips with her tongue, as though they +were parched. "You are all mad! Mad, I think! Don't you see," she +continued, stooping over me again and whispering hurriedly, her wild +eyes close to mine, "that he is jealous of you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He was," I said uneasily. "That is all right now."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He was? He is!" she retorted. "He went away wild with you. He comes +back smiling and holding out his hand. Do you trust him? Don't you +see--don't you see," she cried, rocking me to and fro with her hand in +her excitement, "that he is fooling you? He is leading us all into a +trap that has been laid carefully enough. What is this tale of an +English envoy on his way to Germany? Rubbish! Rubbish, I tell you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But Clarence----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Bah! It was all your fancy!" she cried fiercely, her eyes for the +moment flitting to the door, then returning to my face. "How should he +find us here? Or what has Clarence to do with an English envoy?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know," I said. She had not in the least persuaded me. In a +rare moment I had seen into Van Tree's soul and trusted him +implicitly. "Please take care," I added, wincing under her hand. "You +hurt me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She sprang back with a sudden change of countenance as if I had struck +her, and for a moment cowered away from me, her former passion still +apparent fighting for the mastery in her face. I set down her +condition to terror at the plight we were all in, or to vexation that +no one would take her view. The next moment I went farther. I thought +her mad, when she turned abruptly from me and, flying to the door by +which Van Tree had entered, began with trembling fingers to release +the pin which confined the bar.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Stop! stop! you will ruin all!" I cried in horror. "They can see that +door from the river, and if they see the light, they will know we are +up and have taken the alarm; and they may make a dash to secure us. +Stop, Anne! Stop!" I cried. But the girl was deaf. She tugged +desperately at the pin, and had already loosened the bar when I caught +her by the arms, and, pushing her away, set my back against the door. +"Don't be foolish!" I said gently. "You have lost your head. You must +let us men settle these things, Anne."</p> + +<p class="normal">She was indeed beside herself, for she faced me during a second or two +as though she would spring upon me and tear me from the door. Her +hands worked, her eyes gleamed, her strong white teeth showed +themselves. I shuddered. I had never pictured her looking like that. +Then, as steps sounded on the stairs and cheerful voices--cheerful +they seemed to me as they broke in on that strange scene--drew nearer, +she turned, and walking deliberately to a seat, fell to weeping +hysterically.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What are you doing to that door?" cried the Duchess sharply, as she +entered with the others. I was securing the bar again.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing," I said stolidly. "I am seeing that it is fast."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And hoity toity, miss!" she continued, turning to Anne. "What has +come over you, I would like to know? Stop crying, girl; what is the +matter with you? Will you shame us all before this Dutch maid? Here, +carry these things to the back door."</p> + +<p class="normal">Anne somehow stifled her sobs and rose. Seeming by a great effort to +recover composure, she went out, keeping her face to the last averted +from me.</p> + +<p class="normal">We all followed, variously laden, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree, who +carried between them the plate-chest, being the last to leave. There +was not one of us--even of us who had only known the house a few +weeks--who did not heave a sigh as we passed out of the warm lamp-lit +parlor, which, littered as it was with the debris of packing, looked +still pleasant and comfortable in comparison with the darkness outside +and the uncertain future before us. What, then, must have been the +pain of parting to those who had never known any other home? Yet they +took it bravely. To Dymphna, Van Tree's return had brought great +happiness. To Master Lindstrom, any ending to a long series of +anxieties and humiliations was welcome. To Van Tree--well, he had +Dymphna with him, and his side of the plate-chest was heavy, and gave +him ample employment.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">We passed out silently through the back door, leaving the young +Dutchman to lock it behind us, and flitted, a line of gliding shadows, +through the orchard. It was two o'clock, the sky was overcast, a +slight drizzle was falling. Once an alarm was given that we were being +followed; and we huddled together, and stood breathless, a clump of +dark figures gazing affrightedly at the tree trunks which surrounded +us, and which seemed--at least to the women's eyes--to be moving, and +to be men closing in on us. But the alarm was groundless, and with no +greater mishap than a few stumbles when we came to the slippery edge +of the creek, we reached the boat, and one by one, admirably ordered +by our host, got in and took our seats. Van Tree and Master Lindstrom +pushed us off; then they swung themselves in and paddled warily along, +close under the bank, where the shadows of the poplars fell across us, +and our figures blended darkly with the line of rushes on the shore.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_12" href="#div1Ref_12">ANNE'S PETITION.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">We coasted along in this silent fashion, nearly as far as the hamlet +and bridge, following, but farther inshore, the course which Master +Lindstrom and I had taken when on our way to bury the Spaniard. A +certain point gained, at a signal from our host we struck out into the +open, and rowed swiftly toward the edge of the marsh. This was the +critical moment; but, so far as we could learn, our passage was +unnoticed. We reached the fringe of rushes; with a prolonged hissing +sound the boat pushed through them; a flight of water-fowl rose, +whirring and clapping about us, and we floated out into a dim misty +lake, whose shores and surface stretched away on every side, alike +dark, shifting, and uncertain.</p> + +<p class="normal">Across this the Dutchman steered us, bringing us presently to a narrow +opening, through which we glided into a second and smaller mere. At +the farther end of this one the way seemed barred by a black, +impenetrable wall of rushes, which rose far above our heads. But the +tall stems bent slowly with many a whispered protest before our silent +onset, and we slid into a deep water-lane, here narrow, there widening +into a pool, in one place dark, in another reflecting the gray night +sky. Down this we sped swiftly, the sullen plash of the oars and the +walls of rushes always with us. For ourselves, we crouched still and +silent, shivering and listening for sounds of pursuit; now starting at +the splash of a frog, again shuddering at the cry of a night-bird. The +Duchess, her child, and I were in the bows, Master Lindstrom, his +daughter, and Mistress Anne in the stern. They had made me comfortable +with the baggage and some warm coverings, and would insist on treating +me as helpless. Even when the others began to talk in whispers, the +Duchess enjoined silence on me, and bade me sleep. Presently I did so, +my last impression one of unending water-ways and shoreless, shadowy +lakes.</p> + +<p class="normal">When I awoke the sun was high and the scene was changed indeed. We lay +on the bosom of a broad river, our boat seeming now to stand still as +the sail flapped idly, now to heel over and shoot forward as the light +breeze struck us. The shores abreast of us were still low and reedy, +but ahead the slopes of green wooded hills rose gently from the +stream. Master Bertie was steering, and, seeing me lift my head, +greeted me with a smile. The girls in the stern were covered up and +asleep. Amidships, too, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree had curled +themselves up between the thwarts, and were slumbering peacefully. I +turned to look for the Duchess, and found her sitting wide awake at my +elbow, her eyes on her husband.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," she said smiling, "do you feel better now? You have had a good +sleep."</p> + +<p class="normal">"How long have I been asleep, please?" I asked, bewildered by the +sunshine, by the shining river and the green hills, by the fresh +morning air, by the change in everything; and answering in a question, +as people freshly aroused do nine times out of ten. "Where are we?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have been asleep nearly six hours, and we are on the Rhine, near +Emmerich," she answered, smiling. She was pale, and the long hours of +watching had drawn dark circles round her eyes. But the old undaunted +courage shone in them still, and her smile was as sweet as ever.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Have we passed the frontier?" I asked eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, nearly," she answered. "But how does your wound feel?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Rather stiff and sore," I said ruefully, after making an experiment +by moving my body to and fro. "And I am very thirsty, but I could +steer."</p> + +<p class="normal">"So you shall," she said. "Only first eat something. We broke our fast +before the others lay down. There is bread and meat behind you, and +some hollands and water in the bottle."</p> + +<p class="normal">I seized the latter and drank greedily. Then, finding myself hungry +now I came to think about it, I fell upon the eatables.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will do now, I think," she said, when she had watched me for some +time.</p> + +<p class="normal">I laughed for answer, pleased that the long dark night, its gloom and +treachery were past. But its memories remained and presently I said, +"If Van Tree did not try to kill me--and I am perfectly sure he did +not----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"So am I," she said. "We were all wrong."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then," I continued, looking at her gravely, "who did? that is the +question. And why?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are sure that it was not the Spaniard whom you hurt in defense of +Dymphna?" my lady asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quite sure."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And sure that it was not Clarence?" she persisted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quite sure. It was a short man," I explained again, "and dressed in a +cloak. That is all I can tell about him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It might be some one employed by Clarence," she suggested, her face +gloomy, her brows knit.</p> + +<p class="normal">"True, I had not thought of that," I answered. "And it reminds me. I +have heard so much of Clarence----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And seen some little--even that little more than was good for you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, he has had the better of me, on both occasions," I allowed. "But +I was going to ask you," I continued, "to tell me something about him. +He was your steward, I know. But how did he come to you? How was it +you trusted him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"We are all fools at times," she answered grimly. "We wanted to have +persons of our own faith about us, and he was highly commended to us +by Protestants abroad, as having seen service in the cause. He applied +to us just at the right moment, too. And at the first we felt a great +liking for him. He was so clever in arranging things, he kept such +excellent order among the servants; he was so ready, so willing, so +plausible! Oh!" she added bitterly, "he had ways that enabled him to +twist nine women out of ten round his fingers! Richard was fond of +him; I liked him; we had talked more than once of how we might advance +his interests. And then, like a thunderbolt on a clear day, the +knowledge of his double-dealing fell upon us. We learned that he had +been seen talking with a known agent of Gardiner, and this at a time +when the Bishop was planning our ruin. We had him watched, and just +when the net had all but closed round us we discovered that he had +been throughout in Gardiner's pay."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" I said viciously. "The oddest thing to me is the way he has +twice escaped me when I had him at the sword's point!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"The third time may bring other fortune, Master Francis," she answered +smiling. "Yet be wary with him. He is a good swordsman, as my husband, +who sometimes fenced with him, will tell you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He can be no common man," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is not. He is well-bred, and has seen service. He is at once bold +and cunning. He has a tongue would win most women, and a hardihood +that would chain them to him. Women love bold men," my lady added +naïvely. And she smiled on me--yet humorously--so that I blushed.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was silence for a moment. The sail flapped, then filled again. +How delicious this morning after that night, this bright expanse after +the dark, sluggish channels! Far away in front a great barge, +high-laden with a mighty stack of rushes, crept along beside the bank, +the horse that drew it covered by a kind of knitted rug. When my lady +spoke next, it was abruptly. "Is it Anne?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">I knew quite well what she meant, and blushed again. I shook my head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think it was going to be," she said sagely, "only Mistress Dymphna +came upon the scene. You have heard the story of the donkey halting +between two bundles of hay, Master Francis? And in the multitude of +sweethearts there is safety."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not think that was my case," I said. Instinctively my hand went +to my breast, in which Petronilla's velvet sword-knot lay safe and +warm. The Duchess saw the gesture and instantly bent forward and +mimicked it. "Ha! ha!" she cried, leaning back with her hands clasped +about her knees, and her eyes shining with fun and amusement. "Now I +understand. You have left her at home; now, do not deny it, or I will +tell the others. Be frank and I will keep your secret, on my honor."</p> + +<p class="normal">"She is my cousin," I said, my cheeks hot.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And her name?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Petronilla."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Petronilla?" my lady repeated shrewdly. "That was the name of your +Spanish grandmother, then?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, madam."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Petronilla? Petronilla?" she repeated, stroking her cheek with her +hand. "She would be before my time, would she not? Yet there used to +be several Petronillas about the court in Queen Catherine of Aragon's +days, I remember. There was Petronilla de Vargas for one. But there, I +guess at random. Why do you not tell me more about yourself, Master +Francis? Do you not know me well enough now?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is nothing to tell, madam," I said in a low voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Your family? You come, I am sure, of a good house."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I did, but it is nothing to me now. I am cut off from it. I am +building my house afresh. And," I added bitterly, "I have not made +much way with it yet."</p> + +<p class="normal">She broke, greatly to my surprise, into a long peal of laughter. "Oh, +you vain boy!" she cried. "You valiant castle-builder! How long have +you been about the work? Three months? Do you think a house is to be +built in a day? Three months, indeed? Quite a lifetime!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Was it three months? It seemed to me to be fully three years. I seemed +to have grown more than three years older since that February morning +when I had crossed Arden Forest with the first light, and looked down +on Wootton Wawen sleeping in its vale, and roused the herons fishing +in the bottoms.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come, tell me all about it!" she said abruptly. "What did you do to +be cut off?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I cannot tell you," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">A shade of annoyance clouded her countenance. But it passed away +almost on the instant. "Very well," she said, with a little nod of +disdain and a pretty grimace. "So be it. Have your own way. But I +prophesy you will come to me with your tale some day."</p> + +<p class="normal">I went then and took Master Bertie's place at the tiller; and, he +lying down, I had the boat to myself until noon, and drew no little +pleasure from the placid picture which the moving banks and the wide +river presented. About noon there was a general uprising; and, coming +immediately afterward to a little island lying close to one bank, we +all landed to stretch our legs and refresh ourselves after the +confinement on board.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"We are over the border now and close to Emmerich," said Master +Lindstrom, "though the mere line of frontier will avail us little if +the Spanish soldiers can by hook or crook lay hands on us! Therefore, +we must lose no time in getting within the walls of some town. We +should be fairly secure for a few days either in Wesel or Santon."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought Wesel was the point we were making for," Master Bertie said +in some surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was Wesel I mentioned the other day," the Dutchman admitted +frankly. "And it is the bigger town and the stronger. But I have more +friends in Santon. To Wesel the road from Emmerich runs along the +right bank. To Santon we go by a cross-country road, starting from the +left bank opposite Emmerich, a road longer and more tedious. But we +are much less likely to be followed that way than along the Wesel +road, and on second thoughts I incline to Santon."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But why adopt either road? Why not go on by river?" I asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because we should be overtaken. The wind is falling, and the boat," +our late host explained, more truly than politely, "with the women in +it is heavy."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I understand," I said. "And you feel sure we shall be pursued?"</p> + +<p class="normal">For answer he pointed with a smile to his plate-chest. "Quite sure," +he added. "With that before them they will think nothing of the +frontier. I fancy that for you, if the English Government be in +earnest, there will be no absolutely safe place short of the free city +of Frankfort. Unless indeed you have interest with the Duke of +Cleves."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" said the Duchess. And she looked at her husband.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" said Master Bertie, and he looked very blankly at his wife. So +that I did not derive much comfort from that suggestion.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then it is Santon, is it?" said my lady.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That first, at any rate. Then, if they follow us along the Wesel +road, we shall still give them the slip."</p> + +<p class="normal">So it was settled, neither Van Tree nor the girls having taken any +part in the discussion. The former and Dymphna were talking aside, and +Mistress Anne was sitting low down on the bank, with her feet almost +in the water, immersed to all appearance in her own thoughts. There +was a little bustle as we rose to get into the boat, which we had +drawn up on the landward side of the island so as to be invisible from +the main channel; and in the middle of this I was standing with one +foot in the boat and one on shore, taking from Anne various articles +which we had landed for rearrangement, when she whispered to me that +she wanted to speak to me alone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want to tell you something," she said, raising her eyes to my face, +and then averting them. "Follow me this way."</p> + +<p class="normal">She strolled, as if accidentally, twenty or thirty paces along the +bank; and in a minute I joined her. I found her gazing down the river +in the direction from which we had come. "What is it?" I said +anxiously. "You do not see anything, do you?" For there had been a +hint of bad news in her voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">She dropped the hand with which she had been shading her eyes and +turned to me. "Master Francis, you will not think me very foolish?" +she said. Then I perceived that her lip was quivering and that there +were tears in her eyes. They were very beautiful eyes when, as now, +they grew soft, and appeal took the place of challenge.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" I replied, speaking cheerfully to reassure her. She had +scarcely got over her terror of last night. She trembled as she stood.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is about Santon," she answered with a miserable little catch in +her voice. "I am so afraid of going there! Master Lindstrom says it is +a rough, long road, and when we are there we are not a bit farther +from those wretches than at Wesel, and--and----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"There, there!" I said. She was on the point of bursting into tears, +and was clearly much overwrought. "You are making the worst of it. If +it were not for Master Lindstrom I should be inclined to choose Wesel +myself. But he ought to know best."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But that is not all," she said, clasping her hands and looking up at +me with her face grown full of solemn awe; "I have had a dream."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, but dreams----" I objected.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You do not believe in dreams?" she said, dropping her head +sorrowfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no; I do not say that," I admitted, naturally startled. "But what +was your dream?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought we took the road to Santon. And mind," she added earnestly, +"this was before Master Lindstrom had uttered a word about going that +way, or any other way save to Wesel. I dreamt that we followed the +road through such a dreadful flat country, a country all woods and +desolate moorland, under a gray sky, and in torrents of rain, to----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, well?" I said, with a passing shiver at the picture. She +described it with a rapt, absent air, which made me creep--as if even +now she were seeing something uncanny.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And then I thought that in the middle of these woods, about half-way +to Santon, they overtook us, and there was a great fight."</p> + +<p class="normal">"There would be sure to be that!" I muttered, with shut teeth.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And I thought you were killed, and we women were dragged back! There, +I cannot tell you the rest!" she added wildly. "But try, try to get +them to go the old way. If not, I know evil will come of it. Promise +me to try?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will tell them your dream," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no!" she exclaimed still more vehemently. "They would only laugh. +Madam does not believe in dreams. But they will listen to you if you +say you think the other way better. Promise me you will! Promise me!" +she pleaded, her hands clasping my arm, and her tearful eyes looking +up to mine.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well," I agreed reluctantly, "I will try. After all, the shortest way +may be the best. But if I do," I said kindly, "you must promise me in +return not to be alarmed any longer, Anne."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will try," she said gratefully; "I will indeed, Francis."</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">We were summoned at that minute, for the boat was waiting for us. The +Duchess scanned us rather curiously as we ran up--we were the last. +But Anne kept her word, and concealed her fears so bravely that, as +she jumped in from the bank, her air of gayety almost deceived me, and +would have misled the sharpest-sighted person who had not been present +at our interview, so admirably was it assumed.</p> + +<p class="normal">We calculated that our pursuers would not follow us down the river for +some hours. They would first have to search the island, and the watch +which they had set on the landing-stage would lead them to suspect +rather that we had fled by land. We hoped, therefore, to reach +Emmerich unmolested. There Master Lindstrom said we could get horses, +and he thought we might be safe in Santon by the following evening.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If you really think we had better go to Santon," I said. This was an +hour or two after leaving the island, and when we looked to sight +Emmerich very soon, the hills which we had seen in front all day, and +which were grateful to eyes sated with the monotony of Holland, being +now pretty close to us.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I thought that we had settled that," replied the Dutchman promptly.</p> + +<p class="normal">I felt they were all looking at me. "I look at it this way," I said, +reddening. "Wesel is not far from Emmerich by the road. Should we not +have an excellent chance of reaching it before our pursuers come up?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You might reach it," Master Lindstrom said gravely. "Though, again, +you might not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And, Wesel once reached," I persisted, "there is less fear of +violence being attempted there than in Santon. It is a larger town."</p> + +<p class="normal">"True," he admitted. "But it is just this. Will you be able to reach +Wesel? It is the getting there--that is the difficulty; the getting +there before you are caught."</p> + +<p class="normal">"If we have a good start, why should we not?" I urged; and urged it +the more persistently, the more I found them opposed to it. Naturally +there ensued a warm discussion. At first they all sided against me, +save of course Anne, and she sat silent, though she was visibly +agitated, as from minute to minute I or they seemed likely to prevail. +But presently when I grew warmer, and urged again and again the +strength of Wesel, my own party veered round, yet still with doubt and +misgiving. The Dutchman shrugged his shoulders to the end and remained +unpersuaded. But finally it was decided that I should have my own way. +We would go to Wesel.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Every one knows how a man feels when he comes victorious out of such a +battle. He begins on the instant to regret his victory, and to see the +possible evils which may result from it; to repent the hot words he +has used in the strife and the declarations he has flung broadcast. +That dreadful phrase, "I told you so!" rises like an avenging fury +before his fancy, and he quails.</p> + +<p class="normal">I felt all this the moment the thing was settled. But I was too young +to back out and withdraw my words. I hoped for the best, and resolved +inwardly to get the party mounted the moment we reached Emmerich.</p> + +<p class="normal">I soon had the opportunity of proving this resolution to be more +easily made than carried out. About three o'clock we reached the +little town dominated, as we saw from afar, by an ancient minster, +and, preferring not to enter it, landed at the steps of an inn a +quarter of a mile short of the gates, and marking a point where we +might take the road to Wesel, or, crossing the river, the road to +Santon. Master Lindstrom seemed well known, but there were +difficulties about the horses. The German landlord listened to his +story with apparent sympathy--but no horses! We could not understand +the tongue in which the two talked, but the Dutchman's questions, +quick and animated for once, and the landlord's slow replies, reminded +me of the foggy morning when in a similar plight we had urged the +master of the <i>Lion's Whelp</i> to put to sea. And I feared a similar +result.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He says he cannot get so many horses to-night," said Master Lindstrom +with a long face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Offer him more money!" quoth the Duchess.</p> + +<p class="normal">"If we cannot have horses until the morning, we may as well go on in +the boat," I urged.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He says, too, that the water is out on the road," continued the +Dutchman.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nonsense! Double the price!" cried my lady impatiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">I suppose that this turned the scale. The landlord finally promised +that in an hour four saddle-horses for Master Bertie and the Duchess, +Anne and myself, should be ready, with a couple of pack-horses and a +guide. Master Lindstrom, his daughter, and Van Tree would start a +little later for Cleves, five miles on the road to Santon, if +conveyance could be got. "And if not," our late host added, as we said +something about our unwillingness to leave him in danger, "I shall be +safe enough in the town, but I hope to sleep in Cleves."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was all settled very hastily. We felt--and I in particular, since +my plan had been adopted--an unreasonable impatience to be off. As we +stood on the bank by the inn-door, we had a straight reach of river a +mile long in full view below us; and now we were no longer moving +ourselves, but standing still, expected each minute to see the Spanish +boat, with its crew of desperadoes, sweep round the corner before our +eyes. Master Lindstrom assured us that if we were once out of sight +our pursuers would get no information as to the road we had taken, +either from the inn-keeper or his neighbors. "There is no love lost +between them and the Spaniards," he said shrewdly. "And I know the +people here, and they know me. The burghers may not be very keen to +come to blows with the Spaniards or to resent their foray. But the +latter, on their part, will be careful not to go too far or to make +themselves obnoxious."</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">We took the opportunity of supping then, not knowing when we might get +food again. I happened to finish first, and, hearing the horses' +hoofs, went out and watched the lads who were to be our guides +fastening the baggage on the sumpter beasts. I gave them a hand--not +without a wince or two, for the wound in my chest was painful--and +while doing so had a flash of remembrance. I went to the unglazed +window of the kitchen in which the others sat, and leaned my elbows on +the sill. "I say!" I said, full of my discovery, "there is something +we have forgotten!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What?" asked the Duchess, rising and coming toward me, while the +others paused in their meal to listen.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The letter to Mistress Clarence," I answered. "I was going to get it +when I was stabbed, you remember, and afterward we forgot all about +it. Now it is too late. It has been left behind."</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not answer then, but came out to me, and turned with me to +look at the horses. "This comes of your foolish scruples, Master +Francis!" she said severely. "Where was it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I slipped it between the leathers of the old haversack you gave me," +I answered, "which I used to have for a pillow. Van Tree brought my +things down, but overlooked the haversack, I suppose. At any rate, it +is not here."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, it is no good crying over spilt milk," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">She called the others out then, and there was no mistaking Mistress +Anne's pleasure at escaping the Santon road. She was radiant, and +vouchsafed me a very pretty glance of thanks, in which her relief as +well as her gratitude shone clearly. By half-past four we had got, +wearied as we were, to horse, and with three hours of daylight before +us hoped to reach Wesel without mishap. But for most of us the start +was saddened by the parting--though we hoped it would be only for a +time--from our Dutch friends. We remembered how good and stanch they +had been to us. We feared--though Master Lindstrom would not hear of +it--that we had brought misfortune upon them, and neither the +Duchess's brave eyes nor Dymphna's blue ones were free from tears as +they embraced. I wrung Van Tree's hand as if I had known him for +months instead of days, for a common danger is a wondrous knitter of +hearts; and he only smiled--though Dymphna blushed--when I kissed her +cheek. A few broken words, a last cry of farewell, and we four, with +our two guides behind us, moved down the Wesel road, the last I heard +of our good friends being Master Lindstrom's charge, shouted after us, +"to beware of the water if it was out!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_13" href="#div1Ref_13">A WILLFUL MAN'S WAY.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Only to feel that we were moving was a relief, though our march was +very slow. Master Bertie carried the child slung in a cloak before +him, and, thus burdened, could not well go beyond a smooth amble, +while the guides, who were on foot, and the pack-horses, found this +pace as much as they could manage. A little while and the exhilaration +of the start died away. The fine morning was followed by a wet +evening, and before we had left Emmerich three miles behind us Master +Bertie and I had come to look at one another meaningly. We were moving +in a dreary, silent procession through heavy rain, with the prospect +of the night closing in early. The road, too, grew more heavy with +each furlong, and presently began to be covered with pools of water. +We tried to avoid this inconvenience by resorting to the hill slopes +on our left, but found the attempt a waste of time, as a deep stream +or backwater, bordered by marshes, intervened. The narrow road, raised +but little above the level of the swiftly flowing river on our right, +turned out to be our only possible path; and when Master Bertie +discerned this his face grew more and more grave.</p> + +<p class="normal">We soon found, indeed, as we plodded along, that a sheet of water, +which palely reflected the evening light, was taking the place of the +road; and through this we had to plash and plash at a snail's pace, +one of the guides on a pack-horse leading the way, and Master Bertie +in charge of his wife coming next; then, at some distance, for her +horse did not take kindly to the water, the younger woman followed in +my care. The other guide brought up the rear. In this way, stopped +constantly by the fears of the horses, which were scared by the +expanse of flood before them, we crept wearily on until the moon rose. +It brought, alas, an access of light, but no comfort! The water seemed +continually to grow deeper, the current on our right swifter; and each +moment I dreaded the announcement that farther advance was impossible.</p> + +<p class="normal">It seemed to have come to that at last, for I saw the Duchess and her +husband stop and stand waiting for me, their dark shadows projected +far over the moonlit surface.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is to be done?" Master Bertie called out, as we moved up to +them. "The guide tells me that there is a broken piece of road in +front which will be impassable with this depth of water."</p> + +<p class="normal">I had expected to hear this; yet I was so dumfoundered--for, this +being true, we were lost indeed--that for a time I could not answer. +No one had uttered a word of reproach, but I knew what they must be +thinking. I had brought them to this. It was my foolish insistence had +done it. The poor beast under me shivered. I struck him with my heels. +"We must go forward!" I said desperately. "Or what? What do you think? +Go back?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Steady! steady, Master Knight Errant!" the Duchess cried in her calm, +brave voice. "I never knew you so bad a counselor before!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is my fault that you are here," I said, looking dismally around.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Perhaps the other road is as bad," Master Bertie replied. "At any +rate, that is past and gone. The question is, what are we to do now? +To remain here is to die of cold and misery. To go back may be to run +into the enemy's arms. To go forward----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will be to be drowned!" Mistress Anne cried with a pitiful sob.</p> + +<p class="normal">I could not blame her. A more gloomy outlook than ours, as we sat on +our jaded horses in the middle of this waste of waters, which appeared +in the moonlight to be boundless, could scarcely be imagined. The +night was cold for the time of year, and the keen wind pierced our +garments and benumbed our limbs. At any moment the rain might begin +afresh, and the moon be overcast. Of ourselves, we could not take a +step without danger, and our guides had manifestly lost their heads +and longed only to return.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yet, I am for going forward," the Duchess urged. "If there be but +this one bad place we may pass it with care."</p> + +<p class="normal">"We may," her husband assented dubiously. "But suppose when we have +passed it we can go no farther. Suppose the----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is no good supposing!" she retorted with some sharpness. "Let us +cross this place first, Richard, and we will deal with the other when +we come to it."</p> + +<p class="normal">He nodded assent, and we moved slowly forward, compelling the guides +to go first. In this order we waded some hundred yards through water, +which grew deeper with each step, until it rose nearly to our girths. +Then the lads stopped.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are we over?" said the Duchess eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">For answer one of them pointed to the flood before him, and peering +forward I made out a current sweeping silently and swiftly across our +path--a current with an ominous rush and swirl.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Over?" grunted Master Bertie. "No, this is the place. See, the road +has given way, and the stream is pouring through from the river. I +expect it is getting worse every minute as the banks crumble."</p> + +<p class="normal">We all craned forward, looking at it. It was impossible to say how +deep the water was, or how far the deep part might extend. And we had +with us a child and two women.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We must go back!" said Master Bertie resolutely. "There is no doubt +about it. The flood is rising. If we do not take care, we shall be cut +off, and be able to go neither backward nor forward. I cannot see a +foot of dry land, as it is, before or behind us."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was right. Far and wide, wherever our eyes could reach, the +moonlight was reflected in a sheet of water. We were nearly up to our +girths in water. On one side was the hurrying river, on the other were +the treacherous depths of the backwater. I asked the guide as well as +I could whether the road was good beyond. He answered that he did not +know. He and his companion were so terrified that we only kept them +beside us by threats.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I fear we must go back," I said, assenting sorrowfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">Even the Duchess agreed, and we were in the act of turning to +retrace our steps with what spirit we might, when a distant sound +brought us all to a standstill again. The wind was blowing from the +quarter whence we had come--from Emmerich; and it brought to us the +sound of voices. We all stopped to listen. Yes, they were voices we +heard--loud, strident tones, mingled now with the sullen plash of +horses tramping through the water. I looked at the Duchess. Her face +was pale, but her courage did not fail her. She understood in a trice +that the danger we had so much dreaded was upon us--that we were +followed, and the followers were at our heels; and she turned her +horse round again. Without a word she spurred it back toward the deep +part. I seized Anne's rein and followed, notwithstanding that the poor +girl in her terror would have resisted. Letting the guides go as they +pleased, we four in a moment found ourselves abreast again, our horses +craning over the stream, while we, with whip and spur, urged them on.</p> + +<p class="normal">In cold blood we should scarcely have done it. Indeed, for a minute, +as our steeds stumbled, and recovered themselves, and slid forward, +only to draw back trembling--as the water rose above our boots or was +flung by our fellows in our eyes, and all was flogging and scrambling +and splashing, it seemed as if we were to be caught in a trap despite +our resolve. But at last Master Bertie's horse took the plunge. His +wife's followed; and both, partly floundering and partly swimming, set +forward snorting the while in fear. To my joy I saw them emerge safely +not ten yards away, and, shaking themselves, stand comparatively high +out of the water.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come!" cried my lady imperatively, as she turned in her saddle with a +gesture of defiance. "Come! It is all right."</p> + +<p class="normal">Come, indeed! I wanted nothing better, for I was beside myself with +passion. But, flog as I might, I could not get Anne's brute to take +the plunge. The girl herself could give me no aid; clinging to her +saddle, pale and half-fainting, she could only beg me to leave her, +crying out again and again in a terrified voice that she would be +drowned. With her cry there suddenly mingled another, the hail of our +pursuers as they sighted us. I could hear them drawing nearer, and I +grew desperate. Luckily they could not make any speed in water so +deep, and time was given me for one last furious effort. It succeeded. +My horse literally fell into the stream; it dragged Anne's after it. +How we kept our seats, how they their footing, I never understood; +but, somehow, splashing and stumbling and blinded by the water dashed +in our faces, we came out on the other side, where the Duchess and her +husband, too faithful to us to save themselves, had watched the +struggle in an agony of suspense. I did but fling the girl's rein to +Master Bertie; and then I wheeled my horse to the stream again. I had +made up my mind what I must do. "Go on," I cried, waving my hand with +a gesture of farewell. "Go on! I can keep them here for a while."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nonsense!" I heard the Duchess cry, her voice high and shrill. "It +is----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go on!" I cried. "Go on! Do not lose a moment, or it will be +useless."</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie hesitated. But he too saw that this was the only chance. +The Spaniards were on the brink of the stream now, and must, if they +passed it, overtake us easily. He hesitated, I have said, for a +moment. Then he seized his wife's rein and drew her on, and I heard +the three horses go splashing away through the flood. I threw a +glance at them over my shoulder, bethinking me that I had not told +the Duchess my story, and that Sir Anthony and Petronilla would +never--but, pish! What was I thinking of? That was a thought for a +woman. I had only to harden my heart now, and set my teeth together. +My task was very simple indeed. I had just to keep these men--there +were four--here as long as I could, and if possible to stop Clarence's +pursuit altogether.</p> + +<p class="normal">For I had made no mistake. The first man to come up was +Clarence--Clarence himself. He let fall a savage word as his horse +stopped suddenly with its fore feet spread out on the edge of the +stream, and his dark face grew darker as he saw the swirling eddies, +and me standing fronting him in the moonlight with my sword out. He +discerned at once, I think, the strength of my position. Where I stood +the water was scarcely over my horse's fetlocks. Where he stood it was +over his horse's knees. And between us it flowed nearly four feet +deep.</p> + +<p class="normal">He held a hasty parley with his companions. And then he hailed me. +"Will you surrender?" he cried in English. "We will give you quarter."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Surrender? To whom?" I said. "And why--why should I surrender? Are +you robbers and cutpurses?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Surrender in the name of the Emperor, you fool!" he answered sternly +and roughly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I know nothing about the Emperor!" I retorted. "What Emperor?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"In the Queen's name, then!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"The Duke of Cleves is queen here!" I cried. "And as the flood is +rising," I added scornfully, "I would advise you to go home again."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You would advise, would you? Who <i>are</i> you?" he replied, in a kind of +wrathful curiosity.</p> + +<p class="normal">I gave him no answer. I have often since reflected, with a fuller +knowledge of certain facts, that no stranger interview ever took place +than this short colloquy between us, that no stranger fight ever was +fought than that which we contemplated as we stood there bathed in the +May moonlight, with the water all round us, and the cold sky above. A +strange fight indeed it would have been between him and me, had it +ever come to the sword's point!</p> + +<p class="normal">But this was what happened. His last words had scarcely rung out when +my horse began to quiver under me and sway backward and forward. I had +just time to take the alarm, when the poor beast sank down and rolled +gently over, leaving me bestriding its body, my feet in the water. +Whatever the cause of this, I had to disentangle myself, and that +quickly, for the four men opposite me, seeing me dismounted, plunged +with a cry of triumph into the water, and began to flounder across. +Without more ado I stepped forward to keep the ford.</p> + +<p class="normal">The foremost and nearest to me was Clarence, whose horse began, +half-way across, to swim. It was still scrambling to regain its +footing when it came within my reach, and I slashed it cruelly across +the nostrils. It turned in an instant on its side. I saw the rider's +face gleam white in the water; his stirrup shone a moment as the horse +rolled over, then in a second the two were gone down the stream. It +was done so easily, so quickly, it amazed me. One gone! hurrah! I +turned quickly to the others, who were about landing. My blood was +fired, and my yell of victory, as I dashed at them, scared back two of +the horses. Despite their riders' urging, they turned and scrambled +out on the side from which they had entered. Only one was left, the +farthest from me. He got across indeed. Yet he was the most unlucky of +all, for his horse stumbled on landing, came down heavily on its head, +and flung him at my very feet.</p> +<br> + +<p class="center"><img src="images/lunged.png" alt="lunged"><br> +I LUNGED TWICE AT THE RIDER</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It was no time for quarter--I had to think of my friends--and while +with one hand I seized the flying rein as the horse scrambled +trembling to its feet, with the other I lunged twice at the rider as +he half tried to rise, half tried to grasp at me. The second time I +ran him through, and he screamed shrilly. In those days I was young +and hotheaded, and I answered only by a shout of defiance, as I flung +myself into the saddle and dashed away through the water after my +friends.</p> + +<p class="normal"><i>Vœ victis!</i> I had done enough to check the pursuit, and had yet +escaped myself. If I could join the others again, what a triumph it +would be! I had no guide, but neither had those in front of me; and +luckily at this point a row of pollard willows defined the line +between the road and the river. Keeping this on my right, I made good +way. The horse seemed strong under me, the water was shallow, and +appeared to be growing more so, and presently across the waste of +flood I discerned before me a dark, solitary tower, the tower +seemingly of a church, for it was topped by a stumpy spire, which +daylight would probably have shown to be of wood.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a little dry ground round the church, a mere patch in a sea +of water, but my horse rang its hoofs on it with every sign of joy, +and arched its neck as it trotted up to the neighborhood of the +church, whinnying with pleasure. From the back of the building, I was +not surprised, came an answering neigh. As I pulled up, a man, his +weapon in his hand, came from the porch, and a woman followed him. I +called to them gayly. "I fancied you would be here the moment I saw +the church!" I said, sliding to the ground.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Thank Heaven you are safe!" the Duchess answered, and to my +astonishment she flung her arms round my neck and kissed me. "What has +happened?" she asked, looking in my eyes, her own full of tears.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think I have stopped them," I answered, turning suddenly shy, +though, boylike, I had been longing a few minutes before to talk of my +victory. "They tried to cross, and----"</p> + +<p class="normal">I had not sheathed my sword. Master Bertie caught my wrist, and, +lifting the blade, looked at it. "So, so!" he said nodding. "Are you +hurt?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not touched!" I answered. Before more was said he compelled his wife +to go back into the porch. The wind blew keenly across the open +ground, and we were all wet and shivering. When we had fastened up the +horse we followed her. The door of the church was locked, it seemed, +and the porch afforded the best shelter to be had. Its upper part was +of open woodwork, and freely admitted the wind; but wide eaves +projected over these openings, and over the door, so that at least it +was dry within. By huddling together on the floor against the windward +side we got some protection. I hastily told what had happened.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So Clarence is gone!" My lady's voice as she said the words trembled, +but not in sorrow or pity as I judged. Rather in relief. Her dread and +hatred of the man were strange and terrible, and so seemed to me then. +Afterward, I learned that something had passed between them which made +almost natural such feelings on her part, and made natural also a +bitter resentment on his. But of that no more. "You are quite sure," +she said--pressing me anxiously for confirmation--"that it was he!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. But I am not sure that he is dead," I explained.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You seem to bear a charmed life yourself," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hush!" cried her husband quickly. "Do not say that to the lad. It is +unlucky. But do you think," he continued--the porch was in darkness, +and we could scarcely make out one another's faces--"that there is any +further chance of pursuit?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not by that party to-night," I said grimly. "Nor I think to-morrow."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good!" he answered. "For I can see nothing but water ahead, and it +would be madness to go on by night without a guide. We must stay here +until morning, whatever the risk."</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke gloomily--and with reason. Our position was a miserable, +almost a desperate one, even on the supposition that pursuit had +ceased. We had lost all our baggage, food, wraps. We had no guides, +and we were in the midst of a flooded country, with two tender women +and a baby, our only shelter the porch of God's house. Mistress Anne, +who was crouching in the darkest corner next the church, seemed to +have collapsed entirely. I remembered afterward that I did not once +hear her speak that night. The Duchess tried to maintain our spirits +and her own; but in the face of cold, damp, and hunger, she could do +little. Master Bertie and I took it by turns to keep a kind of watch, +but by morning--it was a long night and a bitter one--we were worn +out, and slept despite our misery. We should have been surprised and +captured without a blow if the enemy had come upon us then.</p> + +<p class="normal">I awoke with a start to find the gray light of a raw misty morning +falling upon and showing up our wretched group. The Duchess's head was +hidden in her cloak; her husband's had sunk on his breast; but +Mistress Anne--I looked at her and shuddered. Had she sat so all +night? Sat staring with that stony face of pain, and those tearless +eyes on the moonlight, on the darkness which had been before the dawn, +on the cold first rays of morning? Stared on all alike, and seen none? +I shuddered and peered at her, alarmed, doubtful, wondering, asking +myself what this was that had happened to her. Had fear and cold +killed her, or turned her brain? "Anne!" I said timidly. "Anne!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not answer nor turn; nor did the fixed gaze of her eyes waver. +I thought she did not hear. "Anne!" I cried again, so loudly that the +Duchess stirred, and muttered something in her sleep. But the girl +showed no sign of consciousness. I put out my hand and touched her.</p> + +<p class="normal">She turned sharply and saw me, and in an instant drew her skirt away +with a gesture of such dread, loathing repulsion as froze me; while a +violent shudder convulsed her whole frame. Afterward she seemed unable +to withdraw her eyes from me, but sat in the same attitude, gazing at +me with a fixed look of horror, as one might gaze at a serpent, while +tremor after tremor shook her.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was frightened and puzzled, and was still staring at her, wondering +what I had done, when a footstep fell on the road outside and called +away my attention. I turned from her to see a man's figure looming +dark in the doorway. He looked at us--I suppose he had found the +horses outside--gazing in surprise at the queer group. I bade him +good-morning in Dutch, and he answered as well as his astonishment +would let him. He was a short, stout fellow, with a big face, capable +of expressing a good deal of astonishment. He seemed to be a peasant +or farmer. "What do you here?" he continued, his guttural phrases +tolerably intelligible to me.</p> + +<p class="normal">I explained as clearly as I could that we were on the way to Wesel. +Then I awoke the Duchess and her husband, and stretching our chilled +and aching limbs, we went outside, the man still gazing at us. Alas! +the day was not much better than the night. We could see but a very +little way, a couple of hundred yards round us only. The rest was +mist--all mist. We appealed to the man for food and shelter, and he +nodded, and, obeying his signs rather than his words, we kicked up our +starved beasts and plodded out into the fog by his side. Anne mounted +silently and without objection, but it was plain that something +strange had happened to her. Her condition was unnatural. The Duchess +gazed at her very anxiously, and, getting no answers, or very scanty +ones, to her questions, shook her head gravely.</p> + +<p class="normal">But we were on the verge of one pleasure at least. When we reached the +hospitable kitchen of the farmhouse it was joy indeed to stand before +the great turf fire, and feel the heat stealing into our half-frozen +bodies; to turn and warm back and front, while the good wife set bread +and hot milk before us. How differently we three felt in half an hour! +How the Duchess's eyes shone once more! How easily rose the laugh to +our lips! Joy had indeed come with the morning. To be warm and dry and +well fed after being cold and wet and hungry--what a thing this is!</p> + +<p class="normal">But on one neither food nor warmth seemed to have any effect. Mistress +Anne did, indeed, in obedience to my lady's sharp words, raise her +bowl to her lips. But she set it down quickly and sat looking in dull +apathy at the glowing peat. What had come over her?</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie went out with the farmer to attend to the horses, and +when he came back he had news.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is a lad here," he said in some excitement, "who has just seen +three foreigners ride past on the road, along with two Germans on +pack-horses; five in all. They must be three of the party who followed +us yesterday."</p> + +<p class="normal">I whistled. "Then Clarence got himself out," I said, shrugging my +shoulders. "Well! well!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I expect that is so," Master Bertie answered, the Duchess remaining +silent. "The question arises again, what is to be done?" he continued. +"We may follow them to Wesel, but the good man says the floods are +deep between here and the town, and we shall have Clarence and his +party before us all the way--shall perhaps run straight into their +arms."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But what else can we do?" I said. "It is impossible to go back."</p> + +<p class="normal">We held a long conference, and by much questioning of our host learned +that half a league away was a ferry-boat, which could carry as many as +two horses over the river at a time. On the farther side we might hit +a road leading to Santon, three leagues distant. Should we go to +Santon after all? The farmer thought the roads on that side of the +river might not be flooded. We should then be in touch once more with +our Dutch friends and might profit by Master Lindstrom's advice, on +which I for one was now inclined to set a higher value.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The river is bank full. Are you sure the ferry-boat can cross?" I +asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">Our host was not certain. And thereupon an unexpected voice struck in.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, dear, do not let us run any more risks!" it said. It was Mistress +Anne's. She was herself again, trembling, excited, bright-eyed; as +different as possible from the Anne of a few minutes before. A great +change had come over her. Perhaps the warmth had done it.</p> + +<p class="normal">A third course was suggested, to stay quietly where we were. The +farmhouse stood at some little distance from the road; and though it +was rough--it was very rough, consisting only of two rooms, in one of +which a cow was stalled--still it could furnish food and shelter. Why +not stay there?</p> + +<p class="normal">But the Duchess wisely, I think, decided against this. "It is +unpleasant to go wandering again," she said with a shiver. "But I +shall not rest until we are within the walls of a town. Master +Lindstrom laid so much stress on that. And I fancy that the party who +overtook us last night are not the main body. Others will have gone to +Wesel by boat perhaps, or along the other bank. There they will meet, +and, learning we have not arrived, they will probably return this way +and search for us."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Clarence----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, if we have Clarence to deal with," Master Bertie assented +gravely, "we cannot afford to lose a point. We will try the ferry."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was something gained to start dry and warm. But the women's pale +faces--for little by little the fatigue, the want of rest, the fear, +were telling even on the Duchess--were sad to see. I was sore and +stiff myself. The wound I had received so mysteriously had bled +afresh, probably during last night's fight. We needed all our courage +to put a brave face on the matter, and bear up and go out again into +the air, which for the first week in May was cold and nipping. +Suspense and anxiety had told in various ways on all of us. While I +felt a fierce anger against those who were driving us to these +straits. Master Bertie was nervous and excited, alarmed for his wife +and child, and inclined to see an enemy in every bush.</p> + +<p class="normal">However, we cheered up a little when we reached the ferry and found +the boat could cross without much risk. We had to go over in two +detachments, and it was nearly an hour past noon before we all stood +on the farther bank and bade farewell to the honest soul whose help +had been of so much importance to us. He told us we had three leagues +to go, and we hoped to be at rest in Santon by four o'clock.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the three leagues turned out to be more nearly five, while the +road was so founderous that we had again and again to quit it.</p> + +<p class="normal">The evening came on, the light waned, and still we were feeling our +way, so to speak--the women tired and on the verge of tears; the men +muddy to the waist, savage, and impatient. It was eight o'clock, and +dusk was well upon us before we caught sight of the first lights of +Santon, and in fear lest the gates might be shut, pressed forward at +such speed as our horses could compass.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you go on!" the Duchess adjured us. "Anne and I will be safe +enough behind you. Let me take the child, and do you ride on. We +cannot pass the night in the fields."</p> + +<p class="normal">The importance of securing admission was so great that Master Bertie +and I agreed; and cantered on, soon outstripping our companions, and +almost in the gloom losing sight of them. Dark masses of woods, the +last remnants, apparently, of a forest, lay about the road we had to +traverse. We were passing one of these, scarcely three hundred paces +short of the town, and I was turning in the saddle to see that the +ladies were following safely, when I heard Master Bertie, who was a +bow-shot in front of me, give a sudden cry.</p> + +<p class="normal">I wheeled round hastily to learn the reason, and was just in time to +see three horsemen sweep into the road before him from the cover of +the trees. They were so close to him--and they filled the road--that +his horse carried him amongst them almost before he could check it, or +so it seemed to me. I heard their loud challenge, saw his arm wave, +and guessed that his sword was out. I spurred desperately to join him, +giving a wild shout of encouragement as I did so. But before I could +come up, or indeed cross half the distance, the scuffle was over. One +man fell headlong from his saddle, one horse fled riderless down the +road, and at sight of this, or perhaps of me, the others turned tail +without more ado and made off, leaving Master Bertie in possession of +the field. The whole thing had passed in the shadow of the wood in +less than half a minute. When I drew rein by him he was sheathing his +sword. "Is it Clarence?" I cried eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, no; I did not see him. I think not," he answered. He was +breathing hard and was very much excited. "They were poor swordsmen, +for Spaniards," he added--"very poor, I thought."</p> + +<p class="normal">I jumped off my horse, and, kneeling beside the man, turned him over. +He was badly hurt, if not dying, cut across the neck. He looked hard +at him by such light as there was, and did not recognize him as one of +our assailants of the night before.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not think he is a Spaniard," I said slowly. Then a certain +suspicion occurred to my mind, and I stooped lower over him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not a Spaniard?" Master Bertie said stupidly. "How is that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Before I answered I raised the man in my arms, and, carrying him +carefully to the side of the road, set him with his back to a tree. +Then I got quickly on my horse. The women were just coming up. "Master +Bertie," I said in a low voice, as I looked this way and that to see +if the alarm had spread, "I am afraid there is a mistake. But say +nothing to them. It is one of the town-guard you have killed!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"One of the town-guard!" he cried, a light bursting in on him, and +the reins dropping from his hand. "What shall we do? We are lost, man!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_14" href="#div1Ref_14">AT BAY IN THE GATEHOUSE.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">What was to be done? That was the question, and a terrible question it +was. Behind us we had the inhospitable country, dark and dreary, the +night wind sweeping over it. In front, where the lights twinkled and +the smoke of the town went up, we were like to meet with a savage +reception. And it was no time for weighing alternatives. The choice +had to be made, made in a moment; I marvel to this day at the +quickness with which I made it for good or ill.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We must get into the town!" I cried imperatively. "And before the +alarm is given. It is hopeless to fly, Master Bertie, and we cannot +spend another night in the fields. Quick, madam!" I continued to the +Duchess, as she came up. I did not wait to hear his opinion, for I saw +he was stunned by the catastrophe. "We have hurt one of the town-guard +through a mistake. We must get through the gate before it is +discovered!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I seized her rein and flogged up her horse, and gave her no time to +ask questions, but urged on the party at a hand gallop until the gate +was reached. The attempt, I knew, was desperate, for the two men who +had escaped had ridden straight for the town; but I saw no other +resource, and it seemed to me to be better to surrender peaceably, if +that were possible, than to expose the women to another night of such +cold and hunger as the last. And fortune so far favored us that when +we reached the gate it was open. Probably, the patrol having ridden +through to get help, no one had thought fit to close it; and, no one +withstanding us, we spurred our sobbing horses under the archway and +entered the street.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was a curious entry, and a curious scene we came upon. I remember +now how strange it all looked. The houses, leaning forward in a dozen +quaint forms, clear cut against the pale evening sky, caused a +darkness as of a cavern in the narrow street below. Here and there in +the midst of this darkness hung a lantern, which, making the gloom +away from it seem deeper, lit up the things about it, throwing into +flaring prominence some barred window with a scared face peering from +it, some corner with a puddle, a slinking dog, a broken flight of +steps. Just within the gate stood a brazier full of glowing coal, and +beside it a halbert rested against the wall. I divined that the +watchman had run into the town with the riders, and I drew rein in +doubt, listening and looking. I think if we had ridden straight on +then, all might have been well; or, at least, we might have been +allowed to give ourselves up.</p> + +<p class="normal">But we hesitated a moment, and were lost. No doubt, though we saw but +one, there were a score of people watching us, who took us for four +men, Master Bertie and I being in front; and these, judging from the +boldness of our entry that there were more behind, concluded that this +was a foray upon the town. At any rate, they took instant advantage of +our pause. With a swift whir an iron pot came hurtling past me, and, +missing the Duchess by a hand's-breadth, went clanking under the +gatehouse. That served for a signal. In a moment an alarm of hostile +cries rose all round us. An arrow whizzed between my horse's feet. +Half a dozen odd missiles, snatched up by hasty hands, came raining in +on us out of the gloom. The town seemed to be rising as one man. A +bell began to ring, and a hundred yards in front, where the street +branched off to right and left, the way seemed suddenly alive from +wall to wall with lights and voices and brandished arms, the gleam of +steel, and the babel of a furious crowd--a crowd making down toward us +with a purpose we needed no German to interpret.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It was a horrible moment; the more horrible that I had not expected +this fury, and was unnerved as well as taken aback by it. Remembering +that I had brought my companions here, and that two were women, one +was a child, I quailed. How could I protect them? There was no +mistaking the stern meaning of those cries, of that rage so much +surpassing anything I had feared. Though I did not know that the man +we had struck down was a bridegroom, and that there were those in the +crowd in whose ears the young wife's piercing scream still rang, I yet +quailed before their yells and curses.</p> + +<p class="normal">As I glanced round for a place of refuge, my eyes lit on an open +doorway close to me, and close also to the brazier and halbert. It was +a low stone doorway, beetle-browed, with a coat of arms carved over +it. I saw in an instant that it must lead to the tower above us--the +gatehouse; and I sprang from my horse, a fresh yell from the houses +hailing the act. I saw that, if we were to gain a moment for +parleying, we must take refuge there. I do not know how I did it, but +somehow I made myself understood by the others and got the women off +their horses and dragged Mistress Anne inside, where at once we both +fell in the darkness over the lower steps of a spiral staircase. This +hindered the Duchess, who was following, and I heard a scuffle taking +place behind us. But in that confined space--the staircase was very +narrow--I could give no help. I could only stumble upward, dragging +the fainting girl after me, until we emerged through an open doorway +at the top into a room. What kind of room I did not notice then, only +that it was empty. Notice! It was no time for taking notice. The bell +was clanging louder and louder outside. The mob were yelling like +hounds in sight of their quarry. The shouts, the confused cries, and +threats, and questions deafened me. I turned to learn what was +happening behind me. The other two had not come up.</p> + +<p class="normal">I felt my way down again, one hand on the central pillar, my shoulder +against the outside wall. The stair-foot was faintly lit by the glow +from outside, and on the bottom step I came on some one, hurt or dead, +just a dark mass at my feet. It was Master Bertie. I gave a cry and +leaped over his body. The Duchess, brave wife, was standing before +him, the halbert which she had snatched up presented at the doorway +and the howling mob outside.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fortunately the crowd had not yet learned how few we were; nor saw, I +think, that it was but a woman who confronted them. To rush into the +low doorway and storm the narrow winding staircase in the face of +unknown numbers was a task from which the bravest veterans might have +flinched, and the townsfolk, furious as they were, hung back. I took +advantage of the pause. I grasped the halbert myself and pushed the +Duchess back. "Drag him up!" I muttered. "If you cannot manage it, +call Anne!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But grief and hard necessity gave her strength, and, despite the noise +in front of me, I heard her toil panting up with her burden. When I +judged she had reached the room above, I too turned and ran up after +her, posting myself in the last angle just below the room. There I was +sheltered from missiles by the turn in the staircase, and was further +protected by the darkness. Now I could hold the way with little risk, +for only one could come up at a time, and he would be a brave man who +should storm the stairs in my teeth.</p> + +<p class="normal">All this, I remember, was done in a kind of desperate frenzy, in haste +and confusion, with no plan or final purpose, but simply out of the +instinct of self-preservation, which led me to do, from moment to +moment, what I could to save our lives. I did not know whether there +was another staircase to the tower, nor whether there were enemies +above us; whether, indeed, enemies might not swarm in on us from a +dozen entrances. I had no time to think of more than just this; that +my staircase, of which I did know, must be held.</p> + +<p class="normal">I think I had stood there about a minute, breathing hard and listening +to the din outside, which came to my ears a little softened by the +thick walls round me--so much softened, at least, that I could hear my +heart beating in the midst of it--when the Duchess came back to the +door above. I could see her, there being a certain amount of light in +the room behind her, but she could not see me. "What can I do?" she +asked softly.</p> + +<p class="normal">I answered by a question. "Is he alive?" I muttered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes; but hurt," she answered, struggling with a sob, with a +fluttering of the woman's heart she had repressed so bravely. "Much +hurt, I fear! Oh, why, why did we come here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">She did not mean it as a reproach, but I took it as one, and braced +myself more firmly to meet this crisis--to save her at least if it +should be any way possible. When she asked again "Can I do anything?" +I bade her take my pike and stand where I was for a moment. Since no +enemy had yet made his appearance above, the strength of our position +seemed to hold out some hope, and it was the more essential that I +should understand it and know exactly what our chances were.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I sprang up the stairs into the room and looked round, my eyes seeming +to take in everything at once. It was a big bare room, with signs of +habitation only in one corner. On the side toward the town was a long, +low window, through which--a score of the diamond panes were broken +already--the flare of the besiegers' torches fell luridly on the walls +and vaulted roof. By the dull embers of a wood fire, over which hung a +huge black pot, Master Bertie was lying on the boards, breathing +loudly and painfully, his head pillowed on the Duchess's kerchief. +Beside him sat Mistress Anne, her face hidden, the child wailing in +her lap. A glance round assured me that there was no other staircase, +and that on the side toward the country, the wall was pierced with no +window bigger than a loophole or an arrow-slit; with no opening which +even a boy could enter. For the present, therefore, unless the top of +the tower should be escaladed from the adjacent houses--and I could do +nothing to provide against that--we had nothing to fear except from +the staircase and the window I have mentioned. Every moment, however, +a missile or a shot crashed through the latter, adding the shiver of +falling glass to the general din. No wonder the child wailed and the +girl sank over it in abject terror. Those savage yells might well make +a woman blench. They carried more fear and dread to my heart than did +the real danger of our position, desperate as it was.</p> + +<p class="normal">And yet it was so desperate that, for a moment, I leant against the +wall dazed and hopeless, listening to the infernal tumult without and +within. Had Bertie been by my side to share the responsibility and +join in the risk, I could have borne it better. I might have felt then +some of the joy of battle, and the stern pleasure of the one matched +against the many. But I was alone. How was I to save these women and +that poor child from the yelling crew outside? How indeed? I did not +know the enemy's language; I could not communicate with him, could not +explain, could not even cry for quarter for the women.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">A stone which glanced from one of the mullions and grazed my shoulder +roused me from this fit of cowardice, which, I trust and believe, had +lasted for a few seconds only. At the same moment an unusual volley of +missiles tore through the window as if discharged at a given signal. +We were under cover, and they did us no harm, rolling for the most +part noisily about the floor. But when the storm ceased and a calm as +sudden followed, I heard a dull, regular sound close to the window--a +thud! thud! thud!--and on the instant divined the plan and the danger. +My courage came back and with it my wits. I remembered an old tale +I had heard, and, dropping my sword where I stood, I flew to the +hearth, and unhooked the great pot. It was heavy; half full of +something--broth, most likely; but I recked nothing of that, I bore it +swiftly to the window, and just as the foremost man on the ladder had +driven in the lead work before him with his ax, flung the whole of the +contents--they were not scalding, but they were very hot--in his face. +The fellow shrieked loudly, and, blinded and taken by surprise, lost +his hold and fell against his supporter, and both tumbled down again +more quickly than they had come up.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sternly triumphant, I poised the great pot itself in my hands, +thinking to fling it down upon the sea of savage upturned faces, of +which I had a brief view, as the torches flared now on one, now on +another. But prudence prevailed. If no more blood were shed it might +still be possible to get some terms. I laid the pot down by the side +of the window as a weapon to be used only in the last resort.</p> + +<p class="normal">Meanwhile the Duchess, posted in the dark, had heard the noise of the +window being driven in, and cried out pitifully to know what it was. +"Stand firm!" I shouted loudly. "Stand firm. We are safe as yet."</p> + +<p class="normal">Even the uproar without seemed to abate a little as the first fury of +the mob died down. Probably their leaders were concerting fresh +action. I went and knelt beside Master Bertie and made a rough +examination of his wound. He had received a nasty blow on the back of +the head, from which the blood was still oozing, and he was +insensible. His face looked very long and thin and deathlike. But, so +far as I could ascertain, the bones were uninjured, and he was now +breathing more quietly. "I think he will recover," I said, easing his +clothes.</p> + +<p class="normal">Anne was crouching on the other side of him. As she did not answer I +looked up at her. Her lips were moving, but the only word I caught was +"Clarence!" I did not wonder she was distraught; I had work enough to +keep my own wits. But I wanted her help, and I repeated loudly, "Anne! +Anne!" trying to rouse her.</p> + +<p class="normal">She looked past me shuddering. "Heaven forgive you!" she muttered. +"You have brought me to this! And now I must die! I must die here. In +the net they have set for others is their own foot taken!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She was quite beside herself with terror. I saw that she was not +addressing me; and I had not time to make sense of her wanderings. I +left her and went out to speak to the Duchess. Poor woman! even her +brave spirit was giving way. I felt her cold hands tremble as I took +the halbert from her. "Go into the room a while," I said softly. "He +is not seriously hurt, I am sure. I will guard this. If any one +appears at the window, scream."</p> + +<p class="normal">She went gladly, and I took her place, having now to do double duty. I +had been there a few minutes only, listening, with my soul in my ears, +to detect the first signs of attack, either below me or in the room +behind, when I distinguished a strange rustling sound on the +staircase. It appeared to come from a point a good deal below me, and +probably, whoever made it was just within the doorway. I peered into +the gloom, but could see no one as yet. "Stand!" I cried in a tone of +warning. "Who is that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The sound ceased abruptly, but it left me uneasy. Could they be going +to blow us up with gunpowder? No! I did not think so. They would not +care to ruin the gateway for the sake of capturing so small a party. +And the tower was strong. It would not be easy to blow it up.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet in a short time the noise began again; and my fears returned with +it. "Stand!" I cried savagely, "or take care of yourself."</p> + +<p class="normal">The answer was a flash of bright light--which for a second showed the +rough stone walls winding away at my feet--a stunning report, and the +pattering down of half a dozen slugs from the roof. I laughed, my +first start over. "You will have to come a little higher up!" I cried +tauntingly, as I smelt the fumes. My eyes had become so accustomed to +the darkness that I felt sure I should detect an assailant, however +warily he might make his approach. And my halbert was seven feet long, +so that I could reach as far as I could see. I had had time, too, to +grow cool.</p> + +<p class="normal">After this there was comparative quiet for another space. Every now +and then a stone or, more rarely, the ball of an arquebuse would come +whizzing into the room above. But I did not fear this. It was easy to +keep under cover. And their shouting no longer startled me. I began to +see a glimpse of hope. It was plain that the townsfolk were puzzled +how to come at us without suffering great loss. They were unaware of +our numbers, and, as it proved, believed that we had three uninjured +men at least. The staircase was impracticable as a point of assault, +and the window, being only three feet in height and twenty from the +ground, was not much better, if defended, as they expected it would +be, by a couple of desperate swordsmen.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I was not much astonished, therefore, when the rustling sound, +beginning again at the foot of the staircase, came this time to no +more formidable issue than a hail in Spanish. "Will you surrender?" +the envoy cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No!" I said roundly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who are you?" was the next question.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We are English!" I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">He went then; and there for the time the negotiations ended. But, +seeing the dawn of hope, I was the more afraid of any trap or +surprise, and I cried to the Duchess to be on her guard. For this +reason, too, the suspense of the next few minutes was almost more +trying than anything which had gone before. But the minutes came at +last to an end. A voice below cried loudly in English, "Holloa! are +you friends?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, yes," I replied joyfully, before the words had well ceased to +rebound from the walls. For the voice and accent were Master +Lindstrom's. A cry of relief from the room behind me showed that +there, too, the speaker was recognized. The Duchess came running to +the door, but I begged her to go back and keep a good lookout. And she +obeyed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How come you here? How has it happened?" Master Lindstrom asked, his +voice, though he still remained below, betraying his perplexity and +unhappiness. "Can I not do something? This is terrible, indeed."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You can come up, if you like," I answered, after a moment's thought. +"But you must come alone. And I cannot let even you, friend as you +are, see our defenses."</p> + +<p class="normal">As he came up I stepped back and drew the door of the room toward me, +so that, though a little light reached the head of the stairs, he +could not, standing there, see into the room or discern our real +weakness. I did not distrust him--Heaven forbid! but he might have to +tell all he saw to his friends below, and I thought it well, for his +sake as well as our own, that he should be able to do this freely, and +without hurting us. As he joined me I held up a finger for silence and +listened keenly. But all was quiet below. No one had followed him. +Then I turned and warmly grasped his hands, and we peered into one +another's faces. I saw he was deeply moved; that he was thinking of +Dymphna, and how I had saved her. He held my hands as though he would +never loose them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well!" I said, as cheerfully as I could, "have you brought us an +offer of terms? But let me tell you first," I continued, "how it +happened." And I briefly explained that we had mistaken the captain of +the guard and his two followers for Clarence and the two Spaniards. +"Is he dead?" I continued.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, he is still alive," Master Lindstrom answered gravely. "But the +townsfolk are furious, and the seizure of the tower has still further +exasperated them. Why did you do it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because we should have been torn to pieces if we had not done it," I +answered dryly. "You think we are in a strait place?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you not think so yourself?" he said, somewhat astonished.</p> + +<p class="normal">I laughed. "That is as may be," I answered with an affectation of +recklessness. "The staircase is narrow and the window low. We shall +sell our lives dearly, my friend. Yet, for the sake of the women who +are with us, we are willing to surrender if the citizens offer us +terms. After all, it was an accident. Cannot you impress this on +them?" I added eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">He shook his head. "They will not hear reason," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then," I replied, "impress the other thing upon them. Tell them that +our swords are sharp and we are desperate."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will see what I can do," he answered slowly. "The Duke of Cleves is +expected here to-morrow, and the townsfolk feel they would be +disgraced forever if he should find their gate held by a party of +marauders, as they consider you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The Duke of Cleves?" I repeated. "Perhaps he may be better affected +toward us."</p> + +<p class="normal">"They will overpower you before he comes," Master Lindstrom answered +despondently. "I would put no trust in him if I were you. But I will +go to them, and, believe me, I will do all that man can do."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of that I am sure," I said warmly. And then, cautioning me to remain +strictly on the defensive, he left me.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Before his footsteps had ceased to echo on the stairs the door beside +me opened, and Mistress Anne appeared at it. I saw at once that his +familiar voice had roused her from the stupor of fear in which I had +last seen her. Her eyes were bright, her whole frame was thrilling +with excitement, hope, suspense. I began to understand her; to discern +beneath the disguise thrown over it in ordinary times by a strong +will, the nervous nature which was always confident or despairing, +which felt everything so keenly--everything, that is, which touched +itself. "Well?" she cried, "well?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Patience! patience!" I replied rather sharply. I could not help +comparing her conduct with that of the Duchess, and blaming her, not +for her timidity, but for the selfishness which she had betrayed in +her fear. I could fancy Petronilla trembling and a coward, but not +despairing nor utterly cast down, nor useless when others needed her, +nor wrapped in her own terrors to the very exclusion of reason. +"Patience!" I said; "he is coming back. He and his friends will do all +they can for us. We must wait a while and hope, and keep a good +lookout."</p> + +<p class="normal">She had her hand on the door, and by an abrupt movement, she slipped +out to me and closed it behind her. This made the staircase so dark +that I could no longer distinguish her face, but I judged from her +tone that her fears were regaining possession of her. "Clarence," she +muttered, her voice low and trembling. "Have you thought of him? Could +not he help us? He may have followed us here, and may be here now. +Now! And perhaps he does not know in what danger we are."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Clarence!" I said, astonished and almost angry. "Clarence help us? Go +back, girl, go back. You are mad. He would be more likely to complete +our ruin. Go in and nurse the baby!" I added bitterly.</p> + +<p class="normal">What could she mean, I asked myself, when she had gone in. Was there +anything in her suggestion? Would Clarence follow us hither? If so, +and if he should come in time, would he have power to help us, using +such mysterious influence, Spanish or English, as he seemed to +possess? And if he could help us, would it be better to fall into his +hands than into those of the exasperated Santonese? I thought the +Duchess would say "No!"</p> + +<p class="normal">So it mattered not what I answered myself. I hoped, now Master +Lindstrom had appeared, that the women would be allowed to go free; +and it seemed to me that to surrender to Clarence would be to hand +over the Duchess to her enemy simply that the rest of us might escape.</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Lindstrom returned while I was still considering this, and, +observing the same precautions as before, I bade him join me. "Well?" +I said, not so impetuously, I hope, as Mistress Anne, yet I dare say +with a good deal of eagerness. "Well, what do they say?" For he was +slow to speak.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have bad news," he answered gently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" I ejaculated, a lump which was due as much to rage as to any +other emotion rising in my throat. "So they will give us no terms? +Then so be it! Let them come and take us."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nay," he hastened to answer. "It is not so bad as that, lad. They are +fathers and husbands themselves, and not lanzknechts. They will suffer +the women to go free, and will even let me take charge of them if +necessary."</p> + +<p class="normal">"They will!" I exclaimed, overjoyed. I wondered why on earth he had +hesitated to tell me this. "Why, that is the main point, friend."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he said gravely, "perhaps so. More, the men may go too, if the +tower be surrendered within an hour. With one exception, that is. The +man who struck the blow must be given up."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The man who struck the blow!" I repeated slowly. "Do you mean--you +mean the man who cut the patrol down?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," he said. He was peering very closely at me, as though he would +learn from my face who it was. And I stood thinking. This was as much +as we could expect. I divined, and most truly, that but for the honest +Dutchman's influence, promises, perhaps bribes, such terms would never +have been offered to us by the men who hours before had driven us to +hold as if we had been vermin. Yet give up Master Bertie? "What," I +said, "will be done to him? The man who must be given up, I mean?" +Master Lindstrom shook his head. "It was an accident," I urged, my +eyes on his.</p> + +<p class="normal">He grasped my hand firmly, and, turning away his face, seemed for a +while unable to speak. At last he whispered, "He must suffer for the +others, lad. I fear so. It is a hard fate, a cruel fate. But I can do +no more. They will not hear me on this. It is true he will be first +tried by the magistrate, but there is no hope. They are very hard."</p> + +<p class="normal">My heart sank. I stood irresolute, pondering on what we ought to do, +pondering on what I should say to the wife who so loved the man who +must die. What could I say? Yet, somehow I must break the news. I +asked Master Lindstrom to wait where he was while I consulted the +others, adding, "You will answer for it that there will be no attack +while you are here, I suppose?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will," he said. I knew I could trust him, and I went in to the +Duchess, closing the door behind me. A change had come over the room +since I had left it. The moon had risen and was flinging its cold +white light through the twisted and shattered framework of the window, +to fall in three bright panels on the floor. The torches in the street +had for the most part burned out, or been extinguished. In place of +the red glare, the shouts and the crash of glass, the atmosphere of +battle and strife I had left, I found this silvery light and a +stillness made more apparent by the distant hum of many voices.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mistress Anne was standing just within the threshold, her face showing +pale against the gloom, her hands clasped. The Duchess was kneeling by +her husband, but she looked up as I entered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They will let us all go," I said bluntly; it was best to tell the +tale at once--"except the one who hurt the patrol, that is."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was strange how differently the two women received the news; while +Mistress Anne flung her hands to her face with a sobbing cry of +thankfulness, and leaned against the wall crying and shaking, my lady +stood up straight and still, breathing hard but saying nothing. I saw +that she did not need to ask what would be done to the one who was +excepted. She knew. "No," she murmured at last, her hands pressed to +her bosom, "we cannot do it! Oh, no, no!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I fear we must," I said gently--calmly, too, I think. Yet in saying +it I was not quite myself. An odd sensation was growing upon me in the +stillness of the room. I began on a sudden, I did not know why, to +thrill with excitement, to tremble with nervousness, such as would +rather have become one of the women than a man. My head grew hot, my +heart began to beat quickly. I caught myself looking out, listening, +waiting for something to happen, something to be said. It was +something more terrible, as it seemed to me, than the din and crash of +the worst moments of the assault. What was it? What was it that was +threatening my being? An instant and I knew.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, no, never!" cried the Duchess again, her voice quivering, her +face full of keenest pain. "We will not give you up. We will stand or +fall together, friend."</p> + +<p class="normal">Give <i>you</i> up! Give <i>you</i> up! Ha! The veil was lifted now, and I saw +what the something with the cold breath going before it was. I looked +quietly from her to her husband; and I asked--I fancy she thought my +question strangely irrelevant at that moment, "How is he? Is he +better?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Much better. He knew me for a moment," she answered. "Then he seemed +to sink away again. But his eyes were quite clear."</p> + +<p class="normal">I stood gazing down at his thin face, which had ever looked so kindly +into mine. My fingers played idly with the knot of my sword. "He will +live?" I asked abruptly, harshly.</p> + +<p class="normal">She started at the sudden question. But, brutal as it must have +sounded, she was looking at me in pity so great and generous that it +did not wound her. "Oh, yes," she said, her eyes still clinging to me. +"I think he will live, thank Heaven!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Thank Heaven! Ah, yes, thank Heaven!</p> + +<p class="normal">I turned and went slowly toward the door. But before I reached it she +was at my side, nay, was on her knees by me, clasping my hand, looking +up to me with streaming eyes. "What are you going to do?" she cried, +reading, I suppose, something in my face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will see if Master Lindstrom cannot get better terms for us," I +answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">She rose, still detaining me. "You are sure?" she said, still eying me +jealously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quite sure," I answered, forcing a smile. "I will come back and +report to you."</p> + +<p class="normal">She let me go then, and I went out and joined Lindstrom on the +staircase.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you certain," I asked, speaking in a whisper, "that they +will--that the town will keep its word and let the others go?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am quite sure of it," he replied nodding. "They are Germans, and +hard and pitiless, but you may trust them. So far I will answer for +them."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then we accept," I said gravely. "I give myself up. Let them take +me."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XV.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_15" href="#div1Ref_15">BEFORE THE COURT.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I had not seen the first moonbeams pierce the broken casement of the +tower-room, but I was there to watch the last tiny patch of silver +glide aslant from wall to sill, and sill to frame, and so pass out. +Near the fire, which had been made up, and now glowed and crackled +bravely on the hearthstone at my elbow, my three jailers had set a +mattress for me; and on this I sat, my back to the wall and my face to +the window. The guards lounged on the other side of the hearth round a +lantern, playing at dice and drinking. They were rough, hard men, +whose features, as they leaned over the table and the light played +strongly on their faces, blazoning them against a wall of shadow, were +stern and rugged enough. But they had not shown themselves unkindly. +They had given me a share of their wine, and had pointed to the window +and shrugged their shoulders, as much as to say that it was my own +fault if I suffered from the draught. Nay, from time to time, one of +them would turn from his game and look at me--in pity, I think--and +utter a curse that was meant for encouragement.</p> + +<p class="normal">Even when the first excitement had passed away, I felt none of the +stupefaction which I have heard that men feel in such a position. My +brain was painfully active. In vain I longed to sleep, if it were only +that I might not be thought to fear death. But the fact that I was to +be tried first, though the sentence was a certainty, distracted and +troubled me. My thoughts paced from thing to thing; now dwelling on +the Duchess and her husband, now flitting to Petronilla and Sir +Anthony, to the old place at home and the servants; to strange petty +things, long familiar--a tree in the chase at Coton, an herb I had +planted. Once a great lump rose in my throat, and I had to turn away +to hide the hot tears that would rise at the thought that I must die +in this mean German town, in this unknown corner, and be buried and +forgotten! And once, too, to torment me, there rose a doubt in my mind +whether Master Bertie would recover; whether, indeed, I had not thrown +my life away for nothing. But it was too late to think of that! And +the doubt, which the Evil One himself must have suggested, so terrible +was it passed away quickly.</p> + +<p class="normal">My thoughts raced, but the night crawled. We had surrendered about +ten, and the magistrates, less pitiful than the jailers, had forbidden +my friends to stay with me. An hour or more after midnight, two of the +men lay down and the other sat humming a drinking-song, or at +intervals rose to yawn and stretch himself and look out of the window. +From time to time, the cry of the watchman going his rounds came +drearily to my ears, recalling to me the night I had spent behind the +boarding in Moorgate Street, when the adventure which was to end +to-morrow--nay, to-day--in a few hours--had lured me away. To-day? Was +I to die to-day? To perish with all my plans, hopes, love? It seemed +impossible. As I gazed at the window, whose shape began to be printed +on my brain, it seemed impossible. My soul so rose in rebellion +against it, that the perspiration stood on my brow, and I had to clasp +my hands about my knees, and strain every muscle to keep in the cry I +would have uttered! a cry, not of fear, but of rage and remonstrance +and revolt.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was glad to see the first streaks of dawn, to hear the first +cock-crowings, and, a few minutes later, the voices of men in the +street and on the stairs. The sounds of day and life acted magically +upon me. The horror of the night passed off as does the horror of a +dream. When a man, heavily cloaked and with his head covered, came in, +the door being shut behind him by another hand, I looked up at him +bravely. The worst was past.</p> + +<p class="normal">He replied by looking down at me for a few moments without disclosing +himself, the collar of his cloak being raised so high that I could see +nothing of his features. My first notion that he must be Master +Lindstrom passed away; and, displeased by his silent scrutiny, and +thinking him a stranger, I said sharply, "I hope you are satisfied, +sir."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Satisfied?" he replied, in a voice which made me start so that the +irons clanked on my feet, "Well, I think I should be--seeing you so, +my friend!"</p> + +<p class="normal">It was Clarence! Of all men, Clarence! I knew his voice, and he, +seeing himself recognized, lowered his cloak. I stared at him in +stupefied silence, and he at me in a grim curiosity. I was not +prepared for the blunt abruptness with which he continued--using +almost the very words he had used when face to face with me in the +flood: "Now tell me who you are, and what brought you into this +company?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I gave him no answer. I still stared at him in silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come!" he continued, his hawk's eyes bent on my face, "make a clean +breast of it, and perhaps--who knows? I may help you yet, lad. You +have puzzled and foiled me, and I want to understand you. Where did my +lady pick you up just when she wanted you? I had arranged for every +checker on the board except you. Who are you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">This time I did answer him--by a question. "How many times have we +met?" I asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Three," he said readily, "and the last time you nearly rid the world +of me. Now the luck is against you. It generally is in the end against +those who thwart me, my friend." He chuckled at the conceit, and I +read in his face at once his love of intrigue and his vanity. "I come +uppermost, as always."</p> + +<p class="normal">I only nodded.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you want?" I asked. I felt a certain expectation. He wanted +something.</p> + +<p class="normal">"First, to know who you are."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall not tell you!" I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">He smiled dryly, sitting opposite to me. He had drawn up a stool, and +made himself comfortable. He was not an uncomely man as he sat there +playing with his dagger, a dubious smile on his lean, dark face. +Unwarned, I might have been attracted by the masterful audacity, the +intellect as well as the force which I saw stamped on his features. +Being warned, I read cunning in his bold eyes, and cruelty in the curl +of his lip. "What do you want next?" I asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want to save your life," he replied lightly.</p> + +<p class="normal">At that I started--I could not help it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ha! ha!" he laughed, "I thought the stoicism did not go quite down to +the bottom, my lad. But there, it is true enough, I have come to help +you. I have come to save your life if you will let me."</p> + +<p class="normal">I strove in vain to keep entire mastery over myself. The feelings to +which he appealed were too strong for me. My voice sounded strange, +even in my own ears, as I said hoarsely, "It is impossible! What can +you do?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What can I do?" he answered with a stern smile. "Much! I have, boy, a +dozen strings in my hands, and a neck--a life at the end of each!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He raised his hand, and extending the fingers, moved them to and fro.</p> + +<p class="normal">"See! see! A life, a death!" he exclaimed. "And for you, I can and +will save your life--on one condition."</p> + +<p class="normal">"On one condition?" I murmured.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, on one condition; but it is a very easy one. I will save your +life on my part; and you, on yours, must give me a little assistance. +Do you see? Then we shall be quits."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not understand," I said dully. I did not. His words had set my +heart fluttering so that I could for the moment take in only one +idea--that here was a new hope of life.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is very simple," he resumed, speaking slowly. "Certain plans of +mine require that I should get your friend the Duchess conveyed back +to England. But for you I should have succeeded before this. In what +you have hindered me, you can now help me. You have their confidence +and great influence with them. All I ask is that you will use that +influence so that they may be at a certain place at a certain hour. I +will contrive the rest. It shall never be known, I promise you, that +you----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Betrayed them!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, gave me some information," he said lightly, puffing away my +phrase.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No. Betrayed them!" I persisted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Put it so, if you please," he replied, shrugging his shoulders and +raising his eyebrows. "What is in a word?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are the tempter himself, I think!" I cried in bitter rage--for it +<i>was</i> bitter--bitter, indeed, to feel that new-born hope die out. "But +you come to me in vain. I defy you!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Softly! softly!" he answered with calmness.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet I saw a little pulse beating in his cheek that seemed to tell of +some emotion kept in subjection.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It frightens you at first," he said. "But listen. You will do them no +harm, and yourself good. I shall get them anyway, both the Duchess and +her husband; though, without your aid, it will be more difficult. Why, +help of that kind is given every day. They need never know it. Even +now there is one of whom you little dream who has----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Silence!" I cried fiercely. "I care not. I defy you!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I could think of only one thing. I was wild with rage and +disappointment. His words had aggravated the pain of every regret, +every clinging to life I felt.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go!" I cried. "Go and leave me, you villain!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"If I do leave you," he said, fixing his eyes on me, "it will be, my +friend--to death."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then so be it!" I answered wildly. "So be it! I will keep my honor."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Your honor!" The mask dropped from his face, and he sneered as he +rose from his seat. A darker scowl changed and disfigured his brow, +as he lost hope of gaining me. "Your honor? Where will it be by +to-night?" he hissed, his eyes glowering down at me. "Where a week +hence, when you will be cast into a pit and forgotten? Your honor, +fool? What is the honor of a dead man? Pah! But die, then, if you will +have it so! Die, like the brainless brute you are! And rot, and be +forgotten!" he concluded passionately.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">They were terrible words; more terrible I know now than either he or I +understood then. They so shook me that when he was gone I crouched +trembling on my pallet, hiding my face in a fit of horror--taking no +heed of my jailers or of appearances. "Die and be forgotten! Die and +be forgotten!" The doom rang in my ears.</p> + +<p class="normal">Something which seemed to me angelic roused me from this misery. It +was the sound of a kindly, familiar voice speaking English. I looked +up and found the Dutchman bending over me with a face of infinite +distress. With him, but rather behind him, stood Van Tree, pale and +vicious-eyed, tugging his scanty chin-beard and gazing about him like +a dog seeking some one to fasten upon. "Poor lad! poor lad!" the old +man said, his voice shaking as he looked at me.</p> + +<p class="normal">I sprang to my feet, the irons rattling as I dashed my hand across my +eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is all right!" I said hurriedly. "I had a--but never mind that. It +was like a dream. Only tell the Duchess to look to herself," I +continued, still rather vehemently. "Clarence is here. He is in +Santon. I have seen him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have seen him?" both the Dutchmen cried at once.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay!" I said, with a laugh that was three parts hysterical--indeed, I +was still tingling all over with excitement. "He has been here to +offer me my life if I would help him in his schemes. I told him he was +the tempter, and defied him. And he--he said I should die and be +forgotten!" I added, trembling, yet laughing wildly at the same time.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think he <i>is</i> the tempter!" said Master Lindstrom solemnly, his +face very grim. "And therefore a liar and the father of lies! You may +die, lad, to-day; perhaps you must. But forgotten you shall not be, +while we live, or one of us lives, or one of the children who shall +come after us. He is a liar!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I got my hands, with a struggle, from the old man, and turning my back +upon him, went and looked out of the window. The sun was rising. The +tower of the great minster, seen row for the first time, rose in +stately brightness above the red roofs and quaint gables and the +rows of dormer windows. Down in the streets the grayness and chill +yet lingered. But above was a very glory of light and warmth and +color--the rising of the May sun. When I turned round I was myself +again. The calm beauty of that sight had stolen into my soul. "Is it +time?" I said cheerfully. For the crowd was gathering below, and there +were voices and feet on the stairs.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think it is," Master Lindstrom answered. "We have obtained leave to +go with you. You need fear no violence in the streets, for the man who +was hurt is still alive and may recover. I have been with the +magistrates this morning," he continued, "and found them better +disposed to you; but the Sub-dean has joint jurisdiction with them, as +the deputy of the Bishop of Arras, who is dean of the minster; and he +is, for some reason, very bitter against you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The Bishop of Arras? Granville, do you mean?" I asked. I knew the +name of the Emperor's shrewd and powerful minister, by whose advice +the Netherlands were at this time ruled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The same. He, of course, is not here, but his deputy is. Were it not +for him---- But there, it is no good talking of that!" the Dutchman +said, breaking off and rubbing his head in his chagrin.</p> + +<p class="normal">One of the guards who had spent the night with me brought me at this +moment a bowl of broth with a piece of bread in it. I could not eat +the bread, but I drank the broth and felt the better for it. Having in +my pocket a little money with which the Duchess had furnished me, I +put a silver piece in the bowl and handed it back to him. The man +seemed astonished, and muttered something in German as he turned away.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What did he say?" I asked the Dutchman.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, nothing, nothing," he answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But what was it? It was something," I persisted, seeing him confused.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He--well, he said he would have a mass said for you!" Lindstrom +answered in despair. "It will do no harm."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, why should it?" I replied mechanically.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">We were in the street by this time, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree +walking beside me in the middle of a score of soldiers, who seemed to +my eyes fantastically dressed. I remarked, as we passed out, a tall +man clothed in red and black, who was standing by the door as if +waiting to fall in behind me. He carried on his shoulder a long +broad-bladed sword, and I guessed who he was, seeing how Master +Lindstrom strove to intercept my view of him. But I was not afraid of +<i>that</i>. I had heard long ago--perhaps six months in time, but it +seemed long ago--how bravely Queen Jane had died. And if a girl had +not trembled, surely a man should not. So I looked steadfastly at him, +and took great courage, and after that was able to gaze calmly on the +people, who pressed to stare at me, peeping over the soldiers' +shoulders, and clustering in every doorway and window to see me go +past. They were all silent, and it even seemed to me that some--but +this may have been my fancy--pitied me.</p> + +<p class="normal">I saw nothing of the Duchess, and might have wondered, had not Master +Lindstrom explained that he had contrived to keep her in ignorance of +the hour fixed for the proceedings. Her husband was better, he said, +and conscious; but, for fear of exciting him, they were keeping the +news from him also. I remember I felt for a moment very sore at this, +and then I tried to persuade myself that it was right.</p> + +<p class="normal">The distance through the streets was short, and almost before I was +aware of it I was in the court-house, the guard had fallen back, and I +was standing before three persons who were seated behind a long table. +Two of them were grave, portly men wearing flat black caps and scarlet +robes, with gold chains about their necks. The third, dressed as an +ecclesiastic, wore a huge gem ring upon his thumb. Behind them stood +three attendants holding a sword, a crosier, and a ducal cap upon a +cushion; and above and behind all was a lofty stained window, whose +rich hues, the sun being low as yet, shot athwart the corbels of the +roof. At the end of the table sat a black-robed man with an ink-horn +and spectacles, a grave, still, down-looking man; and the crowd being +behind me, and preserving a dead silence, and the attendants standing +like statues, I seemed indeed to be alone with these four at the +table, and the great stained window and the solemn hush. They talked +to one another in low tones for a minute, gazing at me the while. And +I fancied they were astonished to find me so young.</p> + +<p class="normal">At length they all fell back into their chairs. "Do you speak German?" +the eldest burgher said, addressing me gravely. He sat in the middle, +with the Sub-dean on his right.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; but I speak and understand Spanish," I answered in that language, +feeling chilled already by the stern formality which like an iron hand +was laying its grip upon me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good! Your name?" replied the president.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am commonly called Francis Carey, and I am an Englishman." The +Sub-dean--he was a pale, stout man, with gloomy eyes--had hitherto +been looking at me in evident doubt. But at this he nodded assent, +and, averting his eyes from me, gazed meditatively at the roof of the +hall, considering apparently what he should have for breakfast.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are charged," said the president slowly, consulting a document, +"with having assaulted and wounded in the highway last night one +Heinrich Schröder, a citizen of this town, acting at the time as +Lieutenant of the Night Guard. Do you admit this, prisoner, or do you +require proof?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He was wounded," I answered steadily, "but by mistake, and in error. +I supposed him to be one of three persons who had unlawfully waylaid +me and my party on the previous night between Emmerich and Wesel."</p> + +<p class="normal">The Sub-dean, still gazing at the roof, shook his head with a faint +smile. The other magistrates looked doubtfully at me, but made no +comment, and my words seemed to be wasted on the silence. The +president consulted his document again, and continued: "You are also +charged with having by force of arms, in time of peace, seized a gate +of this town, and maintained it, and declined to surrender it when +called upon so to do. What do you say to that?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is true in part," I answered firmly. "I seized not the gate, but +part of the tower, in order to preserve my life and to protect certain +ladies traveling with me from the violence of a crowd which, under a +misapprehension, was threatening to do us a mischief."</p> + +<p class="normal">The priest again shook his head, and smiled faintly at the carved +roof. His colleagues were perhaps somewhat moved in my favor, for a +few words passed between them. However, in the end they shook their +heads, and the president mechanically asked me if I had anything +further to say.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing!" I replied bitterly. The ecclesiastic's cynical +heedlessness, his air of one whose mind is made up, seemed so cruel to +me whose life was at stake, that I lost patience. "Except what I have +said," I continued--"that for the wounding, it was done in error; and +for the gate-seizing, I would do it again to save the lives of those +with me. Only that and this: that I am a foreigner ignorant of your +language and customs, desiring only to pass peacefully through your +country."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is all?" the president asked impassively.</p> + +<p class="normal">"All," I answered, yet with a strange tightening at my throat. Was it +all? All I could say for my life?</p> + +<p class="normal">I was waiting, sore and angry and desperate, to hear the sentence, +when there came an interruption. Master Lindstrom, whose presence at +my side I had forgotten, broke suddenly into a torrent of impassioned +words, and his urgent voice, ringing through the court, seemed in a +moment to change its aspect--to infuse into it some degree of life and +sympathy. More than one guttural exclamation, which seemed to mark +approval, burst from the throng at the back of the hall. In another +moment, indeed, the Dutchman's courage might have saved me. But there +was one who marked the danger. The Sub-dean, who had at first only +glowered at the speaker in rude astonishment, now cut him short with a +harsh question.</p> + +<p class="normal">"One moment, Master Dutchman!" he cried. "Are you one of the heretics +who call themselves Protestants?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am. But I understand that there is here liberty of conscience," our +friend answered manfully, nothing daunted in his fervor at finding the +attack turned upon himself.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That depends upon the conscience," the priest answered with a scowl. +"We will have no Anabaptists here, nor foreign praters to bring us +into feud with our neighbors. It is enough that such men as you are +allowed to live. We will not be bearded by you, so take warning! Take +heed, I say, Master Dutchman, and be silent!" he repeated, leaning +forward and clapping his hand upon the table.</p> + +<p class="normal">I touched Master Lindstrom's sleeve--who would of himself have +persisted--and stayed him. "It is of no use," I muttered. "That dog in +a crochet has condemned me. He will have his way!"</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a short debate between the three judges, while in the court +you might have heard a pin drop. Master Lindstrom had fallen back once +more. I was alone again, and the stained window seemed to be putting +forth its mystic influence to enfold me, when, looking up, I saw a +tiny shadow flit across the soft many-hued rays which streamed from it +athwart the roof. It passed again, once, twice, thrice. I peered +upward intently. It was a swallow flying to and fro amid the carved +work.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yes, a swallow. And straightway I forgot the judges; forgot the crowd. +The scene vanished and I was at Coton End again, giving Martin Luther +the nest for Petronilla--a sign, as I meant it then, that I should +return. I should never return now. Yet my heart was on a sudden so +softened that, instead of this reflection giving me pain, as one would +have expected, it only filled me with a great anxiety to provide for +the event. She must not wait and watch for me day after day, perhaps +year after year. I must see to it somehow; and I was thinking with +such intentness of this, that it was only vaguely I heard the sentence +pronounced. It might have been some other person who was to be +beheaded at the east gate an hour before noon. And so God save the +Duke!</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XVI.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_16" href="#div1Ref_16">IN THE DUKE'S NAME.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">They took me back to the room in the tower, it being now nearly ten +o'clock. Master Lindstrom would fain have stayed with me constantly to +the end, but having the matter I have mentioned much in my mind, I +begged him to go and get me writing materials. When he returned Van +Tree was with him. With a particularity very curious at that moment, I +remarked that the latter was carrying something.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Where did you get that?" I said sharply and at once.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is your haversack," he answered, setting it down quietly. "I found +the man who had taken possession of your horse, and got it from him. I +thought there might be something in it you might like."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is my haversack," I assented. "But it was not on my horse. I have +not seen it since I left it in Master Lindstrom's house by the river. +I left it on the pallet in my room there, and it was forgotten. I +searched for it at Emmerich, you remember."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I only know," he replied, "that I discovered it behind the saddle of +the horse you were riding yesterday."</p> + +<p class="normal">He thought that I had become confused and was a little wrong-headed +from excitement. Master Lindstrom also felt troubled, as he told me +afterward, at seeing me taken up with a trifle at such a time.</p> + +<p class="normal">But there was nothing wrong with my wits, as I promptly showed them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The horse I was riding yesterday?" I continued. "Ah! then, I +understand. I was riding the horse which I took from the Spanish +trooper. The Spaniard must have annexed the haversack when he and his +companions searched the house after our departure."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is it, no doubt," Master Lindstrom said. "And in the hurry of +yesterday's ride you failed to notice it."</p> + +<p class="normal">It was a strange way of recovering one's property--strange that the +enemy should have helped one to it. But there are times--and this to +me was one--when the strange seems the ordinary and commonplace. I +took the sack and slipped my hand through a well-known slit in the +lining. Yes, the letter I had left there was there still--the letter +to Mistress Clarence. I drew it out. The corners of the little packet +were frayed, and the parchment was stained and discolored, no doubt by +the damp which had penetrated to it. But the seal was whole. I placed +it, as it was, in Master Lindstrom's hands.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Give it," I said, "to the Duchess afterward. It concerns her. You +have heard us talk about it. Bid her make what use she pleases of it."</p> + +<p class="normal">I turned away then and sat down, feeling a little flurried and +excited, as one about to start upon a journey might feel; not afraid +nor exceedingly depressed, but braced up to make a brave show and hide +what sadness I did feel by the knowledge that many eyes were upon me, +and that more would be watching me presently. At the far end of the +room a number of people had now gathered, and were conversing +together. Among them were not only my jailers of the night, but two or +three officers, a priest who had come to offer me his services, and +some inquisitive gazers who had obtained admission. Their curiosity, +however, did not distress me. On the contrary, I was glad to hear the +stir and murmur of life about me to the last.</p> + +<p class="normal">I will not set down the letter I wrote to the Duchess, though it were +easy for me to do so, seeing that her son has it now. It contains some +things very proper to be said by a dying man, of which I am not +ashamed--God forbid! but which it would not be meet for me to repeat +here. Enough that I told her in a few words who I was, and entreated +her, in the name of whatever services I had rendered her, to let +Petronilla and Sir Anthony know how I had died. And I added something +which would, I thought, comfort her and her husband--namely, that I +was not afraid, or in any suffering of mind or body.</p> + +<p class="normal">The writing of this shook my composure a little. But as I laid down +the pen and looked up and found that the time was come, I took courage +in a marvelous manner. The captain of the guard--I think that out of a +compassionate desire not to interrupt me they had allowed me some +minutes of grace--came to me, leaving the group at the other end, and +told me gravely that I was waited for. I rose at once and gave the +letter to Master Lindstrom with some messages in which Dymphna and +Anne were not forgotten. And then, with a smile--for I felt under all +those eyes as if I were going into battle--I said: "Gentlemen, I am +ready if you are. It is a fine day to die. You know," I added gayly, +"in England we have a proverb, 'The better the day, the better the +deed!' So it is well to have a good day to have a good death, Sir +Captain."</p> + +<p class="normal">"A soldier's death, sir, is a good death;" he answered gravely, +speaking in Spanish and bowing.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then he pointed to the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">As I walked toward it, I paused momentarily by the window, and looked +out on the crowd below. It filled the sunlit street--save where a +little raised platform strewn with rushes protruded itself--with heads +from wall to wall, with faces all turned one way--toward me. It was a +silent crowd standing in hushed awe and expectation, the consciousness +of which for an instant sent a sudden chill to my heart, blanching my +cheek, and making my blood run slow for a moment. The next I moved on +to the door, and bowing to the spectators as they stood aside, began +to descend the narrow staircase.</p> + +<p class="normal">There were guards going down before me, and behind me were Master +Lindstrom and more guards. The Dutchman reached forward in the gloom, +and clasped my hand, holding it, as we went down, in a firm, strong +grip.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Never fear," I said to him cheerily, looking back. "It is all right."</p> + +<p class="normal">He answered in words which I will not write here; not wishing, as I +have said, to make certain things common.</p> + +<p class="normal">I suppose the doorway at the bottom was accidentally blocked, for a +few steps short of it we came to a standstill; and almost at the same +moment I started, despite myself, on hearing a sudden clamor and a +roar of many voices outside.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" I asked the Dutchman.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is the Duke of Cleves arriving, I expect," he whispered. "He comes +in by the other gate."</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">A moment later we moved on and passed out into the light, the soldiers +before me stepping on either side to give me place. The sunshine for +an instant dazzled me, and I lowered my eyes. As I gradually raised +them again I saw before me a short lane formed by two rows of +spectators kept back by guards; and at the end of this, two or three +rough wooden steps leading to a platform on which were standing a +number of people. And above and beyond all only the bright blue sky, +the roofs and gables of the nearer houses showing dark against it.</p> + +<p class="normal">I advanced steadily along the path left for me, and would have +ascended the steps. But at the foot of them I came to a standstill, +and looked round for guidance. The persons on the scaffold all had +their backs turned to me, and did not make way, while the shouting and +uproar hindered them from hearing that we had come out. Then it struck +me, seeing that the people at the windows were also gazing away, and +taking no heed of me, that the Duke was passing the farther end of the +street, and a sharp pang of angry pain shot through me. I had come out +to die, but that which was all to me was so little to these people +that they turned away to see a fellow-mortal ride by!</p> + +<p class="normal">Presently, as we stood there, in a pit, as it were, getting no view, I +felt Master Lindstrom's hand, which still clasped mine, begin to +shake; and turning to him, I found that his face had changed to a deep +red, and that his eyes were protruding with a kind of convulsive +eagerness which instantly infected me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" I stammered. I began to tremble also. The air rang, it +seemed to me, with one word, which a thousand tongues took up and +reiterated. But it was a German word, and I did not understand it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Wait! wait!" Master Lindstrom exclaimed. "Pray God it be true!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He seized my other hand and held it as though he would protect me from +something. At the same moment Van Tree pushed past me, and, bounding +up the steps, thrust his way through the officials on the scaffold, +causing more than one fur-robed citizen near the edge to lose his +balance and come down as best he could on the shoulders of the guards.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" I cried. "What is it?" I cried in impatient wonder.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh! my lad, my lad!" Master Lindstrom answered, his face close to +mine, and the tears running down his cheeks. "It is cruel if it be not +true! Cruel! They cry a pardon!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"A pardon?" I echoed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, lad, a pardon. But it may not be true," he said, putting his arm +about my shoulder. "Do not make too sure of it. It is only the mob cry +it out."</p> + +<p class="normal">My heart made a great bound, and seemed to stand still. There was a +loud surging in my brain, and a mist rose before my eyes and hid +everything. The clamor and shouting of the street passed away, and +sounded vague and distant. The next instant, it is true, I was myself +again, but my knees were trembling under me, and I stood flaccid and +unnerved, leaning on my friend.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" I said faintly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Patience! patience a while, lad!" he answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">But, thank Heaven! I had not long to wait. The words were scarcely off +his tongue, when another hand sought mine and shook it wildly; and I +saw Van Tree before me, his face radiant with joy, while a man whom he +had knocked down in his hasty leap from the scaffold was rising beside +me with a good-natured smile. As if at a signal, every face now turned +toward me. A dozen friendly hands passed me up the steps amid a fresh +outburst of cheering. The throng on the scaffold opened somehow, and I +found myself in a second, as it seemed, face to face with the +president of the court. He smiled on me gravely and kindly--what +smiles there seemed to be on all those faces--and held out a paper.</p> + +<p class="normal">"In the name of the Duke!" he said, speaking in Spanish, in a clear, +loud voice. "A pardon!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I muttered something, I know not what; nor did it matter, for it was +lost in a burst of cheering. When this was over and silence obtained, +the magistrate continued, "You are required, however, to attend the +Duke at the courthouse. Whither we had better proceed at once."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am ready, sir," I muttered.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">A road was made for us to descend, and, walking in a kind of beautiful +dream, I passed slowly up the street by the side of the magistrate, +the crowd everywhere willingly standing aside for us. I do not know +whether all those thousands of faces really looked joyfully and kindly +on me as I passed, or whether the deep thankfulness which choked me, +and brought the tears continually to my eyes, transfigured them and +gave them a generous charm not their own. But this I do know: that the +sunshine seemed brighter and the air softer than ever before; that the +clouds trailing across the blue expanse were things of beauty such as +I had never met before; that to draw breath was a joy, and to move, +delight; and that only when the dark valley was left behind did I +comprehend its full gloom--by Heaven's mercy. So may it be with all!</p> + +<p class="normal">At the door of the court-house, whither numbers of the people had +already run, the press was so great that we came to a standstill, and +were much buffeted about, though in all good humor, before, even with +the aid of the soldiers, we could be got through the throng. When I at +last emerged I found myself again before the table, and saw--but only +dimly, for the light now fell through the stained window directly on +my head--a commanding figure standing behind it. Then a strange thing +happened. A woman passed swiftly round the table, and came to me and +flung her arms round my neck and kissed me. It was the Duchess, and +for a moment she hung upon me, weeping before them all.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Madam," I said softly, "then it is you who have done this!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ah!" she exclaimed, holding me off from her and looking at me with +eyes which glowed through her tears, "and it was you who did that!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She drew back from me then, and took me by the hand, and turned +impetuously to the Duke of Cleves, who stood behind smiling at her in +frank amusement. "This," she said, "is the man who gave his life for +my husband, and to whom your highness has given it back."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let him tell his tale," the Duke answered gravely. "And do you, my +cousin, sit here beside me."</p> + +<p class="normal">She left me and walked round the table, and he came forward and placed +her in his own chair amid a great hush of wonder, for she was still +meanly clad, and showed in a hundred places the marks and stains of +travel. Then he stood by her with his hand on the back of the seat. He +was a tall, burly man, with bold, quick-glancing eyes, a flushed face, +and a loud manner; a fierce, blusterous prince, as I have heard. He +was plainly dressed in a leather hunting-suit, and wore huge gauntlets +and brown boots, with a broad-leaved hat pinned up on one side. Yet he +looked a prince.</p> + +<p class="normal">Somehow I stammered out the tale of the surrender.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But why? why? why, man?" he asked, when I had finished; "why did you +let them think it was you who wounded the burgher, if it was not?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Your highness," I answered, "I had received nothing but good from her +grace, I had eaten her bread and been received into her service. +Besides, it was through my persuasion that we came by the road which +led to this misfortune instead of by another way. Therefore it seemed +to me right that I should suffer, who stood alone and could be +spared--and not her husband."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was a great deed!" cried the prince loudly. "I would I had such a +servant. Are you noble, lad?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I colored high, but not in pain or mortification. The old wound might +reopen, but amid events such as those of this morning it was a slight +matter. "I come of a noble family, may it please your highness," I +answered modestly; "but circumstances prevent me claiming kinship with +it."</p> + +<p class="normal">He was about, I think, to question me further, when the Duchess looked +up, and said something to him and he something to her. She spoke again +and he answered. Then he nodded assent. "You would fain stand on your +own feet?" he cried to me. "Is that so?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is, sire," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then so be it!" he replied loudly, looking round on the throng with a +frown. "I will ennoble you. You would have died for your lord and +friend, and therefore I give you a rood of land in the common +graveyard of Santon to hold of me, and I name you Von Santonkirch. And +I, William, Duke of Cleves, Julich and Guelders, prince of the Empire, +declare you noble, and give you for your arms three swords of justice; +and the motto you may buy of a clerk! Further, let this decree be +enrolled in my Chancery. Are you satisfied?"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">As I dropped on my knees, my eyes sparkling, there was a momentary +disturbance behind me. It was caused by the abrupt entrance of the +Sub-dean. He took in part of the situation at a glance; that is, he +saw me kneeling before the Duke. But he could not see the Duchess of +Suffolk, the Duke's figure being interposed. As he came forward, the +crowd making way for him, he cast an angry glance at me, and scarcely +smoothed his brow even to address the prince. "I am glad that your +highness has not done what was reported to me," he said hastily, his +obeisance brief and perfunctory. "I heard an uproar in the town, and +was told that this man was pardoned."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is so!" said the Duke curtly, eying the ecclesiastic with no great +favor. "He is pardoned."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Only in part, I presume," the priest rejoined urgently. "Or, if +otherwise, I am sure that your highness has not received certain +information with which I can furnish you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Furnish away, sir," quoth the Duke, yawning.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have had letters from my Lord Bishop of Arras respecting him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Respecting him!" exclaimed the prince, starting and bending his brows +in surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Respecting those in whose company he travels," the priest answered +hastily. "They are represented to me as dangerous persons, pestilent +refugees from England, and obnoxious alike to the Emperor, the Prince +of Spain, and the Queen of England."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wonder you do not add also to the King of France and the Soldan of +Turkey!" growled the Duke. "Pish! I am not going to be dictated to by +Master Granvelle--no, nor by his master, be he ten times Emperor! Go +to! Go to! Master Sub-dean! You forget yourself, and so does your +master the Bishop. I will have you know that these people are not what +you think them. Call you my cousin, the widow of the consort of the +late Queen of France, an obnoxious person? Fie! Fie! You forget +yourself!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He moved as he stopped speaking, so that the astonished churchman +found himself confronted on a sudden by the smiling, defiant Duchess. +The Sub-dean started and his face fell, for, seeing her seated in the +Duke's presence, he discerned at once that the game was played out. +Yet he rallied himself, bethinking him, I fancy, that there were many +spectators. He made a last effort. "The Bishop of Arras----" he began.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Pish!" scoffed the Duke, interrupting him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The Bishop of Arras----" the priest repeated firmly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I would he were hung with his own tapestry!" retorted the Duke, with +a brutal laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Heaven forbid!" replied the ecclesiastic, his pale face reddening and +his eyes darting baleful glances at me. But he took the hint, and +henceforth said no more of the Bishop. Instead, he continued smoothly, +"Your highness has, of course, considered the danger--the danger, I +mean, of provoking neighbors so powerful by shielding this lady and +making her cause your own. You will remember, sir----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will remember Innspruck!" roared the Duke, in a rage, "where the +Emperor, ay, and your everlasting Bishop too, fled before a handful of +Protestants, like sheep before wolves. A fig for your Emperor! I never +feared him young, and I fear him less now that he is old and decrepit +and, as men say, mad. Let him get to his watches, and you to your +prayers. If there were not this table between us, I would pull your +ears, Master Churchman!"</p> + +<p style="text-align:center; letter-spacing:20pt">* * * * *</p> + +<p class="normal">"But tell me," I asked Master Bertie as I stood beside his +couch an +hour later, "how did the Duchess manage it? I gathered from something +you or she said, a short time back, that you had no influence with the +Duke of Cleves."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not quite that," he answered. "My wife and the late Duke of Suffolk +had much to do with wedding the Prince's sister to King Henry, +thirteen--fourteen years back, is it? And so far we might have felt +confident of his protection. But the marriage turned out ill, or +turned out short, and Queen Anne of Cleves was divorced. And--well, we +felt a little less confident on that account, particularly as he has +the name of a headstrong, passionate man."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Heaven keep him in it!" I said, smiling. "But you have not told me +yet what happened."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The Duchess was still asleep this morning, fairly worn out, as you +may suppose, when a great noise awoke her. She got up and went to +Dymphna, and learned it was the Duke's trumpets. Then she went to the +window, and, seeing few people in the streets to welcome him, inquired +why this was. Dymphna broke down at that, and told her what was +happening to you, and that you were to die at that very hour. She went +out straightway, without covering her head,--you know how impetuous +she is,--and flung herself on her knees in the mud before the Duke's +horse as he entered. He knew her, and the rest you can guess."</p> + +<p class="normal">Can guess? Ah, what happiness it was! Outside, the sun fell hotly on +the steep red roofs, with their rows of casements, and on the sleepy +square, in which knots of people still lingered, talking of the +morning's events. I could see below me the guard which Duke William, +shrewdly mistrusting the Sub-dean, had posted in front of the house, +nominally to do the Duchess honor. I could hear in the next room the +cheerful voices of my friends. What happiness it was to live! What +happiness to be loved! How very, very good and beautiful and glorious +a world, seemed the world to me on that old May morning in that quaint +German town which we had entered so oddly!</p> + +<p class="normal">As I turned from the window full of thankfulness, my eyes met those of +Mistress Anne, who was sitting on the far side of the sick man's +couch, the baby in a cradle beside her. The risk and exposure of the +last week had made a deeper mark upon her than upon any of us. She was +paler, graver, older, more of a woman and less, much less, of a girl. +And she looked very ill. Her eyes, in particular, seemed to have grown +larger, and as they dwelt on me now there was a strange and solemn +light in them, under which I grew uneasy.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have been wonderfully preserved," she said presently, speaking +dreamily, and as much to herself as to me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have, indeed," I answered, thinking she referred only to my escape +of the morning.</p> + +<p class="normal">But she did not.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There was, firstly, the time on the river when you were hurt with the +oar," she continued, gazing absently at me, her hands in her lap; "and +then the night when you saw Clarence with Dymphna."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Or, rather, saw him without her," I interposed, smiling. It was +strange that she should mention it as a fact, when at the time she had +so scolded me for making the statement.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And then," she continued, disregarding my interruption, "there was +the time when you were stabbed in the passage; and again when you had +the skirmish by the river; and then to-day you were within a minute of +death. You have been wonderfully preserved!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have," I assented thoughtfully. "The more as I suspect that I have +to thank Master Clarence for all these little adventures."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Strange--very strange!" she muttered, removing her eyes from me that +she might fix them on the floor.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is strange?"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The abrupt questioner was the Duchess, who came bustling in at the +moment. "What is strange?" she repeated, with a heightened color and +dancing eyes. "Shall I tell you?" She paused and looked brightly at +me, holding something concealed behind her. I guessed in a moment, +from the aspect of her face, what it was: the letter which I had given +to Master Lindstrom in the morning, and which, with a pardonable +forgetfulness, I had failed to reclaim.</p> + +<p class="normal">I turned very red. "It was not intended for you now," I said shyly. +For in the letter I had told her my story.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Pooh! pooh!" she cried. "It is just as I thought. A pretty piece of +folly! No," she continued, as I opened my mouth, "I am not going to +keep your secret, sir. You may go down on your knees. It will be of no +use. Richard, you remember Sir Anthony Cludde of Coton End in +Warwickshire?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, yes," her husband said, rising on his elbow, while his face lit +up, and I stood bashfully, shifting my feet.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have danced with him a dozen times, years ago!" she continued, her +eyes sparkling with mischief. "Well, sir, this gentleman, Master +Francis Carey, otherwise Von Santonkirch, is Francis Cludde, his +nephew!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sir Anthony's nephew?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, and the son of Ferdinand Cludde, whom you also have heard of, of +whom the less----"</p> + +<p class="normal">She stopped, and turned quickly, interrupted by a half-stifled scream. +It was a scream full of sudden horror and amazement and fear; and it +came from Mistress Anne. The girl had risen, and was gazing at me with +distended eyes and blanched cheeks, and hands stretched out to keep me +off--gazing, indeed, as if she saw in me some awful portent or some +dreadful threat. She did not speak, but she began, without taking her +eyes from me, to retreat toward the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hoity toity!" cried my lady, stamping her foot in anger. "What has +happened to the girl? What----"</p> + +<p class="normal">What, indeed? The Duchess stopped, still more astonished. For, without +uttering a word of explanation or apology, Mistress Anne had reached +the door, groped blindly for the latch, found it, and gone out, her +eyes, with the same haunted look of horror in them, fixed on me to the +last.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XVII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_17" href="#div1Ref_17">A LETTER THAT HAD MANY ESCAPES.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"Hoity, toity!" the Duchess cried again, looking from one to another +of us when Anne had disappeared. "What has come to the little fool? +Has she gone crazy?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head, too completely at sea even to hazard a conjecture. +Master Bertie shook his head also, keeping his eyes glued to the door, +as if he could not believe Anne had really gone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I said nothing to frighten her!" my lady protested.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nothing at all," I answered. For how should the announcement that my +real name was Cludde terrify Mistress Anne Brandon nearly out of her +senses?</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, no," Master Bertie agreed, his thoughtful face more thoughtful +than usual; "so far as I heard, you said nothing. But I think, my +dear, that you had better follow her and learn what it is. She must be +ill."</p> + +<p class="normal">The Duchess sat down. "I will go by-and-by," she said coolly, at which +I was not much surprised, for I have always remarked that women have +less sympathy with other women's ailments, especially of the nerves, +than have men.</p> + +<p class="normal">"For the moment I want to scold this brave, silly boy here!" she +continued, looking so kindly at me that I blushed again, and forgot +all about Mistress Anne. "To think of him leaving his home to become a +wandering squire of dames merely because his father was a--well, not +quite what he would have liked him to be! I remember something about +him," she continued, pursing up her lips, and nodding her head at us. +"I fancied him dead, however, years ago. But there! if every one whose +father were not quite to his liking left home and went astraying, +Master Francis, all sensible folk would turn innkeepers, and make +their fortunes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was not only that which drove me from home," I explained. "The +Bishop of Winchester gave me clearly to understand----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"That Coton was not the place for you!" exclaimed my lady scornfully. +"He is a sort of connection of yours, is he not? Oh, I know. And he +thinks he has a kind of reversionary interest in the property! With +you and your father out of the way, and only your girl cousin left, +his interest is much more likely to come to hand. Do you see?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I recalled what Martin Luther had said about the cuckoo. But I have +since thought that probably they both wronged Stephen Gardiner in +this. He was not a man of petty mind, and his estate was equal to his +high place. I think it more likely that his motive in removing me from +Coton was chiefly the desire to use my services abroad, in conjunction +perhaps with some remoter and darker plan for eventually devoting the +Cludde property to the Church. Such an act of piety would have been +possible had Sir Anthony died leaving his daughter unmarried, and +would certainly have earned for the Chancellor Queen Mary's lasting +favor. I think it the more likely to have been in his mind because his +inability to persuade the gentry to such acts of restitution--King +Harry had much enriched us--was always a sore point with the Queen, +and more than once exposed him to her resentment.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The strangest thing of all," the Duchess continued with alacrity, +"seems to me to be this: that if he had not meddled with you, he would +not have had his plans in regard to us thwarted. If he had not driven +you from home, you would never have helped me to escape from London, +nor been with us to foil his agents."</p> + +<p class="normal">"A higher power than the Chancellor arranged that!" said Master Bertie +emphatically.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, at any rate, I am glad that you are you!" the Duchess answered, +rising gayly. "A Cludde? Why, one feels at home again. And yet," she +continued, her lips trembling suddenly, and her eyes filling with +tears as she looked at me, "there was never house raised yet on nobler +deed than yours."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go! go! go!" cried her husband, seeing my embarrassment. "Go and look +to that foolish girl!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will! Yet stop!" cried my lady, pausing when she was half way +across the floor, and returning, "I was forgetting that I have another +letter to open. It is very odd that this letter was never opened +before," she continued, producing that which had lain in my haversack. +"It has had several narrow escapes. But this time I vow I will see +inside it. You give me leave?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, yes," I said, smiling. "I wash my hands of it. Whoever the +Mistress Clarence to whom it is addressed may be, it is enough that +her name is Clarence! We have suffered too much at his hands."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I open it, then!" my lady cried dramatically. I nodded. She took her +husband's dagger and cut the green silk which bound the packet, and +opened and read.</p> + +<p class="normal">Only a few words. Then she stopped, and looking off the paper, +shivered. "I do not understand this," she murmured. "What does it +mean?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No good! I'll be sworn!" Master Bertie replied, gazing at her +eagerly. "Read it aloud, Katherine."</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"'To Mistress A---- B----. I am advertised by my trusty agent, Master +Clarence, that he hath benefited much by your aid in the matter in +which I have employed him. Such service goeth always for much, and +never for naught, with me. In which belief confirm yourself. For the +present, working with him as heretofore, be secret, and on no account +let your true sentiments come to light. So you will be the more +valuable to me, even as it is more easy to unfasten a barred door from +within than from without.'"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Here the Duchess broke off abruptly, and turned on us a face full of +wonder. "What does it mean?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is that all?" her husband said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not quite," she answered, returning to it, and reading:</p> + +<p class="normal">"'Those whom you have hitherto served have too long made a mockery of +sacred things, but their cup is full and the business of seeing that +they drink it lieth with me, who am not wont to be slothful in these +matters. Be faithful and secret. Good speed and fare you well.--Ste. +Winton."</p> + +<p class="normal">"One thing is quite clear!" said Master Bertie slowly. "That you and I +are the persons whose cup is full. You remember how you once dressed +up a dog in a rochet, and dandled it before Gardiner? And it is our +matter in which Clarence is employed. Then who is it who has been +cooperating with him, and whose aid is of so much value to him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"'Even as it is easier,'" I muttered thoughtfully, "'to unfasten a +barred door from within than from without." What was it of which that +strange sentence reminded me? Ha! I had it. Of the night on which we +had fled from Master Lindstrom's house, when Mistress Anne had been +seized with that odd fit of perverseness, and had almost opened the +door looking upon the river in spite of all I could say or do. It was +of that the sentence reminded me. "To whom is it addressed?" I asked +abruptly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"To Mistress Clarence," my lady answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; inside, I mean."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh! to Mistress A---- B----. But that gives us no clew," she added. +"It is a disguise. You see they are the two first letters of the +alphabet."</p> + +<p class="normal">So they were. And the initial letters of Anne Brandon! I wondered that +the Duchess did not see it, that she did not at once turn her +suspicions toward the right quarter. But she was, for a woman, +singularly truthful and confiding. And she saw nothing.</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked at Master Bertie. He seemed puzzled, discerning, I fancy, +how strangely the allusions pointed to Mistress Anne, but not daring +at once to draw the inference. She was his wife's kinswoman by +marriage--albeit a distant one--and much indebted to her. She had been +almost as his own sister. She was young and fair, and to associate +treachery and ingratitude such as this with her seemed almost too +horrible.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then why was I so clear sighted as to read the riddle? Why was I the +first to see the truth? Because I had felt for days a vague and +ill-defined distrust of the girl. I had seen more of her odd fits and +caprices than had the others. Looking back now I could find a +confirmation of my idea in a dozen things which had befallen us. I +remembered how ill and stricken she had looked on the day when I had +first brought out the letter, and how strangely she had talked to me +about it. I remembered Clarence's interview with, not Dymphna,--as I +had then thought,--but, as I now guessed, Anne, wearing her cloak. I +recalled the manner in which she had used me to persuade Master Bertie +to take the Wesel instead of the Santon road; no doubt she had told +Clarence to follow in that direction, if by any chance we escaped +him on the island. And her despair when she heard in the church porch +that I had killed Clarence at the ford! And her utter abandonment to +fear--poor guilty thing!--when she thought that all her devices had +only led her with us to a dreadful death! These things, in the light +in which I now viewed them, were cogent evidences against her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It must have been written to some one about us!" said the Duchess at +length. "To some one in our confidence. 'On our side of the door,' as +he calls it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, that is certain," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And on the wrapper he styles her Mistress Clarence. Now who----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who could it have been? That is the question we have to answer," +Master Bertie replied dryly. Hearing his voice, I knew he had come at +last to the same conclusion to which I had jumped. "I think you may +dismiss the servants from the inquiry," he continued. "The Bishop of +Winchester would scarcely write to them in that style."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Dismiss the servants? Then who is left?" she protested.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think----" He lost courage, hesitated, and broke off. She looked at +him wonderingly. He turned to me, and, gaining confirmation from my +nod, began again. "I think I should ask A---- B----," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A---- B----?" she cried, still not seeing one whit.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes. Anne Brandon," he answered sternly.</p> + +<p class="normal">She repeated his words softly and stood a moment gazing at him. In +that moment she saw it all. She sat down suddenly on the chair beside +her and shuddered violently, as if she had laid her hand unwittingly +upon a snake. "Oh, Richard," she whispered, "it is too horrible!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I fear it is too true," he answered gloomily.</p> + +<p class="normal">I shrank from looking at them, from meeting her eyes or his. I felt as +if this shame had come upon us all. The thought that the culprit might +walk into the room at any moment filled me with terror. I turned away +and looked through the window, leaving the husband and wife together.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Is it only the name you are thinking of?" she muttered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," he answered. "Before I left England to go to Calais I saw +something pass between them--between her and Clarence--which, +surprised me. Only in the confusion of those last days it slipped from +my memory for the time."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I see," she said quietly. "The villain!"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Looking back on the events of the last week, I found many things made +plain by the lurid light now cast upon them. I understood how Master +Lindstrom's vase had come to be broken when we were discussing the +letter, which in my hands must have been a perpetual terror to the +girl. I discerned that she had purposely sown dissension between +myself and Van Tree, and recalled how she had striven to persuade us +not to leave the island; then, how she had induced us to take that +unlucky road; finally, how on the road her horse had lagged and lagged +behind, detaining us all when every minute was precious. The things +all dovetailed into one another; each by itself was weak, but together +they formed a strong scaffold--a scaffold strong enough for the +hanging of a man, if she had been a man! The others appealed to me, +the Duchess feverishly anxious to be assured one way or the other. The +very suspicion of the existence of such treachery at her side seemed +to stifle her. Still looking out of the window I detailed the proofs I +have mentioned, not gladly, Heaven knows, or in any spirit of revenge. +But my duty was rather to my companions who had been true to me, than +to her. I told them the truth as far as I knew it. The whole wretched, +miserable truth was only to become known to me later.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"I will go to her," the Duchess said presently, rising from her seat.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My dear!" her husband cried. He stretched out his hand, and grasping +her skirt detained her. "You will not----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do not be afraid!" she replied sadly, as she stooped over him and +kissed his forehead. "It is a thing past scolding, Richard; past love +and even hope, and all but past pity. I will be merciful as we hope +for mercy, but she can never be friend of ours again, and some one +must tell her. I will do so and return. As for that man!" she +continued, obscuring suddenly the fair and noble side of her character +which she had just exhibited, and which I confess had surprised me, +for I had not thought her capable of a generosity so uncommon; "as for +that man," she repeated, drawing herself up to her full height, while +her eyes sparkled and her cheek grew red, "who has turned her into a +vile schemer and a shameless hypocrite, as he would fain have turned +better women, I will show him no mercy nor grace if I ever have him +under my feet. I will crush him as I would an adder, though I be +crushed next moment myself!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She was sweeping with that word from the room, and had nearly reached +the door before I found my voice. Then I called out "Stay!" just in +time. "You will do no good, madam, by going!" I said, rising. "You +will not find her. She is gone."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Gone?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," I said quietly. "She left the house twenty minutes ago. I saw +her cross the market-place, wearing her cloak and carrying a bag. I do +not think she will return."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not return? But whither has she gone?" they both cried at once.</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can only guess," I said in a low voice. "I saw no more than I have +told you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But why did you not tell me'" the Duchess cried reproachfully. "She +shall be brought back."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It would be useless," Master Bertie answered. "Yet I doubt if it be +as Carey thinks. Why should she go just at this time? She does not +know that she is found out. She does not know that this letter has +been recovered. Not a word, mind, was said of it before she left the +room."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I allowed; "that is true."</p> + +<p class="normal">I was puzzled on this point myself, now I came to consider it. I could +not see why she had taken the alarm so opportunely; but I maintained +my opinion nevertheless.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Something frightened her," I said; "though it may not have been the +letter."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," said the Duchess, after a moment's silence. "I suppose you are +right. I suppose something frightened her, as you say. I wonder what +it was, poor wretch!"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It turned out that I was right. Mistress Anne had gone indeed, having +stayed, so far as we could learn from an examination of the room which +she had shared with Dymphna, merely to put together the few things +which our adventures had left her. She had gone out from among us in +this foreign land without a word of farewell, without a good wish +given or received, without a soul to say God speed! The thought made +me tremble. If she had died it would have been different. Now, to feel +sorrow for her as for one who had been with us in heart as well as in +body, seemed a mockery. How could we grieve for one who had moved day +by day and hour by hour among us, only that with each hour and day she +might plot and scheme and plan our destruction? It was impossible!</p> + +<p class="normal">We made inquiries indeed, but without result; and so, abruptly and +terribly she passed--for the time--out of our knowledge, though often +afterward I recalled sadly the weary, hunted look which I had +sometimes seen in her eyes when she sat listless and dreamy. Poor +girl! Her own acts had placed her, as the Duchess said, beyond love or +hope, but not beyond pity.</p> + +<p class="normal">So it is in life. The day which sees one's trial end sees another's +begin. We--the Duchess and her child, Master Bertie and I--stayed with +our good and faithful friends the Lindstroms a while, resting and +recruiting our strength; and during this interval, at the pressing +instance of the Duchess, I wrote letters to Sir Anthony and +Petronilla, stating that I was abroad, and was well, and looked +presently to return; but not disclosing my refuge or the names of my +companions. At the end of five days, Master Bertie being fairly strong +again and Santon being considered unsafe for us as a permanent +residence, we went under guard to Wesel, where we were received as +people of quality, and lodged, there being no fitting place, in the +disused church of St. Willibrod. Here the child was christened +Peregrine--a wanderer; the governor of the city and I being +godfathers. And here we lived in peace--albeit with hearts that +yearned for home--for some months.</p> + +<p class="normal">During this time two pieces of news came to us from England: one, that +the Parliament, though much pressed to it, had refused to acquiesce in +the confiscation of the Duchess's estates; the other, that our joint +persecutor, the great Bishop of Winchester, was dead. This last we at +first disbelieved. It was true, nevertheless. Stephen Gardiner, whose +vast schemes had enmeshed people so far apart in station, and indeed +in all else, as the Duchess and myself, was dead at last; had died +toward the end of 1555, at the height of his power, with England at +his feet, and gone to his Maker. I have known many worse men.</p> + +<p class="normal">We trusted that this might open the way for our return, but we found +on the contrary that fresh clouds were rising. The persecution of the +Reformers, which Queen Mary had begun in England, was carried on with +increasing rigor, and her husband, who was now King of Spain and +master of the Netherlands, freed from the prudent checks of his +father, was inclined to pleasure her in this by giving what aid he +could abroad. His Minister in the Netherlands, the Bishop of Arras, +brought so much pressure to bear upon our protector to induce him to +give us up, that it was plain the Duke of Cleves must sooner or later +comply. We thought it better, therefore, to remove ourselves, and +presently did so, going to the town of Winnheim in the Rhine +Palatinate.</p> + +<p class="normal">We found ourselves not much more secure here, however, and all our +efforts to discover a safe road into France failing, and the stock of +money which the Duchess had provided beginning to give out, we were in +great straits whither to go or what to do.</p> + +<p class="normal">At this time of our need, however, Providence opened a door in a +quarter where we least looked for it. Letters came from Sigismund, the +King of Poland, and from the Palatine of Wilna in that country, +inviting the Duchess and Master Bertie to take up their residence +there, and offering the latter an establishment and honorable +employment. The overture was unlooked for, and was not accepted +without misgivings, Wilna being so far distant, and there being none +of our race in that country. However, assurance of the Polish King's +good faith reached us--I say us, for in all their plans I was +included--through John Alasco, a nobleman who had visited England. And +in due time we started on this prodigious journey, and came safely to +Wilna, where our reception was such as the letters had led us to +expect.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I do not propose to set down here our adventures, though they were +many, in that strange country of frozen marshes and endless plains, +but to pass over eighteen months which I spent not without profit to +myself in the Pole's service, seeing something of war in his +Lithuanian campaigns, and learning much of men and the world, which +here, to say nothing of wolves and bears, bore certain aspects not +commonly visible in Warwickshire. I pass on to the early autumn of +1558, when a letter from the Duchess, who was at Wilna, was brought to +me at Cracovy. It was to this effect:</p> + +<p class="normal">"Dear Friend: Send you good speed! Word has come to us here of an +enterprise Englandward, which promises, if it be truly reported to us, +to so alter things at home that there may be room for us at our own +firesides. Heaven so further it, both for our happiness and the good +of the religion. Master Bertie has embarked on it, and I have taken +upon myself to answer for your aid and counsel, which have never been +wanting to us. Wherefore, dear friend, come, sparing neither horse nor +spurs, nor anything which may bring you sooner to Wilna, and your +assured and loving friend, Katherine Suffolk."</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">In five days after receiving this I was at Wilna, and two months later +I saw England again, after an absence of three years. Early in +November, 1558, Master Bertie and I landed at Lowestoft, having made +the passage from Hamburg in a trading vessel of that place. We stopped +only to sleep one night, and then, dressed as traveling merchants, we +set out on the road to London, entering the city without accident or +hindrance on the third day after landing.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_18" href="#div1Ref_18">THE WITCH'S WARNING.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"One minute!" I said. "That is the place."</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie turned in his saddle, and looked at it. The light was +fading into the early dusk of a November evening, but the main +features of four cross streets, the angle between two of them filled +by the tall belfry of a church, were still to be made out. The east +wind had driven loiterers indoors, and there was scarcely any one +abroad to notice us. I pointed to a dead wall ten paces down one +street. "Opposite that they stopped," I said. "There was a pile of +boards leaning against it then."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have had many a worse bedchamber since, lad," he said, smiling.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Many," I answered. And then by a common impulse we shook up the +horses, and trotting gently on were soon clear of London and making +for Islington. Passing through the latter we began to breast the steep +slope which leads to Highgate, and coming, when we had reached the +summit, plump upon the lights of the village, pulled up in front of a +building which loomed darkly across the road.</p> + +<p class="normal">"This is the Gatehouse Tavern," Master Bertie said in a low voice. "We +shall soon know whether we have come on a fool's errand--or worse!"</p> + +<p class="normal">We rode under the archway into a great courtyard, from which the road +issued again on the other side through another gate. In one corner two +men were littering down a line of packhorses by the light of the +lanterns, which brought their tanned and rugged faces into relief. In +another, where the light poured ruddily from an open doorway, an +ostler was serving out fodder, and doing so, if we might judge from +the travelers' remonstrances, with a niggardly hand. From the windows +of the house a dozen rays of light shot athwart the darkness, and +disclosed as many pigs wallowing asleep in the middle of the yard. In +all we saw a coarse comfort and welcome. Master Bertie led the way +across the yard, and accosted the ostler. "Can we have stalls and +beds?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">The man stayed his chaffering, and looked up at us. "Every man to his +business," he replied gruffly. "Stalls, yes; but of beds I know +nothing. For women's work go to the women."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Right!" said I, "so we will. With better luck than you would go, I +expect, my man!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Bursting into a hoarse laugh at this--he was lame and one-eyed and not +very well-favored--he led us into a long, many-stalled stable, feebly +lit by lanterns which here and there glimmered against the walls. +"Suit yourselves," he said; "first come is first served here."</p> + +<p class="normal">He seemed an ill-conditioned fellow, but the businesslike way in which +we went about our work, watering, feeding, and littering down in old +campaigners' fashion, drew from him a grunt of commendation. "Have you +come from far, masters?" he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, from London," I answered curtly. "We come as linen-drapers from +Westcheap, if you want to know."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, I see that," he said chuckling. "Never were atop of a horse +before nor handled anything but a clothyard; oh, no!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"We want a merchant reputed to sell French lace," I continued, looking +hard at him. "Do you happen to know if there is a dealer here with +any?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He nodded rather to himself than to me, as if he had expected the +question. Then in the same tone, but with a quick glance of +intelligence, he answered, "I will show you into the house presently, +and you can see for yourselves. A stable is no place for French lace." +He pointed with a wink over his shoulder toward a stall in which a +man, apparently drunk, lay snoring. "That is a fine toy!" he ran on +carelessly, as I removed my dagger from the holster and concealed it +under my cloak--"a fine plaything--for a linen draper!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Peace, peace, man! and show us in," said Master Bertie impatiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">With a shrug of his shoulders the man obeyed. Crossing the courtyard +behind him, we entered the great kitchen, which, full of light +and warmth and noise, presented just such a scene of comfort and +bustle, of loud talking, red-faced guests, and hurrying bare-armed +serving-maids, as I remembered lighting upon at St. Albans three years +back. But I had changed much since then, and seen much. The bailiff +himself would hardly have recognized his old antagonist in the tall, +heavily cloaked stranger, whose assured air, acquired amid wild +surroundings in a foreign land, gave him a look of age to which I +could not fairly lay claim. Master Bertie had assigned the lead to me +as being in less danger of recognition, and I followed the ostler +toward the hearth without hesitation. "Master Jenkin!" the man cried, +with the same rough bluntness he had shown without, "here are two +travelers want the lace-seller who was here to-day. Has he gone?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who gone?" retorted the host as loudly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The lace merchant who came this morning."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; he is in No. 32," returned the landlord. "Will you sup first, +gentlemen?"</p> + +<p class="normal">We declined, and followed the ostler, who made no secret of our +destination, telling those in our road to make way, as the gentlemen +were for No. 32. One of the crowd, however, who seemed to be crossing +from the lower end of the room, failed apparently to understand, and, +interposing between us and our guide, brought me perforce to a halt.</p> + +<p class="normal">"By your leave, good woman!" I said, and turned to pass round her.</p> + +<p class="normal">But she foiled me with unexpected nimbleness, and I could not push her +aside, she was so very old. Her gums were toothless and her forehead +was lined and wrinkled. About her eyes, which under hideous red lids +still shone with an evil gleam--a kind of reflection of a wicked +past--a thousand crows' feet had gathered. A few wisps of gray hair +struggled from under the handkerchief which covered her head. She was +humpbacked, and stooped over a stick, and whether she saw or not my +movement of repugnance, her voice was harsh when she spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Young gentleman," she croaked, "let me tell your fortune by the +stars. A fortune for a groat, young gentleman!" she continued, peering +up into my face and frustrating my attempts to pass.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Here is a groat," I answered peevishly, "and for the fortune, I will +hear it another day. So let us by!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But she would not. My companion, seeing that the attention of the room +was being drawn to us, tried to pull me by her. But I could not use +force, and short of force there was no remedy. The ostler, indeed, +would have interfered on our behalf, and returned to bid her, with a +civility he had not bestowed on us, "give us passage." But she swiftly +turned her eyes on him in a sinister fashion, and he retreated with an +oath and a paling face, while those nearest to us--and half a dozen +had crowded round--drew back, and crossed themselves in haste almost +ludicrous.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let me see your face, young gentleman," she persisted, with a hollow +cough. "My eyes are not so clear as they were, or it is not your cloak +and your flap-hat that would blind me."</p> + +<p class="normal">Thinking it best to get rid of her, even at a slight risk--and the +chance that among the travelers present there would be one able to +recognize me was small indeed--I uncovered. She shot a piercing glance +at my face, and looking down on the floor, traced hurriedly a figure +with her stick. She studied the phantom lines a moment, and then +looked up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Listen!" she said solemnly, and waving her stick round me, she +quavered out in tones which filled me with a strange tremor:</p> +<div class="poem1"> +<p class="t0" style="text-indent:-6pt"> +"The man goes east, and the wind blows west,<br> +Wood to the head, and steel to the breast!<br> +The man goes west, and the wind blows east,<br> +The neck twice doomed the gallows shall feast!</p> +</div> + +<p class="normal">"Beware!" she went on more loudly, and harshly, tapping with her stick +on the floor, and snaking her palsied head at me. "Beware, unlucky +shoot of a crooked branch! Go no farther with it! Go back! The sword +may miss or may not fall, but the cord is sure!"</p> + +<p class="normal">If Master Bertie had not held my arm tightly, I should have recoiled, +as most of those within hearing had already done. The strange +allusions to my past, which I had no difficulty in detecting, and the +witch's knowledge of the risks of our present enterprise, were enough +to startle and shake the most constant mind; and in the midst of +enterprises secret and dangerous, few minds are so firm or so reckless +as to disdain omens. That she was one of those unhappy beings who buy +dark secrets at the expense of their souls, seemed certain; and had I +been alone, I should have, I am not ashamed to say it, given back.</p> + +<p class="normal">But I was lucky in having for my companion a man of rare mind, and +besides of so single a religious belief that to the end of his life he +always refused to put faith in a thing of the existence of which I +have no doubt myself--I mean witchcraft.</p> + +<p class="normal">He showed at this moment the courage of his opinions. "Peace, peace, +woman!" he said compassionately. "We shall live while God wills it, +and die when he wills it. And neither live longer nor die earlier! So +let us by."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Would you perish?" she quavered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay! If so God wills," he answered undaunted.</p> + +<p class="normal">At that she seemed to shake all over, and hobbled aside, muttering, +"Then go on! Go on! God wills it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie gave me no time for hesitation, but, holding my arm, +urged me on to where the ostler stood awaiting the event with a face +of much discomposure. He opened the door for us, however, and led the +way up a narrow and not too clean staircase. On the landing at the +head of this he paused, and raised his lantern so as to cast the light +on our faces. "She has overlooked me, the old witch!" he said +viciously; "I wish I had never meddled in this business."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Man!" Master Bertie replied sternly; "do you fear that weak old +woman?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; but I fear her master," retorted the ostler, "and that is the +devil!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then I do not," Master Bertie answered bravely. "For my Master is as +good a match for him as I am for that old woman. When he wills it, +man, you will die, and not before. So pluck up spirit."</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie did not look at me, though I needed his encouragement as +much as the ostler, having had better proofs of the woman's strange +knowledge. But, seeing that his exhortation had emboldened this +ignorant man, I was ashamed to seem to hesitate. When the ostler +knocked at the door--not of 32, but of 15--and it presently opened, I +went in without more ado.</p> + +<p class="normal">The room was a bare inn-chamber. A pallet without coverings lay in one +corner. In the middle were a couple of stools, and on one of them a +taper.</p> + +<p class="normal">The person who had opened to us stood eying us attentively; a bluff, +weather-beaten man with a thick beard and the air of a sailor. "Well," +he said, "what now?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"These gentlemen want to buy some lace," the ostler explained.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What lace do they want?" was the retort.</p> + +<p class="normal">"French lace," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have come to the right shop, then," the man answered briskly. +Nodding to our conductor to depart, he carefully let him out. Then, +barring the door behind him, he as rapidly strode to the pallet and +twitched it aside, disclosing a trap door. He lifted this, and we saw +a narrow shaft descending into darkness. He brought the taper and held +it so as to throw a faint light into the opening. There was no ladder, +but blocks of wood nailed alternately against two of the sides, at +intervals of a couple of feet or so, made the descent pretty easy for +an active man. "The door is on this side," he said, pointing out the +one. "Knock loudly once and softly twice. The word is the same."</p> + +<p class="normal">We nodded and while he held the taper above, we descended, one by one, +without much difficulty, though I admit that half-way down the old +woman's words "Go on and perish" came back disquietingly to my mind. +However, my foot struck the bottom before I had time to digest them, +and a streak of light which seemed to issue from under a door forced +my thoughts the next moment into a new channel. Whispering to Master +Bertie to pause a minute, for there was only room for one of us to +stand at the bottom of the shaft, I knocked in the fashion prescribed.</p> + +<p class="normal">The sound of loud voices, which I had already detected, ceased on a +sudden, and I heard a shuffling on the other side of the boards. This +was followed by silence, and then the door was flung open, and, +blinded for the moment by a blaze of light, I walked mechanically +forward into a room. I made out as I advanced a group of men standing +round a rude table, their figures thrown into dark relief by flares +stuck in sconces on the walls behind them. Some had weapons in their +hands and others had partly risen from their seats and stood in +postures of surprise. "What do you seek?" cried a threatening voice +from among them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Lace," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What lace?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"French lace."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then you are welcome--heartily welcome!" was the answer given in a +tone of relief. "But who comes with you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Master Richard Bertie, of Lincolnshire," I answered promptly; and at +that moment he emerged from the shaft.</p> + +<p class="normal">A still more hearty murmur of welcome hailed his name and appearance, +and we were borne forward to the table amid a chorus of voices, the +greeting given to Master Bertie being that of men who joyfully hail +unlooked-for help. The room, from its vaulted ceiling and stone floor, +and the trams of casks which lay here and there or near the table +serving for seats, appeared to be a cellar. Its dark, gloomy recesses, +the flaring lights, and the weapons on the table, seemed meet and +fitting surroundings for the anxious faces which were gathered about +the board; for there was a something in the air which was not so much +secrecy as a thing more unpleasant--suspicion and mistrust. Almost at +the moment of our entrance it showed itself. One of the men, before +the door had well closed behind us, went toward it, as if to go out. +The leader--he who had questioned me--called sharply to him, bidding +him come back. And he came back, but reluctantly, as it seemed to me.</p> + +<p class="normal">I barely noticed this, for Master Bertie, who was known personally to +many and by name to all, was introducing me to two who were apparently +the leaders: Sir Thomas Penruddocke, a fair man as tall as myself, +loose-limbed and untidily dressed, with a reckless eye and a loud +tongue; and Master Walter Kingston, a younger brother, I was told, of +that Sir Anthony Kingston who had suffered death the year before for +conspiracy against the queen--the same in which Lord Devon had showed +the white feather. Kingston was a young man of moderate height and +slender; of a brown complexion, and delicate, almost womanish beauty, +his sleepy dark eyes and dainty mustache suggesting a temper rather +amiable than firm. But the spirit of revenge had entered into him, and +I soon learned that not even Penruddocke, a Cornish knight of longer +lineage than purse, was so vehement a plotter or so devoted to the +cause. Looking at the others my heart sank; it needed no greater +experience than mine to discern that, except three or four whom I +identified as stout professors of religion, they were men rather of +desperate fortunes than good estate. I learned on the instant that +conspiracy makes strange bedfellows, and that it is impossible to do +dirty work even with the purest intentions--in good company! Master +Bertie's face indicated to one who knew him as well as I did something +of the same feeling; and could the clock have been put back awhile, +and we placed with free hands and uncommitted outside the Gatehouse, I +think we should with one accord have turned our backs on it, and given +up an attempt which in this company could scarcely fare any way but +ill. Still, for good or evil, the die was cast now, and retreat was +out of the question.</p> + +<p class="normal">We had confronted too many dangers during the last three years not to +be able to face this one with a good courage; and presently Master +Bertie, taking a seat, requested to be told of the strength and plans +of our associates, his businesslike manner introducing at once some +degree of order and method into a conference which before our arrival +had--unless I was much mistaken--been conspicuously lacking in both.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Our resources?" Penruddocke replied confidently. "They lie +everywhere, man! We have but to raise the flag and the rest will be a +triumphal march. The people, sick of burnings and torturings, and +heated by the loss of Calais last January, will flock to us. Flock to +us, do I say? I will answer for it they will!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"But you have some engagements, some promises from people of +standing?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, yes! But the whole nation will join us. They are weary of the +present state of things."</p> + +<p class="normal">"They may be as weary of it as you say," Master Bertie answered +shrewdly; "but is it equally certain that they will risk their necks +to amend it? You have fixed upon some secure base from which we can +act, and upon which, if necessary, we may fall back to concentrate our +strength?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Fall back?" cried Penruddocke, rising from his seat in heat. "Master +Bertie, I hope you have not come among us to talk of falling back! Let +us have no talk of that. If Wyatt had held on at once London would +have been his! It was falling back ruined him."</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie shook his head. "If you have no secure base, you run the +risk of being crushed in the first half hour," he said. "When a fire +is first lighted the breeze puts it out which afterward but fans it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will not say that when you hear our plans. There are to be three +risings at once. Lord Delaware will rise in the west."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But will he?" said Master Bertie pointedly, disregarding the +threatening looks which were cast at him by more than one. "The late +rebellion there was put down very summarily, and I should have thought +that countryside would not be prone to rise again. <i>Will</i> Lord +Delaware rise?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Oh, yes, he will rise fast enough!" Penruddocke replied carelessly. +"I will answer for him. And on the same day, while we do the London +business, Sir Richard Bray will gather his men in Kent."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do not count on him!" said Master Bertie. "A prisoner, muffled and +hoodwinked, was taken to the Tower by water this afternoon. And rumor +says it was Sir Richard Bray."</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a pause of consternation, during which one looked at +another, and swarthy faces grew pale. Penruddocke was the first to +recover himself. "Bah!" he exclaimed, "a fig for rumor! She is ever a +lying jade! I will bet a noble Richard Bray is supping in his own +house at this minute."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then you would lose," Master Bertie rejoined sadly, and with no show +of triumph. "On hearing the report I sent a messenger to Sir Richard's +house. He brought word back that Sir Richard Bray had been fetched +away unexpectedly by four men, and that the house was in confusion."</p> + +<p class="normal">A murmur of dismay broke out at the lower end of the table. But the +Cornishman rose to the situation. "What matter?" he cried +boisterously. "What we have lost in Bray we have gained in Master +Bertie. He will raise Lincolnshire for us, and the Duchess's tenants. +There should be five hundred stout men of the latter, and two-thirds +of them Protestants at heart. If Bray has been seized there is the +more call for haste that we may release him."</p> + +<p class="normal">This appeal was answered by an outburst of cries. One or two even +rose, and waving their weapons swore a speedy vengeance. But Master +Bertie sat silent until the noise had subsided. Then he spoke. "You +must not count on them either, Sir Thomas," he said firmly. "I cannot +find it in my conscience to bring my wife's tenants into a plan so +desperate as this appears to be. To appeal to the people generally is +one thing; to call on those who are bound to us and who cannot in +honor refuse is another. And I will not risk in a hopeless struggle +the lives of men whose fathers looked for guidance to me and mine."</p> + +<p class="normal">A silence, the silence of utter astonishment, fell upon the plotters +round the table. In every face--and they were all turned upon my +companion--I read rage and distrust and dismay. They had chafed under +his cold criticisms and his calm reasonings. But this went beyond all, +and there were hands which stole instinctively to daggers, and eyes +which waited scowling for a signal. But Penruddocke, sanguine by +nature and rendered reckless by circumstances, had still the feelings +of a gentleman, and something in him responded to the appeal which +underlay Master Bertie's words. He remained silent, gazing gloomily at +the table, his eyes perhaps opened at this late hour to the +hopelessness of the attempt he meditated.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was Walter Kingston who came to the fore, and put into words the +thoughts of the coarser and more selfish spirits round him. Leaping +from his seat he dashed his slender hand on the table. "What does this +mean?" he sneered, a dangerous light in his dark eyes. "Those only are +here or should be here who are willing to stake all--all, mind you--on +the cause. Let us have no sneaks! Let us have no men with a foot on +either bank! Let us have no Courtenays nor cowards! Such men ruined +Wyatt and hanged my brother! A curse on them!" he cried, his voice +rising almost to a scream.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Master Kingston! do you refer to me?" Bertie rejoined in haughty +surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, I do!" cried the young man hotly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then I must beg leave of these gentlemen to explain my position."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Your position? So! More words?" quoth the other mockingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay! as many words as I please," retorted Master Bertie, his color +rising. "Afterward I will be as ready with deeds, I dare swear, as any +other! My tenants and my wife's I will not draw into an almost +hopeless struggle. But my own life and my friend's, since we have +obtained your secrets, I must risk, and I will do so in honor to the +death. For the rest, who doubts my courage may test it below ground or +above."</p> + +<p class="normal">The young man laughed rudely. "You will risk your life, but not your +lands, Master Bertie? That is the position, is it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">My companion was about to utter a rejoinder, fierce for him, when I, +who had hitherto sat silent, interposed. "The old witch told the +truth," I cried bitterly. "She said if we came hither we should +perish. And perish we shall, through being linked to a dozen men as +brave as I could wish, but the biggest fools under heaven!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Fools?" shouted Kingston.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, fools!" I repeated. "For who but fools, being at sea in a boat in +which all must sink or swim, would fall a-quarreling? Tell me that!" I +cried, slapping the table.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are about right," Penruddocke said, and half a dozen voices +muttered assent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"About right, is he?" shrieked Kingston. "But who knows we are in a +boat together? Who knows that, I'd like to hear?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do!" I said, standing up and overtopping him by eight inches. "And +if any man hints that Master Bertie is here for any other purpose or +with any other intent than to honestly risk his life in this endeavor +as becomes a gentleman, let him stand out--let him stand out, and I +will break his neck! Fie, gentlemen, fie!" I continued, after a short +pause, which I did not make too long lest Master Kingston's passion +should get the better of his prudence. "Though I am young I have seen +service. But I never saw battle won yet with dissension in the camp. +For shame! Let us to business, and make the best dispositions we may."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You talk sense, Master Carey!" Penruddocke cried, with a great oath. +"Give me your hand. And do you, Kingston, hold your peace. If Master +Bertie will not raise his men to save his own skin, he will hardly do +it for ours. Now, Sir Richard Bray being taken, what is to be done, my +lads? Come, let us look to that."</p> + +<p class="normal">So the storm blew over. But it was with heavy hearts that two of us +fell to the discussion which followed, counting over weapons and +assigning posts, and debating this one's fidelity and that one's +lukewarmness. Our first impressions had not deceived us. The +plot was desperate, and those engaged in it were wanting in every +element which should command success--in information, forethought, +arrangement--everything save sheer audacity. When after a prolonged +and miserable sitting it was proposed that all should take the oath of +association on the Gospels, Master Bertie and I assented gloomily. It +would make our position no worse, for already we were fully committed. +The position was indeed bad enough. We had only persuaded the others +to a short delay; and even this meant that we must remain in hiding in +England, exposed from day to day to all the chances of detection and +treachery.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Thomas brought out from some secret place about him a tiny roll of +paper wrapped in a quill, and while we stood about him looking over +his shoulders, he laboriously added, letter by letter, three or four +names. The stern, anxious faces which peered the while at the document +or scanned each other only to find their anxiety reflected, the +flaring lights behind us, the recklessness of some and the distrust of +others, the cloaks in which many were wrapped to the chin, and the +occasional gleam of hidden weapons, made up a scene very striking. The +more as it was no mere show, but some of us saw only too distinctly +behind it the figure of the headsman and the block.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now," said Penruddocke, who himself I think took a certain grim +pleasure in the formality, "be ready to swear, gentlemen, in pairs, as +I call the names. Kingston and Matthewson!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Lolling against the wall under one of the sconces I looked at Master +Bertie, expecting to be called up with him. He smiled as our eyes met; +and I thought with a rush of tenderness how lightly I could have dared +the worst had all my associates been like him. But repining came too +late, and in a moment Penruddocke surprised me by calling out +"Crewdson and Carey!"</p> + +<p class="normal">So Master Bertie was not to be my companion! I learned afterward that +men who were strangers to one another were purposely associated, the +theory being that each should keep an eye upon his oath-fellow. I went +forward to the end of the table, and took the book.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a slight pause.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Crewdson!" called Penruddocke sharply; "did you not hear, man?"</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a little stir at the farther end of the room, and he came +forward, moving slowly and reluctantly. I saw that he was the man whom +Penruddocke had called back when we entered, a man of great height, +though slender, and closely cloaked. A drooping gray mustache covered +his mouth, and that was almost all I made out before Sir Thomas, with +some sharpness, bade him uncover. He did so with an abrupt gesture, +and reaching out his hand grasped the other end of the book as though +he would take it from me. His manner was so strange that I looked hard +at him, and he, jerking up his head with a gesture of defiance, looked +at me too, his face very pale.</p> + +<p class="normal">I heard Penruddocke's voice droning the words of the oath, but I paid +no attention to them--I was busied with something else. Where had I +seen the sinister gleam in those eyes before, and that forehead high +and narrow, and those lean, swarthy cheeks? Where had I before +confronted that very face which now glared into mine across the book? +Its look was bold and defiant, but low down in the cheek I saw a +little pulse beating furiously, a pulse which told of anxiety, and the +jaws, half veiled by the ragged mustache, were set in an iron grip. +Where? Ha! I knew. I dropped my end of the book and stepped back.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Look to the door!" I cried, my voice sounding harsh and strange in my +own ears. "Let no one leave! I denounce that man!" And raising my hand +I pointed pitilessly at my oath-fellow. "I denounce him--he is a spy +and traitor!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I a spy?" the man shouted fiercely--with the fierceness of despair.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, you! you! Clarence, or Crewdson, or whatever you call yourself, I +denounce you! My time has come!"</p> +<br> + +<p class="center"><img border="0" src="images/spy.png" alt="spy"><br> +". . . HE IS A SPY AND A TRAITOR!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XIX.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_19" href="#div1Ref_19">FERDINAND CLUDDE.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The bitterness of that hour long past, when he had left me for death, +when he had played with the human longing for life, and striven +without a thought of pity to corrupt me by hopes and fears the most +awful that mortals know, was in my voice as I spoke. I rejoiced that +vengeance had come upon him at last, and that I was its instrument. I +saw the pallor of a great fear creep into his dark cheek, and read in +his eyes the vicious passion of a wild beast trapped, and felt no +pity. "Master Clarence!" I said, and laughed--laughed mockingly. "You +do not look pleased to see your friends. Or perhaps you do not +remember me. Stand forward, Master Bertie! Maybe he will recognize +you."</p> + +<p class="normal">But though Master Bertie came forward and stood by my side gazing at +him, the villain's eyes did not for an instant shift from mine. "It is +the man!" my companion said after a solemn pause--for the other, +breathing fast, made no answer. "He was a spy in the pay of Bishop +Gardiner, when I knew him. At the Bishop's death I heard that he +passed into the service of the Spanish Ambassador, the Count de Feria. +He called himself at that time Clarence. I recognize him."</p> + +<p class="normal">The quiet words had their effect. From full one-half of the savage +crew round us a fierce murmur rose more terrible than any loud outcry. +Yet this seemed a relief to the doomed man; he forced himself to look +away from me and to confront the dark ring of menacing faces which +hemmed him in. The moment he did so he appeared to find courage and +words. "They take me for another man!" he cried in hoarse accents. "I +know nothing of them!" and he added a fearful oath. "He knows me. Ask +him!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He pointed to Walter Kingston, who was sitting moodily on a tram +outside the ring, and who alone had not risen under the excitement of +my challenge. On being thus appealed to he looked up suddenly. "If I +am to choose between you," he said bitterly, "and say which is the +true man, I know which I shall pick."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Which?" Clarence murmured. "Which?" This time his tone was different. +In his voice was the ring of hope.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I should give my vote for you," Kingston replied, looking +contemptuously at him. "I know something about you, but of the other +gentleman I know nothing!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And not much of the person you call Crewdson," I retorted fiercely, +"since you do not know his real name."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I know this much," the young man answered, tapping his boot with his +scabbard with studied carelessness, "that he lent me some money, and +seemed a good fellow and one that hated a mass priest. That is enough +for me. As for his name, it is his fancy perhaps. You call yourself +Carey. Well, I know a good many Careys, but I do not know you, nor +ever heard of you!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I swung round on him with a hot cheek. But the challenge which was +upon my tongue was anticipated by Master Bertie, who drew me forcibly +back. "Leave this to me, Francis," he said, "and do you watch that +man. Master Kingston and gentlemen," he continued, turning again to +them, and drawing himself to his full height as he addressed them, +"listen, if you please! You know me, if you do not know my friend. The +honor of Richard Bertie has never been challenged until to-night, nor +ever will be with impunity. Leave my friend out of the question and +put me in it. I, Richard Bertie, say that that man is a paid spy and +informer, come here in quest of blood-money! And he, Crewdson, a +nameless man, says that I lie. Choose between us. Or look at him and +judge! Look!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He was right to bid them look. As the savage murmur rose again and +took from the wretched man his last hope, as the ugliness of despair +and wicked, impotent passion distorted his face, he was indeed the +most deadly witness against himself.</p> + +<p class="normal">The lights which shone on treacherous weapons half hidden, or on the +glittering eyes of cruel men whose blood was roused, fell on nothing +so dangerous as the livid, despairing face which, unmasked and eyed by +all with aversion, still defied us. Traitor and spy as he was, he had +the merit of courage at least; he would die game. And even as I, with +a first feeling of pity for him, discerned this, his sword was out, +and with a curse he lunged at me.</p> + +<p class="normal">Penruddocke saved me by a buffet which sent me reeling against the +wall, so that the villain's thrust was spent on air. Before he could +repeat it, four or five men flung themselves upon him from behind. For +a moment there was a great uproar, while the group surrounding him +swayed to and fro as he dragged his captors up and down with a +strength I should not have expected. But the end was certain, and we +stood looking on quietly. In a minute or two they had him down, and +disarming him, bound his hands.</p> + +<p class="normal">For me he seemed to have a special hatred. "Curse you!" he panted, +glaring at me as he lay helpless. "You have been my evil angel! From +the first day I saw you, you have thwarted me in every plan, and now +you have brought me to this!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not I, but yourself," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My curse upon you!" he cried again, the rage and hate in his face so +terrible that I turned away shuddering and sick at heart. "If I could +have killed you," he cried, "I would have died contented."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Enough!" interposed Penruddocke briskly. "It is well for us that +Master Bertie and his friend came here to-night. Heaven grant it be +not too late! We do not need," he added, looking round, "any more +evidence, I think?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The dissent was loud, and, save for Kingston, who still sat sulking +apart, unanimous.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Death?" said the Cornishman quietly.</p> + +<p class="normal">No one spoke, but each man gave a brief stern nod.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," the leader continued; "then I propose----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"One moment," said Master Bertie, interrupting him. "A word with you +apart, with our friends' permission. You can repeat it to them +afterward."</p> + +<p class="normal">He drew Sir Thomas aside, and they retired into the corner by the +door, where they stood talking in whispers. I had small reason to feel +sympathy for the man who lay there tied and doomed to die like a calf. +Yet even I shuddered--yes, and some of the hardened men round me +shuddered also at the awful expression in his eyes as, without moving +his head, he followed the motions of the two by the door. Some faint +hope springing into being wrung his soul, and brought the perspiration +in great drops to his forehead. I turned away, thinking gravely of the +early morning three years ago when he had tortured me by the very same +hopes and fears which now racked his own spirit.</p> + +<p class="normal">Penruddocke came back, Master Bertie following him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It must not be done to-night," he announced quietly, with a nod which +meant that he would explain the reason afterward. "We will meet again +to-morrow at four in the afternoon instead of at eight in the evening. +Until then two must remain on guard with him. It is right he should +have some time to repent, and he shall have it."</p> + +<p class="normal">This did not at once find favor.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why not run him through now?" said one bluntly. "And meet to-morrow +at some place unknown to him? If we come here again we shall, likely +enough, walk straight into the trap."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, have it that way, if you please," answered Sir Thomas, +shrugging his shoulders. "But do not blame me afterward if you find we +have let slip a golden opportunity. Be fools if you like. I dare say +it will not make much difference in the end!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He spoke at random, but he knew how to deal with his crew, it seemed, +for on this those who had objected assented reluctantly to the course +he proposed. "Barnes and Walters are here in hiding, so they had +better be the two to guard him," he continued. "There is no fear that +they will be inclined to let him go!" I looked at the men whom the +glances of their fellows singled out, and found them to belong to the +little knot of fanatics I had before remarked: dark, stern men, worth, +if the matter ever came to fighting, all the rest of the band put +together.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At four, to-morrow, then, we meet," Sir Thomas concluded lightly. +"Then we will deal with him, never fear! Now it is near midnight, and +we must be going. But not all together, or we shall attract +attention."</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Half an hour later Master Bertie and I rode softly out of the +courtyard and turned our faces toward the city. The night wind came +sweeping across the valley of the Thames, and met us full in the face +as we reached the brow of the hill. It seemed laden with melancholy +whispers. The wretched enterprise, ill-conceived, ill-ordered, and in +its very nature desperate, to which we were in honor committed, would +have accounted of itself for any degree of foreboding. But the scene +through which we had just passed, and on my part the knowledge that I +had given up a fellow-being to death, had their depressing influences. +For some distance we rode in silence, which I was the first to break.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why did you put off his punishment?" I asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because I think he will give us information in the interval," Bertie +answered briefly. "Information which may help us. A spy is generally +ready to betray his own side upon occasion."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you will spare him if he does?" I asked. It seemed to me neither +justice nor mercy.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," he said, "there is no fear of that. Those who go with ropes +round their necks know no mercy. But drowning men will catch at +straws; and ten to one he will babble!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I shivered. "It is a bad business," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">He thought I referred to the conspiracy, and he inveighed bitterly +against it, reproaching himself for bringing me into it, and for his +folly in believing the rosy accounts of men who had all to win, and +nothing save their worthless lives to lose. "There is only one thing +gained," he said. "We are likely to pay dearly for that, so we may +think the more of it. We have been the means of punishing a villain."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," I said, "that is true. It was a strange meeting and a strange +recognition. Strangest of all that I should be called up to swear with +him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not strange," Master Bertie answered gravely. "I would rather call it +providential. Let us think of that, and be of better courage, friend. +We have been used; we shall not be cast away before our time."</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked back. For some minutes I had thought I heard behind us a +light footstep, more like the pattering of a dog than anything else. I +could see nothing, but that was not wonderful, for the moon was young +and the sky overcast. "Do you hear some one following us?" I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie drew rein suddenly, and turning in the saddle we +listened. For a second I thought I still heard the sound. The next it +ceased, and only the wind toying with the November leaves and sighing +away in the distance, came to our ears. "No," he said, "I think it +must have been your fancy. I hear nothing."</p> + +<p class="normal">But when we rode on the sound began again, though at first more +faintly, as if our follower had learned prudence and fallen farther +behind. "Do not stop, but listen!" I said softly. "Cannot you hear the +pattering of a naked foot now?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I hear something," he answered. "I am afraid you are right, and that +we are followed."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is to be done?" I said, my thoughts busy.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There is Caen wood in front," he answered, "with a little open ground +on this side of it. We will ride under the trees and then stop +suddenly. Perhaps we shall be able to distinguish him as he crosses +the open behind us." We made the experiment; but as if our follower +had divined the plan, his footstep ceased to sound before we had +stopped our horses. He had fallen farther behind. "We might ride +quickly back," I suggested, "and surprise him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It would be useless," Bertie answered. "There is too much cover close +to the road. Let us rather trot on and outstrip him."</p> + +<p class="normal">We did trot on; and what with the tramp of our horses as they swung +along the road, and the sharp passage of the wind by our ears, we +heard no more of the footstep behind. But when we presently pulled up +to breathe our horses--or rather within a few minutes of our doing +so--there it was behind us, nearer and louder than before. I shivered +as I listened; and presently, acting on a sudden impulse, I wheeled my +horse round and spurred him back a dozen paces along the road.</p> + +<p class="normal">I pulled up.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a movement in the shadow of the trees on my right, and I +leaned forward, peering in that direction. Gradually, I made out the +lines of a figure standing still as though gazing at me; a strange, +distorted figure, crooked, short, and in some way, though no lineament +of the face was visible, expressive of a strange and weird +malevolence. It was the witch! The witch whom I had seen in the +kitchen at the Gatehouse. How, then, had she come hither? How had she, +old, lame, decrepit, kept up with us?</p> + +<p class="normal">I trembled as she raised her hand, and, standing otherwise motionless, +pointed at me out of the gloom. The horse under me was trembling too, +trembling violently, with its ears laid back, and, as she moved, its +terror increased, it plunged wildly. I had to give for a moment all my +attention to it, and though I tried, in mere revolt against the fear +which I felt was overcoming me, to urge it nearer, my efforts were +vain. After nearly unseating me, the beast whirled round and, getting +the better of me, galloped down the road toward London.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" cried Master Bertie, as I came speedily up with him; he +had ridden slowly on. "What is the matter?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Something in the hedge startled it," I explained, trying to soothe +the horse. "I could not clearly see what it was."</p> + +<p class="normal">"A rabbit, I dare say," he remarked, deceived by my manner.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Perhaps it was," I answered. Some impulse, not unnatural, led me to +say nothing about what I had seen. I was not quite sure that my eyes +had not deceived me. I feared his ridicule, too, though he was not +very prone to ridicule. And above all I shrank from explaining the +medley of superstitious fear, distrust, and abhorrence in which I held +the creature who had shown so strange a knowledge of my life.</p> + +<p class="normal">We were already near Holborn, and reaching without further adventure a +modest inn near the Bars, we retired to a room we had engaged, and lay +down with none of the gallant hopes which had last night formed the +subject of our talk. Yet we slept well, for depression goes better +with sleep than does the tumult of anticipation; and I was up early, +and down in the yard looking to the horses before London was well +awake. As I entered the stable a man lying curled up in the straw +rolled lazily over and, shading his eyes, glanced up. Apparently he +recognized me, for he got slowly to his feet. "Morning!" he said +gruffly.</p> + +<p class="normal">I stood staring at him, wondering if I had made a mistake.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What are you doing here, my man?" I said sharply, when I had made +certain I knew him, and that he was really the surly ostler from the +Gatehouse tavern at Highgate. "Why did you come here? Why have you +followed us?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Come about your business," he answered. "To give you that."</p> + +<p class="normal">I took the note he held out to me. "From whom?" I said. "Who sent it +by you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Cannot tell," he replied, shaking his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Cannot, or will not?" I retorted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Both," he said doggedly. "But there, if you want to know what sort of +a kernel is in a nut, you don't shake the tree, master--you crack the +nut."</p> + +<p class="normal">I looked at the note he had given me. It was but a slip of paper +folded thrice. The sender had not addressed, or sealed, or fastened it +in anyway; had taken no care either to insure its reaching its +destination or to prevent prying eyes seeing the contents. If one of +our associates had sent it, he had been guilty of the grossest +carelessness. "You are sure it is for me?" I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"As sure as mortal can be," he answered. "Only that it was given me +for a man, and not a mouse! You are not afraid, master?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I was not; but he edged away as he spoke, and looked with so much +alarm at the scrap of paper that it was abundantly clear he was very +much afraid himself, even while he derided me. I saw that if I had +offered to return the note he would have backed out of the stable and +gone off there and then as fast as his lame foot would let him. This +puzzled me. However, I read the note. There was nothing in it to +frighten me. Yet, as I read, the color came into my face, for it +contained one name to which I had long been a stranger.</p> + +<p class="normal">"To Francis Cludde," it ran. "If you would not do a thing of which you +will miserably repent all your life, and which will stain you in the +eyes of all Christian men, meet me two hours before noon at the cross +street by St. Botolph's, where you first saw Mistress Bertram. And +tell no one. Fail not to come. In Heaven's name, fail not!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The note had nothing to do with the conspiracy, then, on the face of +it; mysterious as it was, and mysteriously as it came. "Look here!" I +said to the man. "Tell me who sent it, and I will give you a crown."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I would not tell you," he answered stubbornly, "if you could make me +King of England! No, nor King of Spain too! You might rack me and you +would not get it from me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">His one eye glowed with so obstinate a resolve that I gave up the +attempt to persuade him, and turned to examine the message itself. But +here I fared no better. I did not know the handwriting, and there was +no peculiarity in the paper. I was no wiser than before. "Are you to +take back any answer?" I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," he replied, "the saints be thanked for the same! But you will +bear me witness," he went on anxiously, "that I gave you the letter. +You will not forget that, or say that you have not had it? But there!" +he added to himself as he turned away, speaking in a low voice, so +that I barely caught the sense of the words, "what is the use? she +will know!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She will know! It had something to do with a woman then, even if a +woman were not the writer. I went in to breakfast in two minds about +going. I longed to tell Master Bertie and take his advice, though the +unknown had enjoined me not to do so. But for the time I refrained, +and explaining my absence of mind as well as I could, I presently +stole away on some excuse or other, and started in good time, and on +foot, into the city. I reached the rendezvous a quarter of an hour +before the time named, and strolling between the church and the +baker's shop, tried to look as much like a chance passer-by as I +could, keeping the while a wary lookout for any one who might turn out +to be my correspondent.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The morning was cold and gray. A drizzling rain was falling. The +passers were few, and the appearance of the streets dirty and, with +littered kennels, was dreary indeed. I found it hard at once to keep +myself warm and to avoid observation as I hung about. Ten o'clock had +rung from more than one steeple, and I was beginning to think myself a +fool for my pains, when a woman of middle height, slender and young in +figure, but wearing a shabby brown cloak, and with her head muffled in +a hood, as though she had the toothache or dreaded the weather more +than ordinary, turned the corner of the belfry and made straight +toward me. She drew near, and seemed about to pass me without notice. +But when abreast of me she glanced up suddenly, her eyes the only +features I could see.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Follow me to the church!" she murmured gently. And she swept on to +the porch.</p> + +<p class="normal">I obeyed reluctantly; very reluctantly, my feet seeming like lead. For +I knew who she was. Though I had only seen her eyes, I had recognized +them, and guessed already what her business with me was. She led the +way resolutely to a quiet corner. The church was empty and still, with +only the scent of incense in the air to tell of a recent service. It +was no surprise to me when she turned abruptly, and, removing her +hood, looked me in the face.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What have you done with him?" she panted, laying her hand on my arm. +"Speak! Tell me what you have done with him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The question, the very question, I had foreseen! Yet I tried to fence +with her. I said, "With whom?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"With whom?" she repeated bitterly. "You know me! I am not so changed +in three years that you do not recognize me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No; I know you," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a hectic flush on her cheeks, and it seemed to me that the +dark hair was thinner on her thin temples than when I had seen her +last. But the eyes were the same.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then why ask with whom?" she cried passionately. "What have you done +with the man you called Clarence?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Done with him?" I said feebly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, done with him? Come, speak and tell me!" she repeated in fierce +accents, her hand clutching my wrist, her eyes probing my face with +merciless glances. "Have you killed him? Tell me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Killed him, Mistress Anne?" I said sullenly. "No, I have not killed +him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is alive?" she cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">"For all I know, he is alive."</p> + +<p class="normal">She glared at me for some seconds to assure herself that I was telling +the truth. Then she heaved a great sigh; her hands fell from my +wrists, the color faded out of her face, and she lowered her eyes. I +glanced round with a momentary idea of escape--I so shrank from that +which was to come. But before I had well entertained the notion she +looked up, her face grown calm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then what have you done with him?" she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have done nothing with him," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">She laughed; a mirthless laugh. "Bah!" she said, "do not tell me lies! +That is your honor, I suppose--your honor to your friends down in the +cellar there! Do you think that I do not know all about them? Shall I +give you the list? He is a very dangerous conspirator, is Sir Thomas +Penruddocke, is he not? And that scented dandy Master Kingston! Or +Master Crewdson--tell me of him! Tell me of him, I say!" she +exclaimed, with a sudden return from irony to a fierce eagerness, a +breathless impatience. "Why did he not come up last night? What have +you done with him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head, sick and trembling. How could I tell her?</p> + +<p class="normal">"I see," she said. "You will not tell me. But you swear he is yet +alive, Master Cludde? Good. Then you are holding him for a hostage? Is +that it?" with a piercing glance at my face. "Or, you have condemned +him, but for some reason the sentence has not been executed!" She drew +a long, deep breath, for I fear my face betrayed me. "That is it, is +it? Then there is still time."</p> + +<p class="normal">She turned from me and looked toward the end of the aisle, where a +dull red lamp hanging before the altar glowed feebly in the warm +scented air. She seemed so to turn and so to look in thankfulness, as +if the news she had learned were good instead of what it was. "What is +the hour fixed?" she asked suddenly.</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will not tell me? Well, it matters not," she answered briskly. +"He must be saved. Do you hear? He must be saved, Master Cludde. That +is your business."</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You think it is not?" she said. "Well, I can show you it is! Listen!"</p> + +<p class="normal">She raised herself on a step of the font, and looked me harshly in the +face. "If he be not given up to me safe and sound by sunset this +evening, I will betray you all! All! I have the list here," she +muttered sternly, touching her bosom. "You, Master Bertie, +Penruddocke, Fleming, Barnes--all. All, do you hear? Give him up or +you shall hang!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You would not do it!" I cried aghast, peering into her burning eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Would not do it? Fool!" she hissed. "If all the world but he had one +head, I would cut it off to save his! He is my husband! Do you hear? +He is my husband--my all! Do you think I have given up everything, +friends and honor and safety, for him, to lose him now? No! You say I +would not do it? Do you know what I have done? You have a scar there."</p> + +<p class="normal">She touched me lightly on the breast. "I did it," she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You?" I muttered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, I, you blind fool! I did it," she answered. "You escaped then, +and I was glad of it, since the wound answered my purpose. But you +will not escape again. The cord is surer."</p> + +<p class="normal">Something in her last words crossed my memory and enlightened me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You were the woman I saw last night," I said. "You followed us from +High gate."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What matter! What matter!" she exclaimed impatiently. "Better be +footsore than heartsore. Will you do now what I want? Will you answer +for his life?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can do nothing without the others," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But the others know nothing," she answered. "They do not know their +own danger. Where will you find them?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall find them," I replied resolutely. "And in any case I must +consult Master Bertie. Will you come and see him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And be locked up too?" she said sternly, and in a different tone. +"No. It is you must do this, and you must answer for it, Francis +Cludde. You, and no one else."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I can do nothing by myself," I repeated.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, but you can--you must!" she retorted, "or Heaven's curse will be +upon you! You think me mad to say that. Listen! Listen, fool! The man +whom you have condemned, whom you have left to die, is not only my +husband, wedded to me these three years, but your father--your father, +Ferdinand Cludde!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XX.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_20" href="#div1Ref_20">THE COMING QUEEN.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I stood glaring at her.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You were a blind bat or you would have found it out for yourself," +she continued scornfully. "A babe would have guessed it, knowing as +much of your father as you did."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Does he know himself?" I muttered hoarsely, looking anywhere but at +her now. The shock had left me dull and confused. I did not doubt her +word, rather I wondered with her that I had not found this out for +myself. But the possibility of meeting my father in that wide world +into which I had plunged to escape from the knowledge of his +existence, had never occurred to me. Had I thought of it, it would +have seemed too unlikely; and though I might have seen in Gardiner a +link between us, and so have identified him, the greatness of the +Chancellor's transactions, and certain things about Clarence which had +seemed, or would have seemed, had I ever taken the point into +consideration, at variance with my ideas of my father, had prevented +me getting upon the track.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Does he know that you are his son, do you mean?" she said. "No, he +does not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have not told him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," she answered with a slight shiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">I understood. I comprehended that even to her the eagerness with +which, being father and son, we had sought one another's lives during +those days on the Rhine, had seemed so dreadful that she had concealed +the truth from him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"When did you learn it?" I asked, trembling too.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I knew his right name before I ever saw you," she answered. "Yours I +learned on the day I left you at Santon." Looking back I remembered +the strange horror, then inexplicable, which she had betrayed; and I +understood it. So it was that knowledge which had driven her from us! +"What will you do now?" she said. "You will save him? You must save +him! He is your father."</p> + +<p class="normal">Save him? I shuddered at the thought that I had destroyed him! that I, +his son, had denounced him! Save him! The perspiration sprang out in +beads on my forehead. If I could not save him I should live pitied by +my friends and loathed by my enemies!</p> + +<p class="normal">"If it be possible," I muttered, "I will save him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You swear it?" she cried. Before I could answer she seized my arm and +dragged me up the dim aisle until we stood together before the Figure +and the Cross. The chimes above us rang eleven. A shaft of cold +sunshine pierced a dusty window, and, full of dancing motes, shot +athwart the pillars.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Swear!" she repeated with trembling eagerness, turning her eyes on +mine, and raising her hand solemnly toward the Figure. "Swear by the +Cross!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I swear," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">She dropped her hand. Her form seemed to shrink and grow less. Making +a sign to me to go, she fell on her knees on the step, and drew her +hood over her face. I walked away on tiptoe down the aisle, but +glancing back from the door of the church I saw the small, solitary +figure still kneeling in prayer. The sunshine had died away. The dusty +window was colorless. Only the red lamp glowed dully above her head. I +seemed to see what the end would be. Then I pushed aside the curtain, +and slipped out into the keen air. It was hers to pray. It was mine to +act.</p> + +<p class="normal">I lost no time, but on my return I could not find Master Bertie either +in the public room or in the inn yard, so I sought him in his bedroom, +where I found him placidly reading a book; his patient waiting in +striking contrast with the feverish anxiety which had taken hold of +me. "What is it, lad?" he said, closing the volume, and laying it down +on my entrance. "You look disturbed?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have seen Mistress Anne," I answered. He whistled softly, staring +at me without a word. "She knows all," I continued.</p> + +<p class="normal">"How much is all?" he asked after a pause.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Our names--all our names, Penruddocke's, Kingston's, the others; our +meeting-place, and that we hold Clarence a prisoner. She was that old +woman whom we saw at the Gatehouse tavern last night."</p> + +<p class="normal">He nodded, appearing neither greatly surprised nor greatly alarmed. +"Does she intend to use her knowledge?" he said. "I suppose she does."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Unless we let him go safe and unhurt before sunset."</p> + +<p class="normal">"They will never consent to it," he answered, shaking his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then they will hang!" I cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked hard at me a moment, discerning something strange in the +bitterness of my last words. "Come, lad," he said, "you have not told +me all. What else have you learned?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"How can I tell you?" I cried wildly, waving him off, and going to the +lattice that my face might be hidden from him. "Heaven has cursed me!" +I added, my voice breaking.</p> + +<p class="normal">He came and laid his hand on my shoulder. "Heaven curses no one," he +said. "Most of our curses we make for ourselves. What is it, lad?"</p> + +<p class="normal">I covered my face with my hands. "He--he is my father," I muttered. +"Do you understand? Do you see what I have done? He is my father!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ha!" Master Bertie uttered that one exclamation in intense +astonishment; then he said no more. But the pressure of his hand told +me that he understood, that he felt with me, that he would help me. +And that silent comprehension, that silent assurance, gave the +sweetest comfort. "He must be allowed to go, then, for this time," he +resumed gravely, after a pause in which I had had time to recover +myself. "We will see to it. But there will be difficulties. You must +be strong and brave. The truth must be told. It is the only way."</p> + +<p class="normal">I saw that it was, though I shrank exceedingly from the ordeal before +me. Master Bertie advised, when I grew more calm, that we should be +the first at the rendezvous, lest by some chance Penruddocke's orders +should be anticipated; and accordingly, soon after two o'clock, we +mounted, and set forth. I remarked that my companion looked very +carefully to his arms, and, taking the hint, I followed his example.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was a silent, melancholy, anxious ride. However successful we might +be in rescuing my father--alas! that I should have to-day and always +to call that man father--I could not escape the future before me. I +had felt shame while he was but a name to me; how could I endure to +live, with his infamy always before my eyes? Petronilla, of whom I had +been thinking so much since I returned to England, whose knot of +velvet had never left my breast nor her gentle face my heart--how +could I go back to her now? I had thought my father dead, and his name +and fame old tales. But the years of foreign life which yesterday had +seemed a sufficient barrier between his past and myself--of what use +were they now? Or the foreign service I had fondly regarded as a kind +of purification?</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie broke in on my reverie much as if he had followed its +course. "Understand one thing, lad!" he said, laying his hand on the +withers of my horse. "Yours must not be the hand to punish your +father. But after to-day you will owe him no duty. You will part from +him to-day and he will be a stranger to you. He deserted you when you +were a child; and if you owe reverence to any one, it is to your uncle +and not to him. He has himself severed the ties between you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes," I said. "I will go abroad. I will go back to Wilna."</p> + +<p class="normal">"If ill comes of our enterprise--as I fear ill will come--we will both +go back, if we can," he answered. "If good by any chance should come +of it, then you shall be my brother, our family shall be your family. +The Duchess is rich enough," he added with a smile, "to allow you a +younger brother's portion."</p> + +<p class="normal">I could not answer him as I desired, for we passed at that moment +under the archway, and became instantly involved in the bustle going +forward in the courtyard. Near the principal door of the inn stood +eight or nine horses gayly caparisoned and in the charge of three +foreign-looking men, who, lounging in their saddles, were passing a +jug from hand to hand. They turned as we rode in and looked at us +curiously, but not with any impertinence. Apparently they were waiting +for the rest of their party, who were inside the house. Civilly +disposed as they seemed, the fact that they were armed, and wore rich +liveries of black and gold, caused me, and I think both of us, a +momentary alarm.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who are they?" Master Bertie asked in a low voice, as he rode to the +opposite door and dismounted with his back to them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They are Spaniards, I fancy," I said, scanning them over the +shoulders of my horse as I too got off. "Old friends, so to speak."</p> + +<p class="normal">"They seem wonderfully subdued for them," he answered, "and on their +best behavior. If half the tales we heard this morning be true, they +are not wont to carry themselves like this."</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet they certainly were Spanish, for I overheard them speaking to one +another in that language; and before we had well dismounted, their +leader--whom they received with great respect, one of them jumping +down to hold his stirrup--came out with three or four more and got to +horse again. Turning his rein to lead the way out through the north +gate he passed near us, and as he settled himself in his saddle took a +good look at us. The look passed harmlessly over me, but reaching +Master Bertie became concentrated. The rider started and smiled +faintly. He seemed to pause, then he raised his plumed cap and bowed +low--covered himself again and rode on. His train all followed his +example and saluted us as they passed. Master Bertie's face, which had +flushed a fiery red under the other's gaze, grew pale again. He looked +at me, when they had gone by, with startled eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you know who that was?" he said, speaking like one who had +received a blow and did not yet know how much he was hurt.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was the Count de Feria, the Spanish Ambassador," he answered. "And +he recognized me. I met him often, years ago. I knew him again as soon +as he came out, but I did not think he would by any chance recognize +me in this dress."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you sure," I asked in amazement, "that it was he?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Quite sure," he answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But why did he not have you arrested, or at least detained? The +warrants are still out against you."</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie shook his head. "I cannot tell," he said darkly. "He is +a Spaniard. But come, we have the less time to lose. We must join our +friends and take their advice; we seem to be surrounded by pitfalls."</p> + +<p class="normal">At this moment the lame ostler came up, and grumbling at us as if he +had never seen us in his life before, and never wished to see us +again, took our horses. We went into the kitchen, and taking the first +chance of slipping upstairs to No. 15, we were admitted with the same +precautions as before, and descending the shaft gained the cellar.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Here we were not, as we had looked to be, the first on the scene. I +suppose a sense of the insecurity of our meeting-place had led every +one to come early, so as to be gone early. Penruddocke indeed was not +here yet, but Kingston and half a score of others were sitting about +conversing in low tones. It was plain that the distrust and suspicion +which we had remarked on the previous day had not been allayed by the +discovery of Clarence's treachery.</p> + +<p class="normal">Indeed, it was clear that the distrust and despondency had to-day +become a panic. Men glared at one another and at the door, and talked +in whispers and started at the slightest sound. I glanced round. The +one I sought for with eager yet shrinking eyes was not to be seen. I +turned to Master Bertie, my face mutely calling on him to ask the +question. "Where is the prisoner?" he said sharply.</p> + +<p class="normal">A moment I hung in suspense. Then one of the men said, "He is in +there. He is safe enough!" He pointed, as he spoke, to a door which +seemed to lead to an inner cellar.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Right," said Master Bertie, still standing. "I have two pieces of bad +news for you nevertheless. Firstly I have just been recognized by the +Spanish Ambassador, whom I met in the courtyard above."</p> + +<p class="normal">Half the men rose to their feet. "What is he doing here?" they cried, +one boldly, the others with the quaver very plain in their voices.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know; but he recognized me. Why he took no steps to detain +or arrest me I cannot tell. He rode away by the north road."</p> + +<p class="normal">They gazed at one another and we at them. The wolfish look which fear +brings into some faces grew stronger in theirs.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is your other bad news?" said Kingston, with an oath.</p> + +<p class="normal">"A person outside, a friend of the prisoner, has a list of our names, +and knows our meeting-place and our plans. She threatens to use the +knowledge unless the man Clarence or Crewdson be set free."</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a loud murmur of wrath and dismay, amid which Kingston alone +preserved his composure. "We might have been prepared for that," he +said quietly. "It is an old precaution of such folk. But how did you +come to hear of it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"My friend here saw the messenger and heard the terms. The man must be +set free by sunset."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And what warranty have we that he will not go straight with his plans +and his list to the Council?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie could not answer that, neither could I; we had no +surety, and if we set him free could take none save his word. <i>His +word!</i> Could even I ask them to accept that? To stake the life of the +meanest of them on it?</p> + +<p class="normal">I saw the difficulties of the position, and when Master Kingston +pronounced coolly that this was a waste of time, and that the only +wise course was to dispose of the principal witness, both in the +interests of justice and our own safety, and then shift for ourselves +before the storm broke, I acknowledged in my heart the wisdom of the +course, and felt that yesterday it would have received my assent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The risk is about the same either way," Master Bertie said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not at all," Kingston objected, a sparkle of malice in his eye. Last +night we had thwarted him. To-night it was his turn; and the dark +lowering looks of those round him showed that numbers were with him. +"This fellow can hang us all. His accomplice who escapes can know +nothing save through him, and could give only vague and uncertain +evidence. No, no. Let us cast lots who shall do it, get it done +quickly, and begone."</p> + +<p class="normal">"We must wait at least," Bertie urged, "until Sir Thomas comes."</p> + +<p class="normal">"No!" retorted Kingston, with heat. "We are all equal here. Besides +the man was condemned yesterday, with the full assent of all. It only +remains to carry out the sentence. Surely this gentleman," he +continued, turning suddenly upon me, "who was so ready to accuse him +yesterday, does not wish him spared to-day?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do wish it," I said, in a low tone.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ho! ho!" he cried, folding his arms and throwing back his head, +astonished at the success of his own question. "Then may we ask for +your reasons, sir? Last night you could not lay your tongue to words +too bad for him. Tonight you wish to spare him, and let him go?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do," I said. I felt that every eye was upon me, and that, Master +Bertie excepted, not one there would feel sympathy with me in my +humiliation. They were driven to the wall. They had no time for fine +feeling, for sympathy, for appreciation of the tragic, unless it +touched themselves. What chance had I with them, though I was a son +pleading for a father? Nay, what argument had I save that I was his +son, and that I had brought him to this? No argument. Only the appeal +to them that they would not make me a parricide! And I felt that at +this they would mock.</p> + +<p class="normal">And so, in view of those stern, curious faces, a new temptation seized +me--the temptation to be silent. Why should I not stand by and let +things take their course? Why should I not spare myself the shame +which I already saw would be fruitless? When Master Kingston, with a +cynical bow, said, "Your reasons, sir?" I stood mute and trembling. If +I kept silence, if I refused to give my reasons, if I did not +acknowledge the prisoner, but merely begged his life, he would die, +and the connection between us would be known only to one or two. I +should be freed from him and might go my own way. The sins of +Ferdinand Cludde were well-nigh forgotten--why take to myself the sins +of Clarence, which would otherwise never stain my name, would never be +associated with my father or myself?</p> + +<p class="normal">Why, indeed? It was a great and sore temptation, as I stood there +before all those eyes. He had deserved death. I had given him up in +perfect innocence. Had I any right to call on them to risk their lives +that I might go harmless in conscience, and he in person? Had I----</p> + +<p class="normal">What, was there after all some taint in my blood? Was I going to +become like him--to take to myself a shame of my own earning, in the +effort to escape from the burden of his ill-fame? I remembered in time +the oath I had sworn, and when Kingston repeated his question, I +answered him quickly. "I did not know yesterday who he was," I said. +"I have discovered since that he is my father. I ask nothing on his +account. Were he only my father I would not plead for him. I plead for +myself," I murmured. "If you show no pity, you make me a parricide."</p> + +<p class="normal">I had done them wrong. There was something in my voice, I suppose, as +I said the words which cost me so much, which wrought with almost all +of them in a degree. They gazed at me with awed, wondering faces, and +murmured "His father!" in low tones. They were recalling the scene of +last night, the moment when I had denounced him, the curse he had +hurled at me, the half-told story of which that had seemed the climax. +I had wronged them. They did see the tragedy of it.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yes, they pitied me; but they showed plainly that they would still do +what perhaps I should have done in their place--justice. "He knows too +much!" said one. "Our lives are as good as his," muttered another--the +first to become thoroughly himself again--"why should we all die for +him?" The wolfish glare came back fast to their eyes. They handled +their weapons impatiently. They were longing to be away. At this +moment, when I saw I had indeed made my confession in vain, Master +Bertie struck in. "What," he said, "if Master Carey and I take charge +of him, and escorting him to his agent without, be answerable for both +of them?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You would be only putting your necks into the noose!" said Kingston.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We will risk that!" replied my friend--and what a friend and what a +man he seemed amid that ignoble crew!--"I will myself promise you that +if he refuse to remain with us until midnight, or tries wherever we +are to raise an alarm or communicate with any one, I will run him +through with my own hand? Will not that satisfy you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," Master Kingston retorted, "it will not! A bird in the hand is +worth two in the bush!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"But the woman outside?" said one timidly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"We must run that risk!" quoth he. "In an hour or two we shall be in +hiding. Come, the lot must be drawn. For this gentleman, let him stand +aside."</p> + +<p class="normal">I leaned against the wall, dazed and horror-stricken. Now that I had +identified myself with him I felt a great longing to save him. I +scarcely noticed the group drawing pieces of paper at the table. My +every thought was taken up with the low door over there, and the +wretched man lying bound in the darkness behind it. What must be the +horror, the black despair, the hate and defiance of his mind as he lay +there, trapped at last like any beast of prey? It was horrible! +horrible! horrible!</p> + +<p class="normal">I covered my face and could not restrain the cry of unutterable +distress which rose to my lips. They looked round, two or three of +them, from the table. But the impression my appeal had made upon them +had faded away already, and they only shrugged their shoulders and +turned again to their task. Master Bertie alone stood apart, his arms +folded, his face grave and dark. He too had abandoned hope. There +seemed no hope, when suddenly there came a knocking at the door. The +papers were dropped, and while some stood as if stiffened into stone, +others turned and gazed at their neighbors. It was a knocking more +hasty and imperative than the usual summons, though given in the same +fashion. At last a man found tongue. "It is Sir Thomas," he suggested, +with a sigh of relief. "He is in a hurry and brings news. I know his +knock."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then open the door, fool," cried Kingston. "If you can see through a +two-inch plank, why do you stand there like a gaby?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Master Bertie anticipated the man, and himself opened the door and +admitted the knocker. Penruddocke it was; he came in, still drumming +on the door with his fist, his eyes sparkling, his ruddy cheeks aglow. +He crossed the threshold with a swagger, and looking at us all burst +into a strange peal of laughter. "Yoicks! Gone to earth!" he shouted, +waving his hand as if he had a whip in it. "Gone to earth--gone +forever! Did you think it was the Lords of the Council, my lads?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He had left the door wide open behind him, and we now saw in the +doorway the seafaring man who usually guarded the room above. "What +does this mean, Sir Thomas?" Kingston said sternly. He thought, I +fancy, as many of us did, that the knight was drunk. "Have you given +that man permission to leave his post?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Post? There are no more posts," cried Sir Thomas, with a strange +jollity. He certainly was drunk, but perhaps not with liquor. "Except +good fat posts," he continued, smacking Master Bertie on the shoulder, +"for loyal men who have done the state service, and risked their lives +in evil times! Posts? I shall get so drunk to-night that the stoutest +post on Ludgate will not hold me up!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"You seem to have gone far that way already," my friend said coldly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"So will you, when you hear the news!" Penruddocke replied more +soberly. "Lads, the Queen is dying!"</p> + +<p class="normal">In the vaulted room his statement was received in silence; a silence +dictated by no feeling for the woman going before her Maker--how +should we who were plotting against her feel for her, we who were for +the most part homeless and proscribed through her?--but the silence of +men in doubt, in doubt whether this might mean all that from Sir +Thomas's aspect it seemed to mean.</p> + +<p class="normal">"She cannot live a week!" Penruddocke continued. "The doctors have +given up hope, and at the palace all is in confusion. She has named +the Princess Elizabeth her successor, and even now Cecil is drawing up +the proclamations. To show that the game is really up, the Count de +Feria, the Spanish Ambassador, has gone this very day to Hatfield to +pay his respects to the coming queen."</p> + +<p class="normal">Then indeed the vaulted roof did ring--ring and ring again with shouts +of "The Coming Queen!" Men over whom the wings of death had seemed a +minute ago to be hovering, darkening all things to them, looked up and +saw the sun. "The Coming Queen!" they cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You need fear nothing!" continued Penruddocke wildly. "No one will +dare to execute the warrants. The Bishops are shaking in their miters. +Pole is said to be dying. Bonner is more likely to hang himself than +burn others. Up and out and play the man! Away to your counties and +get ready your tar-barrels! Now we will give them a taste of the Cujus +Regio! Ho! drawer, there! A cup of ale!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He turned, and shouting a scrap of a song, swaggered back into the +shaft and began to ascend. They all trooped after him, talking and +laughing, a reckless, good-natured crew, looking to a man as if they +had never known fear or selfishness--as if distrust were a thing +impossible to them. Master Kingston alone, whom his losses had soured +and who still brooded over his revenge, went off moodily.</p> + +<p class="normal">I was for stopping one of them; but Master Bertie directed my eyes by +a gesture of his hand to the door at the far end of the cellar, and I +saw that the key was in the lock. He wrung my hand hard. "Tell him +all," he muttered. "I will wait above."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXI.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_21" href="#div1Ref_21">MY FATHER.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Tell him all? I stood thinking, my hand on the key. The voices of the +rearmost of the conspirators sounded more and more faintly as they +passed up the shaft, until their last accents died in the room above, +and silence followed; a silence in strange contrast with the bright +glare of the torches which burned round me and lit up the empty cellar +as for a feast. I was wondering what he would say when I told him +all--when I said "I am your son! I, whom Providence has used to thwart +your plans, whose life you sought, whom, without a thought of pity, +you left to perish! I am your son!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Infinitely I dreaded the moment when I should tell him this, and hear +his answer; and I lingered with my hand on the key until an abrupt +knocking on the other side of the door brought the blood to my face. +Before I could turn the key the hasty summons was repeated, and grew +to a frantic, hurried drumming on the boards--a sound which plainly +told of terror suddenly conceived and in an instant full-grown. A +hoarse cry followed, coming dully to my ears through the thickness of +the door, and the next moment the stout planks shook as a heavy weight +fell against them.</p> + +<p class="normal">I turned the key, and the door was flung open from within. My father +stumbled out.</p> + +<p class="normal">The strong light for an instant blinded him, and he blinked as an owl +does brought to the sunshine. Even in him the long hours passed in +solitude and the blackness of despair had worked changes. His hair was +grayer; in patches it was almost white, and then again dark. He had +gnawed his lower lip, and there were bloodstains on it. His mustache, +too, was ragged and torn, as if he had gnawed that also. His eyes were +bloodshot, his lean face was white and haggard and fierce.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ha!" he cried, trembling, as he peered round, "I thought they had +left me to starve! There were rats in there! I thought----"</p> + +<p class="normal">He stopped. He saw me standing holding the edge of the door. He saw +that otherwise the room was empty, the farther door leading to the +shaft open. An open door! To him doubtless it seemed of all sights the +most wonderful, the most heavenly! His knees began to shake under him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" he muttered. "What were they shouting about? I heard +them shouting."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The queen is dying," I answered simply, "or dead, and you can do us +no more harm. You are free."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Free?" He repeated the word, leaning against the wall, his eyes wild +and glaring, his lips parted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, free," I answered, in a lower voice--"free to go out into the +air of heaven a living man!" I paused. For a moment I could not +continue. Then I added solemnly, "Sir, Providence has saved you from +death, and me from a crime."</p> + +<p class="normal">He leaned still against the wall, dazed, thunderstruck, almost +incredulous, and looked from me to the open door and back again as if +without this constant testimony of his eyes he could not believe in +his escape.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was not Anne?" he murmured. "She did not----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"She tried to save your life," I answered; "but they would not listen +to her."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Did she come here?"</p> + +<p class="normal">As he spoke, he straightened himself with an effort and stood up. He +was growing more like himself.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No," I answered. "She sent for me and told me her terms. But Kingston +and the others would not listen to them. You would have been dead now, +though I did all I could to save you, if Penruddocke had not brought +this news of the queen."</p> + +<p class="normal">"She is dead?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"She is dying. The Spanish Ambassador," I added, to clinch the matter, +for I saw he doubted, "rode through here this afternoon to pay his +court to the Princess Elizabeth at Hatfield."</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked down at the ground, thinking deeply. Most men would have +been unable to think at all, unable to concentrate their thoughts on +anything save their escape from death. But a life of daily risk and +hazard had so hardened this man that I was certain, as I watched him, +that he was not praying nor giving thanks. He was already pondering +how he might make the most out of the change; how he might to the best +advantage sell his knowledge of the government whose hours were +numbered to the government which soon would be. The life of intrigue +had become second nature to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked up and our eyes met. We gazed at one another.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why are you here?" he said curiously. "Why did they leave you? Why +were you the one to stop to set me free, Master Carey?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"My name is not Carey," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it, then?" he asked carelessly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Cludde," I answered softly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Cludde!" He called it out. Even his self-mastery could not cope with +this surprise. "Cludde," he said again--said it twice in a lower +voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, Cludde," I answered, meeting and yet shrinking from his +questioning eyes, "my name is Cludde. So is yours. I tried to save +your life, because I learned from Mistress Anne----"</p> + +<p class="normal">I paused. I shrank from telling him that which, as it seemed to me, +would strike him to the ground in shame and horror. But he had no +fear.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What?" he cried. "What did you learn?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"That you are my father," I answered slowly. "I am Francis Cludde, the +son whom you deserted many years ago, and to whom Sir Anthony gave a +home at Coton."</p> + +<p class="normal">I expected him to do anything except what he did. He stared at me with +astonished eyes for a minute, and then a low whistle issued from his +lips.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My son, are you! My son!" he said coolly. "And how long have you +known this, young sir?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Since yesterday," I murmured. The words he had used on that morning +at Santon, when he had bidden me die and rot, were fresh in my +memory--in my memory, not in his. I recalled his treachery to the +Duchess, his pursuit of us, his departure with Anne, the words in +which he had cursed me. He remembered apparently none of these things, +but simply gazed at me with a thoughtful smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wish I had known it before," he said at last. "Things might have +been different. A pretty dutiful son you have been!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The sneer did me good. It recalled to my mind what Master Bertie had +said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"There can be no question of duty between us," I answered firmly. +"What duty I owe to any one of my family, I owe to my uncle."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then why have you told me this?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Because I thought it right you should know it," I answered, "were it +only that, knowing it, we may go different ways. We have nearly done +one another a mischief more than once," I added gravely.</p> + +<p class="normal">He laughed. He was not one whit abashed by the discovery, nor awed, +nor cast down. There was even in his cynical face a gleam of +kindliness and pride as he scanned me. We were almost of a height--I +the taller by an inch or two; and in our features I believe there was +a likeness, though not such as to invite remark.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have grown to be a chip of the old block," he said coolly. "I +would as soon have you for a son as another. I think on the whole I am +pleased. You talked of Providence just now"--this with a laugh of +serene amusement--"and perhaps you were right. Perhaps there is such a +thing. For I am growing old, and lo! it gives me a son to take care of +me."</p> + +<p class="normal">I shook my head. I could never be that kind of son to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Wait a bit," he said, frowning slightly. "You think your side is up +and mine is down, and I can do you no good now, but only harm. You are +ashamed of me. Well, wait," he continued, nodding confidently. "Do not +be too sure that I cannot help you. I have been wrecked a dozen times, +but I never yet failed to find a boat that would take me to shore."</p> + +<p class="normal">Yes, he was so arrogant in the pride of his many deceits that an hour +after Heaven had stretched out its hand to save him, he denied its +power and took the glory to himself. I did not know what to say to +him, how to undeceive him, how to tell him that it was not the failure +of his treachery which shamed me, but the treachery itself. I could +only remain silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">And so he mistook me; and, after pondering a moment with his chin in +his hand, he continued:</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have a plan, my lad. The Queen dies. Well--I am no bigot--long live +the Queen and the Protestant religion! The down will be up and the up +down, and the Protestants will be everything. It will go hard then +with those who cling to the old faith."</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked at me with a crafty smile, his head on one side.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not understand," I said coldly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then listen. Sir Anthony, will hold by his religion. He used to be a +choleric gentleman, and as obstinate as a mule. He will need but to be +pricked up a little, and he will get into trouble with the authorities +as sure as eggs are eggs. I will answer for it. And then----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well?" I said grimly. How was I to observe even a show of respect for +him when I was quivering with fierce wrath and abhorrence? "Do you +think that will benefit <i>you?</i>" I cried. "Do you think that you are so +high in favor with Cecil and the Protestants that they will set you in +Sir Anthony's place? You!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He looked at me still more craftily, not put out by my indignation, +but rather amused by it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No, lad, not me," he replied, with tolerant good-nature. "I am +somewhat blown upon of late. But Providence has not given me back my +son for nothing. I am not alone in the world now. I must remember my +family. I must think a little of others as well as of myself."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you mean?" I said, recoiling.</p> + +<p class="normal">He scanned me for a moment, with his eyes half-shut, his head on one +side. Then he laughed, a cynical, jarring laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good boy!" he said. "Excellent boy! He knows no more than he is told. +His hands are clean, and he has friends upon the winning side who will +not see him lose a chance, should a chance turn up. Be satisfied. Keep +your hands clean if you like, boy. We understand one another."</p> + +<p class="normal">He laughed again and turned away; and, much as I dreaded and disliked +him, there was something in the indomitable nature of the man which +wrung from me a meed of admiration. Could the best of men have +recovered more quickly from despair? Could the best of men, their +plans failing, have begun to spin fresh webs with equal patience? +Could the most courageous and faithful of those who have tried to work +the world's bettering, have faced the downfall of their hopes with +stouter hearts, with more genuine resignation? Bad as he was, he had +courage and endurance beyond the common.</p> + +<p class="normal">He came back to me when he had gone a few paces.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do you know where my sword is?" he asked in a matter-of-fact tone, as +one might ask a question of an old comrade.</p> + +<p class="normal">I found it cast aside behind the door. He took it from me, grumbling +over a nick in the edge, which he had caused by some desperate blow +when he was seized. He fastened it on with an oath. I could not look +at the sword without remembering how nearly he had taken my life with +it. The recollection did not trouble him in the slightest.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Now farewell!" he said carelessly, "I am going to turn over a new +leaf, and begin returning good for evil. Do you go to your friends and +do your work, and I will go to my friends and do mine."</p> + +<p class="normal">Then with a nod he walked briskly away, and I heard him climb the +ladder and depart.</p> + +<p class="normal">What was he going to do? I was so deeply amazed by the interview that +I did not understand. I had thought him a wicked man, but I had not +conceived the hardness of his nature. As I stood alone looking round +the vault, I could hardly believe that I had met and spoken to my +father, and told him I was his son--and this was all! I could hardly +believe that he had gone away with this knowledge, unmoved and +unrepentant; alike unwarned by the Providence which had used me to +thwart his schemes, and untouched by the beneficence which had thrice +held him back from the crime of killing me--ay, proof even against the +long-suffering which had plucked him from the abyss and given him one +more chance of repentance.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">I found Master Bertie in the stables waiting for me with some +impatience. Of which, upon the whole, I was glad. For I had no wish to +be closely questioned, and the account I gave him of the interview +might at another time have seemed disjointed and incoherent. He +listened to it, however, without remark; and his next words made it +clear that he had other matters in his mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know what to do about fetching the Duchess over," he said. +"This news seems to be true, and she ought to be here."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Certainly," I agreed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The country in general is well affected to the Princess Elizabeth," +he continued. "Yet the interests of the Bishops, of the Spanish +faction, and of some of the council, will lie in giving trouble. To +avoid this, we should show our strength. Therefore I want the Duchess +to come over with all speed. Will you fetch her?" he added sharply, +turning to me.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Will I?" I cried in surprise.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, you. I cannot well go myself at this crisis. Will you go +instead?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course I will," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">And the prospect cheered me wonderfully. It gave me something to do, +and opened my eyes to the great change of which Penruddocke had been +the herald, a change which was even then beginning. As we rode down +Highgate Hill that day, messengers were speeding north and south and +east and west, to Norwich and Bristol and Canterbury and Coventry and +York, with the tidings that the somber rule under which England had +groaned for five years and more was coming to an end. If in a dozen +towns of England they roped their bells afresh; if in every county, as +Penruddocke had prophesied, they got their tar-barrels ready; if all, +save a few old-fashioned folk and a few gloomy bigots and hysterical +women, awoke as from an evil dream; if even sensible men saw in the +coming of the young queen a panacea for all their ills--a quenching of +Smithfield fires, a Calais recovered, a cure for the worthless coinage +which hampered trade, and a riddance of worthless foreigners who +plundered it--with better roads, purer justice, a fuller Exchequer, +more favorable seasons--if England read all this in that news of +Penruddocke's, was it not something to us also?</p> + +<p class="normal">It was indeed. We were saved at the last moment from the dangerous +enterprise on which we had rashly embarked. We had now such prospects +before us as only the success of that scheme could have ordinarily +opened. Ease and honor instead of the gallows, and to lie warm instead +of creaking in the wind! Thinking of this, I fell into a better frame +of mind as I jogged along toward London. For what, after all, was my +father to me, that his existence should make me unhappy, or rob mine +of all pleasure? I had made a place for myself in the world. I had +earned friends for myself. He might take away my pride in the one, but +he could never rob me of the love of the others--of those who had +eaten and drunk and fought and suffered beside me, and for whom I too +had fought and suffered!</p> + +<p style="text-align:center; letter-spacing:20pt">* * * * *</p> + +<p class="normal">"A strange time for the swallows to come back," said my lady, +turning +to smile at me, as I rode on her off-side.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">It would have been strange, indeed, if there had been swallows in the +air. For it was the end of December. The roads were frost-bound and +the trees leafless. The east wind, gathering force in its rush across +the Essex marshes, whirled before it the last trophies of Hainault +Forest, and seemed, as it whistled by our ears and shaved our faces, +to grudge us the shelter to which we were hastening. The long train +behind us--for the good times of which we had talked so often had +come--were full of the huge fire we expected to find at the inn at +Barking--our last stage on the road to London. And if the Duchess and +I bore the cold more patiently, it was probably because we had more +food for thought--and perhaps thicker raiment.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Do not shake your head," she continued, glancing at me with mischief +in her eyes, "and flatter yourself you will not go back, but will go +on making yourself and some one else unhappy. You will do nothing of +the kind, Francis. Before the spring comes you and I will ride over +the drawbridge at Coton End, or I am a Dutchwoman!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I cannot see that things are changed," I said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Not changed?" she replied. "When you left, you were nobody. Now +you are somebody, if it be only in having a sister with a dozen +serving-men in her train. Leave it to me. And now, thank Heaven, we +are here! I am so stiff and cold, you must lift me down. We have not +to ride far after dinner, I hope."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Only seven miles," I answered, as the host, who had been warned by an +outrider to expect us, came running out with a tail at his heels.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What news from London, Master Landlord?" I said to him as he led us +through the kitchen, where there was indeed a great fire, but no +chimney, and so to a smaller room possessing both these luxuries. "Is +all quiet?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Certainly, your worship," he replied, bowing and rubbing his hands. +"There never was such an accession, nor more ale drunk, nor powder +burned--and I have seen three--and there was pretty shouting at old +King Harry's, but not like this. Such a fair young queen, men report, +with a look of the stout king about her, and as prudent and discreet +as if she had changed heads with Sir William Cecil. God bless her, say +I, and send her a wise husband!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"And a loving one," quoth my lady prettily. "Amen."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am glad all has gone off well," I continued, speaking to the +Duchess, as I turned to the blazing hearth. "If there had been blows, +I would fain have been here to strike one."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Nay, sir, not a finger has wagged against her," the landlord +answered, kicking the logs together--"to speak of, that is, your +worship. I do hear to-day of a little trouble down in Warwickshire. +But it is no more than a storm in a wash-tub, I am told."</p> + +<p class="normal">"In Warwickshire?" I said, arrested, in the act of taking off my +cloak, by the familiar name. "In what part, my man?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not clear about that, sir, not knowing the country," he replied. +"But I heard that a gentleman there had fallen foul of her Grace's +orders about church matters, and beaten the officers sent to see them +carried out; and that, when the sheriff remonstrated with him, he beat +him too. But I warrant they will soon bring him to his senses."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Did you hear his name?" I asked. There was a natural misgiving in my +mind. Warwickshire was large; and yet something in the tale smacked of +Sir Anthony.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I did hear it," the host answered, scratching his head, "but I cannot +call it to mind. I think I should know it if I heard it."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Was it Sir Anthony Cludde?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It was that very same name!" he exclaimed, clapping his hands in +wonder. "To be sure! Your worship has it pat!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I slipped back into my cloak again, and snatched up my hat and whip. +But the Duchess was as quick. She stepped between me and the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sit down, Francis!" she said imperiously. "What would you be at?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What would I be at?" I cried with emotion. "I would be with my uncle. +I shall take horse at once and ride Warwickshire way with all speed. +It is possible that I may be in time to avert the consequences. At +least I can see that my cousin comes to no harm."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Good lad," she said placidly. "You shall start tomorrow."</p> + +<p class="normal">"To-morrow!" I cried impatiently. "But time is everything, madam."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You shall start to-morrow," she repeated. "Time is not everything, +firebrand! If you start to-day what can you do? Nothing! No more than +if the thing had happened three years ago, before you met me. But +to-morrow--when you have seen the Secretary of State, as I promise you +you shall, this evening if he be in London--to-morrow you shall go in +a different character, and with credentials."</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will do this for me?" I exclaimed, leaping up and taking her +hand, for I saw in a moment the wisdom of the course she proposed. +"You will get me----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will get you something to the purpose," my lady answered roundly. +"Something that shall save your uncle if there be any power in England +can save him. You shall have it, Frank," she added, her color rising, +and her eyes filling, as I kissed her hand, "though I have to take +Master Secretary by the beard!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_22" href="#div1Ref_22">SIR ANTHONY'S PURPOSE.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Late, as I have heard, on the afternoon of November 20, 1558, a man +riding between Oxford and Worcester, with the news of the queen's +death, caught sight of the gateway tower at Coton End, which is +plainly visible from the road. Though he had already drunk that day as +much ale as would have sufficed him for a week when the queen was +well, yet much wants more. He calculated he had time to stop and taste +the Squire's brewing, which he judged, from the look of the tower, +might be worth his news; and he rode through the gate and railed at +his nag for stumbling.</p> + +<p class="normal">Half way across the Chase he met Sir Anthony. The old gentleman was +walking out, with his staff in his hand and his dogs behind him, to +take the air before supper. The man, while he was still a hundred +paces off, began to wave his hat and shout something, which ale and +excitement rendered unintelligible.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is the matter?" said Sir Anthony to himself. And he stood still.</p> + +<p class="normal">"The queen is dead!" shouted the messenger, swaying in his saddle.</p> + +<p class="normal">The knight stared.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, sure!" he ejaculated after a while. And he took off his hat. "Is +it true, man?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"As true as that I left London yesterday afternoon and have never +drawn rein since!" swore the knave, who had been three days on the +road, and had drunk at every hostel and at half the manor-houses +between London and Oxford.</p> + +<p class="normal">"God rest her soul!" said Sir Anthony piously, still in somewhat of a +maze. "And do you come in! Come in, man, and take something."</p> + +<p class="normal">But the messenger had got his formula by heart, and was not to be +defrauded of any part of it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"God save the queen!" he shouted. And out of respect for the knight, +he slipped from his saddle and promptly fell on his back in the road.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, to be sure, God save the queen!" echoed Sir Anthony, taking off +his hat again. "You are right, man!" Then he hurried on, not noticing +the messenger's mishap. The tidings he had heard seemed of such +importance, and he was so anxious to tell them to his household--for +the greatest men have weaknesses, and news such as this comes seldom +in a lifetime--that he strode on to the house, and over the drawbridge +into the courtyard, without once looking behind him.</p> + +<p class="normal">He loved order and decent observance. But there are times when a cat, +to get to the cream-pan, will wet its feet. He stood now in the middle +of the courtyard, and raising his voice, shouted for his daughter. +"Ho, Petronilla! do you hear, girl! Father! Father Carey! Martin +Luther! Baldwin!" and so on, until half the household were collected. +"Do you hear, all of you? The queen is dead! God rest her soul!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Amen!" said Father Carey, as became him, putting in his word amid the +wondering silence which followed; while Martin Luther and Baldwin, who +were washing themselves at the pump, stood with their heads dripping +and their mouths agape.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Amen!" echoed the knight. "And long live the queen! Long live Queen +Elizabeth!" he continued, having now got his formula by heart. And he +swung his hat.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a cheer, a fairly loud cheer. But there was one who did not +join in it, and that was Petronilla. She, listening at her lattice +upstairs, began at once to think, as was her habit when any matter +great or small fell out, whether this would affect the fortunes of a +certain person far away. It might, it might not; she did not know. But +the doubt so far entertained her that she came down to supper with a +heightened color, not thinking in the least, poor girl, that the event +might have dire consequences for others almost as dear to her, and +nearer home.</p> + +<p class="normal">Every year since his sudden departure a letter from Francis Cludde had +come to Coton; a meager letter, which had passed through many hands, +and reached Sir Anthony now through one channel, now through another. +The knight grumbled and swore over these letters, which never +contained an address to which an answer could be forwarded, nor said +much, save that the writer was well and sent his love and duty, and +looked to return, all being well. But, meager as they were, and loud +as he swore over them, he put them religiously away in an oak-chest in +his parlor; and another always put away for her share something else, +which was invariably inclosed--a tiny swallow's feather. The knight +never said anything about the feather; neither asked the meaning of +its presence, nor commented upon its absence when Petronilla gave him +back the letter. But for days after each of these arrivals he would +look much at his daughter, would follow her about with his eyes, be +more regular in bidding her attend him in his walk, and more +particular in seeing that she had the tidbits of the joint.</p> + +<p class="normal">For Petronilla, it cannot be said, though I think in after times she +would have liked to make some one believe it, that she wasted away. +But she did take a more serious and thoughtful air in these days, +which she never, God bless her, lost afterward. There came from +Wootton Wawen and from Henley in Arden and from Cookhill gentlemen of +excellent estate, to woo her. But they all went away disconsolate +after drinking very deeply of Sir Anthony's ale and strong waters. And +some wondered that the good knight did not roundly take the jade to +task and see her settled.</p> + +<p class="normal">But he did not; so possibly even in these days he had other views. I +have been told that, going up once to her little chamber to seek her, +he found a very singular ornament suspended inside her lattice. It was +no other than a common clay house-martin's nest. But it was so deftly +hung in a netted bag, and so daintily swathed in moss always green, +and the Christmas roses and snowdrops and violets and daffodils which +decked it in turn were always so pure and fresh and bright--as the +knight learned by more than one stealthy visit afterward--that, coming +down the steep steps, he could not see clearly, and stumbled against a +cook-boy, and beat him soundly for getting in his way.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">To return, however. The news of the queen's death had scarcely been +well digested at Coton, nor the mass for her soul, which Father Carey +celebrated with much devotion, been properly criticised, before +another surprise fell upon the household. Two strangers arrived, +riding late one evening, and rang the great bell while all were at +supper. Baldwin and the porter went to see what it was, and brought +back a message which drew the knight from his chair, as a terrier +draws a rat.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You are drunk!" he shouted, purple in the face, and fumbling for the +stick which usually leaned against his seat ready for emergencies. +"How dare you bring cock-and-bull stories to me?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is true enough!" muttered Baldwin sullenly: a stout, dour man, not +much afraid of his master, but loving him exceedingly. "I knew him +again myself."</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Anthony strode firmly out of the room, and in the courtyard near +the great gate found a man and a woman standing in the dusk. He walked +up to the former and looked him in the face. "What do you here?" he +said, in a strange, hard voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want shelter for a night for myself and my wife; a meal and some +words with you--no more," was the answer. "Give me this," the stranger +continued, "which every idle passer-by may claim at Coton End, and you +shall see no more of me, Anthony."</p> + +<p class="normal">For a moment the knight seemed to hesitate. Then he answered, pointing +sternly with his hand, "There is the hall and supper. Go and eat and +drink. Or, stay!" he resumed. And he turned and gave some orders to +Baldwin, who went swiftly to the hall, and in a moment came again. +"Now go! What you want the servants will prepare for you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I want speech of you," said the newcomer.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Anthony seemed about to refuse, but thought better of it. "You can +come to my room when you have supped," he said, in the same ungracious +tone, speaking with his eyes averted.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you--do you not take supper?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I have finished," said the knight, albeit he had eaten little. And he +turned on his heel.</p> + +<p class="normal">Very few of those who sat round the table and watched with +astonishment the tall stranger's entrance knew him again. It was +thirteen years since Ferdinand Cludde had last sat there; sitting +there of right. And the thirteen years had worked much change in him. +When he found that Petronilla, obeying her father's message, had +disappeared, he said haughtily that his wife would sup in her own +room; and with a flashing eye and curling lip, bade Baldwin see to it. +Then, seating himself in a place next Sir Anthony's, he looked down +the board at which all sat silent. His sarcastic eye, his high +bearing, his manner--the manner of one who had gone long with his life +in his hand--awed these simple folk. Then, too, he was a Cludde. +Father Carey was absent that evening. Martin Luther had one of those +turns, half-sick, half-sullen, which alternated with his moods of +merriment; and kept his straw pallet in some corner or other. There +was no one to come between the servants and this dark-visaged +stranger, who was yet no stranger.</p> + +<p class="normal">He had his way and his talk with Sir Anthony; the latter lasting far +into the night and producing odd results. In the first place, the +unbidden guest and his wife stayed on over next day, and over many +days to come, and seemed gradually to grow more and more at home. The +knight began to take long walks and rides with his brother, and from +each walk and ride came back with a more gloomy face and a curter +manner. Petronilla, his companion of old, found herself set aside for +her uncle, and cast, for society, on Ferdinand's wife, the strange +young woman with the brilliant eyes, whose odd changes from grave to +gay rivaled Martin Luther's; and who now scared the girl by wild +laughter and wilder gibes, and now moved her to pity by fits of +weeping or dark moods of gloom. That Uncle Ferdinand's wife stood in +dread of her husband, Petronilla soon learned, and even began to share +this dread, to shrink from his presence, and to shut herself up more +and more closely in her own chamber.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was another, too, who grew to be troubled about this time, and +that was Father Carey. The good-natured, easy priest received with joy +and thankfulness the news that Ferdinand Cludde had seen his errors +and re-entered the fold. But when he had had two or three interviews +with the convert, his brow, too, grew clouded, and his mind troubled. +He learned to see that the accession of the young Protestant queen +must bear fruit for which he had a poor appetite. He began to spend +many hours in the church--the church which he had known all his +life--and wrestled much with himself--if his face were any index to +his soul. Good, kindly man, he was not of the stuff of which martyrs +are made; and to be forced, pushed on, and goaded into becoming a +martyr against one's will--well, the Father's position was a hard one. +As was that in those days of many a good and learned clergyman bred in +one church, and bidden suddenly, on pain of losing his livelihood, if +not his life, to migrate to another.</p> + +<p class="normal">The visitors had been in the house a month--and in that month an +observant eye might have noted much change, though all things in +seeming went on as before--when the queen's orders enjoining all +priests to read the service, or a great part of it, in English, came +down, being forwarded by the sheriff to Father Carey. The missive +arrived on a Friday, and had been indeed long expected.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What shall you do?" Ferdinand asked Sir Anthony.</p> + +<p class="normal">"As before!" the tall old man replied, gripping his staff more firmly. +It was no new subject between them. A hundred times they had discussed +it already, even as they were now discussing it on the terrace by the +fish-pool, with the church which adjoins the house full in view across +the garden. "I will have no mushroom faith at Coton End," the knight +continued warmly. "It sprang up under King Henry, and how long did it +last? A year or two. It came in again under King Edward, and how long +did it last? A year or two. So it will be again. It will not last, +Ferdinand."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am of that mind," the younger man answered, nodding his head +gravely.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Of course you are!" Sir Anthony rejoined, as he rested one hand on +the sundial. "For ten generations our forefathers have worshiped in +that church after the old fashion--and shall it be changed in my day? +Heaven forbid! The old fashion did for my fathers; it shall do for me. +Why, I would as soon expect that the river yonder should flow backward +as that the church which has stood for centuries, and more years to +the back of them than I can count, should be swept away by these Hot +Gospelers! I will have none of them! I will have no new-fangled ways +at Coton End!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, I think you are right!" the younger brother said. By what means +he had brought the knight to this mind without committing himself more +fully, I cannot tell. Yet so it was. Ferdinand showed himself always +the cautious doubter. Father Carey even must have done him that +justice. But--and this was strange--the more doubtful he showed +himself, the more stubborn grew his brother. There are men so shrewd +as to pass off stones for bread; and men so simple-minded as to take +something less than the word for the deed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why should it come in our time?" cried Sir Anthony fractiously.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why indeed?" quoth the subtle one.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I say, why should it come now? I have heard and read of the sect +called Lollards who gave trouble a while ago. But they passed, and the +church stood. So will these Gospelers pass, and the church will +stand."</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is our experience certainly," said Ferdinand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I hate change!" the old man continued, his eyes on the old church, +the old timbered house--for only the gateway tower at Coton is of +stone--the old yew trees in the churchyard. "I do not believe in it, +and, what is more, I will not have it. As my fathers have worshiped, +so will I, though it cost me every rood of land! A fig for the Order +in Council!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"If you really will not change with the younger generations----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I will not!" replied the old knight sharply. "There is an end of it!"</p> + +<p class="normal">To-day the Reformed Church in England has seen many an anniversary, +and grown stronger with each year; and we can afford to laugh at Sir +Anthony's arguments. We know better than he did, for the proof of the +pudding is in the eating. But in him and his fellows, who had only the +knowledge of their own day, such arguments were natural enough. All +time, all experience, all history and custom and habit, as known to +them, were on their side. Only it was once again to be the battle of +David and the Giant of Gath.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Anthony had said, "There is an end of it!" But his companion, as +he presently strolled up to the house with a smile on his saturnine +face, well knew that this was only the beginning of it. This was +Friday.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">On the Sunday, a rumor of the order having gone abroad, a larger +congregation than usual streamed across the Chase to church, prepared +to hear some new thing. They were disappointed. Sir Anthony stalked in +as of old, through the double ranks of people waiting at the door to +receive him; and after him Ferdinand and his wife, and Petronilla and +Baldwin, and every servant from the house save a cook or two and the +porter. The church was full. Seldom had such a congregation been seen +in it. But all passed as of old. Father Carey's hand shook, indeed, +and his voice quavered; but he went through the ceremony of the mass, +and all was done in Latin. A little change would have been pleasant, +some thought. But no one in this country place on the borders of the +forest held very strong views. No bishop had come heretic-hunting to +Coton End. No abbey existed to excite dislike by its extravagance or +by its license or by the swarm of ragged idlers it supported. Father +Carey was the most harmless and kindest of men. The villagers did not +care one way or the other. To them Sir Anthony was king. And if any +one felt tempted to interfere, the old knight's face, as he gazed +steadfastly at the brass effigy of a Cludde, who had fallen in Spain +fighting against the Moors, warned the meddler to be silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">And so on that Sunday all went well. But some one must have told +tales, for early in the week there came a strong letter of +remonstrance from the sheriff, who was an old friend of Sir Anthony, +and of his own free will, I fancy, would have winked. But he was +committed to the Protestants, and bound to stand or fall with them. +The choleric knight sent back an answer by the same messenger. The +sheriff replied, the knight rejoined--having his brother always at his +elbow. The upshot of the correspondence was an announcement on the +part of the sheriff that he should send his officers to the next +service, to see that the queen's order was obeyed; and a reply on the +part of Sir Anthony that he should as certainly put the men in the +duck-pond. Some inkling of this state of things got abroad, and spread +as a September fire flies through a wood; so that there was like to be +such a congregation at the next service to witness the trial of +strength, as would throw the last Sunday's gathering altogether into +the shade.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was clear at last that Sir Anthony himself did not think that here +was the end of it. For on that Saturday afternoon he took a remarkable +walk. He called Petronilla after dinner, and bade her get her hood +and come with him. And the girl, who had seen so little of her father +in the last month, and who, what with rumors and fears and surmises, +was eating her heart out, obeyed him with joy. It was a fine frosty +day near the close of December. Sir Anthony led the way over the +plank-bridge which crossed the moat in the rear of the house, and +tramped steadily through the home farm toward a hill called the +Woodman's View, which marked the border of the forest. He did not +talk, but neither was he sunk in reverie. As he entered each field he +stood and scanned it, at times merely nodding, at times smiling, or +again muttering a few words such as, "The three-acre piece! My father +inclosed it!" or, "That is where Ferdinand killed the old mare!" or, +"The best land for wheat on this side of the house!" The hill climbed, +he stood a long time gazing over the landscape, eying first the fields +and meadows which stretched away from his feet toward the house; the +latter, as seen from this point, losing all its stateliness in the +mass of stacks and ricks and barns and granaries which surrounded it. +Then his eyes traveled farther in the same line to the broad expanse +of woodland--Coton Chase--through which the road passed along a ridge +as straight as an arrow. To the right were more fields, and here and +there amid them a homestead with its smaller ring of stacks and barns. +When he turned to the left, his eyes, passing over the shoulders of +Barnt Hill and Mill Head Copse and Beacon Hill, all bulwarks of the +forest, followed the streak of river as it wound away toward Stratford +through luscious flood meadows, here growing wide, and there narrow, +as the woodland advanced or retreated.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is all mine," he said, as much to himself as to the girl. "It is +all Cludde land as far as you can see."</p> + +<p class="normal">There were tears in her eyes, and she had to turn away to conceal +them. Why, she hardly knew. For he said nothing more, and he walked +down the hill dry-eyed. But all the way home he still looked sharply +about, noting this or that, as if he were bidding farewell to the old +familiar objects, the spinneys and copses--ay, and the very gates and +gaps and the hollow trees where the owls built. It was the saddest and +most pathetic walk the girl had ever taken. Yet there was nothing +said.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIII.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_23" href="#div1Ref_23">THE LAST MASS.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The north wall of the church at Coton End is only four paces from the +house, the church standing within the moat. Isolated as the sacred +building, therefore, is from the outer world by the wide-spreading +Chase, and close-massed with the homestead, Sir Anthony had some +excuse for considering it as much a part of his demesne as the mill or +the smithy. In words he would have been willing to admit a +distinction; but in thought I fancy he lumped it with the rest of his +possessions.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was with a lowering eye that on this Sunday morning he watched from +his room over the gateway the unusual stream of people making for the +church. Perchance he had in his mind other Sundays--Sundays when he +had walked out at this hour, light of heart and kind of eye, with his +staff in his fist and his glove dangling, and his dog at his heels; +and, free from care, had taken pleasure in each bonnet doffed and +each old wife's "God bless ye, Sir Anthony!" Well, those days were +gone. Now the rain dripped from the eaves--for a thaw had come in the +night--and the bells, that could on occasion ring so cheerily, sounded +sad and forlorn. His daughter, when she came, according to custom, +bringing his great service-book, could scarcely look him in the face. +I know not whether even then his resolution to dare all might not, at +sound of a word from her, or at sight of her face, have melted like +yesterday's ice. But before the word could be spoken, or the eyes +meet, another step rang on the stone staircase and brother Ferdinand +entered.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They are here!" he said in a low voice. "Six of them, Anthony, and +sturdy fellows, as all Clopton's men are. If you do not think your +people will stand by you----"</p> + +<p class="normal">The knight fired at this suggestion. "What!" he burst out, turning +from the window, "if Cludde men cannot meet Clopton men the times are +indeed gone mad! Make way and let me come! Though the mass be never +said again in Coton church, it shall be said to-day!" And he swore a +great oath.</p> + +<p class="normal">He strode down the stairs and under the gateway, where were arranged, +according to the custom of the house on wet days, all the servants, +with Baldwin and Martin Luther at their head. The knight stalked +through them with a gloomy brow. His brother followed him, a faint +smile flickering about the corners of his mouth. Then came Ferdinand's +wife and Petronilla, the latter with her hood drawn close about her +face, Anne with her chin in the air and her eyes aglow. "It is not a +bit of a bustle will scare her!" Baldwin muttered, as he fell in +behind her, and eyed her back with no great favor.</p> + +<p class="normal">"No--so long as it does not touch her," Martin replied in a cynical +whisper. "She is well mated! Well mated and ill fated! Ha! ha!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Silence, fool," growled his companion angrily. "Is this a time for +antics?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, it is!" Martin retorted swiftly, though with the same caution. +"For when wise men turn fools, fools are put to it to act up to their +profession! You see, brother?" And he deliberately cut a caper. His +eyes were glittering, and the nerves on one side of his face twitched +oddly. Baldwin looked at him, and muttered that Martin was going to +have one of his mad fits. What had grown on the fool of late?</p> + +<p class="normal">The knight reached the church porch and passed through the crowd which +awaited him there. Save for its unusual size and some strange faces to +be seen on its skirts, there was no indication of trouble. He walked, +tapping his stick on the pavement a little more loudly than usual, to +his place in the front pew. The household, the villagers, the +strangers, pressed in behind him until every seat was filled. Even the +table monument of Sir Piers Cludde, which stood lengthwise in the +aisle, was seized upon, and if the two similar monuments which stood +to right and left below the chancel steps had not been under the +knight's eyes, they too would have been invaded. Yet all was done +decently and in order, with a clattering of rustic boots indeed, but +no scrambling or ill words. The Clopton men were there. Baldwin had +marked them well, and so had a dozen stout fellows, sons of Sir +Anthony's tenants. But they behaved, discreetly, and amid such a +silence as Father Carey never remembered to have faced, he began the +Roman service.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The December light fell faintly through the east window on the Father +at his ministrations, on his small acolytes, on the four Cludde +brasses before the altar. It fell everywhere--on gray dusty walls +buttressed by gray tombs which left but a narrow space in the middle +of the chancel. The marble crusader to the left matched the canopied +bed of Sir Anthony's parents on the right; the Abbess's tomb in the +next row faced the plainer monument of Sir Anthony's wife, a vacant +place by her side awaiting his own effigy. And there were others. The +chancel was so small--nay, the church too--so small and old and gray +and solid, and the tombs were so massive, that they elbowed one +another. The very dust which rose as men stirred was the dust of +Cluddes. Sir Anthony's brow relaxed. He listened gravely and sadly.</p> + +<p class="normal">And then the interruption came. "I protest!" a rough voice in rear of +the crowd cried suddenly, ringing harshly and strangely above the +Father's accents and the solemn hush. "I protest against this +service!"</p> + +<p class="normal">A thrill of astonishment ran through the crowd, and all rose. Every +man in the church turned round, Sir Anthony among the first, and +looked in the direction of the voice. Then it was seen that the +Clopton men had massed themselves about the door in the southwest +corner--a strong position, whence retreat was easy. Father Carey, +after a momentary glance, went on as if he had not heard; but his +voice shook, and all still waited with their faces turned toward the +west end.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I protest in the name of the Queen!" the same man cried sharply, +while his fellows raised a murmur so that the priest's voice was +drowned.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Anthony stepped into the aisle, his face inflamed with anger. The +interruption taking place there, in that place, seemed to him a double +profanation.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who is that brawler?" he said, his hand trembling on his staff; and +all the old dames trembled too. "Let him stand out."</p> + +<p class="normal">The sheriff's spokesman was so concealed by his fellows that he could +not be seen; but he answered civilly enough.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am no brawler," he said. "I only require the law to be observed; +and that you know, sir. I am here on behalf of the sheriff; and I warn +all present that a continuation of this service will expose them to +grievous pains and penalties. If you desire it, I will read the royal +order to prove that I do not speak without warrant."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Begone, knave, you and your fellows!" Sir Anthony cried. A loyal man +in all else, and the last to deny the queen's right or title, he had +no reasonable answer to give, and could only bluster. "Begone, do you +hear?" he repeated; and he rapped his staff on the pavement, and then, +raising it, pointed to the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">All Coton thought the men must go; but the men, perhaps, because they +were Clopton, did not go. And Sir Anthony had not so completely lost +his head as to proceed to extremities except in the last resort. +Affecting to consider the incident at an end, he stepped back into his +pew without waiting to see whether the man obeyed him or no, and +resumed his devotions. Father Carey, at a nod from him, went on with +the interrupted service.</p> + +<p class="normal">But again the priest had barely read a dozen lines before the same man +made the congregation start by crying loudly, "Stop!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go on!" shouted Sir Anthony in a voice of thunder.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At your peril!" retorted the intervener.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go on!" from Sir Anthony again.</p> + +<p class="normal">Father Carey stood silent, trembling and looking from one to the +other. Many a priest of his faith would have risen on the storm and in +the spirit of Hildebrand hurled his church's curse at the intruder. +But the Father was not of these, and he hesitated, fumbling with his +surplice with his feeble white hands. He feared as much for his patron +as for himself; and it was on the knight that his eyes finally rested. +But Sir Anthony's brow was black; he got no comfort there. So the +Father took courage and a long breath, opened his mouth and read on, +amid the hush of suppressed excitement, and of such anger and stealthy +defiance as surely English church had never seen before. As he read, +however, he gathered courage, and his voice strength. The solemn +words, so ancient, so familiar, fell on the stillness of the church, +and awed even the sheriff's men. To the surprise of nearly every one, +there was no further interruption; the service ended quietly.</p> + +<p class="normal">So after all Sir Anthony had his way, and stalked out, stiff and +unbending. Nor was there any falling off, but rather an increase in +the respect with which his people rose, according to custom, as he +passed. Yet under that increase of respect lay a something which cut +the old man to the heart. He saw that his dependents pitied him while +they honored him; that they thought him a fool for running his head +against a stone wall--as Martin Luther put it--even while they felt +that there was something grand in it too.</p> + +<p class="normal">During the rest of the day he went about his usual employments, but +probably with little zest. He had done what he had done without any +very clear idea how he was going to proceed. Between his loyalty in +all else and his treason in this, it would not have been easy for a +Solomon to choose a consistent path. And Sir Anthony was no Solomon. +He chose at last to carry himself as if there were no danger--as if +the thing which had happened were unimportant. He ordered no change +and took no precautions. He shut his ears to the whispering which went +on among the servants, and his eyes to the watch which by some secret +order of Baldwin was kept upon the Ridgeway.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was something of a shock to him, therefore, when his daughter came +to him after breakfast next morning, looking pale and heavy-eyed, and, +breaking through the respect which had hitherto kept her silent, +begged him to go away.</p> + +<p class="normal">"To go away?" he cried. He rose from his oak chair and glared at her. +Then his feelings found their easiest vent in anger. "What do you +mean, girl?" he blustered, "Go away? Go where?"</p> + +<p class="normal">But she did not quail. Indeed she had her suggestion ready.</p> + +<p class="normal">"To the Mere Farm in the Forest, sir," she answered earnestly. "They +will not look for you there; and Martin says----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Martin? The fool!"</p> + +<p class="normal">His face grew redder and redder. This was too much. He loved order and +discipline; and to be advised in such matters by a woman and a fool! +It was intolerable!</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go to, girl!" he cried, fuming. "I wondered where you had got your +tale so pat. So you and the fool have been putting your heads +together! Go! Go and spin, and leave these maters to men! Do you think +that my brother, after traveling the world over, has not got a head on +his shoulders? Do you think, if there were danger, he and I would not +have foreseen it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">He waved his hand and turned away expecting her to go. But Petronilla +did not go. She had something else to say and though the task was +painful she was resolved to say it.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Father, one word," she murmured. "About my uncle."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, well! What about him?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I distrust him, sir," she ventured, in a low tone, her color rising. +"The servants do not like him. They fear him, and suspect him of I +know not what."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The servants!" Sir Anthony answered in an awful tone.</p> + +<p class="normal">Indeed it was not the wisest thing she could have said; but the +consequences were averted by a sudden alarm and shouting outside. Half +a dozen voices, shrill or threatening, seemed to rise at once. The +knight strode to the window, but the noise appeared to come, not from +the Chase upon which it looked, but from the courtyard or the rear of +the house. Sir Anthony caught up his stick, and, followed by the girl, +ran down the steps. He pushed aside half a dozen women who had +likewise been attracted by the noise, and hastened through the narrow +passage which led to the wooden bridge in the rear of the buildings.</p> + +<p class="normal">Here, in the close on the far side of the moat, a strange scene was +passing. A dozen horsemen were grouped in the middle of the field +about a couple of prisoners, while round the gate by which they had +entered stood as many stout men on foot, headed by Baldwin and armed +with pikes and staves. These seemed to be taunting the cavaliers and +daring them to come on. On the wooden bridge by which the knight stood +were half a dozen of the servants, also armed. Sir Anthony recognized +in the leading horseman Sir Philip Clopton, and in the prisoners +Father Carey and one of the woodmen; and in a moment he comprehended +what had happened.</p> + +<p class="normal">The sheriff, in the most unneighborly manner, instead of challenging +his front door, had stolen up to the rear of the house, and, without +saying with your leave or by your leave, had snapped up the poor +priest, who happened to be wandering in that direction. Probably he +had intended to force an entrance; but he had laid aside the plan when +he saw his only retreat menaced by the watchful Baldwin, who was not +to be caught napping. The knight took all this in at a glance, and his +gorge rose as much at the Clopton men's trick as at the danger in +which Father Carey stood. So he lost his head, and made matters worse. +"Who are these villains," he cried in a rage, his face aflame, "who +come attacking men's houses in time of peace? Begone, or I will have +at ye!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sir Anthony!" Clopton cried, interrupting him, "in Heaven's name do +not carry the thing farther! Give me way in the Queen's name, and I +will----"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">What he would do was never known, for at that last word, away at the +house, behind Sir Anthony, there was a puff of smoke, and down went +the sheriff headlong, horse and man, while the report of an arquebuse +rang dully round the buildings. The knight gazed horrified; but the +damage was done and could not be undone. Nay, more, the Coton men took +the sound for a signal. With a shout, before Sir Anthony could +interfere, they made a dash for the group of horsemen. The latter, +uncertain and hampered by the fall of their leader, who was not hit, +but was stunned beyond giving orders, did the best they could. They +let their prisoners go with a curse, and then, raising Sir Philip and +forming a rough line, they charged toward the gate by which they had +entered.</p> + +<p class="normal">The footmen stood the brunt gallantly, and for a moment the sharp +ringing of quarter-staves and the shivering of steel told of as pretty +a combat as ever took place on level sward in full view of an English +home. The spectators could see Baldwin doing wonders. His men backed +him up bravely. But in the end the impetus of the horses told, the +footmen gave way and fled aside, and the strangers passed them. A +little more skirmishing took place at the gateway, Sir Anthony's men +being deaf to all his attempts to call them off; and then the Clopton +horse got clear, and, shaking their fists and vowing vengeance, rode +off toward the forest. They left two of their men on the field, +however, one with a broken arm and one with a shattered knee-cap; +while the house party, on their side, beside sundry knocks and +bruises, could show one deep sword-cut, a broken wrist, and half a +dozen nasty wounds.</p> + +<p class="normal">"My poor little girl!" Sir Anthony whispered to himself, as he gazed +with scared eyes at the prostrate men and the dead horse, and +comprehended what had happened. "This is a hanging business! In arms +against the Queen! What am I to do?" And as he went back to the house +in a kind of stupor, he muttered again, "My little girl! my poor +little girl!"</p> + +<p class="normal">I fancy that in this terrible crisis he looked to get support and +comfort from his brother--that old campaigner, who had seen so many +vicissitudes and knew by heart so many shifts. But Ferdinand, though +he thought the event unlucky, had little to say and less to suggest; +and seemed, indeed, to have become on a sudden flaccid and lukewarm. +Sir Anthony felt himself thrown on his own resources. "Who fired the +shot?" he asked, looking about the room in a dazed fashion. "It was +that which did the mischief," he continued, forgetting his own hasty +challenge.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think it must have been Martin Luther," Ferdinand answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">But Martin Luther, when he was accused, denied this stoutly. He had +been so far along the Ridgeway, he said, that though he had returned +at once on hearing the shot fired, he had arrived too late for the +fight. The fool's stomach for a fight was so well known that this +seemed probable enough, and though some still suspected him, the +origin of the unfortunate signal was never clearly determined, though +in after days shrewd guesses were made by some.</p> + +<p class="normal">For a few hours it seemed as if Sir Anthony had sunk into his former +state of indecision. But when Petronilla came again to him soon after +noon to beg him to go into hiding, she found his mood had altered. "Go +to the Mere Farm?" he said, not angrily now, but firmly and quietly. +"No, girl, I cannot. I have been in fault, and I must stay and pay for +it. If I left these poor fellows to bear the brunt, I could never hold +up my head again. But do you go now and tell Baldwin to come to me."</p> + +<p class="normal">She went and told the stern, down-looking steward, and he came up.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Baldwin," said the knight when the door was shut, and the two were +alone, "you are to dismiss to their homes all the tenants--who have +indeed been called out without my orders. Bid them go and keep the +peace, and I hope they will not be molested. For you and Father Carey, +you must go into hiding. The Mere Farm will be best."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And what of you, Sir Anthony?" the steward asked, amazed at this act +of folly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I shall remain here," the knight replied with dignity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You will be taken," said Baldwin, after a pause.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Very well," said the knight.</p> + +<p class="normal">The man shrugged his shoulders, and was silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you mean?" asked Sir Anthony in anger.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Why, just that I cannot do it," Baldwin answered, glowering at him +with a flush on his dark cheek. "That is what I mean. Let the priest +go. I cannot go, and will not."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then you will be hanged!" quoth the knight warmly. "You have been in +arms against the Queen, you fool! You will be hanged as sure as you +stay here!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then I shall be hanged," replied the steward sullenly. "There never +was a Cludde hanged yet without one to keep him company. To hear of it +would make my grandsire turn in his grave out there. I dare not do it, +Sir Anthony, and that is the fact. But for the rest I will do as you +bid me."</p> + +<p class="normal">And he had his way. But never had evening fallen more strangely and +sadly at Coton before. The rain pattered drearily in the courtyard. +The drawbridge, by Baldwin's order, had been pulled up, and the planks +over the moat in the rear removed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They shall not steal upon us again!" he muttered. "And if we must +surrender, they shall see we do it willingly."</p> + +<p class="normal">The tenants had gone to their homes and their wives. Only the servants +remained. They clustered, solemn and sorrowful, about the hearth in +the great hall, starting if a dog howled without or a coal flew from +the fire within. Sir Anthony remained brooding in his own room, +Petronilla sitting beside him silent and fearful, while Ferdinand and +his wife moved restlessly about, listening to the wind. But the +evening and the night wore peacefully away, and so, to the surprise of +everybody, did the next day and the next. Could the sheriff be going +to overlook the matter? Alas! on the third day the doubt was resolved. +Two or three boys, who had been sent out as scouts, came in with news +that there was a strong watch set on the Ridgeway, that the paths +through the forest were guarded, that bodies of armed men were +arriving in the neighboring villages, and that soldiers had been +demanded--or so it was said--from Warwick and Worcester, and even from +a place as far away as Oxford. Probably it was only the sheriff's +prudence which had postponed the crisis; and now it had come. The net +was drawn all round. As the day closed in on Coton and the sun set +angrily among the forest trees, the boys' tale, which grew no doubt in +the telling, passed from one to another, and men swore and looked out +of window, and women wept in corners. In the Tower-room Sir Anthony +sat awaiting the summons, and wondered what he could to save his +daughter from possible rudeness, or even hurt, at the hands of these +strangers.</p> + +<p class="normal">There was one man missing from hall and kitchen, but few in the +suspense noticed his absence. The fool had heard the boys' story, and, +unable to remain inactive under such excitement, he presently stole +off in the dusk to the rear of the house. Here he managed to cross the +moat by means of a plank, which he then drew over and hid in the +grass. This quietly managed--Baldwin, be it said, had strictly +forbidden any one to leave the house--Martin made off with a grim +chuckle toward the forest, and following the main track leading toward +Wootton Wawen, presently came among the trees upon a couple of +sentinels. They heard him, saw him indistinctly, and made a rush for +him. But this was just the sport Martin liked, and the fun he had come +for. His quick ear apprised him of the danger, and in a second he was +lost in the underwood, his mocking laugh and shrill taunts keeping the +poor men on the shudder for the next ten minutes. Then the uncanny +accents died away, and, satisfied with his sport and the knowledge he +had gained, the fool made for home. As he sped quickly across the last +field, however, he was astonished by the sight of a dark figure in the +very act of launching his--Martin's--plank across the moat.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ho, ho!" the fool muttered in a fierce undertone. "That is it, is it? +And only one! If they will come one by one, like the plums in the +kitchen porridge, I shall make a fine meal!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He stood back, crouching down on the grass, and watched the unknown, +his eyes glittering. The stranger was a tall, big fellow, a formidable +antagonist. But Martin cared nothing for that. Had he not his long +knife, as keen as his wits--when they were at home, which was not +always. He drew it out now, and under cover of the darkness crept +nearer and nearer, his blood glowing pleasantly, though the night was +cold. How lucky it was he had come out! He could hardly restrain the +"Ho, ho!" which rose to his lips. He meant to leap upon the man on +this side of the water, that there might be no tell-tale traces on the +farther bank.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the stranger was too quick for him in this. He got his bridge +fixed, and began to cross before Martin could crawl near enough. As he +crossed, however, his feet made a slight noise on the plank, and under +cover of it the fool rose and ran forward, then followed him over with +the stealthiness of a cat. And like a cat too, the moment the +stranger's foot touched the bank, Martin sprang on him with his knife +raised--sprang on him silently, with his teeth grinning and his eyes +aflame.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIV.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_24" href="#div1Ref_24">AWAITING THE BLOW.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">A moment later the servants in the hall heard a scream--a scream of +such horror and fear that they scarcely recognized a human voice in +the sound. They sprang to their feet scared and trembling, and for a +few seconds looked into one another's faces. Then, as curiosity got +the upper hand, the boldest took the lead and all hurried pell-mell to +the door, issuing in a mob into the courtyard, where Ferdinand Cludde, +who happened to be near and had also heard the cry, joined them. +"Where was it, Baldwin?" he exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">"At the back, I think," the steward answered. He alone had had the +coolness to bring out a lantern, and he now led the way toward the +rear of the house. Sure enough, close to the edge of the moat, they +found Martin, stooping with his hands on his knees, a great wound, +half bruise, half cut, upon his forehead. "What is it?" Ferdinand +cried sharply. "Who did it, man?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Baldwin had already thrown his light on the fool's face, and Martin, +seeming to become conscious of their presence, looked at them, but in +a dazed fashion. "What?" he muttered, "what is what?"</p> + +<p class="normal">By this time nearly every one in the house had hurried to the spot; +among them not only Petronilla, clinging to her father's arm, but +Mistress Anne, her face pale and gloomy, and half a dozen womenfolk +who clutched one another tightly, and screamed at regular intervals.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" Baldwin repeated roughly, laying his hand on Martin's +arm and slightly shaking him. "Come, who struck you, man?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think," the fool answered slowly, gulping down something and +turning a dull eye on the group; "a--a swallow flew by--and hit me!"</p> + +<p class="normal">They shrank away from him instinctively and some crossed themselves. +"He is in one of his mad fits," Baldwin muttered. Still the steward +showed no fear. "A swallow, man!" he cried aloud. "Come, talk sense. +There are no swallows flying at this time of year. And if there were, +they do not fly by night, nor give men wounds like that. What was it? +Out with it, now. Do you not see, man," he added, giving Martin an +impatient shake, "that Sir Anthony is waiting?"</p> + +<p class="normal">The fool nodded stupidly. "A swallow," he muttered. "Ay, 'twas a +swallow, a great big swallow. I--I nearly put my foot on him."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And he flew up and hit you in the face?" Baldwin said, with huge +contempt in his tone.</p> + +<p class="normal">Martin accepted the suggestion placidly. "Ay, 'twas so. A great big +swallow, and he flew in my face," he repeated.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Anthony looked at him compassionately. "Poor fellow!" he said; +"Baldwin, see to him. He has had one of his fits and hurt himself."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I never knew him hurt <i>himself</i>," Baldwin muttered darkly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let somebody see to him," the knight said, disregarding the +interruption. "And now come, Petronilla. Why--where has the girl +gone?"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">Not far. Only round to the other side of him, that she might be a +little nearer to Martin. The curiosity in the other women's faces was +a small thing in comparison with the startled, earnest look in hers. +She gazed at the man with eyes not of affright, but of eager, avid +questioning, while through her parted lips her breath came in gasps. +Her cheek was red and white by turns, and, for her heart--well, it had +seemed to stand still a moment, and now was beating like the heart of +some poor captured bird held in the hand. She did not seem to hear her +father speak to her, and he had to touch her sleeve. Then she started +as though she were awakening from a dream, and followed him sadly into +the house.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sadly, and yet there was a light in her eyes which had not been there +five minutes before. A swallow? A great big swallow? And this was +December, when the swallows were at the bottom of the horse-ponds. She +only knew of one swallow whose return was possible in winter. But then +that one swallow--ay, though the snow should lie inches deep in the +chase, and the water should freeze in her room--would make a summer +for her. Could it be that one? Could it be? Petronilla's heart was +beating so loudly as she went upstairs after her father, that she +wondered he did not hear it.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">The group left round Martin gradually melted away. Baldwin was the +only man who could deal with him in his mad fits, and the other +servants, with a shudder and a backward glance, gladly left him to the +steward. Mistress Anne had gone in some time. Only Ferdinand Cludde +remained, and he stood a little apart, and seemed more deeply engaged +in listening for any sound which might betoken the sheriff's approach +than in hearkening to their conversation. Listen as he might he would +have gained little from the latter, for it was made up entirely of +scolding on one side and stupid reiteration on the other. Yet +Ferdinand, ever suspicious and on his guard, must have felt some +interest in it, for he presently called the steward to him. "Is he +more fool or knave?" he muttered, pointing under hand at Martin, who +stood in the gloom a few paces away.</p> + +<p class="normal">Baldwin shrugged his shoulders, but remained silent. "What happened? +What is the meaning of it all?" Ferdinand persisted, his keen eyes on +the steward's face. "Did he do it himself? Or who did it?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Baldwin turned slowly and nodded toward the moat. "I expect you will +find him who did it there," he said grimly. "I never knew a man save +Sir Anthony or Master Francis hit Martin yet, but he paid for it. And +when his temper is up, he is mad, or as good as mad; and better than +two sane men!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is a dangerous fellow," Ferdinand said thoughtfully, shivering a +little. It was unlike him to shiver and shake. But the bravest have +their moods.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Dangerous?" the steward answered. "Ay, he is to some, and sometimes."</p> + +<p class="normal">Ferdinand Cludde looked sharply at the speaker, as if he suspected him +of a covert sneer. But Baldwin's gloomy face betrayed no glint of +intelligence or amusement, and the knight's brother, reassured and yet +uneasy, turned on his heel and went into the house, meeting at the +door a servant who came to tell him that Sir Anthony was calling for +him. Baldwin Moor, left alone, stood a moment thinking, and then +turned to speak to Martin. But Martin was gone, and was nowhere to be +seen.</p> + +<p class="normal">The lights in the hall windows twinkled cheerily, and the great fire +cast its glow half way across the courtyard, as lights and fire had +twinkled and glowed at Coton End on many a night before. But neither +in hall nor chamber was there any answering merriment. Baldwin, coming +in, cursed the servants who were in his way, and the men moved meekly +and without retort, taking his oaths for what they were--a man's +tears. The women folk sat listening pale and frightened, and one or +two of the grooms, those who had done least in the skirmish, had +visions of a tree and a rope, and looked sickly. The rest scowled and +blinked at the fire, or kicked up a dog if it barked in its sleep.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hasn't Martin come in?" Baldwin growled presently, setting his heavy +wet boot on a glowing log, which hissed and sputtered under it. "Where +is he?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Don't know!" one of the men took on himself to answer. "He did not +come in here."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I wonder what he is up to now?" Baldwin exclaimed, with gloomy +irritation; for which, under the circumstances, he had ample excuse. +He knew that resistance was utterly hopeless, and could only make +matters worse, and twist the rope more tightly about his neck, to put +the thought as he framed it. The suspicion, therefore, that this +madman--for such in his worst fits the fool became--might be hanging +round the place in dark corners, doing what deadly mischief he could +to the attacking party, was not a pleasant one.</p> + +<p class="normal">A gray-haired man in the warmest nook by the fire seemed to read his +thoughts. "There is one in the house," he said slowly and oracularly, +his eyes on Baldwin's boot, "whom he has just as good a mind to hurt, +has our Martin, as any of them Clopton men. Ay, that has he, Master +Baldwin."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And who is that, gaffer?" Baldwin asked contemptuously.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the old fellow turned shy. "Well, it is not Sir Anthony," he +answered, nodding his head, and stooping forward to caress his +toasting shins. "Be you very sure of that. Nor the young mistress, nor +the young master as was, nor the new lady that came a month ago. No, +nor it is not you, Master Baldwin."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then who is it?" cried the steward impatiently.</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is shrewd, is Martin--when the saints have not got their backs to +him," said the old fellow slyly.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who is it?" thundered the steward, well used to this rustic method of +evasion. "Answer, you dolt!"</p> + +<p class="normal">But no answer came, and Baldwin never got one; for at this moment a +man who had been watching in front of the house ran in.</p> + +<p class="normal">"They are here!" he cried, "a good hundred of them, and torches enough +for St. Anthony's Eve. Get you to the gate, porter, Sir Anthony is +calling for you. Do you hear?"</p> + +<p class="normal">There was a great uprising, a great clattering of feet and barking of +dogs, and some wailing among the women. As the messenger finished +speaking, a harsh challenge which penetrated even the courtyard arose +from many voices without, and was followed by the winding of a horn. +This sufficed. All hurried with one accord into the court, where the +porter looked to Baldwin for instructions.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Hold a minute!" cried the steward, silencing the loudest hound by a +sound kick, and disregarding Sir Anthony's voice, which came from the +direction of the gateway. "Let us see if they are at the back too."</p> + +<p class="normal">He ran through the passage and, emerging on the edge of the moat, was +at once saluted by a dozen voices warning him back. There were a score +of dark figures standing in the little close where the fight had taken +place. "Right," said Baldwin to himself. "Needs must when the old +gentleman drives! Only I thought I would make sure."</p> + +<p class="normal">He ran back at once, nearly knocking down Martin, who with a companion +was making, but at a slower pace, for the front of the house.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, old comrade!" cried the steward, smiting the fool on the back +as he passed, "you are here, are you? I never thought that you and I +would be in at our own deaths!"</p> + +<p class="normal">He did not notice, in the wild humor which had seized him, who +Martin's companion was, though probably at another time it would have +struck him that there was no one in the house quite so tall. He sped +on with scarcely a glance, and in a moment was under the gateway, +where Sir Anthony was soundly rating everybody, and particularly the +porter, who with his key in the door found or affected to find the +task of turning it a difficult one. As the steward came up, however, +the big doors at some sign from him creaked on their hinges, and the +knight, his staff in his hand, and the servants clustering behind him +with lanterns, walked forward a pace or two to the end of the bridge, +bearing himself with some dignity.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who disturbs us at this hour?" he cried, peering across the moat, and +signing to Baldwin to hold up his large lantern, since the others, +uncertain of their reception, had put out their torches. By its light +he and those behind him could make out a group of half a dozen figures +a score of yards away, while in support of these there appeared a +bowshot off, and still in the open ground, a clump of, it might be, a +hundred men. Beyond all lay the dark line of trees, above which the +moon, new-risen, was sailing through a watery wrack of clouds. "Who +are ye?" the knight repeated.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you Sir Anthony Cludde?" came the answer.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Then in the Queen's name, Sir Anthony," the leader of the troop cried +solemnly, "I call on you to surrender. I hold a warrant for your +arrest, and also for the arrest of James Carey, a priest, and Baldwin +Moor, who, I am told, is your steward. I am backed by forces which it +will be vain to resist."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Are you Sir Philip Clopton?" the knight asked. For at that distance +and in that light it was impossible to be sure.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am," the sheriff answered earnestly. "And, as a friend, I beg you, +Sir Anthony, to avoid useless bloodshed and further cause for offense. +Sir Thomas Greville, the governor of Warwick Castle, and Colonel +Bridgewater are with me. I implore you, my friend, to surrender, and I +will do you what good offices I may."</p> + +<p class="normal">The knight, as we know, had made up his mind. And yet for a second he +hesitated. There were stern, grim faces round him, changed by the +stress of the moment into the semblance of dark Baldwin's; the faces +of men, who though they numbered but a dozen were his men, bound to +him by every tie of instinct, and breeding, and custom. And he had +been a soldier, and knew the fierce joy of a desperate struggle +against odds. Might it not be better after all?</p> + +<p class="normal">But then he remembered his womenkind; and after all, why endanger +these faithful men? He raised his voice and cried clearly, "I accept +your good offices, Sir Philip, and I take your advice. I will have the +drawbridge lowered, only I beg you will keep your men well in hand, +and do my poor house as little damage as may be."</p> + +<p class="normal">Giving Baldwin the order, and bidding him as soon as it was performed +come to him, the knight walked steadily back into the courtyard and +took his stand there. He dispatched the women and some of the servants +to lay out a meal in the hall. But it was noticeable that the men went +reluctantly, and that all who could find any excuse to do so lingered +round Sir Anthony as if they could not bear to abandon him; as if, +even at the last moment, they had some vague notion of protecting +their master at all hazards. A score of lanterns shed a gloomy, +uncertain light--only in places reinforced by the glow, from the hall +windows--upon the group. Seldom had a Coton moon peeped over the +gables at a scene stranger than that which met the sheriff's eyes, as +with his two backers he passed under the gateway.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"I surrender to you, Sir Philip," the knight said with dignity, +stepping forward a pace or two, "and call you to witness that I might +have made resistance and have not. My tenants are quiet in their +homes, and only my servants are present. Father Carey is not here, nor +in the house. This is Baldwin Moor, my steward, but I beg for him your +especial offices, since he has done nothing save by my command."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sir Anthony, believe me that I will do all I can," the sheriff +responded gravely, "but----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"But to set at naught the Queen's proclamation and order!" struck in a +third voice harshly--it was Sir Thomas Greville's--"and she but a +month on the throne! For shame, Sir Anthony! It smacks to me of high +treason. And many a man has suffered for less, let me tell you."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Had she been longer on the throne," the sheriff put in more gently, +"and were the times quiet, the matter would have been of less moment, +Sir Anthony, and might not have become a state matter. But just +now----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Things are in a perilous condition," Greville said bluntly, "and you +have done your little to make them worse!"</p> + +<p class="normal">The knight by a great effort swallowed his rage and humiliation. "What +will you do with me, gentlemen?" he asked, speaking with at least the +appearance of calmness.</p> + +<p class="normal">"That is to be seen," Greville said, roughly over-riding his +companion. "For to-night we must make ourselves and our men +comfortable here."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Certainly--with Sir Anthony's leave, Sir Thomas Greville," quoth a +voice from behind. "But only so!"</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">More than one started violently, while the Cludde servants almost to a +man spun round at the sound of the voice--my voice, Francis Cludde's, +though in the darknesss no one knew me. How shall I ever forget the +joy and lively gratitude which filled my heart as I spoke; which +turned the night into day, and that fantastic scene of shadows into a +festival, as I felt that the ambition of the last four years was about +to be gratified. Sir Anthony, who was one of the first to turn, peered +among the servants. "Who spoke?" he cried, a sudden discomposure in +his voice and manner. "Who spoke there?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Ay, Sir Anthony, who did?" Greville said haughtily. "Some one +apparently who does not quite understand his place or the state of +affairs here. Stand back, my men, and let me see him. Perhaps we may +teach him a useful lesson."</p> + +<p class="normal">The challenge was welcome, for I feared a scene, and to be left face +to face with my uncle more than anything. Now, as the servants with a +loud murmur of surprise and recognition fell back and disclosed me +standing by Martin's side, I turned a little from Sir Anthony and +faced Greville. "Not this time, I think, Sir Thomas," I said, giving +him back glance for glance. "I have learned my lesson from some who +have fared farther and seen more than you, from men who have stood by +their cause in foul weather as well as fair; and were not for mass one +day and a sermon the next."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is this?" he cried angrily. "Who are you?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Sir Anthony Cludde's dutiful and loving nephew," I answered, with a +courteous bow. "Come back, I thank Heaven, in time to do him a +service, Sir Thomas."</p> + +<p class="normal">"Master Francis! Master Francis!" Clopton exclaimed in remonstrance. +He had known me in old days. My uncle, meanwhile, gazed at me in the +utmost astonishment, and into the servants' faces there flashed a +strange light, while many of them hailed me in a tone which told me +that I had but to give the word, and they would fall on the very +sheriff himself. "Master Francis," Sir Philip Clopton repeated +gravely, "if you would do your uncle a service, this is not the way to +go about it. He has surrendered and is our prisoner. Brawling will not +mend matters."</p> + +<p class="normal">I laughed out loudly and merrily. "Do you know, Sir Philip," I said, +with something of the old boyish ring in my voice, "I have been, since +I saw you last, to Belgium and Germany, ay, and Poland and Hamburg! Do +you think I have come back a fool?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"I do not know what to think of you," he replied dryly, "but you had +best----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Keep a civil tongue in your head, my friend!" said Greville with +harshness, "and yourself out of this business."</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is just this business I have come to get into, Sir Thomas," I +answered, with increasing good humor. "Sir Anthony, show them that!" I +continued, and I drew out a little packet of parchment with a great +red seal hanging from it by a green ribbon; just such a packet as that +which I had stolen from the Bishop's apparitor nearly four years back. +"A lantern here!" I cried. "Hold it steady, Martin, that Sir Anthony +may read. Master Sheriff wants his rere-supper."</p> + +<p class="normal">I gave the packet into the knight's hand, my own shaking. Ay, shaking, +for was not this the fulfillment of that boyish vow I had made in my +little room in the gable yonder, so many years ago? A fulfillment +strange and timely, such as none but a boy in his teens could have +hoped for, nor any but a man who had tried the chances and mishaps of +the world could fully enjoy as I was enjoying it. I tingled with the +rush through my veins of triumph and gratitude. Up to the last moment +I had feared lest anything should go wrong, lest this crowning +happiness should be withheld from me. Now I stood there smiling, +watching Sir Anthony, as with trembling fingers he fumbled with the +paper. And there was only one thing, only one person, wanting to my +joy. I looked, and looked again, but I could not anywhere see +Petronilla.</p> + +<p class="normal">"What is it?" Sir Anthony said feebly, turning the packet over and +over. "It is for the sheriff; for the sheriff, is it not?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He had better open it then, sir," I answered gayly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Philip took the packet and after a glance at the address tore it +open. "It is an order from Sir William Cecil," he muttered. Then he +ran his eye down the brief contents, while all save myself pricked +their ears and pressed closer, and I looked swiftly from face to face, +as the wavering light lit up now one and now another. Old familiar +faces for the most part.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Well, Sir Philip, will you stop to supper?" I cried with a laugh, +when he had had time, as I judged, to reach the signature.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Go to!" he grunted, looking at me. "Nice fools you have made of us, +young man!" He passed the letter to Greville. "Sir Anthony," he +continued, a mixture of pleasure and chagrin in his voice, "you are +free! I congratulate you on your luck. Your nephew has brought an +amnesty for all things done up to the present time save for any life +taken, in which case the matter is to be referred to the Secretary. +Fortunately my dead horse is the worst of the mischief, so free you +are, and amnestied, though nicely Master Cecil has befooled us!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"We will give you another horse, Sir Philip," I answered.</p> + +<p class="normal">But the words were wasted on the air. They were drowned in a great +shout of joy and triumph which rang from a score of Cludde throats the +moment the purport of the paper was understood; a shout which made the +old house shake again, and scared the dogs so that they fled away into +corners and gazed askance at us, their tails between their legs; a +shout that was plainly heard a mile away in half a dozen homesteads +where Cludde men lay gloomy in their beds.</p> + +<p class="normal">By this time my uncle's hand was in mine. With his other he took off +his hat. "Lads!" he cried huskily, rearing his tall form in our midst; +"a cheer for the Queen! God keep her safe, and long may she reign!"</p> + +<p class="normal">This was universally regarded as the end of what they still proudly +call in those parts "the Coton Insurrection!" When silence came again, +every dog, even the oldest and wisest, had bayed himself hoarse and +fled to kennel, thinking the end of the world was come. My heart, as I +joined roundly in, swelled high with pride, and there were tears in my +eyes as well as in my uncle's. But there is no triumph after all +without its drawback, no fruition equal to the anticipation. Where was +Petronilla? I could see her nowhere. I looked from window to window, +but she was at none. I scanned the knot of maids, but could not find +her. Even the cheering had not brought her out.</p> + +<p class="normal">It was wonderful, though, how the cheers cleared the air. Even Sir +Thomas Greville regained good humor, and deigned to shake me by the +hand and express himself pleased that the matter had ended so happily. +Then the sheriff drew him and Bridgewater away, to look to their men's +arrangements, seeing, I think, that my uncle and I would fain be alone +awhile; and at last I asked with a trembling voice after Petronilla.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"To be sure," Sir Anthony answered, furtively wiping his eyes. "I had +forgotten her, dear lad. I wish now that she had stayed. But tell me, +Francis, how came you back to-night, and how did you manage this?"</p> + +<p class="normal">Something of what he asked I told him hurriedly. But then--be sure I +took advantage of the first opening--I asked again after Petronilla. +"Where has she gone, sir?" I said, trying to conceal my impatience. "I +thought that Martin told me she was here; indeed, that he had seen her +after I arrived."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I am not sure, do you know," Sir Anthony answered, eying me absently, +"that I was wise, but I considered she was safer away, Francis. And +she can be fetched back in the morning. I feared there might be some +disturbance in the house--as indeed there well might have been--and +though she begged very hard to stay with me, I sent her off."</p> + +<p class="normal">"This evening, sir?" I stammered, suddenly chilled.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, an hour ago."</p> + +<p class="normal">"But an hour ago every approach was guarded, Sir Anthony," I cried in +surprise. "I had the greatest difficulty in slipping through from the +outside myself, well as I know every field and tree. To escape from +within, even for a man, much less a woman, would have been impossible. +She will have been stopped."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I think not," he said, with a smile at once sage and indulgent--which +seemed to add, "You think yourself a clever lad, but you do not know +everything yet."</p> + +<p class="normal">"I sent her out by the secret passage to the mill-house, you see," he +explained, "as soon as I heard the sheriff's party outside. I could +have given them the slip myself, had I pleased."</p> + +<p class="normal">"The mill house?" I answered. The mill stood nearly a quarter of a +mile from Coton End, beyond the gardens, and in the direction of the +village. I remembered vaguely that I had heard from the servants in +old days some talk of a secret outlet leading from the house to it. +But they knew no particulars, and its existence was only darkly +rumored among them.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You did not know of the passage," Sir Anthony said, chuckling at my +astonishment. "No, I remember. But the girl did. Your father and his +wife went with her. He quite agreed in the wisdom of sending her away, +and indeed advised it. On reaching the mill, if they found all quiet +they were to walk across to Watney's farm. There they could get horses +and might ride at their leisure to Stratford and wait the event. I +thought it best for her; and Ferdinand agreed."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And my father--went with her?" I muttered hoarsely, feeling myself +growing chill to the heart. Hardly could I restrain my indignation at +Sir Anthony's folly, or my own anger and disappointment--and fear. For +though my head seemed on fire and there was a tumult in my brain, I +was cool enough to trace clearly my father's motives, and discern with +what a deliberate purpose he had acted. "He went with her?"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Yes, he and his wife," the knight answered, noticing nothing in his +obtuseness.</p> + +<p class="normal">"You have been fooled, sir," I said bitterly. "My father you should +have known, and for his wife, she is a bad, unscrupulous woman! Oh, +the madness of it, to put my cousin into their hands!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"What do you mean?" the knight cried, beginning to tremble. "Your +father is a changed man, lad. He has come back to the old faith and in +a dark hour too. He----"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He is a hypocrite and a villain!" I retorted, stung almost to madness +by this wound in my tenderest place; stung indeed beyond endurance. +Why should I spare him, when to spare him was to sacrifice the +innocent? Why should I pick my words, when my love was in danger? He +had had no mercy and no pity. Why should I shrink from exposing him? +Heaven had dealt with him patiently and given him life; and he did but +abuse it. I could keep silence no longer, and told Sir Anthony all +with a stinging tongue and in gibing words; even, at last, how my +father had given me a hint of the very plan he had now carried out, of +coming down to Coton, and goading his brother into some offense which +might leave his estate at the mercy of the authorities.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I did not think he meant it," I said bitterly. "But I might have +known that the leopard does not change its spots. How you, who knew +him years ago, and knew that he had plotted against you since, came to +trust him again--to trust your daughter to him--passes my fancy!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"He was my brother," the knight murmured, leaning white and stricken +on my shoulder.</p> + +<p class="normal">"And my father--heaven help us!" I rejoined.</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER XXV.</h2> + +<h3><a name="div1_25" href="#div1Ref_25">IN HARBOR AT LAST.</a></h3> +<br> + +<p class="normal">"We must first help ourselves," Sir Anthony answered sharply; rousing +himself with wonderful energy from the prostration into which my story +had thrown him. "I will send after her. She shall be brought back. Ho! +Baldwin! Martin!" he cried loudly. "Send Baldwin hither! Be quick +there!"</p> + +<p class="normal">Out of the ruck of servants in and about the hall, Baldwin came +rushing presently, wiping his lips as he approached. A single glance +at our faces sobered him. "Send Martin down to the mill!" Sir Anthony +ordered curtly. "Bid him tell my daughter if she be there to come +back. And do you saddle a couple of horses, and be ready to ride with +Master Francis to Watney's farm, and on to Stratford, if it be +necessary. Lose not a minute; my daughter is with Master Ferdinand. My +order is that she return."</p> + +<p class="normal">The fool had come up only a pace or two behind the steward. "Do you +hear, Martin?" I added eagerly, turning to him. My thoughts, busy with +the misery which might befall her in their hands, maddened me. "You +will bring her back if you find her, mind you."</p> + +<p class="normal">He did not answer, but his eyes glittered as they met mine, and I knew +that he understood. As he flitted silently across the court and +disappeared under the gateway, I knew that no hound could be more +sure, I knew that he would not leave the trail until he had found +Petronilla, though he had to follow her for many a mile. We might have +to pursue the fugitives to Stratford, but I felt sure that Martin's +lean figure and keen dark face would be there to meet us.</p> + +<p class="normal">Us? No. Sir Anthony indeed said to me, "You will go of course?" +speaking as if only one answer were possible.</p> + +<p class="normal">But it was not to be so. "No," I said, "you had better go, sir. Or +Baldwin can be trusted. He can take two or three of the grooms. They +should be armed," I added, in a lower tone.</p> + +<p class="normal">My uncle looked hard at me, and then gave his assent, no longer +wondering why I did not go. Instead he bade Baldwin do as I had +suggested. In truth my heart was so hot with wrath and indignation +that I dared not follow, lest my father, in his stern, mocking way, +should refuse to let her go, and harm should happen between us. If I +were right in my suspicions, and he had capped his intrigue by +deliberately getting the girl I loved into his hands as a hostage, +either as a surety that I would share with him if I succeeded to the +estates, or as a means of extorting money from his brother, then I +dared not trust myself face to face with him. If I could have mounted +and ridden after my love, I could have borne it better. But the curse +seemed to cling to me still. My worst foe was one against whom I could +not lift my hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">"But what," my uncle asked, his voice quavering, though his words +seemed intended to combat my fears, "what can he do, lad? She is his +niece."</p> + +<p class="normal">"What?" I answered, with a shudder. "I do not know, but I fear +everything. If he should elude us and take her abroad with him--heaven +help her, sir! He will use her somehow to gain his ends--or kill her."</p> + +<p class="normal">Sir Anthony wiped his brow with a trembling hand. "Baldwin will +overtake them," he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"Let us hope so," I answered. Alas, how far fell fruition short of +anticipation. This was my time of triumph! "You had better go in, +sir," I said presently, gaining a little mastery over myself. "I see +Sir Philip has returned; from settling his men for the night. He and +Greville will be wondering what has happened."</p> + +<p class="normal">"And you?" he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">"I cannot," I answered, shaking my head.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">After he had gone I stood a while in the shadow on the far side of the +court, listening to the clatter of knives and dishes, the cheerful hum +of the servants as they called to one another, the hurrying footsteps +of the maids. A dog crept out, and licked my hand as it hung nerveless +by my side. Surely Martin or Baldwin would overtake them. Or if not, +it still was not so easy to take a girl abroad against her will.</p> + +<p class="normal">But would that be his plan? He must have hiding-places in England to +which he might take her, telling her any wild story of her father's +death or flight, or even perhaps of her own danger if her whereabouts +were known. I had had experience of his daring, his cunning, his +plausibility. Had he not taken in all with whom he had come into +contact, except, by some strange fate, myself. To be sure Anne was not +altogether without feeling or conscience. But she was his--his +entirely, body and soul. Yes, if I could have followed, I could have +borne it better. It was this dreadful inaction which was killing me.</p> + +<p class="normal">The bustle and voices of the servants, who were in high spirits, so +irritated me at last that I wandered away, going first to the dark, +silent gardens, where I walked up and down in a fever of doubt and +fear, much as I had done on the last evening I had spent at Coton. +Then a fancy seized me, and turning from the fish-pond I walked toward +the house. Crossing the moat I made for the church door and tried it. +It was unlocked. I went in. Here at least in the sacred place I should +find quietness; and unable to help myself in this terrible crisis, +might get help from One to whom my extremity was but an opportunity.</p> + +<p class="normal">I walked up the aisle and, finding all in darkness, the moon at the +moment being obscured, felt my way as far as Sir Piers' flat monument, +and sat down upon it. I had been there scarcely a minute when a faint +sound, which seemed rather a sigh or an audible shudder than any +articulate word, came out of the darkness in front of me. My great +trouble had seemed to make superstitious fears for the time +impossible, but at this sound I started and trembled; and holding my +breath felt a cold shiver run down my back. Motionless I peered before +me, and yet could see nothing. All was gloom, the only distinguishable +feature being the east window.</p> + +<p class="normal">What was that? A soft rustle as of ghostly garments moving in the +aisle was succeeded by another sigh which made me rise from my seat, +my hair stiffening. Then I saw the outline of the east window growing +brighter and brighter, and I knew that the moon was about to shine +clear of the clouds, and longed to turn and fly, yet did not dare to +move.</p> + +<p class="normal">Suddenly the light fell on the altar steps and disclosed a kneeling +form which seemed to be partly turned toward me as though watching me. +The face I could not see--it was in shadow--and I stood transfixed, +gazing at the figure, half in superstitious terror and half in wonder; +until a voice I had not heard for years, and yet should have known +among a thousand, said softly, "Francis!"</p> + +<p class="normal">"Who calls me?" I muttered hoarsely, knowing and yet disbelieving, +hoping and yet with a terrible fear at heart.</p> + +<p class="normal">"It is I, Petronilla!" said the same voice gently. And then the form +rose and glided toward me through the moonlight. "It is I, Petronilla. +Do you not know me?" said my love again; and fell upon my breast.</p> + +<p style="text-align:center; letter-spacing:20pt">* * * * *</p> + +<p class="normal">She had been firmly resolved all the time not to quit her +father, and +on the first opportunity had given the slip to her company, while the +horses were being saddled at Watney's farm. Stealing back through the +darkness she had found the house full of uproar, and apparently +occupied by strange troopers. Aghast and not knowing what to do, she +had bethought herself of the church and there taken refuge. On my +first entrance she was horribly alarmed. But as I walked up the +aisle, she recognized--so she has since told me a thousand times with +pride--my footstep, though it had long been a stranger to her ear, and +she had no thought at the moment of seeing me, or hearing the joyful +news I brought.</p> +<br> + +<p class="normal">And so my story is told. For what passed then between Petronilla and +me lies between my wife and myself. And it is an old, old story, and +one which our children have no need to learn, for they have told it, +many of them for themselves, and their children are growing up to tell +it. I think in some odd corner of the house there may still be found a +very ancient swallow's nest, which young girls bring out and look at +tenderly; but for my sword-knot I fear it has been worn out these +thirty years. What matter, even though it was velvet of Genoa? He that +has the substance, lacks not the shadow.</p> + +<p class="normal">I never saw my father again, nor learned accurately what passed at +Watney's farm after Petronilla was missed by her two companions. But +one man, whom I could ill spare, was also missing on that night, whose +fate is still something of a mystery. That was Martin Luther. I have +always believed that he fell in a desperate encounter with my father, +but no traces of the struggle, or his body were ever found. The track +between Watney's farm and Stratford, however, runs for a certain +distance by the river; and at some point on this road I think Martin +must have come up with the refugees, and failing either to find +Petronilla with them, or to get any satisfactory account of her, must +have flung himself on my father and been foiled and killed. The exact +truth I have said was never known, though Baldwin and I talked over it +again and again; and there were even some who said that a servant much +resembling Martin Luther was seen with my father in the Low Countries +not a month before his death. I put no credence in this, however, +having good reason to think that the poor fool--who was wiser in his +sane moments than most men--would never have left my service while the +breath remained in his body.</p> + +<p class="normal">I have heard it said that blood washes out shame. My father was killed +in a skirmish in the Netherlands shortly before the peace of Chateau +Cambrésis, and about three months after the events here related. I +have no doubt that he died as a brave man should; for he had that +virtue. He held no communication with me or with any at Coton End +later than that which I have here described; but would appear to have +entered the service of Cardinal Granvelle, the governor of the +Netherlands, for after his death word came to the Duchess of Suffolk +that Mistress Anne Cludde had entered a nunnery at Bruges under the +Cardinal's auspices. Doubtless she is long since dead.</p> + +<p class="normal">And so are many others of whom I have spoken--Sir Anthony, the +Duchess, Master Bertie, and Master Lindstrom. For forty years have +passed since these things happened--years of peaceful, happy life, +which have gone by more swiftly, as it seems to me in the retrospect, +than the four years of my wanderings. The Lindstroms sought refuge in +England in the second year of the Queen, and settled in Lowestoft +under the Duchess of Suffolk's protection, and did well and flourished +as became them; nor indeed did they find, I trust, others ungrateful, +though I experienced some difficulty in inducing Sir Anthony to treat +the Dutch burgher as on an equality with himself. Lord Willoughby de +Eresby, the Peregrine to whom I stood godfather in St. Willibrod's +church at Wesel, is now a middle-aged man and my very good friend, the +affection which his mother felt for me having descended to him in full +measure. She was indeed such a woman as Her Majesty; large-hearted and +free-tongued, of masculine courage and a wonderful tenderness. And of +her husband what can I say save that he was a brave Christian--and in +peaceful times--a studious gentleman.</p> + +<p class="normal">But it is not only in vacant seats and gray hairs that I trace the +progress of forty years. They have done for England almost all that +men hoped they might do in the first dawn of the reign. We have seen +great foes defeated, and strong friends gained. We have seen the +coinage amended, trade doubled, the Exchequer filled, the roads made +good, the poor provided for in a Christian manner, the Church grown +strong; all this in these years. We have seen Holland rise and Spain +decline, and well may say in the words of the old text, which my +grandfather set up over the hall door at Coton, "<i>Frustra, nisi +Dominus</i>."</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h3>THE END</h3> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Story of Francis Cludde, by Stanley J. 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Weyman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Story of Francis Cludde + +Author: Stanley J. Weyman + +Release Date: March 29, 2012 [EBook #39296] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the +Web Archive (University of California Libraries) + + + + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + 1. Page scan source: + http://www.archive.org/details/storyoffranciscl00weymiala + (University of California Libraries) + + 2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. + + + + + + + + THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE + + + + + + + BY STANLEY J. WEYMAN + + * * * + +THE HOUSE OF THE WOLF. A Romance. With Frontispiece and Vignette. +Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE. A Romance. With four Illustrations. Crown +8vo, $1.25. + +A GENTLEMAN OF FRANCE. Being the Memoirs of Gaston de Bonne, Sieur de +Marsac. With Frontispiece and Vignette. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +UNDER THE RED ROBE. With twelve full-page Illustrations. Crown 8vo, +cloth, $1.25. + +MY LADY ROTHA. A Romance of the Thirty Years' War. With eight +Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +FROM THE MEMOIRS OF A MINISTER OF FRANCE. With thirty-six +Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth, $1.25. + +SHREWSBURY. A Romance. With twenty-four illustrations. Crown 8vo, +$1.50. + +THE RED COCKADE. A Novel. With 48 illustrations by R. Caton Woodville. +Crown 8vo, $1.50. + + * * * + + New York: Longmans, Green, and Co. + + + + + + + THE STORY + + OF + + FRANCIS CLUDDE + + + + + BY + + STANLEY J. WEYMAN + + AUTHOR OF "A GENTLEMAN OF FRANCE," "UNDER THE RED ROBE," + "MY LADY ROTHA," ETC., ETC. + + + + +_ILLUSTRATED_ + + + + + NEW YORK + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + 1898 + + + + + + + Copyright, 1891, by + CASSELL PUBLISHING COMPANY + + * * * + + Copyright, 1897, by + LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. + + _All rights reserved_ + + + + + + CONTENTS. + + + CHAPTER + + I. "He, Sire Ane, He," + + II. In the Bishop's Room, + + III. "Down with Purveyors!" + + IV. Two Sisters of Mercy, + + V. Mistress Bertram, + + VI. Master Clarence, + + VII. On Board the "Framlingham," + + VIII. A House of Peace, + + IX. Playing with Fire, + + X. The Face in the Porch, + + XI. A Foul Blow, + + XII. Anne's Petition, + + XIII. A Willful Man's Way, + + XIV. At Bay in the Gatehouse, + + XV. Before the Court, + + XVI. In the Duke's Name, + + XVII. A Letter that had Many Escapes, + + XVIII. The Witch's Warning + + XIX. Ferdinand Cludde, + + XX. The Coming Queen, + + XXI. My Father, + + XXII. Sir Anthony's Purpose, + + XXIII. The Last Mass, + + XXIV. Awaiting the Blow, + + XXV. In Harbor at Last, + + + + + + THE STORY OF FRANCIS CLUDDE. + + + + + CHAPTER I. + + "HE, SIRE ANE, HE!" + + +On the boundary line between the two counties of Warwick and Worcester +there is a road very famous in those parts, and called the Ridgeway. +Father Carey used to say--and no better Latinist could be found for a +score of miles round in the times of which I write--that it was made +by the Romans. It runs north and south along the narrow spine of the +country, which is spread out on either side like a map, or a picture. +As you fare southward you see on your right hand the green orchards +and pastures of Worcestershire stretching as far as the Malvern Hills. +You have in front of you Bredon Hill, which is a wonderful hill, for +if a man goes down the Avon by boat it goes with him--now before, and +now behind--a whole day's journey--and then stands in the same place. +And on the left hand you have the great Forest of Arden, and not much +besides, except oak trees, which grow well in Warwickshire. + +I describe this road, firstly, because it is a notable one, and forty +years ago was the only Queen's highway, to call a highway, in that +country. The rest were mere horse-tracks. Secondly, because the chase +wall of Coton End runs along the side of it for two good miles; and +the Cluddes--I am Francis Cludde--have lived at Coton End by the +Ridgeway time out of mind, probably--for the name smacks of the +soil--before the Romans made the road. And thirdly, because forty +years ago, on a drizzling February day in 1555--second year of Mary, +old religion just reestablished--a number of people were collected on +this road, forming a group of a score or more, who stood in an ordered +kind of disorder about my uncle's gates and looked all one way, as if +expecting an arrival, and an arrival of consequence. + +First, there was my uncle Sir Anthony, tall and lean. He wore his best +black velvet doublet and cloak, and had put them on with an air of +huge importance. This increased each time he turned, staff in hand, +and surveyed his following, and as regularly gave place to a "Pshaw!" +of vexation and a petulant glance when his eye rested on me. Close +beside him, looking important too, but anxious and a little frightened +as well, stood good Father Carey. The priest wore his silk cassock, +and his lips moved from time to time without sound, as though he +were trying over a Latin oration--which, indeed, was the fact. At a +more respectful distance were ranged Baldwin Moor, the steward, +and a dozen servants; while still farther away lounged as many +ragamuffins--landless men, who swarmed about every gentleman's door +in those times, and took toll of such abbey lands as the king might +have given him. Against one of the stone gate-pillars I leaned +myself--nineteen years and six months old, and none too wise, though +well grown, and as strong as one here and there. And perched on the +top of the twin post, with his chin on his knees, and his hands +clasped about them, was Martin Luther, the fool. + +Martin had chosen this elevated position partly out of curiosity, and +partly, perhaps, under a strong sense of duty. He knew that, whether +he would or no, he must needs look funny up there. His nose was red, +and his eyes were running, and his teeth chattering; and he did look +funny. But as he felt the cold most his patience failed first. The +steady, silent drizzle, the mist creeping about the stems of the oak +trees, the leaden sky proved too much for him in the end. "A watched +pot never boils!" he grumbled. + +"Silence, sirrah!" commanded my uncle angrily. "This is no time for +your fooling. Have a care how you talk in the same breath of pots and +my Lord Bishop!" + +"_Sanctae ecclesiae_," Father Carey broke out, turning up his eyes in a +kind of ecstasy, as though he were knee to knee with the prelate--"_te +defensorem inclytum atque ardentem----_" + +"_Pottum!_" cried I, laughing loudly at my own wit. + +It was an ill-mannered word, but I was cold and peevish. I had been +forced to this function against my will. I had never seen the guest +whom we were expecting, and who was no other than the Queen's +Chancellor, Stephen Gardiner, but I disliked him as if I had. In +truth, he was related to us in a peculiar fashion, which my uncle and +I naturally looked at from different standpoints. Sir Anthony viewed +with complacence, if not with pride, any connection with the powerful +Bishop of Winchester, for the knight knew the world, and could +appreciate the value it sets on success, and the blind eyes it has for +spots if they do but speckle the risen sun. I could make no such +allowance, but, with the pride of youth and family, at once despised +the great Bishop for his base blood, and blushed that the shame lay on +our side. I hated this parade of doing honor to him, and would fain +have hidden at home with Petronilla, my cousin, Sir Anthony's +daughter, and awaited our guest there. The knight, however, had not +permitted this, and I had been forced out, being in the worst of +humors. + +So I said "_Pottum!_" and laughed. + +"Silence, boy!" cried Sir Anthony fiercely. He loved an orderly +procession, and to arrange things decently. "Silence!" he repeated, +darting an angry glance first at me and then at his followers, "or I +will warm that jacket of yours, lad! And you, Martin Luther, see to +your tongue for the next twenty-four hours, and keep it off my Lord +Bishop! And, Father Carey, hold yourself ready----" + +"For here Sir Hot-Pot cometh!" cried the undaunted Martin, skipping +nimbly down from his post of vantage; "and a dozen of London saucepans +with him, or may I never lick the inside of one again!" + +A jest on the sauciness of London serving-men was sure to tell with +the crowd, and there was a great laugh at this, especially among the +landless men, who were on the skirts of the party, and well sheltered +from Sir Anthony's eye. He glared about him, provoked to find at this +critical moment smiles where there should have been looks of +deference, and a ring round a fool where he had marshaled a +procession. Unluckily, he chose to visit his displeasure upon me. "You +won't behave, won't you, you puppy!" he cried. "You won't, won't you!" +and stepping forward he aimed a blow at my shoulders, which would have +made me rub myself if it had reached me. But I was too quick. I +stepped back, the stick swung idly, and the crowd laughed. + +And there the matter would have ended, for the Bishop's party were now +close upon us, had not my foot slipped on the wet grass and I fallen +backward. Seeing me thus at his mercy, the temptation proved too much +for the knight. He forgot his love of seemliness and even that his +visitors were at his elbow--and, stooping a moment to plant home a +couple of shrewd cuts, cried, "Take that! Take that, my lad!" in a +voice that rang as crisply as his thwacks. + +I was up in an instant; not that the pain was anything, and before our +own people I should have thought as little of shame, for if the old +may not lay hand to the young, being related, where is to be any +obedience? Now, however, my first glance met the grinning faces of +strange lackeys, and while my shoulders still smarted, the laughter of +a couple of soberly-clad pages stung a hundred times more sharply. I +glared furiously round, and my eyes fell on one face--a face long +remembered. It was that of a man who neither smiled nor laughed; a man +whom I recognized immediately, not by his sleek hackney or his purple +cassock, which a riding-coat partially concealed, or even by his +jeweled hand, but by the keen glance of power which passed over me, +took me in, and did not acknowledge me; which saw my humiliation +without interest or amusement. The look hurt me beyond smarting of +shoulders, for it conveyed to me in the twentieth part of a second how +very small a person Francis Cludde was, and how very great a personage +was Stephen Gardiner, whom in my thoughts I had presumed to belittle. + +I stood irresolute a moment, shifting my feet and glowering at him, my +face on fire. But when he raised his hand to give the Benediction, and +the more devout, or those with mended hose, fell on their knees in the +mud, I turned my back abruptly, and, climbing the wall, flung away +across the chase. + +"What, Sir Anthony!" I heard him say as I stalked off, his voice +ringing clear and incisive amid the reverential silence which followed +the Latin words; "have we a heretic here, cousin? How is this? So near +home too!" + +"It is my nephew, my Lord Bishop," I could hear Sir Anthony answer, +apology in his tone; "and a willful boy at times. You know of him; he +has queer notions of his own, put into his head long ago." + +I caught no more, my angry strides carrying me out of earshot. Fuming, +I hurried across the long damp grass, avoiding here and there the +fallen limb of an elm or a huge round of holly. I wanted to get out of +the way, and be out of the way; and made such haste that before the +slowly moving cavalcade had traversed one-half of the interval between +the road and the house I had reached the bridge which crossed the +moat, and, pushing my way impatiently through the maids and scullions +who had flocked to it to see the show, had passed into the courtyard. + +The light was failing, and the place looked dark and gloomy in spite +of the warm glow of burning logs which poured from the lower windows, +and some show of green boughs which had been placed over the doorways +in honor of the occasion. I glanced up at a lattice in one of the +gables--the window of Petronilla's little parlor. There was no face at +it, and I turned fretfully into the hall--and yes, there she was, +perched up in one of the high window-seats. She was looking out on the +chase, as the maids were doing. + +Yes, as the maids were doing. She too was watching for his High +Mightiness, I muttered, and that angered me afresh. I crossed the +rushes in silence, and climbed up beside her. + +"Well," I said ungraciously, as she started, hearing me at her +shoulder, "well, have you seen enough of him yet, cousin? You will, I +warrant you, before he leaves. A little of him goes far." + +"A little of whom, Francis?" she asked simply. + +Though her voice betrayed some wonder at my rough tone, she was so +much engaged with the show that she did not look at me immediately. +This of course kept my anger warm, and I began to feel that she was in +the conspiracy against me. + +"Of my Lord of Winchester, of course," I answered, laughing rudely; +"of Sir Hot-Pot!" + +"Why do you call him that?" she remonstrated in gentle wonder. And +then she did turn her soft dark eyes upon me. She was a slender, +willowy girl in those days, with a complexion clear yet pale--a maiden +all bending and gracefulness, yet with a great store of secret +firmness, as I was to learn. "He seems as handsome an old man," she +continued, "as I have ever met, and stately and benevolent, too, as I +see him at this distance. What is the matter with you, Francis? What +has put you out?" + +"Put me out!" I retorted angrily. "Who said anything had put me out?" + +But I reddened under her eyes; I was longing to tell her all, and be +comforted, while at the same time I shrank with a man's shame from +saying to her that I had been beaten. + +"I can see that something is the matter," she said sagely, with her +head on one side, and that air of being the elder which she often +assumed with me, though she was really the younger by two years. "Why +did you not wait for the others? Why have you come home alone? +Francis," [with sudden conviction] "you have vexed my father! That is +it!" + +"He has beaten me like a dog!" I blurted out passionately; "and before +them all! Before those strangers he flogged me!" + +She had her back to the window, and some faint gleam of wintry +sunshine, passing through the gules of the shield blazoned behind her, +cast a red stain on her dark hair and shapely head. She was silent, +probably through pity or consternation; but I could not see her face, +and misread her. I thought her hard, and, resenting this, bragged on +with a lad's empty violence. + +"He did; but I will not stand it! I give you warning, I won't stand +it, Petronilla!" and I stamped, young bully that I was, until the dust +sprang out of the boards, and the hounds by the distant hearth jumped +up and whined. "No! not for all the base bishops in England!" I +continued, taking a step this way and that. "He had better not do it +again! If he does, I tell you it will be the worse for some one!" + +"Francis," she exclaimed abruptly, "you must not speak in that way!" + +But I was too angry to be silenced, though instinctively I changed my +ground. + +"Stephen Gardiner!" I cried furiously. "Who is Stephen Gardiner, I +should like to know? He has no right to call himself Gardiner at all! +Dr. Stephens he used to call himself, I have heard. A child with no +name but his godfather's; that is what he is, for all his airs and his +bishopric! Who is he to look on and see a Cludde beaten? If my uncle +does not take care----" + +"Francis!" she cried again, cutting me short ruthlessly. "Be silent, +sir!" [and this time I was silent], "You unmanly boy," she continued, +her face glowing with indignation, "to threaten my father before my +face! How dare you, sir? How dare you? And who are you, you poor +child," she exclaimed, with a startling change from invective to +sarcasm--"who are you to talk of bishops, I should like to know?" + +"One," I said sullenly, "who thinks less of cardinals and bishops than +some folk, Mistress Petronilla!" + +"Ay, I know," she retorted scathingly--"I know that you are a kind of +half-hearted Protestant--neither fish, flesh, nor fowl!" + +"I am what my father made me!" I muttered. + +"At any rate," she replied, "you do not see how small you are, or you +would not talk of bishops. Heaven help us! That a boy who has done +nothing and seen nothing, should talk of the Queen's Chancellor! Go! +Go on, you foolish boy, and rule a country, or cut off heads, and then +you may talk of such men--men who could unmake you and yours with a +stroke of the pen! You, to talk so of Stephen Gardiner! Fie, fie, I +say! For shame!" + +I looked at her, dazed and bewildered, and had long afterward in my +mind a picture of her as she stood above me, in the window bay, her +back to the light, her slender figure drawn to its full height, her +hand extended toward me. I could scarcely understand or believe that +this was my gentle cousin. I turned without a word and stole away, not +looking behind me. I was cowed. + +It happened that the servants came hurrying in at the moment with a +clatter of dishes and knives, and the noise covered my retreat. I had +a fancy afterward that, as I moved away, Petronilla called to me. But +at the time, what with the confusion and my own disorder, I paid no +heed to her, but got myself blindly out of the hall, and away to my +own attic. + +It was a sharp lesson. But my feelings when, being alone, I had time +to feel, need not be set down. After events made them of no moment, +for I was even then on the verge of a change so great that all the +threats and misgivings, the fevers and agues, of that afternoon, real +as they seemed at the time, became in a few hours as immaterial as the +dew which fell before yesterday's thunderstorm. + +The way the change began to come about was this. I crept in late to +supper, facing the din and lights, the rows of guests and the hurrying +servants, with a mixture of shame and sullenness. I was sitting down +with a scowl next the Bishop's pages--my place was beside them, +half-way down the table, and I was not too careful to keep my feet +clear of their clothing--when my uncle's voice, raised in a harsher +tone than was usual with him, even when he was displeased, summoned +me. + +"Come here, sirrah!" he cried roundly. "Come here, Master Francis! I +have a word to speak to you!" + +I went slowly, dragging my feet, while all looked up, and there was a +partial silence. I was conscious of this, and it nerved me. For a +moment indeed, as I stepped on to the dais I had a vision of scores of +candles and rushlights floating in mist, and of innumerable bodiless +faces all turned up to me. But the vision and the mistiness passed +away, and left only my uncle's long, thin face inflamed with anger, +and beside it, in the same ring of light, the watchful eyes and stern, +impassive features of Stephen Gardiner. The Bishop's face and his eyes +were all I saw then; the same face, the same eyes, I remembered, which +had looked unyielding into those of the relentless Cromwell and had +scarce dropped before the frown of a Tudor. His purple cap and +cassock, the lace and rich fur, the chain of office, I remembered +afterward. + +"Now, boy," thundered Sir Anthony, pointing out the place where I +should stand, "what have you to say for yourself? why have you so +misbehaved this afternoon? Let your tongue speak quickly, do you hear, +or you will smart for it. And let it be to the purpose, boy!" + +I was about to answer something--whether it was likely to make things +worse or better, I cannot remember--when Gardiner stayed me. He laid +his hand gently on Sir Anthony's sleeve, and interposed. "One moment," +he said mildly, "your nephew did not stay for the Church's blessing, I +remember. Perhaps he has scruples. There are people nowadays who have. +Let us hear if it be so." + +This time it was Sir Anthony who did not let me answer. + +"No, no," he cried hastily; "no, no; it is not so. He conforms, my +lord, he conforms. You conform, sir," he continued, turning fiercely +upon me, "do you not? Answer, sir." + +"Ah!" the Bishop put in with a sneer, "you conform, do you?" + +"I attend mass--to please my uncle," I replied boldly. + +"He was ill brought up as a child," Sir Anthony said hastily, speaking +in a tone which those below could not hear. "But you know all that, my +lord--you know all that. It is an old story to you. So I make, and I +pray you to make for the sake of the house, some allowance. He +conforms; he undoubtedly conforms." + +"Enough!" Gardiner assented. "The rest is for the good priest here, +whose ministrations will no doubt in time avail. But a word with this +young gentleman, Sir Anthony, on another subject. If it was not to the +holy office he objected, perhaps it was to the Queen's Chancellor, or +to the Queen?" He raised his voice with the last words and bent his +brows, so that I could scarcely believe it was the same man speaking. +"Eh, sir, was that so?" he continued severely, putting aside Sir +Anthony's remonstrance and glowering at me. "It may be that we have a +rebel here instead of a heretic." + +"God forbid!" cried the knight, unable to contain himself. It was +clear that he repented already of his ill-timed discipline. "I will +answer for it that we have no Wyatts here, my lord." + +"That is well!" the Chancellor replied. "That is well!" he repeated, +his eyes leaving me and roving the hall with so proud a menace in +their glance that all quailed, even the fool. "That is very well," he +said, drumming on the table with his fingers; "but let Master Francis +speak for himself." + +"I never heard," said I boldly--I had had a moment for thought--"that +Sir Thomas Wyatt had any following in this country. None to my +knowledge. As for the Queen's marriage with the Prince of Spain, which +was the ground, as we gathered here, of Wyatt's rising with the +Kentish folk, it seems a matter rather for the Queen's grace than her +subjects. But if that be not so, I, for my part, would rather have +seen her married to a stout Englishman--ay, or to a Frenchman." + +"And why, young gentleman?" + +"Because I would we kept at peace with France. We have more to gain by +fighting Spain than fighting France," I answered bluntly. + +My uncle held up his hands. "The boy is clean mad!" he groaned. "Who +ever heard of such a thing? With all France, the rightful estate of +her Majesty, waiting to be won back, he talks of fighting Spain! And +his own grandmother was a Spaniard!" + +"I am none the less an Englishman for that!" I said; whereon there was +a slight murmur of applause in the hall below. "And for France," I +continued, carried away by this, "we have been fighting it, off and +on, as long as men remember; and what are we the better? We have only +lost what we had to begin. Besides, I am told that France is five +times stronger than it was in Henry the Fifth's time, and we should +only spend our strength in winning what we could not hold. While as to +Spain----" + +"Ay, as to Spain?" grumbled Sir Anthony, forgetting his formidable +neighbor, and staring at me with eyes of wonder. "Why, my father +fought the French at Guinegate, and my grandfather at Cherbourg, and +his father at Agincourt! But there! As to Spain, you popinjay?" + +"Why, she is conquering here," I answered warmly, "and colonizing +there among the newly-discovered countries of the world, and getting +all the trade and all the seaports and all the gold and silver; and +Spain after all is a nation with no greater strength of men than +England. Ay, and I hear," I cried, growing more excited and raising my +voice, "that now is our time or never! The Spaniards and the +Portuguese have discovered a new world over seas. + + + "A Castilla y a Leon + Nuevo mundo dio Coton! + + +say they; but depend upon it, every country that is to be rich and +strong in the time that is coming must have part in it. We cannot +conquer either Spain or France; we have not men enough. But we have +docks and sailors, and ships in London and Fowey, and Bristol and the +Cinque Ports, enough to fight Spain over the great seas, and I say, +'Have at her!'" + +"What next?" groaned Sir Anthony piteously. "Did man ever hear such +crackbrained nonsense?" + +But I think it was not nonsense, for his words were almost lost in the +cry which ran through the hall as I ceased speaking--a cry of English +voices. One moment my heart beat high and proudly with a new sense of +power; the next, as a shadow of a cloud falls on a sunny hillside, the +cold sneer on the statesman's face fell on me and chilled me. His set +look had neither thawed nor altered, his color had neither come nor +gone. "You speak your lesson well, lad," he said. "Who taught you +statecraft?" + +I grew smaller, shrinking with each word he uttered; and faltered, and +was dumb. + +"Come," he said, "you see but a little way; yet country lads do not +talk of Fowey and Bristol! Who primed you?" + +"I met a Master Sebastian Cabot," I said reluctantly at last, when he +had pressed me more than once, "who stayed a while at a house not far +from here, and had been Inspector of the Navy to King Edward. He had +been a seaman seventy years, and he talked----" + +"Too fast!" said Gardiner, with a curt nod. "But enough, I understand. +I know the man. He is dead." + +He was silent then, and seemed to have fallen suddenly into thought, +as a man well might who had the governing of a kingdom on his +shoulders. + +Seemingly he had done with me. I looked at Sir Anthony. "Ay, go!" he +said irritably, waving me off. "Go!" + +And I went. The ordeal was over, and over so successfully that I felt +the humiliation of the afternoon cheap at the price of this triumph; +for, as I stepped down, there was a buzz around me, a murmur of +congratulation and pride and excitement. On every Coton face I marked +a flush, in every Coton eye I read a sparkle, and every flush and +every sparkle was for me. Even the Chancellor's secretaries, grave, +down-looking men, all secrecy and caution, cast curious glances at me, +as though I were something out of the common; and the Chancellor's +pages made way for me with new-born deference. "There is for country +wits!" I heard Baldwin Moor cry gleefully, while the man who put food +before me murmured of "the Cludde bull-pup!" If I read in Father +Carey's face, as indeed I did, solicitude as well as relief and +gladness, I marked the latter only, and hugged a natural pride to my +breast. When Martin Luther said boldly that it was not only Bishop +could fill a bowl, it was by an effort I refrained from joining in the +laugh which followed. + +For an hour I enjoyed this triumph, and did all but brag of it. +Especially I wished Petronilla had witnessed it. At the end of that +time--_Finis_, as the book says. I was crossing the courtyard, +one-half of which was bathed in a cold splendor of moonlight, and was +feeling the first sobering touch of the night air on my brow, when I +heard some one call out my name. I turned, to find one of the +Chancellor's servants, a sleek, substantial fellow, with a smug mouth, +at my elbow. + +"What is it?" I said. + +"I am bidden to fetch you at once, Master Cludde," he answered, a +gleam of sly malice peeping through the gravity of his demeanor. "The +Chancellor would see you in his room, young sir." + + + + + CHAPTER II. + + IN THE BISHOP'S ROOM. + + +Chancellor was lodged in the great chamber on the southern side of the +courtyard, a room which we called the Tapestried Chamber, and in which +tradition said that King Henry the Sixth had once slept. It was on the +upper floor, and for this reason free from the damp air which in +autumn and winter rose from the moat and hung about the lower range of +rooms. It was besides, of easy access from the hall, a door in the +gallery of the latter leading into an anteroom, which again opened +into the Tapestried Chamber; while a winding staircase, starting from +a dark nook in the main passage of the house, also led to this state +apartment, but by another and more private door. + +I reached the antechamber with a stout heart in my breast, though a +little sobered by my summons, and feeling such a reaction from the +heat of a few minutes before as follows a plunge into cold water. In +the anteroom I was bidden to wait while the great man's will was +taken, which seemed strange to me, then unused to the mummery of Court +folk. But before I had time to feel much surprise, the inner door was +opened, and I was told to enter. + +The great room, which I had seldom seen in use, had now an appearance +quite new to me. A dull red fire was glowing comfortably on the +hearthstone, before which a posset stool was standing. Near this, +seated at a table strewn with a profusion of papers and documents, was +a secretary writing busily. The great oaken bedstead, with its nodding +tester, lay in a background of shadows, which played about the figures +broidered on the hangings, or were lost in the darkness of the +corners; while near the fire, in the light cast by the sconces fixed +above the hearth, lay part of the Chancellor's equipment. The fur rugs +and cloak of sable, the saddle-bags, the dispatch-boxes, and the +silver chafing-dish, gave an air of comfort to this part of the room. +Walking up and down in the midst of these, dictating a sentence at +every other turn, was Stephen Gardiner. + +As I entered the clerk looked up, holding his pen suspended. His +master, by a quick nod, ordered him to proceed. Then, signaling to me +in a like silent fashion his command that I should stand by the +hearth, the Bishop resumed his task of composition. + +For some minutes my interest in the man, whom I had now an opportunity +of scrutinizing unmarked and at my leisure, took up all my attention. +He was at this time close on seventy, but looked, being still tall and +stout, full ten years younger. His face, square and sallow, was indeed +wrinkled and lined; his eyes lay deep in his head, his shoulders were +beginning to bend, the nape of his neck to become prominent. He had +lost an inch of his full height. But his eyes still shone brightly, +nor did any trace of weakness mar the stern character of his mouth, or +the crafty wisdom of his brow. The face was the face of a man austere, +determined, perhaps cruel; of a man who could both think and act. + +My curiosity somewhat satisfied, I had leisure, first to wonder why I +had been sent for, and then to admire the prodigious number of books +and papers which lay about, more, indeed, than I had ever seen +together in my life. From this I passed to listening, idly at first, +and with interest afterward, to the letter which the Chancellor was +dictating. It seemed from its tenor to be a letter to some person in +authority, and presently one passage attracted my attention, so that I +could afterward recall it word for word. + +"I do not think"--the Chancellor pronounced, speaking in a sonorous +voice, and the measured tone of one whose thoughts lie perfectly +arranged in his head--"that the Duchess Katherine will venture to take +the step suggested as possible. Yet Clarence's report may be of +moment. Let the house, therefore, be watched if anything savoring of +flight be marked, and take notice whether there be a vessel in the +Pool adapted to her purpose. A vessel trading to Dunquerque would be +most likely. Leave her husband till I return, when I will deal with +him roundly." + +I missed what followed. It was upon another subject, and my thoughts +lagged behind, being wholly taken up with the Duchess Katherine and +her fortunes. I wondered who she was, young or old, and what this step +could be she was said to meditate, and what the jargon about the Pool +and Dunquerque meant. I was still thinking of this when I was aroused +by an abrupt silence, and looking up found that the Chancellor was +bending over the papers on the table. The secretary was leaving the +room. + +As the door closed behind him, Gardiner rose from his stooping posture +and came slowly toward me, a roll of papers in his hand. "Now," he +said tranquilly, seating himself in an elbow-chair which stood in +front of the hearth, "I will dispose of your business, Master Cludde." + +He paused, looking at me in a shrewd, masterful way, much as if--I +thought at the time, little knowing how near the truth my fancy +went--I were a beast he was about to buy; and then he went on. "I have +sent for you, Master Francis," he said dryly, fixing his piercing eyes +on mine, "because I think that this country does not suit your health. +You conform, but you conform with a bad grace, and England is no +longer the place for such. You incite the commonalty against the +Queen's allies, and England is not the place for such. Do not +contradict me; I have heard you myself. Then," he continued, grimly +thrusting out his jaw in a sour smile, "you misname those whom the +Queen honors; and were Dr. Stephens--you take me, Master Malapert? +such a man as his predecessors, you would rue the word. For a trifle +scarce weightier Wolsey threw a man to rot six years in a dungeon, +boy!" + +I changed color, yet not so much in fear--though it were vain to say I +did not tremble--as in confusion. I had called him Dr. Stephens +indeed, but it had been to Petronilla only. I stood, not knowing what +to say, until he, after lingering on his last words to enjoy my +misery, resumed his subject. "That is one good and sufficient +reason--mind you, sufficient, boy--why England is no place for you. +For another, the Cluddes have always been soldiers; and you--though +readier-witted than some, which comes of your Spanish grandmother--are +quicker with a word than a thought, and a blow than either. Of which +afterward. Well, England is going to be no place for soldiers. Please +God, we have finished with wars at home. A woman's reign should be a +reign of peace." + +I hardened my heart at that. A reign of peace, forsooth, when the week +before we had heard of a bishop burned at Gloucester! I hardened my +heart. I would not be frightened, though I knew his power, and knew +how men in those days misused power. I would put a bold face on the +matter. + +He had not done with me yet, however. "One more reason I have," he +continued, stopping me as I was about to speak, "for saying that +England will not suit your health, Master Cludde. It is that I do not +want you here. Abroad, you may be of use to me, and at the same time +carve out your own fortune. You have courage and can use a sword, I +hear. You understand--and it is a rare gift with Englishmen--some +Spanish, which I suppose your father or your uncle taught you. You +can--so Father Carey says--construe a Latin sentence if it be not too +difficult. You are scarcely twenty, and you will have me for your +patron. Why, were I you, boy, with your age and your chances, I would +die Prince or Pope! Ay, I would!" He stopped speaking, his eyes on +fire. Nay, a ring of such real feeling flashed out in his last words +that, though I distrusted him, though old prejudices warned me against +him, and, at heart a Protestant, I shuddered at things I had heard of +him, the longing to see the world and have adventures seized upon me. +Yet I did not speak at once. He had told me that my tongue outran my +thoughts, and I stood silent until he asked me curtly, "Well, sirrah, +what do you say?" + +"I say, my Lord Bishop," I replied respectfully, "that the prospect +you hold out to me would tempt me were I a younger son, or without +those ties of gratitude which hold me to my uncle. But, my father +excepted, I am Sir Anthony's only heir." + +"Ah, your father!" he said contemptuously. "You do well to remind me +of him, for I see you are forgetting the first part of my speech in +thinking of the last! Should I have promised first and threatened +later? You would fain, I expect, stay here and woo Mistress +Petronilla? Do I touch you there? You think to marry the maid and be +master of Coton End in God's good time, do you? Then listen, Francis +Cludde. Neither one nor the other, neither maid nor meadow will be +yours should you stay here till Doomsday!" + +I started, and stood glowering on him, speechless with anger and +astonishment. + +"You do not know who you are," he continued, leaning forward with a +sudden movement, and speaking with one claw-like finger extended, and +a malevolent gleam in his eyes. "You called me a nameless child a +while ago, and so I was; yet have I risen to be ruler of England, +Master Cludde! But you--I will tell you which of us is base-born. I +will tell you who and what your father, Ferdinand Cludde, was. He was, +nay, he is, my tool, spy, jackal! Do you understand, boy? Your father +is one of the band of foul creatures to whom such as I, base-born +though I be, fling the scraps from their table! He is the vilest of +the vile men who do my dirty work, my lad." + +He had raised his voice and hand in passion, real or assumed. He +dropped them as I sprang forward. "You lie!" I cried, trembling all +over. + +"Easy! easy!" he said. He stopped me where I was by a gesture of stern +command. "Think!" he continued, calmly and weightily. "Has any one +ever spoken to you of your father since the day seven years ago, when +you came here, a child, brought by a servant? Has Sir Anthony talked +of him? Has any servant named his name to you. Think, boy. If +Ferdinand Cludde be a father to be proud of, why does his brother make +naught of him?" + +"He is a Protestant," I said faintly. Faintly, because I had asked +myself this very question not once but often. Sir Anthony so seldom +mentioned my father that I had thought it strange myself. I had +thought it strange, too, that the servants, who must well remember +Ferdinand Cludde, never talked to me about him. Hitherto I had always +been satisfied to answer, "He is a Protestant"; but face to face with +this terrible old man and his pitiless charge, the words came but +faintly from my lips. + +"A Protestant," he replied solemnly. "Yes, this comes of schism, that +villains cloak themselves in it, and parade for true men. A Protestant +you call him, boy? He has been that, ay, and all things to all men; +and he has betrayed all things and all men. He was in the great +Cardinal's confidence, and forsook him, when he fell, for Cromwell. +Thomas Cromwell, although they were of the same persuasion, he +betrayed to me. I have here, here"--and he struck the letters in his +hand a scornful blow--"the offer he made to me, and his terms. Then +eight years back, when the late King Edward came to the throne, I too +fell on evil days, and Master Cludde abandoned me for my Lord +Hertford, but did me no great harm. But he did something which blasted +him--blasted him at last." + +He paused. Had the fire died down, or was it only my imagination +that the shadows thickened round the bed behind him, and closed in +more nearly on us, leaving his pale grim face to confront me--his +face, which seemed the paler and grimmer, the more saturnine and +all-mastering, for the dark frame which set it off? + +"He did this," he continued slowly, "which came to light and blasted +him. He asked, as the price of his service in betraying me, his +brother's estate." + +"Impossible!" I stammered. "Why, Sir Anthony----" + +"What of Sir Anthony, you would ask?" the Chancellor replied, +interrupting me with savage irony. "Oh, he was a Papist! an obstinate +Papist! He might go hang--or to Warwick Jail!" + +"Nay, but this at least, my lord, is false!" I cried. "Palpably false! +If my father had so betrayed his own flesh and blood, should I be +here? Should I be at Coton End? You say this happened eight years ago. +Seven years ago I came here. Would Sir Anthony----" + +"There are fools everywhere," the old man sneered. "When my Lord +Hertford refused your father's suit, Ferdinand began--it is his +nature--to plot against him. He was found out, and execrated by +all--for he had been false to all--he fled for his life. He left you +behind, and a servant brought you to Coton End, where Sir Anthony took +you in." + +I covered my face. Alas! I believed him; I, who had always been so +proud of my lineage, so proud of the brave traditions of the house and +its honor, so proud of Coton End and all that belonged to it! Now, if +this were true, I could never again take pleasure in one or the other. +I was the son of a man branded as a turncoat and an informer, of one +who was the worst of traitors! I sank down on the settle behind me and +hid my face. Another might have thought less of the blow, or, with +greater knowledge of the world, might have made light of it as a thing +not touching himself. But on me, young as I was, and proud, and as yet +tender, and having done nothing myself, it fell with crushing force. + +It was years since I had seen my father, and I could not stand forth +loyally and fight his battle, as a son his father's friend and +familiar for years might have fought it. On the contrary, there was so +much which seemed mysterious in my past life, so much that bore out +the Chancellor's accusation, that I felt a dread of its truth even +before I had proof. Yet I would have proof. "Show me the letters!" I +said harshly; "show me the letters, my lord!" + +"You know your father's handwriting?" + +"I do." + +I knew it, not from any correspondence my father had held with me, but +because I had more than once examined with natural curiosity the +wrappers of the dispatches which at intervals of many months, +sometimes of a year, came from him to Sir Anthony. I had never known +anything of the contents of the letters, all that fell to my share +being certain formal messages, which Sir Anthony would give me, +generally with a clouded brow and a testy manner that grew genial +again only with the lapse of time. + +Gardiner handed me the letters, and I took them and read one. One was +enough. That my father! Alas! alas! No wonder that I turned my face to +the wall, shivering as with the ague, and that all about me--except +the red glow of the fire, which burned into my brain--seemed darkness! +I had lost the thing I valued most. I had lost at a blow everything of +which I was proud. The treachery that could flush that worn face +opposite to me, lined as it was with statecraft, and betray the wily +tongue into passion, seemed to me, young and impulsive, a thing so +vile as to brand a man's children through generations. + +Therefore I hid my face in the corner of the settle, while the +Chancellor gazed at me a while in silence, as one who had made an +experiment might watch the result. + +"You see now, my friend," he said at last, almost gently, "that you +may be base-born in more ways than one. But be of good cheer; you are +young, and what I have done you may do. Think of Thomas Cromwell--his +father was naught. Think of the old Cardinal--my master. Think of the +Duke of Suffolk--Charles Brandon, I mean. He was a plain gentleman, +yet he married a queen. More, the door which they had to open for +themselves I will open for you--only, when you are inside, play the +man, and be faithful." + +"What would you have me do?" I whispered hoarsely. + +"I would have you do this," he answered. "There are great things +brewing in the Netherlands, boy--great changes, unless I am mistaken. +I have need of an agent there, a man, stout, trusty, and, in +particular, unknown, who will keep me informed of events. If you will +be that agent, I can procure for you--and not appear in the matter +myself--a post of pay and honor in the Regent's Guards. What say you +to that, Master Cludde? A few weeks and you will be making history, +and Coton End will seem a mean place to you. Now, what do you say?" + +I was longing to be away and alone with my misery, but I forced myself +to reply patiently. + +"With your leave I will give you my answer to-morrow, my lord," I +said, as steadily as I could; and I rose, still keeping my face turned +from him. + +"Very well," he replied, with apparent confidence. But he watched me +keenly, as I fancied. "I know already what your answer will be. Yet +before you go I will give you a piece of advice which in the new +life you begin to-night will avail you more than silver, more than +gold--ay, more than steel, Master Francis. It is this: Be prompt to +think, be prompt to strike, be slow to speak! Mark it well! It is a +simple recipe, yet it has made me what I am, and may make you greater. +Now go!" + +He pointed to the little door opening on the staircase, and I bowed +and went out, closing it carefully behind me. On the stairs, moving +blindly in the dark, I fell over some one who lay sleeping there, and +who clutched at my leg. I shook him off, however, with an exclamation +of rage, and, stumbling down the rest of the steps, gained the open +air. Excited and feverish, I shrank with aversion from the confinement +of my room, and, hurrying over the drawbridge, sought at random the +long terrace by the fish-pools, on which the moonlight fell, a sheet +of silver, broken only by the sundial and the shadows of the rose +bushes. The night air, weeping chill from the forest, fanned my cheeks +as I paced up and down. One way I had before me the manor-house--the +steep gable-ends, the gateway tower, the low outbuildings and +cornstacks and stables--and flanking these the squat tower and nave of +the church. I turned. Now I saw only the water and the dark line of +trees which fringed the further bank. But above these the stars were +shining. + +Yet in my mind there was no starlight. There all was a blur of wild +passions and resolves. Shame and an angry resentment against those who +had kept me so long in ignorance--even against Sir Anthony--were my +uppermost feelings. I smarted under the thought that I had been living +on his charity. I remembered many a time when I had taken much on +myself, and he had smiled, and the remembrance stung me. I longed to +assert myself and do something to wipe off the stain. + +But should I accept the Bishop's offer? It never crossed my mind to do +so. He had humiliated me, and I hated him for it. Longing to cut +myself off from my old life, I could not support a patron who would +know, and might cast in my teeth the old shame. A third reason, too, +worked powerfully with me as I became cooler. This was the conviction +that, apart from the glitter which the old man's craft had cast about +it, the part he would have me play was that of a spy--an informer! A +creature like--I dared not say like my father, yet I had him in my +mind. And from this, from the barest suspicion of this, I shrank as +the burned puppy from the fire--shrank with fierce twitching of nerve +and sinew. + +Yet if I would not accept his offer it was clear I must fend for +myself. His threats meant as much as that, and I smiled sternly as I +found necessity at one with inclination. I would leave Coton End at +once, and henceforth I would fight for my own hand. I would have no +name until I had made for myself a new one. + +This resolve formed, I turned and went back to the house, and felt my +way to my own chamber. The moonlight poured through the lattice and +fell white on my pallet. I crossed the room and stood still. Down the +middle of the coverlet--or my eyes deceived me--lay a dark line. + +I stooped mechanically to see what this was and found my own sword +lying there; the sword which Sir Anthony had given me on my last +birthday. But how had it come there? As I took it up something soft +and light brushed my hand and drooped from the hilt. Then I +remembered. A week before I had begged Petronilla to make me a +sword-knot of blue velvet for use on state occasions. No doubt she had +done it, and had brought the sword back this evening, and laid it +there in token of peace. + +I sat down on my bed, and softer and kindlier thoughts came to me; +thoughts of love and gratitude, in which the old man who had been a +second father to me had part. I would go as I had resolved, but I +would return to them when I had done a thing worth doing; something +which should efface the brand that lay on me now. + +With gentle fingers I disengaged the velvet knot and thrust it into my +bosom. Then I tied about the hilt the old leather thong, and began to +make my preparations; considering this or that route while I hunted +for my dagger and changed my doublet and hose for stouter raiment and +long, untanned boots. I was yet in the midst of this, when a knock at +the door startled me. + +"Who is there?" I asked, standing erect. + +For answer Martin Luther slid in, closing the door behind him. The +fool did not speak, but turning his eyes first on one thing and then +on another nodded sagely. + +"Well?" I growled. + +"You are off, master," he said, nodding again. "I thought so." + +"Why did you think so?" I retorted impatiently. + +"It is time for the young birds to fly when the cuckoo begins to +stir," he answered. + +I understood him dimly and in part. "You have been listening," I said +wrathfully, my cheeks burning. + +"And been kicked in the face like a fool for my pains," he answered. +"Ah, well, it is better to be kicked by the boot you love than kissed +by the lips you hate. But Master Francis, Master Francis!" he +continued in a whisper. + +He said no more, and I looked up. The man was stooping slightly +forward, his pale face thrust out. There was a strange gleam in his +eyes, and his teeth grinned in the moonlight. Thrice he drew his +finger across his lean knotted throat. "Shall I?" he hissed, his hot +breath reaching me, "shall I?" + +I recoiled from him shuddering. It was a ghastly pantomime, and it +seemed to me that I saw madness in his eyes. + +"In Heaven's name, no!" I cried--"No! Do you hear, Martin? No!" + +He stood back on the instant, as a dog might have done being reproved. +But I could hardly finish in comfort after that with him standing +there, although when I next turned to him he seemed half asleep and +his eyes were dull and fishy as ever. + +"One thing you can do," I said brusquely. Then I hesitated, looking +round me. I wished to send something to Petronilla, some word, some +keepsake. But I had nothing that would serve a maid's purpose, and +could think of nothing until my eye lit on a house-martin's nest, +lying where I had cast it on the window-sill. I had taken it down that +morning because the droppings during the last summer had fallen on the +lead work, and I would not have it used when the swallows returned. It +was but a bit of clay, and yet it would serve. She would guess its +meaning. + +I gave it into his hands. "Take this," I said, "and give it privately +to Mistress Petronilla. Privately, you understand. And say nothing to +any one, or the Bishop will flay your back, Martin." + + + + + CHAPTER III. + + "DOWN WITH PURVEYORS!" + + +The first streak of daylight found me already footing it through the +forest by paths known to few save the woodcutters, but with which many +a boyish exploration had made me familiar. From Coton End the London +road lies plain and fair through Stratford-on-Avon and Oxford. But my +plan, the better to evade pursuit, was, instead, to cross the forest +in a northeasterly direction, and, passing by Warwick, to strike the +great north road between Coventry and Daventry, which, running thence +southeastward, would take me as straight as a bird might fly through +Dunstable, St. Albans, and Barnet, to London. My baggage consisted +only of my cloak, sword, and dagger; and for money I had but a gold +angel, and a few silver bits of doubtful value. But I trusted that +this store, slender as it was, would meet my charges as far as London. +Once there I must depend on my wits either for providence at home or a +passage abroad. + +Striding steadily up and down hill, for Arden Forest is made up of +hills and dells which follow one another as do the wave and trough of +the sea, only less regularly, I made my way toward Wootton Wawen. As +soon as I espied its battlemented church lying in a wooded bottom +below me, I kept a more easterly course, and, leaving Henley-in-Arden +far to the left, passed down toward Leek Wootton. The damp, dead +bracken underfoot, the leafless oaks and gray sky overhead, nay the +very cry of the bittern fishing in the bottoms, seemed to be at one +with my thoughts; for these were dreary and sad enough. + +But hope and a fixed aim form no bad makeshifts for happiness. +Striking the broad London road as I had purposed I slept that +night at Ryton Dunsmoor, and the next at Towcester; and the third day, +which rose bright and frosty, found me stepping gayly southward, +travel-stained indeed, but dry and whole. My spirits rose with the +temperature. For a time I put the past behind me, and found amusement +in the sights of the road; in the heavy wagons and long trains of +pack-horses, and the cheery greetings which met me with each mile. +After all, I had youth and strength, and the world before me; and +particularly Stony Stratford, where I meant to dine. + +There was one trouble common among wayfarers which did not touch me; +and that was the fear of robbers, for he would be a sturdy beggar who +would rob an armed foot-passenger for the sake of an angel; and the +groats were gone. So I felt no terrors on that account, and even when +about noon I heard a horseman trot up behind me, and rein in his horse +so as to keep pace with me at a walk, step for step--a thing which +might have seemed suspicious to some--I took no heed of him. I was +engaged with my first view of Stratford, and did not turn my head. We +had walked on so for fifty paces or more, before it struck me as odd +that the man did not pass me. + +Then I turned, and shading my eyes from the sun, which stood just over +his shoulder, said, "Good-day, friend." + +"Good-day, master," he answered. + +He was a stout fellow, looking like a citizen, although he had a sword +by his side, and wore it with an air of importance which the sunshine +of opportunity might have ripened into a swagger. His dress was plain; +and he sat a good hackney as a miller's sack might have sat it. His +face was the last thing I looked at. When I raised my eyes to it, I +got an unpleasant start. The man was no stranger. I knew him in a +moment for the messenger who had summoned me to the Chancellor's +presence. + +The remembrance did not please me; and reading in the fellow's sly +look that he recognized me, and thought he had made a happy discovery +on finding me, I halted abruptly. He did the same. + +"It is a fine morning," he said, taken aback by my sudden movement, +but affecting an indifference which the sparkle in his eye belied. "A +rare day for the time of year." + +"It is," I answered, gazing steadily at him. + +"Going to London? Or may be only to Stratford?" he hazarded. He +fidgeted uncomfortably under my eye, but still pretended ignorance of +me. + +"That is as may be," I answered. + +"No offense, I am sure," he said. + +I cast a quick glance up and down the road. There happened to be no +one in sight. "Look here!" I replied, stepping forward to lay my hand +on the horse's shoulder--but the man reined back and prevented me, +thereby giving me a clew to his character--"you are in the service of +the Bishop of Winchester?" + +His face fell, and he could not conceal his disappointment at being +recognized. "Well, master," he answered reluctantly, "perhaps I am, +and perhaps I am not." + +"That is enough," I said shortly. "And you know me. You need not lie +about it, man, for I can see you do. Now, look here, Master Steward, +or whatever your name may be----" + +"It is Master Pritchard," he put in sulkily; "and I am not ashamed of +it." + +"Very well. Then let us understand one another. Do you mean to +interfere with me?" + +He grinned. "Well, to be plain, I do," he replied, reining his horse +back another step. "I have orders to look out for you, and have you +stopped if I find you. And I must do my duty, sir; I am sworn to it, +Master Cludde." + +"Right," said I calmly; "and I must do mine, which is to take care of +my skin." And I drew my sword and advanced upon him with a flourish. +"We will soon decide this little matter," I added grimly, one eye on +him and one on the empty road, "if you will be good enough to defend +yourself." + +But there was no fight in the fellow. By good luck, too, he was so +startled that he did not do what he might have done with safety; +namely, retreat, and keep me in sight until some passers-by came up. +He did give back, indeed, but it was against the bank. "Have a care," +he cried in a fume, his eye following my sword nervously; he did not +try to draw his own. "There is no call for fighting, I say." + +"But I say there is," I replied bluntly. "Call and cause! Either you +fight me, or I go where I please." + +"You may go to Bath for me!" he spluttered, his face the color of a +turkey-cock's wattles with rage. + +"Do you mean it, my friend?" I said, and I played my point about his +leg, half-minded to give him a little prod by way of earnest. "Make up +your mind." + +"Yes!" he shrieked out, suspecting my purpose, and bouncing about in +his saddle like a parched pea. "Yes, I say!" he roared. "Do you hear +me? You go your way, and I will go mine." + +"That is a bargain," I said quietly; "and mind you keep to it." + +I put up my sword with my face turned from him, lest he should see the +curl of my lip and the light in my eyes. In truth, I was uncommonly +well pleased with myself, and was thinking that if I came through all +my adventures as well, I should do merrily. Outwardly, however, I +tried to ignore my victory, and to make things as easy as I could for +my friend--if one may call a man who will not fight him a friend, a +thing I doubt. "Which way are you going?" I asked amicably; "to +Stratford?" + +He nodded, for he was too sulky to speak. + +"All right!" I said cheerfully, feeling that my dignity could take +care of itself now. "Then so far we may go together. Only do you +remember the terms. After dinner each goes his own way." + +He nodded again, and we turned, and went on in silence, eying one +another askance, like two ill-matched dogs coupled together. But, +luckily, our forced companionship did not last long, a quarter of a +mile and a bend in the road bringing us to the first low, gray houses +of Stratford; a long, straggling village it seemed, made up of inns +strewn along the road, like beads threaded on a rosary. And to be +sure, to complete the likeness, we came presently upon an ancient +stone cross standing on the green. I pulled up in front of this with a +sigh of pleasure, for on either side of it, one facing the other, was +an inn of the better class. + +"Well," I said, "which shall it be? The Rose and Crown, or the Crown +without the Rose?" + +"Choose for yourself," he answered churlishly. "I go to the other." + +I shrugged my shoulders. After all, you cannot make a silk purse out +of a sow's ear, and if a man has not courage he is not likely to have +good-fellowship. But the words angered me, nevertheless, for a shabby, +hulking fellow lounging at my elbow overheard them and grinned; a +hiccoughing, blear-eyed man he was as I had ever met, with a red nose +and the rags of a tattered cassock about him. I turned away in +annoyance, and chose the "Crown" at hazard; and pushing my way through +a knot of horses that stood tethered at the door, went in, leaving the +two to their devices. + + +I found a roaring fire in the great room, and three or four yeomen +standing about it, drinking ale. But I was hot from walking, so, after +saluting them and ordering my meal, I went and sat for choice on a +bench by the window away from the fire. The window was one of a kind +common in Warwickshire houses; long and low and beetle-browed, the +story above projecting over it. I sat here a minute looking idly out +at the inn opposite, a heavy stone building with a walled courtyard +attached to it; such an inn as was common enough about the time of the +Wars of the Roses when wayfarers looked rather for safety than +comfort. Presently I saw a boy come out of it and start up the road at +a run. Then, a minute later, the ragged fellow I had seen on the green +came out and lurched across the road. He seemed to be making, though +uncertainly, for my inn, and, sure enough, just as my bread and +bacon--the latter hot and hissing--were put before me, he staggered +into the room, bringing a strong smell of ale and onions with him. +"_Pax vobiscum!_" he said, leering at me with tipsy solemnity. + +I guessed what he was--a monk, one of those unfortunates still to be +found here and there up and down the country, whom King Henry, when he +put down the monasteries, had made homeless. I did not look on the +class with much favor, thinking that for most of them the cloister, +even if the Queen should succeed in setting the abbeys on their legs +again, would have few attractions. But I saw that the simple farmers +received his scrap of Latin with respect, and I nodded civilly as I +went on with my meal. + +I was not to get off so easily, however. He came and planted himself +opposite to me. + +"_Pax vobiscum_, my son," he repeated. "The ale is cheap here, and +good." + +"So is the ham, good father," I replied cheerfully, not pausing in my +attack on the victuals. "I will answer for so much." + +"Well, well," the knave replied with ready wit, "I breakfasted early. +I am content. Landlord, another plate and a full tankard. The young +gentleman would have me dine with him." + +I could not tell whether to be angry or to laugh at his impudence. + +"The gentleman says he will answer for it!" repeated the rascal, with +a twinkle in his eye, as the landlord hesitated. He was by no means so +drunk as he looked. + +"No, no, father," I cried, joining in the general laugh into which the +farmers by the fire broke. "A cup of ale is in reason, and for that I +will pay, but for no more. Drink it, and wish me Godspeed." + +"I will do more than that, lad," he answered. Swaying to and fro +my cup, which he had seized in his grasp, he laid his hand on the +window-ledge beside me, as though to steady himself, and stooped until +his coarse, puffy face was but a few inches from mine. "More than +that," he whispered hoarsely; and his eyes, peering into mine, were +now sober and full of meaning. "If you do not want to be put in the +stocks or worse, make tracks! Make tracks, lad!" he continued. "Your +friend over there--he is a niggardly oaf--has sent for the hundredman +and the constable, and you are the quarry. So the word is, Go! That," +he added aloud, standing erect again, with a drunken smile, "is for +your cup of ale; and good coin too!" + +For half a minute I sat quite still; taken aback, and wondering, while +the bacon cooled on the plate before me, what I was to do. I did not +doubt the monk was telling the truth. Why should he lie to me? And I +cursed my folly in trusting to a coward's honor or a serving-man's +good faith. But lamentations were useless. What was I to do? I had no +horse, and no means of getting one. I was in a strange country, and to +try to escape on foot from pursuers who knew the roads, and had the +law on their side, would be a hopeless undertaking. Yet to be haled +back to Coton End a prisoner--I could not face that. Mechanically I +raised a morsel of bacon to my lips, and as I did so, a thought +occurred to me--an idea suggested by some talk I had heard the evening +before at Towcester. + +Fanciful as the plan was, I snatched at it; and knowing each instant +to be precious, took my courage in my hand--and my tankard. "Here," I +cried, speaking suddenly and loudly, "here is bad luck to purveyors, +Master Host!" + +There were a couple of stablemen within hearing, lounging in the +doorway, besides the landlord and his wife and the farmers. A villager +or two also had dropped in, and there were two peddlers lying half +asleep in the corner. All these pricked up their ears more or less at +my words. But, like most country folk, they were slow to take in +anything new or unexpected; and I had to drink afresh and say again, +"Here is bad luck to purveyors!" before any one took it up. + +Then the landlord showed he understood. + +"Ay, so say I!" he cried, with an oath. "Purveyors, indeed! It is such +as they give the Queen a bad name." + +"God bless her!" quoth the monk loyally. + +"And drown the purveyors!" a farmer exclaimed. + +"They were here a year ago, and left us as bare as a shorn sheep," +struck in a strapping villager, speaking at a white heat, but telling +me no news; for this was what I had heard at Towcester the night +before. "The Queen should lie warm if she uses all the wool they took! +And the pack-horses they purveyed to carry off the plunder--why, the +packmen avoid Stratford ever since as though we had the Black Death! +Oh, down with the purveyors, say I! The first that comes this way I +will show the bottom of the Ouse. Ay, that I will, though I hang for +it!" + +"Easy! easy, Tom Miller!" the host interposed, affecting an air of +assurance, even while he cast an eye of trouble at his flitches. "It +will be another ten years before they harry us again. There is +Potter's Pury! They never took a tester's worth from Potter's Pury! +No, nor from Preston Gobion! But they will go to them next, depend +upon it!" + +"I hope they will," I said, with a world of gloomy insinuation in my +words. "But I doubt it!" + +And this time my hint was not wasted. The landlord changed color. +"What are you driving at, master?" he asked mildly, while the others +looked at me in silence and waited for more. + +"What if there be one across the road now!" I said, giving way to the +temptation, and speaking falsely--for which I paid dearly afterward. +"A purveyor, I mean, unless I am mistaken in him, or he tells lies. He +has come straight from the Chancellor, white wand, warrant, and all. +He is taking his dinner now, but he has sent for the hundredman, so I +guess he means business." + +"For the hundredman?" repeated the landlord, his brows meeting. + +"Yes; unless I am mistaken." + +There was silence for a moment. Then the man they called Tom Miller +dashed his cap on the floor and, folding his arms defiantly, looked +round on his neighbors. "He has come, has he!" he roared, his face +swollen, his eyes bloodshot. "Then I will be as good as my word! Who +will help? Shall we sit down and be shorn like sheep, as we were +before, so that our children lay on the bare stones, and we pulled the +plow ourselves? Or shall we show that we are free Englishmen, and not +slaves of Frenchmen? Shall we teach Master Purveyor not to trouble us +again? Now, what say you, neighbors?" + +So fierce a growl of impatience and anger rose round me as at once +answered the question. A dozen red faces glared at me and at one +another, and from the very motion and passion of the men as they +snarled and threatened, the room seemed twice as full as it was. Their +oaths and cries of encouragement, not loud, but the more dangerous for +that, the fresh burst of fury which rose as the village smith and +another came in and learned the news, the menacing gestures of a score +of brandished fists--these sights, though they told of the very effect +at which I had aimed, scared as well as pleased me. I turned red and +white, and hesitated, fearing that I had gone too far. + +The thing was done, however; and, what was more, I had soon to take +care of myself. At the very moment when the hubbub was at its loudest +I felt a chill run down my back as I met the monk's eye, and, reading +in it whimsical admiration, read in it something besides, and that was +an unmistakable menace. "Clever lad!" the eye said. "I will expose +you," it threatened. + +I had forgotten him--or, at any rate, that my acting would be +transparent enough to him holding the clew in his hand--and his look +was like the shock of cold water to me. But it is wonderful how keen +the wits grow on the grindstone of necessity. With scarcely a second's +hesitation I drew out my only piece of gold, and unnoticed by the +other men, who were busy swearing at and encouraging one another, I +disclosed a morsel of it. The monk's crafty eye glistened. I laid my +finger on my lips. + +He held up two fingers. + +I shook my head and showed an empty palm. I had no more. He nodded; +and the relief that nod gave me was great. Before I had time, however, +to consider the narrowness of my escape, a movement of the crowd--for +the news had spread with strange swiftness, and there was now a crowd +assembled which more than filled the room--proclaimed that the +purveyor had come out, and was in the street. + +The room was nearly emptied at a rush. Though I prudently remained +behind, I could, through the open window, hear as well as see what +passed. The leading spirits had naturally struggled out first, and +were gathered, sullen and full of dangerous possibilities, about the +porch. + + +I suppose the Bishop's messenger saw in them nothing but a crowd of +country clowns, for he came hectoring toward the door, smiting his +boot with his whip, and puffing out his red cheeks mightily. He felt +brave enough, now that he had dined and had at his back three stout +constables sworn to keep the Queen's peace. + +"Make way! Make way, there, do you hear?" he cried in a husky, pompous +voice. "Make way!" he repeated, lightly touching the nearest man with +his switch. "I am on the Queen's service, boobies, and must not be +hindered." + +The man swore at him, but did not budge, and the bully, brought up +thus sharply, awoke to the lowering faces and threatening looks which +confronted him. He changed color a little. But the ale was still in +him, and, forgetting his natural discretion, he thought to carry +matters with a high hand. "Come! come!" he exclaimed angrily. "I have +a warrant, and you resist me at your peril. I have to enter this +house. Clear the way, Master Hundredman, and break these fellows' +heads if they withstand you." + +A growl as of a dozen bulldogs answered him, and he drew back, as a +child might who has trodden on an adder. "You fools!" he spluttered, +glaring at them viciously. "Are you mad? Do you know what you are +doing? Do you see this?" He whipped out from some pocket a short white +staff and brandished it. "I come direct from the Lord Chancellor and +upon his business, do you hear, and if you resist me it is treason. +Treason, you dogs!" he cried, his rage getting the better of him, "and +like dogs you will hang for it. Master Hundredman, I order you to take +in your constables and arrest that man!" + +"What man?" quoth Tom Miller, eying him fixedly. + +"The stranger who came in an hour ago, and is inside the house." + +"Him, he means, who told about the purveyor across the road," +explained the monk with a wink. + +That wink sufficed. There was a roar of execration, and in the +twinkling of an eye the Jack-in-office, tripped up this way and shoved +that, was struggling helplessly in the grasp of half a dozen men, who +fought savagely for his body with the Hundredman and the constables. + +"To the river! To the Ouse with him!" yelled the mob. "In the Queen's +name!" shouted the officers. But these were to those as three to a +score, and taken by surprise besides, and doubtful of the rights of +the matter. Yet for an instant, as the crowd went reeling and fighting +down the road, they prevailed; the constables managed to drag their +leader free, and I caught a glimpse of him, wild-eyed and frantic with +fear, his clothes torn from his back, standing at bay like some +animal, and brandishing his staff in one hand, a packet of letters in +the other. + +"I have letters, letters of state!" he screamed shrilly. "Let me +alone, I tell you! Let me go, you curs!" + +But in vain. The next instant the mob were upon him again. The packet +of letters went one way, the staff was dashed another. He was thrown +down and plucked up again, and hurried, bruised and struggling, toward +the river, his screams for mercy and furious threats rising shrilly +above the oaths and laughter. + +I felt myself growing pale as scream followed scream. "They will kill +him!" I exclaimed trembling, and prepared to follow. "I cannot see +this done." + +But the monk, who had returned to my side, grasped my arm. "Don't be a +fool," he said sharply. "I will answer for it they will not kill him. +Tom Miller is not a fool, though he is angry. He will duck him, and +let him go. But I will trouble you for that bit of gold, young +gentleman." + +I gave it to him. + +"Now," he continued with a leer, "I will give you a hint in return. If +you are wise, you will be out of this county in twelve hours. Tethered +to the gate over there is a good horse which belongs to a certain +purveyor now in the river. Take it! There is no one to say you nay. +And begone!" + +I looked hard at him for a minute, my heart beating fast. This was +horse-stealing. And horse-stealing was a hanging matter. But I had +done so much already that I felt I might as well be hanged for a sheep +as for a lamb. I was not sure that I had not incited to treason, and +what was stealing a horse beside that? "I will do it!" I said +desperately. + +"Don't lose time, then," quoth my mentor. + +I went out then and there, and found he had told the truth. Every soul +in the place had gone to see the ducking, and the street was empty. +Kicked aside in the roadway lay the bundle of letters, soiled but not +torn, and in the gutter was the staff. I stooped and picked up one and +the other--in for a lamb, in for a sheep! and they might be useful +some day. Then I jumped into the saddle, and twitched the reins off +the hook. + +But before I could drive in the spurs, a hand fell on the bridle, and +the monk's face appeared at my knee. "Well?" I said, glaring down at +him--I was burning to be away. + +"That is a good cloak you have got there," he muttered hurriedly. +"There, strapped to the saddle, you fool. You do not want that, give +it me. Do you hear? Quick, give it me," he cried, raising his voice +and clutching at it fiercely, his face dark with greed and fear. + +"I see," I replied, as I unstrapped it. "I am to steal the horse that +you may get the cloak. And then you will lay the lot on my shoulders. +Well, take it!" I cried, "and go your way as fast as you can." + +Throwing it at him as hard as I could, I shook up the reins and went +off down the road at a gallop. The wind whistled pleasantly past my +ears. The sounds of the town grew faint and distant. Each bound of the +good hack carried me farther and farther from present danger, farther +and farther from the old life. In the exhilaration and excitement of +the moment I forgot my condition; forgot that I had not a penny-piece +in my pocket, and that I had left an unpaid bill behind me; forgot +even that I rode a--well, a borrowed horse. + + + + + CHAPTER IV. + + TWO SISTERS OF MERCY. + + +A younger generation has often posed me finely by asking, "What, Sir +Francis! Did you not see _one_ bishop burned? Did you not know _one_ +of the martyrs? Did you _never_ come face to face with Queen Mary?" To +all which questions I have one answer, No, and I watch small eyes grow +large with astonishment. But the truth is, a man can only be at one +place at a time. And though, in this very month of February, 1555, +Prebendary Rogers--a good, kindly man, as I have heard, who had a wife +and nine children--was burned in Smithfield in London for religion, +and the Bishop of Gloucester suffered in his own city, and other +inoffensive men were burned to death, and there was much talk of these +things, and in thousands of breasts a smoldering fire was kindled +which blazed high enough by and by--why, I was at Coton End, or on the +London Road, at the time, and learned such things only dimly and by +hearsay. + +But the rill joins the river at last; and ofttimes suddenly and at a +bound, as it were. On this very day, while I cantered easily southward +with my face set toward St. Albans, Providence was at work shaping a +niche for me in the lives of certain people who were at the time as +unconscious of my existence as I was of theirs. In a great house in +the Barbican in London there was much stealthy going and coming on +this February afternoon and evening. Behind locked doors, and in fear +and trembling, mails were being packed and bags strapped, and fingers +almost too delicate for the task were busy with nails and hammers, +securing this and closing that. The packers knew nothing of me, nor I +of them. Yet but for me all that packing would have been of no avail; +and but for them my fate might have been very different. Still, the +sound of the hammer did not reach my ears, or, doing so, was covered +by the steady tramp of the roadster; and no vision, so far as I ever +heard, of a dusty youth riding Londonward came between the secret +workers and their task. + +I had made up my mind to sleep at St. Albans that night, and for this +reason, and for others relating to the Sheriff of Buckinghamshire, in +which county Stony Stratford lies, I pushed on briskly. I presently +found time, however, to examine the packet of letters of which I had +made spoil. On the outer wrapper I found there was no address, only an +exhortation to be speedy. Off this came, therefore, without ceremony, +and was left in the dirt. Inside I found two sealed epistles, each +countersigned on the wrapper, "Stephen Winton." + +"Ho! ho!" said I. "I did well to take them." + +Over the signature on the first letter--it seemed to be written on +parchment--were the words, "Haste! haste! haste!" This was the thicker +and heavier of the two, and was addressed to Sir Maurice Berkeley, at +St. Mary Overy's, Southwark, London. I turned it over and over in my +hands, and peeped into it, hesitating. Twice I muttered, "All is fair +in love and war!" And at last, with curiosity fully awake, and a +glance behind me to make sure that the act was unobserved, I broke the +seal. The document proved to be as short and pithy as it was +startling. It was an order commanding Sir Maurice Berkeley forthwith +in the Queen's name, and by the authority of the Council, and so on, +and so on, to arrest Katherine Willoughby de Eresby, Duchess of +Suffolk, and to deliver her into the custody of the Lieutenant of the +Tower, "These presents to be his waranty for the detention of the said +Duchess of Suffolk until her Grace's pleasure in the matter be known." + +When it was too late I trembled to think what I had done. To meddle +with matters of state might be more dangerous a hundred times than +stealing horses, or even than ducking the Chancellor's messenger! +Seeing at this moment a party of travelers approach, I crammed the +letter into my pocket, and rode by them with a red face, and a tongue +that stuttered so feebly that I could scarcely return their greetings. +When they had gone by I pulled out the warrant again, having it in my +mind to tear it up without a moment's delay--to tear it into the +smallest morsels, and so get rid of a thing most dangerous. But the +great red seal dangling at the foot of the parchment caught my eye, +and I paused to think. It was so red, so large, so imposing, it seemed +a pity to destroy it. It must surely be good for something. I folded +up the warrant again, and put it away in my safest pocket. Yes, it +might be good for something. + +I took out the other letter. It was bound with green ribbon and sealed +with extreme care, being directed simply to Mistress Clarence--there +was no address. But over Gardiner's signature on the wrapper were the +words, "These, on your peril, very privately." + +I turned it over and over, and said the same thing about love and war, +and even repeated to myself my old proverb about a sheep and a lamb. +But somehow I could not do it. The letter was a woman's letter; the +secret, her secret; and though my fingers itched as they hovered about +the seals, my cheek tingled too. So at last, with a muttered, "What +would Petronilla say?" I put it away unopened in the pocket where the +warrant lay. The odds were immense that Mistress Clarence would never +get it; but at least her secret should remain hers, my honor mine! + + +It was dark when I rode, thoroughly jaded, into St. Albans. I was +splashed with mud up to the waist and wetted by a shower, and looked, +I have no doubt, from the effect of my journeying on foot and +horseback, as disreputable a fellow as might be. The consciousness too +that I was without a penny, and the fear lest, careful as I had been +to let no one outsrip me, the news of the riot at Stratford might have +arrived, did not tend to give me assurance. I poked my head timidly +into the great room, hoping that I might have it to myself. To my +disgust it was full of people. Half-a-dozen travelers and as many +townsfolk were sitting round the fire, talking briskly over their +evening draught. Yet I had no choice. I was hungry, and the thing had +to be done, and I swaggered in, something of the sneak, no doubt, +peeping through my bravado. I remarked, as I took my seat by the fire +and set to drying myself, that I was greeted by a momentary silence, +and that two or three of the company began to eye me suspiciously. + +There was one man, who sat on the settle in the warmest corner of the +chimney, who seemed in particular to resent my damp neighborhood. His +companions treated him with so much reverence, and he snubbed them so +regularly, that I wondered who he was; and presently, listening to the +conversation which went on round me, I had my curiosity satisfied. He +was no less a personage than the Bailiff of St. Albans, and his manner +befitted such a man; for it seemed to indicate that he thought himself +heir to all the powers of the old Abbots under whose broad thumb his +father and grandfather had groaned. + +My conscience pricking me, I felt some misgiving when I saw him, after +staring at me and whispering to two or three of his neighbors, beckon +the landlord aside. His big round face and burly figure gave him a +general likeness to bluff King Hal and he appeared to be aware of this +himself, and to be inclined to ape the stout king's ways, which, I +have heard my uncle say, were ever ways heavy for others' toes. For a +while, however, seeing my supper come in, I forgot him. The bare-armed +girl who brought it to me, and in whom my draggled condition seemed to +provoke feelings of a different nature, lugged up a round table to the +fire. On this she laid my meal, not scrupling to set aside some of the +snug dry townsfolk. Then she set a chair for me well in the blaze, and +folding her arms in her apron stood to watch me fall to. I did so with +a will, and with each mouthful of beef and draught of ale, spirit and +strength came back to me. The cits round me might sneer and shake +their heads, and the travelers smile at my appetite. In five minutes I +cared not a whit! I could give them back joke for joke, and laugh with +the best of them. + +Indeed, I had clean forgotten the Bailiff, when he stalked back to his +place. But the moment our eyes met, I guessed there was trouble afoot. +The landlord came with him and stood looking at me, sending off the +wench with a flea in her ear; and I felt under his eye an +uncomfortable consciousness that my purse was empty. Two or three late +arrivals, to whom I suppose Master Bailiff had confided his +suspicions, took their stand also in a half-circle and scanned me +queerly. Altogether it struck me suddenly that I was in a tight place, +and had need of my wits. + +"Ahem!" said the Bailiff abruptly, taking skillful advantage of a lull +in the talk. "Where from last, young man?" He spoke in a deep choky +voice, and, if I was not mistaken, he winked one of his small eyes in +the direction of his friends, as though to say, "Now see me pose him!" + +But I only put another morsel in my mouth. For a moment indeed the +temptation to reply "Towcester," seeing that such a journey over a +middling road was something to brag of before the Highway Law came in, +almost overcame me. But in time I bethought me of Stephen Gardiner's +maxim, "Be slow to speak!" and I put another morsel in my mouth. + +The Bailiff's face grew red, or rather, redder. "Come, young man, did +you hear me speak?" he said pompously. "Where from last?" + +"From the road, sir," I replied, turning to him as if I had not heard +him before. "And a very wet road it was." + +A man who sat next me chuckled, being apparently a stranger like +myself. But the Bailiff puffed himself into a still more striking +likeness to King Henry, and including him in his scowl shouted at me, +"Sirrah! don't bandy words with me! Which way did you come along the +road, I asked." + +It was on the tip of my tongue to answer saucily, "The right way!" But +I reflected that I might be stopped; and to be stopped might mean to +be hanged at worst, and something very unpleasant at best. So I +controlled myself, and answered--though the man's arrogance was +provoking enough--"I have come from Stratford, and I am going to +London. Now you know as much as I do." + +"Do I?" he said, with a sneer and a wink at the landlord. + +"Yes, I think so," I answered patiently. + +"Well, I don't!" he retorted, in vulgar triumph. "I don't. It is my +opinion that you have come from London." + +I went on with my supper. + +"Do you hear?" he asked pompously, sticking his arms akimbo and +looking round for sympathy. "You will have to give an account of +yourself, young man. We will have no penniless rogues and sturdy +vagabonds wandering about St. Albans." + +"Penniless rogues do not go a-horseback," I answered. But it was +wonderful how my spirits sank again under that word "penniless." It +hit me hard. + +"Wait a bit," he said, raising his finger to command attention for his +next question. "What is your religion, young man?" + +"Oh!" I replied, putting down my knife and looking open scorn at him, +"you are an inquisitor, are you?" At which words of mine there was a +kind of stir. "You would burn me as I hear they burned Master Sandars +at Coventry last week, would you? They were talking about it down the +road." + +"You will come to a bad end, young man!" he retorted viciously, his +outstretched finger shaking as if the palsy had seized him. For this +time my taunt had gone home, and more than one of the listeners +standing on the outer edge of the group, and so beyond his ken, had +muttered "shame." More than one face had grown dark. "You will come to +a bad end!" he repeated. "If it be not here, then somewhere else! It +is my opinion that you have come from London, and that you have been +in trouble. There is a hue-and-cry out for a young fellow just your +age, and a cock of your hackle, I judge, who is wanted for heresy. A +Londoner too. You do not leave here until you have given an account of +yourself, Master Jack-a-Dandy!" The party had all risen round me, and +some of the hindmost had got on benches to see me the better. Among +these, between two bacon flitches, I caught a glimpse of the +serving-maid's face as she peered at me, pale and scared, and a queer +impulse led me to nod to her--a reassuring little nod. I found myself +growing cool and confident, seeing myself so cornered. + +"Easy! easy!" I said, "let a man finish his supper and get warmed in +peace." + +"Bishop Bonner will warm you!" cried the Bailiff. + +"I dare say--as they warm people in Spain!" I sneered. + +"He will be Bishop Burner to you!" shrieked the Bailiff, almost beside +himself with rage at being so bearded by a lad. + +"Take care!" I retorted. "Do not you speak evil of dignitaries, or you +will be getting into trouble!" + +He fairly writhed under this rejoinder. + +"Landlord!" he spluttered. "I shall hold you responsible! If this +person leaves your house, and is not forthcoming when wanted, you will +suffer for it!" + +The landlord scratched his head, being a good-natured fellow; but a +bailiff is a bailiff, especially at St. Albans. And I was muddy and +travel-stained, and quick of my tongue for one so young; which the +middle-aged never like, though the old bear it better. He hesitated. + +"Do not be a fool, Master Host!" I said. "I have something +here----" and I touched my pocket, which happened to be near my +sword-hilt--"that will make you rue it if you interfere with me!" + +"Ho! ho!" cried the Bailiff, in haste and triumph. "So that is his +tone! We have a tavern-brawler here, have we! A young swashbuckler! +His tongue will not run so fast when he finds his feet in the stocks. +Master landlord, call the watch! Call the watch at once, I command +you!" + +"You will do so at your peril!" I said sternly. Then, seeing that my +manner had some effect upon all save the angry official, I gave way to +the temptation to drive the matter home and secure my safety by the +only means that seemed possible. It is an old story that one deception +leads inevitably to another. I solemnly drew out the white staff I had +taken from the apparitor. "Look here!" I continued, waving it. "Do you +see this, you booby? I am traveling in the Queen's name, and on her +service. By special commission, too, from the Chancellor! Is that +plain speaking enough for you? And let me tell you, Master Bailiff," I +added, fixing my eye upon him, "that my business is private, and that +my Lord of Winchester will not be best pleased when he hears how I +have had to declare myself. Do you think the Queen's servants go +always in cloth of gold, you fool? The stocks indeed!" + +I laughed out loudly and without effort, for there never was anything +so absurd as the change in the Bailiff's visage. His color fled, his +cheeks grew pendulous, his lip hung loose. He stared at me, gasping +like a fish out of water, and seemed unable to move toe or finger. The +rest enjoyed the scene, as people will enjoy a marvelous sudden stroke +of fortune. It was as good as a stage pageant to them. They could not +take their eyes from the pocket in which I had replaced my wand, and +continued, long after I had returned to my meal, to gaze at me in +respectful silence. The crestfallen Bailiff presently slipped out, and +I was left cock of the walk, and for the rest of the evening enjoyed +the fruits of victory. + +They proved to be more substantial than I had expected, for, as I was +on my way upstairs to bed, the landlord preceding me with a light, a +man accosted me, and beckoned me aside mysteriously. + +"The Bailiff is very much annoyed," he said, speaking in a muffled +voice behind his hand, while his eyes peered into mine. + +"Well, what is that to me?" I replied, looking sternly at him. I was +tired and sleepy after my meal. "He should not make such a fool of +himself." + +"Tut, tut, tut, tut! You misunderstood me, young sir," the man +answered, plucking my sleeve as I turned away. "He regrets the +annoyance he has caused you. A mistake, he says, a pure mistake, and +he hopes you will have forgotten it by morning." Then, with a skillful +hand, which seemed not unused to the task, he slid two coins into my +palm. I looked at them, for a moment not perceiving his drift. Then I +found they were two gold angels, and I began to understand. "Ahem!" I +said, fingering them uneasily. "Yes. Well, well, I will look over it, +I will look over it! Tell him from me," I continued, gaining +confidence as I proceeded with my new role, "that he shall hear no +more about it. He is zealous--perhaps over zealous!" + +"That is it!" muttered the envoy eagerly; "that is it, my dear sir! +You see perfectly how it is. He is zealous. Zealous in the Queen's +service!" + +"To be sure; and so I will report him. Tell him that so I will report +him. And here, my good friend, take one of these for yourself," I +added, magnificently giving him back half my fortune--young donkey +that I was. "Drink to the Queen's health; and so good-night to you." + +He went away, bowing to the very ground, and, when the landlord +likewise had left me, I was very merry over this, being in no mood for +weighing words. The world seemed--to be sure, the ale was humming in +my head, and I was in the landlord's best room--easy enough to +conquer, provided one possessed a white staff. The fact that I had no +right to mine only added--be it remembered I was young and foolish--to +my enjoyment of its power. I went to bed in all comfort with it under +my pillow, and slept soundly, untroubled by any dream of a mischance. +But when did a lie ever help a man in the end? + + +When I awoke, which I seemed to do on a sudden, it was still dark. I +wondered for a moment where I was, and what was the meaning of the +shouting and knocking I heard. Then, discerning the faint outline of +the window, I remembered the place in which I had gone to bed, and I +sat up and listened. Some one--nay, several people--were drumming and +kicking against the wooden doors of the inn-yard, and shouting +besides, loud enough to raise the dead. In the next room to mine I +caught the grumbling voices of persons disturbed, like myself, from +sleep. And by and by a window was opened, and I heard the landlord ask +what was the matter. + +"In the Queen's name!" came the loud, impatient answer, given in a +voice that rose above the ring of bridles and the stamping of iron +hoofs, "open! and that quickly, Master Host. The watch are here, and +we must search." + +I waited to hear no more. I was out of bed, and huddling on my +clothes, and thrusting my feet into my boots, like one possessed. My +heart was beating as fast as if I had been running in a race, and my +hands were shaking with the shock of the alarm. The impatient voice +without was Master Pritchard's, and it rang with all the vengeful +passion which I should have expected that gentleman, duped, ducked, +and robbed, to be feeling. There would be little mercy to be had at +his hands. Moreover, my ears, grown as keen for the moment as the +hunted hare's, distinguished the tramping of at least half-a-dozen +horses, so that it was clear that he had come with a force at his +back. Resistance would be useless. My sole chance lay in flight--if +flight should still be possible. + +Even in my haste I did not forsake the talisman which had served me so +well, but stayed an instant to thrust it into my pocket. The Cluddes +have, I fancy, a knack of keeping cool in emergencies, getting, +indeed, the cooler the greater the stress. + +By this time the inn was thoroughly aroused. Doors were opening and +shutting on all sides of me, and questions were being shouted in +different tones from room to room. In the midst of the hubbub I heard +the landlord come out muttering, and go downstairs to open the door. +Instantly I unlatched mine, slipped through it stealthily, sneaked a +step or two down the passage, and then came plump in the dark against +some one who was moving as softly as myself. The surprise was +complete, and I should have cried out at the unexpected collision, had +not the unknown laid a cold hand on my mouth, and gently pushed me +back into my room. + +Here there was now a faint glimmer of dawn, and by this I saw that my +companion was the serving-maid. "Hist!" she said, speaking under her +breath, "Is it you they want?" + +I nodded. + +"I thought so," she muttered. "Then you must get out through your +window. You cannot pass them. They are a dozen or more, and armed. +Quick! knot this about the bars. It is no great depth to the bottom, +and the ground is soft from the rain." + +She tore, as she spoke, the coverlet from the bed, and, twisting it +into a kind of rope, helped me to secure one corner of it about the +window-bar. "When you are down," she whispered, "keep along the wall +to the right until you come to a haystack. Turn to the left there--you +will have to ford the water--and you will soon be clear of the town. +Look about you then, and you will see a horse-track, which leads to +Elstree, running in a line with the London Road, but a mile from it +and through woods. At Elstree any path to the left will take you to +Barnet, and not two miles lost." + +"Heaven bless you!" I said, turning from the gloom, the dark sky, and +driving scud without to peer gratefully at her. "Heaven bless you for +a good woman!" + +"And God keep you for a bonny boy," she whispered. + +I kissed her, forcing into her hands--a thing the remembrance of which +is very pleasant to me to this day--my last piece of gold. + + +A moment more, and I stood unhurt, but almost up to my knees in mud, +in an alley bounded on both sides, as far as I could see, by blind +walls. Stopping only to indicate by a low whistle that I was safe, I +turned and sped away as fast as I could run in the direction which she +had pointed out. There was no one abroad, and in a shorter time than I +had expected I found myself outside the town, traveling over a kind of +moorland tract bounded in the distance by woods. + +Here I picked up the horse-track easily enough, and without stopping, +save for a short breathing space, hurried along it, to gain the +shelter of the trees. So far so good! I had reason to be thankful. But +my case was still an indifferent one. More than once in getting out of +the town I had slipped and fallen. I was wet through, and plastered +with dirt owing to these mishaps; and my clothes were in a woeful +plight. For a time excitement kept me up, however, and I made good +way, warmed by the thought that I had again baffled the great Bishop. +It was only when the day had come, and grown on to noon, and I saw no +sign of any pursuers, that thought got the upper hand. Then I began to +compare, with some bitterness of feeling, my present condition--wet, +dirty, and homeless--with that which I had enjoyed only a week before; +and it needed all my courage to support me. Skulking, half famished, +between Barnet and Tottenham, often compelled to crouch in ditches or +behind walls while travelers went by, and liable each instant to have +to leave the highway and take to my heels, I had leisure to feel; and +I did feel, more keenly, I think, that afternoon than at any later +time, the bitterness of fortune. I cursed Stephen Gardiner a dozen +times, and dared not let my thoughts wander to my father. I had said +that I would build my house afresh. Well, truly I was building it from +the foundation. + +It added very much to my misery that it rained all day a cold, +half-frozen rain. The whole afternoon I spent in hiding, shivering and +shaking in a hole under a ledge near Tottenham; being afraid to go +into London before nightfall, lest I should be waited for at the gate +and be captured. Chilled and bedraggled as I was, and weak through +want of food which I dared not go out to beg, the terrors of capture +got hold of my mind and presented to me one by one every horrible form +of humiliation, the stocks, the pillory, the cart-tail; so that even +Master Pritchard, could he have seen me and known my mind, might have +pitied me; so that I loathe to this day the hours I spent in that foul +hiding-place. Between a man's best and worse, there is little but a +platter of food. + +The way this was put an end to, I well remember. An old woman came +into the field where I lay hid, to drive home a cow. I had had my eyes +on this cow for at least an hour, having made up my mind to milk it +for my own benefit as soon as the dusk fell. In my disappointment at +seeing it driven off, and also out of a desire to learn whether the +old dame might not be going to milk it in a corner of the pasture, in +which case I might still get an after taste, I crawled so far out of +my hole that, turning suddenly, she caught sight of me. I expected to +see her hurry off, but she did not. She took a long look, and then +came back toward me, making, however, as it seemed to me, as if she +did not see me. When she had come within a few feet of me, she looked +down abruptly, and our eyes met. What she saw in mine I can only +guess. In hers I read a divine pity. "Oh, poor lad!" she murmured; +"oh, you poor, poor lad!" and there were tears in her voice. + +I was so weak--it was almost twenty-four hours since I had tasted +food, and I had come twenty-four miles in the time--that at that I +broke down, and cried like a child. + +I learned later that the old woman took me for just the same person +for whom the Bailiff at St. Albans had mistaken me, a young apprentice +named Hunter, who had got into trouble about religion, and was at this +time hiding up and down the country; Bishop Bonner having clapped his +father into jail until the son should come to hand. But her kind heart +knew no distinction of creeds. She took me to her cottage as soon as +night fell, and warmed, and dried, and fed me. She did not dare to +keep me under her roof for longer than an hour or two, neither would I +have stayed to endanger her. But she sent me out a new man, with a +crust, moreover, in my pocket. A hundred times between Tottenham and +Aldersgate I said "God bless her!" And I say so now. + +So twice in one day, and that the gloomiest day of my life, I was +succored by a woman. I have never forgotten it. I have tried to keep +it always in mind; remembering too a saying of my uncle's, that "there +is nothing on earth so merciful as a good woman, or so pitiless as a +bad one!" + + + + + CHAPTER V. + + MISTRESS BERTRAM. + + +"Ding! ding! ding! Aid ye the poor! Pray for the dead! Five o'clock and +a murky morning." + +The noise of the bell, and the cry which accompanied it, roused me +from my first sleep in London, and that with a vengeance; the bell +being rung and the words uttered within three feet of my head. Where +did I sleep, then? Well, I had found a cozy resting-place behind some +boards which stood propped against the wall of a baker's oven in a +street near Moorgate. The wall was warm and smelt of new bread, and +another besides myself had discovered its advantages. This was the +watchman, who had slumbered away most of his vigil cheek by jowl with +me, but, morning approaching, had roused himself, and before he was +well out of his bed, certainly before he had left his bedroom, had +begun--the ungrateful wretch--to prove his watchfulness by disturbing +every one else. + +I sat up and rubbed my eyes, grinding my shoulders well against the +wall for warmth. I had no need to turn out yet, but I began to think, +and the more I thought the harder I stared at the planks six inches +before my nose. My thoughts turned upon a very knotty point; one that +I had never seriously considered before. What was I going to do next? +How was I going to live or to rear the new house of which I have made +mention? Hitherto I had aimed simply at reaching London. London had +paraded itself before my mind--though my mind should have known +better--not as a town of cold streets and dreary alleys and shops open +from seven to four with perhaps here and there a vacant place for an +apprentice; but as a gilded city of adventure and romance, in which a +young man of enterprise, whether he wanted to go abroad or to rise at +home, might be sure of finding his sword weighed, priced, and bought +up on the instant, and himself valued at his own standard. + +But London reached, the hoarding in Moorgate reached, and five o'clock +in the morning reached, somehow these visions faded rapidly. In the +cold reality left to me I felt myself astray. If I would stay at home, +who was going to employ me? To whom should I apply? What patron had I? +Or if I would go abroad, how was I to set about it? how find a vessel, +seeing that I might expect to be arrested the moment I showed my face +in daylight? + +Here all my experience failed me. I did not know what to do, though +the time had come for action, and I must do or starve. It had been all +very well when I was at Coton, to propose that I would go up to +London, and get across the water--such had been my dim notion--to the +Courtenays and Killigrews, who, with other refugees, Protestants for +the most part, were lying on the French coast, waiting for better +times. But now that I was in London, and as good as an outlaw myself, +I saw no means of going to them. I seemed farther from my goal than I +had been in Warwickshire. + +Thinking very blankly over this I began to munch the piece of bread +which I owed to the old dame at Tottenham; and had solemnly got +through half of it, when the sound of rapid footsteps--the footsteps +of women, I judged from the lightness of the tread--caused me to hold +my hand and listen. Whoever they were--and I wondered, for it was +still early, and I had heard no one pass since the watchman left +me--they came to a stand in front of my shelter, and one of them +spoke. Her words made me start; unmistakably the voice was a +gentlewoman's, such as I had not heard for almost a week. And at this +place and hour, on the raw borderland of day and night, a gentlewoman +was the last person I expected to light upon. Yet if the speaker were +not some one of station, Petronilla's lessons had been thrown away +upon me. + +The words were uttered in a low voice; but the planks in front of me +were thin, and the speaker was actually leaning against them. I caught +every accent of what seemed to be the answer to a question. "Yes, yes! +It is all right!" she said, a covert ring of impatience in her tone. +"Take breath a moment. I do not see him now." + +"Thank Heaven!" muttered another voice. As I had fancied, there were +two persons. The latter speaker's tone smacked equally of breeding +with the former's, but was rounder and fuller, and more masterful; and +she appeared to be out of breath. "Then perhaps we have thrown him off +the trail," she continued, after a short pause, in which she seemed to +have somewhat recovered herself. "I distrusted him from the first, +Anne--from the first. Yet, do you know, I never feared him as I did +Master Clarence; and as it was too much to hope that we should be rid +of both at once--they took good care of that--why, the attempt had to +be made while he was at home. But I always felt he was a spy." + +"Who? Master Clarence?" asked she who had spoken first. + +"Ay, he certainly. But I did not mean him, I meant Philip." + +"Well, I--I said at first, you remember, that it was a foolhardy +enterprise, mistress!" + +"Tut, tut, girl!" quoth the other tartly--this time the impatience lay +with her, and she took no pains to conceal it--"we are not beaten yet. +Come, look about! Cannot you remember where we are, nor which way the +river should be? If the dawn were come, we could tell." + +"But with the dawn----" + +"The streets would fill. True, and, Master Philip giving the alarm, we +should be detected before we had gone far. The more need, girl, to +lose no time. I have my breath again, and the child is asleep. Let us +venture one way or the other, and Heaven grant it be the right one!" + +"Let me see," the younger woman answered slowly, as if in doubt. "Did +we come by the church? No; we came the other way. Let us try this +turning, then." + +"Why, child, we came that way," was the decided answer. "What are you +thinking of? That would take us straight back into his arms, the +wretch! Come, come! you loiter," continued this, the more masculine +speaker, "and a minute may make all the difference between a prison +and freedom. If we can reach the Lion Wharf by seven--it is like to be +a dark morning and foggy--we may still escape before Master Philip +brings the watch upon us." + +They moved briskly away as she spoke, and her words were already +growing indistinct from distance, while I remained still, idly seeking +the clew to their talk and muttering over and over again the name +Clarence, which seemed familiar to me, when a cry of alarm, in which I +recognized one of their voices, cut short my reverie. I crawled with +all speed from my shelter, and stood up, being still in a line with +the boards, and not easily distinguishable. As she had said, it was a +dark morning; but the roofs of the houses--now high, now low--could be +plainly discerned against a gray, drifting sky wherein the first signs +of dawn were visible; and the blank outlines of the streets, which met +at this point, could be seen. Six or seven yards from me, in the +middle of the roadway, stood three dusky figures, of whom I judged the +nearer, from their attitudes, to be the two women. The farthest seemed +to be a man. + +I was astonished to see that he was standing cap in hand; nay, I was +disgusted as well, for I had crept out hot-fisted, expecting to be +called upon to defend the women. But, despite the cry I had heard, +they were talking to him quietly enough, as far as I could hear. And +in a minute or so I saw the taller woman give him something. + +He took it with a low bow, and appeared almost to sweep the dirt with +his bonnet. She waved her hand in dismissal, and he stood back still +uncovered. And--hey, presto! the women tripped swiftly away. + +By this time my curiosity was intensely excited, but for a moment I +thought it was doomed to disappointment. I thought that it was all +over. It was not, by any means. The man stood looking after them until +they reached the corner, and the moment they had passed it, he +followed. His stealthy manner of going, and his fashion of peering +after them, was enough for me. I guessed at once that he was dogging +them, following them unknown to them and against their will; and with +considerable elation I started after him, using the same precautions. +What was sauce for the geese was sauce for the gander! So we went, +two--one--one, slipping after one another through half a dozen dark +streets, tending generally southward. + +Following him in this way I seldom caught a glimpse of the women. The +man kept at a considerable distance behind them, and I had my +attention fixed on him. But once or twice, when, turning a corner, I +all but trod on his heels, I saw them; and presently an odd point +about them struck me. There was a white kerchief or something attached +apparently to the back of the one's cloak, which considerably assisted +my stealthy friend to keep them in view. It puzzled me. Was it a +signal to him? Was he really all the time acting in concert with them; +and was I throwing away my pains? Or was the white object which so +betrayed them merely the result of carelessness, and the lack of +foresight of women grappling with a condition of things to which they +were unaccustomed? Of course I could not decide this, the more as, at +that distance, I failed to distinguish what the white something was, +or even which of the two wore it. + +Presently I got a clew to our position, for we crossed Cheapside close +to Paul's Cross, which my childish memories of the town enabled me to +recognize, even by that light. Here my friend looked up and down, and +hung a minute on his heel before he followed the women, as if +expecting or looking for some one. It might be that he was trying to +make certain that the watch were not in sight. They were not, at any +rate. Probably they had gone home to bed, for the morning was growing. +And, after a momentary hesitation, he plunged into the narrow street +down which the women had flitted. + +He had only gone a few yards when I heard him cry out. The next +instant, almost running against him myself, I saw what had happened. +The women had craftily lain in wait for him in the little court into +which the street ran and had caught him as neatly as could be. When I +came upon them the taller woman was standing at bay with a passion +that was almost fury in her pose and gesture. Her face, from which the +hood of a coarse cloak had fallen back, was pale with anger; her gray +eyes flashed, her teeth glimmered. Seeing her thus, and seeing the +burden she carried under her cloak--which instinct told me was her +child--I thought of a tigress brought to bay. + +"You lying knave!" she hissed. "You Judas!" + +The man recoiled a couple of paces, and in recoiling nearly touched +me. + +"What would you?" she continued. "What do you want? What would you do? +You have been paid to go. Go, and leave us!" + +"I dare not," he muttered, keeping away from her as if he dreaded a +blow. She looked a woman who could deal a blow, a woman who could both +love and hate fiercely and openly--as proud and frank and haughty a +lady as I had ever seen in my life. "I dare not," he muttered +sullenly; "I have my orders." + +"Oh!" she cried, with scorn. "You have your orders, have you! The +murder is out. But from whom, sirrah? Whose orders are to supersede +mine? I would King Harry were alive, and I would have you whipped to +Tyburn. Speak, rogue; who bade you follow me?" + +He shook his head. + +She looked about her wildly, passionately, and I saw that she was at +her wits' end what to do, or how to escape him. But she was a woman. +When she next spoke there was a marvelous change in her. Her face had +grown soft, her voice low. "Philip," she said gently, "the purse was +light. I will give you more. I will give you treble the amount within +a few weeks, and I will thank you on my knees, and my husband shall be +such a friend to you as you have never dreamed of, if you will only go +home and be silent. Only that--or, better still, walk the streets an +hour, and then report that you lost sight of us. Think, man, think!" +she cried with energy--"the times may change. A little more, and Wyatt +had been master of London last year. Now the people are fuller of +discontent than ever, and these burnings and torturings, these +Spaniards in the streets--England will not endure them long. The times +will change. Let us go, and you will have a friend--when most you need +one." + +He shook his head sullenly. "I dare not do it," he said. And somehow I +got the idea that he was telling the truth, and that it was not the +man's stubborn nature only that withstood the bribe and the plea. He +spoke as if he were repeating a lesson and the master were present. + +When she saw that she could not move him, the anger, which I think +came more naturally to her, broke out afresh. "You will not, you +hound!" she cried. "Will neither threats nor promises move you?" + +"Neither," he answered doggedly; "I have my orders." + +So far, I had remained a quiet listener, standing in the mouth of the +lane which opened upon the court where they were. The women had taken +no notice of me; either because they did not see me, or because, +seeing me, they thought that I was a hanger-on of the man before them. +And he, having his back to me, and his eyes on them, could not see me. +It was a surprise to him--a very great surprise, I think--when I took +three steps forward, and gripped him by the scruff of his neck. + +"You have your orders, have you?" I muttered in his ear, as I shook +him to and fro, while the taller woman started back and the younger +uttered a cry of alarm at my sudden appearance. "Well, you will not +obey them. Do you hear? Your employer may go hang! You will do just +what these ladies please to ask of you." + +He struggled an instant; but he was an undersized man, and he could +not loosen the hold which I had secured at my leisure. Then I noticed +his hand going to his girdle in a suspicious way. "Stop that!" I said, +flashing before his eyes a short, broad blade, which had cut many a +deer's throat in Old Arden Forest. "You had better keep quiet, or it +will be the worse for you! Now, mistress," I continued, "you can +dispose of this little man as you please." + +"Who are you?" she said, after a pause; during which she had stared at +me in open astonishment. No doubt I was a wild-looking figure. + +"A friend," I replied. "Or one who would be such. I saw this fellow +follow you, and I followed him. For the last five minutes I have been +listening to your talk. He was not amenable to reason then, but I +think he will be now. What shall I do with him?" + +She smiled faintly, but did not answer at once, the coolness and +resolution with which she had faced him before failing her now, +possibly in sheer astonishment, or because my appearance at her side, +by removing the strain, sapped the strength. "I do not know," she said +at length, in a vague, puzzled tone. + +"Well," I answered, "you are going to the Lion Wharf, and----" + +"Oh, you fool!" she screamed out loud. "Oh, you fool!" she repeated +bitterly. "Now you have told him all." + +I stood confounded. My cheeks burned with shame, and her look of +contempt cut me like a knife. That the reproach was deserved I knew at +once, for the man in my grasp gave a start, which proved that the +information was not lost upon him. "Who told you?" the woman went on, +clutching the child jealously to her breast, as though she saw herself +menaced afresh. "Who told you about the Lion Wharf?" + +"Never mind," I answered gloomily. "I have made a mistake, but it is +easy to remedy it." And I took out my knife again. "Do you go on and +leave us." + +I hardly know whether I meant my threat or no. But my prisoner had no +doubts. He shrieked out--a wild cry of fear which rang round the empty +court--and by a rapid blow, despair giving him courage, he dashed the +hunting-knife from my hand. This done he first flung himself on me, +then tried by a sudden jerk to free himself. In a moment we were down +on the stones, and tumbling over one another in the dirt, while he +struggled to reach his knife, which was still in his girdle, and I +strove to prevent him. The fight was sharp, but it lasted barely a +minute. When the first effort of his despair was spent, I came +uppermost, and he was but a child in my hands. Presently, with my knee +on his chest, I looked up. The women were still there, the younger +clinging to the other. + +"Go! go!" I cried impatiently. Each second I expected the court to be +invaded, for the man had screamed more than once. + +But they hesitated. I had been forced to hurt him a little, and he was +moaning piteously. "Who are you?" the elder woman asked--she who had +spoken all through. + +"Nay, never mind that!" I answered. "Do you go! Go, while you can. You +know the way to the Wharf." + +"Yes," she answered. "But I cannot go and leave him at your mercy. +Remember he is a man, and has----" + +"He is a treacherous scoundrel," I answered, giving his throat a +squeeze. "But he shall have one more chance. Listen, sirrah!" I +continued to the man, "and stop that noise or I will knock out your +teeth with my dagger-hilt. Listen and be silent. I shall go with these +ladies, and I promise you this: If they are stopped or hindered on +their way, or if evil happen to them at that wharf, whose name you had +better forget, it will be the worse for you. Do you hear? You will +suffer for it, though there be a dozen guards about you! Mind you," I +added, "I have nothing to lose myself, for I am desperate already." + +He vowed--the poor craven--with his stuttering tongue, that he would +be true, and vowed it again and again. But I saw that his eyes did not +meet mine. They glanced instead at the knife-blade, and I knew, even +while I pretended to trust him, that he would betray us. My real hope +lay in his fears, and in this, that as the fugitives knew the way to +the wharf, and it could not now be far distant, we might reach it, +and go on board some vessel--I had gathered they were flying the +country--before this wretch could recover himself and get together a +force to stop us. That was my real hope, and in that hope only I left +him. + +We went as fast as the women could walk. I did not trouble them with +questions; indeed, I had myself no more leisure than enabled me to +notice their general appearance, which was that of comfortable +tradesmen's womenfolk. Their cloaks and hoods were plainly fashioned, +and of coarse stuff, their shoes were thick, and no jewel or scrap of +lace, peeping out, betrayed them. Yet there was something in their +carriage which could not be hidden, something which, to my eye, told +tales; so that minute by minute I became more sure that this was +really an adventure worth pursuing, and that London had kept a reward +in store for me besides its cold stones and inhospitable streets. + +The city was beginning to rouse itself. As we flitted through the +lanes and alleys which lie between Cheapside and the river, we met +many people, chiefly of the lower classes, on their way to work. Yet +in spite of this, we had no need to fear observation, for, though the +morning was fully come, with the light had arrived such a thick, +choking, yellow fog as I, being for the most part country-bred, had +never experienced. It was so dense and blinding that we had a +difficulty in keeping together, and even hand in hand could scarcely +see one another. In my wonder how my companions found their way, I +presently failed to notice their condition, and only remarked the +distress and exhaustion which one of them was suffering, when she +began, notwithstanding all her efforts, to lag behind. Then I sprang +forward, blaming myself much. "Forgive me," I said. "You are tired, +and no wonder. Let me carry the child, mistress." + +Exhausted as she was, she drew away from me jealously. + +"No," she panted. "We are nearly there. I am better now." And she +strained the child closer to her, as though she feared I might take it +from her by force. + +"Well, if you will not trust me," I answered, "let your friend carry +it for a time. I can see you are tired out." + +Through the mist she bent forward, and peered into my face, her eyes +scarcely a foot from mine. The scrutiny seemed to satisfy her. She +drew a long breath and held out her burden. "No," she said; "you shall +take him. I will trust you." + +I took the little wrapped-up thing as gently as I could. "You shall +not repent it, if I can help it, Mistress----" + +"Bertram," she said. + +"Mistress Bertram," I repeated. "Now let us get on and lose no time." + +A walk of a hundred yards or so brought us clear of the houses, and +revealed before us, in place of all else, a yellow curtain of fog. +Below this, at our feet, yet apparently a long way from us, was a +strange, pale line of shimmering light, which they told me was the +water. At first I could hardly believe this. But, pausing a moment +while my companions whispered together, dull creakings and groanings +and uncouth shouts and cries, and at last the regular beat of oars, +came to my ears out of the bank of vapor, and convinced me that we +really had the river before us. + +Mistress Bertram turned to me abruptly. "Listen," she said, "and +decide for yourself, my friend. We are close to the wharf now, and in +a few minutes shall know our fate. It is possible that we may be +intercepted at this point, and if that happen, it will be bad for me +and worse for any one aiding me. You have done us gallant service, but +you are young; and I am loath to drag you into perils which do not +belong to you. Take my advice, then, and leave us now. I would I could +reward you," she added hastily, "but that knave has my purse." + +I put the child gently back into her arms. "Good-by," she said, with +more feeling. "We thank you. Some day I may return to England, and +have ample power----" + +"Not so fast," I answered stiffly. "Did you think it possible, +mistress, that I would desert you now? I gave you back the child only +because it might hamper me, and will be safer with you. Come, let us +on at once to the wharf." + +"You mean it?" she said. + +"Of a certainty!" I answered, settling my cap on my head with perhaps +a boyish touch of the braggart. + +At any rate, she did not take me at once at my word; and her thought +for me touched me the more because I judged her--I know not exactly +why--to be a woman not over prone to think of others. "Do not be +reckless," she said slowly, her eyes intently fixed on mine. "I should +be sorry to bring evil upon you. You are but a boy." + +"And yet," I answered, smiling, "there is as good as a price upon my +head already. I should be reckless if I stayed here. If you will take +me with you, let us go. We have loitered too long already." + +She turned then, asking no questions; but she looked at me from time +to time in a puzzled way, as though she thought she ought to know +me--as though I reminded her of some one. Paying little heed to this +then, I hurried her and her companion down to the water, traversing a +stretch of foreshore strewn with piles of wood and stacks of barrels +and old rotting boats, between which the mud lay deep. Fortunately it +was high tide, and so we had not far to go. In a minute or two I +distinguished the hull of a ship looming large through the fog; and a +few more steps placed us safely on a floating raft, on the far side of +which the vessel lay moored. + +There was only one man to be seen lounging on the raft, and the +neighborhood was quiet. My spirits rose as I looked round. "Is this +the _Whelp?_" the tall lady asked. I had not heard the other open her +mouth since the encounter in the court. + +"Yes, it is the _Whelp_, madam," the man answered, saluting her and +speaking formally, and with a foreign accent. "You are the lady who is +expected?" + +"I am," she answered, with authority. "Will you tell the captain that +I desire to sail immediately, without a moment's delay? Do you +understand?" + +"Well, the tide is going out," quoth the sailor, dubiously, looking +steadily into the fog, which hid the river. "It has just turned, it is +true. But as to sailing----" + +She cut him short. "Go, go! man. Tell your captain what I say. And let +down a ladder for us to get on board." + +He caught a rope which hung over the side, and, swinging himself up, +disappeared. We stood below, listening to the weird sounds which came +off the water, the creaking and flapping of masts and canvas, the whir +of wings and shrieks of unseen gulls, the distant hail of boatmen. A +bell in the city solemnly tolled eight. The younger woman shivered. +The elder's foot tapped impatiently on the planks. Shut in by the +yellow walls of fog, I experienced a strange sense of solitude; it was +as if we three were alone in the world--we three who had come together +so strangely. + + + + + CHAPTER VI. + + MASTER CLARENCE. + + +We had stood thus for a few moments when a harsh voice, hailing us +from above, put an end to our several thoughts and forebodings. We +looked up and I saw half a dozen night-capped heads thrust over the +bulwarks. A rope ladder came hurtling down at our feet, and a man, +nimbly descending, held it tight at the bottom. "Now, madame!" he said +briskly. They all, I noticed, had the same foreign accent, yet all +spoke English; a singularity I did not understand, until I learned +later that the boat was the _Lions Whelp_, trading between London and +Calais, and manned from the latter place. + +Mistress Bertram ascended quickly and steadily, holding the baby in +her arms. The other made some demur, lingering at the foot of the +ladder and looking up as if afraid, until her companion chid her +sharply. Then she too went up, but as she passed me--I was holding one +side of the ladder steady--she shot at me from under her hood a look +which disturbed me strangely. + +It was the first time I had seen her face, and it was such a face as a +man rarely forgets. Not because of its beauty; rather because it was a +speaking face, a strange and expressive one, which the dark waving +hair, swelling in thick clusters upon either temple, seemed to +accentuate. The features were regular, but, the full red lips +excepted, rather thin than shapely. The nose, too, was prominent. But +the eyes! The eyes seemed to glorify the dark brilliant thinness of +the face, and to print it upon the memory. They were dark flashing +eyes, and their smile seemed to me perpetually to challenge, to allure +and repulse, and even to goad. Sometimes they were gay, more rarely +sad, sometimes soft, and again hard as steel. They changed in a moment +as one or another approached her. But always at their gayest, there +was a suspicion of weariness and fatigue in their depths. Or so I +thought later. + +Something of this flashed through my mind as I followed her up the +side. But once on board I glanced round, forgetting her in the novelty +of my position. The _Whelp_ was decked fore and aft only, the +blackness of the hold gaping amidships, spanned by a narrow gangway, +which served to connect the two decks. We found ourselves in the +forepart, amid coils of rope and windlasses and water-casks; +surrounded by half a dozen wild-looking sailors wearing blue knitted +frocks and carrying sheath-knives at their girdles. + +The foremost and biggest of these seemed to be the captain, although, +so far as outward appearances went, the only difference between him +and his crew lay in a marlin-spike which he wore slung to a thong +beside his knife. When I reached the deck he was telling a long story +to Mistress Bertram, and telling it very slowly. But the drift of it I +soon gathered. While the fog lasted he could not put to sea. + +"Nonsense!" cried my masterful companion, chafing at his slowness of +speech. "Why not? Would it be dangerous?" + +"Well, madam, it would be dangerous," he answered, more slowly than +ever. "Yes, it would be dangerous. And to put to sea in a fog? That is +not seamanship. And your baggage has not arrived." + +"Never mind my baggage!" she answered imperiously. "I have made other +arrangements for it. Two or three things I know came on board last +night. I want to start--to start at once, do you hear?" + +The captain shook his head, and said sluggishly that it was +impossible. Spitting on the deck he ground his heel leisurely round in +a knothole. "Impossible," he repeated; "it would not be seamanship to +start in a fog. When the fog lifts we will go. 'Twill be all the same +to-morrow. We shall lie at Leigh to-night, whether we go now or go +when the fog lifts." + +"At Leigh?" + +"That is it, madam." + +"And when will you go from Leigh?" she cried indignantly. + +"Daybreak to-morrow," he answered. "You leave it to me, mistress," he +continued, in a tone of rough patronage, "and you will see your good +man before you expect it." + +"But, man!" she exclaimed, trembling with impotent rage. "Did not +Master Bertram engage you to bring me across whenever I might be +ready? Ay, and pay you handsomely for it? Did he not, sirrah?" + +"To be sure, to be sure!" replied the giant unmoved. "Using +seamanship, and not going to sea in a fog, if it please you." + +"It does not please me!" she retorted. "And why stay at Leigh?" + +He looked up at the rigging, then down at the deck. He set his heel in +the knothole, and ground it round again. Then he looked at his +questioner with a broad smile. "Well, mistress, for a very good +reason. It is there your good man is waiting for you. Only," added +this careful keeper of a secret, "he bade me not tell any one." + +She uttered a low cry, which might have been an echo of her baby's +cooing, and convulsively clasped the child more tightly to her. "He is +at Leigh!" she murmured, flushing and trembling, another woman +altogether. Even her voice was wonderfully changed. "He is really at +Leigh, you say?" + +"To be sure!" replied the captain, with a portentous wink and a +mysterious roll of the head. "He is there safe enough! Safe enough, +you may bet your handsome face to a rushlight. And we will be there +to-night." + +She started up with a wild gesture. For a moment she had sat down on a +cask standing beside her, and forgotten our peril, and the probability +that we might never see Leigh at all. Now, I have said, she started +up. "No, no!" she cried, struggling for breath and utterance. "Oh, no! +no! Let us go at once. We must start at once!" Her voice was +hysterical in its sudden anxiety and terror, as the consciousness of +our position rolled back upon her. "Captain! listen, listen!" she +pleaded. "Let us start now, and my husband will give you double. I +will promise you double whatever he said if you will chance the fog." + +I think all who heard her were moved, save the captain only. He rubbed +his head and grinned. Slow and heavy, he saw nothing in her prayer +save the freak of a woman wild to get to her man. He did not weigh her +promise at a groat; she was but a woman. And being a foreigner, he did +not perceive a certain air of breeding which might have influenced a +native. He was one of those men against whose stupidity Father Carey +used to say the gods fight in vain. When he answered good-naturedly, +"No, no, mistress, it is impossible. It would not be seamanship," I +felt that we might as well try to stop the ebbing tide as move him +from his position. + +The feeling was a maddening one. The special peril which menaced my +companions I did not know; but I knew they feared pursuit, and I had +every reason to fear it for myself. Yet at any moment, out of the +fog which encircled us so closely that we could barely see the raft +below--and the shore not at all--might come the tramp of hurrying feet +and the stern hail of the law. It was maddening to think of this, and +to know that we had only to cast off a rope or two in order to escape; +and to know also that we were absolutely helpless. + +I expected that Mistress Bertram, brave as she had shown herself, +would burst into a passion of rage or tears. But apparently she had +one hope left. She looked at me. + +I tried to think--to think hard. Alas, I seemed only able to listen. +An hour had gone by since we parted from that rascal in the court, and +we might expect him to appear at any moment, vengeful and exultant, +with a posse at his back. Yet I tried hard to think; and the fog +presently suggested a possible course. "Look here," I said suddenly, +speaking for the first time, "if you do not start until the fog lifts, +captain, we may as well breakfast ashore, and return presently." + +"That is as you please," he answered indifferently. + +"What do you think?" I said, turning to my companions with as much +carelessness as I could command. "Had we not better do that?" + +Mistress Bertram did not understand, but in her despair she obeyed the +motion of my hand mechanically, and walked to the side. The younger +woman followed more slowly, so that I had to speak to her with some +curtness, bidding her make haste; for I was in a fever until we were +clear of the _Whelp_ and the Lion Wharf. It had struck me that, if the +ship were not to leave at once, we were nowhere in so much danger as +on board. At large in the fog we might escape detection for a time. +Our pursuers might as well look for a needle in a haystack as seek us +through it when once we were clear of the wharf. And this was not the +end of my idea. But for the present it was enough. Therefore I took up +Mistress Anne very short. "Come!" I said, "be quick! Let me help you." + +She obeyed, and I was ashamed of my impatience when at the foot of the +ladder she thanked me prettily. It was almost with good cheer in my +voice and a rebound of spirits that I explained, as I hurried my +companions across the raft, what my plan was. + +The moment we were ashore I felt safer. The fog swallowed us up quick, +as the Bible says. The very hull of the ship vanished from sight +before we had gone half a dozen paces. I had never seen a London fog +before, and to me it seemed portentous and providential; a marvel as +great as the crimson hail which fell in the London gardens to mark her +Majesty's accession. + +Yet after all, without my happy thought, the fog would have availed us +little. We had scarcely gone a score of yards before the cautious +tread of several people hastening down the strand toward the wharf +struck my ear. They were proceeding in silence, and we might not have +noticed their approach if the foremost had not by chance tripped and +fallen; whereupon one laughed and another swore. With a warning hand I +grasped my companions' arms, and hurried them forward some paces until +I felt sure that our figures could not be seen through the mist. Then +I halted, and we stood listening, gazing into one another's strained +eyes, while the steps came nearer and nearer, crossed our track and +then with a noisy rush thundered on the wooden raft. My ear caught the +jingle of harness and the clank of weapons. + +"It is the watch," I muttered. "Come, and make no noise. What I want +is a little this way. I fancy I saw it as we passed down to the +wharf." + +They turned with me, but we had not taken many steps before Mistress +Anne, who was walking on my left side, stumbled over something. She +tried to save herself, but failed and fell heavily, uttering as she +did so a loud cry. I sprang to her assistance, and even before I +raised her I laid my hand lightly on her mouth. "Hush!" I said softly, +"for safety's sake, make no noise. What is the matter?" + +"Oh!" she moaned, making no effort to rise, "my ankle! my ankle! I am +sure I have broken it." + +I muttered my dismay, while Mistress Bertram, stooping anxiously, +examined the injured limb. "Can you stand?" she asked. + +But it was no time for questioning, and I put her aside. The troop +which had passed were within easy hearing, and if there should be one +among them familiar with the girl's voice, we might be pounced upon, +fog or no fog. I felt that it was no time for ceremony, and picked +Mistress Anne up in my arms, whispering to the elder woman: "Go on +ahead! I think I see the boat. It is straight before you." + +Luckily I was right, it was the boat; and so far well. But at the +moment I spoke I heard a sudden outcry behind us, and knew the hunt +was up. I plunged forward with my burden, recklessly and blindly, +through mud and over obstacles. The wherry for which I was making was +moored in the water a few feet from the edge. I had remarked it idly +and without purpose as we came down to the wharf, and had even noticed +that the oars were lying in it. Now, if we could reach it and start +down the river for Leigh, we might by possibility gain that place, and +meet Mistress Bertram's husband. + +At any late, nothing in the world seemed so desirable to me at the +moment as the shelter of that boat. I plunged through the mud, and +waded desperately through the water to it, Mistress Bertram scarce a +whit behind me. I reached it, but reached it only as the foremost +pursuer caught sight of us. I heard his shout of triumph, and somehow +I bundled my burden into the boat--I remember that she clung about my +neck in fear, and I had to loosen her hands roughly. But I did loosen +them--in time. With one stroke of my hunting-knife, I severed the +rope, and pushing off the boat with all my strength, sprang into it as +it floated away--and was in time. But one second's delay would have +undone us. Two men were already in the water up to their knees, and +their very breath was hot on my face as we swung out into the stream. + +Fortunately, I had had experience of boats on the Avon, at Bidford and +Stratford, and could pull a good oar. For a moment indeed the wherry +rolled and dipped as I snatched up the sculls; but I quickly got her +in hand, and, bending to my work, sent her spinning through the mist, +every stroke I pulled increasing the distance between us and our now +unseen foes. Happily we were below London Bridge, and had not that +dangerous passage to make. The river, too, was nearly clear of craft, +and though once and again in the Pool a huge hulk loomed suddenly +across our bows, and then faded behind us into the mist like some +monstrous phantom, and so told of a danger narrowly escaped, I thought +it best to run all risks, and go ahead as long as the tide should ebb. + +It was strange how suddenly we had passed from storm into calm. +Mistress Anne had bound her ankle with a handkerchief, and bravely +made light of the hurt; and now the two women sat crouching in the +stern watching me, their heads together, their faces pale. The mist +had closed round us, and we were alone again, gliding over the bosom +of the great river that runs down to the sea. I was oddly struck by +the strange current of life which for a week had tossed me from one +adventure to another, only to bring me into contact at length with +these two, and sweep me into the unknown whirlpool of their fortunes. + +Who were they? A merchant's wife and her sister flying from Bishop +Bonner's inquisition? I thought it likely. Their cloaks and hoods +indeed, and all that I could see of their clothes, fell below such a +condition; but probably they were worn as a disguise. Their speech +rose as much above it, but I knew that of late many merchant's wives +had become scholars, and might pass in noblemen's houses; even as in +those days when London waxed fat, and set up and threw down +governments, every alderman had come to ride in mail. + +No doubt the women, watching me in anxious silence, were as curious +about me. I still bore the stains of country travel. I was unwashen, +unkempt, my doublet was torn, the cloak I had cast at my feet was the +very wreck of a cloak. Yet I read no distrust in their looks. The +elder's brave eyes seemed ever thanking me. I never saw her lips move +silently that they did not shape "Well done!" And though I caught +Mistress Anne scanning me once or twice with an expression I could ill +interpret, a smile took its place the moment her gaze met mine. + +We had passed, but were still in sight of, Greenwich Palace--as they +told me--when the mist rose suddenly like a curtain rolled away, and +the cold, bright February sun, shining out, disclosed the sparkling +river with the green hills rising on our right hand. Here and there on +its surface a small boat such as our own moved to and fro, and in the +distant Pool from which we had come rose a little forest of masts. I +hung on the oars a moment, and my eyes were drawn to a two-masted +vessel which, nearly half a mile below us, was drifting down, gently +heeling over with the current as the crew got up the sails. "I wonder +whither she is bound," I said thoughtfully, "and whether they would +take us on board by any chance." + +Mistress Bertram shook her head. "I have no money," she answered +sadly. "I fear we must go on to Leigh, if it be any way possible. You +are tired, and no wonder. But what is it?" with a sudden change of +voice. "What is the matter?" + +I had flashed out the oars with a single touch, and begun to pull as +fast as I could down the stream. No doubt my face, too, proclaimed my +discovery and awoke her fears. "Look behind!" I muttered between my +set teeth. + +She turned, and on the instant uttered a low cry. A wherry like our +own, but even lighter--in my first glance up the river I had not +noticed it--had stolen nearer to us, and yet nearer, and now throwing +aside disguise was in hot pursuit of us. There were three men on +board, two rowing and one steering. When they saw that we had +discovered them they hailed us in a loud voice, and I heard the +steersman's feet rattle on the boards, as he cried to his men to give +way, and stamped in very eagerness. My only reply was to take a longer +stroke, and, pulling hard, to sweep away from them. + +But presently my first strength died away, and the work began to tell +upon me, and little by little they overhauled us. Not that I gave up +at once for that. They were still some sixty yards behind, and for a +few minutes at any rate I might put off capture. In that time +something might happen. At the worst they were only three to one, and +their boat looked light and cranky and easy to upset. + +So I pulled on, savagely straining at the oars. But my chest heaved +and my arms ached more and more with each stroke. The banks slid by +us; we turned one bend, then another, though I saw nothing of them. I +saw only the pursuing boat, on which my eyes were fixed, heard only +the measured rattle of the oars in the rowlocks. A minute, two +minutes, three minutes passed. They had not gained on us, but the +water was beginning to waver before my eyes, their boat seemed +floating in the air, there was a pulsation in my ears louder than that +of the oars, I struggled and yet I flagged. My knees trembled. Their +boat shot nearer now, nearer and nearer, so that I could read the +smile of triumph on the steersman's dark face and hear his cry of +exultation. Nearer! and then with a cry I dropped the oars. + +"Quick!" I panted to my companions. "Change places with me! So!" +Trembling and out of breath as I was, I crawled between the women and +gained the stern sheets of the boat. As I passed Mistress Bertram she +clutched my arm. Her eyes, as they met mine, flashed fire, her lips +were white. "The man steering!" she hissed between her teeth. "Leave +the others. He is Clarence, and I fear him!" + +I nodded; but still, as the hostile boat bore swiftly down upon us, I +cast a glance round to see if there were any help at hand. I saw no +sign of any. I saw only the pale blue sky overhead, and the stream +flowing swiftly under the boat. I drew my sword. The case was one +rather for despair than courage. The women were in my charge, and if I +did not acquit myself like a man now, when should I do so? Bah! it +would soon be over. + +There was an instant's confusion in the other boat, as the crew ceased +rowing, and, seeing my attitude and not liking it, changed their +seats. To my joy the man, who had hitherto been steering, flung a +curse at the others and came forward to bear the brunt of the +encounter. He was a tall, sinewy man, past middle age, with a +clean-shaven face, a dark complexion, and cruel eyes. So he was Master +Clarence! Well, he had the air of a swordsman and a soldier. I +trembled for the women. + +"Surrender, you fool!" he cried to me harshly. "In the Queen's +name--do you hear? What do you in this company?" + +I answered nothing, for I was out of breath. But softly, my eyes on +his, I drew out with my left hand my hunting-knife. If I could beat +aside his sword, I would spring upon him and drive the knife home with +that hand. So, standing erect in bow and stern we faced one another, +the man and the boy, the flush of rage and exertion on my cheek, a +dark shade on his. And silently the boats drew together. + +Thought is quick, quicker than anything else in the world I suppose, +for in some drawn-out second before the boats came together I had time +to wonder where I had seen his face before, and to rack my memory. I +knew no Master Clarence, yet I had seen this man somewhere. Another +second, and away with thought! He was crouching for a spring. I drew +back a little, then lunged--lunged with heart and hand. Our swords +crossed and whistled--just crossed--and even as I saw his eyes gleam +behind his point, the shock of the two boats coming together flung us +both backward and apart. A moment we reeled, staggering and throwing +out wild hands. I strove hard to recover myself, nay, I almost did so; +then I caught my foot in Mistress Anne's cloak, which she had left in +her place, and fell heavily back into the boat. + +I was up in a moment--on my knees at least--and unhurt. But another +was before me. As I stooped half-risen, I saw one moment a dark shadow +above me, and the next a sheet of flame shone before my eyes, and a +tremendous shock swept all away. I fell senseless into the bottom of +the boat, knowing nothing of what had happened to me. + + + + + CHAPTER VII. + + ON BOARD THE "FRAMLINGHAM." + + +I am told by people who have been seasick that the sound of the waves +beating against the hull comes in time to be an intolerable torment. +But bad as this may be, it can be nothing in comparison with the pains +I suffered from the same cause, as I recovered my senses. My brain +seemed to be a cavern into which each moment, with a rhythmical +regularity which added the pangs of anticipation to those of reality, +the sea rushed, booming and thundering, jarring every nerve and +straining the walls to bursting, and making each moment of +consciousness a vivid agony. And this lasted long; how long I cannot +say. But it had subsided somewhat when I first opened my eyes, and +dully, not daring to move my head, looked up. + +I was lying on my back. About a foot from my eyes were rough beams of +wood disclosed by a smoky yellow light, which flickered on the +knotholes and rude joists. The light swayed to and fro regularly; and +this adding to my pain, I closed my eyes with a moan. Then some one +came to me, and I heard voices which sounded a long way off, and +promptly fell again into a deep sleep, troubled still, but less +painfully, by the same rhythmical shocks, the same dull crashings in +my brain. + +When I awoke again I had sense to know what caused this, and where I +was--in a berth on board ship. The noise which had so troubled me was +that of the waves beating against her forefoot. The beams so close to +my face formed the deck, the smoky light came from the ship's lantern +swinging on a hook. I tried to turn. Some one came again, and with +gentle hands arranged my pillow and presently began to feed me with a +spoon. When I had swallowed a few mouthfuls I gained strength to turn. + +Who was this feeding me? The light was at her back and dazzled me. +For a short while I took her for Petronilla, my thoughts going back at +one bound to Coton, and skipping all that had happened since I left +home. But as I grew stronger I grew clearer, and recalling bit by bit +what had happened in the boat, I recognized Mistress Anne. I tried to +murmur thanks, but she laid a cool finger on my lips and shook her +head, smiling on me. "You must not talk," she murmured, "you are +getting well. Now go to sleep again." + +I shut my eyes at once as a child might. Another interval of +unconsciousness, painless this time, followed, and again I awoke. I +was lying on my side now, and without moving could see the whole of +the tiny cabin. The lantern still hung and smoked. But the light was +steady now, and I heard no splashing without, nor the dull groaning +and creaking of the timbers within. There reigned a quiet which seemed +bliss to me; and I lay wrapped in it, my thoughts growing clearer and +clearer each moment. + +On a sea-chest at the farther end of the cabin were sitting two people +engaged in talk. The one, a woman, I recognized immediately. The gray +eyes full of command, the handsome features, the reddish-brown hair +and gracious figure left me in no doubt, even for a moment, that I +looked on Mistress Bertram. The sharer of her seat was a tall, thin +man with a thoughtful face and dreamy, rather melancholy eyes. One of +her hands rested on his knee, and her lips as she talked were close to +his ear. A little aside, sitting on the lowest step of the ladder +which led to the deck, her head leaning against the timbers, and a +cloak about her, was Mistress Anne. + +I tried to speak, and after more than one effort found my voice. +"Where am I?" I whispered. My head ached sadly, and I fancied, though +I was too languid to raise my hand to it, that it was bandaged. My +mind was so far clear that I remembered Master Clarence and his +pursuit and the fight in the boats, and knew that we ought to be on +our way to prison. Who, then, was the mild, comely gentleman whose +length of limb made the cabin seem smaller than it was? Not a jailer, +surely? Yet who else? + +I could compass no more than a whisper, but faint as my voice was they +all heard me, and looked up. "Anne!" the elder lady cried sharply, +seeming by her tone to direct the other to attend to me. Yet was she +herself the first to rise, and come and lay her hand on my brow. "Ah! +the fever is gone!" she said, speaking apparently to the gentleman, +who kept his seat. "His head is quite cool. He will do well now, I am +sure. Do you know me?" she continued, leaning over me. + +I looked up into her eyes, and read only kindness. "Yes," I muttered. +But the effort of looking was so painful that I closed my eyes again +with a sigh. Nevertheless, my memory of the events which had gone +before my illness grew clearer, and I fumbled feebly for something +which should have been at my side. "Where is--where is my sword?" I +made shift to whisper. + +She laughed. "Show it to him, Anne," she said; "what a never-die it +is! There, Master Knight Errant, we did not forget to bring it off the +field, you see!" + +"But how," I murmured, "how did you escape?" I saw that there was no +question of a prison. Her laugh was gay, her voice full of content. + +"That is a long story," she answered kindly. "Are you well enough to +hear it? You think you are? Then take some of this first. You remember +that knave Philip striking you on the head with an oar as you got up? +No? Well, it was a cowardly stroke, but it stood him in little stead, +for we had drifted, in the excitement of the race, under the stern of +the ship which you remember seeing a little before. There were English +seamen on her; and when they saw three men in the act of boarding two +defenseless women, they stepped in, and threatened to send Clarence +and his crew to the bottom unless they sheered off." + +"Ha!" I murmured. "Good!" + +"And so we escaped. I prayed the captain to take us on board his ship, +the _Framlingham_, and he did so. More, putting into Leigh on his way +to the Nore, he took off my husband. There he stands, and when you are +better he shall thank you." + +"Nay, he will thank you now," said the tall man, rising and stepping +to my berth with his head bent. He could not stand upright, so low was +the deck. "But for you," he continued, his earnestness showing in his +voice and eyes--the latter were almost too tender for a man's--"my +wife would be now lying in prison, her life in jeopardy, and her +property as good as gone. She has told me how bravely you rescued her +from that cur in Cheapside, and how your presence of mind baffled the +watch at the riverside. It is well, young gentleman. It is very well. +But these things call for other returns than words. When it lies in +her power my wife will make them; if not to-day, to-morrow, and if not +to-morrow, the day after." + +I was very weak, and his words brought the tears to my eyes. "She has +saved my life already," I murmured. + +"You foolish boy!" she cried, smiling down on me, her hand on her +husband's shoulder. "You got your head broken in my defense. It was a +great thing, was it not, that I did not leave you to die in the boat? +There, make haste and get well. You have talked enough now. Go to +sleep, or we shall have the fever back again." + +"One thing first," I pleaded. "Tell me whither we are going." + +"In a few hours we shall be at Dort in Holland," she answered. "But be +content. We will take care of you, and send you back if you will, or +you shall still come with us; as you please. Be content. Go to sleep +now and get strong. Presently, perhaps, we shall have need of your +help again." + +They went and sat down then on their former seat and talked in +whispers, while Mistress Anne shook up my pillows, and laid a fresh +cool bandage on my head. I was too weak to speak my gratitude, but I +tried to look it and so fell asleep again, her hand in mine, and the +wondrous smile of those lustrous eyes the last impression of which I +was conscious. + + +A long dreamless sleep followed. When I awoke once more the light +still hung steady, but the peacefulness of night was gone. We lay in +the midst of turmoil. The scampering of feet over the deck above me, +the creaking of the windlass, the bumping and clattering of barrels +hoisted in or hoisted out, the harsh sound of voices raised in a +foreign tongue and in queer keys, sufficed as I grew wide-awake to +tell me we were in port. + +But the cabin was empty, and I lay for some time gazing at its dreary +interior, and wondering what was to become of me. Presently an uneasy +fear crept into my mind. What if my companions had deserted me? Alone, +ill, and penniless in a foreign land, what should I do? This fear in +my sick state was so terrible that I struggled to get up, and with +reeling brain and nerveless hands did get out of my berth. But this +feat accomplished I found that I could not stand. Everything swam +before my eyes. I could not take a single step, but remained, clinging +helplessly to the edge of my berth, despair at my heart. I tried to +call out, but my voice rose little above a whisper, and the banging +and shrieking, the babel without went on endlessly. Oh, it was cruel! +cruel! They had left me! + +I think my senses were leaving me too, when I felt an arm about my +waist, and found Mistress Anne by my side guiding me to the chest. I +sat down on it, the certainty of my helplessness and the sudden relief +of her presence bringing the tears to my eyes. She fanned me, and gave +me some restorative, chiding me the while for getting out of my berth. + +"I thought that you had gone and left me," I muttered. I was as weak +as a child. + +She said cheerily: "Did you leave us when we were in trouble? Of +course you did not. There, take some more of this. After all, it is +well you are up, for in a short time we must move you to the other +boat." + +"The other boat?" + +"Yes, we are at Dort, you know. And we are going by the Waal, a branch +of the Rhine, to Arnheim. But the boat is here, close to this one, +and, with help, I think you will be able to walk to it." + +"I am sure I shall if you will give me your arm," I answered +gratefully. + +"But you will not think again," she replied, "that we have deserted +you?" + +"No," I said. "I will trust you always." + +I wondered why a shadow crossed her face at that. But I had no time to +do more than wonder, for Master Bertram, coming down, brought our +sitting to an end. She bustled about to wrap me up, and somehow, +partly walking, partly carried, I was got on deck. There I sat down on +a bale to recover myself, and felt at once much the better for the +fresh, keen air, the clear sky and wintry sunshine which welcomed me +to a foreign land. + +On the outer side of the vessel stretched a wide expanse of turbid +water, five or six times as wide as the Thames at London, and +foam-flecked here and there by the up-running tide. On the other side +was a wide and spacious quay, paved neatly with round stones, and +piled here and there with merchandise; but possessing, by virtue of +the lines of leafless elms which bordered it, a quaint air of +rusticity in the midst of bustle. The sober bearing of the sturdy +landsmen, going quietly about their business, accorded well with the +substantial comfort of the rows of tall, steep-roofed houses I saw +beyond the quay, and seemed only made more homely by the occasional +swagger and uncouth cry of some half-barbarous seaman, wandering +aimlessly about. Above the town rose the heavy square tower of a +church, a notable landmark where all around, land and water, lay so +low, where the horizon seemed so far, and the sky so wide and breezy. + +"So you have made up your mind to come with us," said Master Bertram, +returning to my side--he had left me to make some arrangements. "You +understand that if you would prefer to go home I can secure your +tendance here by good, kindly people, and provide for your passage +back when you feel strong enough to cross. You understand that? And +that the choice is entirely your own? So which will you do?" + +I changed color and felt I did. I shrunk, as being well and strong I +should not have shrunk, from losing sight of those three faces which I +had known for so short a time, yet which alone stood between myself +and loneliness. "I would rather come with you," I stammered. "But I +shall be a great burden to you now, I fear." + +"It is not that," he replied, with hearty assurance in his voice. "A +week's rest and quiet will restore you to strength, and then the +burden will be on the other shoulder. It is for your own sake I give +you the choice, because our future is for the time uncertain. Very +uncertain," he repeated, his brow clouding over; "and to become our +companion may expose you to fresh dangers. We are refugees from +England; that you probably guess. Our plan was to go to France, where +are many of our friends, and where we could live safely until better +times. You know how that plan was frustrated. Here the Spaniards are +masters--Prince Philip's people; and if we are recognized, we shall be +arrested and sent back to England. Still, my wife and I must make the +best of it. The hue and cry will not follow us for some days, and +there is still a degree of independence in the cities of Holland which +may, since I have friends here, protect us for a time. Now you know +something of our position, my friend. You can make your choice with +your eyes open. Either way we shall not forget you." + +"I will go on with you, if you please," I answered at once. "I, too, +cannot go home." And as I said this, Mistress Bertram also came up, +and I took her hand in mine--which looked, by the way, so strangely +thin I scarcely recognized it--and kissed it. "I will come with you, +madam, if you will let me," I said. + +"Good!" she replied, her eyes sparkling. "I said you would! I do not +mind telling you now that I am glad of it. And if ever we return to +England, as God grant we may and soon, you shall not regret your +decision. Shall he, Richard?" + +"If you say he shall not, my dear," he responded, smiling at her +enthusiasm, "I think I may answer for it he will not." + +I was struck then, as I had been before, by a certain air of deference +which the husband assumed toward the wife. It did not surprise me, for +her bearing and manner, as well as such of her actions as I had seen, +stamped her as singularly self-reliant and independent for a woman; +and to these qualities, as much as to the rather dreamy character of +the husband, I was content to set down the peculiarity. I should add +that a rare and pretty tenderness constantly displayed on her part +toward him robbed it of any semblance of unseemliness. + +They saw that the exertion of talking exhausted me, and so, with an +encouraging nod, left me to myself. A few minutes later a couple of +English sailors, belonging to the _Framlingham_, came up, and with +gentle strength transported me, under Mistress Anne's directions, to a +queer-looking wide-beamed boat which lay almost alongside. She was +more like a huge Thames barge than anything else, for she drew little +water, but had a great expanse of sail when all was set. There was a +large deck-house, gay with paint and as clean as it could be; and in a +compartment at one end of this--which seemed to be assigned to our +party--I was soon comfortably settled. + +Exhausted as I was by the excitement of sitting up and being moved, I +knew little of what passed about me for the next two days, and +remember less. I slept and ate, and sometimes awoke to wonder where I +was. But the meals and the vague attempts at thought made scarcely +more impression on my mind than the sleep. Yet all the while I was +gaining strength rapidly, my youth and health standing me in good +stead. The wound in my head, which had caused great loss of blood, +healed all one way, as we say in Warwickshire; and about noon, on the +second day after leaving Dort, I was well enough to reach the deck +unassisted, and sit in the sunshine on a pile of rugs which Mistress +Anne, my constant nurse, had laid for me in a corner sheltered from +the wind. + + * * * * * + +Fortunately the weather was mild and warm, and the sunshine fell +brightly on the wide river and the wider plain of pasture which +stretched away on either side of the horizon, dotted, here and there +only, by a windmill, a farmhouse, the steeple of a church, the brown +sails of a barge, or at most broken by a low dike or a line of +sand-dunes. All was open, free; all was largeness, space, and +distance. I gazed astonished. + +The husband and wife, who were pacing the deck forward, came to me. He +noticed the wondering looks I cast round. "This is new to you?" he +said smiling. + +"Quite--quite new," I answered. "I never imagined anything so flat, +and yet in its way so beautiful." + +"You do not know Lincolnshire?" + +"No." + +"Ah, that is my native county," he answered. "It is much like this. +But you are better, and you can talk again. Now I and my wife have +been discussing whether we shall tell you more about ourselves. And +since there is no time like the present I may say that we have decided +to trust you." + +"All in all or not at all," Mistress Bertram added brightly. + +I murmured my thanks. + +"Then, first to tell you who we are. For myself I am plain Richard +Bertie of Lincolnshire, at your service. My wife is something more +than appears from this, or"--with a smile--"from her present not too +graceful dress. She is----" + +"Stop, Richard! This is not sufficiently formal," my lady cried +prettily. "I have the honor to present to you, young gentleman," she +went on, laughing merrily and making a very grand courtesy before me, +"Katherine, Duchess of Suffolk." + +I made shift to get to my feet, and bowed respectfully, but she forced +me to sit down again. "Enough of that," she said lightly, "until we go +back to England. Here and for the future we are Master Bertram and his +wife. And this young lady, my distant kinswoman, Anne Brandon, must +pass as Mistress Anne. You wonder how we came to be straying in the +streets alone and unattended when you found us?" + +I did wonder, for the name of the gay and brilliant Duchess of +Suffolk was well known even to me, a country lad. Her former husband, +Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, had been not only the one trusted +and constant friend of King Henry the Eighth, but the king's +brother-in-law, his first wife having been Mary, Princess of England +and Queen Dowager of France. Late in his splendid and prosperous +career the Duke had married Katherine, the heiress of Lord Willoughby +de Eresby, and she it was who stood before me, still young and +handsome. After her husband's death she had made England ring with her +name, first by a love match with a Lincolnshire squire, and secondly +by her fearless and outspoken defense of the reformers. I did wonder +indeed how she had come to be wandering in the streets at daybreak, an +object of a chance passer's chivalry and pity. + +"It is simple enough," she said dryly; "I am rich, I am a Protestant, +and I have an enemy. When I do not like a person I speak out. Do I +not, Richard?" + +"You do indeed, my dear," he answered smiling. + +"And once I spoke out to Bishop Gardiner. What! Do you know Stephen +Gardiner?" + +For I had started at the name, after which I could scarcely have +concealed my knowledge if I would. So I answered simply, "Yes, I have +seen him." I was thinking how wonderful this was. These people had +been utter strangers to me until a day or two before, yet now we were +all looking out together from the deck of a Dutch boat on the low +Dutch landscape, united by one tie, the enmity of the same man. + +"He is a man to be dreaded," the Duchess continued, her eyes resting +on her baby, which lay asleep on my bundle of rugs--and I guessed what +fear it was had tamed her pride to flight. "His power in England is +absolute. We learned that it was his purpose to arrest me, and +determined to leave England. But our very household was full of spies, +and though we chose a time when Clarence, our steward, whom we had +long suspected of being Gardiner's chief tool, was away, Philip, his +deputy, gained a clew to our design, and watched us. We gave him the +slip with difficulty, leaving our luggage, but he dogged and overtook +us, and the rest you know." + +I bowed. As I gazed at her, my admiration, I know, shone in my eyes. +She looked, as she stood on the deck, an exile and fugitive, so gay, +so bright, so indomitable, that in herself she was at once a warranty +and an omen of better times. The breeze had heightened her color and +loosened here and there a tress of her auburn hair. No wonder Master +Bertie looked proudly on his Duchess. + +Suddenly a thing I had clean forgotten flashed into my mind, and I +thrust my hand into my pocket. The action was so abrupt that it +attracted their attention, and when I pulled out a packet--two +packets--there were three pairs of eyes upon me. The seal dangled from +one missive. "What have you there?" the Duchess asked briskly, for she +was a woman, and curious. "Do you carry the deeds of your property +about with you?" + +"No," I said, not unwilling to make a small sensation. "This touches +your Grace." + +"Hush!" she cried, raising one imperious finger. "Transgressing +already? From this time forth I am Mistress Bertram, remember. But +come," she went on, eying the packet with the seal inquisitively, "how +does it touch me?" + +I put it silently into her hands, and she opened it and read a few +lines, her husband peeping over her shoulder. As she read her brow +darkened, her eyes grew hard. Master Bertie's face changed with hers, +and they both peeped suddenly at me over the edge of the parchment, +suspicion and hostility in their glances. "How came you by this, young +sir?" he said slowly, after a long pause. "Have we escaped Peter to +fall into the hands of Paul?" + +"No, no!" I cried hurriedly. I saw that I had made a greater sensation +than I had bargained for. I hastened to tell them how I had met with +Gardiner's servant at Stony Stratford, and how I had become possessed +of his credentials. They laughed of course--indeed they laughed so +loudly that the placid Dutchmen, standing aft with their hands in +their breeches-pockets, stared open-mouthed at us, and the kindred +cattle on the bank looked mildly up from the knee-deep grass. + +"And what was the other packet?" the Duchess asked presently. "Is that +it in your hand?" + +"Yes," I answered, holding it up with some reluctance. "It seems to be +a letter addressed to Mistress Clarence." + +"Clarence!" she cried. "Clarence!" arresting the hand she was +extending. "What! Here is our friend again then. What is in it? You +have opened it?" + +"No." + +"You have not? Then quick, open it!" she exclaimed. "This too touches +us, I will bet a penny. Let us see at once what it contains. Clarence +indeed! Perhaps we may have him on the hip yet, the arch-traitor!" + +But I held the pocket-book back, though my cheeks reddened and I knew +I must seem foolish. They made certain that this letter was a +communication to some spy, probably to Clarence himself under cover of +a feminine address. Perhaps it was, but it bore a woman's name and it +was sealed; and foolish though I might be, I would not betray the +woman's secret. + +"No, madam," I said confused, awkward, stammering, yet withholding it +with a secret obstinacy; "pardon me if I do not obey you--if I do not +let this be opened. It may be what you say," I added with an effort; +"but it may also contain an honest secret, and that a woman's." + +"What do you say?" cried the Duchess; "here are scruples!" At that her +husband smiled, and I looked in despair from him to Mistress Anne. +Would she sympathize with my feelings? I found that she had turned her +back on us, and was gazing over the side. "Do you really mean," +continued the Duchess, tapping her foot sharply on the deck, "that you +are not going to open that, you foolish boy?" + +"I do--with your Grace's leave," I answered. + +"Or without my Grace's leave! That is what you mean," she retorted +pettishly, a red spot in each cheek. "When people will not do what I +ask, it is always, Grace! Grace! Grace! But I know them now." + +I dared not smile; and I would not look up, lest my heart should fail +me and I should give her her way. + +"You foolish boy!" she again said, and sniffed. Then with a toss of +her head she went away, her husband following her obediently. + +I feared that she was grievously offended, and I got up restlessly and +went across the deck to the rail on which Mistress Anne was leaning, +meaning to say something which should gain for me her sympathy, +perhaps her advice. But the words died on my lips, for as I approached +she turned her face abruptly toward me, and it was so white, so +haggard, so drawn, that I uttered a cry of alarm. "You are ill!" I +exclaimed. "Let me call the Duchess!" + +She gripped my sleeve almost fiercely, "Hush!" she muttered. "Do +nothing of the kind. I am not well. It is the water. But it will pass +off, if you do not notice it. I hate to be noticed," she added, with +an angry shrug. + +I was full of pity for her and reproached myself sorely. "What a +selfish brute I have been!" I said. "You have watched by me night +after night, and nursed me day after day, and I have scarcely thanked +you. And now you are ill yourself. It is my fault!" + +She looked at me, a wan smile on her face. "A little, perhaps," she +answered faintly. "But it is chiefly the water. I shall be better +presently. About that letter--did you not come to speak to me about +it?" + +"Never mind it now," I said anxiously. "Will you not lie down on the +rugs awhile? Let me give you my place," I pleaded. + +"No, no!" she cried impatiently; and seeing I vexed her by my +importunity, I desisted. "The letter," she went on; "you will open it +by and by?" + +"No," I said slowly, considering, to tell the truth, the strength of +my resolution, "I think I shall not." + +"You will! you will!" she repeated, with a kind of scorn. "The Duchess +will ask you again, and you will give it to her. Of course you will!" + +Her tone was strangely querulous, and her eyes continually flashed +keen, biting glances at me. But I thought only that she was ill and +excited, and I fancied it was best to humor her. "Well, perhaps I +shall," I said soothingly. "Possibly. It is hard to refuse her +anything. And yet I hope I may not. The girl--it may be a girl's +secret." + +"Well?" she asked, interrupting me abruptly, her voice harsh and +unmusical. "What of her?" She laid her hand on her bosom as though to +still some secret pain. I looked at her, anxious and wondering, but +she had again averted her face. "What of her?" she repeated. + +"Only that--I would not willingly hurt her!" I blurted out. + +She did not answer. She stood a moment, then to my surprise she turned +away without a word, and merely commanding me by a gesture of the hand +not to follow, walked slowly away. I watched her cross the deck and +pass through the doorway into the deck-house. She did not once turn +her face, and my only fear was that she was ill; more seriously ill, +perhaps, than she had acknowledged. + + + + + CHAPTER VIII. + + A HOUSE OF PEACE. + + +As the day went on, therefore, I looked eagerly for Mistress Anne's +return, but she appeared no more, though I maintained a close watch +on the cabin-door. All the afternoon, too, the Duchess kept away from +me, and I feared that I had seriously offended her; so that it was +with no very pleasant anticipations that, going into that part of the +deck-house which served us for a common room, to see if the evening +meal was set, I found only the Duchess and Master Bertie prepared to +sit down to it. I suppose that something of my feeling was expressed +in my face, for while I was yet half-way between door and table, my +lady gave way to a peal of merriment. + +"Come, sit down, and do not be afraid!" she cried pleasantly, her gray +eyes still full of laughter. "I vow the lad thinks I shall eat him. +Nay, when all is said and done, I like you the better, Sir Knight +Errant, for your scruples. I see that you are determined to act up to +your name. But that reminds me," she added in a more serious vein. "We +have been frank with you. You must be equally frank with us. What are +we to call you, pray?" + +I looked down at my plate and felt my face grow scarlet. The wound +which the discovery of my father's treachery had dealt me had begun to +heal. In the action, the movement, the adventure of the last +fortnight, I had well-nigh lost sight of the blot on my escutcheon, of +the shame which had driven me from home. But the question, "What are +we to call you?" revived the smart, and revived it with an added pang. +It had been very well, in theory, to proudly discard my old name. It +was painful, in practice, to be unable to answer the Duchess, "I am a +Cludde of Coton, nephew to Sir Anthony, formerly esquire of the body +to King Henry. I am no unworthy follower and associate even for you," +and to have instead to reply, "I have no name. I am nobody. I have all +to make and win." Yet this was my ill-fortune. + +Her woman's eye saw my trouble as I hesitated, confused and doubting +what I should reply. "Come!" she said good-naturedly, trying to +reassure me. "You are of gentle birth. Of that we feel sure." + +I shook my head. "Nay, I am of no birth, madam," I answered hurriedly. +"I have no name, or at any rate no name that I can be proud of. Call +me--call me, if it please you, Francis Carey." + +"It is a good name," quoth Master Bertie, pausing with his knife +suspended in the air. "A right good Protestant name!" + +"But I have no claim to it," I rejoined, mere and more hurt. "I have +all to make. I am a new man. Yet do not fear!" I added quickly, as I +saw what I took to be a cloud of doubt cross my lady's face. "I will +follow you no less faithfully for that!" + +"Well," said the Duchess, a smile again transforming her open +features, "I will answer for that, Master Carey. Deeds are better than +names, and as for being a new man, what with Pagets and Cavendishes +and Spencers, we have nought but new men nowadays. So, cheer up!" she +continued kindly. "And we will poke no questions at you, though I +doubt whether you do not possess more birth and breeding than you +would have us think. And if, when we return to England, as I trust we +may before we are old men and women, we can advance your cause, then +let us have your secret. No one can say that Katherine Willoughby ever +forgot her friend." + +"Or forgave her enemy over quickly," quoth her husband naively. + +She rapped his knuckles with the back of her knife for that; and under +cover of this small diversion I had time to regain my composure. But +the matter left me sore at heart, and more than a little homesick. And +I sought leave to retire early. + +"You are right!" said the Duchess, rising graciously. "To-night, after +being out in the air, you will sleep soundly, and to-morrow you will +be a new man," with a faint smile. "Believe me, I am not ungrateful, +Master Francis, and I will diligently seek occasion to repay both your +gallant defense of the other day and your future service." She gave me +her hand to kiss, and I bent over it. "Now," she continued, "do homage +to my baby, and then I shall consider that you are really one of us, +and pledged to our cause." + +I kissed the tiny fist held out to me, a soft pink thing looking like +some dainty sea-shell. Master Bertie cordially grasped my hand. And so +under the oil-lamp in the neat cabin of that old Dutch boat, somewhere +on the Waal between Gorcum and Nimuegen, we plighted our troth to one +another, and in a sense I became one of them. + + +I went to my berth cheered and encouraged by their kindness. But the +interview, satisfactory as it was, had set up no little excitement in +my brain, and it was long before I slept. When I did I had a strange +dream. I dreamed that I was sitting in the hall at Coton, and that +Petronilla was standing on the dais looking fixedly at me with gentle, +sorrowful eyes. I wanted to go to her, but I could not move; every +dreamer knows the sensation. I tried to call to her, to ask her what +was the matter, and why she so looked at me. But I could utter no +sound. And still she continued to fix me with the same sad, +reproachful eyes, in which I read a warning, yet could not ask its +meaning. + +I struggled so hard that at last the spell was in a degree broken. +Following the direction of her eyes I looked down at myself, and saw +fastened to the breast of my doublet the knot of blue velvet which she +had made for my sword-hilt, and which I had ever since carried in my +bosom. More, I saw, with a singular feeling of anger and sorrow, that +a hand which came over my shoulder was tugging hard at the ribbon in +the attempt to remove it. + +This gave me horrible concern, yet at the moment I could not move nor +do anything to prevent it. At last, making a stupendous effort, I +awoke, my last experience, dreaming, being of the strange hand working +at my breast. My first waking idea was the same, so that I threw out +my arms, and cried aloud, and sat up. "Ugh!" I exclaimed, trembling in +the intensity of my relief, as I looked about and welcomed the now +familiar surroundings. "It was only a dream. It was----" + +I stopped abruptly, my eyes falling on a form lurking in the doorway. +I could see it only dimly by the light of a hanging lamp, which smoked +and burned redly overhead. Yet I could see it. It was real, +substantial--a waking figure; nevertheless, a faint touch of +superstitious terror still clung to me. "Speak, please!" I asked. "Who +is it?" + +"It is only I," answered a soft voice, well known to me--Mistress +Anne's. "I came in to see how you were," she continued, advancing a +little, "and whether you were sleeping. I am afraid I awoke you. But +you seemed," she added, "to be having such painful dreams that perhaps +it was as well I did." + +I was fumbling in my breast while she spoke; and certainly, whether in +my sleep I had undone the fastenings or had loosened them +intentionally before I lay down (though I could not remember doing +so), my doublet and shirt were open at the breast. The velvet knot was +safe, however, in that tiny inner pocket beside the letter, and I +breathed again. "I am very glad you did awake me!" I replied, looking +gratefully at her. "I was having a horrible dream. But how good it was +of you to think of me--and when you are not well yourself, too." + +"Oh, I am better," she murmured, her eyes, which glistened in the +light, fixed steadily on me. "Much better. Now go to sleep again, and +happier dreams to you. After to-night," she added pleasantly, "I shall +no longer consider you as an invalid, nor intrude upon you." + +And she was gone before I could reiterate my thanks. The door fell to, +and I was alone, full of kindly feelings toward her, and of +thankfulness that my horrible vision had no foundation. "Thank +Heaven!" I murmured more than once, as I lay down; "it was only a +dream." + + +Next day we reached Nimuegen, where we stayed a short time. Leaving +that place in the afternoon, twenty-four hours' journeying, partly by +river, partly, if I remember rightly, by canal, brought us to the +neighborhood of Arnheim on the Rhine. It was the 1st of March, but the +opening month belied its reputation. There was a brightness, a +softness in the air, and a consequent feeling as of spring which would +better have befitted the middle of April. All day we remained on deck +enjoying the kindliness of nature, which was especially grateful to +me, in whom the sap of health was beginning to spring again; and we +were still there when one of those gorgeous sunsets which are peculiar +to that country began to fling its hues across our path. We turned a +jutting promontory, the boat began to fall off, and the captain came +up, his errand to tell us that our journey was done. + +We went eagerly forward at the news, and saw in a kind of bay, formed +by a lake-like expansion of the river, a little island green and low, +its banks trimly set with a single row of poplars. It was perhaps a +quarter of a mile every way, and a channel one-fourth as wide +separated it from the nearer shore of the river; to which, however, a +long narrow bridge of planks laid on trestles gave access. On the +outer side of the island, facing the river's course, stood a low white +house, before which a sloping green terrace, also bordered with +poplars, led down to a tiny pier. Behind and around the house were +meadows as trim and neat as a child's toys, over which the eye roved +with pleasure until it reached the landward side of the island, and +there detected, nestling among gardens, a tiny village of half a dozen +cottages. It was a scene of enchanting peace and quietude. As we +slowly plowed our way up to the landing-place, I saw the rabbits stand +to gaze at us, and then with a flick of their heels dart off to their +holes. I marked the cattle moving homeward in a string, and heard the +wild fowl rise in creek and pool with a whir of wings. I turned with a +full heart to my neighbor. "Is it not lovely?" I cried with +enthusiasm. "Is it not a peaceful place--a very Garden of Eden?" + +I looked to see her fall into raptures such as women are commonly more +prone to than men. But all women are not the same. Mistress Anne was +looking, indeed, when I turned and surprised her, at the scene which +had so moved me, but the expression of her face was sad and bitter and +utterly melancholy. The weariness and fatigue I had often seen lurking +in her eyes had invaded all her features. She looked five years older; +no longer a girl, but a gray-faced, hopeless woman whom the sight of +this peaceful haven rather smote to the heart than filled with +anticipations of safety and repose. + +It was but for a moment I saw her so. Then she dashed her hand across +her eyes--though I saw no tears in them--and with a pettish +exclamation turned away. "Poor girl!" I thought. "She, too, is +homesick. No doubt this reminds her of some place at home, or of some +person." I thought this the more likely, as Master Bertie came from +Lincolnshire, which he said had many of the features of this strange +land. And it was conceivable enough that she should know Lincolnshire +too, being related to his wife. + +I soon forgot the matter in the excitement of landing. A few minutes +of bustle and it was over. The boat put out again; and we four were +left face to face with two strangers, an elderly man and a girl, who +had come down to the pier to meet us. The former, stout, bluff, and +red-faced, with a thick gray beard and a gold chain about his neck, +had the air of a man of position. He greeted us warmly. His companion, +who hung behind him, somewhat shyly, was as pretty a girl as one could +find in a month. A second look assured me of something more--that she +formed an excellent foil to the piquant brightness and keen vivacity, +the dark hair and nervous features of Mistress Anne. For the Dutch +girl was fair and plump and of perfect complexion. Her hair was very +light, almost flaxen indeed, and her eyes were softly and limpidly +blue; grave, innocent, wondering eyes they were, I remember. I guessed +rightly that she was the elderly man's daughter. Later I learned that +she was his only child, and that her name was Dymphna. + +He was a Master Lindstrom, a merchant of standing in Arnheim. He had +visited England and spoke English fairly, and being under some +obligations, it appeared, to the Duchess Katherine, was to be our +host. + +We all walked up the little avenue together. Master Lindstrom talking +as he went to husband or wife, while his daughter and Mistress Anne +came next, gazing each at each in silence, as women when they first +meet will gaze, taking stock, I suppose, of a rival's weapons. I +walked last, wondering why they had nothing to say to one another. + +As we entered the house the mystery was explained. "She speaks no +English," said Mistress Anne, with a touch of scorn. + +"And we no Dutch," I answered, smiling. "Here in Holland I am afraid +that she will have somewhat the best of us. Try her with Spanish." + +"Spanish! I know none." + +"Well, I do, a little." + +"What, you know Spanish?" Mistress Anne's tone of surprise amounted +almost to incredulity, and it flattered me, boy that I was. I dare say +it would have flattered many an older head than mine. "You know +Spanish? Where did you learn it?" she continued sharply. + +"At home." + +"At home! Where is that?" And she eyed me still more closely. "Where +is your home, Master Carey? You have never told me." + +But I had said already more than I intended, and I shook my head. "I +mean," I explained awkwardly, "that I learned it in a home I once had. +Now my home is here. At any rate I have no other." + +The Dutch girl, standing patiently beside us, had looked first at one +face and then at the other as we talked. We were all by this time in a +long, low parlor, warmed by a pretty closed fireplace covered with +glazed tiles. On the shelves of a great armoire, or dresser, at one +end of the room appeared a fine show of silver plate. At the other end +stood a tall linen-press of walnut-wood, handsomely carved; and even +the gratings of the windows and the handles of the doors were of +hammered iron-work. There were no rushes on the floor, which was made +of small pieces of wood delicately joined and set together and +brightly polished. But everything in sight was clean and trim to a +degree which would have shamed our great house at Coton, where the +rushes sometimes lay for a week unchanged. With each glance round I +felt a livelier satisfaction. I turned to Mistress Dymphna. + +"Senorita!" I said, mustering my noblest accent. "Beso los pies de +usted! Habla usted Castillano?" + +Mistress Anne stared, while the effect on the girl whom I addressed +was greater than I had looked for, but certainly of a different kind. +She started and drew back, an expression of offended dignity and of +something like anger ruffling her placid face. Did she not understand? +Yes, for after a moment's hesitation, and with a heightened color, she +answered, "Si, Senor." + +Her constrained manner was not promising, but I was going on to open a +conversation if I could--for it looked little grateful of us to stand +there speechless and staring--when Mistress Anne interposed. "What did +you say to her? What was it?" she asked eagerly. + +"I asked her if she spoke Spanish. That was all," I replied, my eyes +on Dymphna's face, which still betrayed trouble of some kind, "except +that I paid her the usual formal compliment. But what is she saying to +her father?" + +It was like the Christmas game of cross-questions. The girl and I had +spoken in Spanish. I translated what we had said into English for +Mistress Anne, and Mistress Dymphna turned it into Dutch for her +father; an anxious look on her face which needed no translation. + +"What is it?" asked Master Bertie, observing that something was wrong. + +"It is nothing--nothing!" replied the merchant apologetically, though, +as he spoke, his eyes dwelt on me curiously. "It is only that I did +not know that you had a Spaniard in your company." + +"A Spaniard?" Master Bertie answered. "We have none. This," pointing +to me, "is our very good friend and faithful follower, Master +Carey--an Englishman." + +"To whom," added the Duchess, smiling gravely, "I am greatly +indebted." + +I hurriedly explained the mistake, and brought at once a smile of +relief to the Mynheer's face. "Ah! pardon me, I beseech you," he said. +"My daughter was in error." And he added something in Dutch which +caused Mistress Dymphna to blush. "You know," he continued--"I may +speak freely to you, since our enemies are in the main the same--you +know that our Spanish rulers are not very popular with us, and grow +less popular every day, especially with those who are of the reformed +faith. We have learned some of us to speak their language, but we love +them none the better for that." + +"I can sympathize with you, indeed," cried the Duchess impulsively. +"God grant that our country may never be in the same plight: though it +looks as if this Spanish marriage were like to put us in it. It is +Spain! Spain! Spain! and nothing else nowadays!" + +"Nevertheless, the Emperor is a great and puissant monarch," rejoined +the Arnheimer thoughtfully; "and could he rule us himself, we might do +well. But his dominions are so large, he knows little of us. And +worse, he is dying, or as good as dying. He can scarcely sit his +horse, and rumor says that before the year is out he will resign the +throne. Then we hear little good of his successor, your queen's +husband, and look to hear less. I fear that there is a dark time +before us, and God only knows the issue." + +"And alone will rule it," Master Bertie rejoined piously. + +This saying was in a way the keynote to the life we found our host +living on his island estate. Peace, but peace with constant fear for +an assailant, and religion for a supporter. Several times a week +Master Lindstrom would go to Arnheim to superintend his business, and +always after his return he would shake his head, and speak gravely, +and Dymphna would lose her color for an hour or two. Things were going +badly. The reformers were being more and more hardly dealt with. The +Spaniards were growing more despotic. That was his constant report. +And then I would see him, as he walked with us in orchard or garden, +or sat beside the stove, cast wistful glances at the comfort and +plenty round him. I knew that he was asking himself how long they +would last. If they escaped the clutches of a tyrannical government, +would they be safe in the times that were coming from the violence of +an ill-paid soldiery? The answer was doubtful, or rather it was too +certain. + +I sometimes wondered how he could patiently foresee such +possibilities, and take no steps, whatever the risk, to prevent them. +At first I thought his patience sprang from the Dutch character. Later +I traced its deeper roots to a simplicity of faith and a deep +religious feeling, which either did not at that time exist in England, +or existed only among people with whom I had never come into contact. +Here they seemed common enough and real enough. These folks' faith +sustained them. It was a part of their lives; a bulwark against the +fear that otherwise would have overwhelmed them. And to an extent, +too, which then surprised me, I found, as time went on, that the +Duchess and Master Bertie shared this enthusiasm, although with them +it took a less obtrusive form. + +I was led at the time to think a good deal about this; and just a word +I may say of myself, and of those days spent on the Rhine inland--that +whereas before I had taken but a lukewarm interest in religious +questions, and, while clinging instinctively to the teaching of my +childhood, had conformed with a light heart rather than annoy my +uncle, I came to think somewhat differently now; differently and more +seriously. And so I have continued to think since, though I have never +become a bigot; a fact I owe, perhaps, to Mistress Dymphna, in whose +tender heart there was room for charity as well as faith. For she was +my teacher. + +Of necessity, since no other of our party could communicate with her, +I became more or less the Dutch girl's companion. I would often, of an +evening, join her on a wooden bench which stood under an elm on a +little spit of grass looking toward the city, and at some distance +from the house. Here, when the weather was warm, she would watch for +her father's return; and here one day, while talking with her, I had +the opportunity of witnessing a sight unknown in England, but which +year by year was to become more common in the Netherlands, more +heavily fraught with menace in Netherland eyes. + +We happened to be so deeply engaged in watching the upper end of the +reach at the time in question, where we expected each moment to see +Master Lindstrom's boat round the point, that we saw nothing of a boat +coming the other way, until the flapping of its sails, as it tacked, +drew our eyes toward it. Even then in the boat itself I saw nothing +strange, but in its passengers I did. They were swarthy, mustachioed +men, who in the hundred poses they assumed, as they lounged on deck or +leaned over the side, never lost a peculiar air of bravado. As they +drew nearer to us the sound of their loud voices, their oaths and +laughter reached us plainly, and seemed to jar on the evening +stillness. Their bold, fierce eyes, raking the banks unceasingly, +reached us at last. The girl by my side uttered a cry of alarm, and +rose as if to retreat. But she sat down again, for behind us was an +open stretch of turf, and to escape unseen was impossible. Already a +score of eyes had marked her beauty, and as the boat drew abreast of +us, I had to listen to the ribald jests and laughter of those on +board. My ears tingled and my cheeks burned. But I could do nothing. I +could only glare at them, and grind my teeth. + +"Who are they?" I muttered. "The cowardly knaves!' + +"Oh, hush! hush!" the girl pleaded. She had retreated behind me. And +indeed I need not have put my question, for though I had never seen +the Spanish soldiery, I had heard enough about them to recognize them +now. In the year 1555 their reputation was at its height. Their +fathers had overcome the Moors after a contest of centuries, and they +themselves had overrun Italy and lowered the pride of France. As a +result they had many military virtues and all the military vices. +Proud, bloodthirsty, and licentious everywhere, it may be imagined +that in the subject Netherlands, with their pay always in arrear, they +were, indeed, people to be feared. It was seldom that even their +commanders dared to check their excesses. + +Yet, when the first flush of my anger had subsided, I looked after +them, odd as it may seem, with mingled feelings. With all their faults +they were few against many, a conquering race in a foreign land. They +could boast of blood and descent. They were proud to call themselves +the soldiers and gentlemen of Europe. I was against them, yet I +admired them with a boy's admiration for the strong and reckless. + +Of course I said nothing of this to my companion. Indeed, when she +spoke to me I did not hear her. My thoughts had flown far from the +burgher's daughter sitting by me, and were with my grandmother's +people. I saw, in imagination, the uplands of Old Castile, as I had +often heard them described, hot in summer and bleak in winter. I +pictured the dark, frowning walls of Toledo, with its hundred Moorish +trophies, the castles that crowned the hills around, the gray olive +groves, and the box-clad slopes. I saw Palencia, where my grandmother, +Petronilla de Vargas, was born; Palencia, dry and brown and sun-baked, +lying squat and low on its plain, the eaves of its cathedral a man's +height from the ground. All this I saw. I suppose the Spanish blood in +me awoke and asserted itself at sight of those other Spaniards. And +then--then I forgot it all as I heard behind me an alien voice, and I +turned and found Dymphna had stolen from me and was talking to a +stranger. + + + + + CHAPTER IX. + + PLAYING WITH FIRE. + + +He was a young man, and a Dutchman, but not a Dutchman of the stout, +burly type which I had most commonly seen in the country. He had, it +is true, the usual fair hair and blue eyes, and he was rather short +than tall; but his figure was thin and meager, and he had a pointed +nose and chin, and a scanty fair beard. I took him to be nearsighted: +at a second glance I saw that he was angry. He was talking fast to +Dymphna--of course in Dutch--and my first impulse, in face of his +excited gestures and queer appearance, was to laugh. But I had a +notion what his relationship to the girl was, and I smothered this, +and instead asked, as soon as I could get a word in, whether I should +leave them. + +"Oh, no!" Dymphna answered, blushing slightly, and turning to me with +a troubled glance. I believe she had clean forgotten my presence. +"This is Master Jan Van Tree, a good friend of ours. And this," she +continued, still in Spanish, but speaking to him, "is Master Carey, +one of my father's guests." + +We bowed, he formally, for he had not recovered his temper, and I--I +dare say I still had my Spanish ancestors in my head--with +condescension. We disliked one another at sight, I think. I dubbed him +a mean little fellow, a trader, a peddler; and, however he classed me, +it was not favorably. So it was no particular desire to please him +which led me to say with outward solicitude, "I fear you are annoyed +at something, Master Van Tree?" + +"I am!" he said bluntly, meeting me half-way. + +"And am I to know the cause?" I asked, "or is it a secret?" + +"It is no secret!" he retorted. "Mistress Lindstrom should have been +more careful. She should not have exposed herself to the chance of +being seen by those miserable foreigners." + +"The foreigners--in the boat?" I said dryly. + +"Yes, of course--in the boat," he answered. He was obliged to say +that, but he glared at me across her as he spoke. We had turned and +were walking back to the house, the poplars casting long shadows +across our path. + +"They were rude," I observed carelessly, my chin very high. "But there +is no particular harm done that I can see, Master Van Tree." + +"Perhaps not, as far as you can see," he retorted in great excitement. +"But perhaps also you are not very far-sighted. You may not see it +now, yet harm will follow." + +"Possibly," I said, and I was going to follow up this seemingly candid +admission by something very boorish, when Mistress Dymphna struck in +nervously. + +"My father is anxious," she explained, speaking to me, "that I should +have as little to do with our Spanish governors as possible, Master +Carey. It always vexes him to hear that I have fallen in their way, +and that is why my friend feels annoyed. It was not, of course, your +fault, since you did not know of this. It was I," she continued +hurriedly, "who should not have ventured to the elm tree without +seeing that the coast was clear." + +I knew that she was timidly trying, her color coming and going, to +catch my eye; to appease me as the greater stranger, and to keep the +peace between her ill-matched companions, who, indeed, stalked along +eying one another much as a wolf-hound and a badger-dog might regard +each other across a choice bone. But the young Dutchman's sudden +appearance had put me out. I was not in love with her, yet I liked to +talk to her, and I grudged her to him, he seemed so mean a fellow. And +so--churl that I was--in answer to her speech I let drop some sneer +about the great fear of the Spaniards which seemed to prevail in these +parts. + +"_You_ are not afraid of them, then?" Van Tree said, with a smile. + +"No, I am not," I answered, my lip curling also. + +"Ah!" with much meaning. "Perhaps you do not know them very well." + +"Perhaps not," I replied. "Still, my grandmother was a Spaniard." + +"So I should have thought," he retorted swiftly. + +So swiftly that I felt the words as I should have felt a blow. "What +do you mean?" I blurted out, halting before him, with my cheek +crimson. In vain were all Dymphna's appealing glances, all her signs +of distress. "I will have you explain, Master Van Tree, what you mean +by that?" I repeated fiercely. + +"I mean what I said," he answered, confronting me stubbornly, and +shaking off Dymphna's hand. His blue eyes twinkled with rage, his thin +beard bristled; he was the color of a turkey-cock's comb. At home we +should have thought him a comical little figure; but he did not seem +so absurd here. For one thing, he looked spiteful enough for anything; +and for another, though I topped him by a head and shoulders, I could +not flatter myself that he was afraid of me. On the contrary, I felt +that in the presence of his mistress, small and short-sighted as he +was, he would have faced a lion without winking. + +His courage was not to be put to the proof. I was still glaring at +him, seeking some retort which should provoke him beyond endurance, +when a hand was laid on my shoulder, and I turned to find that Master +Bertie and the Duchess had joined us. + +"So here are the truants," the former said pleasantly, speaking in +English, and showing no consciousness whatever of the crisis in the +middle of which he had come up, though he must have discerned in our +defiant attitudes, and in Dymphna's troubled face, that something was +wrong. "You know who this is, Master Francis," he continued heartily. +"Or have you not been introduced to Master Van Tree, the betrothed of +our host's daughter?" + +"Mistress Dymphna has done me that honor," I said stiffly, recovering +myself in appearance, while at heart sore and angry with everybody. +"But I fear the Dutch gentleman has not thanked her for the +introduction, since he learned that my grandmother was Spanish." + +"_Your_ grandmother, do you mean?" cried the Duchess, much astonished. + +"Yes, madam." + +"Well, to be sure!" she exclaimed, lifting up her hands and appealing +whimsically to the others. "This boy is full of starts and surprises. +You never know what he will produce next. The other day it was a +warrant! To-day it is a grandmother, and a temper!" + +I could not be angry with her; and perhaps I was not sorry now that my +quarrel with the young Dutchman had stopped where it had. I affected, +as well as I could, to join in the laugh at my expense, and took +advantage of the arrival of our host--who at this moment came up the +slope from the landing-place, his hands outstretched and a smile of +greeting on his kindly face--to slip away unnoticed, and make amends +to my humor by switching off the heads of the withes by the river. + +But naturally the scene left a degree of ill-feeling behind it; and +for the first time, during the two months we had spent under Master +Lindstrom's roof, the party who sat down to supper were under some +constraint. I felt that the young Dutchman had had the best of the +bout in the garden; and I talked loudly and foolishly in the boyish +attempt to assert myself, and to set myself right at least in my own +estimation. Master Van Tree meanwhile sat silent, eying me from time +to time in no friendly fashion. Dymphna seemed nervous and frightened, +and the Duchess and her husband exchanged troubled glances. Only our +host and Mistress Anne, who was in particularly good spirits, were +unaffected by the prevailing chill. + + +Mistress Anne, indeed, in her ignorance, made matters worse. She had +begun to pick up some Dutch, and was fond of airing her knowledge and +practicing fresh sentences at meal-times. By some ill-luck she +contrived this evening--particularly after, finding no one to +contradict me, I had fallen into comparative silence--to frame her +sentences so as to cause as much embarrassment as possible to all of +us. "Where did you walk with Dymphna this morning?" was the question +put to me. "You are fond of the water; Englishmen are fond of the +water," she said to Dymphna. "Dymphna is tall; Master Francis is tall. +I sit by you to-night; the Dutch lady sat by you last night," and +soon, and so on, with prattle which seemed to amuse our host +exceedingly--he was never tired of correcting her mistakes--but which +put the rest of us out of countenance, bringing the tears to poor +Dymphna's eyes--she did not know where to look--and making her lover +glower at me as though he would eat me. + +It was in vain that the Duchess made spasmodic rushes into +conversation, and in the intervals nodded and frowned at the +delinquent. Mistress Anne in her innocence saw nothing. She went on +until Van Tree could stand it no longer, and with a half-smothered +threat, which was perfectly intelligible to me, rose roughly from the +table, and went to the door as if to look out at the night. + +"What is the matter?" Mistress Anne said, wonderingly, in English. Her +eyes seemed at length to be opened to the fact that something was +amiss with us. + +Before I could answer, the Duchess, who had risen, came behind her. +"You little fool!" she whispered fiercely, "if fool you are. You +deserve to be whipped!" + +"Why, what have I done?" murmured the girl, really frightened now, and +appealing to me. + +"Done!" whispered the Duchess; and I think she pinched her, for my +neighbor winced. "More harm than you guess, you minx! And for you, +Master Francis, a word with you. Come with me to my room, please." + +I went with her, half-minded to be angry, and half-inclined to feel +ashamed of myself. She did not give me time, however, to consider +which attitude I should take up, for the moment the door of her room +was closed behind us, she turned upon me, the color high in her +cheeks. "Now, young man," she said in a tone of ringing contempt, "do +you really think that that girl is in love with you?" + +"What girl?" I asked sheepishly. The unexpected question and her tone +put me out of countenance. + +"What girl? What girl?" she replied impatiently. "Don't play with me, +boy! You know whom I mean. Dymphna Lindstrom!" + +"Oh, I thought you meant Mistress Anne," I said, somewhat +impertinently. + +Her face fell in an extraordinary fashion, as if the suggestion were +not pleasant to her. But she answered on the instant: "Well! The +vanity of the lad! Do you think all the girls are in love with you? +Because you have been sitting with a pretty face on each side of you, +do you think you have only to throw the handkerchief, this way or +that? If you do, open your eyes, and you will find it is not so. My +kinswoman can take care of herself, so we will leave her out of the +discussion, please. And for this pink and white Dutch girl," my lady +continued viciously, "let me tell you that she thinks more of Van +Tree's little finger than of your whole body." + +I shrugged my shoulders, but still I was mortified. A young man may +not be in love with a girl, yet it displeases him to hear that she is +indifferent to him. + +The Duchess noticed the movement. "Don't do that," she cried in +impatient scorn. "You do not see much in Master Van Tree, perhaps? I +thought not. Therefore you think a girl must be of the same mind as +yourself. Well," with a fierce little nod, "you will learn some day +that it is not so, that women are not quite what men think them; and +particularly, Master Francis, that six feet of manhood, and a pretty +face on top of it, do not always have their way. But there, I did not +bring you here to tell you that. I want to know whether you are aware +what you are doing?" + +I muttered something to the effect that I did not know I was doing any +harm. + +"You do not call it harm, then," the Duchess retorted with energy, "to +endanger the safety of every one of us? Cannot you see that if you +insult and offend this young man--which you are doing out of pure +wanton mischief, for you are not in love with the girl--he may ruin +us?" + +"Ruin us?" I repeated incredulously. + +"Yes, ruin us!" she cried. "Here we are, living more or less in hiding +through the kindness of Master Lindstrom--living in peace and +quietness. But do you suppose that inquiries are not being made for +us? Why, I would bet a dozen gold angels that Master Clarence is in +the Netherlands, at this moment, tracking us." + +I was startled by this idea, and she saw I was. "We can trust Master +Lindstrom, were it only for his own sake," she continued more quietly, +satisfied perhaps with the effect she had produced. "And this young +man, who is the son of one of the principal men of Arnheim, is also +disposed to look kindly on us, as I fancy it is his nature to look. +But if you make mischief between Dymphna and him----" + +"I have not," I said. + +"Then do not," she replied sharply. "Look to it for the future. And +more, do not let him fancy it possible. Jealousy is as easily awakened +as it is hardly put to sleep. A word from this young man to the +Spanish authorities, and we should be hauled back to England in a +trice, if worse did not befall us here. Now, you will be careful?" + +"I will," I said, conscience-stricken and a little cowed. + +"That is better," she replied smiling. "I think you will. Now go." + +I went down again with some food for thought--with some good +intentions, too. But I was to find--the discovery is made by +many--that good resolutions commonly come too late. When I went +downstairs I found my host and Master Bertie alone in the parlor. The +girls had disappeared, so had Van Tree, and I saw at once that +something had happened. Master Bertie was standing gazing at the stove +very thoughtfully, and the Dutchman was walking up and down the room +with an almost comical expression of annoyance and trouble on his +pleasant face. + +"Where are the young ladies?" I asked. + +"Upstairs," said Master Bertie, not looking at me. + +"And--and Van Tree?" I asked mechanically. Somehow I anticipated the +answer. + +"Gone!" said the Englishman curtly. + +"Ay, gone, the foolish lad!" the Dutchman struck in, tugging at his +beard. "What has come to him? He is not wont to show temper. I have +never known him and Dymphna have a cross word before. What has come to +the lad, I say, to go off in a passion at this time of night? And no +one knows whither he has gone, or when he will come back again!" + +He seemed as he spoke hardly conscious of my presence; but Master +Bertie turned and looked at me, and I hung my head, and very shortly +afterward, I slunk out. The thought of what I might have brought upon +us all by my petulance and vanity made me feel sick. I crept up to bed +nervous and fearful of the morrow, listening to every noise without, +and praying inwardly that my alarm might not be justified. + + +When the morrow came I went downstairs as anxious to see Van Tree in +the flesh as I had been yesterday disappointed by his appearance. But +no Van Tree was there to be seen. Nothing had been heard of him. +Dymphna moved restlessly about, her cheeks pale, her eyes downcast, +and if I had ever flattered myself that I was anything to the girl, I +was undeceived now. The Duchess shot angry glances at me from time to +time. Master Bertie kept looking anxiously at the door. Every one +seemed to fear and to expect something. But none of them feared and +expected it as I did. + +"He must have gone home; he must have gone to Arnheim," said our host, +trying to hide his vexation. "He will be back in a day or two. Young +men will be young men." + +But I found that the Duchess did not share the belief that Van Tree +had gone home; for in the course of the morning she took occasion, +when we were alone, to charge me to be careful not to come into +collision with him. + +"How can I, now he has gone?" I said meekly, feeling I was in +disgrace. + +"He has not gone far," replied the Duchess meaningly. "Depend upon it, +he will not go far out of sight unless there is more harm done than I +think, or he is very different from English lovers. But if you come +across him, I pray you to keep clear of him, Master Francis." + +I nodded assent. + +But of what weight are resolutions, with fate in the other scale! It +was some hours after this, toward two o'clock indeed, when Mistress +Anne came to me, looking flurried and vexed. "Have you seen Dymphna?" +she asked abruptly. + +"No," I answered. "Why?" + +"Because she is not in the house," the girl answered, speaking +quickly, "nor in the garden; and the last time I saw her she was +crossing the island toward the footbridge. I think she has gone that +way to be on the lookout--you can guess for whom [with a smile]. But I +am fearful lest she shall meet some one else, Master Francis; she is +wearing her gold chain, and one of the maids says that she saw two of +the Spanish garrison on the road near the end of the footbridge this +morning. That is the way by land to Arnheim, you know." + +"That is bad," I said. "What is to be done?" + +"You must go and look for her," Anne suggested. "She should not be +alone." + +"Let her father go, or Master Bertie," I answered. + +"Her father has gone down the river--to Arnheim, I expect; and Master +Bertie is fishing in a boat somewhere. It will take time to find him. +Why cannot you go? If she has crossed the footbridge she will not be +far away." + +She seemed so anxious as she spoke for the Dutch girl's safety, that +she infected me with her fears, and I let myself be persuaded. After +all there might be danger, and I did not see what else was to be done. +Indeed, Mistress Anne did not leave me until she had seen me clear of +the orchard and half across the meadows toward the footbridge. "Mind +you bring her back," she cried after me. "Do not let her come alone!" +And those were her last words. + +After we had separated I did think for a moment that it was a pity I +had not asked her to come with me. But the thought occurred too late, +and I strode on toward the head of the bridge, resolving that, as soon +as I had sighted Dymphna, I would keep away from her and content +myself with watching over her from a distance. As I passed by the +little cluster of cottages on the landward side of the island, I +glanced sharply about me, for I thought it not unlikely that Master +Van Tree might be lurking in the neighborhood. But I saw nothing +either of her or him. All was quiet, the air full of spring sunshine +and warmth and hope and the blossoms of fruit trees; and with an +indefinable pleasure, a feeling of escape from control and restraint, +I crossed the long footbridge, and set foot, almost for the first time +since our arrival--for at Master Lindstrom's desire we had kept very +close--on the river bank. + +To the right a fair road or causeway along the waterside led to +Arnheim. At the point where I stood, this road on its way from the +city took a turn at right angles, running straight away from the river +to avoid a wide track of swamp and mere which lay on my left--a +quaking marsh many miles round, overgrown with tall rushes and sedges, +which formed the head of the bay in which our island lay. I looked up +the long, straight road to Arnheim, and saw only a group of travelers +moving slowly along it, their backs toward me. The road before me was +bare of passengers. Where, then, was Dymphna, if she had crossed the +bridge? In the last resort I scanned the green expanse of rushes and +willows, which stretched, with intervals of open water, as far as the +eye could reach on my left. It was all rustling and shimmering in the +light breeze, but my eye picked out one or two raised dykes which +penetrated it here and there, and served at once as pathways to islets +in the mere and as breastworks against further encroachments of the +river. Presently, on one of these, of which the course was fairly +defined by a line of willows, I made out the flutter of a woman's +hood. And I remembered that the day before I had heard Dymphna express +a wish to go to the marsh for some herb which grew there. + +"Right!" I said, seating myself with much satisfaction on the last +post of the bridge. "She is safe enough there! And I will go no +nearer. It is only on the road she is likely to be in danger from our +Spanish gallants!" + +My eyes, released from duty, wandered idly over the landscape for a +while, but presently returned to the dyke across the mere. I could not +now see Dymphna. The willows hid her, and I waited for her to +reappear. She did not, but some one else did; for by and by, on the +same path and crossing an interval between the willows, there came +into sight a man's form. + +"Ho! ho!" I said, following it with my eyes. "So I may go home! Master +Van Tree is on the track. And now I hope they will make it up!" I +added pettishly. + +Another second and I started up with a low cry. The sunlight had +caught a part of the man's dress, a shining something which flashed +back a point of intense light. The something I guessed at once was a +corselet, and it needed scarce another thought to apprise me that +Dymphna's follower was not Van Tree at all, but a Spanish soldier! + +I lost no time; yet it took me a minute--a minute of trembling haste +and anxiety--to discover the path from the causeway on to the dyke. +When once I had stumbled on to the latter I found I had lost sight of +both figures; but I ran along at the top of my speed, calculating that +the two, who could not be far apart, the man being the nearer to me, +were about a quarter of a mile or rather more from the road. I had +gone one-half of this distance perhaps when a shrill scream in front +caused me to redouble my efforts. I expected to find the ruffian in +the act of robbing the girl, and clutched my cudgel--for, alas! I had +left my sword at home--more tightly in my grasp, so that it was an +immense relief to me when, on turning an angle in the dyke, I saw her +running toward me. Her face, still white with fear, however, and her +hair streaming loosely behind her, told how narrow had been her +escape--if escape it could be called. For about ten feet behind her, +the hood he had plucked off still in his grasp, came Master Spaniard, +hot-foot and panting, but gaining on her now with every stride. + + +[Illustration: I STOOD OVER HIM WATCHING HIM] + + +He was a tall fellow, gayly dressed, swarthy, mustachioed, and +fierce-eyed. His corselet and sword-belt shone and jingled as he ran +and swore; but he had dropped his feathered bonnet in the slight +struggle which had evidently taken place when she got by him; and it +lay a black spot in the middle of the grassy avenue behind him. The +sun--it was about three hours after noon--was at my back, and shining +directly into his eyes, and I marked this as I raised my cudgel and +jumped aside to let the girl pass; for she in her blind fear would +have run against me. + +It was almost the same with him. He did not see me until I was within +a few paces of him, and even then I think he noticed my presence +merely as that of an unwelcome spectator. He fancied I should step +aside; and he cursed me, calling me a Dutch dog for getting in his +way. + +The next moment--he had not drawn his sword nor made any attempt to +draw it--we came together violently, and I had my hand on his throat. +We swayed as we whirled round one another in the first shock of the +collision. A cry of astonishment escaped him--astonishment at my +hardihood. He tried, his eyes glaring into mine, and his hot breath on +my cheek, to get at his dagger. But it was too late. I brought down my +staff, with all the strength of an arm nerved at the moment by rage +and despair, upon his bare head. + +He went down like a stone, and the blood bubbled from his lips. I +stood over him watching him. He stretched himself out and turned with +a convulsive movement on his face. His hands clawed the grass. His leg +moved once, twice, a third time faintly. Then he lay still. + +There was a lark singing just over my head, and its clear notes +seemed, during the long, long minute while I stood bending over him in +an awful fascination, to be the only sounds in nature. I looked so +long at him in that dreadful stillness and absorption, I dared not at +last look up lest I should see I knew not what. Yet when a touch fell +on my arm I did not start. + +"You have killed him!" the girl whispered, shuddering. + +"Yes, I have killed him," I answered mechanically. + +I could not take my eyes off him. It was not as if I had done this +thing after a long conflict, or in a _melee_ with others fighting +round me, or on the battle-field. I should have felt no horror then +such as I felt now, standing over him in the sunshine with the lark's +song in my ears. It had happened so quickly, and the waste about us +was so still; and I had never killed a man before, nor seen a man die. + +"Oh, come away!" Dymphna wailed suddenly. "Come away!" + +I turned then, and the sight of the girl's wan face and strained eyes +recalled me in some degree to myself. I saw she was ill; and hastily I +gave her my arm, and partly carried, partly supported, her back to the +road. The way seemed long and I looked behind me often. But we reached +the causeway at last, and there in the open I felt some relief. Yet +even then, stopping to cast a backward glance at the marsh, I +shuddered anew, espying a bright white spark gleaming amid the green +of the rushes. It was the dead man's corselet. But if it had been his +eye I could scarcely have shrunk from it in greater dread. + +It will be imagined that we were not long in crossing the island. +Naturally I was full of what had happened, and never gave a thought to +Van Tree's jealousy, or the incidents of his short visit. I had indeed +forgotten his existence until we reached the porch. There entering +rapidly, with Dymphna clinging to my arm, I was so oblivious of other +matters that when the young Dutchman rose suddenly from the seat on +one side of the door, and at the same moment the Duchess rose from the +bench on the other, I did not understand in the first instant of +surprise what was the matter, though I let Dymphna's hand fall from my +arm. The dark scowling face of the one, however, and the anger and +chagrin written on the features of the other, as they both glared at +us, brought all back to me in a flash. But it was too late. Before I +could utter a word the girl's lover pushed by me with a fierce gesture +and fiercer cry, and disappeared round a corner of the house. + +"Was ever such folly!" cried the Duchess, stamping her foot, and +standing before us, her face crimson. "Or such fools! You idiot! +You----" + +"Hush, madam," I said sternly--had I really grown older in doing the +deed? "something has happened." + +And Dymphna, with a low cry of "The Spaniard! The Spaniard!" tottered +up to her and fainted in her arms. + + + + + CHAPTER X. + + THE FACE IN THE PORCH. + + +"This is a serious matter," said Master Bertie thoughtfully, as we sat +in conclave an hour later round the table in the parlor. Mistress Anne +was attending to Dymphna upstairs, and Van Tree had not returned +again; so that we had been unable to tell him of the morning's +adventure. But the rest of us were there. "It considerably adds to the +danger of our position," Bertie continued. + +"Of course it does," his wife said promptly. "But Master Lindstrom +here can best judge of that, and of what course it will be safest to +take." + +"It depends," our host answered slowly, "upon whether the dead man be +discovered before night. You see if the body be not found----" + +"Well?" said my lady impatiently, as he paused. + +"Then we must some of us go after dark and bury him," he decided. "And +perhaps, though he will be missed at the next roll-call in the city, +his death may not be proved, or traced to this neighborhood. In that +case the storm will blow over, and things be no worse than before." + +"I fear there is no likelihood of that," I said; "for I am told he had +a companion. One of the maids noticed them lurking about the end of +the bridge more than once this morning." + +Our host's face fell. + +"That is bad," he said, looking at me in evident consternation. "Who +told you?" + +"Mistress Anne. And one of the maids told her. It was that which led +me to follow your daughter." + +The old man got up for about the fortieth time, and shook my hand, +while the tears stood in his eyes and his lip trembled. "Heaven bless +you, Master Carey!" he said. "But for you, my girl might not have +escaped." + +He could not finish. His emotion choked him, and he sat down again. +The event of the morning--his daughter's danger, and my share in +averting it--had touched him as nothing else could have touched him. I +met the Duchess's eyes and they too were soft and shining, wearing an +expression very different from that which had greeted me on my return +with Dymphna. + +"Ah, well! she is safe," Master Lindstrom resumed, when he had +regained his composure. "Thanks to Heaven and your friend, madam! +Small matter now if house and lands go!" + +"Still, let us hope they will not," Master Bertie said. "Do you think +these miscreants were watching the island on our account? That some +information had been given as to our presence, and they were sent to +learn what they could?" + +"No, no!" the Dutchman answered confidently. "It was the sight of the +girl and her gewgaws yesterday brought them--the villains! There is +nothing safe from them and nothing sacred to them. They saw her as +they passed up in the boat, you remember." + +"But then, supposing the worst to come to the worst?" + +"We must escape across the frontier to Wesel, in the Duchy of Cleves," +replied Lindstrom in a matter-of-fact tone, as if he had long +considered and settled the point. "The distance is not great, and in +Wesel we may find shelter, at any rate for a time. Even there, if +pressure be brought to bear upon the Government to give us up, I would +not trust it. Yet for a time it may do." + +"And you would leave all this?" the Duchess said in wonder, her eyes +traveling round the room, so clean and warm and comfortable, and +settling at length upon the great armoire of plate, which happened to +be opposite to her. "You would leave all this at a moment's notice?" + +"Yes, madam, all we could not carry with us," he answered simply. +"Honor and life, these come first. And I thank Heaven that I live here +within reach of a foreign soil, and not in the interior, where escape +would be hopeless." + +"But if the true facts were known," the Duchess urged, "would you +still be in danger? Would not the magistrates protect you? The Schout +and Schepen as you call them? They are Dutchmen." + +"Against a Spanish governor and a Spanish garrison?" he replied with +emphasis. "Ay, they would protect me--as one sheep protects another +against the wolves. No! I dare not risk it. Were I in prison, what +would become of Dymphna?" + +"Master Van Tree?" + +"He has the will to shelter her, no doubt. And his father has +influence; but such as mine--a broken reed to trust to. Then Dymphna +is not all. Once in prison, whatever the charge, there would be +questioning about religion; perhaps," with a faint smile, "questioning +about my guests." + +"I suppose you know best," said the Duchess, with a sigh. "But I hope +the worst will not come to the worst." + +"Amen to that!" he answered quite cheerfully. + +Indeed, it was strange that we seemed to feel more sorrow at the +prospect of leaving this haven of a few weeks, than our host of +quitting the home of a lifetime. But the necessity had come upon us +suddenly, while he had contemplated it for years. So much fear and +humiliation had mingled with his enjoyment of his choicest possessions +that this long-expected moment brought with it a feeling akin to +relief. + +For myself I had a present trouble that outweighed any calamity of +to-morrow. Perforce, since I alone knew the spot where the man lay, I +must be one of the burying party. My nerves had not recovered from the +blow which the sight of the Spaniard lying dead at my feet had dealt +them so short a time before, and I shrank with a natural repulsion +from the task before me. Yet there was no escaping it, no chance of +escaping it, I saw. + +None the less, throughout the silent meal to which we four sat down +together, neither the girls nor Van Tree appearing, were my thoughts +taken up with the business which was to follow. I heard our host, who +was to go with me, explaining that there was a waterway right up to +the dyke, and that we would go by boat; and heard him with apathy. +What matter how we went, if such were the object of our journey? +I wondered how the man's face would look when we came to turn him +over, and pictured it in all ghastliest shapes. I wondered whether I +should ever forget the strange spasmodic twitching of his leg, the +gurgle--half oath, half cry--which had come with the blood from his +throat. When Lindstrom said the moon was up and bade me come with him +to the boat, I went mechanically. No one seemed to suspect me of fear. +I suppose they thought that, as I had not feared to kill him, I should +not fear him dead. And in the general silence and moodiness I escaped +notice. + + +"It is a good night for the purpose," the Dutchman said, looking about +when we were outside. "It is light enough for us, yet not so light +that we run much risk of being seen." + +I assented, shivering. The moon was almost at the full, and the +weather was dry, but scud after scud of thin clouds, sweeping across +the breezy sky, obscured the light from time to time, and left nothing +certain. We loosed the smallest boat in silence, and getting in, +pulled gently round the lower end of the island, making for the fringe +of rushes which marked the line of division between river and fen. We +could hear the frogs croaking in the marsh, and the water lapping the +banks, and gurgling among the tree-roots, and making a hundred strange +noises to which daylight ears are deaf. Yet as long as I was in the +open water I felt bold enough. I kept my tremors for the moment when +we should brush through the rustling belt of reeds, and the willows +should whisper about our heads, and the rank vegetation, the +mysterious darkness of the mere should shut us in. + +For a time I was to be spared this. Master Lindstrom suddenly stopped +rowing. "We have forgotten to bring a stone, lad," he said in a low +voice. + +"A stone?" I answered, turning. I was pulling the stroke oar, and my +back was toward him. "Do we want a stone?" + +"To sink the body," he replied. "We cannot bury it in the marsh, and +if we could it were trouble thrown away. We must have a stone." + +"What is to be done?" I asked, leaning on my oar and shivering, as +much in impatience as nervousness. "Must we go back?" + +"No, we are not far from the causeway now," he answered, with Dutch +coolness. "There are some big stones, I fancy, by the end of the +bridge. If not, there are some lying among the cottages just across +the bridge. Your eyes are younger than mine, so you had better go. I +will pull on, and land you." + +I assented, and the boat's course being changed a point or two, three +minutes' rowing laid her bows on the mud, some fifty yards from the +landward bend of the bridge, and just in the shadow of the causeway. I +sprang ashore and clambered up. "Hist!" he cried, warning me as I was +about to start on my errand. "Go about it quietly, Master Francis. The +people will probably be in bed. But be secret." + +I nodded and moved off, as warily as he could desire. I spent a minute +or two peering about the causeway, but I found nothing that would +serve our purpose. There was no course left then but to cross the +planks, and seek what I wanted in the hamlet. Remembering how the +timbers had creaked and clattered when I went over them in the +daylight, I stole across on tiptoe. I fancied I had seen a pile of +stones near one of the posts at that end, but I could not find them +now, and after groping about a while--for this part was at the moment +in darkness--I crept cautiously past the first hovel, peering to right +and left as I went. I did not like to confess to myself that I was +afraid to be alone in the dark, but that was nearly the truth. I was +feverishly anxious to find what I wanted and return to my companion. + +Suddenly I paused and held my breath. A slight sound had fallen on my +ears, nervously ready to catch the slightest. I paused and listened. +Yes, there it was again; a whispering of cautious voices close by me, +within a few feet of me. I could see no one. But a moment's thought +told me that the speakers were hidden by the farther corner of the +cottage abreast of which I stood. The sound of human voices, the +assurance of living companionship, steadied my nerves, and to some +extent rid me of my folly. I took a step to one side, so as to be more +completely in the shadow cast by the reed-thatched eaves, and then +softly advanced until I commanded a view of the whisperers. + +They were two, a man and a woman. And the woman was of all people +Dymphna! She had her back to me, but she stood in the moonlight, and I +knew her hood in a moment. The man--surely the man was Van Tree then, +if the woman was Dymphna? I stared. I felt sure it must be Van Tree. +It was wonderful enough that Dymphna should so far have regained nerve +and composure as to rise and come out to meet him. But in that case +her conduct, though strange, was explicable. If not, however, if the +man were not Van Tree---- + +Well, he certainly was not. Stare as I might, rub my eyes as I might, +I could not alter the man's figure, which was of the tallest, whereas +I have said that the young Dutchman was short. This man's face, too, +though it was obscured as he bent over the girl by his cloak, which +was pulled high up about his throat, was swarthy; swarthy and +beardless, I made out. More, his cap had a feather, and even as he +stood still I thought I read the soldier in his attitude. The soldier +and the Spaniard! + +What did it mean? On what strange combination had I lit? Dymphna and a +Spaniard! Impossible. Yet a thousand doubts and thoughts ran riot in +my brain, a thousand conjectures jostled one another to get uppermost. +What was I to do? What ought I to do? Go nearer to them, as near as +possible, and listen and learn the truth? Or steal back the way I had +come, and fetch Master Lindstrom? But first, was it certain that the +girl was there of her own free will? Yes, the question was answered as +soon as put. The man laid his hand gently on her shoulder. She did not +draw back. + +Confident of this, and consequently of Dymphna's bodily safety, I +hesitated, and was beginning to consider whether the best course might +not be to withdraw and say nothing, leaving the question of future +proceedings to be decided after I had spoken to her on the morrow, +when a movement diverted my thoughts. The man at last raised his head. +The moonlight fell cold and bright on his face, displaying every +feature as clearly as if it had been day. And though I had only once +seen his face before, I knew it again. + +And knew him! In a second I was back in England, looking on a far +different scene. I saw the Thames, its ebb tide rippling in the +sunshine as it ripples past Greenwich, and a small boat gliding over +it, and a man in the bow of the boat, a man with a grim lip and a +sinister eye. Yes, the tall soldier talking to Dymphna in the +moonlight, his cap the cap of a Spanish guard, was Master Clarence! +the Duchess's chief enemy! + + * * * * * + +I stayed my foot. With a strange settling into resolve of all my +doubts I felt if my sword, which happily I had brought with me, was +loose in its sheath, and leaned forward scanning him. So he had +tracked us! He was here! With wonderful vividness I pictured all the +dangers which menaced the Duchess, Master Bertie, the Lindstroms, +myself, through his discovery of us, all the evils which would befall +us if the villain went away with his tale. Forgetting Dymphna's +presence, I set my teeth hard together. He should not escape me this +time. + +But man can only propose. As I took a step forward, I trod on a round +piece of wood which turned under my foot, and I stumbled. My eye left +the pair for a second. When it returned to them they had taken the +alarm. Dymphna had started away, and I saw her figure retreating +swiftly in the direction of the house. The man poised himself a moment +irresolute opposite to me; then dashed aside and disappeared behind +the cottage. + +I was after him on the instant, my sword out, and caught sight of his +cloak as he whisked round a corner. He dodged me twice round the next +cottage, the one nearer the river. Then he broke away and made for the +bridge, his object evidently to get off the island. But he seemed at +last to see that I was too quick for him--as I certainly was--and +should catch him half way across the narrow planking; and changing his +mind again he doubled nimbly back and rushed into the open porch of a +cottage, and I heard his sword ring out. I had him at bay. + +At bay indeed! But ready as I was, and resolute to capture or kill +him, I paused. I hesitated to run in on him. The darkness of the porch +hid him, while I must attack with the moonlight shining on me. I +peered in cautiously. "Come out!" I cried. "Come out, you coward!" +Then I heard him move, and for a moment I thought he was coming, and I +stood a-tiptoe waiting for his rush. But he only laughed a derisive +laugh of triumph. He had the odds, and I saw he would keep them. + +I took another cautious step toward him, and shading my eyes with +my left hand, tried to make him out. As I did so, gradually his face +took dim form and shape, confronting mine in the darkness. I stared +yet more intently. The face became more clear. Nay, with a sudden +leap into vividness, as it were, it grew white against the dark +background--white and whiter. It seemed to be thrust out nearer and +nearer, until it almost touched mine. It--his face? No, it was not his +face! For one awful moment a terror, which seemed to still my heart, +glued me to the ground where I stood, as it flashed upon my brain that +it was another face that grinned at me so close to mine, that it was +another face I was looking on; the livid, bloodstained face and stony +eyes of the man I had killed! + +With a wild scream I turned and fled. By instinct, for terror had +deprived me of reason, I hied to the bridge, and keeping, I knew not +how, my footing upon the loose clattering planks, made one desperate +rush across it. The shimmering water below, in which I saw that face a +thousand times reflected, the breeze, which seemed the dead man's hand +clutching me, lent wings to my flight. I sprang at a bound from the +bridge to the bank, from the bank to the boat, and overturning, yet +never seeing, my startled companion, shoved off from the shore with +all my might--and fell a-crying. + +A very learned man, physician to the Queen's Majesty has since told +me, when I related this strange story to him, that probably that burst +of tears saved my reason. It so far restored me at any rate that I +presently knew where I was--cowering in the bottom of the boat, with +my eyes covered; and understood that Master Lindstrom was leaning over +me in a terrible state of mind, imploring me in mingled Dutch and +English to tell him what had happened. "I have seen him!" was all I +could say at first, and I scarcely dared remove my hands from my eyes. +"I have seen him!" I begged my host to row away from the shore, and +after a time was able to tell him what the matter was, he sitting the +while with his arm round my shoulder. + +"You are sure that it was the Spaniard?" he said kindly, after he had +thought a minute. + +"Quite sure," I answered shuddering, yet with less violence. "How +could I be mistaken? If you had seen him----" + +"And you are sure--did you feel his heart this morning? Whether it was +beating?" + +"His heart?" Something in his voice gave me courage to look up, though +I still shunned the water, lest that dreadful visage should rise from +the depths. "No, I did not touch him." + +"And you tell me that he fell on his face. Did you turn him over?" + +"No." I saw his drift now. I was sitting erect. My brain began to work +again. "No," I admitted; "I did not." + +"Then how----" asked the Dutchman roughly--"how do you know that he +was dead, young sir? Tell me that." + +When I explained, "Bah!" he cried. "There is nothing in that! You +jumped to a conclusion. I thought a Spaniard's head was harder to +break. As for the blood coming from his mouth, perhaps he bit his +tongue, or did any one of a hundred things--except die, Master +Francis. That you may be sure is just what he did not do." + +"You think so?" I said gratefully. I began to look about me, yet still +with a tremor in my limbs, and an inclination to start at shadows. + +"Think?" he rejoined, with a heartiness which brought conviction home +tome; "I am sure of it. You may depend upon it that Master Clarence, +or the man you take for Master Clarence--who no doubt was the other +soldier seen with the scoundrel this morning--found him hurt late in +the evening. Then, seeing him in that state, he put him in the porch +for shelter, either because he could not get him to Arnheim at once, +or because he did not wish to give the alarm before he had made his +arrangements for netting your party." + +"That is possible!" I allowed, with a sigh of relief. "But what of +Master Clarence?" + +"Well," the old man said; "let us get home first. We will talk of him +afterward." + +I felt he had more in his mind than appeared, and I obeyed; growing +ashamed now of my panic, and looking forward with no very pleasant +feelings to hearing the story narrated. But when we reached the house, +and found Master Bertie and the Duchess in the parlor waiting for +us--they rose startled at sight of my face--he bade me leave that out, +but tell the rest of the story. + +I complied, describing how I had seen Dymphna meet Clarence, and what +I had observed to pass between them. The astonishment of my hearers +may be imagined. "The point is very simple," said our host coolly, +when I had, in the face of many exclamations and some incredulity, +completed the tale; "it is just this! The woman certainly was not +Dymphna. In the first place, she would not be out at night. In the +second place, what could she know of your Clarence, an Englishman and +a stranger? In the third place, I will warrant she has been in her +room all the evening. Then if Master Francis was mistaken in the +woman, may he not have been mistaken in the man? That is the point." + +"No," I said boldly. "I only saw her back. I saw his face." + +"Certainly, that is something," Master Lindstrom admitted reluctantly. + +"But how many times had you seen him before?" put in my lady very +pertinently. "Only once." + +In answer to that I could do no more than give further assurance of my +certainty on the point. "It was the man I saw in the boat at +Greenwich," I declared positively. "Why should I imagine it?" + +"All the same, I trust you have," she rejoined. "For, if it was indeed +that arch scoundrel, we are undone." + +"Imagination plays us queer tricks sometimes," Master Lindstrom said, +with a smile of much meaning. "But come, lad, I will ask Dymphna, +though I think it useless to do so. For whether you are right or wrong +as to your friend, I will answer for it you are wrong as to my +daughter." + +He was rising to go from them for the purpose, when Mistress Anne +opened the door and came in. She looked somewhat startled at finding +us all in conclave. "I thought I heard your voices," she explained +timidly, standing between us and the door. "I could not sleep." + +She looked indeed as if that were so. Her eyes were very bright, and +there was a bright spot of crimson in each cheek. "What is it?" she +went on abruptly, looking hard at me and shutting her lips tightly. +There was so much to explain that no one had taken it in hand to +begin. + +"It is just this," the Duchess said, opening her mouth with a snap. +"Have you been with Dymphna all the time?" + +"Yes, of course," was the prompt answer. + +"What is she doing?" + +"Doing?" Mistress Anne repeated in surprise. "She is asleep." + +"Has she been out since nightfall?" the Duchess continued. "Out of her +room? Or out of the house?" + +"Out? Certainly not. Before she fell asleep she was in no state to go +out, as you know, though I hope she will be all right when she awakes. +Who says she has been out?" Anne added sharply. She looked at me with +a challenge in her eyes, as much as to say, "Is it you?" + +"I am satisfied," I said, "that I was mistaken as to Mistress Dymphna. +But I am just as sure as before that I saw Clarence." + +"Clarence?" Mistress Anne repeated, starting violently, and the color +for an instant fleeing from her cheeks. She sat down on the nearest +seat. + +"You need not be afraid, Anne," my lady said smiling. She had a +wonderfully high courage herself. "I think Master Francis was +mistaken, though he is so certain about it." + +"But where--where did he see him?" the girl asked. She still trembled. + +Once more I had to tell the tale; Mistress Anne, as was natural, +listening to it with the liveliest emotions. And this time so much of +the ghost story had to be introduced--for she pressed me closely as to +where I had left Clarence, and why I had let him go--that my +assurances got less credence than ever. + +"I think I see how it is," she said, with a saucy scorn that hurt me +not a little. "Master Carey's nerves are in much the same state +to-night as Dymphna's. He thought he saw a ghost, and he did not. He +thought he saw Dymphna, and he did not. And he thought he saw Master +Clarence, and he did not." + +"Not so fast, child!" cried the Duchess sharply, seeing me wince. +"Your tongue runs too freely. No one has had better proofs of Master +Carey's courage--for which I will answer myself--than we have!" + +"Then he should not say things about Dymphna!" the young lady +retorted, her foot tapping the floor, and the red spots back in her +cheeks. "Such rubbish I never heard!" + + + + + CHAPTER XI. + + A FOUL BLOW. + + +They none of them believed me, it seemed; and smarting under Mistress +Anne's ridicule, hurt by even the Duchess's kindly incredulity, what +could I do? Only assert what I had asserted already, that it was +undoubtedly Clarence, and that before twenty-four hours elapsed they +would have proof of my words. + +At mention of this possibility Master Bertie looked up. He had left +the main part in the discussion to others, but now he intervened. "One +moment!" he said. "Take it that the lad is right, Master Lindstrom. Is +there any precaution we can adopt, any back door, so to speak, we can +keep open, in case of an attempt to arrest us being made? What would +be the line of our retreat to Wesel?" + +"The river," replied the Dutchman promptly. + +"And the boats are all at the landing-stage?" + +"They are, and for that reason they are useless in an emergency," our +host answered thoughtfully. "Knowing the place, any one sent to +surprise and arrest us would secure them first, and the bridge. Then +they would have us in a trap. It might be well to take a boat round, +and moor it in the little creek in the farther orchard," he added, +rising. "It is a good idea, at any rate. I will go and do it." + +He went out, leaving us four--the Duchess, her husband, Anne, and +myself--sitting round the lamp. + +"If Master Carey is so certain that it was Clarence," my lady began, +"I think he ought to----" + +"Yes, Kate?" her husband said. She had paused and seemed to be +listening. + +"Ought to open that letter he has!" she continued impetuously. "I have +no doubt it is a letter to Clarence. Now the rogue has come on the +scene again, the lad's scruples ought not to stand in the way. They +are all nonsense. The letter may throw some light on the Bishop's +schemes and Clarence's presence here; and it should be read. That is +what I think." + +"What do you say, Carey?" her husband asked, as I kept silence. "Is +not that reasonable?" + +Sitting with my elbows on the table, I twisted and untwisted the +fingers of my clasped hands, gazing at them the while as though +inspiration might come of them. What was I to do? I knew that the +three pairs of eyes were upon me, and the knowledge distracted me, and +prevented me really thinking, though I seemed to be thinking so hard. +"Well," I burst out at last, "the circumstances are certainly altered. +I see no reason why I should not----" + +Crash! + +I stopped, uttering an exclamation, and we all sprang to our feet. +"Oh, what a pity!" the Duchess cried, clasping her hands. "You clumsy, +clumsy girl! What have you done?" + +Mistress Anne's sleeve as she turned had swept from the table a +Florentine jug, one of Master Lindstrom's greatest treasures, and it +lay in a dozen fragments on the floor. We stood and looked at it, the +Duchess in anger, Master Bertie and I in comic dismay. The girl's lip +trembled, and she turned quite white as she contemplated the ruin she +had caused. + +"Well, you have done it now!" the Duchess said pitilessly. What woman +could ever overlook clumsiness in another woman! "It only remains to +pick up the pieces, miss. If a man had done it--but there, pick up the +pieces. You will have to make your tale good to Master Lindstrom +afterward." + +I went down on my knees and helped Anne, the annoyance her incredulity +had caused me forgotten. She was so shaken that I heard the bits of +ware in her hand clatter together. When we had picked up all, even to +the smallest piece, I rose, and the Duchess returned to the former +subject. "You will open this letter, then?" she said; "I see you will. +Then the sooner the better. Have you got it about you?" + +"No, it is in my bedroom," I answered. "I hid it away there, and I +must fetch it. But do you think," I continued, pausing as I opened the +door for Mistress Anne to go out with her double handful of fragments, +"it is absolutely necessary to read it, my lady?" + +"Most certainly," she answered, gravely nodding with each syllable, "I +think so. I will be responsible." And Master Bertie nodded also. + +"So be it," I said reluctantly. And I was about to leave the room to +fetch the letter--my bedroom being in a different part of the house, +only connected with the main building by a covered passage--when our +host returned. He told us that he had removed a boat, and I stayed a +while to hear if he had anything more to report, and then, finding he +had not, went out to go to my room, shutting the door behind me. + + +The passage I have mentioned, which was merely formed of rough planks, +was very dark. At the nearer end was the foot of the staircase leading +to the upper rooms. Farther along was a door in the side opening into +the garden. Going straight out of the lighted room, I had almost to +grope my way, feeling the walls with my hands. When I had about +reached the middle I paused. It struck me that the door into the +garden must be open, for I felt a cold draught of air strike my brow, +and saw, or fancied I saw, a slice of night sky and the branch of a +tree waving against it. I took a step forward, slightly shivering in +the night air as I did so, and had stretched out my hand with the +intention of closing the door, when a dark form rose suddenly close to +me, I saw a knife gleam in the starlight, and the next moment I reeled +back into the darknesss of the passage, a sharp pain in my breast. + +I knew at once what had happened to me, and leaned a moment against +the planking with a sick, faint feeling, saying to myself, "I have it +this time!" The attack had been so sudden and unexpected, I had been +taken so completely off my guard, that I had made no attempt either to +strike or to clutch my assailant, and I suppose only the darkness of +the passage saved me from another blow. But was one needed? The hand +which I had raised instinctively to shield my throat was wet with the +warm blood trickling fast down my breast. I staggered back to the door +of the parlor, groped blindly for the latch, seemed to be an age +finding it, found it at last, and walked in. + +The Duchess sprang up at sight of me. "What," she cried, backing from +me, "what has happened?" + +"I have been stabbed," I said, and I sat down. + +It amused me afterward to recall what they all did. The Dutchman +stared, my lady screamed loudly, Master Bertie whipped out his sword; +he could make up his mind quickly enough at times. + +"I think he has gone," I said faintly. + +The words brought the Duchess to her knees by my chair. She tore open +my doublet, through which the blood was oozing fast. I made no doubt +that I was a dead man, for I had never been wounded in this way +before, and the blood scared me. I remember my prevailing idea was a +kind of stunned pity for myself. Perhaps later--I hope so--I should +have come to think of Petronilla and my uncle and other people. But +before this stage was readied, the Duchess reassured me. "Courage, +lad!" she cried heartily. "It is all right, Dick. The villain struck +him on the breastbone an inch too low, and has just ripped up a scrap +of skin. It has blooded him for the spring, that is all. A bit of +plaster----" + +"And a drink of strong waters," suggested the Dutchman soberly--his +thoughts were always to the point when they came. + +"Yes, that too," quoth my lady, "and he will be all right." + +I thought so myself when I had emptied the cup they offered me. I had +been a good deal shaken by the events of the day. The sight of blood +had further upset me. I really think it possible I might have died of +this slight hurt and my imagination, if I had been left to myself. But +the Duchess's assurance and the draught of schnapps, which seemed to +send new blood through my veins, made me feel ashamed of myself. If +the Duchess would have let me, I would at once have gone to search the +premises; as it was, she made me sit still while she ran to and fro +for hot water and plaster, and the men searched the lower rooms and +secured the door afresh. + +"And so you could see nothing of him?" our host asked, when he and +Master Bertie returned, weapons in hand. "Nothing of his figure or +face?" + +"Nothing, save that he was short," I answered; "shorter than I am, at +any rate, and I fancy a good deal." + +"A good deal shorter than you are?" my lady said uneasily; "that is no +clew. In this country nine people out of ten are that. Clarence, now, +is not." + +"No," I said; "he is about the same height. It was not Clarence." + +"Then who could it be?" she muttered, rising, and then with a quick +shudder sitting down again. "Heaven help us, we seem to be in the +midst of foes! What could be the motive? And why should the villain +have selected you? Why pick you out?" + +Thereupon a strange thing happened. Three pairs of English eyes met, +and signaled a common message eye to eye. No word passed, but the +message was "Van Tree!" When we had glanced at one another we looked +all of us at our host--looked somewhat guiltily. He was deep in +thought, his eyes on the stove; but he seemed to feel our gaze upon +him, and he looked up abruptly. "Master Van Tree----" he said, and +stopped. + +"You know him well?" the Duchess said, appealing to him softly. We +felt a kind of sorrow for him, and some delicacy, too, about accusing +one of his countrymen of a thing so cowardly. "Do you think it is +possible," she continued with an effort--"possible that he can have +done this, Master Lindstrom?" + +"I have known him from a boy," the merchant said, looking up, a hand +on either knee, and speaking with a simplicity almost majestic, "and +never knew him do a mean thing, madam. I know no more than that." And +he looked round on us. + +"That is a good deal; still, he went off in a fit of jealousy when +Master Carey brought Dymphna home. We must remember that." + +"Yes, I would he knew the rights of that matter," said the Dutchman +heartily. + +"And he has been hanging about the place all day," my lady persisted. + +"Yes," Master Lindstrom rejoined patiently; "yet I do not think he did +this." + +"Then who did?" she said, somewhat nettled. + +That was the question. I had my opinion, as I saw Master Bertie and +the Duchess had. I did not doubt it was Van Tree. Yet a thought struck +me. "It might be well," I suggested, "that some one should ask +Mistress Anne whether the door was open when she left the room. She +passed out just in front of me." + +"But she does not go by the door," my lady objected. + +"No, she would turn at once and go upstairs," I agreed. "But she could +see the door from the foot of the stairs--if she looked that way, I +mean." + +The Duchess assented, and went out of the room to put the question. We +three, left together, sat staring at the dull flame of the lamp, and +were for the most part silent, Master Bertie only remarking that it +was after midnight. The suspicion he and I entertained of Van Tree's +guilt seemed to raise a barrier between us and our host. My wound, +slight as it was, smarted and burned, and my head ached. After +midnight, was it? What a day it had been! + +When the Duchess came back, as she did in a few minutes, both Anne and +Dymphna came with her. The girls had risen hastily, and were shivering +with cold and alarm. Their eyes were bright, their manner was excited. +They were full of sympathy and horror and wonder, as was natural; of +nervous fear for themselves, too. But my lady cut short their +exclamations. "Anne says she did not notice the door," she said. + +"No," the girl answered, trembling visibly as she spoke. "I went up +straight to bed. But who could it be? Did you see nothing of him as he +struck you? Not a feature? Not an outline?" + +"No," I murmured. + +"Did he not say a word?" she continued, with strange insistence. "Was +he tall or short?" Her dark eyes dwelling on mine seemed to probe my +thoughts, as though they challenged me to keep anything back from her. +"Was it the man you hurt this morning?" she suggested. + +"No," I answered reluctantly. "This man was short." + +"Short, was he? Was it Master Van Tree, then?" + +We, who felt also certain that it was Van Tree, started, nevertheless, +at hearing the charge put into words before Dymphna. I wondered, and I +think the others did, too, at Mistress Anne's harshness. Even my lady, +so blunt and outspoken by nature, had shrunk from trying to question +the Dutch girl about her lover. We looked at Dymphna, wondering how +she would take it. + +We had forgotten that she could not understand English. But this did +not serve her; for without a pause Mistress Anne turned to her, and +unfalteringly said something in her scanty Dutch which came to the +same thing. A word or two of questioning and explanation followed. +Then the meaning of the accusation dawned at last on Dymphna's mind. I +looked for an outburst of tears or protestations. Instead, with a +glance of wonder and great scorn, with a single indignant widening of +her beautiful eyes, she replied by a curt Dutch sentence. + +"What does she say?" my lady exclaimed eagerly. + +"She says," replied Master Lindstrom, who was looking on gravely, +"that it is a base lie, madam." + +On that we became spectators. It seemed to me, and I think to all of +us, that the two girls stood apart from us in a circle of light by +themselves; confronting one another with sharp glances as though a +curtain had been raised from between them, and they saw one another in +their true colors and recognized some natural antagonism, or, it might +be, some rivalry each in the other. I think I was not peculiar in +feeling this, for we all kept silence for a space as though expecting +something to follow. In the middle of this silence there came a low +rapping at the door. + +One uttered a faint shriek; another stood as if turned to stone. The +Duchess cried for her child. The rest of us looked at one another. +Midnight was past. Who could be abroad, who could want us at this +hour? As a rule we should have been in bed and asleep long ago. We had +no neighbors save the cotters on the far side of the island. We knew +of no one likely to arrive at this time with any good intent. + +"I will open," said Master Lindstrom. But he looked doubtfully at the +women-folk as he said it. + +"One minute," whispered the Duchess. "That table is solid and heavy. +Could you not----" + +"Put it across the door?" concluded her husband. "Yes, we will." And +it was done at once, the two men--my lady would not let me help--so +arranging it that it prevented the door being opened to its full +width. + +"That will stop a rush," said Master Bertie with satisfaction. + +It did strengthen the position, yet it was a nervous moment when our +host prepared to lower the bar. "Who is there?" he cried loudly. + +We waited, listening and looking at one another, the fear of arrest +and the horrors of the Inquisition looming large in the minds of some +of us at least. The answer, when it came, did not reassure us. It was +uttered in a voice so low and muffled that we gained no information, +and rather augured treachery the more. I remember noticing how each +took the crisis; how Mistress Anne's face was set hard, and her breath +came in jerks; how Dymphna, pale and trembling, seemed yet to have +eyes only for her father; how the Duchess faced the entrance like a +queen at bay. All this I took in at a glance. Then my gaze returned to +Master Lindstrom, as he dropped the bar with a jerk. The door was +pushed open at once as far as it would go. A draught of cold air came +in, and with it Van Tree. He shut the door behind him. + + +Never were six people so taken aback as we were. But the newcomer, +whose face was flushed with haste and excitement, observed nothing. +Apparently he saw nothing unexpected even in our presence downstairs +at that hour, nothing hostile or questioning in the half circle of +astonished faces turned toward him. On the contrary, he seemed +pleased. "Ah!" he exclaimed gutturally. "It is well! You are up! You +have taken the alarm!" + +It was to me he spoke, and I was so surprised by that, and by his +sudden appearance, so dumfounded by his easy address and the absence +of all self-consciousness on his part, so struck by a change in him, +that I stared in silence. I could not believe that this was the same +half-shy, half-fierce young man who had flung away a few hours before +in a passion of jealousy. My theory that he was the assassin seemed on +a sudden extravagant, though here he was on the spot. When Master +Lindstrom asked, "Alarm! What alarm?" I listened for his answer as I +should have listened for the answer of a friend and ally, without +hesitation, without distrust. For in truth the man was transfigured; +changed by the rise of something to the surface which ordinarily lay +hid in him. Before, he had seemed churlish, awkward, a boor. But in +this hour of our need and of his opportunity he showed himself as he +was. Action and purpose lifted him above his outward seeming. I caught +the generous sparkle in his eye, and trusted him. + +"What!" he said, keeping his voice low. "You do not know? They are +coming to arrest you. Their plan is to surround the house before +daybreak. Already there is a boat lying in the river watching the +landing-stage." + +"Whom are they coming to arrest?" I asked. The others were silent, +looking at this strange messenger with mingled feelings. + +"All, I fear," he replied. "You, too, Master Lindstrom. Some one has +traced your English friends hither and informed against you. I know +not on what ground you are included, but I fear the worst. There is +not a moment to be lost if you would escape by the bridge, before the +troop who are on the way to guard it arrives." + +"The landing-stage, you say, is already watched?" our host asked, his +phlegmatic coolness showing at its best. His eyes roved round the +room, and he tugged, as was his habit when deep in thought, at his +beard. I felt sure that he was calculating which of his possessions he +could remove. + +"Yes," Van Tree answered. "My father got wind of the plan in Arnheim. +An English envoy arrived there yesterday on his way to Cleves or some +part of Germany. It is rumored that he has come out of his road to +inquire after certain English fugitives whom his Government are +anxious to seize. But come, we have no time to lose! Let us go!" + +"Do you come too?" Master Lindstrom said, pausing in the act of +turning away. He spoke in Dutch, but by some inspiration born of +sympathy I understood both his question and the answer. + +"Yes, I come. Where Dymphna goes I go, and where she stops I stop, +though it be at Madrid itself," the young man answered gallantly. His +eyes kindled, and he seemed to grow taller and to gain majesty. The +barrier of race, which had hindered me from viewing him fairly before, +fell in a trice. I felt now only a kindly sorrow that he had done this +noble thing, and not I. I went to him and grasped his hand; and though +I said nothing, he seemed, after a single start of surprise, to +understand me fully. He understood me even better, if that were +possible, an hour later, when Dymphna had told him of her adventure +with the Spaniard, and he came to me to thank me. + +Ordered myself to be idle, I found all busy round me, busy with a +stealthy diligence. Master Lindstrom was packing his plate. Dymphna, +pale, but with soft, happy eyes--for had she not cause to be +proud?--was preparing food and thick clothing. The Duchess had fetched +her child and was dressing it for the journey. Master Bertie was +collecting small matters, and looking to our arms. In one or other of +these occupations--I can guess in which--Van Tree was giving his aid. +And so, since the Duchess would not let me do anything, it chanced +that presently I found myself left alone for a few minutes with Anne. + +I was not watching her. I was gnawing my nails in a fit of +despondency, reflecting that I was nothing but a hindrance and a +drawback to my friends, since whenever a move had to be made I was +sure to be invalided, when I became aware, through some mysterious +sense, that my companion, who was kneeling on the floor behind me, +packing, had desisted from her work and was gazing fixedly at me. I +turned. Yes, she was looking at me; her eyes, in which a smoldering +fire seemed to burn, contrasting vividly with her pale face and +contracted brows. When she saw that I had turned--of which at first +she did not seem aware--she rose and came to me, and laid a hand on my +shoulder and leaned over me. A feeling that was very like fright fell +upon me, her manner was so strange. "What is it?" I stammered, as she +still pored on me in silence, still maintained her attitude. "What is +the matter, Anne?" + +"Are you _quite_ a fool?" she whispered, her voice almost a hiss, her +hot breath on my cheek. "Have you no sense left, that you trust that +man?" + +For a moment I failed to understand her. "What man?" I said. "Oh, Van +Tree!" + +"Ay, Van Tree! Who else? Will you go straight into the trap he has +laid for you?" She moistened her lips with her tongue, as though they +were parched. "You are all mad! Mad, I think! Don't you see," she +continued, stooping over me again and whispering hurriedly, her wild +eyes close to mine, "that he is jealous of you?" + +"He was," I said uneasily. "That is all right now." + +"He was? He is!" she retorted. "He went away wild with you. He comes +back smiling and holding out his hand. Do you trust him? Don't you +see--don't you see," she cried, rocking me to and fro with her hand in +her excitement, "that he is fooling you? He is leading us all into a +trap that has been laid carefully enough. What is this tale of an +English envoy on his way to Germany? Rubbish! Rubbish, I tell you." + +"But Clarence----" + +"Bah! It was all your fancy!" she cried fiercely, her eyes for the +moment flitting to the door, then returning to my face. "How should he +find us here? Or what has Clarence to do with an English envoy?" + +"I do not know," I said. She had not in the least persuaded me. In a +rare moment I had seen into Van Tree's soul and trusted him +implicitly. "Please take care," I added, wincing under her hand. "You +hurt me!" + +She sprang back with a sudden change of countenance as if I had struck +her, and for a moment cowered away from me, her former passion still +apparent fighting for the mastery in her face. I set down her +condition to terror at the plight we were all in, or to vexation that +no one would take her view. The next moment I went farther. I thought +her mad, when she turned abruptly from me and, flying to the door by +which Van Tree had entered, began with trembling fingers to release +the pin which confined the bar. + +"Stop! stop! you will ruin all!" I cried in horror. "They can see that +door from the river, and if they see the light, they will know we are +up and have taken the alarm; and they may make a dash to secure us. +Stop, Anne! Stop!" I cried. But the girl was deaf. She tugged +desperately at the pin, and had already loosened the bar when I caught +her by the arms, and, pushing her away, set my back against the door. +"Don't be foolish!" I said gently. "You have lost your head. You must +let us men settle these things, Anne." + +She was indeed beside herself, for she faced me during a second or two +as though she would spring upon me and tear me from the door. Her +hands worked, her eyes gleamed, her strong white teeth showed +themselves. I shuddered. I had never pictured her looking like that. +Then, as steps sounded on the stairs and cheerful voices--cheerful +they seemed to me as they broke in on that strange scene--drew nearer, +she turned, and walking deliberately to a seat, fell to weeping +hysterically. + +"What are you doing to that door?" cried the Duchess sharply, as she +entered with the others. I was securing the bar again. + +"Nothing," I said stolidly. "I am seeing that it is fast." + +"And hoity toity, miss!" she continued, turning to Anne. "What has +come over you, I would like to know? Stop crying, girl; what is the +matter with you? Will you shame us all before this Dutch maid? Here, +carry these things to the back door." + +Anne somehow stifled her sobs and rose. Seeming by a great effort to +recover composure, she went out, keeping her face to the last averted +from me. + +We all followed, variously laden, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree, who +carried between them the plate-chest, being the last to leave. There +was not one of us--even of us who had only known the house a few +weeks--who did not heave a sigh as we passed out of the warm lamp-lit +parlor, which, littered as it was with the debris of packing, looked +still pleasant and comfortable in comparison with the darkness outside +and the uncertain future before us. What, then, must have been the +pain of parting to those who had never known any other home? Yet they +took it bravely. To Dymphna, Van Tree's return had brought great +happiness. To Master Lindstrom, any ending to a long series of +anxieties and humiliations was welcome. To Van Tree--well, he had +Dymphna with him, and his side of the plate-chest was heavy, and gave +him ample employment. + + +We passed out silently through the back door, leaving the young +Dutchman to lock it behind us, and flitted, a line of gliding shadows, +through the orchard. It was two o'clock, the sky was overcast, a +slight drizzle was falling. Once an alarm was given that we were being +followed; and we huddled together, and stood breathless, a clump of +dark figures gazing affrightedly at the tree trunks which surrounded +us, and which seemed--at least to the women's eyes--to be moving, and +to be men closing in on us. But the alarm was groundless, and with no +greater mishap than a few stumbles when we came to the slippery edge +of the creek, we reached the boat, and one by one, admirably ordered +by our host, got in and took our seats. Van Tree and Master Lindstrom +pushed us off; then they swung themselves in and paddled warily along, +close under the bank, where the shadows of the poplars fell across us, +and our figures blended darkly with the line of rushes on the shore. + + + + + CHAPTER XII. + + ANNE'S PETITION. + + +We coasted along in this silent fashion, nearly as far as the hamlet +and bridge, following, but farther inshore, the course which Master +Lindstrom and I had taken when on our way to bury the Spaniard. A +certain point gained, at a signal from our host we struck out into the +open, and rowed swiftly toward the edge of the marsh. This was the +critical moment; but, so far as we could learn, our passage was +unnoticed. We reached the fringe of rushes; with a prolonged hissing +sound the boat pushed through them; a flight of water-fowl rose, +whirring and clapping about us, and we floated out into a dim misty +lake, whose shores and surface stretched away on every side, alike +dark, shifting, and uncertain. + +Across this the Dutchman steered us, bringing us presently to a narrow +opening, through which we glided into a second and smaller mere. At +the farther end of this one the way seemed barred by a black, +impenetrable wall of rushes, which rose far above our heads. But the +tall stems bent slowly with many a whispered protest before our silent +onset, and we slid into a deep water-lane, here narrow, there widening +into a pool, in one place dark, in another reflecting the gray night +sky. Down this we sped swiftly, the sullen plash of the oars and the +walls of rushes always with us. For ourselves, we crouched still and +silent, shivering and listening for sounds of pursuit; now starting at +the splash of a frog, again shuddering at the cry of a night-bird. The +Duchess, her child, and I were in the bows, Master Lindstrom, his +daughter, and Mistress Anne in the stern. They had made me comfortable +with the baggage and some warm coverings, and would insist on treating +me as helpless. Even when the others began to talk in whispers, the +Duchess enjoined silence on me, and bade me sleep. Presently I did so, +my last impression one of unending water-ways and shoreless, shadowy +lakes. + +When I awoke the sun was high and the scene was changed indeed. We lay +on the bosom of a broad river, our boat seeming now to stand still as +the sail flapped idly, now to heel over and shoot forward as the light +breeze struck us. The shores abreast of us were still low and reedy, +but ahead the slopes of green wooded hills rose gently from the +stream. Master Bertie was steering, and, seeing me lift my head, +greeted me with a smile. The girls in the stern were covered up and +asleep. Amidships, too, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree had curled +themselves up between the thwarts, and were slumbering peacefully. I +turned to look for the Duchess, and found her sitting wide awake at my +elbow, her eyes on her husband. + +"Well," she said smiling, "do you feel better now? You have had a good +sleep." + +"How long have I been asleep, please?" I asked, bewildered by the +sunshine, by the shining river and the green hills, by the fresh +morning air, by the change in everything; and answering in a question, +as people freshly aroused do nine times out of ten. "Where are we?" + +"You have been asleep nearly six hours, and we are on the Rhine, near +Emmerich," she answered, smiling. She was pale, and the long hours of +watching had drawn dark circles round her eyes. But the old undaunted +courage shone in them still, and her smile was as sweet as ever. + +"Have we passed the frontier?" I asked eagerly. + +"Well, nearly," she answered. "But how does your wound feel?" + +"Rather stiff and sore," I said ruefully, after making an experiment +by moving my body to and fro. "And I am very thirsty, but I could +steer." + +"So you shall," she said. "Only first eat something. We broke our fast +before the others lay down. There is bread and meat behind you, and +some hollands and water in the bottle." + +I seized the latter and drank greedily. Then, finding myself hungry +now I came to think about it, I fell upon the eatables. + +"You will do now, I think," she said, when she had watched me for some +time. + +I laughed for answer, pleased that the long dark night, its gloom and +treachery were past. But its memories remained and presently I said, +"If Van Tree did not try to kill me--and I am perfectly sure he did +not----" + +"So am I," she said. "We were all wrong." + +"Then," I continued, looking at her gravely, "who did? that is the +question. And why?" + +"You are sure that it was not the Spaniard whom you hurt in defense of +Dymphna?" my lady asked. + +"Quite sure." + +"And sure that it was not Clarence?" she persisted. + +"Quite sure. It was a short man," I explained again, "and dressed in a +cloak. That is all I can tell about him." + +"It might be some one employed by Clarence," she suggested, her face +gloomy, her brows knit. + +"True, I had not thought of that," I answered. "And it reminds me. I +have heard so much of Clarence----" + +"And seen some little--even that little more than was good for you." + +"Yes, he has had the better of me, on both occasions," I allowed. "But +I was going to ask you," I continued, "to tell me something about him. +He was your steward, I know. But how did he come to you? How was it +you trusted him?" + +"We are all fools at times," she answered grimly. "We wanted to have +persons of our own faith about us, and he was highly commended to us +by Protestants abroad, as having seen service in the cause. He applied +to us just at the right moment, too. And at the first we felt a great +liking for him. He was so clever in arranging things, he kept such +excellent order among the servants; he was so ready, so willing, so +plausible! Oh!" she added bitterly, "he had ways that enabled him to +twist nine women out of ten round his fingers! Richard was fond of +him; I liked him; we had talked more than once of how we might advance +his interests. And then, like a thunderbolt on a clear day, the +knowledge of his double-dealing fell upon us. We learned that he had +been seen talking with a known agent of Gardiner, and this at a time +when the Bishop was planning our ruin. We had him watched, and just +when the net had all but closed round us we discovered that he had +been throughout in Gardiner's pay." + +"Ah!" I said viciously. "The oddest thing to me is the way he has +twice escaped me when I had him at the sword's point!" + +"The third time may bring other fortune, Master Francis," she answered +smiling. "Yet be wary with him. He is a good swordsman, as my husband, +who sometimes fenced with him, will tell you." + +"He can be no common man," I said. + +"He is not. He is well-bred, and has seen service. He is at once bold +and cunning. He has a tongue would win most women, and a hardihood +that would chain them to him. Women love bold men," my lady added +naively. And she smiled on me--yet humorously--so that I blushed. + +There was silence for a moment. The sail flapped, then filled again. +How delicious this morning after that night, this bright expanse after +the dark, sluggish channels! Far away in front a great barge, +high-laden with a mighty stack of rushes, crept along beside the bank, +the horse that drew it covered by a kind of knitted rug. When my lady +spoke next, it was abruptly. "Is it Anne?" she asked. + +I knew quite well what she meant, and blushed again. I shook my head. + +"I think it was going to be," she said sagely, "only Mistress Dymphna +came upon the scene. You have heard the story of the donkey halting +between two bundles of hay, Master Francis? And in the multitude of +sweethearts there is safety." + +"I do not think that was my case," I said. Instinctively my hand went +to my breast, in which Petronilla's velvet sword-knot lay safe and +warm. The Duchess saw the gesture and instantly bent forward and +mimicked it. "Ha! ha!" she cried, leaning back with her hands clasped +about her knees, and her eyes shining with fun and amusement. "Now I +understand. You have left her at home; now, do not deny it, or I will +tell the others. Be frank and I will keep your secret, on my honor." + +"She is my cousin," I said, my cheeks hot. + +"And her name?" + +"Petronilla." + +"Petronilla?" my lady repeated shrewdly. "That was the name of your +Spanish grandmother, then?" + +"Yes, madam." + +"Petronilla? Petronilla?" she repeated, stroking her cheek with her +hand. "She would be before my time, would she not? Yet there used to +be several Petronillas about the court in Queen Catherine of Aragon's +days, I remember. There was Petronilla de Vargas for one. But there, I +guess at random. Why do you not tell me more about yourself, Master +Francis? Do you not know me well enough now?" + +"There is nothing to tell, madam," I said in a low voice. + +"Your family? You come, I am sure, of a good house." + +"I did, but it is nothing to me now. I am cut off from it. I am +building my house afresh. And," I added bitterly, "I have not made +much way with it yet." + +She broke, greatly to my surprise, into a long peal of laughter. "Oh, +you vain boy!" she cried. "You valiant castle-builder! How long have +you been about the work? Three months? Do you think a house is to be +built in a day? Three months, indeed? Quite a lifetime!" + +Was it three months? It seemed to me to be fully three years. I seemed +to have grown more than three years older since that February morning +when I had crossed Arden Forest with the first light, and looked down +on Wootton Wawen sleeping in its vale, and roused the herons fishing +in the bottoms. + +"Come, tell me all about it!" she said abruptly. "What did you do to +be cut off?" + +"I cannot tell you," I answered. + +A shade of annoyance clouded her countenance. But it passed away +almost on the instant. "Very well," she said, with a little nod of +disdain and a pretty grimace. "So be it. Have your own way. But I +prophesy you will come to me with your tale some day." + +I went then and took Master Bertie's place at the tiller; and, he +lying down, I had the boat to myself until noon, and drew no little +pleasure from the placid picture which the moving banks and the wide +river presented. About noon there was a general uprising; and, coming +immediately afterward to a little island lying close to one bank, we +all landed to stretch our legs and refresh ourselves after the +confinement on board. + + +"We are over the border now and close to Emmerich," said Master +Lindstrom, "though the mere line of frontier will avail us little if +the Spanish soldiers can by hook or crook lay hands on us! Therefore, +we must lose no time in getting within the walls of some town. We +should be fairly secure for a few days either in Wesel or Santon." + +"I thought Wesel was the point we were making for," Master Bertie said +in some surprise. + +"It was Wesel I mentioned the other day," the Dutchman admitted +frankly. "And it is the bigger town and the stronger. But I have more +friends in Santon. To Wesel the road from Emmerich runs along the +right bank. To Santon we go by a cross-country road, starting from the +left bank opposite Emmerich, a road longer and more tedious. But we +are much less likely to be followed that way than along the Wesel +road, and on second thoughts I incline to Santon." + +"But why adopt either road? Why not go on by river?" I asked. + +"Because we should be overtaken. The wind is falling, and the boat," +our late host explained, more truly than politely, "with the women in +it is heavy." + +"I understand," I said. "And you feel sure we shall be pursued?" + +For answer he pointed with a smile to his plate-chest. "Quite sure," +he added. "With that before them they will think nothing of the +frontier. I fancy that for you, if the English Government be in +earnest, there will be no absolutely safe place short of the free city +of Frankfort. Unless indeed you have interest with the Duke of +Cleves." + +"Ah!" said the Duchess. And she looked at her husband. + +"Ah!" said Master Bertie, and he looked very blankly at his wife. So +that I did not derive much comfort from that suggestion. + +"Then it is Santon, is it?" said my lady. + +"That first, at any rate. Then, if they follow us along the Wesel +road, we shall still give them the slip." + +So it was settled, neither Van Tree nor the girls having taken any +part in the discussion. The former and Dymphna were talking aside, and +Mistress Anne was sitting low down on the bank, with her feet almost +in the water, immersed to all appearance in her own thoughts. There +was a little bustle as we rose to get into the boat, which we had +drawn up on the landward side of the island so as to be invisible from +the main channel; and in the middle of this I was standing with one +foot in the boat and one on shore, taking from Anne various articles +which we had landed for rearrangement, when she whispered to me that +she wanted to speak to me alone. + +"I want to tell you something," she said, raising her eyes to my face, +and then averting them. "Follow me this way." + +She strolled, as if accidentally, twenty or thirty paces along the +bank; and in a minute I joined her. I found her gazing down the river +in the direction from which we had come. "What is it?" I said +anxiously. "You do not see anything, do you?" For there had been a +hint of bad news in her voice. + +She dropped the hand with which she had been shading her eyes and +turned to me. "Master Francis, you will not think me very foolish?" +she said. Then I perceived that her lip was quivering and that there +were tears in her eyes. They were very beautiful eyes when, as now, +they grew soft, and appeal took the place of challenge. + +"What is it?" I replied, speaking cheerfully to reassure her. She had +scarcely got over her terror of last night. She trembled as she stood. + +"It is about Santon," she answered with a miserable little catch in +her voice. "I am so afraid of going there! Master Lindstrom says it is +a rough, long road, and when we are there we are not a bit farther +from those wretches than at Wesel, and--and----" + +"There, there!" I said. She was on the point of bursting into tears, +and was clearly much overwrought. "You are making the worst of it. If +it were not for Master Lindstrom I should be inclined to choose Wesel +myself. But he ought to know best." + +"But that is not all," she said, clasping her hands and looking up at +me with her face grown full of solemn awe; "I have had a dream." + +"Well, but dreams----" I objected. + +"You do not believe in dreams?" she said, dropping her head +sorrowfully. + +"No, no; I do not say that," I admitted, naturally startled. "But what +was your dream?" + +"I thought we took the road to Santon. And mind," she added earnestly, +"this was before Master Lindstrom had uttered a word about going that +way, or any other way save to Wesel. I dreamt that we followed the +road through such a dreadful flat country, a country all woods and +desolate moorland, under a gray sky, and in torrents of rain, to----" + +"Well, well?" I said, with a passing shiver at the picture. She +described it with a rapt, absent air, which made me creep--as if even +now she were seeing something uncanny. + +"And then I thought that in the middle of these woods, about half-way +to Santon, they overtook us, and there was a great fight." + +"There would be sure to be that!" I muttered, with shut teeth. + +"And I thought you were killed, and we women were dragged back! There, +I cannot tell you the rest!" she added wildly. "But try, try to get +them to go the old way. If not, I know evil will come of it. Promise +me to try?" + +"I will tell them your dream," I said. + +"No, no!" she exclaimed still more vehemently. "They would only laugh. +Madam does not believe in dreams. But they will listen to you if you +say you think the other way better. Promise me you will! Promise me!" +she pleaded, her hands clasping my arm, and her tearful eyes looking +up to mine. + +"Well," I agreed reluctantly, "I will try. After all, the shortest way +may be the best. But if I do," I said kindly, "you must promise me in +return not to be alarmed any longer, Anne." + +"I will try," she said gratefully; "I will indeed, Francis." + + +We were summoned at that minute, for the boat was waiting for us. The +Duchess scanned us rather curiously as we ran up--we were the last. +But Anne kept her word, and concealed her fears so bravely that, as +she jumped in from the bank, her air of gayety almost deceived me, and +would have misled the sharpest-sighted person who had not been present +at our interview, so admirably was it assumed. + +We calculated that our pursuers would not follow us down the river for +some hours. They would first have to search the island, and the watch +which they had set on the landing-stage would lead them to suspect +rather that we had fled by land. We hoped, therefore, to reach +Emmerich unmolested. There Master Lindstrom said we could get horses, +and he thought we might be safe in Santon by the following evening. + +"If you really think we had better go to Santon," I said. This was an +hour or two after leaving the island, and when we looked to sight +Emmerich very soon, the hills which we had seen in front all day, and +which were grateful to eyes sated with the monotony of Holland, being +now pretty close to us. + +"I thought that we had settled that," replied the Dutchman promptly. + +I felt they were all looking at me. "I look at it this way," I said, +reddening. "Wesel is not far from Emmerich by the road. Should we not +have an excellent chance of reaching it before our pursuers come up?" + +"You might reach it," Master Lindstrom said gravely. "Though, again, +you might not." + +"And, Wesel once reached," I persisted, "there is less fear of +violence being attempted there than in Santon. It is a larger town." + +"True," he admitted. "But it is just this. Will you be able to reach +Wesel? It is the getting there--that is the difficulty; the getting +there before you are caught." + +"If we have a good start, why should we not?" I urged; and urged it +the more persistently, the more I found them opposed to it. Naturally +there ensued a warm discussion. At first they all sided against me, +save of course Anne, and she sat silent, though she was visibly +agitated, as from minute to minute I or they seemed likely to prevail. +But presently when I grew warmer, and urged again and again the +strength of Wesel, my own party veered round, yet still with doubt and +misgiving. The Dutchman shrugged his shoulders to the end and remained +unpersuaded. But finally it was decided that I should have my own way. +We would go to Wesel. + + +Every one knows how a man feels when he comes victorious out of such a +battle. He begins on the instant to regret his victory, and to see the +possible evils which may result from it; to repent the hot words he +has used in the strife and the declarations he has flung broadcast. +That dreadful phrase, "I told you so!" rises like an avenging fury +before his fancy, and he quails. + +I felt all this the moment the thing was settled. But I was too young +to back out and withdraw my words. I hoped for the best, and resolved +inwardly to get the party mounted the moment we reached Emmerich. + +I soon had the opportunity of proving this resolution to be more +easily made than carried out. About three o'clock we reached the +little town dominated, as we saw from afar, by an ancient minster, +and, preferring not to enter it, landed at the steps of an inn a +quarter of a mile short of the gates, and marking a point where we +might take the road to Wesel, or, crossing the river, the road to +Santon. Master Lindstrom seemed well known, but there were +difficulties about the horses. The German landlord listened to his +story with apparent sympathy--but no horses! We could not understand +the tongue in which the two talked, but the Dutchman's questions, +quick and animated for once, and the landlord's slow replies, reminded +me of the foggy morning when in a similar plight we had urged the +master of the _Lion's Whelp_ to put to sea. And I feared a similar +result. + +"He says he cannot get so many horses to-night," said Master Lindstrom +with a long face. + +"Offer him more money!" quoth the Duchess. + +"If we cannot have horses until the morning, we may as well go on in +the boat," I urged. + +"He says, too, that the water is out on the road," continued the +Dutchman. + +"Nonsense! Double the price!" cried my lady impatiently. + +I suppose that this turned the scale. The landlord finally promised +that in an hour four saddle-horses for Master Bertie and the Duchess, +Anne and myself, should be ready, with a couple of pack-horses and a +guide. Master Lindstrom, his daughter, and Van Tree would start a +little later for Cleves, five miles on the road to Santon, if +conveyance could be got. "And if not," our late host added, as we said +something about our unwillingness to leave him in danger, "I shall be +safe enough in the town, but I hope to sleep in Cleves." + +It was all settled very hastily. We felt--and I in particular, since +my plan had been adopted--an unreasonable impatience to be off. As we +stood on the bank by the inn-door, we had a straight reach of river a +mile long in full view below us; and now we were no longer moving +ourselves, but standing still, expected each minute to see the Spanish +boat, with its crew of desperadoes, sweep round the corner before our +eyes. Master Lindstrom assured us that if we were once out of sight +our pursuers would get no information as to the road we had taken, +either from the inn-keeper or his neighbors. "There is no love lost +between them and the Spaniards," he said shrewdly. "And I know the +people here, and they know me. The burghers may not be very keen to +come to blows with the Spaniards or to resent their foray. But the +latter, on their part, will be careful not to go too far or to make +themselves obnoxious." + + +We took the opportunity of supping then, not knowing when we might get +food again. I happened to finish first, and, hearing the horses' +hoofs, went out and watched the lads who were to be our guides +fastening the baggage on the sumpter beasts. I gave them a hand--not +without a wince or two, for the wound in my chest was painful--and +while doing so had a flash of remembrance. I went to the unglazed +window of the kitchen in which the others sat, and leaned my elbows on +the sill. "I say!" I said, full of my discovery, "there is something +we have forgotten!" + +"What?" asked the Duchess, rising and coming toward me, while the +others paused in their meal to listen. + +"The letter to Mistress Clarence," I answered. "I was going to get it +when I was stabbed, you remember, and afterward we forgot all about +it. Now it is too late. It has been left behind." + +She did not answer then, but came out to me, and turned with me to +look at the horses. "This comes of your foolish scruples, Master +Francis!" she said severely. "Where was it?" + +"I slipped it between the leathers of the old haversack you gave me," +I answered, "which I used to have for a pillow. Van Tree brought my +things down, but overlooked the haversack, I suppose. At any rate, it +is not here." + +"Well, it is no good crying over spilt milk," she said. + +She called the others out then, and there was no mistaking Mistress +Anne's pleasure at escaping the Santon road. She was radiant, and +vouchsafed me a very pretty glance of thanks, in which her relief as +well as her gratitude shone clearly. By half-past four we had got, +wearied as we were, to horse, and with three hours of daylight before +us hoped to reach Wesel without mishap. But for most of us the start +was saddened by the parting--though we hoped it would be only for a +time--from our Dutch friends. We remembered how good and stanch they +had been to us. We feared--though Master Lindstrom would not hear of +it--that we had brought misfortune upon them, and neither the +Duchess's brave eyes nor Dymphna's blue ones were free from tears as +they embraced. I wrung Van Tree's hand as if I had known him for +months instead of days, for a common danger is a wondrous knitter of +hearts; and he only smiled--though Dymphna blushed--when I kissed her +cheek. A few broken words, a last cry of farewell, and we four, with +our two guides behind us, moved down the Wesel road, the last I heard +of our good friends being Master Lindstrom's charge, shouted after us, +"to beware of the water if it was out!" + + + + + CHAPTER XIII. + + A WILLFUL MAN'S WAY. + + +Only to feel that we were moving was a relief, though our march was +very slow. Master Bertie carried the child slung in a cloak before +him, and, thus burdened, could not well go beyond a smooth amble, +while the guides, who were on foot, and the pack-horses, found this +pace as much as they could manage. A little while and the exhilaration +of the start died away. The fine morning was followed by a wet +evening, and before we had left Emmerich three miles behind us Master +Bertie and I had come to look at one another meaningly. We were moving +in a dreary, silent procession through heavy rain, with the prospect +of the night closing in early. The road, too, grew more heavy with +each furlong, and presently began to be covered with pools of water. +We tried to avoid this inconvenience by resorting to the hill slopes +on our left, but found the attempt a waste of time, as a deep stream +or backwater, bordered by marshes, intervened. The narrow road, raised +but little above the level of the swiftly flowing river on our right, +turned out to be our only possible path; and when Master Bertie +discerned this his face grew more and more grave. + +We soon found, indeed, as we plodded along, that a sheet of water, +which palely reflected the evening light, was taking the place of the +road; and through this we had to plash and plash at a snail's pace, +one of the guides on a pack-horse leading the way, and Master Bertie +in charge of his wife coming next; then, at some distance, for her +horse did not take kindly to the water, the younger woman followed in +my care. The other guide brought up the rear. In this way, stopped +constantly by the fears of the horses, which were scared by the +expanse of flood before them, we crept wearily on until the moon rose. +It brought, alas, an access of light, but no comfort! The water seemed +continually to grow deeper, the current on our right swifter; and each +moment I dreaded the announcement that farther advance was impossible. + +It seemed to have come to that at last, for I saw the Duchess and her +husband stop and stand waiting for me, their dark shadows projected +far over the moonlit surface. + +"What is to be done?" Master Bertie called out, as we moved up to +them. "The guide tells me that there is a broken piece of road in +front which will be impassable with this depth of water." + +I had expected to hear this; yet I was so dumfoundered--for, this +being true, we were lost indeed--that for a time I could not answer. +No one had uttered a word of reproach, but I knew what they must be +thinking. I had brought them to this. It was my foolish insistence had +done it. The poor beast under me shivered. I struck him with my heels. +"We must go forward!" I said desperately. "Or what? What do you think? +Go back?" + +"Steady! steady, Master Knight Errant!" the Duchess cried in her calm, +brave voice. "I never knew you so bad a counselor before!" + +"It is my fault that you are here," I said, looking dismally around. + +"Perhaps the other road is as bad," Master Bertie replied. "At any +rate, that is past and gone. The question is, what are we to do now? +To remain here is to die of cold and misery. To go back may be to run +into the enemy's arms. To go forward----" + +"Will be to be drowned!" Mistress Anne cried with a pitiful sob. + +I could not blame her. A more gloomy outlook than ours, as we sat on +our jaded horses in the middle of this waste of waters, which appeared +in the moonlight to be boundless, could scarcely be imagined. The +night was cold for the time of year, and the keen wind pierced our +garments and benumbed our limbs. At any moment the rain might begin +afresh, and the moon be overcast. Of ourselves, we could not take a +step without danger, and our guides had manifestly lost their heads +and longed only to return. + +"Yet, I am for going forward," the Duchess urged. "If there be but +this one bad place we may pass it with care." + +"We may," her husband assented dubiously. "But suppose when we have +passed it we can go no farther. Suppose the----" + +"It is no good supposing!" she retorted with some sharpness. "Let us +cross this place first, Richard, and we will deal with the other when +we come to it." + +He nodded assent, and we moved slowly forward, compelling the guides +to go first. In this order we waded some hundred yards through water, +which grew deeper with each step, until it rose nearly to our girths. +Then the lads stopped. + +"Are we over?" said the Duchess eagerly. + +For answer one of them pointed to the flood before him, and peering +forward I made out a current sweeping silently and swiftly across our +path--a current with an ominous rush and swirl. + +"Over?" grunted Master Bertie. "No, this is the place. See, the road +has given way, and the stream is pouring through from the river. I +expect it is getting worse every minute as the banks crumble." + +We all craned forward, looking at it. It was impossible to say how +deep the water was, or how far the deep part might extend. And we had +with us a child and two women. + +"We must go back!" said Master Bertie resolutely. "There is no doubt +about it. The flood is rising. If we do not take care, we shall be cut +off, and be able to go neither backward nor forward. I cannot see a +foot of dry land, as it is, before or behind us." + +He was right. Far and wide, wherever our eyes could reach, the +moonlight was reflected in a sheet of water. We were nearly up to our +girths in water. On one side was the hurrying river, on the other were +the treacherous depths of the backwater. I asked the guide as well as +I could whether the road was good beyond. He answered that he did not +know. He and his companion were so terrified that we only kept them +beside us by threats. + +"I fear we must go back," I said, assenting sorrowfully. + +Even the Duchess agreed, and we were in the act of turning to +retrace our steps with what spirit we might, when a distant sound +brought us all to a standstill again. The wind was blowing from the +quarter whence we had come--from Emmerich; and it brought to us the +sound of voices. We all stopped to listen. Yes, they were voices we +heard--loud, strident tones, mingled now with the sullen plash of +horses tramping through the water. I looked at the Duchess. Her face +was pale, but her courage did not fail her. She understood in a trice +that the danger we had so much dreaded was upon us--that we were +followed, and the followers were at our heels; and she turned her +horse round again. Without a word she spurred it back toward the deep +part. I seized Anne's rein and followed, notwithstanding that the poor +girl in her terror would have resisted. Letting the guides go as they +pleased, we four in a moment found ourselves abreast again, our horses +craning over the stream, while we, with whip and spur, urged them on. + +In cold blood we should scarcely have done it. Indeed, for a minute, +as our steeds stumbled, and recovered themselves, and slid forward, +only to draw back trembling--as the water rose above our boots or was +flung by our fellows in our eyes, and all was flogging and scrambling +and splashing, it seemed as if we were to be caught in a trap despite +our resolve. But at last Master Bertie's horse took the plunge. His +wife's followed; and both, partly floundering and partly swimming, set +forward snorting the while in fear. To my joy I saw them emerge safely +not ten yards away, and, shaking themselves, stand comparatively high +out of the water. + +"Come!" cried my lady imperatively, as she turned in her saddle with a +gesture of defiance. "Come! It is all right." + +Come, indeed! I wanted nothing better, for I was beside myself with +passion. But, flog as I might, I could not get Anne's brute to take +the plunge. The girl herself could give me no aid; clinging to her +saddle, pale and half-fainting, she could only beg me to leave her, +crying out again and again in a terrified voice that she would be +drowned. With her cry there suddenly mingled another, the hail of our +pursuers as they sighted us. I could hear them drawing nearer, and I +grew desperate. Luckily they could not make any speed in water so +deep, and time was given me for one last furious effort. It succeeded. +My horse literally fell into the stream; it dragged Anne's after it. +How we kept our seats, how they their footing, I never understood; +but, somehow, splashing and stumbling and blinded by the water dashed +in our faces, we came out on the other side, where the Duchess and her +husband, too faithful to us to save themselves, had watched the +struggle in an agony of suspense. I did but fling the girl's rein to +Master Bertie; and then I wheeled my horse to the stream again. I had +made up my mind what I must do. "Go on," I cried, waving my hand with +a gesture of farewell. "Go on! I can keep them here for a while." + +"Nonsense!" I heard the Duchess cry, her voice high and shrill. "It +is----" + +"Go on!" I cried. "Go on! Do not lose a moment, or it will be +useless." + +Master Bertie hesitated. But he too saw that this was the only chance. +The Spaniards were on the brink of the stream now, and must, if they +passed it, overtake us easily. He hesitated, I have said, for a +moment. Then he seized his wife's rein and drew her on, and I heard +the three horses go splashing away through the flood. I threw a +glance at them over my shoulder, bethinking me that I had not told +the Duchess my story, and that Sir Anthony and Petronilla would +never--but, pish! What was I thinking of? That was a thought for a +woman. I had only to harden my heart now, and set my teeth together. +My task was very simple indeed. I had just to keep these men--there +were four--here as long as I could, and if possible to stop Clarence's +pursuit altogether. + +For I had made no mistake. The first man to come up was +Clarence--Clarence himself. He let fall a savage word as his horse +stopped suddenly with its fore feet spread out on the edge of the +stream, and his dark face grew darker as he saw the swirling eddies, +and me standing fronting him in the moonlight with my sword out. He +discerned at once, I think, the strength of my position. Where I stood +the water was scarcely over my horse's fetlocks. Where he stood it was +over his horse's knees. And between us it flowed nearly four feet +deep. + +He held a hasty parley with his companions. And then he hailed me. +"Will you surrender?" he cried in English. "We will give you quarter." + +"Surrender? To whom?" I said. "And why--why should I surrender? Are +you robbers and cutpurses?" + +"Surrender in the name of the Emperor, you fool!" he answered sternly +and roughly. + +"I know nothing about the Emperor!" I retorted. "What Emperor?" + +"In the Queen's name, then!" + +"The Duke of Cleves is queen here!" I cried. "And as the flood is +rising," I added scornfully, "I would advise you to go home again." + +"You would advise, would you? Who _are_ you?" he replied, in a kind of +wrathful curiosity. + +I gave him no answer. I have often since reflected, with a fuller +knowledge of certain facts, that no stranger interview ever took place +than this short colloquy between us, that no stranger fight ever was +fought than that which we contemplated as we stood there bathed in the +May moonlight, with the water all round us, and the cold sky above. A +strange fight indeed it would have been between him and me, had it +ever come to the sword's point! + +But this was what happened. His last words had scarcely rung out when +my horse began to quiver under me and sway backward and forward. I had +just time to take the alarm, when the poor beast sank down and rolled +gently over, leaving me bestriding its body, my feet in the water. +Whatever the cause of this, I had to disentangle myself, and that +quickly, for the four men opposite me, seeing me dismounted, plunged +with a cry of triumph into the water, and began to flounder across. +Without more ado I stepped forward to keep the ford. + +The foremost and nearest to me was Clarence, whose horse began, +half-way across, to swim. It was still scrambling to regain its +footing when it came within my reach, and I slashed it cruelly across +the nostrils. It turned in an instant on its side. I saw the rider's +face gleam white in the water; his stirrup shone a moment as the horse +rolled over, then in a second the two were gone down the stream. It +was done so easily, so quickly, it amazed me. One gone! hurrah! I +turned quickly to the others, who were about landing. My blood was +fired, and my yell of victory, as I dashed at them, scared back two of +the horses. Despite their riders' urging, they turned and scrambled +out on the side from which they had entered. Only one was left, the +farthest from me. He got across indeed. Yet he was the most unlucky of +all, for his horse stumbled on landing, came down heavily on its head, +and flung him at my very feet. + + +[Illustration: I LUNGED TWICE AT THE RIDER] + + +It was no time for quarter--I had to think of my friends--and while +with one hand I seized the flying rein as the horse scrambled +trembling to its feet, with the other I lunged twice at the rider as +he half tried to rise, half tried to grasp at me. The second time I +ran him through, and he screamed shrilly. In those days I was young +and hotheaded, and I answered only by a shout of defiance, as I flung +myself into the saddle and dashed away through the water after my +friends. + +_V[oe] victis!_ I had done enough to check the pursuit, and had yet +escaped myself. If I could join the others again, what a triumph it +would be! I had no guide, but neither had those in front of me; and +luckily at this point a row of pollard willows defined the line +between the road and the river. Keeping this on my right, I made good +way. The horse seemed strong under me, the water was shallow, and +appeared to be growing more so, and presently across the waste of +flood I discerned before me a dark, solitary tower, the tower +seemingly of a church, for it was topped by a stumpy spire, which +daylight would probably have shown to be of wood. + +There was a little dry ground round the church, a mere patch in a sea +of water, but my horse rang its hoofs on it with every sign of joy, +and arched its neck as it trotted up to the neighborhood of the +church, whinnying with pleasure. From the back of the building, I was +not surprised, came an answering neigh. As I pulled up, a man, his +weapon in his hand, came from the porch, and a woman followed him. I +called to them gayly. "I fancied you would be here the moment I saw +the church!" I said, sliding to the ground. + +"Thank Heaven you are safe!" the Duchess answered, and to my +astonishment she flung her arms round my neck and kissed me. "What has +happened?" she asked, looking in my eyes, her own full of tears. + +"I think I have stopped them," I answered, turning suddenly shy, +though, boylike, I had been longing a few minutes before to talk of my +victory. "They tried to cross, and----" + +I had not sheathed my sword. Master Bertie caught my wrist, and, +lifting the blade, looked at it. "So, so!" he said nodding. "Are you +hurt?" + +"Not touched!" I answered. Before more was said he compelled his wife +to go back into the porch. The wind blew keenly across the open +ground, and we were all wet and shivering. When we had fastened up the +horse we followed her. The door of the church was locked, it seemed, +and the porch afforded the best shelter to be had. Its upper part was +of open woodwork, and freely admitted the wind; but wide eaves +projected over these openings, and over the door, so that at least it +was dry within. By huddling together on the floor against the windward +side we got some protection. I hastily told what had happened. + +"So Clarence is gone!" My lady's voice as she said the words trembled, +but not in sorrow or pity as I judged. Rather in relief. Her dread and +hatred of the man were strange and terrible, and so seemed to me then. +Afterward, I learned that something had passed between them which made +almost natural such feelings on her part, and made natural also a +bitter resentment on his. But of that no more. "You are quite sure," +she said--pressing me anxiously for confirmation--"that it was he!" + +"Yes. But I am not sure that he is dead," I explained. + +"You seem to bear a charmed life yourself," she said. + +"Hush!" cried her husband quickly. "Do not say that to the lad. It is +unlucky. But do you think," he continued--the porch was in darkness, +and we could scarcely make out one another's faces--"that there is any +further chance of pursuit?" + +"Not by that party to-night," I said grimly. "Nor I think to-morrow." + +"Good!" he answered. "For I can see nothing but water ahead, and it +would be madness to go on by night without a guide. We must stay here +until morning, whatever the risk." + +He spoke gloomily--and with reason. Our position was a miserable, +almost a desperate one, even on the supposition that pursuit had +ceased. We had lost all our baggage, food, wraps. We had no guides, +and we were in the midst of a flooded country, with two tender women +and a baby, our only shelter the porch of God's house. Mistress Anne, +who was crouching in the darkest corner next the church, seemed to +have collapsed entirely. I remembered afterward that I did not once +hear her speak that night. The Duchess tried to maintain our spirits +and her own; but in the face of cold, damp, and hunger, she could do +little. Master Bertie and I took it by turns to keep a kind of watch, +but by morning--it was a long night and a bitter one--we were worn +out, and slept despite our misery. We should have been surprised and +captured without a blow if the enemy had come upon us then. + +I awoke with a start to find the gray light of a raw misty morning +falling upon and showing up our wretched group. The Duchess's head was +hidden in her cloak; her husband's had sunk on his breast; but +Mistress Anne--I looked at her and shuddered. Had she sat so all +night? Sat staring with that stony face of pain, and those tearless +eyes on the moonlight, on the darkness which had been before the dawn, +on the cold first rays of morning? Stared on all alike, and seen none? +I shuddered and peered at her, alarmed, doubtful, wondering, asking +myself what this was that had happened to her. Had fear and cold +killed her, or turned her brain? "Anne!" I said timidly. "Anne!" + +She did not answer nor turn; nor did the fixed gaze of her eyes waver. +I thought she did not hear. "Anne!" I cried again, so loudly that the +Duchess stirred, and muttered something in her sleep. But the girl +showed no sign of consciousness. I put out my hand and touched her. + +She turned sharply and saw me, and in an instant drew her skirt away +with a gesture of such dread, loathing repulsion as froze me; while a +violent shudder convulsed her whole frame. Afterward she seemed unable +to withdraw her eyes from me, but sat in the same attitude, gazing at +me with a fixed look of horror, as one might gaze at a serpent, while +tremor after tremor shook her. + +I was frightened and puzzled, and was still staring at her, wondering +what I had done, when a footstep fell on the road outside and called +away my attention. I turned from her to see a man's figure looming +dark in the doorway. He looked at us--I suppose he had found the +horses outside--gazing in surprise at the queer group. I bade him +good-morning in Dutch, and he answered as well as his astonishment +would let him. He was a short, stout fellow, with a big face, capable +of expressing a good deal of astonishment. He seemed to be a peasant +or farmer. "What do you here?" he continued, his guttural phrases +tolerably intelligible to me. + +I explained as clearly as I could that we were on the way to Wesel. +Then I awoke the Duchess and her husband, and stretching our chilled +and aching limbs, we went outside, the man still gazing at us. Alas! +the day was not much better than the night. We could see but a very +little way, a couple of hundred yards round us only. The rest was +mist--all mist. We appealed to the man for food and shelter, and he +nodded, and, obeying his signs rather than his words, we kicked up our +starved beasts and plodded out into the fog by his side. Anne mounted +silently and without objection, but it was plain that something +strange had happened to her. Her condition was unnatural. The Duchess +gazed at her very anxiously, and, getting no answers, or very scanty +ones, to her questions, shook her head gravely. + +But we were on the verge of one pleasure at least. When we reached the +hospitable kitchen of the farmhouse it was joy indeed to stand before +the great turf fire, and feel the heat stealing into our half-frozen +bodies; to turn and warm back and front, while the good wife set bread +and hot milk before us. How differently we three felt in half an hour! +How the Duchess's eyes shone once more! How easily rose the laugh to +our lips! Joy had indeed come with the morning. To be warm and dry and +well fed after being cold and wet and hungry--what a thing this is! + +But on one neither food nor warmth seemed to have any effect. Mistress +Anne did, indeed, in obedience to my lady's sharp words, raise her +bowl to her lips. But she set it down quickly and sat looking in dull +apathy at the glowing peat. What had come over her? + + +Master Bertie went out with the farmer to attend to the horses, and +when he came back he had news. + +"There is a lad here," he said in some excitement, "who has just seen +three foreigners ride past on the road, along with two Germans on +pack-horses; five in all. They must be three of the party who followed +us yesterday." + +I whistled. "Then Clarence got himself out," I said, shrugging my +shoulders. "Well! well!" + +"I expect that is so," Master Bertie answered, the Duchess remaining +silent. "The question arises again, what is to be done?" he continued. +"We may follow them to Wesel, but the good man says the floods are +deep between here and the town, and we shall have Clarence and his +party before us all the way--shall perhaps run straight into their +arms." + +"But what else can we do?" I said. "It is impossible to go back." + +We held a long conference, and by much questioning of our host learned +that half a league away was a ferry-boat, which could carry as many as +two horses over the river at a time. On the farther side we might hit +a road leading to Santon, three leagues distant. Should we go to +Santon after all? The farmer thought the roads on that side of the +river might not be flooded. We should then be in touch once more with +our Dutch friends and might profit by Master Lindstrom's advice, on +which I for one was now inclined to set a higher value. + +"The river is bank full. Are you sure the ferry-boat can cross?" I +asked. + +Our host was not certain. And thereupon an unexpected voice struck in. + +"Oh, dear, do not let us run any more risks!" it said. It was Mistress +Anne's. She was herself again, trembling, excited, bright-eyed; as +different as possible from the Anne of a few minutes before. A great +change had come over her. Perhaps the warmth had done it. + +A third course was suggested, to stay quietly where we were. The +farmhouse stood at some little distance from the road; and though it +was rough--it was very rough, consisting only of two rooms, in one of +which a cow was stalled--still it could furnish food and shelter. Why +not stay there? + +But the Duchess wisely, I think, decided against this. "It is +unpleasant to go wandering again," she said with a shiver. "But I +shall not rest until we are within the walls of a town. Master +Lindstrom laid so much stress on that. And I fancy that the party who +overtook us last night are not the main body. Others will have gone to +Wesel by boat perhaps, or along the other bank. There they will meet, +and, learning we have not arrived, they will probably return this way +and search for us." + +"Clarence----" + +"Yes, if we have Clarence to deal with," Master Bertie assented +gravely, "we cannot afford to lose a point. We will try the ferry." + +It was something gained to start dry and warm. But the women's pale +faces--for little by little the fatigue, the want of rest, the fear, +were telling even on the Duchess--were sad to see. I was sore and +stiff myself. The wound I had received so mysteriously had bled +afresh, probably during last night's fight. We needed all our courage +to put a brave face on the matter, and bear up and go out again into +the air, which for the first week in May was cold and nipping. +Suspense and anxiety had told in various ways on all of us. While I +felt a fierce anger against those who were driving us to these +straits. Master Bertie was nervous and excited, alarmed for his wife +and child, and inclined to see an enemy in every bush. + +However, we cheered up a little when we reached the ferry and found +the boat could cross without much risk. We had to go over in two +detachments, and it was nearly an hour past noon before we all stood +on the farther bank and bade farewell to the honest soul whose help +had been of so much importance to us. He told us we had three leagues +to go, and we hoped to be at rest in Santon by four o'clock. + +But the three leagues turned out to be more nearly five, while the +road was so founderous that we had again and again to quit it. + +The evening came on, the light waned, and still we were feeling our +way, so to speak--the women tired and on the verge of tears; the men +muddy to the waist, savage, and impatient. It was eight o'clock, and +dusk was well upon us before we caught sight of the first lights of +Santon, and in fear lest the gates might be shut, pressed forward at +such speed as our horses could compass. + +"Do you go on!" the Duchess adjured us. "Anne and I will be safe +enough behind you. Let me take the child, and do you ride on. We +cannot pass the night in the fields." + +The importance of securing admission was so great that Master Bertie +and I agreed; and cantered on, soon outstripping our companions, and +almost in the gloom losing sight of them. Dark masses of woods, the +last remnants, apparently, of a forest, lay about the road we had to +traverse. We were passing one of these, scarcely three hundred paces +short of the town, and I was turning in the saddle to see that the +ladies were following safely, when I heard Master Bertie, who was a +bow-shot in front of me, give a sudden cry. + +I wheeled round hastily to learn the reason, and was just in time to +see three horsemen sweep into the road before him from the cover of +the trees. They were so close to him--and they filled the road--that +his horse carried him amongst them almost before he could check it, or +so it seemed to me. I heard their loud challenge, saw his arm wave, +and guessed that his sword was out. I spurred desperately to join him, +giving a wild shout of encouragement as I did so. But before I could +come up, or indeed cross half the distance, the scuffle was over. One +man fell headlong from his saddle, one horse fled riderless down the +road, and at sight of this, or perhaps of me, the others turned tail +without more ado and made off, leaving Master Bertie in possession of +the field. The whole thing had passed in the shadow of the wood in +less than half a minute. When I drew rein by him he was sheathing his +sword. "Is it Clarence?" I cried eagerly. + +"No, no; I did not see him. I think not," he answered. He was +breathing hard and was very much excited. "They were poor swordsmen, +for Spaniards," he added--"very poor, I thought." + +I jumped off my horse, and, kneeling beside the man, turned him over. +He was badly hurt, if not dying, cut across the neck. He looked hard +at him by such light as there was, and did not recognize him as one of +our assailants of the night before. + +"I do not think he is a Spaniard," I said slowly. Then a certain +suspicion occurred to my mind, and I stooped lower over him. + +"Not a Spaniard?" Master Bertie said stupidly. "How is that?" + +Before I answered I raised the man in my arms, and, carrying him +carefully to the side of the road, set him with his back to a tree. +Then I got quickly on my horse. The women were just coming up. "Master +Bertie," I said in a low voice, as I looked this way and that to see +if the alarm had spread, "I am afraid there is a mistake. But say +nothing to them. It is one of the town-guard you have killed!" + +"One of the town-guard!" he cried, a light bursting in on him, and +the reins dropping from his hand. "What shall we do? We are lost, man!" + + + + + CHAPTER XIV. + + AT BAY IN THE GATEHOUSE. + + +What was to be done? That was the question, and a terrible question it +was. Behind us we had the inhospitable country, dark and dreary, the +night wind sweeping over it. In front, where the lights twinkled and +the smoke of the town went up, we were like to meet with a savage +reception. And it was no time for weighing alternatives. The choice +had to be made, made in a moment; I marvel to this day at the +quickness with which I made it for good or ill. + +"We must get into the town!" I cried imperatively. "And before the +alarm is given. It is hopeless to fly, Master Bertie, and we cannot +spend another night in the fields. Quick, madam!" I continued to the +Duchess, as she came up. I did not wait to hear his opinion, for I saw +he was stunned by the catastrophe. "We have hurt one of the town-guard +through a mistake. We must get through the gate before it is +discovered!" + +I seized her rein and flogged up her horse, and gave her no time to +ask questions, but urged on the party at a hand gallop until the gate +was reached. The attempt, I knew, was desperate, for the two men who +had escaped had ridden straight for the town; but I saw no other +resource, and it seemed to me to be better to surrender peaceably, if +that were possible, than to expose the women to another night of such +cold and hunger as the last. And fortune so far favored us that when +we reached the gate it was open. Probably, the patrol having ridden +through to get help, no one had thought fit to close it; and, no one +withstanding us, we spurred our sobbing horses under the archway and +entered the street. + +It was a curious entry, and a curious scene we came upon. I remember +now how strange it all looked. The houses, leaning forward in a dozen +quaint forms, clear cut against the pale evening sky, caused a +darkness as of a cavern in the narrow street below. Here and there in +the midst of this darkness hung a lantern, which, making the gloom +away from it seem deeper, lit up the things about it, throwing into +flaring prominence some barred window with a scared face peering from +it, some corner with a puddle, a slinking dog, a broken flight of +steps. Just within the gate stood a brazier full of glowing coal, and +beside it a halbert rested against the wall. I divined that the +watchman had run into the town with the riders, and I drew rein in +doubt, listening and looking. I think if we had ridden straight on +then, all might have been well; or, at least, we might have been +allowed to give ourselves up. + +But we hesitated a moment, and were lost. No doubt, though we saw but +one, there were a score of people watching us, who took us for four +men, Master Bertie and I being in front; and these, judging from the +boldness of our entry that there were more behind, concluded that this +was a foray upon the town. At any rate, they took instant advantage of +our pause. With a swift whir an iron pot came hurtling past me, and, +missing the Duchess by a hand's-breadth, went clanking under the +gatehouse. That served for a signal. In a moment an alarm of hostile +cries rose all round us. An arrow whizzed between my horse's feet. +Half a dozen odd missiles, snatched up by hasty hands, came raining in +on us out of the gloom. The town seemed to be rising as one man. A +bell began to ring, and a hundred yards in front, where the street +branched off to right and left, the way seemed suddenly alive from +wall to wall with lights and voices and brandished arms, the gleam of +steel, and the babel of a furious crowd--a crowd making down toward us +with a purpose we needed no German to interpret. + + +It was a horrible moment; the more horrible that I had not expected +this fury, and was unnerved as well as taken aback by it. Remembering +that I had brought my companions here, and that two were women, one +was a child, I quailed. How could I protect them? There was no +mistaking the stern meaning of those cries, of that rage so much +surpassing anything I had feared. Though I did not know that the man +we had struck down was a bridegroom, and that there were those in the +crowd in whose ears the young wife's piercing scream still rang, I yet +quailed before their yells and curses. + +As I glanced round for a place of refuge, my eyes lit on an open +doorway close to me, and close also to the brazier and halbert. It was +a low stone doorway, beetle-browed, with a coat of arms carved over +it. I saw in an instant that it must lead to the tower above us--the +gatehouse; and I sprang from my horse, a fresh yell from the houses +hailing the act. I saw that, if we were to gain a moment for +parleying, we must take refuge there. I do not know how I did it, but +somehow I made myself understood by the others and got the women off +their horses and dragged Mistress Anne inside, where at once we both +fell in the darkness over the lower steps of a spiral staircase. This +hindered the Duchess, who was following, and I heard a scuffle taking +place behind us. But in that confined space--the staircase was very +narrow--I could give no help. I could only stumble upward, dragging +the fainting girl after me, until we emerged through an open doorway +at the top into a room. What kind of room I did not notice then, only +that it was empty. Notice! It was no time for taking notice. The bell +was clanging louder and louder outside. The mob were yelling like +hounds in sight of their quarry. The shouts, the confused cries, and +threats, and questions deafened me. I turned to learn what was +happening behind me. The other two had not come up. + +I felt my way down again, one hand on the central pillar, my shoulder +against the outside wall. The stair-foot was faintly lit by the glow +from outside, and on the bottom step I came on some one, hurt or dead, +just a dark mass at my feet. It was Master Bertie. I gave a cry and +leaped over his body. The Duchess, brave wife, was standing before +him, the halbert which she had snatched up presented at the doorway +and the howling mob outside. + +Fortunately the crowd had not yet learned how few we were; nor saw, I +think, that it was but a woman who confronted them. To rush into the +low doorway and storm the narrow winding staircase in the face of +unknown numbers was a task from which the bravest veterans might have +flinched, and the townsfolk, furious as they were, hung back. I took +advantage of the pause. I grasped the halbert myself and pushed the +Duchess back. "Drag him up!" I muttered. "If you cannot manage it, +call Anne!" + +But grief and hard necessity gave her strength, and, despite the noise +in front of me, I heard her toil panting up with her burden. When I +judged she had reached the room above, I too turned and ran up after +her, posting myself in the last angle just below the room. There I was +sheltered from missiles by the turn in the staircase, and was further +protected by the darkness. Now I could hold the way with little risk, +for only one could come up at a time, and he would be a brave man who +should storm the stairs in my teeth. + +All this, I remember, was done in a kind of desperate frenzy, in haste +and confusion, with no plan or final purpose, but simply out of the +instinct of self-preservation, which led me to do, from moment to +moment, what I could to save our lives. I did not know whether there +was another staircase to the tower, nor whether there were enemies +above us; whether, indeed, enemies might not swarm in on us from a +dozen entrances. I had no time to think of more than just this; that +my staircase, of which I did know, must be held. + +I think I had stood there about a minute, breathing hard and listening +to the din outside, which came to my ears a little softened by the +thick walls round me--so much softened, at least, that I could hear my +heart beating in the midst of it--when the Duchess came back to the +door above. I could see her, there being a certain amount of light in +the room behind her, but she could not see me. "What can I do?" she +asked softly. + +I answered by a question. "Is he alive?" I muttered. + +"Yes; but hurt," she answered, struggling with a sob, with a +fluttering of the woman's heart she had repressed so bravely. "Much +hurt, I fear! Oh, why, why did we come here?" + +She did not mean it as a reproach, but I took it as one, and braced +myself more firmly to meet this crisis--to save her at least if it +should be any way possible. When she asked again "Can I do anything?" +I bade her take my pike and stand where I was for a moment. Since no +enemy had yet made his appearance above, the strength of our position +seemed to hold out some hope, and it was the more essential that I +should understand it and know exactly what our chances were. + + +I sprang up the stairs into the room and looked round, my eyes seeming +to take in everything at once. It was a big bare room, with signs of +habitation only in one corner. On the side toward the town was a long, +low window, through which--a score of the diamond panes were broken +already--the flare of the besiegers' torches fell luridly on the walls +and vaulted roof. By the dull embers of a wood fire, over which hung a +huge black pot, Master Bertie was lying on the boards, breathing +loudly and painfully, his head pillowed on the Duchess's kerchief. +Beside him sat Mistress Anne, her face hidden, the child wailing in +her lap. A glance round assured me that there was no other staircase, +and that on the side toward the country, the wall was pierced with no +window bigger than a loophole or an arrow-slit; with no opening which +even a boy could enter. For the present, therefore, unless the top of +the tower should be escaladed from the adjacent houses--and I could do +nothing to provide against that--we had nothing to fear except from +the staircase and the window I have mentioned. Every moment, however, +a missile or a shot crashed through the latter, adding the shiver of +falling glass to the general din. No wonder the child wailed and the +girl sank over it in abject terror. Those savage yells might well make +a woman blench. They carried more fear and dread to my heart than did +the real danger of our position, desperate as it was. + +And yet it was so desperate that, for a moment, I leant against the +wall dazed and hopeless, listening to the infernal tumult without and +within. Had Bertie been by my side to share the responsibility and +join in the risk, I could have borne it better. I might have felt then +some of the joy of battle, and the stern pleasure of the one matched +against the many. But I was alone. How was I to save these women and +that poor child from the yelling crew outside? How indeed? I did not +know the enemy's language; I could not communicate with him, could not +explain, could not even cry for quarter for the women. + + +A stone which glanced from one of the mullions and grazed my shoulder +roused me from this fit of cowardice, which, I trust and believe, had +lasted for a few seconds only. At the same moment an unusual volley of +missiles tore through the window as if discharged at a given signal. +We were under cover, and they did us no harm, rolling for the most +part noisily about the floor. But when the storm ceased and a calm as +sudden followed, I heard a dull, regular sound close to the window--a +thud! thud! thud!--and on the instant divined the plan and the danger. +My courage came back and with it my wits. I remembered an old tale +I had heard, and, dropping my sword where I stood, I flew to the +hearth, and unhooked the great pot. It was heavy; half full of +something--broth, most likely; but I recked nothing of that, I bore it +swiftly to the window, and just as the foremost man on the ladder had +driven in the lead work before him with his ax, flung the whole of the +contents--they were not scalding, but they were very hot--in his face. +The fellow shrieked loudly, and, blinded and taken by surprise, lost +his hold and fell against his supporter, and both tumbled down again +more quickly than they had come up. + +Sternly triumphant, I poised the great pot itself in my hands, +thinking to fling it down upon the sea of savage upturned faces, of +which I had a brief view, as the torches flared now on one, now on +another. But prudence prevailed. If no more blood were shed it might +still be possible to get some terms. I laid the pot down by the side +of the window as a weapon to be used only in the last resort. + +Meanwhile the Duchess, posted in the dark, had heard the noise of the +window being driven in, and cried out pitifully to know what it was. +"Stand firm!" I shouted loudly. "Stand firm. We are safe as yet." + +Even the uproar without seemed to abate a little as the first fury of +the mob died down. Probably their leaders were concerting fresh +action. I went and knelt beside Master Bertie and made a rough +examination of his wound. He had received a nasty blow on the back of +the head, from which the blood was still oozing, and he was +insensible. His face looked very long and thin and deathlike. But, so +far as I could ascertain, the bones were uninjured, and he was now +breathing more quietly. "I think he will recover," I said, easing his +clothes. + +Anne was crouching on the other side of him. As she did not answer I +looked up at her. Her lips were moving, but the only word I caught was +"Clarence!" I did not wonder she was distraught; I had work enough to +keep my own wits. But I wanted her help, and I repeated loudly, "Anne! +Anne!" trying to rouse her. + +She looked past me shuddering. "Heaven forgive you!" she muttered. +"You have brought me to this! And now I must die! I must die here. In +the net they have set for others is their own foot taken!" + +She was quite beside herself with terror. I saw that she was not +addressing me; and I had not time to make sense of her wanderings. I +left her and went out to speak to the Duchess. Poor woman! even her +brave spirit was giving way. I felt her cold hands tremble as I took +the halbert from her. "Go into the room a while," I said softly. "He +is not seriously hurt, I am sure. I will guard this. If any one +appears at the window, scream." + +She went gladly, and I took her place, having now to do double duty. I +had been there a few minutes only, listening, with my soul in my ears, +to detect the first signs of attack, either below me or in the room +behind, when I distinguished a strange rustling sound on the +staircase. It appeared to come from a point a good deal below me, and +probably, whoever made it was just within the doorway. I peered into +the gloom, but could see no one as yet. "Stand!" I cried in a tone of +warning. "Who is that?" + +The sound ceased abruptly, but it left me uneasy. Could they be going +to blow us up with gunpowder? No! I did not think so. They would not +care to ruin the gateway for the sake of capturing so small a party. +And the tower was strong. It would not be easy to blow it up. + +Yet in a short time the noise began again; and my fears returned with +it. "Stand!" I cried savagely, "or take care of yourself." + +The answer was a flash of bright light--which for a second showed the +rough stone walls winding away at my feet--a stunning report, and the +pattering down of half a dozen slugs from the roof. I laughed, my +first start over. "You will have to come a little higher up!" I cried +tauntingly, as I smelt the fumes. My eyes had become so accustomed to +the darkness that I felt sure I should detect an assailant, however +warily he might make his approach. And my halbert was seven feet long, +so that I could reach as far as I could see. I had had time, too, to +grow cool. + +After this there was comparative quiet for another space. Every now +and then a stone or, more rarely, the ball of an arquebuse would come +whizzing into the room above. But I did not fear this. It was easy to +keep under cover. And their shouting no longer startled me. I began to +see a glimpse of hope. It was plain that the townsfolk were puzzled +how to come at us without suffering great loss. They were unaware of +our numbers, and, as it proved, believed that we had three uninjured +men at least. The staircase was impracticable as a point of assault, +and the window, being only three feet in height and twenty from the +ground, was not much better, if defended, as they expected it would +be, by a couple of desperate swordsmen. + + +I was not much astonished, therefore, when the rustling sound, +beginning again at the foot of the staircase, came this time to no +more formidable issue than a hail in Spanish. "Will you surrender?" +the envoy cried. + +"No!" I said roundly. + +"Who are you?" was the next question. + +"We are English!" I answered. + +He went then; and there for the time the negotiations ended. But, +seeing the dawn of hope, I was the more afraid of any trap or +surprise, and I cried to the Duchess to be on her guard. For this +reason, too, the suspense of the next few minutes was almost more +trying than anything which had gone before. But the minutes came at +last to an end. A voice below cried loudly in English, "Holloa! are +you friends?" + +"Yes, yes," I replied joyfully, before the words had well ceased to +rebound from the walls. For the voice and accent were Master +Lindstrom's. A cry of relief from the room behind me showed that +there, too, the speaker was recognized. The Duchess came running to +the door, but I begged her to go back and keep a good lookout. And she +obeyed. + +"How come you here? How has it happened?" Master Lindstrom asked, his +voice, though he still remained below, betraying his perplexity and +unhappiness. "Can I not do something? This is terrible, indeed." + +"You can come up, if you like," I answered, after a moment's thought. +"But you must come alone. And I cannot let even you, friend as you +are, see our defenses." + +As he came up I stepped back and drew the door of the room toward me, +so that, though a little light reached the head of the stairs, he +could not, standing there, see into the room or discern our real +weakness. I did not distrust him--Heaven forbid! but he might have to +tell all he saw to his friends below, and I thought it well, for his +sake as well as our own, that he should be able to do this freely, and +without hurting us. As he joined me I held up a finger for silence and +listened keenly. But all was quiet below. No one had followed him. +Then I turned and warmly grasped his hands, and we peered into one +another's faces. I saw he was deeply moved; that he was thinking of +Dymphna, and how I had saved her. He held my hands as though he would +never loose them. + +"Well!" I said, as cheerfully as I could, "have you brought us an +offer of terms? But let me tell you first," I continued, "how it +happened." And I briefly explained that we had mistaken the captain of +the guard and his two followers for Clarence and the two Spaniards. +"Is he dead?" I continued. + +"No, he is still alive," Master Lindstrom answered gravely. "But the +townsfolk are furious, and the seizure of the tower has still further +exasperated them. Why did you do it?" + +"Because we should have been torn to pieces if we had not done it," I +answered dryly. "You think we are in a strait place?" + +"Do you not think so yourself?" he said, somewhat astonished. + +I laughed. "That is as may be," I answered with an affectation of +recklessness. "The staircase is narrow and the window low. We shall +sell our lives dearly, my friend. Yet, for the sake of the women who +are with us, we are willing to surrender if the citizens offer us +terms. After all, it was an accident. Cannot you impress this on +them?" I added eagerly. + +He shook his head. "They will not hear reason," he said. + +"Then," I replied, "impress the other thing upon them. Tell them that +our swords are sharp and we are desperate." + +"I will see what I can do," he answered slowly. "The Duke of Cleves is +expected here to-morrow, and the townsfolk feel they would be +disgraced forever if he should find their gate held by a party of +marauders, as they consider you." + +"The Duke of Cleves?" I repeated. "Perhaps he may be better affected +toward us." + +"They will overpower you before he comes," Master Lindstrom answered +despondently. "I would put no trust in him if I were you. But I will +go to them, and, believe me, I will do all that man can do." + +"Of that I am sure," I said warmly. And then, cautioning me to remain +strictly on the defensive, he left me. + + +Before his footsteps had ceased to echo on the stairs the door beside +me opened, and Mistress Anne appeared at it. I saw at once that his +familiar voice had roused her from the stupor of fear in which I had +last seen her. Her eyes were bright, her whole frame was thrilling +with excitement, hope, suspense. I began to understand her; to discern +beneath the disguise thrown over it in ordinary times by a strong +will, the nervous nature which was always confident or despairing, +which felt everything so keenly--everything, that is, which touched +itself. "Well?" she cried, "well?" + +"Patience! patience!" I replied rather sharply. I could not help +comparing her conduct with that of the Duchess, and blaming her, not +for her timidity, but for the selfishness which she had betrayed in +her fear. I could fancy Petronilla trembling and a coward, but not +despairing nor utterly cast down, nor useless when others needed her, +nor wrapped in her own terrors to the very exclusion of reason. +"Patience!" I said; "he is coming back. He and his friends will do all +they can for us. We must wait a while and hope, and keep a good +lookout." + +She had her hand on the door, and by an abrupt movement, she slipped +out to me and closed it behind her. This made the staircase so dark +that I could no longer distinguish her face, but I judged from her +tone that her fears were regaining possession of her. "Clarence," she +muttered, her voice low and trembling. "Have you thought of him? Could +not he help us? He may have followed us here, and may be here now. +Now! And perhaps he does not know in what danger we are." + +"Clarence!" I said, astonished and almost angry. "Clarence help us? Go +back, girl, go back. You are mad. He would be more likely to complete +our ruin. Go in and nurse the baby!" I added bitterly. + +What could she mean, I asked myself, when she had gone in. Was there +anything in her suggestion? Would Clarence follow us hither? If so, +and if he should come in time, would he have power to help us, using +such mysterious influence, Spanish or English, as he seemed to +possess? And if he could help us, would it be better to fall into his +hands than into those of the exasperated Santonese? I thought the +Duchess would say "No!" + +So it mattered not what I answered myself. I hoped, now Master +Lindstrom had appeared, that the women would be allowed to go free; +and it seemed to me that to surrender to Clarence would be to hand +over the Duchess to her enemy simply that the rest of us might escape. + +Master Lindstrom returned while I was still considering this, and, +observing the same precautions as before, I bade him join me. "Well?" +I said, not so impetuously, I hope, as Mistress Anne, yet I dare say +with a good deal of eagerness. "Well, what do they say?" For he was +slow to speak. + +"I have bad news," he answered gently. + +"Ah!" I ejaculated, a lump which was due as much to rage as to any +other emotion rising in my throat. "So they will give us no terms? +Then so be it! Let them come and take us." + +"Nay," he hastened to answer. "It is not so bad as that, lad. They are +fathers and husbands themselves, and not lanzknechts. They will suffer +the women to go free, and will even let me take charge of them if +necessary." + +"They will!" I exclaimed, overjoyed. I wondered why on earth he had +hesitated to tell me this. "Why, that is the main point, friend." + +"Yes," he said gravely, "perhaps so. More, the men may go too, if the +tower be surrendered within an hour. With one exception, that is. The +man who struck the blow must be given up." + +"The man who struck the blow!" I repeated slowly. "Do you mean--you +mean the man who cut the patrol down?" + +"Yes," he said. He was peering very closely at me, as though he would +learn from my face who it was. And I stood thinking. This was as much +as we could expect. I divined, and most truly, that but for the honest +Dutchman's influence, promises, perhaps bribes, such terms would never +have been offered to us by the men who hours before had driven us to +hold as if we had been vermin. Yet give up Master Bertie? "What," I +said, "will be done to him? The man who must be given up, I mean?" +Master Lindstrom shook his head. "It was an accident," I urged, my +eyes on his. + +He grasped my hand firmly, and, turning away his face, seemed for a +while unable to speak. At last he whispered, "He must suffer for the +others, lad. I fear so. It is a hard fate, a cruel fate. But I can do +no more. They will not hear me on this. It is true he will be first +tried by the magistrate, but there is no hope. They are very hard." + +My heart sank. I stood irresolute, pondering on what we ought to do, +pondering on what I should say to the wife who so loved the man who +must die. What could I say? Yet, somehow I must break the news. I +asked Master Lindstrom to wait where he was while I consulted the +others, adding, "You will answer for it that there will be no attack +while you are here, I suppose?" + +"I will," he said. I knew I could trust him, and I went in to the +Duchess, closing the door behind me. A change had come over the room +since I had left it. The moon had risen and was flinging its cold +white light through the twisted and shattered framework of the window, +to fall in three bright panels on the floor. The torches in the street +had for the most part burned out, or been extinguished. In place of +the red glare, the shouts and the crash of glass, the atmosphere of +battle and strife I had left, I found this silvery light and a +stillness made more apparent by the distant hum of many voices. + +Mistress Anne was standing just within the threshold, her face showing +pale against the gloom, her hands clasped. The Duchess was kneeling by +her husband, but she looked up as I entered. + +"They will let us all go," I said bluntly; it was best to tell the +tale at once--"except the one who hurt the patrol, that is." + +It was strange how differently the two women received the news; while +Mistress Anne flung her hands to her face with a sobbing cry of +thankfulness, and leaned against the wall crying and shaking, my lady +stood up straight and still, breathing hard but saying nothing. I saw +that she did not need to ask what would be done to the one who was +excepted. She knew. "No," she murmured at last, her hands pressed to +her bosom, "we cannot do it! Oh, no, no!" + +"I fear we must," I said gently--calmly, too, I think. Yet in saying +it I was not quite myself. An odd sensation was growing upon me in the +stillness of the room. I began on a sudden, I did not know why, to +thrill with excitement, to tremble with nervousness, such as would +rather have become one of the women than a man. My head grew hot, my +heart began to beat quickly. I caught myself looking out, listening, +waiting for something to happen, something to be said. It was +something more terrible, as it seemed to me, than the din and crash of +the worst moments of the assault. What was it? What was it that was +threatening my being? An instant and I knew. + +"Oh, no, never!" cried the Duchess again, her voice quivering, her +face full of keenest pain. "We will not give you up. We will stand or +fall together, friend." + +Give _you_ up! Give _you_ up! Ha! The veil was lifted now, and I saw +what the something with the cold breath going before it was. I looked +quietly from her to her husband; and I asked--I fancy she thought my +question strangely irrelevant at that moment, "How is he? Is he +better?" + +"Much better. He knew me for a moment," she answered. "Then he seemed +to sink away again. But his eyes were quite clear." + +I stood gazing down at his thin face, which had ever looked so kindly +into mine. My fingers played idly with the knot of my sword. "He will +live?" I asked abruptly, harshly. + +She started at the sudden question. But, brutal as it must have +sounded, she was looking at me in pity so great and generous that it +did not wound her. "Oh, yes," she said, her eyes still clinging to me. +"I think he will live, thank Heaven!" + +Thank Heaven! Ah, yes, thank Heaven! + +I turned and went slowly toward the door. But before I reached it she +was at my side, nay, was on her knees by me, clasping my hand, looking +up to me with streaming eyes. "What are you going to do?" she cried, +reading, I suppose, something in my face. + +"I will see if Master Lindstrom cannot get better terms for us," I +answered. + +She rose, still detaining me. "You are sure?" she said, still eying me +jealously. + +"Quite sure," I answered, forcing a smile. "I will come back and +report to you." + +She let me go then, and I went out and joined Lindstrom on the +staircase. + +"Are you certain," I asked, speaking in a whisper, "that they +will--that the town will keep its word and let the others go?" + +"I am quite sure of it," he replied nodding. "They are Germans, and +hard and pitiless, but you may trust them. So far I will answer for +them." + +"Then we accept," I said gravely. "I give myself up. Let them take +me." + + + + + CHAPTER XV. + + BEFORE THE COURT. + + +I had not seen the first moonbeams pierce the broken casement of the +tower-room, but I was there to watch the last tiny patch of silver +glide aslant from wall to sill, and sill to frame, and so pass out. +Near the fire, which had been made up, and now glowed and crackled +bravely on the hearthstone at my elbow, my three jailers had set a +mattress for me; and on this I sat, my back to the wall and my face to +the window. The guards lounged on the other side of the hearth round a +lantern, playing at dice and drinking. They were rough, hard men, +whose features, as they leaned over the table and the light played +strongly on their faces, blazoning them against a wall of shadow, were +stern and rugged enough. But they had not shown themselves unkindly. +They had given me a share of their wine, and had pointed to the window +and shrugged their shoulders, as much as to say that it was my own +fault if I suffered from the draught. Nay, from time to time, one of +them would turn from his game and look at me--in pity, I think--and +utter a curse that was meant for encouragement. + +Even when the first excitement had passed away, I felt none of the +stupefaction which I have heard that men feel in such a position. My +brain was painfully active. In vain I longed to sleep, if it were only +that I might not be thought to fear death. But the fact that I was to +be tried first, though the sentence was a certainty, distracted and +troubled me. My thoughts paced from thing to thing; now dwelling on +the Duchess and her husband, now flitting to Petronilla and Sir +Anthony, to the old place at home and the servants; to strange petty +things, long familiar--a tree in the chase at Coton, an herb I had +planted. Once a great lump rose in my throat, and I had to turn away +to hide the hot tears that would rise at the thought that I must die +in this mean German town, in this unknown corner, and be buried and +forgotten! And once, too, to torment me, there rose a doubt in my mind +whether Master Bertie would recover; whether, indeed, I had not thrown +my life away for nothing. But it was too late to think of that! And +the doubt, which the Evil One himself must have suggested, so terrible +was it passed away quickly. + +My thoughts raced, but the night crawled. We had surrendered about +ten, and the magistrates, less pitiful than the jailers, had forbidden +my friends to stay with me. An hour or more after midnight, two of the +men lay down and the other sat humming a drinking-song, or at +intervals rose to yawn and stretch himself and look out of the window. +From time to time, the cry of the watchman going his rounds came +drearily to my ears, recalling to me the night I had spent behind the +boarding in Moorgate Street, when the adventure which was to end +to-morrow--nay, to-day--in a few hours--had lured me away. To-day? Was +I to die to-day? To perish with all my plans, hopes, love? It seemed +impossible. As I gazed at the window, whose shape began to be printed +on my brain, it seemed impossible. My soul so rose in rebellion +against it, that the perspiration stood on my brow, and I had to clasp +my hands about my knees, and strain every muscle to keep in the cry I +would have uttered! a cry, not of fear, but of rage and remonstrance +and revolt. + +I was glad to see the first streaks of dawn, to hear the first +cock-crowings, and, a few minutes later, the voices of men in the +street and on the stairs. The sounds of day and life acted magically +upon me. The horror of the night passed off as does the horror of a +dream. When a man, heavily cloaked and with his head covered, came in, +the door being shut behind him by another hand, I looked up at him +bravely. The worst was past. + +He replied by looking down at me for a few moments without disclosing +himself, the collar of his cloak being raised so high that I could see +nothing of his features. My first notion that he must be Master +Lindstrom passed away; and, displeased by his silent scrutiny, and +thinking him a stranger, I said sharply, "I hope you are satisfied, +sir." + +"Satisfied?" he replied, in a voice which made me start so that the +irons clanked on my feet, "Well, I think I should be--seeing you so, +my friend!" + +It was Clarence! Of all men, Clarence! I knew his voice, and he, +seeing himself recognized, lowered his cloak. I stared at him in +stupefied silence, and he at me in a grim curiosity. I was not +prepared for the blunt abruptness with which he continued--using +almost the very words he had used when face to face with me in the +flood: "Now tell me who you are, and what brought you into this +company?" + +I gave him no answer. I still stared at him in silence. + +"Come!" he continued, his hawk's eyes bent on my face, "make a clean +breast of it, and perhaps--who knows? I may help you yet, lad. You +have puzzled and foiled me, and I want to understand you. Where did my +lady pick you up just when she wanted you? I had arranged for every +checker on the board except you. Who are you?" + +This time I did answer him--by a question. "How many times have we +met?" I asked. + +"Three," he said readily, "and the last time you nearly rid the world +of me. Now the luck is against you. It generally is in the end against +those who thwart me, my friend." He chuckled at the conceit, and I +read in his face at once his love of intrigue and his vanity. "I come +uppermost, as always." + +I only nodded. + +"What do you want?" I asked. I felt a certain expectation. He wanted +something. + +"First, to know who you are." + +"I shall not tell you!" I answered. + +He smiled dryly, sitting opposite to me. He had drawn up a stool, and +made himself comfortable. He was not an uncomely man as he sat there +playing with his dagger, a dubious smile on his lean, dark face. +Unwarned, I might have been attracted by the masterful audacity, the +intellect as well as the force which I saw stamped on his features. +Being warned, I read cunning in his bold eyes, and cruelty in the curl +of his lip. "What do you want next?" I asked. + +"I want to save your life," he replied lightly. + +At that I started--I could not help it. + +"Ha! ha!" he laughed, "I thought the stoicism did not go quite down to +the bottom, my lad. But there, it is true enough, I have come to help +you. I have come to save your life if you will let me." + +I strove in vain to keep entire mastery over myself. The feelings to +which he appealed were too strong for me. My voice sounded strange, +even in my own ears, as I said hoarsely, "It is impossible! What can +you do?" + +"What can I do?" he answered with a stern smile. "Much! I have, boy, a +dozen strings in my hands, and a neck--a life at the end of each!" + +He raised his hand, and extending the fingers, moved them to and fro. + +"See! see! A life, a death!" he exclaimed. "And for you, I can and +will save your life--on one condition." + +"On one condition?" I murmured. + +"Ay, on one condition; but it is a very easy one. I will save your +life on my part; and you, on yours, must give me a little assistance. +Do you see? Then we shall be quits." + +"I do not understand," I said dully. I did not. His words had set my +heart fluttering so that I could for the moment take in only one +idea--that here was a new hope of life. + +"It is very simple," he resumed, speaking slowly. "Certain plans of +mine require that I should get your friend the Duchess conveyed back +to England. But for you I should have succeeded before this. In what +you have hindered me, you can now help me. You have their confidence +and great influence with them. All I ask is that you will use that +influence so that they may be at a certain place at a certain hour. I +will contrive the rest. It shall never be known, I promise you, that +you----" + +"Betrayed them!" + +"Well, gave me some information," he said lightly, puffing away my +phrase. + +"No. Betrayed them!" I persisted. + +"Put it so, if you please," he replied, shrugging his shoulders and +raising his eyebrows. "What is in a word?" + +"You are the tempter himself, I think!" I cried in bitter rage--for it +_was_ bitter--bitter, indeed, to feel that new-born hope die out. "But +you come to me in vain. I defy you!" + +"Softly! softly!" he answered with calmness. + +Yet I saw a little pulse beating in his cheek that seemed to tell of +some emotion kept in subjection. + +"It frightens you at first," he said. "But listen. You will do them no +harm, and yourself good. I shall get them anyway, both the Duchess and +her husband; though, without your aid, it will be more difficult. Why, +help of that kind is given every day. They need never know it. Even +now there is one of whom you little dream who has----" + +"Silence!" I cried fiercely. "I care not. I defy you!" + +I could think of only one thing. I was wild with rage and +disappointment. His words had aggravated the pain of every regret, +every clinging to life I felt. + +"Go!" I cried. "Go and leave me, you villain!" + +"If I do leave you," he said, fixing his eyes on me, "it will be, my +friend--to death." + +"Then so be it!" I answered wildly. "So be it! I will keep my honor." + +"Your honor!" The mask dropped from his face, and he sneered as he +rose from his seat. A darker scowl changed and disfigured his brow, +as he lost hope of gaining me. "Your honor? Where will it be by +to-night?" he hissed, his eyes glowering down at me. "Where a week +hence, when you will be cast into a pit and forgotten? Your honor, +fool? What is the honor of a dead man? Pah! But die, then, if you will +have it so! Die, like the brainless brute you are! And rot, and be +forgotten!" he concluded passionately. + + +They were terrible words; more terrible I know now than either he or I +understood then. They so shook me that when he was gone I crouched +trembling on my pallet, hiding my face in a fit of horror--taking no +heed of my jailers or of appearances. "Die and be forgotten! Die and +be forgotten!" The doom rang in my ears. + +Something which seemed to me angelic roused me from this misery. It +was the sound of a kindly, familiar voice speaking English. I looked +up and found the Dutchman bending over me with a face of infinite +distress. With him, but rather behind him, stood Van Tree, pale and +vicious-eyed, tugging his scanty chin-beard and gazing about him like +a dog seeking some one to fasten upon. "Poor lad! poor lad!" the old +man said, his voice shaking as he looked at me. + +I sprang to my feet, the irons rattling as I dashed my hand across my +eyes. + +"It is all right!" I said hurriedly. "I had a--but never mind that. It +was like a dream. Only tell the Duchess to look to herself," I +continued, still rather vehemently. "Clarence is here. He is in +Santon. I have seen him." + +"You have seen him?" both the Dutchmen cried at once. + +"Ay!" I said, with a laugh that was three parts hysterical--indeed, I +was still tingling all over with excitement. "He has been here to +offer me my life if I would help him in his schemes. I told him he was +the tempter, and defied him. And he--he said I should die and be +forgotten!" I added, trembling, yet laughing wildly at the same time. + +"I think he _is_ the tempter!" said Master Lindstrom solemnly, his +face very grim. "And therefore a liar and the father of lies! You may +die, lad, to-day; perhaps you must. But forgotten you shall not be, +while we live, or one of us lives, or one of the children who shall +come after us. He is a liar!" + +I got my hands, with a struggle, from the old man, and turning my back +upon him, went and looked out of the window. The sun was rising. The +tower of the great minster, seen row for the first time, rose in +stately brightness above the red roofs and quaint gables and the +rows of dormer windows. Down in the streets the grayness and chill +yet lingered. But above was a very glory of light and warmth and +color--the rising of the May sun. When I turned round I was myself +again. The calm beauty of that sight had stolen into my soul. "Is it +time?" I said cheerfully. For the crowd was gathering below, and there +were voices and feet on the stairs. + +"I think it is," Master Lindstrom answered. "We have obtained leave to +go with you. You need fear no violence in the streets, for the man who +was hurt is still alive and may recover. I have been with the +magistrates this morning," he continued, "and found them better +disposed to you; but the Sub-dean has joint jurisdiction with them, as +the deputy of the Bishop of Arras, who is dean of the minster; and he +is, for some reason, very bitter against you." + +"The Bishop of Arras? Granville, do you mean?" I asked. I knew the +name of the Emperor's shrewd and powerful minister, by whose advice +the Netherlands were at this time ruled. + +"The same. He, of course, is not here, but his deputy is. Were it not +for him---- But there, it is no good talking of that!" the Dutchman +said, breaking off and rubbing his head in his chagrin. + +One of the guards who had spent the night with me brought me at this +moment a bowl of broth with a piece of bread in it. I could not eat +the bread, but I drank the broth and felt the better for it. Having in +my pocket a little money with which the Duchess had furnished me, I +put a silver piece in the bowl and handed it back to him. The man +seemed astonished, and muttered something in German as he turned away. + +"What did he say?" I asked the Dutchman. + +"Oh, nothing, nothing," he answered. + +"But what was it? It was something," I persisted, seeing him confused. + +"He--well, he said he would have a mass said for you!" Lindstrom +answered in despair. "It will do no harm." + +"No, why should it?" I replied mechanically. + + +We were in the street by this time, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree +walking beside me in the middle of a score of soldiers, who seemed to +my eyes fantastically dressed. I remarked, as we passed out, a tall +man clothed in red and black, who was standing by the door as if +waiting to fall in behind me. He carried on his shoulder a long +broad-bladed sword, and I guessed who he was, seeing how Master +Lindstrom strove to intercept my view of him. But I was not afraid of +_that_. I had heard long ago--perhaps six months in time, but it +seemed long ago--how bravely Queen Jane had died. And if a girl had +not trembled, surely a man should not. So I looked steadfastly at him, +and took great courage, and after that was able to gaze calmly on the +people, who pressed to stare at me, peeping over the soldiers' +shoulders, and clustering in every doorway and window to see me go +past. They were all silent, and it even seemed to me that some--but +this may have been my fancy--pitied me. + +I saw nothing of the Duchess, and might have wondered, had not Master +Lindstrom explained that he had contrived to keep her in ignorance of +the hour fixed for the proceedings. Her husband was better, he said, +and conscious; but, for fear of exciting him, they were keeping the +news from him also. I remember I felt for a moment very sore at this, +and then I tried to persuade myself that it was right. + +The distance through the streets was short, and almost before I was +aware of it I was in the court-house, the guard had fallen back, and I +was standing before three persons who were seated behind a long table. +Two of them were grave, portly men wearing flat black caps and scarlet +robes, with gold chains about their necks. The third, dressed as an +ecclesiastic, wore a huge gem ring upon his thumb. Behind them stood +three attendants holding a sword, a crosier, and a ducal cap upon a +cushion; and above and behind all was a lofty stained window, whose +rich hues, the sun being low as yet, shot athwart the corbels of the +roof. At the end of the table sat a black-robed man with an ink-horn +and spectacles, a grave, still, down-looking man; and the crowd being +behind me, and preserving a dead silence, and the attendants standing +like statues, I seemed indeed to be alone with these four at the +table, and the great stained window and the solemn hush. They talked +to one another in low tones for a minute, gazing at me the while. And +I fancied they were astonished to find me so young. + +At length they all fell back into their chairs. "Do you speak German?" +the eldest burgher said, addressing me gravely. He sat in the middle, +with the Sub-dean on his right. + +"No; but I speak and understand Spanish," I answered in that language, +feeling chilled already by the stern formality which like an iron hand +was laying its grip upon me. + +"Good! Your name?" replied the president. + +"I am commonly called Francis Carey, and I am an Englishman." The +Sub-dean--he was a pale, stout man, with gloomy eyes--had hitherto +been looking at me in evident doubt. But at this he nodded assent, +and, averting his eyes from me, gazed meditatively at the roof of the +hall, considering apparently what he should have for breakfast. + +"You are charged," said the president slowly, consulting a document, +"with having assaulted and wounded in the highway last night one +Heinrich Schroeder, a citizen of this town, acting at the time as +Lieutenant of the Night Guard. Do you admit this, prisoner, or do you +require proof?" + +"He was wounded," I answered steadily, "but by mistake, and in error. +I supposed him to be one of three persons who had unlawfully waylaid +me and my party on the previous night between Emmerich and Wesel." + +The Sub-dean, still gazing at the roof, shook his head with a faint +smile. The other magistrates looked doubtfully at me, but made no +comment, and my words seemed to be wasted on the silence. The +president consulted his document again, and continued: "You are also +charged with having by force of arms, in time of peace, seized a gate +of this town, and maintained it, and declined to surrender it when +called upon so to do. What do you say to that?" + +"It is true in part," I answered firmly. "I seized not the gate, but +part of the tower, in order to preserve my life and to protect certain +ladies traveling with me from the violence of a crowd which, under a +misapprehension, was threatening to do us a mischief." + +The priest again shook his head, and smiled faintly at the carved +roof. His colleagues were perhaps somewhat moved in my favor, for a +few words passed between them. However, in the end they shook their +heads, and the president mechanically asked me if I had anything +further to say. + +"Nothing!" I replied bitterly. The ecclesiastic's cynical +heedlessness, his air of one whose mind is made up, seemed so cruel to +me whose life was at stake, that I lost patience. "Except what I have +said," I continued--"that for the wounding, it was done in error; and +for the gate-seizing, I would do it again to save the lives of those +with me. Only that and this: that I am a foreigner ignorant of your +language and customs, desiring only to pass peacefully through your +country." + +"That is all?" the president asked impassively. + +"All," I answered, yet with a strange tightening at my throat. Was it +all? All I could say for my life? + +I was waiting, sore and angry and desperate, to hear the sentence, +when there came an interruption. Master Lindstrom, whose presence at +my side I had forgotten, broke suddenly into a torrent of impassioned +words, and his urgent voice, ringing through the court, seemed in a +moment to change its aspect--to infuse into it some degree of life and +sympathy. More than one guttural exclamation, which seemed to mark +approval, burst from the throng at the back of the hall. In another +moment, indeed, the Dutchman's courage might have saved me. But there +was one who marked the danger. The Sub-dean, who had at first only +glowered at the speaker in rude astonishment, now cut him short with a +harsh question. + +"One moment, Master Dutchman!" he cried. "Are you one of the heretics +who call themselves Protestants?" + +"I am. But I understand that there is here liberty of conscience," our +friend answered manfully, nothing daunted in his fervor at finding the +attack turned upon himself. + +"That depends upon the conscience," the priest answered with a scowl. +"We will have no Anabaptists here, nor foreign praters to bring us +into feud with our neighbors. It is enough that such men as you are +allowed to live. We will not be bearded by you, so take warning! Take +heed, I say, Master Dutchman, and be silent!" he repeated, leaning +forward and clapping his hand upon the table. + +I touched Master Lindstrom's sleeve--who would of himself have +persisted--and stayed him. "It is of no use," I muttered. "That dog in +a crochet has condemned me. He will have his way!" + +There was a short debate between the three judges, while in the court +you might have heard a pin drop. Master Lindstrom had fallen back once +more. I was alone again, and the stained window seemed to be putting +forth its mystic influence to enfold me, when, looking up, I saw a +tiny shadow flit across the soft many-hued rays which streamed from it +athwart the roof. It passed again, once, twice, thrice. I peered +upward intently. It was a swallow flying to and fro amid the carved +work. + +Yes, a swallow. And straightway I forgot the judges; forgot the crowd. +The scene vanished and I was at Coton End again, giving Martin Luther +the nest for Petronilla--a sign, as I meant it then, that I should +return. I should never return now. Yet my heart was on a sudden so +softened that, instead of this reflection giving me pain, as one would +have expected, it only filled me with a great anxiety to provide for +the event. She must not wait and watch for me day after day, perhaps +year after year. I must see to it somehow; and I was thinking with +such intentness of this, that it was only vaguely I heard the sentence +pronounced. It might have been some other person who was to be +beheaded at the east gate an hour before noon. And so God save the +Duke! + + + + + CHAPTER XVI. + + IN THE DUKE'S NAME. + + +They took me back to the room in the tower, it being now nearly ten +o'clock. Master Lindstrom would fain have stayed with me constantly to +the end, but having the matter I have mentioned much in my mind, I +begged him to go and get me writing materials. When he returned Van +Tree was with him. With a particularity very curious at that moment, I +remarked that the latter was carrying something. + +"Where did you get that?" I said sharply and at once. + +"It is your haversack," he answered, setting it down quietly. "I found +the man who had taken possession of your horse, and got it from him. I +thought there might be something in it you might like." + +"It is my haversack," I assented. "But it was not on my horse. I have +not seen it since I left it in Master Lindstrom's house by the river. +I left it on the pallet in my room there, and it was forgotten. I +searched for it at Emmerich, you remember." + +"I only know," he replied, "that I discovered it behind the saddle of +the horse you were riding yesterday." + +He thought that I had become confused and was a little wrong-headed +from excitement. Master Lindstrom also felt troubled, as he told me +afterward, at seeing me taken up with a trifle at such a time. + +But there was nothing wrong with my wits, as I promptly showed them. + +"The horse I was riding yesterday?" I continued. "Ah! then, I +understand. I was riding the horse which I took from the Spanish +trooper. The Spaniard must have annexed the haversack when he and his +companions searched the house after our departure." + +"That is it, no doubt," Master Lindstrom said. "And in the hurry of +yesterday's ride you failed to notice it." + +It was a strange way of recovering one's property--strange that the +enemy should have helped one to it. But there are times--and this to +me was one--when the strange seems the ordinary and commonplace. I +took the sack and slipped my hand through a well-known slit in the +lining. Yes, the letter I had left there was there still--the letter +to Mistress Clarence. I drew it out. The corners of the little packet +were frayed, and the parchment was stained and discolored, no doubt by +the damp which had penetrated to it. But the seal was whole. I placed +it, as it was, in Master Lindstrom's hands. + +"Give it," I said, "to the Duchess afterward. It concerns her. You +have heard us talk about it. Bid her make what use she pleases of it." + +I turned away then and sat down, feeling a little flurried and +excited, as one about to start upon a journey might feel; not afraid +nor exceedingly depressed, but braced up to make a brave show and hide +what sadness I did feel by the knowledge that many eyes were upon me, +and that more would be watching me presently. At the far end of the +room a number of people had now gathered, and were conversing +together. Among them were not only my jailers of the night, but two or +three officers, a priest who had come to offer me his services, and +some inquisitive gazers who had obtained admission. Their curiosity, +however, did not distress me. On the contrary, I was glad to hear the +stir and murmur of life about me to the last. + +I will not set down the letter I wrote to the Duchess, though it were +easy for me to do so, seeing that her son has it now. It contains some +things very proper to be said by a dying man, of which I am not +ashamed--God forbid! but which it would not be meet for me to repeat +here. Enough that I told her in a few words who I was, and entreated +her, in the name of whatever services I had rendered her, to let +Petronilla and Sir Anthony know how I had died. And I added something +which would, I thought, comfort her and her husband--namely, that I +was not afraid, or in any suffering of mind or body. + +The writing of this shook my composure a little. But as I laid down +the pen and looked up and found that the time was come, I took courage +in a marvelous manner. The captain of the guard--I think that out of a +compassionate desire not to interrupt me they had allowed me some +minutes of grace--came to me, leaving the group at the other end, and +told me gravely that I was waited for. I rose at once and gave the +letter to Master Lindstrom with some messages in which Dymphna and +Anne were not forgotten. And then, with a smile--for I felt under all +those eyes as if I were going into battle--I said: "Gentlemen, I am +ready if you are. It is a fine day to die. You know," I added gayly, +"in England we have a proverb, 'The better the day, the better the +deed!' So it is well to have a good day to have a good death, Sir +Captain." + +"A soldier's death, sir, is a good death;" he answered gravely, +speaking in Spanish and bowing. + +Then he pointed to the door. + +As I walked toward it, I paused momentarily by the window, and looked +out on the crowd below. It filled the sunlit street--save where a +little raised platform strewn with rushes protruded itself--with heads +from wall to wall, with faces all turned one way--toward me. It was a +silent crowd standing in hushed awe and expectation, the consciousness +of which for an instant sent a sudden chill to my heart, blanching my +cheek, and making my blood run slow for a moment. The next I moved on +to the door, and bowing to the spectators as they stood aside, began +to descend the narrow staircase. + +There were guards going down before me, and behind me were Master +Lindstrom and more guards. The Dutchman reached forward in the gloom, +and clasped my hand, holding it, as we went down, in a firm, strong +grip. + +"Never fear," I said to him cheerily, looking back. "It is all right." + +He answered in words which I will not write here; not wishing, as I +have said, to make certain things common. + +I suppose the doorway at the bottom was accidentally blocked, for a +few steps short of it we came to a standstill; and almost at the same +moment I started, despite myself, on hearing a sudden clamor and a +roar of many voices outside. + +"What is it?" I asked the Dutchman. + +"It is the Duke of Cleves arriving, I expect," he whispered. "He comes +in by the other gate." + + +A moment later we moved on and passed out into the light, the soldiers +before me stepping on either side to give me place. The sunshine for +an instant dazzled me, and I lowered my eyes. As I gradually raised +them again I saw before me a short lane formed by two rows of +spectators kept back by guards; and at the end of this, two or three +rough wooden steps leading to a platform on which were standing a +number of people. And above and beyond all only the bright blue sky, +the roofs and gables of the nearer houses showing dark against it. + +I advanced steadily along the path left for me, and would have +ascended the steps. But at the foot of them I came to a standstill, +and looked round for guidance. The persons on the scaffold all had +their backs turned to me, and did not make way, while the shouting and +uproar hindered them from hearing that we had come out. Then it struck +me, seeing that the people at the windows were also gazing away, and +taking no heed of me, that the Duke was passing the farther end of the +street, and a sharp pang of angry pain shot through me. I had come out +to die, but that which was all to me was so little to these people +that they turned away to see a fellow-mortal ride by! + +Presently, as we stood there, in a pit, as it were, getting no view, I +felt Master Lindstrom's hand, which still clasped mine, begin to +shake; and turning to him, I found that his face had changed to a deep +red, and that his eyes were protruding with a kind of convulsive +eagerness which instantly infected me. + +"What is it?" I stammered. I began to tremble also. The air rang, it +seemed to me, with one word, which a thousand tongues took up and +reiterated. But it was a German word, and I did not understand it. + +"Wait! wait!" Master Lindstrom exclaimed. "Pray God it be true!" + +He seized my other hand and held it as though he would protect me from +something. At the same moment Van Tree pushed past me, and, bounding +up the steps, thrust his way through the officials on the scaffold, +causing more than one fur-robed citizen near the edge to lose his +balance and come down as best he could on the shoulders of the guards. + +"What is it?" I cried. "What is it?" I cried in impatient wonder. + +"Oh! my lad, my lad!" Master Lindstrom answered, his face close to +mine, and the tears running down his cheeks. "It is cruel if it be not +true! Cruel! They cry a pardon!" + +"A pardon?" I echoed. + +"Ay, lad, a pardon. But it may not be true," he said, putting his arm +about my shoulder. "Do not make too sure of it. It is only the mob cry +it out." + +My heart made a great bound, and seemed to stand still. There was a +loud surging in my brain, and a mist rose before my eyes and hid +everything. The clamor and shouting of the street passed away, and +sounded vague and distant. The next instant, it is true, I was myself +again, but my knees were trembling under me, and I stood flaccid and +unnerved, leaning on my friend. + +"Well?" I said faintly. + +"Patience! patience a while, lad!" he answered. + +But, thank Heaven! I had not long to wait. The words were scarcely off +his tongue, when another hand sought mine and shook it wildly; and I +saw Van Tree before me, his face radiant with joy, while a man whom he +had knocked down in his hasty leap from the scaffold was rising beside +me with a good-natured smile. As if at a signal, every face now turned +toward me. A dozen friendly hands passed me up the steps amid a fresh +outburst of cheering. The throng on the scaffold opened somehow, and I +found myself in a second, as it seemed, face to face with the +president of the court. He smiled on me gravely and kindly--what +smiles there seemed to be on all those faces--and held out a paper. + +"In the name of the Duke!" he said, speaking in Spanish, in a clear, +loud voice. "A pardon!" + +I muttered something, I know not what; nor did it matter, for it was +lost in a burst of cheering. When this was over and silence obtained, +the magistrate continued, "You are required, however, to attend the +Duke at the courthouse. Whither we had better proceed at once." + +"I am ready, sir," I muttered. + + +A road was made for us to descend, and, walking in a kind of beautiful +dream, I passed slowly up the street by the side of the magistrate, +the crowd everywhere willingly standing aside for us. I do not know +whether all those thousands of faces really looked joyfully and kindly +on me as I passed, or whether the deep thankfulness which choked me, +and brought the tears continually to my eyes, transfigured them and +gave them a generous charm not their own. But this I do know: that the +sunshine seemed brighter and the air softer than ever before; that the +clouds trailing across the blue expanse were things of beauty such as +I had never met before; that to draw breath was a joy, and to move, +delight; and that only when the dark valley was left behind did I +comprehend its full gloom--by Heaven's mercy. So may it be with all! + +At the door of the court-house, whither numbers of the people had +already run, the press was so great that we came to a standstill, and +were much buffeted about, though in all good humor, before, even with +the aid of the soldiers, we could be got through the throng. When I at +last emerged I found myself again before the table, and saw--but only +dimly, for the light now fell through the stained window directly on +my head--a commanding figure standing behind it. Then a strange thing +happened. A woman passed swiftly round the table, and came to me and +flung her arms round my neck and kissed me. It was the Duchess, and +for a moment she hung upon me, weeping before them all. + +"Madam," I said softly, "then it is you who have done this!" + +"Ah!" she exclaimed, holding me off from her and looking at me with +eyes which glowed through her tears, "and it was you who did that!" + +She drew back from me then, and took me by the hand, and turned +impetuously to the Duke of Cleves, who stood behind smiling at her in +frank amusement. "This," she said, "is the man who gave his life for +my husband, and to whom your highness has given it back." + +"Let him tell his tale," the Duke answered gravely. "And do you, my +cousin, sit here beside me." + +She left me and walked round the table, and he came forward and placed +her in his own chair amid a great hush of wonder, for she was still +meanly clad, and showed in a hundred places the marks and stains of +travel. Then he stood by her with his hand on the back of the seat. He +was a tall, burly man, with bold, quick-glancing eyes, a flushed face, +and a loud manner; a fierce, blusterous prince, as I have heard. He +was plainly dressed in a leather hunting-suit, and wore huge gauntlets +and brown boots, with a broad-leaved hat pinned up on one side. Yet he +looked a prince. + +Somehow I stammered out the tale of the surrender. + +"But why? why? why, man?" he asked, when I had finished; "why did you +let them think it was you who wounded the burgher, if it was not?" + +"Your highness," I answered, "I had received nothing but good from her +grace, I had eaten her bread and been received into her service. +Besides, it was through my persuasion that we came by the road which +led to this misfortune instead of by another way. Therefore it seemed +to me right that I should suffer, who stood alone and could be +spared--and not her husband." + +"It was a great deed!" cried the prince loudly. "I would I had such a +servant. Are you noble, lad?" + +I colored high, but not in pain or mortification. The old wound might +reopen, but amid events such as those of this morning it was a slight +matter. "I come of a noble family, may it please your highness," I +answered modestly; "but circumstances prevent me claiming kinship with +it." + +He was about, I think, to question me further, when the Duchess looked +up, and said something to him and he something to her. She spoke again +and he answered. Then he nodded assent. "You would fain stand on your +own feet?" he cried to me. "Is that so?" + +"It is, sire," I answered. + +"Then so be it!" he replied loudly, looking round on the throng with a +frown. "I will ennoble you. You would have died for your lord and +friend, and therefore I give you a rood of land in the common +graveyard of Santon to hold of me, and I name you Von Santonkirch. And +I, William, Duke of Cleves, Julich and Guelders, prince of the Empire, +declare you noble, and give you for your arms three swords of justice; +and the motto you may buy of a clerk! Further, let this decree be +enrolled in my Chancery. Are you satisfied?" + + +As I dropped on my knees, my eyes sparkling, there was a momentary +disturbance behind me. It was caused by the abrupt entrance of the +Sub-dean. He took in part of the situation at a glance; that is, he +saw me kneeling before the Duke. But he could not see the Duchess of +Suffolk, the Duke's figure being interposed. As he came forward, the +crowd making way for him, he cast an angry glance at me, and scarcely +smoothed his brow even to address the prince. "I am glad that your +highness has not done what was reported to me," he said hastily, his +obeisance brief and perfunctory. "I heard an uproar in the town, and +was told that this man was pardoned." + +"It is so!" said the Duke curtly, eying the ecclesiastic with no great +favor. "He is pardoned." + +"Only in part, I presume," the priest rejoined urgently. "Or, if +otherwise, I am sure that your highness has not received certain +information with which I can furnish you." + +"Furnish away, sir," quoth the Duke, yawning. + +"I have had letters from my Lord Bishop of Arras respecting him." + +"Respecting him!" exclaimed the prince, starting and bending his brows +in surprise. + +"Respecting those in whose company he travels," the priest answered +hastily. "They are represented to me as dangerous persons, pestilent +refugees from England, and obnoxious alike to the Emperor, the Prince +of Spain, and the Queen of England." + +"I wonder you do not add also to the King of France and the Soldan of +Turkey!" growled the Duke. "Pish! I am not going to be dictated to by +Master Granvelle--no, nor by his master, be he ten times Emperor! Go +to! Go to! Master Sub-dean! You forget yourself, and so does your +master the Bishop. I will have you know that these people are not what +you think them. Call you my cousin, the widow of the consort of the +late Queen of France, an obnoxious person? Fie! Fie! You forget +yourself!" + +He moved as he stopped speaking, so that the astonished churchman +found himself confronted on a sudden by the smiling, defiant Duchess. +The Sub-dean started and his face fell, for, seeing her seated in the +Duke's presence, he discerned at once that the game was played out. +Yet he rallied himself, bethinking him, I fancy, that there were many +spectators. He made a last effort. "The Bishop of Arras----" he began. + +"Pish!" scoffed the Duke, interrupting him. + +"The Bishop of Arras----" the priest repeated firmly. + +"I would he were hung with his own tapestry!" retorted the Duke, with +a brutal laugh. + +"Heaven forbid!" replied the ecclesiastic, his pale face reddening and +his eyes darting baleful glances at me. But he took the hint, and +henceforth said no more of the Bishop. Instead, he continued smoothly, +"Your highness has, of course, considered the danger--the danger, I +mean, of provoking neighbors so powerful by shielding this lady and +making her cause your own. You will remember, sir----" + +"I will remember Innspruck!" roared the Duke, in a rage, "where the +Emperor, ay, and your everlasting Bishop too, fled before a handful of +Protestants, like sheep before wolves. A fig for your Emperor! I never +feared him young, and I fear him less now that he is old and decrepit +and, as men say, mad. Let him get to his watches, and you to your +prayers. If there were not this table between us, I would pull your +ears, Master Churchman!" + + * * * * * + +"But tell me," I asked Master Bertie as I stood beside his couch an +hour later, "how did the Duchess manage it? I gathered from something +you or she said, a short time back, that you had no influence with the +Duke of Cleves." + +"Not quite that," he answered. "My wife and the late Duke of Suffolk +had much to do with wedding the Prince's sister to King Henry, +thirteen--fourteen years back, is it? And so far we might have felt +confident of his protection. But the marriage turned out ill, or +turned out short, and Queen Anne of Cleves was divorced. And--well, we +felt a little less confident on that account, particularly as he has +the name of a headstrong, passionate man." + +"Heaven keep him in it!" I said, smiling. "But you have not told me +yet what happened." + +"The Duchess was still asleep this morning, fairly worn out, as you +may suppose, when a great noise awoke her. She got up and went to +Dymphna, and learned it was the Duke's trumpets. Then she went to the +window, and, seeing few people in the streets to welcome him, inquired +why this was. Dymphna broke down at that, and told her what was +happening to you, and that you were to die at that very hour. She went +out straightway, without covering her head,--you know how impetuous +she is,--and flung herself on her knees in the mud before the Duke's +horse as he entered. He knew her, and the rest you can guess." + +Can guess? Ah, what happiness it was! Outside, the sun fell hotly on +the steep red roofs, with their rows of casements, and on the sleepy +square, in which knots of people still lingered, talking of the +morning's events. I could see below me the guard which Duke William, +shrewdly mistrusting the Sub-dean, had posted in front of the house, +nominally to do the Duchess honor. I could hear in the next room the +cheerful voices of my friends. What happiness it was to live! What +happiness to be loved! How very, very good and beautiful and glorious +a world, seemed the world to me on that old May morning in that quaint +German town which we had entered so oddly! + +As I turned from the window full of thankfulness, my eyes met those of +Mistress Anne, who was sitting on the far side of the sick man's +couch, the baby in a cradle beside her. The risk and exposure of the +last week had made a deeper mark upon her than upon any of us. She was +paler, graver, older, more of a woman and less, much less, of a girl. +And she looked very ill. Her eyes, in particular, seemed to have grown +larger, and as they dwelt on me now there was a strange and solemn +light in them, under which I grew uneasy. + +"You have been wonderfully preserved," she said presently, speaking +dreamily, and as much to herself as to me. + +"I have, indeed," I answered, thinking she referred only to my escape +of the morning. + +But she did not. + +"There was, firstly, the time on the river when you were hurt with the +oar," she continued, gazing absently at me, her hands in her lap; "and +then the night when you saw Clarence with Dymphna." + +"Or, rather, saw him without her," I interposed, smiling. It was +strange that she should mention it as a fact, when at the time she had +so scolded me for making the statement. + +"And then," she continued, disregarding my interruption, "there was +the time when you were stabbed in the passage; and again when you had +the skirmish by the river; and then to-day you were within a minute of +death. You have been wonderfully preserved!" + +"I have," I assented thoughtfully. "The more as I suspect that I have +to thank Master Clarence for all these little adventures." + +"Strange--very strange!" she muttered, removing her eyes from me that +she might fix them on the floor. + +"What is strange?" + + +The abrupt questioner was the Duchess, who came bustling in at the +moment. "What is strange?" she repeated, with a heightened color and +dancing eyes. "Shall I tell you?" She paused and looked brightly at +me, holding something concealed behind her. I guessed in a moment, +from the aspect of her face, what it was: the letter which I had given +to Master Lindstrom in the morning, and which, with a pardonable +forgetfulness, I had failed to reclaim. + +I turned very red. "It was not intended for you now," I said shyly. +For in the letter I had told her my story. + +"Pooh! pooh!" she cried. "It is just as I thought. A pretty piece of +folly! No," she continued, as I opened my mouth, "I am not going to +keep your secret, sir. You may go down on your knees. It will be of no +use. Richard, you remember Sir Anthony Cludde of Coton End in +Warwickshire?" + +"Oh, yes," her husband said, rising on his elbow, while his face lit +up, and I stood bashfully, shifting my feet. + +"I have danced with him a dozen times, years ago!" she continued, her +eyes sparkling with mischief. "Well, sir, this gentleman, Master +Francis Carey, otherwise Von Santonkirch, is Francis Cludde, his +nephew!" + +"Sir Anthony's nephew?" + +"Yes, and the son of Ferdinand Cludde, whom you also have heard of, of +whom the less----" + +She stopped, and turned quickly, interrupted by a half-stifled scream. +It was a scream full of sudden horror and amazement and fear; and it +came from Mistress Anne. The girl had risen, and was gazing at me with +distended eyes and blanched cheeks, and hands stretched out to keep me +off--gazing, indeed, as if she saw in me some awful portent or some +dreadful threat. She did not speak, but she began, without taking her +eyes from me, to retreat toward the door. + +"Hoity toity!" cried my lady, stamping her foot in anger. "What has +happened to the girl? What----" + +What, indeed? The Duchess stopped, still more astonished. For, without +uttering a word of explanation or apology, Mistress Anne had reached +the door, groped blindly for the latch, found it, and gone out, her +eyes, with the same haunted look of horror in them, fixed on me to the +last. + + + + + CHAPTER XVII. + + A LETTER THAT HAD MANY ESCAPES. + + +"Hoity, toity!" the Duchess cried again, looking from one to another +of us when Anne had disappeared. "What has come to the little fool? +Has she gone crazy?" + +I shook my head, too completely at sea even to hazard a conjecture. +Master Bertie shook his head also, keeping his eyes glued to the door, +as if he could not believe Anne had really gone. + +"I said nothing to frighten her!" my lady protested. + +"Nothing at all," I answered. For how should the announcement that my +real name was Cludde terrify Mistress Anne Brandon nearly out of her +senses? + +"Well, no," Master Bertie agreed, his thoughtful face more thoughtful +than usual; "so far as I heard, you said nothing. But I think, my +dear, that you had better follow her and learn what it is. She must be +ill." + +The Duchess sat down. "I will go by-and-by," she said coolly, at which +I was not much surprised, for I have always remarked that women have +less sympathy with other women's ailments, especially of the nerves, +than have men. + +"For the moment I want to scold this brave, silly boy here!" she +continued, looking so kindly at me that I blushed again, and forgot +all about Mistress Anne. "To think of him leaving his home to become a +wandering squire of dames merely because his father was a--well, not +quite what he would have liked him to be! I remember something about +him," she continued, pursing up her lips, and nodding her head at us. +"I fancied him dead, however, years ago. But there! if every one whose +father were not quite to his liking left home and went astraying, +Master Francis, all sensible folk would turn innkeepers, and make +their fortunes." + +"It was not only that which drove me from home," I explained. "The +Bishop of Winchester gave me clearly to understand----" + +"That Coton was not the place for you!" exclaimed my lady scornfully. +"He is a sort of connection of yours, is he not? Oh, I know. And he +thinks he has a kind of reversionary interest in the property! With +you and your father out of the way, and only your girl cousin left, +his interest is much more likely to come to hand. Do you see?" + +I recalled what Martin Luther had said about the cuckoo. But I have +since thought that probably they both wronged Stephen Gardiner in +this. He was not a man of petty mind, and his estate was equal to his +high place. I think it more likely that his motive in removing me from +Coton was chiefly the desire to use my services abroad, in conjunction +perhaps with some remoter and darker plan for eventually devoting the +Cludde property to the Church. Such an act of piety would have been +possible had Sir Anthony died leaving his daughter unmarried, and +would certainly have earned for the Chancellor Queen Mary's lasting +favor. I think it the more likely to have been in his mind because his +inability to persuade the gentry to such acts of restitution--King +Harry had much enriched us--was always a sore point with the Queen, +and more than once exposed him to her resentment. + +"The strangest thing of all," the Duchess continued with alacrity, +"seems to me to be this: that if he had not meddled with you, he would +not have had his plans in regard to us thwarted. If he had not driven +you from home, you would never have helped me to escape from London, +nor been with us to foil his agents." + +"A higher power than the Chancellor arranged that!" said Master Bertie +emphatically. + +"Well, at any rate, I am glad that you are you!" the Duchess answered, +rising gayly. "A Cludde? Why, one feels at home again. And yet," she +continued, her lips trembling suddenly, and her eyes filling with +tears as she looked at me, "there was never house raised yet on nobler +deed than yours." + +"Go! go! go!" cried her husband, seeing my embarrassment. "Go and look +to that foolish girl!" + +"I will! Yet stop!" cried my lady, pausing when she was half way +across the floor, and returning, "I was forgetting that I have another +letter to open. It is very odd that this letter was never opened +before," she continued, producing that which had lain in my haversack. +"It has had several narrow escapes. But this time I vow I will see +inside it. You give me leave?" + +"Oh, yes," I said, smiling. "I wash my hands of it. Whoever the +Mistress Clarence to whom it is addressed may be, it is enough that +her name is Clarence! We have suffered too much at his hands." + +"I open it, then!" my lady cried dramatically. I nodded. She took her +husband's dagger and cut the green silk which bound the packet, and +opened and read. + +Only a few words. Then she stopped, and looking off the paper, +shivered. "I do not understand this," she murmured. "What does it +mean?" + +"No good! I'll be sworn!" Master Bertie replied, gazing at her +eagerly. "Read it aloud, Katherine." + + +"'To Mistress A---- B----. I am advertised by my trusty agent, Master +Clarence, that he hath benefited much by your aid in the matter in +which I have employed him. Such service goeth always for much, and +never for naught, with me. In which belief confirm yourself. For the +present, working with him as heretofore, be secret, and on no account +let your true sentiments come to light. So you will be the more +valuable to me, even as it is more easy to unfasten a barred door from +within than from without.'" + + +Here the Duchess broke off abruptly, and turned on us a face full of +wonder. "What does it mean?" she asked. + +"Is that all?" her husband said. + +"Not quite," she answered, returning to it, and reading: + +"'Those whom you have hitherto served have too long made a mockery of +sacred things, but their cup is full and the business of seeing that +they drink it lieth with me, who am not wont to be slothful in these +matters. Be faithful and secret. Good speed and fare you well.--Ste. +Winton." + +"One thing is quite clear!" said Master Bertie slowly. "That you and I +are the persons whose cup is full. You remember how you once dressed +up a dog in a rochet, and dandled it before Gardiner? And it is our +matter in which Clarence is employed. Then who is it who has been +cooperating with him, and whose aid is of so much value to him?" + +"'Even as it is easier,'" I muttered thoughtfully, "'to unfasten a +barred door from within than from without." What was it of which that +strange sentence reminded me? Ha! I had it. Of the night on which we +had fled from Master Lindstrom's house, when Mistress Anne had been +seized with that odd fit of perverseness, and had almost opened the +door looking upon the river in spite of all I could say or do. It was +of that the sentence reminded me. "To whom is it addressed?" I asked +abruptly. + +"To Mistress Clarence," my lady answered. + +"No; inside, I mean." + +"Oh! to Mistress A---- B----. But that gives us no clew," she added. +"It is a disguise. You see they are the two first letters of the +alphabet." + +So they were. And the initial letters of Anne Brandon! I wondered that +the Duchess did not see it, that she did not at once turn her +suspicions toward the right quarter. But she was, for a woman, +singularly truthful and confiding. And she saw nothing. + +I looked at Master Bertie. He seemed puzzled, discerning, I fancy, +how strangely the allusions pointed to Mistress Anne, but not daring +at once to draw the inference. She was his wife's kinswoman by +marriage--albeit a distant one--and much indebted to her. She had been +almost as his own sister. She was young and fair, and to associate +treachery and ingratitude such as this with her seemed almost too +horrible. + +Then why was I so clear sighted as to read the riddle? Why was I the +first to see the truth? Because I had felt for days a vague and +ill-defined distrust of the girl. I had seen more of her odd fits and +caprices than had the others. Looking back now I could find a +confirmation of my idea in a dozen things which had befallen us. I +remembered how ill and stricken she had looked on the day when I had +first brought out the letter, and how strangely she had talked to me +about it. I remembered Clarence's interview with, not Dymphna,--as I +had then thought,--but, as I now guessed, Anne, wearing her cloak. I +recalled the manner in which she had used me to persuade Master Bertie +to take the Wesel instead of the Santon road; no doubt she had told +Clarence to follow in that direction, if by any chance we escaped +him on the island. And her despair when she heard in the church porch +that I had killed Clarence at the ford! And her utter abandonment to +fear--poor guilty thing!--when she thought that all her devices had +only led her with us to a dreadful death! These things, in the light +in which I now viewed them, were cogent evidences against her. + +"It must have been written to some one about us!" said the Duchess at +length. "To some one in our confidence. 'On our side of the door,' as +he calls it." + +"Yes, that is certain," I said. + +"And on the wrapper he styles her Mistress Clarence. Now who----" + +"Who could it have been? That is the question we have to answer," +Master Bertie replied dryly. Hearing his voice, I knew he had come at +last to the same conclusion to which I had jumped. "I think you may +dismiss the servants from the inquiry," he continued. "The Bishop of +Winchester would scarcely write to them in that style." + +"Dismiss the servants? Then who is left?" she protested. + +"I think----" He lost courage, hesitated, and broke off. She looked at +him wonderingly. He turned to me, and, gaining confirmation from my +nod, began again. "I think I should ask A---- B----," he said. + +"A---- B----?" she cried, still not seeing one whit. + +"Yes. Anne Brandon," he answered sternly. + +She repeated his words softly and stood a moment gazing at him. In +that moment she saw it all. She sat down suddenly on the chair beside +her and shuddered violently, as if she had laid her hand unwittingly +upon a snake. "Oh, Richard," she whispered, "it is too horrible!" + +"I fear it is too true," he answered gloomily. + +I shrank from looking at them, from meeting her eyes or his. I felt as +if this shame had come upon us all. The thought that the culprit might +walk into the room at any moment filled me with terror. I turned away +and looked through the window, leaving the husband and wife together. + +"Is it only the name you are thinking of?" she muttered. + +"No," he answered. "Before I left England to go to Calais I saw +something pass between them--between her and Clarence--which, +surprised me. Only in the confusion of those last days it slipped from +my memory for the time." + +"I see," she said quietly. "The villain!" + + +Looking back on the events of the last week, I found many things made +plain by the lurid light now cast upon them. I understood how Master +Lindstrom's vase had come to be broken when we were discussing the +letter, which in my hands must have been a perpetual terror to the +girl. I discerned that she had purposely sown dissension between +myself and Van Tree, and recalled how she had striven to persuade us +not to leave the island; then, how she had induced us to take that +unlucky road; finally, how on the road her horse had lagged and lagged +behind, detaining us all when every minute was precious. The things +all dovetailed into one another; each by itself was weak, but together +they formed a strong scaffold--a scaffold strong enough for the +hanging of a man, if she had been a man! The others appealed to me, +the Duchess feverishly anxious to be assured one way or the other. The +very suspicion of the existence of such treachery at her side seemed +to stifle her. Still looking out of the window I detailed the proofs I +have mentioned, not gladly, Heaven knows, or in any spirit of revenge. +But my duty was rather to my companions who had been true to me, than +to her. I told them the truth as far as I knew it. The whole wretched, +miserable truth was only to become known to me later. + + +"I will go to her," the Duchess said presently, rising from her seat. + +"My dear!" her husband cried. He stretched out his hand, and grasping +her skirt detained her. "You will not----" + +"Do not be afraid!" she replied sadly, as she stooped over him and +kissed his forehead. "It is a thing past scolding, Richard; past love +and even hope, and all but past pity. I will be merciful as we hope +for mercy, but she can never be friend of ours again, and some one +must tell her. I will do so and return. As for that man!" she +continued, obscuring suddenly the fair and noble side of her character +which she had just exhibited, and which I confess had surprised me, +for I had not thought her capable of a generosity so uncommon; "as for +that man," she repeated, drawing herself up to her full height, while +her eyes sparkled and her cheek grew red, "who has turned her into a +vile schemer and a shameless hypocrite, as he would fain have turned +better women, I will show him no mercy nor grace if I ever have him +under my feet. I will crush him as I would an adder, though I be +crushed next moment myself!" + +She was sweeping with that word from the room, and had nearly reached +the door before I found my voice. Then I called out "Stay!" just in +time. "You will do no good, madam, by going!" I said, rising. "You +will not find her. She is gone." + +"Gone?" + +"Yes," I said quietly. "She left the house twenty minutes ago. I saw +her cross the market-place, wearing her cloak and carrying a bag. I do +not think she will return." + +"Not return? But whither has she gone?" they both cried at once. + +I shook my head. + +"I can only guess," I said in a low voice. "I saw no more than I have +told you." + +"But why did you not tell me'" the Duchess cried reproachfully. "She +shall be brought back." + +"It would be useless," Master Bertie answered. "Yet I doubt if it be +as Carey thinks. Why should she go just at this time? She does not +know that she is found out. She does not know that this letter has +been recovered. Not a word, mind, was said of it before she left the +room." + +"No," I allowed; "that is true." + +I was puzzled on this point myself, now I came to consider it. I could +not see why she had taken the alarm so opportunely; but I maintained +my opinion nevertheless. + +"Something frightened her," I said; "though it may not have been the +letter." + +"Yes," said the Duchess, after a moment's silence. "I suppose you are +right. I suppose something frightened her, as you say. I wonder what +it was, poor wretch!" + + +It turned out that I was right. Mistress Anne had gone indeed, having +stayed, so far as we could learn from an examination of the room which +she had shared with Dymphna, merely to put together the few things +which our adventures had left her. She had gone out from among us in +this foreign land without a word of farewell, without a good wish +given or received, without a soul to say God speed! The thought made +me tremble. If she had died it would have been different. Now, to feel +sorrow for her as for one who had been with us in heart as well as in +body, seemed a mockery. How could we grieve for one who had moved day +by day and hour by hour among us, only that with each hour and day she +might plot and scheme and plan our destruction? It was impossible! + +We made inquiries indeed, but without result; and so, abruptly and +terribly she passed--for the time--out of our knowledge, though often +afterward I recalled sadly the weary, hunted look which I had +sometimes seen in her eyes when she sat listless and dreamy. Poor +girl! Her own acts had placed her, as the Duchess said, beyond love or +hope, but not beyond pity. + +So it is in life. The day which sees one's trial end sees another's +begin. We--the Duchess and her child, Master Bertie and I--stayed with +our good and faithful friends the Lindstroms a while, resting and +recruiting our strength; and during this interval, at the pressing +instance of the Duchess, I wrote letters to Sir Anthony and +Petronilla, stating that I was abroad, and was well, and looked +presently to return; but not disclosing my refuge or the names of my +companions. At the end of five days, Master Bertie being fairly strong +again and Santon being considered unsafe for us as a permanent +residence, we went under guard to Wesel, where we were received as +people of quality, and lodged, there being no fitting place, in the +disused church of St. Willibrod. Here the child was christened +Peregrine--a wanderer; the governor of the city and I being +godfathers. And here we lived in peace--albeit with hearts that +yearned for home--for some months. + +During this time two pieces of news came to us from England: one, that +the Parliament, though much pressed to it, had refused to acquiesce in +the confiscation of the Duchess's estates; the other, that our joint +persecutor, the great Bishop of Winchester, was dead. This last we at +first disbelieved. It was true, nevertheless. Stephen Gardiner, whose +vast schemes had enmeshed people so far apart in station, and indeed +in all else, as the Duchess and myself, was dead at last; had died +toward the end of 1555, at the height of his power, with England at +his feet, and gone to his Maker. I have known many worse men. + +We trusted that this might open the way for our return, but we found +on the contrary that fresh clouds were rising. The persecution of the +Reformers, which Queen Mary had begun in England, was carried on with +increasing rigor, and her husband, who was now King of Spain and +master of the Netherlands, freed from the prudent checks of his +father, was inclined to pleasure her in this by giving what aid he +could abroad. His Minister in the Netherlands, the Bishop of Arras, +brought so much pressure to bear upon our protector to induce him to +give us up, that it was plain the Duke of Cleves must sooner or later +comply. We thought it better, therefore, to remove ourselves, and +presently did so, going to the town of Winnheim in the Rhine +Palatinate. + +We found ourselves not much more secure here, however, and all our +efforts to discover a safe road into France failing, and the stock of +money which the Duchess had provided beginning to give out, we were in +great straits whither to go or what to do. + +At this time of our need, however, Providence opened a door in a +quarter where we least looked for it. Letters came from Sigismund, the +King of Poland, and from the Palatine of Wilna in that country, +inviting the Duchess and Master Bertie to take up their residence +there, and offering the latter an establishment and honorable +employment. The overture was unlooked for, and was not accepted +without misgivings, Wilna being so far distant, and there being none +of our race in that country. However, assurance of the Polish King's +good faith reached us--I say us, for in all their plans I was +included--through John Alasco, a nobleman who had visited England. And +in due time we started on this prodigious journey, and came safely to +Wilna, where our reception was such as the letters had led us to +expect. + + +I do not propose to set down here our adventures, though they were +many, in that strange country of frozen marshes and endless plains, +but to pass over eighteen months which I spent not without profit to +myself in the Pole's service, seeing something of war in his +Lithuanian campaigns, and learning much of men and the world, which +here, to say nothing of wolves and bears, bore certain aspects not +commonly visible in Warwickshire. I pass on to the early autumn of +1558, when a letter from the Duchess, who was at Wilna, was brought to +me at Cracovy. It was to this effect: + +"Dear Friend: Send you good speed! Word has come to us here of an +enterprise Englandward, which promises, if it be truly reported to us, +to so alter things at home that there may be room for us at our own +firesides. Heaven so further it, both for our happiness and the good +of the religion. Master Bertie has embarked on it, and I have taken +upon myself to answer for your aid and counsel, which have never been +wanting to us. Wherefore, dear friend, come, sparing neither horse nor +spurs, nor anything which may bring you sooner to Wilna, and your +assured and loving friend, Katherine Suffolk." + + +In five days after receiving this I was at Wilna, and two months later +I saw England again, after an absence of three years. Early in +November, 1558, Master Bertie and I landed at Lowestoft, having made +the passage from Hamburg in a trading vessel of that place. We stopped +only to sleep one night, and then, dressed as traveling merchants, we +set out on the road to London, entering the city without accident or +hindrance on the third day after landing. + + + + + CHAPTER XVIII. + + THE WITCH'S WARNING. + + +"One minute!" I said. "That is the place." + +Master Bertie turned in his saddle, and looked at it. The light was +fading into the early dusk of a November evening, but the main +features of four cross streets, the angle between two of them filled +by the tall belfry of a church, were still to be made out. The east +wind had driven loiterers indoors, and there was scarcely any one +abroad to notice us. I pointed to a dead wall ten paces down one +street. "Opposite that they stopped," I said. "There was a pile of +boards leaning against it then." + +"You have had many a worse bedchamber since, lad," he said, smiling. + +"Many," I answered. And then by a common impulse we shook up the +horses, and trotting gently on were soon clear of London and making +for Islington. Passing through the latter we began to breast the steep +slope which leads to Highgate, and coming, when we had reached the +summit, plump upon the lights of the village, pulled up in front of a +building which loomed darkly across the road. + +"This is the Gatehouse Tavern," Master Bertie said in a low voice. "We +shall soon know whether we have come on a fool's errand--or worse!" + +We rode under the archway into a great courtyard, from which the road +issued again on the other side through another gate. In one corner two +men were littering down a line of packhorses by the light of the +lanterns, which brought their tanned and rugged faces into relief. In +another, where the light poured ruddily from an open doorway, an +ostler was serving out fodder, and doing so, if we might judge from +the travelers' remonstrances, with a niggardly hand. From the windows +of the house a dozen rays of light shot athwart the darkness, and +disclosed as many pigs wallowing asleep in the middle of the yard. In +all we saw a coarse comfort and welcome. Master Bertie led the way +across the yard, and accosted the ostler. "Can we have stalls and +beds?" he asked. + +The man stayed his chaffering, and looked up at us. "Every man to his +business," he replied gruffly. "Stalls, yes; but of beds I know +nothing. For women's work go to the women." + +"Right!" said I, "so we will. With better luck than you would go, I +expect, my man!" + +Bursting into a hoarse laugh at this--he was lame and one-eyed and not +very well-favored--he led us into a long, many-stalled stable, feebly +lit by lanterns which here and there glimmered against the walls. +"Suit yourselves," he said; "first come is first served here." + +He seemed an ill-conditioned fellow, but the businesslike way in which +we went about our work, watering, feeding, and littering down in old +campaigners' fashion, drew from him a grunt of commendation. "Have you +come from far, masters?" he asked. + +"No, from London," I answered curtly. "We come as linen-drapers from +Westcheap, if you want to know." + +"Ay, I see that," he said chuckling. "Never were atop of a horse +before nor handled anything but a clothyard; oh, no!" + +"We want a merchant reputed to sell French lace," I continued, looking +hard at him. "Do you happen to know if there is a dealer here with +any?" + +He nodded rather to himself than to me, as if he had expected the +question. Then in the same tone, but with a quick glance of +intelligence, he answered, "I will show you into the house presently, +and you can see for yourselves. A stable is no place for French lace." +He pointed with a wink over his shoulder toward a stall in which a +man, apparently drunk, lay snoring. "That is a fine toy!" he ran on +carelessly, as I removed my dagger from the holster and concealed it +under my cloak--"a fine plaything--for a linen draper!" + +"Peace, peace, man! and show us in," said Master Bertie impatiently. + +With a shrug of his shoulders the man obeyed. Crossing the courtyard +behind him, we entered the great kitchen, which, full of light +and warmth and noise, presented just such a scene of comfort and +bustle, of loud talking, red-faced guests, and hurrying bare-armed +serving-maids, as I remembered lighting upon at St. Albans three years +back. But I had changed much since then, and seen much. The bailiff +himself would hardly have recognized his old antagonist in the tall, +heavily cloaked stranger, whose assured air, acquired amid wild +surroundings in a foreign land, gave him a look of age to which I +could not fairly lay claim. Master Bertie had assigned the lead to me +as being in less danger of recognition, and I followed the ostler +toward the hearth without hesitation. "Master Jenkin!" the man cried, +with the same rough bluntness he had shown without, "here are two +travelers want the lace-seller who was here to-day. Has he gone?" + +"Who gone?" retorted the host as loudly. + +"The lace merchant who came this morning." + +"No; he is in No. 32," returned the landlord. "Will you sup first, +gentlemen?" + +We declined, and followed the ostler, who made no secret of our +destination, telling those in our road to make way, as the gentlemen +were for No. 32. One of the crowd, however, who seemed to be crossing +from the lower end of the room, failed apparently to understand, and, +interposing between us and our guide, brought me perforce to a halt. + +"By your leave, good woman!" I said, and turned to pass round her. + +But she foiled me with unexpected nimbleness, and I could not push her +aside, she was so very old. Her gums were toothless and her forehead +was lined and wrinkled. About her eyes, which under hideous red lids +still shone with an evil gleam--a kind of reflection of a wicked +past--a thousand crows' feet had gathered. A few wisps of gray hair +struggled from under the handkerchief which covered her head. She was +humpbacked, and stooped over a stick, and whether she saw or not my +movement of repugnance, her voice was harsh when she spoke. + +"Young gentleman," she croaked, "let me tell your fortune by the +stars. A fortune for a groat, young gentleman!" she continued, peering +up into my face and frustrating my attempts to pass. + +"Here is a groat," I answered peevishly, "and for the fortune, I will +hear it another day. So let us by!" + +But she would not. My companion, seeing that the attention of the room +was being drawn to us, tried to pull me by her. But I could not use +force, and short of force there was no remedy. The ostler, indeed, +would have interfered on our behalf, and returned to bid her, with a +civility he had not bestowed on us, "give us passage." But she swiftly +turned her eyes on him in a sinister fashion, and he retreated with an +oath and a paling face, while those nearest to us--and half a dozen +had crowded round--drew back, and crossed themselves in haste almost +ludicrous. + +"Let me see your face, young gentleman," she persisted, with a hollow +cough. "My eyes are not so clear as they were, or it is not your cloak +and your flap-hat that would blind me." + +Thinking it best to get rid of her, even at a slight risk--and the +chance that among the travelers present there would be one able to +recognize me was small indeed--I uncovered. She shot a piercing glance +at my face, and looking down on the floor, traced hurriedly a figure +with her stick. She studied the phantom lines a moment, and then +looked up. + +"Listen!" she said solemnly, and waving her stick round me, she +quavered out in tones which filled me with a strange tremor: + + + "The man goes east, and the wind blows west, + Wood to the head, and steel to the breast! + The man goes west, and the wind blows east, + The neck twice doomed the gallows shall feast! + + +"Beware!" she went on more loudly, and harshly, tapping with her stick +on the floor, and snaking her palsied head at me. "Beware, unlucky +shoot of a crooked branch! Go no farther with it! Go back! The sword +may miss or may not fall, but the cord is sure!" + +If Master Bertie had not held my arm tightly, I should have recoiled, +as most of those within hearing had already done. The strange +allusions to my past, which I had no difficulty in detecting, and the +witch's knowledge of the risks of our present enterprise, were enough +to startle and shake the most constant mind; and in the midst of +enterprises secret and dangerous, few minds are so firm or so reckless +as to disdain omens. That she was one of those unhappy beings who buy +dark secrets at the expense of their souls, seemed certain; and had I +been alone, I should have, I am not ashamed to say it, given back. + +But I was lucky in having for my companion a man of rare mind, and +besides of so single a religious belief that to the end of his life he +always refused to put faith in a thing of the existence of which I +have no doubt myself--I mean witchcraft. + +He showed at this moment the courage of his opinions. "Peace, peace, +woman!" he said compassionately. "We shall live while God wills it, +and die when he wills it. And neither live longer nor die earlier! So +let us by." + +"Would you perish?" she quavered. + +"Ay! If so God wills," he answered undaunted. + +At that she seemed to shake all over, and hobbled aside, muttering, +"Then go on! Go on! God wills it!" + +Master Bertie gave me no time for hesitation, but, holding my arm, +urged me on to where the ostler stood awaiting the event with a face +of much discomposure. He opened the door for us, however, and led the +way up a narrow and not too clean staircase. On the landing at the +head of this he paused, and raised his lantern so as to cast the light +on our faces. "She has overlooked me, the old witch!" he said +viciously; "I wish I had never meddled in this business." + +"Man!" Master Bertie replied sternly; "do you fear that weak old +woman?" + +"No; but I fear her master," retorted the ostler, "and that is the +devil!" + +"Then I do not," Master Bertie answered bravely. "For my Master is as +good a match for him as I am for that old woman. When he wills it, +man, you will die, and not before. So pluck up spirit." + +Master Bertie did not look at me, though I needed his encouragement as +much as the ostler, having had better proofs of the woman's strange +knowledge. But, seeing that his exhortation had emboldened this +ignorant man, I was ashamed to seem to hesitate. When the ostler +knocked at the door--not of 32, but of 15--and it presently opened, I +went in without more ado. + +The room was a bare inn-chamber. A pallet without coverings lay in one +corner. In the middle were a couple of stools, and on one of them a +taper. + +The person who had opened to us stood eying us attentively; a bluff, +weather-beaten man with a thick beard and the air of a sailor. "Well," +he said, "what now?" + +"These gentlemen want to buy some lace," the ostler explained. + +"What lace do they want?" was the retort. + +"French lace," I answered. + +"You have come to the right shop, then," the man answered briskly. +Nodding to our conductor to depart, he carefully let him out. Then, +barring the door behind him, he as rapidly strode to the pallet and +twitched it aside, disclosing a trap door. He lifted this, and we saw +a narrow shaft descending into darkness. He brought the taper and held +it so as to throw a faint light into the opening. There was no ladder, +but blocks of wood nailed alternately against two of the sides, at +intervals of a couple of feet or so, made the descent pretty easy for +an active man. "The door is on this side," he said, pointing out the +one. "Knock loudly once and softly twice. The word is the same." + +We nodded and while he held the taper above, we descended, one by one, +without much difficulty, though I admit that half-way down the old +woman's words "Go on and perish" came back disquietingly to my mind. +However, my foot struck the bottom before I had time to digest them, +and a streak of light which seemed to issue from under a door forced +my thoughts the next moment into a new channel. Whispering to Master +Bertie to pause a minute, for there was only room for one of us to +stand at the bottom of the shaft, I knocked in the fashion prescribed. + +The sound of loud voices, which I had already detected, ceased on a +sudden, and I heard a shuffling on the other side of the boards. This +was followed by silence, and then the door was flung open, and, +blinded for the moment by a blaze of light, I walked mechanically +forward into a room. I made out as I advanced a group of men standing +round a rude table, their figures thrown into dark relief by flares +stuck in sconces on the walls behind them. Some had weapons in their +hands and others had partly risen from their seats and stood in +postures of surprise. "What do you seek?" cried a threatening voice +from among them. + +"Lace," I answered. + +"What lace?" + +"French lace." + +"Then you are welcome--heartily welcome!" was the answer given in a +tone of relief. "But who comes with you?" + +"Master Richard Bertie, of Lincolnshire," I answered promptly; and at +that moment he emerged from the shaft. + +A still more hearty murmur of welcome hailed his name and appearance, +and we were borne forward to the table amid a chorus of voices, the +greeting given to Master Bertie being that of men who joyfully hail +unlooked-for help. The room, from its vaulted ceiling and stone floor, +and the trams of casks which lay here and there or near the table +serving for seats, appeared to be a cellar. Its dark, gloomy recesses, +the flaring lights, and the weapons on the table, seemed meet and +fitting surroundings for the anxious faces which were gathered about +the board; for there was a something in the air which was not so much +secrecy as a thing more unpleasant--suspicion and mistrust. Almost at +the moment of our entrance it showed itself. One of the men, before +the door had well closed behind us, went toward it, as if to go out. +The leader--he who had questioned me--called sharply to him, bidding +him come back. And he came back, but reluctantly, as it seemed to me. + +I barely noticed this, for Master Bertie, who was known personally to +many and by name to all, was introducing me to two who were apparently +the leaders: Sir Thomas Penruddocke, a fair man as tall as myself, +loose-limbed and untidily dressed, with a reckless eye and a loud +tongue; and Master Walter Kingston, a younger brother, I was told, of +that Sir Anthony Kingston who had suffered death the year before for +conspiracy against the queen--the same in which Lord Devon had showed +the white feather. Kingston was a young man of moderate height and +slender; of a brown complexion, and delicate, almost womanish beauty, +his sleepy dark eyes and dainty mustache suggesting a temper rather +amiable than firm. But the spirit of revenge had entered into him, and +I soon learned that not even Penruddocke, a Cornish knight of longer +lineage than purse, was so vehement a plotter or so devoted to the +cause. Looking at the others my heart sank; it needed no greater +experience than mine to discern that, except three or four whom I +identified as stout professors of religion, they were men rather of +desperate fortunes than good estate. I learned on the instant that +conspiracy makes strange bedfellows, and that it is impossible to do +dirty work even with the purest intentions--in good company! Master +Bertie's face indicated to one who knew him as well as I did something +of the same feeling; and could the clock have been put back awhile, +and we placed with free hands and uncommitted outside the Gatehouse, I +think we should with one accord have turned our backs on it, and given +up an attempt which in this company could scarcely fare any way but +ill. Still, for good or evil, the die was cast now, and retreat was +out of the question. + +We had confronted too many dangers during the last three years not to +be able to face this one with a good courage; and presently Master +Bertie, taking a seat, requested to be told of the strength and plans +of our associates, his businesslike manner introducing at once some +degree of order and method into a conference which before our arrival +had--unless I was much mistaken--been conspicuously lacking in both. + +"Our resources?" Penruddocke replied confidently. "They lie +everywhere, man! We have but to raise the flag and the rest will be a +triumphal march. The people, sick of burnings and torturings, and +heated by the loss of Calais last January, will flock to us. Flock to +us, do I say? I will answer for it they will!" + +"But you have some engagements, some promises from people of +standing?" + +"Oh, yes! But the whole nation will join us. They are weary of the +present state of things." + +"They may be as weary of it as you say," Master Bertie answered +shrewdly; "but is it equally certain that they will risk their necks +to amend it? You have fixed upon some secure base from which we can +act, and upon which, if necessary, we may fall back to concentrate our +strength?" + +"Fall back?" cried Penruddocke, rising from his seat in heat. "Master +Bertie, I hope you have not come among us to talk of falling back! Let +us have no talk of that. If Wyatt had held on at once London would +have been his! It was falling back ruined him." + +Master Bertie shook his head. "If you have no secure base, you run the +risk of being crushed in the first half hour," he said. "When a fire +is first lighted the breeze puts it out which afterward but fans it." + +"You will not say that when you hear our plans. There are to be three +risings at once. Lord Delaware will rise in the west." + +"But will he?" said Master Bertie pointedly, disregarding the +threatening looks which were cast at him by more than one. "The late +rebellion there was put down very summarily, and I should have thought +that countryside would not be prone to rise again. _Will_ Lord +Delaware rise?" + +"Oh, yes, he will rise fast enough!" Penruddocke replied carelessly. +"I will answer for him. And on the same day, while we do the London +business, Sir Richard Bray will gather his men in Kent." + +"Do not count on him!" said Master Bertie. "A prisoner, muffled and +hoodwinked, was taken to the Tower by water this afternoon. And rumor +says it was Sir Richard Bray." + +There was a pause of consternation, during which one looked at +another, and swarthy faces grew pale. Penruddocke was the first to +recover himself. "Bah!" he exclaimed, "a fig for rumor! She is ever a +lying jade! I will bet a noble Richard Bray is supping in his own +house at this minute." + +"Then you would lose," Master Bertie rejoined sadly, and with no show +of triumph. "On hearing the report I sent a messenger to Sir Richard's +house. He brought word back that Sir Richard Bray had been fetched +away unexpectedly by four men, and that the house was in confusion." + +A murmur of dismay broke out at the lower end of the table. But the +Cornishman rose to the situation. "What matter?" he cried +boisterously. "What we have lost in Bray we have gained in Master +Bertie. He will raise Lincolnshire for us, and the Duchess's tenants. +There should be five hundred stout men of the latter, and two-thirds +of them Protestants at heart. If Bray has been seized there is the +more call for haste that we may release him." + +This appeal was answered by an outburst of cries. One or two even +rose, and waving their weapons swore a speedy vengeance. But Master +Bertie sat silent until the noise had subsided. Then he spoke. "You +must not count on them either, Sir Thomas," he said firmly. "I cannot +find it in my conscience to bring my wife's tenants into a plan so +desperate as this appears to be. To appeal to the people generally is +one thing; to call on those who are bound to us and who cannot in +honor refuse is another. And I will not risk in a hopeless struggle +the lives of men whose fathers looked for guidance to me and mine." + +A silence, the silence of utter astonishment, fell upon the plotters +round the table. In every face--and they were all turned upon my +companion--I read rage and distrust and dismay. They had chafed under +his cold criticisms and his calm reasonings. But this went beyond all, +and there were hands which stole instinctively to daggers, and eyes +which waited scowling for a signal. But Penruddocke, sanguine by +nature and rendered reckless by circumstances, had still the feelings +of a gentleman, and something in him responded to the appeal which +underlay Master Bertie's words. He remained silent, gazing gloomily at +the table, his eyes perhaps opened at this late hour to the +hopelessness of the attempt he meditated. + +It was Walter Kingston who came to the fore, and put into words the +thoughts of the coarser and more selfish spirits round him. Leaping +from his seat he dashed his slender hand on the table. "What does this +mean?" he sneered, a dangerous light in his dark eyes. "Those only are +here or should be here who are willing to stake all--all, mind you--on +the cause. Let us have no sneaks! Let us have no men with a foot on +either bank! Let us have no Courtenays nor cowards! Such men ruined +Wyatt and hanged my brother! A curse on them!" he cried, his voice +rising almost to a scream. + +"Master Kingston! do you refer to me?" Bertie rejoined in haughty +surprise. + +"Ay, I do!" cried the young man hotly. + +"Then I must beg leave of these gentlemen to explain my position." + +"Your position? So! More words?" quoth the other mockingly. + +"Ay! as many words as I please," retorted Master Bertie, his color +rising. "Afterward I will be as ready with deeds, I dare swear, as any +other! My tenants and my wife's I will not draw into an almost +hopeless struggle. But my own life and my friend's, since we have +obtained your secrets, I must risk, and I will do so in honor to the +death. For the rest, who doubts my courage may test it below ground or +above." + +The young man laughed rudely. "You will risk your life, but not your +lands, Master Bertie? That is the position, is it?" + +My companion was about to utter a rejoinder, fierce for him, when I, +who had hitherto sat silent, interposed. "The old witch told the +truth," I cried bitterly. "She said if we came hither we should +perish. And perish we shall, through being linked to a dozen men as +brave as I could wish, but the biggest fools under heaven!" + +"Fools?" shouted Kingston. + +"Ay, fools!" I repeated. "For who but fools, being at sea in a boat in +which all must sink or swim, would fall a-quarreling? Tell me that!" I +cried, slapping the table. + +"You are about right," Penruddocke said, and half a dozen voices +muttered assent. + +"About right, is he?" shrieked Kingston. "But who knows we are in a +boat together? Who knows that, I'd like to hear?" + +"I do!" I said, standing up and overtopping him by eight inches. "And +if any man hints that Master Bertie is here for any other purpose or +with any other intent than to honestly risk his life in this endeavor +as becomes a gentleman, let him stand out--let him stand out, and I +will break his neck! Fie, gentlemen, fie!" I continued, after a short +pause, which I did not make too long lest Master Kingston's passion +should get the better of his prudence. "Though I am young I have seen +service. But I never saw battle won yet with dissension in the camp. +For shame! Let us to business, and make the best dispositions we may." + +"You talk sense, Master Carey!" Penruddocke cried, with a great oath. +"Give me your hand. And do you, Kingston, hold your peace. If Master +Bertie will not raise his men to save his own skin, he will hardly do +it for ours. Now, Sir Richard Bray being taken, what is to be done, my +lads? Come, let us look to that." + +So the storm blew over. But it was with heavy hearts that two of us +fell to the discussion which followed, counting over weapons and +assigning posts, and debating this one's fidelity and that one's +lukewarmness. Our first impressions had not deceived us. The +plot was desperate, and those engaged in it were wanting in every +element which should command success--in information, forethought, +arrangement--everything save sheer audacity. When after a prolonged +and miserable sitting it was proposed that all should take the oath of +association on the Gospels, Master Bertie and I assented gloomily. It +would make our position no worse, for already we were fully committed. +The position was indeed bad enough. We had only persuaded the others +to a short delay; and even this meant that we must remain in hiding in +England, exposed from day to day to all the chances of detection and +treachery. + +Sir Thomas brought out from some secret place about him a tiny roll of +paper wrapped in a quill, and while we stood about him looking over +his shoulders, he laboriously added, letter by letter, three or four +names. The stern, anxious faces which peered the while at the document +or scanned each other only to find their anxiety reflected, the +flaring lights behind us, the recklessness of some and the distrust of +others, the cloaks in which many were wrapped to the chin, and the +occasional gleam of hidden weapons, made up a scene very striking. The +more as it was no mere show, but some of us saw only too distinctly +behind it the figure of the headsman and the block. + +"Now," said Penruddocke, who himself I think took a certain grim +pleasure in the formality, "be ready to swear, gentlemen, in pairs, as +I call the names. Kingston and Matthewson!" + +Lolling against the wall under one of the sconces I looked at Master +Bertie, expecting to be called up with him. He smiled as our eyes met; +and I thought with a rush of tenderness how lightly I could have dared +the worst had all my associates been like him. But repining came too +late, and in a moment Penruddocke surprised me by calling out +"Crewdson and Carey!" + +So Master Bertie was not to be my companion! I learned afterward that +men who were strangers to one another were purposely associated, the +theory being that each should keep an eye upon his oath-fellow. I went +forward to the end of the table, and took the book. + +There was a slight pause. + +"Crewdson!" called Penruddocke sharply; "did you not hear, man?" + +There was a little stir at the farther end of the room, and he came +forward, moving slowly and reluctantly. I saw that he was the man whom +Penruddocke had called back when we entered, a man of great height, +though slender, and closely cloaked. A drooping gray mustache covered +his mouth, and that was almost all I made out before Sir Thomas, with +some sharpness, bade him uncover. He did so with an abrupt gesture, +and reaching out his hand grasped the other end of the book as though +he would take it from me. His manner was so strange that I looked hard +at him, and he, jerking up his head with a gesture of defiance, looked +at me too, his face very pale. + +I heard Penruddocke's voice droning the words of the oath, but I paid +no attention to them--I was busied with something else. Where had I +seen the sinister gleam in those eyes before, and that forehead high +and narrow, and those lean, swarthy cheeks? Where had I before +confronted that very face which now glared into mine across the book? +Its look was bold and defiant, but low down in the cheek I saw a +little pulse beating furiously, a pulse which told of anxiety, and the +jaws, half veiled by the ragged mustache, were set in an iron grip. +Where? Ha! I knew. I dropped my end of the book and stepped back. + +"Look to the door!" I cried, my voice sounding harsh and strange in my +own ears. "Let no one leave! I denounce that man!" And raising my hand +I pointed pitilessly at my oath-fellow. "I denounce him--he is a spy +and traitor!" + +"I a spy?" the man shouted fiercely--with the fierceness of despair. + +"Ay, you! you! Clarence, or Crewdson, or whatever you call yourself, I +denounce you! My time has come!" + + +[Illustration: ". . . HE IS A SPY AND A TRAITOR!"] + + + + + CHAPTER XIX. + + FERDINAND CLUDDE. + + +The bitterness of that hour long past, when he had left me for death, +when he had played with the human longing for life, and striven +without a thought of pity to corrupt me by hopes and fears the most +awful that mortals know, was in my voice as I spoke. I rejoiced that +vengeance had come upon him at last, and that I was its instrument. I +saw the pallor of a great fear creep into his dark cheek, and read in +his eyes the vicious passion of a wild beast trapped, and felt no +pity. "Master Clarence!" I said, and laughed--laughed mockingly. "You +do not look pleased to see your friends. Or perhaps you do not +remember me. Stand forward, Master Bertie! Maybe he will recognize +you." + +But though Master Bertie came forward and stood by my side gazing at +him, the villain's eyes did not for an instant shift from mine. "It is +the man!" my companion said after a solemn pause--for the other, +breathing fast, made no answer. "He was a spy in the pay of Bishop +Gardiner, when I knew him. At the Bishop's death I heard that he +passed into the service of the Spanish Ambassador, the Count de Feria. +He called himself at that time Clarence. I recognize him." + +The quiet words had their effect. From full one-half of the savage +crew round us a fierce murmur rose more terrible than any loud outcry. +Yet this seemed a relief to the doomed man; he forced himself to look +away from me and to confront the dark ring of menacing faces which +hemmed him in. The moment he did so he appeared to find courage and +words. "They take me for another man!" he cried in hoarse accents. "I +know nothing of them!" and he added a fearful oath. "He knows me. Ask +him!" + +He pointed to Walter Kingston, who was sitting moodily on a tram +outside the ring, and who alone had not risen under the excitement of +my challenge. On being thus appealed to he looked up suddenly. "If I +am to choose between you," he said bitterly, "and say which is the +true man, I know which I shall pick." + +"Which?" Clarence murmured. "Which?" This time his tone was different. +In his voice was the ring of hope. + +"I should give my vote for you," Kingston replied, looking +contemptuously at him. "I know something about you, but of the other +gentleman I know nothing!" + +"And not much of the person you call Crewdson," I retorted fiercely, +"since you do not know his real name." + +"I know this much," the young man answered, tapping his boot with his +scabbard with studied carelessness, "that he lent me some money, and +seemed a good fellow and one that hated a mass priest. That is enough +for me. As for his name, it is his fancy perhaps. You call yourself +Carey. Well, I know a good many Careys, but I do not know you, nor +ever heard of you!" + +I swung round on him with a hot cheek. But the challenge which was +upon my tongue was anticipated by Master Bertie, who drew me forcibly +back. "Leave this to me, Francis," he said, "and do you watch that +man. Master Kingston and gentlemen," he continued, turning again to +them, and drawing himself to his full height as he addressed them, +"listen, if you please! You know me, if you do not know my friend. The +honor of Richard Bertie has never been challenged until to-night, nor +ever will be with impunity. Leave my friend out of the question and +put me in it. I, Richard Bertie, say that that man is a paid spy and +informer, come here in quest of blood-money! And he, Crewdson, a +nameless man, says that I lie. Choose between us. Or look at him and +judge! Look!" + +He was right to bid them look. As the savage murmur rose again and +took from the wretched man his last hope, as the ugliness of despair +and wicked, impotent passion distorted his face, he was indeed the +most deadly witness against himself. + +The lights which shone on treacherous weapons half hidden, or on the +glittering eyes of cruel men whose blood was roused, fell on nothing +so dangerous as the livid, despairing face which, unmasked and eyed by +all with aversion, still defied us. Traitor and spy as he was, he had +the merit of courage at least; he would die game. And even as I, with +a first feeling of pity for him, discerned this, his sword was out, +and with a curse he lunged at me. + +Penruddocke saved me by a buffet which sent me reeling against the +wall, so that the villain's thrust was spent on air. Before he could +repeat it, four or five men flung themselves upon him from behind. For +a moment there was a great uproar, while the group surrounding him +swayed to and fro as he dragged his captors up and down with a +strength I should not have expected. But the end was certain, and we +stood looking on quietly. In a minute or two they had him down, and +disarming him, bound his hands. + +For me he seemed to have a special hatred. "Curse you!" he panted, +glaring at me as he lay helpless. "You have been my evil angel! From +the first day I saw you, you have thwarted me in every plan, and now +you have brought me to this!" + +"Not I, but yourself," I answered. + +"My curse upon you!" he cried again, the rage and hate in his face so +terrible that I turned away shuddering and sick at heart. "If I could +have killed you," he cried, "I would have died contented." + +"Enough!" interposed Penruddocke briskly. "It is well for us that +Master Bertie and his friend came here to-night. Heaven grant it be +not too late! We do not need," he added, looking round, "any more +evidence, I think?" + +The dissent was loud, and, save for Kingston, who still sat sulking +apart, unanimous. + +"Death?" said the Cornishman quietly. + +No one spoke, but each man gave a brief stern nod. + +"Very well," the leader continued; "then I propose----" + +"One moment," said Master Bertie, interrupting him. "A word with you +apart, with our friends' permission. You can repeat it to them +afterward." + +He drew Sir Thomas aside, and they retired into the corner by the +door, where they stood talking in whispers. I had small reason to feel +sympathy for the man who lay there tied and doomed to die like a calf. +Yet even I shuddered--yes, and some of the hardened men round me +shuddered also at the awful expression in his eyes as, without moving +his head, he followed the motions of the two by the door. Some faint +hope springing into being wrung his soul, and brought the perspiration +in great drops to his forehead. I turned away, thinking gravely of the +early morning three years ago when he had tortured me by the very same +hopes and fears which now racked his own spirit. + +Penruddocke came back, Master Bertie following him. + +"It must not be done to-night," he announced quietly, with a nod which +meant that he would explain the reason afterward. "We will meet again +to-morrow at four in the afternoon instead of at eight in the evening. +Until then two must remain on guard with him. It is right he should +have some time to repent, and he shall have it." + +This did not at once find favor. + +"Why not run him through now?" said one bluntly. "And meet to-morrow +at some place unknown to him? If we come here again we shall, likely +enough, walk straight into the trap." + +"Well, have it that way, if you please," answered Sir Thomas, +shrugging his shoulders. "But do not blame me afterward if you find we +have let slip a golden opportunity. Be fools if you like. I dare say +it will not make much difference in the end!" + +He spoke at random, but he knew how to deal with his crew, it seemed, +for on this those who had objected assented reluctantly to the course +he proposed. "Barnes and Walters are here in hiding, so they had +better be the two to guard him," he continued. "There is no fear that +they will be inclined to let him go!" I looked at the men whom the +glances of their fellows singled out, and found them to belong to the +little knot of fanatics I had before remarked: dark, stern men, worth, +if the matter ever came to fighting, all the rest of the band put +together. + +"At four, to-morrow, then, we meet," Sir Thomas concluded lightly. +"Then we will deal with him, never fear! Now it is near midnight, and +we must be going. But not all together, or we shall attract +attention." + + +Half an hour later Master Bertie and I rode softly out of the +courtyard and turned our faces toward the city. The night wind came +sweeping across the valley of the Thames, and met us full in the face +as we reached the brow of the hill. It seemed laden with melancholy +whispers. The wretched enterprise, ill-conceived, ill-ordered, and in +its very nature desperate, to which we were in honor committed, would +have accounted of itself for any degree of foreboding. But the scene +through which we had just passed, and on my part the knowledge that I +had given up a fellow-being to death, had their depressing influences. +For some distance we rode in silence, which I was the first to break. + +"Why did you put off his punishment?" I asked. + +"Because I think he will give us information in the interval," Bertie +answered briefly. "Information which may help us. A spy is generally +ready to betray his own side upon occasion." + +"And you will spare him if he does?" I asked. It seemed to me neither +justice nor mercy. + +"No," he said, "there is no fear of that. Those who go with ropes +round their necks know no mercy. But drowning men will catch at +straws; and ten to one he will babble!" + +I shivered. "It is a bad business," I said. + +He thought I referred to the conspiracy, and he inveighed bitterly +against it, reproaching himself for bringing me into it, and for his +folly in believing the rosy accounts of men who had all to win, and +nothing save their worthless lives to lose. "There is only one thing +gained," he said. "We are likely to pay dearly for that, so we may +think the more of it. We have been the means of punishing a villain." + +"Yes," I said, "that is true. It was a strange meeting and a strange +recognition. Strangest of all that I should be called up to swear with +him." + +"Not strange," Master Bertie answered gravely. "I would rather call it +providential. Let us think of that, and be of better courage, friend. +We have been used; we shall not be cast away before our time." + +I looked back. For some minutes I had thought I heard behind us a +light footstep, more like the pattering of a dog than anything else. I +could see nothing, but that was not wonderful, for the moon was young +and the sky overcast. "Do you hear some one following us?" I said. + +Master Bertie drew rein suddenly, and turning in the saddle we +listened. For a second I thought I still heard the sound. The next it +ceased, and only the wind toying with the November leaves and sighing +away in the distance, came to our ears. "No," he said, "I think it +must have been your fancy. I hear nothing." + +But when we rode on the sound began again, though at first more +faintly, as if our follower had learned prudence and fallen farther +behind. "Do not stop, but listen!" I said softly. "Cannot you hear the +pattering of a naked foot now?" + +"I hear something," he answered. "I am afraid you are right, and that +we are followed." + +"What is to be done?" I said, my thoughts busy. + +"There is Caen wood in front," he answered, "with a little open ground +on this side of it. We will ride under the trees and then stop +suddenly. Perhaps we shall be able to distinguish him as he crosses +the open behind us." We made the experiment; but as if our follower +had divined the plan, his footstep ceased to sound before we had +stopped our horses. He had fallen farther behind. "We might ride +quickly back," I suggested, "and surprise him." + +"It would be useless," Bertie answered. "There is too much cover close +to the road. Let us rather trot on and outstrip him." + +We did trot on; and what with the tramp of our horses as they swung +along the road, and the sharp passage of the wind by our ears, we +heard no more of the footstep behind. But when we presently pulled up +to breathe our horses--or rather within a few minutes of our doing +so--there it was behind us, nearer and louder than before. I shivered +as I listened; and presently, acting on a sudden impulse, I wheeled my +horse round and spurred him back a dozen paces along the road. + +I pulled up. + +There was a movement in the shadow of the trees on my right, and I +leaned forward, peering in that direction. Gradually, I made out the +lines of a figure standing still as though gazing at me; a strange, +distorted figure, crooked, short, and in some way, though no lineament +of the face was visible, expressive of a strange and weird +malevolence. It was the witch! The witch whom I had seen in the +kitchen at the Gatehouse. How, then, had she come hither? How had she, +old, lame, decrepit, kept up with us? + +I trembled as she raised her hand, and, standing otherwise motionless, +pointed at me out of the gloom. The horse under me was trembling too, +trembling violently, with its ears laid back, and, as she moved, its +terror increased, it plunged wildly. I had to give for a moment all my +attention to it, and though I tried, in mere revolt against the fear +which I felt was overcoming me, to urge it nearer, my efforts were +vain. After nearly unseating me, the beast whirled round and, getting +the better of me, galloped down the road toward London. + +"What is it?" cried Master Bertie, as I came speedily up with him; he +had ridden slowly on. "What is the matter?" + +"Something in the hedge startled it," I explained, trying to soothe +the horse. "I could not clearly see what it was." + +"A rabbit, I dare say," he remarked, deceived by my manner. + +"Perhaps it was," I answered. Some impulse, not unnatural, led me to +say nothing about what I had seen. I was not quite sure that my eyes +had not deceived me. I feared his ridicule, too, though he was not +very prone to ridicule. And above all I shrank from explaining the +medley of superstitious fear, distrust, and abhorrence in which I held +the creature who had shown so strange a knowledge of my life. + +We were already near Holborn, and reaching without further adventure a +modest inn near the Bars, we retired to a room we had engaged, and lay +down with none of the gallant hopes which had last night formed the +subject of our talk. Yet we slept well, for depression goes better +with sleep than does the tumult of anticipation; and I was up early, +and down in the yard looking to the horses before London was well +awake. As I entered the stable a man lying curled up in the straw +rolled lazily over and, shading his eyes, glanced up. Apparently he +recognized me, for he got slowly to his feet. "Morning!" he said +gruffly. + +I stood staring at him, wondering if I had made a mistake. + +"What are you doing here, my man?" I said sharply, when I had made +certain I knew him, and that he was really the surly ostler from the +Gatehouse tavern at Highgate. "Why did you come here? Why have you +followed us?" + +"Come about your business," he answered. "To give you that." + +I took the note he held out to me. "From whom?" I said. "Who sent it +by you?" + +"Cannot tell," he replied, shaking his head. + +"Cannot, or will not?" I retorted. + +"Both," he said doggedly. "But there, if you want to know what sort of +a kernel is in a nut, you don't shake the tree, master--you crack the +nut." + +I looked at the note he had given me. It was but a slip of paper +folded thrice. The sender had not addressed, or sealed, or fastened it +in anyway; had taken no care either to insure its reaching its +destination or to prevent prying eyes seeing the contents. If one of +our associates had sent it, he had been guilty of the grossest +carelessness. "You are sure it is for me?" I said. + +"As sure as mortal can be," he answered. "Only that it was given me +for a man, and not a mouse! You are not afraid, master?" + +I was not; but he edged away as he spoke, and looked with so much +alarm at the scrap of paper that it was abundantly clear he was very +much afraid himself, even while he derided me. I saw that if I had +offered to return the note he would have backed out of the stable and +gone off there and then as fast as his lame foot would let him. This +puzzled me. However, I read the note. There was nothing in it to +frighten me. Yet, as I read, the color came into my face, for it +contained one name to which I had long been a stranger. + +"To Francis Cludde," it ran. "If you would not do a thing of which you +will miserably repent all your life, and which will stain you in the +eyes of all Christian men, meet me two hours before noon at the cross +street by St. Botolph's, where you first saw Mistress Bertram. And +tell no one. Fail not to come. In Heaven's name, fail not!" + +The note had nothing to do with the conspiracy, then, on the face of +it; mysterious as it was, and mysteriously as it came. "Look here!" I +said to the man. "Tell me who sent it, and I will give you a crown." + +"I would not tell you," he answered stubbornly, "if you could make me +King of England! No, nor King of Spain too! You might rack me and you +would not get it from me!" + +His one eye glowed with so obstinate a resolve that I gave up the +attempt to persuade him, and turned to examine the message itself. But +here I fared no better. I did not know the handwriting, and there was +no peculiarity in the paper. I was no wiser than before. "Are you to +take back any answer?" I said. + +"No," he replied, "the saints be thanked for the same! But you will +bear me witness," he went on anxiously, "that I gave you the letter. +You will not forget that, or say that you have not had it? But there!" +he added to himself as he turned away, speaking in a low voice, so +that I barely caught the sense of the words, "what is the use? she +will know!" + +She will know! It had something to do with a woman then, even if a +woman were not the writer. I went in to breakfast in two minds about +going. I longed to tell Master Bertie and take his advice, though the +unknown had enjoined me not to do so. But for the time I refrained, +and explaining my absence of mind as well as I could, I presently +stole away on some excuse or other, and started in good time, and on +foot, into the city. I reached the rendezvous a quarter of an hour +before the time named, and strolling between the church and the +baker's shop, tried to look as much like a chance passer-by as I +could, keeping the while a wary lookout for any one who might turn out +to be my correspondent. + + +The morning was cold and gray. A drizzling rain was falling. The +passers were few, and the appearance of the streets dirty and, with +littered kennels, was dreary indeed. I found it hard at once to keep +myself warm and to avoid observation as I hung about. Ten o'clock had +rung from more than one steeple, and I was beginning to think myself a +fool for my pains, when a woman of middle height, slender and young in +figure, but wearing a shabby brown cloak, and with her head muffled in +a hood, as though she had the toothache or dreaded the weather more +than ordinary, turned the corner of the belfry and made straight +toward me. She drew near, and seemed about to pass me without notice. +But when abreast of me she glanced up suddenly, her eyes the only +features I could see. + +"Follow me to the church!" she murmured gently. And she swept on to +the porch. + +I obeyed reluctantly; very reluctantly, my feet seeming like lead. For +I knew who she was. Though I had only seen her eyes, I had recognized +them, and guessed already what her business with me was. She led the +way resolutely to a quiet corner. The church was empty and still, with +only the scent of incense in the air to tell of a recent service. It +was no surprise to me when she turned abruptly, and, removing her +hood, looked me in the face. + +"What have you done with him?" she panted, laying her hand on my arm. +"Speak! Tell me what you have done with him?" + +The question, the very question, I had foreseen! Yet I tried to fence +with her. I said, "With whom?" + +"With whom?" she repeated bitterly. "You know me! I am not so changed +in three years that you do not recognize me?" + +"No; I know you," I said. + +There was a hectic flush on her cheeks, and it seemed to me that the +dark hair was thinner on her thin temples than when I had seen her +last. But the eyes were the same. + +"Then why ask with whom?" she cried passionately. "What have you done +with the man you called Clarence?" + +"Done with him?" I said feebly. + +"Ay, done with him? Come, speak and tell me!" she repeated in fierce +accents, her hand clutching my wrist, her eyes probing my face with +merciless glances. "Have you killed him? Tell me!" + +"Killed him, Mistress Anne?" I said sullenly. "No, I have not killed +him." + +"He is alive?" she cried. + +"For all I know, he is alive." + +She glared at me for some seconds to assure herself that I was telling +the truth. Then she heaved a great sigh; her hands fell from my +wrists, the color faded out of her face, and she lowered her eyes. I +glanced round with a momentary idea of escape--I so shrank from that +which was to come. But before I had well entertained the notion she +looked up, her face grown calm. + +"Then what have you done with him?" she asked. + +"I have done nothing with him," I answered. + +She laughed; a mirthless laugh. "Bah!" she said, "do not tell me lies! +That is your honor, I suppose--your honor to your friends down in the +cellar there! Do you think that I do not know all about them? Shall I +give you the list? He is a very dangerous conspirator, is Sir Thomas +Penruddocke, is he not? And that scented dandy Master Kingston! Or +Master Crewdson--tell me of him! Tell me of him, I say!" she +exclaimed, with a sudden return from irony to a fierce eagerness, a +breathless impatience. "Why did he not come up last night? What have +you done with him?" + +I shook my head, sick and trembling. How could I tell her? + +"I see," she said. "You will not tell me. But you swear he is yet +alive, Master Cludde? Good. Then you are holding him for a hostage? Is +that it?" with a piercing glance at my face. "Or, you have condemned +him, but for some reason the sentence has not been executed!" She drew +a long, deep breath, for I fear my face betrayed me. "That is it, is +it? Then there is still time." + +She turned from me and looked toward the end of the aisle, where a +dull red lamp hanging before the altar glowed feebly in the warm +scented air. She seemed so to turn and so to look in thankfulness, as +if the news she had learned were good instead of what it was. "What is +the hour fixed?" she asked suddenly. + +I shook my head. + +"You will not tell me? Well, it matters not," she answered briskly. +"He must be saved. Do you hear? He must be saved, Master Cludde. That +is your business." + +I shook my head. + +"You think it is not?" she said. "Well, I can show you it is! Listen!" + +She raised herself on a step of the font, and looked me harshly in the +face. "If he be not given up to me safe and sound by sunset this +evening, I will betray you all! All! I have the list here," she +muttered sternly, touching her bosom. "You, Master Bertie, +Penruddocke, Fleming, Barnes--all. All, do you hear? Give him up or +you shall hang!" + +"You would not do it!" I cried aghast, peering into her burning eyes. + +"Would not do it? Fool!" she hissed. "If all the world but he had one +head, I would cut it off to save his! He is my husband! Do you hear? +He is my husband--my all! Do you think I have given up everything, +friends and honor and safety, for him, to lose him now? No! You say I +would not do it? Do you know what I have done? You have a scar there." + +She touched me lightly on the breast. "I did it," she said. + +"You?" I muttered. + +"Yes, I, you blind fool! I did it," she answered. "You escaped then, +and I was glad of it, since the wound answered my purpose. But you +will not escape again. The cord is surer." + +Something in her last words crossed my memory and enlightened me. + +"You were the woman I saw last night," I said. "You followed us from +High gate." + +"What matter! What matter!" she exclaimed impatiently. "Better be +footsore than heartsore. Will you do now what I want? Will you answer +for his life?" + +"I can do nothing without the others," I said. + +"But the others know nothing," she answered. "They do not know their +own danger. Where will you find them?" + +"I shall find them," I replied resolutely. "And in any case I must +consult Master Bertie. Will you come and see him?" + +"And be locked up too?" she said sternly, and in a different tone. +"No. It is you must do this, and you must answer for it, Francis +Cludde. You, and no one else." + +"I can do nothing by myself," I repeated. + +"Ay, but you can--you must!" she retorted, "or Heaven's curse will be +upon you! You think me mad to say that. Listen! Listen, fool! The man +whom you have condemned, whom you have left to die, is not only my +husband, wedded to me these three years, but your father--your father, +Ferdinand Cludde!" + + + + + CHAPTER XX. + + THE COMING QUEEN. + + +I stood glaring at her. + +"You were a blind bat or you would have found it out for yourself," +she continued scornfully. "A babe would have guessed it, knowing as +much of your father as you did." + +"Does he know himself?" I muttered hoarsely, looking anywhere but at +her now. The shock had left me dull and confused. I did not doubt her +word, rather I wondered with her that I had not found this out for +myself. But the possibility of meeting my father in that wide world +into which I had plunged to escape from the knowledge of his +existence, had never occurred to me. Had I thought of it, it would +have seemed too unlikely; and though I might have seen in Gardiner a +link between us, and so have identified him, the greatness of the +Chancellor's transactions, and certain things about Clarence which had +seemed, or would have seemed, had I ever taken the point into +consideration, at variance with my ideas of my father, had prevented +me getting upon the track. + +"Does he know that you are his son, do you mean?" she said. "No, he +does not." + +"You have not told him?" + +"No," she answered with a slight shiver. + +I understood. I comprehended that even to her the eagerness with +which, being father and son, we had sought one another's lives during +those days on the Rhine, had seemed so dreadful that she had concealed +the truth from him. + +"When did you learn it?" I asked, trembling too. + +"I knew his right name before I ever saw you," she answered. "Yours I +learned on the day I left you at Santon." Looking back I remembered +the strange horror, then inexplicable, which she had betrayed; and I +understood it. So it was that knowledge which had driven her from us! +"What will you do now?" she said. "You will save him? You must save +him! He is your father." + +Save him? I shuddered at the thought that I had destroyed him! that I, +his son, had denounced him! Save him! The perspiration sprang out in +beads on my forehead. If I could not save him I should live pitied by +my friends and loathed by my enemies! + +"If it be possible," I muttered, "I will save him." + +"You swear it?" she cried. Before I could answer she seized my arm and +dragged me up the dim aisle until we stood together before the Figure +and the Cross. The chimes above us rang eleven. A shaft of cold +sunshine pierced a dusty window, and, full of dancing motes, shot +athwart the pillars. + +"Swear!" she repeated with trembling eagerness, turning her eyes on +mine, and raising her hand solemnly toward the Figure. "Swear by the +Cross!" + +"I swear," I said. + +She dropped her hand. Her form seemed to shrink and grow less. Making +a sign to me to go, she fell on her knees on the step, and drew her +hood over her face. I walked away on tiptoe down the aisle, but +glancing back from the door of the church I saw the small, solitary +figure still kneeling in prayer. The sunshine had died away. The dusty +window was colorless. Only the red lamp glowed dully above her head. I +seemed to see what the end would be. Then I pushed aside the curtain, +and slipped out into the keen air. It was hers to pray. It was mine to +act. + +I lost no time, but on my return I could not find Master Bertie either +in the public room or in the inn yard, so I sought him in his bedroom, +where I found him placidly reading a book; his patient waiting in +striking contrast with the feverish anxiety which had taken hold of +me. "What is it, lad?" he said, closing the volume, and laying it down +on my entrance. "You look disturbed?" + +"I have seen Mistress Anne," I answered. He whistled softly, staring +at me without a word. "She knows all," I continued. + +"How much is all?" he asked after a pause. + +"Our names--all our names, Penruddocke's, Kingston's, the others; our +meeting-place, and that we hold Clarence a prisoner. She was that old +woman whom we saw at the Gatehouse tavern last night." + +He nodded, appearing neither greatly surprised nor greatly alarmed. +"Does she intend to use her knowledge?" he said. "I suppose she does." + +"Unless we let him go safe and unhurt before sunset." + +"They will never consent to it," he answered, shaking his head. + +"Then they will hang!" I cried. + +He looked hard at me a moment, discerning something strange in the +bitterness of my last words. "Come, lad," he said, "you have not told +me all. What else have you learned?" + +"How can I tell you?" I cried wildly, waving him off, and going to the +lattice that my face might be hidden from him. "Heaven has cursed me!" +I added, my voice breaking. + +He came and laid his hand on my shoulder. "Heaven curses no one," he +said. "Most of our curses we make for ourselves. What is it, lad?" + +I covered my face with my hands. "He--he is my father," I muttered. +"Do you understand? Do you see what I have done? He is my father!" + +"Ha!" Master Bertie uttered that one exclamation in intense +astonishment; then he said no more. But the pressure of his hand told +me that he understood, that he felt with me, that he would help me. +And that silent comprehension, that silent assurance, gave the +sweetest comfort. "He must be allowed to go, then, for this time," he +resumed gravely, after a pause in which I had had time to recover +myself. "We will see to it. But there will be difficulties. You must +be strong and brave. The truth must be told. It is the only way." + +I saw that it was, though I shrank exceedingly from the ordeal before +me. Master Bertie advised, when I grew more calm, that we should be +the first at the rendezvous, lest by some chance Penruddocke's orders +should be anticipated; and accordingly, soon after two o'clock, we +mounted, and set forth. I remarked that my companion looked very +carefully to his arms, and, taking the hint, I followed his example. + +It was a silent, melancholy, anxious ride. However successful we might +be in rescuing my father--alas! that I should have to-day and always +to call that man father--I could not escape the future before me. I +had felt shame while he was but a name to me; how could I endure to +live, with his infamy always before my eyes? Petronilla, of whom I had +been thinking so much since I returned to England, whose knot of +velvet had never left my breast nor her gentle face my heart--how +could I go back to her now? I had thought my father dead, and his name +and fame old tales. But the years of foreign life which yesterday had +seemed a sufficient barrier between his past and myself--of what use +were they now? Or the foreign service I had fondly regarded as a kind +of purification? + +Master Bertie broke in on my reverie much as if he had followed its +course. "Understand one thing, lad!" he said, laying his hand on the +withers of my horse. "Yours must not be the hand to punish your +father. But after to-day you will owe him no duty. You will part from +him to-day and he will be a stranger to you. He deserted you when you +were a child; and if you owe reverence to any one, it is to your uncle +and not to him. He has himself severed the ties between you." + +"Yes," I said. "I will go abroad. I will go back to Wilna." + +"If ill comes of our enterprise--as I fear ill will come--we will both +go back, if we can," he answered. "If good by any chance should come +of it, then you shall be my brother, our family shall be your family. +The Duchess is rich enough," he added with a smile, "to allow you a +younger brother's portion." + +I could not answer him as I desired, for we passed at that moment +under the archway, and became instantly involved in the bustle going +forward in the courtyard. Near the principal door of the inn stood +eight or nine horses gayly caparisoned and in the charge of three +foreign-looking men, who, lounging in their saddles, were passing a +jug from hand to hand. They turned as we rode in and looked at us +curiously, but not with any impertinence. Apparently they were waiting +for the rest of their party, who were inside the house. Civilly +disposed as they seemed, the fact that they were armed, and wore rich +liveries of black and gold, caused me, and I think both of us, a +momentary alarm. + +"Who are they?" Master Bertie asked in a low voice, as he rode to the +opposite door and dismounted with his back to them. + +"They are Spaniards, I fancy," I said, scanning them over the +shoulders of my horse as I too got off. "Old friends, so to speak." + +"They seem wonderfully subdued for them," he answered, "and on their +best behavior. If half the tales we heard this morning be true, they +are not wont to carry themselves like this." + +Yet they certainly were Spanish, for I overheard them speaking to one +another in that language; and before we had well dismounted, their +leader--whom they received with great respect, one of them jumping +down to hold his stirrup--came out with three or four more and got to +horse again. Turning his rein to lead the way out through the north +gate he passed near us, and as he settled himself in his saddle took a +good look at us. The look passed harmlessly over me, but reaching +Master Bertie became concentrated. The rider started and smiled +faintly. He seemed to pause, then he raised his plumed cap and bowed +low--covered himself again and rode on. His train all followed his +example and saluted us as they passed. Master Bertie's face, which had +flushed a fiery red under the other's gaze, grew pale again. He looked +at me, when they had gone by, with startled eyes. + +"Do you know who that was?" he said, speaking like one who had +received a blow and did not yet know how much he was hurt. + +"No," I said. + +"It was the Count de Feria, the Spanish Ambassador," he answered. "And +he recognized me. I met him often, years ago. I knew him again as soon +as he came out, but I did not think he would by any chance recognize +me in this dress." + +"Are you sure," I asked in amazement, "that it was he?" + +"Quite sure," he answered. + +"But why did he not have you arrested, or at least detained? The +warrants are still out against you." + +Master Bertie shook his head. "I cannot tell," he said darkly. "He is +a Spaniard. But come, we have the less time to lose. We must join our +friends and take their advice; we seem to be surrounded by pitfalls." + +At this moment the lame ostler came up, and grumbling at us as if he +had never seen us in his life before, and never wished to see us +again, took our horses. We went into the kitchen, and taking the first +chance of slipping upstairs to No. 15, we were admitted with the same +precautions as before, and descending the shaft gained the cellar. + + +Here we were not, as we had looked to be, the first on the scene. I +suppose a sense of the insecurity of our meeting-place had led every +one to come early, so as to be gone early. Penruddocke indeed was not +here yet, but Kingston and half a score of others were sitting about +conversing in low tones. It was plain that the distrust and suspicion +which we had remarked on the previous day had not been allayed by the +discovery of Clarence's treachery. + +Indeed, it was clear that the distrust and despondency had to-day +become a panic. Men glared at one another and at the door, and talked +in whispers and started at the slightest sound. I glanced round. The +one I sought for with eager yet shrinking eyes was not to be seen. I +turned to Master Bertie, my face mutely calling on him to ask the +question. "Where is the prisoner?" he said sharply. + +A moment I hung in suspense. Then one of the men said, "He is in +there. He is safe enough!" He pointed, as he spoke, to a door which +seemed to lead to an inner cellar. + +"Right," said Master Bertie, still standing. "I have two pieces of bad +news for you nevertheless. Firstly I have just been recognized by the +Spanish Ambassador, whom I met in the courtyard above." + +Half the men rose to their feet. "What is he doing here?" they cried, +one boldly, the others with the quaver very plain in their voices. + +"I do not know; but he recognized me. Why he took no steps to detain +or arrest me I cannot tell. He rode away by the north road." + +They gazed at one another and we at them. The wolfish look which fear +brings into some faces grew stronger in theirs. + +"What is your other bad news?" said Kingston, with an oath. + +"A person outside, a friend of the prisoner, has a list of our names, +and knows our meeting-place and our plans. She threatens to use the +knowledge unless the man Clarence or Crewdson be set free." + +There was a loud murmur of wrath and dismay, amid which Kingston alone +preserved his composure. "We might have been prepared for that," he +said quietly. "It is an old precaution of such folk. But how did you +come to hear of it?" + +"My friend here saw the messenger and heard the terms. The man must be +set free by sunset." + +"And what warranty have we that he will not go straight with his plans +and his list to the Council?" + +Master Bertie could not answer that, neither could I; we had no +surety, and if we set him free could take none save his word. _His +word!_ Could even I ask them to accept that? To stake the life of the +meanest of them on it? + +I saw the difficulties of the position, and when Master Kingston +pronounced coolly that this was a waste of time, and that the only +wise course was to dispose of the principal witness, both in the +interests of justice and our own safety, and then shift for ourselves +before the storm broke, I acknowledged in my heart the wisdom of the +course, and felt that yesterday it would have received my assent. + +"The risk is about the same either way," Master Bertie said. + +"Not at all," Kingston objected, a sparkle of malice in his eye. Last +night we had thwarted him. To-night it was his turn; and the dark +lowering looks of those round him showed that numbers were with him. +"This fellow can hang us all. His accomplice who escapes can know +nothing save through him, and could give only vague and uncertain +evidence. No, no. Let us cast lots who shall do it, get it done +quickly, and begone." + +"We must wait at least," Bertie urged, "until Sir Thomas comes." + +"No!" retorted Kingston, with heat. "We are all equal here. Besides +the man was condemned yesterday, with the full assent of all. It only +remains to carry out the sentence. Surely this gentleman," he +continued, turning suddenly upon me, "who was so ready to accuse him +yesterday, does not wish him spared to-day?" + +"I do wish it," I said, in a low tone. + +"Ho! ho!" he cried, folding his arms and throwing back his head, +astonished at the success of his own question. "Then may we ask for +your reasons, sir? Last night you could not lay your tongue to words +too bad for him. Tonight you wish to spare him, and let him go?" + +"I do," I said. I felt that every eye was upon me, and that, Master +Bertie excepted, not one there would feel sympathy with me in my +humiliation. They were driven to the wall. They had no time for fine +feeling, for sympathy, for appreciation of the tragic, unless it +touched themselves. What chance had I with them, though I was a son +pleading for a father? Nay, what argument had I save that I was his +son, and that I had brought him to this? No argument. Only the appeal +to them that they would not make me a parricide! And I felt that at +this they would mock. + +And so, in view of those stern, curious faces, a new temptation seized +me--the temptation to be silent. Why should I not stand by and let +things take their course? Why should I not spare myself the shame +which I already saw would be fruitless? When Master Kingston, with a +cynical bow, said, "Your reasons, sir?" I stood mute and trembling. If +I kept silence, if I refused to give my reasons, if I did not +acknowledge the prisoner, but merely begged his life, he would die, +and the connection between us would be known only to one or two. I +should be freed from him and might go my own way. The sins of +Ferdinand Cludde were well-nigh forgotten--why take to myself the sins +of Clarence, which would otherwise never stain my name, would never be +associated with my father or myself? + +Why, indeed? It was a great and sore temptation, as I stood there +before all those eyes. He had deserved death. I had given him up in +perfect innocence. Had I any right to call on them to risk their lives +that I might go harmless in conscience, and he in person? Had I---- + +What, was there after all some taint in my blood? Was I going to +become like him--to take to myself a shame of my own earning, in the +effort to escape from the burden of his ill-fame? I remembered in time +the oath I had sworn, and when Kingston repeated his question, I +answered him quickly. "I did not know yesterday who he was," I said. +"I have discovered since that he is my father. I ask nothing on his +account. Were he only my father I would not plead for him. I plead for +myself," I murmured. "If you show no pity, you make me a parricide." + +I had done them wrong. There was something in my voice, I suppose, as +I said the words which cost me so much, which wrought with almost all +of them in a degree. They gazed at me with awed, wondering faces, and +murmured "His father!" in low tones. They were recalling the scene of +last night, the moment when I had denounced him, the curse he had +hurled at me, the half-told story of which that had seemed the climax. +I had wronged them. They did see the tragedy of it. + +Yes, they pitied me; but they showed plainly that they would still do +what perhaps I should have done in their place--justice. "He knows too +much!" said one. "Our lives are as good as his," muttered another--the +first to become thoroughly himself again--"why should we all die for +him?" The wolfish glare came back fast to their eyes. They handled +their weapons impatiently. They were longing to be away. At this +moment, when I saw I had indeed made my confession in vain, Master +Bertie struck in. "What," he said, "if Master Carey and I take charge +of him, and escorting him to his agent without, be answerable for both +of them?" + +"You would be only putting your necks into the noose!" said Kingston. + +"We will risk that!" replied my friend--and what a friend and what a +man he seemed amid that ignoble crew!--"I will myself promise you that +if he refuse to remain with us until midnight, or tries wherever we +are to raise an alarm or communicate with any one, I will run him +through with my own hand? Will not that satisfy you?" + +"No," Master Kingston retorted, "it will not! A bird in the hand is +worth two in the bush!" + +"But the woman outside?" said one timidly. + +"We must run that risk!" quoth he. "In an hour or two we shall be in +hiding. Come, the lot must be drawn. For this gentleman, let him stand +aside." + +I leaned against the wall, dazed and horror-stricken. Now that I had +identified myself with him I felt a great longing to save him. I +scarcely noticed the group drawing pieces of paper at the table. My +every thought was taken up with the low door over there, and the +wretched man lying bound in the darkness behind it. What must be the +horror, the black despair, the hate and defiance of his mind as he lay +there, trapped at last like any beast of prey? It was horrible! +horrible! horrible! + +I covered my face and could not restrain the cry of unutterable +distress which rose to my lips. They looked round, two or three of +them, from the table. But the impression my appeal had made upon them +had faded away already, and they only shrugged their shoulders and +turned again to their task. Master Bertie alone stood apart, his arms +folded, his face grave and dark. He too had abandoned hope. There +seemed no hope, when suddenly there came a knocking at the door. The +papers were dropped, and while some stood as if stiffened into stone, +others turned and gazed at their neighbors. It was a knocking more +hasty and imperative than the usual summons, though given in the same +fashion. At last a man found tongue. "It is Sir Thomas," he suggested, +with a sigh of relief. "He is in a hurry and brings news. I know his +knock." + +"Then open the door, fool," cried Kingston. "If you can see through a +two-inch plank, why do you stand there like a gaby?" + +Master Bertie anticipated the man, and himself opened the door and +admitted the knocker. Penruddocke it was; he came in, still drumming +on the door with his fist, his eyes sparkling, his ruddy cheeks aglow. +He crossed the threshold with a swagger, and looking at us all burst +into a strange peal of laughter. "Yoicks! Gone to earth!" he shouted, +waving his hand as if he had a whip in it. "Gone to earth--gone +forever! Did you think it was the Lords of the Council, my lads?" + +He had left the door wide open behind him, and we now saw in the +doorway the seafaring man who usually guarded the room above. "What +does this mean, Sir Thomas?" Kingston said sternly. He thought, I +fancy, as many of us did, that the knight was drunk. "Have you given +that man permission to leave his post?" + +"Post? There are no more posts," cried Sir Thomas, with a strange +jollity. He certainly was drunk, but perhaps not with liquor. "Except +good fat posts," he continued, smacking Master Bertie on the shoulder, +"for loyal men who have done the state service, and risked their lives +in evil times! Posts? I shall get so drunk to-night that the stoutest +post on Ludgate will not hold me up!" + +"You seem to have gone far that way already," my friend said coldly. + +"So will you, when you hear the news!" Penruddocke replied more +soberly. "Lads, the Queen is dying!" + +In the vaulted room his statement was received in silence; a silence +dictated by no feeling for the woman going before her Maker--how +should we who were plotting against her feel for her, we who were for +the most part homeless and proscribed through her?--but the silence of +men in doubt, in doubt whether this might mean all that from Sir +Thomas's aspect it seemed to mean. + +"She cannot live a week!" Penruddocke continued. "The doctors have +given up hope, and at the palace all is in confusion. She has named +the Princess Elizabeth her successor, and even now Cecil is drawing up +the proclamations. To show that the game is really up, the Count de +Feria, the Spanish Ambassador, has gone this very day to Hatfield to +pay his respects to the coming queen." + +Then indeed the vaulted roof did ring--ring and ring again with shouts +of "The Coming Queen!" Men over whom the wings of death had seemed a +minute ago to be hovering, darkening all things to them, looked up and +saw the sun. "The Coming Queen!" they cried. + +"You need fear nothing!" continued Penruddocke wildly. "No one will +dare to execute the warrants. The Bishops are shaking in their miters. +Pole is said to be dying. Bonner is more likely to hang himself than +burn others. Up and out and play the man! Away to your counties and +get ready your tar-barrels! Now we will give them a taste of the Cujus +Regio! Ho! drawer, there! A cup of ale!" + +He turned, and shouting a scrap of a song, swaggered back into the +shaft and began to ascend. They all trooped after him, talking and +laughing, a reckless, good-natured crew, looking to a man as if they +had never known fear or selfishness--as if distrust were a thing +impossible to them. Master Kingston alone, whom his losses had soured +and who still brooded over his revenge, went off moodily. + +I was for stopping one of them; but Master Bertie directed my eyes by +a gesture of his hand to the door at the far end of the cellar, and I +saw that the key was in the lock. He wrung my hand hard. "Tell him +all," he muttered. "I will wait above." + + + + + CHAPTER XXI. + + MY FATHER. + + +Tell him all? I stood thinking, my hand on the key. The voices of the +rearmost of the conspirators sounded more and more faintly as they +passed up the shaft, until their last accents died in the room above, +and silence followed; a silence in strange contrast with the bright +glare of the torches which burned round me and lit up the empty cellar +as for a feast. I was wondering what he would say when I told him +all--when I said "I am your son! I, whom Providence has used to thwart +your plans, whose life you sought, whom, without a thought of pity, +you left to perish! I am your son!" + +Infinitely I dreaded the moment when I should tell him this, and hear +his answer; and I lingered with my hand on the key until an abrupt +knocking on the other side of the door brought the blood to my face. +Before I could turn the key the hasty summons was repeated, and grew +to a frantic, hurried drumming on the boards--a sound which plainly +told of terror suddenly conceived and in an instant full-grown. A +hoarse cry followed, coming dully to my ears through the thickness of +the door, and the next moment the stout planks shook as a heavy weight +fell against them. + +I turned the key, and the door was flung open from within. My father +stumbled out. + +The strong light for an instant blinded him, and he blinked as an owl +does brought to the sunshine. Even in him the long hours passed in +solitude and the blackness of despair had worked changes. His hair was +grayer; in patches it was almost white, and then again dark. He had +gnawed his lower lip, and there were bloodstains on it. His mustache, +too, was ragged and torn, as if he had gnawed that also. His eyes were +bloodshot, his lean face was white and haggard and fierce. + +"Ha!" he cried, trembling, as he peered round, "I thought they had +left me to starve! There were rats in there! I thought----" + +He stopped. He saw me standing holding the edge of the door. He saw +that otherwise the room was empty, the farther door leading to the +shaft open. An open door! To him doubtless it seemed of all sights the +most wonderful, the most heavenly! His knees began to shake under him. + +"What is it?" he muttered. "What were they shouting about? I heard +them shouting." + +"The queen is dying," I answered simply, "or dead, and you can do us +no more harm. You are free." + +"Free?" He repeated the word, leaning against the wall, his eyes wild +and glaring, his lips parted. + +"Yes, free," I answered, in a lower voice--"free to go out into the +air of heaven a living man!" I paused. For a moment I could not +continue. Then I added solemnly, "Sir, Providence has saved you from +death, and me from a crime." + +He leaned still against the wall, dazed, thunderstruck, almost +incredulous, and looked from me to the open door and back again as if +without this constant testimony of his eyes he could not believe in +his escape. + +"It was not Anne?" he murmured. "She did not----" + +"She tried to save your life," I answered; "but they would not listen +to her." + +"Did she come here?" + +As he spoke, he straightened himself with an effort and stood up. He +was growing more like himself. + +"No," I answered. "She sent for me and told me her terms. But Kingston +and the others would not listen to them. You would have been dead now, +though I did all I could to save you, if Penruddocke had not brought +this news of the queen." + +"She is dead?" + +"She is dying. The Spanish Ambassador," I added, to clinch the matter, +for I saw he doubted, "rode through here this afternoon to pay his +court to the Princess Elizabeth at Hatfield." + +He looked down at the ground, thinking deeply. Most men would have +been unable to think at all, unable to concentrate their thoughts on +anything save their escape from death. But a life of daily risk and +hazard had so hardened this man that I was certain, as I watched him, +that he was not praying nor giving thanks. He was already pondering +how he might make the most out of the change; how he might to the best +advantage sell his knowledge of the government whose hours were +numbered to the government which soon would be. The life of intrigue +had become second nature to him. + +He looked up and our eyes met. We gazed at one another. + +"Why are you here?" he said curiously. "Why did they leave you? Why +were you the one to stop to set me free, Master Carey?" + +"My name is not Carey," I answered. + +"What is it, then?" he asked carelessly. + +"Cludde," I answered softly. + +"Cludde!" He called it out. Even his self-mastery could not cope with +this surprise. "Cludde," he said again--said it twice in a lower +voice. + +"Yes, Cludde," I answered, meeting and yet shrinking from his +questioning eyes, "my name is Cludde. So is yours. I tried to save +your life, because I learned from Mistress Anne----" + +I paused. I shrank from telling him that which, as it seemed to me, +would strike him to the ground in shame and horror. But he had no +fear. + +"What?" he cried. "What did you learn?" + +"That you are my father," I answered slowly. "I am Francis Cludde, the +son whom you deserted many years ago, and to whom Sir Anthony gave a +home at Coton." + +I expected him to do anything except what he did. He stared at me with +astonished eyes for a minute, and then a low whistle issued from his +lips. + +"My son, are you! My son!" he said coolly. "And how long have you +known this, young sir?" + +"Since yesterday," I murmured. The words he had used on that morning +at Santon, when he had bidden me die and rot, were fresh in my +memory--in my memory, not in his. I recalled his treachery to the +Duchess, his pursuit of us, his departure with Anne, the words in +which he had cursed me. He remembered apparently none of these things, +but simply gazed at me with a thoughtful smile. + +"I wish I had known it before," he said at last. "Things might have +been different. A pretty dutiful son you have been!" + +The sneer did me good. It recalled to my mind what Master Bertie had +said. + +"There can be no question of duty between us," I answered firmly. +"What duty I owe to any one of my family, I owe to my uncle." + +"Then why have you told me this?" + +"Because I thought it right you should know it," I answered, "were it +only that, knowing it, we may go different ways. We have nearly done +one another a mischief more than once," I added gravely. + +He laughed. He was not one whit abashed by the discovery, nor awed, +nor cast down. There was even in his cynical face a gleam of +kindliness and pride as he scanned me. We were almost of a height--I +the taller by an inch or two; and in our features I believe there was +a likeness, though not such as to invite remark. + +"You have grown to be a chip of the old block," he said coolly. "I +would as soon have you for a son as another. I think on the whole I am +pleased. You talked of Providence just now"--this with a laugh of +serene amusement--"and perhaps you were right. Perhaps there is such a +thing. For I am growing old, and lo! it gives me a son to take care of +me." + +I shook my head. I could never be that kind of son to him. + +"Wait a bit," he said, frowning slightly. "You think your side is up +and mine is down, and I can do you no good now, but only harm. You are +ashamed of me. Well, wait," he continued, nodding confidently. "Do not +be too sure that I cannot help you. I have been wrecked a dozen times, +but I never yet failed to find a boat that would take me to shore." + +Yes, he was so arrogant in the pride of his many deceits that an hour +after Heaven had stretched out its hand to save him, he denied its +power and took the glory to himself. I did not know what to say to +him, how to undeceive him, how to tell him that it was not the failure +of his treachery which shamed me, but the treachery itself. I could +only remain silent. + +And so he mistook me; and, after pondering a moment with his chin in +his hand, he continued: + +"I have a plan, my lad. The Queen dies. Well--I am no bigot--long live +the Queen and the Protestant religion! The down will be up and the up +down, and the Protestants will be everything. It will go hard then +with those who cling to the old faith." + +He looked at me with a crafty smile, his head on one side. + +"I do not understand," I said coldly. + +"Then listen. Sir Anthony, will hold by his religion. He used to be a +choleric gentleman, and as obstinate as a mule. He will need but to be +pricked up a little, and he will get into trouble with the authorities +as sure as eggs are eggs. I will answer for it. And then----" + +"Well?" I said grimly. How was I to observe even a show of respect for +him when I was quivering with fierce wrath and abhorrence? "Do you +think that will benefit _you?_" I cried. "Do you think that you are so +high in favor with Cecil and the Protestants that they will set you in +Sir Anthony's place? You!" + +He looked at me still more craftily, not put out by my indignation, +but rather amused by it. + +"No, lad, not me," he replied, with tolerant good-nature. "I am +somewhat blown upon of late. But Providence has not given me back my +son for nothing. I am not alone in the world now. I must remember my +family. I must think a little of others as well as of myself." + +"What do you mean?" I said, recoiling. + +He scanned me for a moment, with his eyes half-shut, his head on one +side. Then he laughed, a cynical, jarring laugh. + +"Good boy!" he said. "Excellent boy! He knows no more than he is told. +His hands are clean, and he has friends upon the winning side who will +not see him lose a chance, should a chance turn up. Be satisfied. Keep +your hands clean if you like, boy. We understand one another." + +He laughed again and turned away; and, much as I dreaded and disliked +him, there was something in the indomitable nature of the man which +wrung from me a meed of admiration. Could the best of men have +recovered more quickly from despair? Could the best of men, their +plans failing, have begun to spin fresh webs with equal patience? +Could the most courageous and faithful of those who have tried to work +the world's bettering, have faced the downfall of their hopes with +stouter hearts, with more genuine resignation? Bad as he was, he had +courage and endurance beyond the common. + +He came back to me when he had gone a few paces. + +"Do you know where my sword is?" he asked in a matter-of-fact tone, as +one might ask a question of an old comrade. + +I found it cast aside behind the door. He took it from me, grumbling +over a nick in the edge, which he had caused by some desperate blow +when he was seized. He fastened it on with an oath. I could not look +at the sword without remembering how nearly he had taken my life with +it. The recollection did not trouble him in the slightest. + +"Now farewell!" he said carelessly, "I am going to turn over a new +leaf, and begin returning good for evil. Do you go to your friends and +do your work, and I will go to my friends and do mine." + +Then with a nod he walked briskly away, and I heard him climb the +ladder and depart. + +What was he going to do? I was so deeply amazed by the interview that +I did not understand. I had thought him a wicked man, but I had not +conceived the hardness of his nature. As I stood alone looking round +the vault, I could hardly believe that I had met and spoken to my +father, and told him I was his son--and this was all! I could hardly +believe that he had gone away with this knowledge, unmoved and +unrepentant; alike unwarned by the Providence which had used me to +thwart his schemes, and untouched by the beneficence which had thrice +held him back from the crime of killing me--ay, proof even against the +long-suffering which had plucked him from the abyss and given him one +more chance of repentance. + + +I found Master Bertie in the stables waiting for me with some +impatience. Of which, upon the whole, I was glad. For I had no wish to +be closely questioned, and the account I gave him of the interview +might at another time have seemed disjointed and incoherent. He +listened to it, however, without remark; and his next words made it +clear that he had other matters in his mind. + +"I do not know what to do about fetching the Duchess over," he said. +"This news seems to be true, and she ought to be here." + +"Certainly," I agreed. + +"The country in general is well affected to the Princess Elizabeth," +he continued. "Yet the interests of the Bishops, of the Spanish +faction, and of some of the council, will lie in giving trouble. To +avoid this, we should show our strength. Therefore I want the Duchess +to come over with all speed. Will you fetch her?" he added sharply, +turning to me. + +"Will I?" I cried in surprise. + +"Yes, you. I cannot well go myself at this crisis. Will you go +instead?" + +"Of course I will," I answered. + +And the prospect cheered me wonderfully. It gave me something to do, +and opened my eyes to the great change of which Penruddocke had been +the herald, a change which was even then beginning. As we rode down +Highgate Hill that day, messengers were speeding north and south and +east and west, to Norwich and Bristol and Canterbury and Coventry and +York, with the tidings that the somber rule under which England had +groaned for five years and more was coming to an end. If in a dozen +towns of England they roped their bells afresh; if in every county, as +Penruddocke had prophesied, they got their tar-barrels ready; if all, +save a few old-fashioned folk and a few gloomy bigots and hysterical +women, awoke as from an evil dream; if even sensible men saw in the +coming of the young queen a panacea for all their ills--a quenching of +Smithfield fires, a Calais recovered, a cure for the worthless coinage +which hampered trade, and a riddance of worthless foreigners who +plundered it--with better roads, purer justice, a fuller Exchequer, +more favorable seasons--if England read all this in that news of +Penruddocke's, was it not something to us also? + +It was indeed. We were saved at the last moment from the dangerous +enterprise on which we had rashly embarked. We had now such prospects +before us as only the success of that scheme could have ordinarily +opened. Ease and honor instead of the gallows, and to lie warm instead +of creaking in the wind! Thinking of this, I fell into a better frame +of mind as I jogged along toward London. For what, after all, was my +father to me, that his existence should make me unhappy, or rob mine +of all pleasure? I had made a place for myself in the world. I had +earned friends for myself. He might take away my pride in the one, but +he could never rob me of the love of the others--of those who had +eaten and drunk and fought and suffered beside me, and for whom I too +had fought and suffered! + + * * * * * + +"A strange time for the swallows to come back," said my lady, turning +to smile at me, as I rode on her off-side. + + +It would have been strange, indeed, if there had been swallows in the +air. For it was the end of December. The roads were frost-bound and +the trees leafless. The east wind, gathering force in its rush across +the Essex marshes, whirled before it the last trophies of Hainault +Forest, and seemed, as it whistled by our ears and shaved our faces, +to grudge us the shelter to which we were hastening. The long train +behind us--for the good times of which we had talked so often had +come--were full of the huge fire we expected to find at the inn at +Barking--our last stage on the road to London. And if the Duchess and +I bore the cold more patiently, it was probably because we had more +food for thought--and perhaps thicker raiment. + +"Do not shake your head," she continued, glancing at me with mischief +in her eyes, "and flatter yourself you will not go back, but will go +on making yourself and some one else unhappy. You will do nothing of +the kind, Francis. Before the spring comes you and I will ride over +the drawbridge at Coton End, or I am a Dutchwoman!" + +"I cannot see that things are changed," I said. + +"Not changed?" she replied. "When you left, you were nobody. Now +you are somebody, if it be only in having a sister with a dozen +serving-men in her train. Leave it to me. And now, thank Heaven, we +are here! I am so stiff and cold, you must lift me down. We have not +to ride far after dinner, I hope." + +"Only seven miles," I answered, as the host, who had been warned by an +outrider to expect us, came running out with a tail at his heels. + +"What news from London, Master Landlord?" I said to him as he led us +through the kitchen, where there was indeed a great fire, but no +chimney, and so to a smaller room possessing both these luxuries. "Is +all quiet?" + +"Certainly, your worship," he replied, bowing and rubbing his hands. +"There never was such an accession, nor more ale drunk, nor powder +burned--and I have seen three--and there was pretty shouting at old +King Harry's, but not like this. Such a fair young queen, men report, +with a look of the stout king about her, and as prudent and discreet +as if she had changed heads with Sir William Cecil. God bless her, say +I, and send her a wise husband!" + +"And a loving one," quoth my lady prettily. "Amen." + +"I am glad all has gone off well," I continued, speaking to the +Duchess, as I turned to the blazing hearth. "If there had been blows, +I would fain have been here to strike one." + +"Nay, sir, not a finger has wagged against her," the landlord +answered, kicking the logs together--"to speak of, that is, your +worship. I do hear to-day of a little trouble down in Warwickshire. +But it is no more than a storm in a wash-tub, I am told." + +"In Warwickshire?" I said, arrested, in the act of taking off my +cloak, by the familiar name. "In what part, my man?" + +"I am not clear about that, sir, not knowing the country," he replied. +"But I heard that a gentleman there had fallen foul of her Grace's +orders about church matters, and beaten the officers sent to see them +carried out; and that, when the sheriff remonstrated with him, he beat +him too. But I warrant they will soon bring him to his senses." + +"Did you hear his name?" I asked. There was a natural misgiving in my +mind. Warwickshire was large; and yet something in the tale smacked of +Sir Anthony. + +"I did hear it," the host answered, scratching his head, "but I cannot +call it to mind. I think I should know it if I heard it." + +"Was it Sir Anthony Cludde?" + +"It was that very same name!" he exclaimed, clapping his hands in +wonder. "To be sure! Your worship has it pat!" + +I slipped back into my cloak again, and snatched up my hat and whip. +But the Duchess was as quick. She stepped between me and the door. + +"Sit down, Francis!" she said imperiously. "What would you be at?" + +"What would I be at?" I cried with emotion. "I would be with my uncle. +I shall take horse at once and ride Warwickshire way with all speed. +It is possible that I may be in time to avert the consequences. At +least I can see that my cousin comes to no harm." + +"Good lad," she said placidly. "You shall start tomorrow." + +"To-morrow!" I cried impatiently. "But time is everything, madam." + +"You shall start to-morrow," she repeated. "Time is not everything, +firebrand! If you start to-day what can you do? Nothing! No more than +if the thing had happened three years ago, before you met me. But +to-morrow--when you have seen the Secretary of State, as I promise you +you shall, this evening if he be in London--to-morrow you shall go in +a different character, and with credentials." + +"You will do this for me?" I exclaimed, leaping up and taking her +hand, for I saw in a moment the wisdom of the course she proposed. +"You will get me----" + +"I will get you something to the purpose," my lady answered roundly. +"Something that shall save your uncle if there be any power in England +can save him. You shall have it, Frank," she added, her color rising, +and her eyes filling, as I kissed her hand, "though I have to take +Master Secretary by the beard!" + + + + + CHAPTER XXII. + + SIR ANTHONY'S PURPOSE. + + +Late, as I have heard, on the afternoon of November 20, 1558, a man +riding between Oxford and Worcester, with the news of the queen's +death, caught sight of the gateway tower at Coton End, which is +plainly visible from the road. Though he had already drunk that day as +much ale as would have sufficed him for a week when the queen was +well, yet much wants more. He calculated he had time to stop and taste +the Squire's brewing, which he judged, from the look of the tower, +might be worth his news; and he rode through the gate and railed at +his nag for stumbling. + +Half way across the Chase he met Sir Anthony. The old gentleman was +walking out, with his staff in his hand and his dogs behind him, to +take the air before supper. The man, while he was still a hundred +paces off, began to wave his hat and shout something, which ale and +excitement rendered unintelligible. + +"What is the matter?" said Sir Anthony to himself. And he stood still. + +"The queen is dead!" shouted the messenger, swaying in his saddle. + +The knight stared. + +"Ay, sure!" he ejaculated after a while. And he took off his hat. "Is +it true, man?" + +"As true as that I left London yesterday afternoon and have never +drawn rein since!" swore the knave, who had been three days on the +road, and had drunk at every hostel and at half the manor-houses +between London and Oxford. + +"God rest her soul!" said Sir Anthony piously, still in somewhat of a +maze. "And do you come in! Come in, man, and take something." + +But the messenger had got his formula by heart, and was not to be +defrauded of any part of it. + +"God save the queen!" he shouted. And out of respect for the knight, +he slipped from his saddle and promptly fell on his back in the road. + +"Ay, to be sure, God save the queen!" echoed Sir Anthony, taking off +his hat again. "You are right, man!" Then he hurried on, not noticing +the messenger's mishap. The tidings he had heard seemed of such +importance, and he was so anxious to tell them to his household--for +the greatest men have weaknesses, and news such as this comes seldom +in a lifetime--that he strode on to the house, and over the drawbridge +into the courtyard, without once looking behind him. + +He loved order and decent observance. But there are times when a cat, +to get to the cream-pan, will wet its feet. He stood now in the middle +of the courtyard, and raising his voice, shouted for his daughter. +"Ho, Petronilla! do you hear, girl! Father! Father Carey! Martin +Luther! Baldwin!" and so on, until half the household were collected. +"Do you hear, all of you? The queen is dead! God rest her soul!" + +"Amen!" said Father Carey, as became him, putting in his word amid the +wondering silence which followed; while Martin Luther and Baldwin, who +were washing themselves at the pump, stood with their heads dripping +and their mouths agape. + +"Amen!" echoed the knight. "And long live the queen! Long live Queen +Elizabeth!" he continued, having now got his formula by heart. And he +swung his hat. + +There was a cheer, a fairly loud cheer. But there was one who did not +join in it, and that was Petronilla. She, listening at her lattice +upstairs, began at once to think, as was her habit when any matter +great or small fell out, whether this would affect the fortunes of a +certain person far away. It might, it might not; she did not know. But +the doubt so far entertained her that she came down to supper with a +heightened color, not thinking in the least, poor girl, that the event +might have dire consequences for others almost as dear to her, and +nearer home. + +Every year since his sudden departure a letter from Francis Cludde had +come to Coton; a meager letter, which had passed through many hands, +and reached Sir Anthony now through one channel, now through another. +The knight grumbled and swore over these letters, which never +contained an address to which an answer could be forwarded, nor said +much, save that the writer was well and sent his love and duty, and +looked to return, all being well. But, meager as they were, and loud +as he swore over them, he put them religiously away in an oak-chest in +his parlor; and another always put away for her share something else, +which was invariably inclosed--a tiny swallow's feather. The knight +never said anything about the feather; neither asked the meaning of +its presence, nor commented upon its absence when Petronilla gave him +back the letter. But for days after each of these arrivals he would +look much at his daughter, would follow her about with his eyes, be +more regular in bidding her attend him in his walk, and more +particular in seeing that she had the tidbits of the joint. + +For Petronilla, it cannot be said, though I think in after times she +would have liked to make some one believe it, that she wasted away. +But she did take a more serious and thoughtful air in these days, +which she never, God bless her, lost afterward. There came from +Wootton Wawen and from Henley in Arden and from Cookhill gentlemen of +excellent estate, to woo her. But they all went away disconsolate +after drinking very deeply of Sir Anthony's ale and strong waters. And +some wondered that the good knight did not roundly take the jade to +task and see her settled. + +But he did not; so possibly even in these days he had other views. I +have been told that, going up once to her little chamber to seek her, +he found a very singular ornament suspended inside her lattice. It was +no other than a common clay house-martin's nest. But it was so deftly +hung in a netted bag, and so daintily swathed in moss always green, +and the Christmas roses and snowdrops and violets and daffodils which +decked it in turn were always so pure and fresh and bright--as the +knight learned by more than one stealthy visit afterward--that, coming +down the steep steps, he could not see clearly, and stumbled against a +cook-boy, and beat him soundly for getting in his way. + + +To return, however. The news of the queen's death had scarcely been +well digested at Coton, nor the mass for her soul, which Father Carey +celebrated with much devotion, been properly criticised, before +another surprise fell upon the household. Two strangers arrived, +riding late one evening, and rang the great bell while all were at +supper. Baldwin and the porter went to see what it was, and brought +back a message which drew the knight from his chair, as a terrier +draws a rat. + +"You are drunk!" he shouted, purple in the face, and fumbling for the +stick which usually leaned against his seat ready for emergencies. +"How dare you bring cock-and-bull stories to me?" + +"It is true enough!" muttered Baldwin sullenly: a stout, dour man, not +much afraid of his master, but loving him exceedingly. "I knew him +again myself." + +Sir Anthony strode firmly out of the room, and in the courtyard near +the great gate found a man and a woman standing in the dusk. He walked +up to the former and looked him in the face. "What do you here?" he +said, in a strange, hard voice. + +"I want shelter for a night for myself and my wife; a meal and some +words with you--no more," was the answer. "Give me this," the stranger +continued, "which every idle passer-by may claim at Coton End, and you +shall see no more of me, Anthony." + +For a moment the knight seemed to hesitate. Then he answered, pointing +sternly with his hand, "There is the hall and supper. Go and eat and +drink. Or, stay!" he resumed. And he turned and gave some orders to +Baldwin, who went swiftly to the hall, and in a moment came again. +"Now go! What you want the servants will prepare for you." + +"I want speech of you," said the newcomer. + +Sir Anthony seemed about to refuse, but thought better of it. "You can +come to my room when you have supped," he said, in the same ungracious +tone, speaking with his eyes averted. + +"And you--do you not take supper?" + +"I have finished," said the knight, albeit he had eaten little. And he +turned on his heel. + +Very few of those who sat round the table and watched with +astonishment the tall stranger's entrance knew him again. It was +thirteen years since Ferdinand Cludde had last sat there; sitting +there of right. And the thirteen years had worked much change in him. +When he found that Petronilla, obeying her father's message, had +disappeared, he said haughtily that his wife would sup in her own +room; and with a flashing eye and curling lip, bade Baldwin see to it. +Then, seating himself in a place next Sir Anthony's, he looked down +the board at which all sat silent. His sarcastic eye, his high +bearing, his manner--the manner of one who had gone long with his life +in his hand--awed these simple folk. Then, too, he was a Cludde. +Father Carey was absent that evening. Martin Luther had one of those +turns, half-sick, half-sullen, which alternated with his moods of +merriment; and kept his straw pallet in some corner or other. There +was no one to come between the servants and this dark-visaged +stranger, who was yet no stranger. + +He had his way and his talk with Sir Anthony; the latter lasting far +into the night and producing odd results. In the first place, the +unbidden guest and his wife stayed on over next day, and over many +days to come, and seemed gradually to grow more and more at home. The +knight began to take long walks and rides with his brother, and from +each walk and ride came back with a more gloomy face and a curter +manner. Petronilla, his companion of old, found herself set aside for +her uncle, and cast, for society, on Ferdinand's wife, the strange +young woman with the brilliant eyes, whose odd changes from grave to +gay rivaled Martin Luther's; and who now scared the girl by wild +laughter and wilder gibes, and now moved her to pity by fits of +weeping or dark moods of gloom. That Uncle Ferdinand's wife stood in +dread of her husband, Petronilla soon learned, and even began to share +this dread, to shrink from his presence, and to shut herself up more +and more closely in her own chamber. + +There was another, too, who grew to be troubled about this time, and +that was Father Carey. The good-natured, easy priest received with joy +and thankfulness the news that Ferdinand Cludde had seen his errors +and re-entered the fold. But when he had had two or three interviews +with the convert, his brow, too, grew clouded, and his mind troubled. +He learned to see that the accession of the young Protestant queen +must bear fruit for which he had a poor appetite. He began to spend +many hours in the church--the church which he had known all his +life--and wrestled much with himself--if his face were any index to +his soul. Good, kindly man, he was not of the stuff of which martyrs +are made; and to be forced, pushed on, and goaded into becoming a +martyr against one's will--well, the Father's position was a hard one. +As was that in those days of many a good and learned clergyman bred in +one church, and bidden suddenly, on pain of losing his livelihood, if +not his life, to migrate to another. + +The visitors had been in the house a month--and in that month an +observant eye might have noted much change, though all things in +seeming went on as before--when the queen's orders enjoining all +priests to read the service, or a great part of it, in English, came +down, being forwarded by the sheriff to Father Carey. The missive +arrived on a Friday, and had been indeed long expected. + +"What shall you do?" Ferdinand asked Sir Anthony. + +"As before!" the tall old man replied, gripping his staff more firmly. +It was no new subject between them. A hundred times they had discussed +it already, even as they were now discussing it on the terrace by the +fish-pool, with the church which adjoins the house full in view across +the garden. "I will have no mushroom faith at Coton End," the knight +continued warmly. "It sprang up under King Henry, and how long did it +last? A year or two. It came in again under King Edward, and how long +did it last? A year or two. So it will be again. It will not last, +Ferdinand." + +"I am of that mind," the younger man answered, nodding his head +gravely. + +"Of course you are!" Sir Anthony rejoined, as he rested one hand on +the sundial. "For ten generations our forefathers have worshiped in +that church after the old fashion--and shall it be changed in my day? +Heaven forbid! The old fashion did for my fathers; it shall do for me. +Why, I would as soon expect that the river yonder should flow backward +as that the church which has stood for centuries, and more years to +the back of them than I can count, should be swept away by these Hot +Gospelers! I will have none of them! I will have no new-fangled ways +at Coton End!" + +"Well, I think you are right!" the younger brother said. By what means +he had brought the knight to this mind without committing himself more +fully, I cannot tell. Yet so it was. Ferdinand showed himself always +the cautious doubter. Father Carey even must have done him that +justice. But--and this was strange--the more doubtful he showed +himself, the more stubborn grew his brother. There are men so shrewd +as to pass off stones for bread; and men so simple-minded as to take +something less than the word for the deed. + +"Why should it come in our time?" cried Sir Anthony fractiously. + +"Why indeed?" quoth the subtle one. + +"I say, why should it come now? I have heard and read of the sect +called Lollards who gave trouble a while ago. But they passed, and the +church stood. So will these Gospelers pass, and the church will +stand." + +"That is our experience certainly," said Ferdinand. + +"I hate change!" the old man continued, his eyes on the old church, +the old timbered house--for only the gateway tower at Coton is of +stone--the old yew trees in the churchyard. "I do not believe in it, +and, what is more, I will not have it. As my fathers have worshiped, +so will I, though it cost me every rood of land! A fig for the Order +in Council!" + +"If you really will not change with the younger generations----" + +"I will not!" replied the old knight sharply. "There is an end of it!" + +To-day the Reformed Church in England has seen many an anniversary, +and grown stronger with each year; and we can afford to laugh at Sir +Anthony's arguments. We know better than he did, for the proof of the +pudding is in the eating. But in him and his fellows, who had only the +knowledge of their own day, such arguments were natural enough. All +time, all experience, all history and custom and habit, as known to +them, were on their side. Only it was once again to be the battle of +David and the Giant of Gath. + +Sir Anthony had said, "There is an end of it!" But his companion, as +he presently strolled up to the house with a smile on his saturnine +face, well knew that this was only the beginning of it. This was +Friday. + + +On the Sunday, a rumor of the order having gone abroad, a larger +congregation than usual streamed across the Chase to church, prepared +to hear some new thing. They were disappointed. Sir Anthony stalked in +as of old, through the double ranks of people waiting at the door to +receive him; and after him Ferdinand and his wife, and Petronilla and +Baldwin, and every servant from the house save a cook or two and the +porter. The church was full. Seldom had such a congregation been seen +in it. But all passed as of old. Father Carey's hand shook, indeed, +and his voice quavered; but he went through the ceremony of the mass, +and all was done in Latin. A little change would have been pleasant, +some thought. But no one in this country place on the borders of the +forest held very strong views. No bishop had come heretic-hunting to +Coton End. No abbey existed to excite dislike by its extravagance or +by its license or by the swarm of ragged idlers it supported. Father +Carey was the most harmless and kindest of men. The villagers did not +care one way or the other. To them Sir Anthony was king. And if any +one felt tempted to interfere, the old knight's face, as he gazed +steadfastly at the brass effigy of a Cludde, who had fallen in Spain +fighting against the Moors, warned the meddler to be silent. + +And so on that Sunday all went well. But some one must have told +tales, for early in the week there came a strong letter of +remonstrance from the sheriff, who was an old friend of Sir Anthony, +and of his own free will, I fancy, would have winked. But he was +committed to the Protestants, and bound to stand or fall with them. +The choleric knight sent back an answer by the same messenger. The +sheriff replied, the knight rejoined--having his brother always at his +elbow. The upshot of the correspondence was an announcement on the +part of the sheriff that he should send his officers to the next +service, to see that the queen's order was obeyed; and a reply on the +part of Sir Anthony that he should as certainly put the men in the +duck-pond. Some inkling of this state of things got abroad, and spread +as a September fire flies through a wood; so that there was like to be +such a congregation at the next service to witness the trial of +strength, as would throw the last Sunday's gathering altogether into +the shade. + +It was clear at last that Sir Anthony himself did not think that here +was the end of it. For on that Saturday afternoon he took a remarkable +walk. He called Petronilla after dinner, and bade her get her hood +and come with him. And the girl, who had seen so little of her father +in the last month, and who, what with rumors and fears and surmises, +was eating her heart out, obeyed him with joy. It was a fine frosty +day near the close of December. Sir Anthony led the way over the +plank-bridge which crossed the moat in the rear of the house, and +tramped steadily through the home farm toward a hill called the +Woodman's View, which marked the border of the forest. He did not +talk, but neither was he sunk in reverie. As he entered each field he +stood and scanned it, at times merely nodding, at times smiling, or +again muttering a few words such as, "The three-acre piece! My father +inclosed it!" or, "That is where Ferdinand killed the old mare!" or, +"The best land for wheat on this side of the house!" The hill climbed, +he stood a long time gazing over the landscape, eying first the fields +and meadows which stretched away from his feet toward the house; the +latter, as seen from this point, losing all its stateliness in the +mass of stacks and ricks and barns and granaries which surrounded it. +Then his eyes traveled farther in the same line to the broad expanse +of woodland--Coton Chase--through which the road passed along a ridge +as straight as an arrow. To the right were more fields, and here and +there amid them a homestead with its smaller ring of stacks and barns. +When he turned to the left, his eyes, passing over the shoulders of +Barnt Hill and Mill Head Copse and Beacon Hill, all bulwarks of the +forest, followed the streak of river as it wound away toward Stratford +through luscious flood meadows, here growing wide, and there narrow, +as the woodland advanced or retreated. + +"It is all mine," he said, as much to himself as to the girl. "It is +all Cludde land as far as you can see." + +There were tears in her eyes, and she had to turn away to conceal +them. Why, she hardly knew. For he said nothing more, and he walked +down the hill dry-eyed. But all the way home he still looked sharply +about, noting this or that, as if he were bidding farewell to the old +familiar objects, the spinneys and copses--ay, and the very gates and +gaps and the hollow trees where the owls built. It was the saddest and +most pathetic walk the girl had ever taken. Yet there was nothing +said. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIII. + + THE LAST MASS. + + +The north wall of the church at Coton End is only four paces from the +house, the church standing within the moat. Isolated as the sacred +building, therefore, is from the outer world by the wide-spreading +Chase, and close-massed with the homestead, Sir Anthony had some +excuse for considering it as much a part of his demesne as the mill or +the smithy. In words he would have been willing to admit a +distinction; but in thought I fancy he lumped it with the rest of his +possessions. + +It was with a lowering eye that on this Sunday morning he watched from +his room over the gateway the unusual stream of people making for the +church. Perchance he had in his mind other Sundays--Sundays when he +had walked out at this hour, light of heart and kind of eye, with his +staff in his fist and his glove dangling, and his dog at his heels; +and, free from care, had taken pleasure in each bonnet doffed and +each old wife's "God bless ye, Sir Anthony!" Well, those days were +gone. Now the rain dripped from the eaves--for a thaw had come in the +night--and the bells, that could on occasion ring so cheerily, sounded +sad and forlorn. His daughter, when she came, according to custom, +bringing his great service-book, could scarcely look him in the face. +I know not whether even then his resolution to dare all might not, at +sound of a word from her, or at sight of her face, have melted like +yesterday's ice. But before the word could be spoken, or the eyes +meet, another step rang on the stone staircase and brother Ferdinand +entered. + +"They are here!" he said in a low voice. "Six of them, Anthony, and +sturdy fellows, as all Clopton's men are. If you do not think your +people will stand by you----" + +The knight fired at this suggestion. "What!" he burst out, turning +from the window, "if Cludde men cannot meet Clopton men the times are +indeed gone mad! Make way and let me come! Though the mass be never +said again in Coton church, it shall be said to-day!" And he swore a +great oath. + +He strode down the stairs and under the gateway, where were arranged, +according to the custom of the house on wet days, all the servants, +with Baldwin and Martin Luther at their head. The knight stalked +through them with a gloomy brow. His brother followed him, a faint +smile flickering about the corners of his mouth. Then came Ferdinand's +wife and Petronilla, the latter with her hood drawn close about her +face, Anne with her chin in the air and her eyes aglow. "It is not a +bit of a bustle will scare her!" Baldwin muttered, as he fell in +behind her, and eyed her back with no great favor. + +"No--so long as it does not touch her," Martin replied in a cynical +whisper. "She is well mated! Well mated and ill fated! Ha! ha!" + +"Silence, fool," growled his companion angrily. "Is this a time for +antics?" + +"Ay, it is!" Martin retorted swiftly, though with the same caution. +"For when wise men turn fools, fools are put to it to act up to their +profession! You see, brother?" And he deliberately cut a caper. His +eyes were glittering, and the nerves on one side of his face twitched +oddly. Baldwin looked at him, and muttered that Martin was going to +have one of his mad fits. What had grown on the fool of late? + +The knight reached the church porch and passed through the crowd which +awaited him there. Save for its unusual size and some strange faces to +be seen on its skirts, there was no indication of trouble. He walked, +tapping his stick on the pavement a little more loudly than usual, to +his place in the front pew. The household, the villagers, the +strangers, pressed in behind him until every seat was filled. Even the +table monument of Sir Piers Cludde, which stood lengthwise in the +aisle, was seized upon, and if the two similar monuments which stood +to right and left below the chancel steps had not been under the +knight's eyes, they too would have been invaded. Yet all was done +decently and in order, with a clattering of rustic boots indeed, but +no scrambling or ill words. The Clopton men were there. Baldwin had +marked them well, and so had a dozen stout fellows, sons of Sir +Anthony's tenants. But they behaved, discreetly, and amid such a +silence as Father Carey never remembered to have faced, he began the +Roman service. + + +The December light fell faintly through the east window on the Father +at his ministrations, on his small acolytes, on the four Cludde +brasses before the altar. It fell everywhere--on gray dusty walls +buttressed by gray tombs which left but a narrow space in the middle +of the chancel. The marble crusader to the left matched the canopied +bed of Sir Anthony's parents on the right; the Abbess's tomb in the +next row faced the plainer monument of Sir Anthony's wife, a vacant +place by her side awaiting his own effigy. And there were others. The +chancel was so small--nay, the church too--so small and old and gray +and solid, and the tombs were so massive, that they elbowed one +another. The very dust which rose as men stirred was the dust of +Cluddes. Sir Anthony's brow relaxed. He listened gravely and sadly. + +And then the interruption came. "I protest!" a rough voice in rear of +the crowd cried suddenly, ringing harshly and strangely above the +Father's accents and the solemn hush. "I protest against this +service!" + +A thrill of astonishment ran through the crowd, and all rose. Every +man in the church turned round, Sir Anthony among the first, and +looked in the direction of the voice. Then it was seen that the +Clopton men had massed themselves about the door in the southwest +corner--a strong position, whence retreat was easy. Father Carey, +after a momentary glance, went on as if he had not heard; but his +voice shook, and all still waited with their faces turned toward the +west end. + +"I protest in the name of the Queen!" the same man cried sharply, +while his fellows raised a murmur so that the priest's voice was +drowned. + +Sir Anthony stepped into the aisle, his face inflamed with anger. The +interruption taking place there, in that place, seemed to him a double +profanation. + +"Who is that brawler?" he said, his hand trembling on his staff; and +all the old dames trembled too. "Let him stand out." + +The sheriff's spokesman was so concealed by his fellows that he could +not be seen; but he answered civilly enough. + +"I am no brawler," he said. "I only require the law to be observed; +and that you know, sir. I am here on behalf of the sheriff; and I warn +all present that a continuation of this service will expose them to +grievous pains and penalties. If you desire it, I will read the royal +order to prove that I do not speak without warrant." + +"Begone, knave, you and your fellows!" Sir Anthony cried. A loyal man +in all else, and the last to deny the queen's right or title, he had +no reasonable answer to give, and could only bluster. "Begone, do you +hear?" he repeated; and he rapped his staff on the pavement, and then, +raising it, pointed to the door. + +All Coton thought the men must go; but the men, perhaps, because they +were Clopton, did not go. And Sir Anthony had not so completely lost +his head as to proceed to extremities except in the last resort. +Affecting to consider the incident at an end, he stepped back into his +pew without waiting to see whether the man obeyed him or no, and +resumed his devotions. Father Carey, at a nod from him, went on with +the interrupted service. + +But again the priest had barely read a dozen lines before the same man +made the congregation start by crying loudly, "Stop!" + +"Go on!" shouted Sir Anthony in a voice of thunder. + +"At your peril!" retorted the intervener. + +"Go on!" from Sir Anthony again. + +Father Carey stood silent, trembling and looking from one to the +other. Many a priest of his faith would have risen on the storm and in +the spirit of Hildebrand hurled his church's curse at the intruder. +But the Father was not of these, and he hesitated, fumbling with his +surplice with his feeble white hands. He feared as much for his patron +as for himself; and it was on the knight that his eyes finally rested. +But Sir Anthony's brow was black; he got no comfort there. So the +Father took courage and a long breath, opened his mouth and read on, +amid the hush of suppressed excitement, and of such anger and stealthy +defiance as surely English church had never seen before. As he read, +however, he gathered courage, and his voice strength. The solemn +words, so ancient, so familiar, fell on the stillness of the church, +and awed even the sheriff's men. To the surprise of nearly every one, +there was no further interruption; the service ended quietly. + +So after all Sir Anthony had his way, and stalked out, stiff and +unbending. Nor was there any falling off, but rather an increase in +the respect with which his people rose, according to custom, as he +passed. Yet under that increase of respect lay a something which cut +the old man to the heart. He saw that his dependents pitied him while +they honored him; that they thought him a fool for running his head +against a stone wall--as Martin Luther put it--even while they felt +that there was something grand in it too. + +During the rest of the day he went about his usual employments, but +probably with little zest. He had done what he had done without any +very clear idea how he was going to proceed. Between his loyalty in +all else and his treason in this, it would not have been easy for a +Solomon to choose a consistent path. And Sir Anthony was no Solomon. +He chose at last to carry himself as if there were no danger--as if +the thing which had happened were unimportant. He ordered no change +and took no precautions. He shut his ears to the whispering which went +on among the servants, and his eyes to the watch which by some secret +order of Baldwin was kept upon the Ridgeway. + +It was something of a shock to him, therefore, when his daughter came +to him after breakfast next morning, looking pale and heavy-eyed, and, +breaking through the respect which had hitherto kept her silent, +begged him to go away. + +"To go away?" he cried. He rose from his oak chair and glared at her. +Then his feelings found their easiest vent in anger. "What do you +mean, girl?" he blustered, "Go away? Go where?" + +But she did not quail. Indeed she had her suggestion ready. + +"To the Mere Farm in the Forest, sir," she answered earnestly. "They +will not look for you there; and Martin says----" + +"Martin? The fool!" + +His face grew redder and redder. This was too much. He loved order and +discipline; and to be advised in such matters by a woman and a fool! +It was intolerable! + +"Go to, girl!" he cried, fuming. "I wondered where you had got your +tale so pat. So you and the fool have been putting your heads +together! Go! Go and spin, and leave these maters to men! Do you think +that my brother, after traveling the world over, has not got a head on +his shoulders? Do you think, if there were danger, he and I would not +have foreseen it?" + +He waved his hand and turned away expecting her to go. But Petronilla +did not go. She had something else to say and though the task was +painful she was resolved to say it. + +"Father, one word," she murmured. "About my uncle." + +"Well, well! What about him?" + +"I distrust him, sir," she ventured, in a low tone, her color rising. +"The servants do not like him. They fear him, and suspect him of I +know not what." + +"The servants!" Sir Anthony answered in an awful tone. + +Indeed it was not the wisest thing she could have said; but the +consequences were averted by a sudden alarm and shouting outside. Half +a dozen voices, shrill or threatening, seemed to rise at once. The +knight strode to the window, but the noise appeared to come, not from +the Chase upon which it looked, but from the courtyard or the rear of +the house. Sir Anthony caught up his stick, and, followed by the girl, +ran down the steps. He pushed aside half a dozen women who had +likewise been attracted by the noise, and hastened through the narrow +passage which led to the wooden bridge in the rear of the buildings. + +Here, in the close on the far side of the moat, a strange scene was +passing. A dozen horsemen were grouped in the middle of the field +about a couple of prisoners, while round the gate by which they had +entered stood as many stout men on foot, headed by Baldwin and armed +with pikes and staves. These seemed to be taunting the cavaliers and +daring them to come on. On the wooden bridge by which the knight stood +were half a dozen of the servants, also armed. Sir Anthony recognized +in the leading horseman Sir Philip Clopton, and in the prisoners +Father Carey and one of the woodmen; and in a moment he comprehended +what had happened. + +The sheriff, in the most unneighborly manner, instead of challenging +his front door, had stolen up to the rear of the house, and, without +saying with your leave or by your leave, had snapped up the poor +priest, who happened to be wandering in that direction. Probably he +had intended to force an entrance; but he had laid aside the plan when +he saw his only retreat menaced by the watchful Baldwin, who was not +to be caught napping. The knight took all this in at a glance, and his +gorge rose as much at the Clopton men's trick as at the danger in +which Father Carey stood. So he lost his head, and made matters worse. +"Who are these villains," he cried in a rage, his face aflame, "who +come attacking men's houses in time of peace? Begone, or I will have +at ye!" + +"Sir Anthony!" Clopton cried, interrupting him, "in Heaven's name do +not carry the thing farther! Give me way in the Queen's name, and I +will----" + + +What he would do was never known, for at that last word, away at the +house, behind Sir Anthony, there was a puff of smoke, and down went +the sheriff headlong, horse and man, while the report of an arquebuse +rang dully round the buildings. The knight gazed horrified; but the +damage was done and could not be undone. Nay, more, the Coton men took +the sound for a signal. With a shout, before Sir Anthony could +interfere, they made a dash for the group of horsemen. The latter, +uncertain and hampered by the fall of their leader, who was not hit, +but was stunned beyond giving orders, did the best they could. They +let their prisoners go with a curse, and then, raising Sir Philip and +forming a rough line, they charged toward the gate by which they had +entered. + +The footmen stood the brunt gallantly, and for a moment the sharp +ringing of quarter-staves and the shivering of steel told of as pretty +a combat as ever took place on level sward in full view of an English +home. The spectators could see Baldwin doing wonders. His men backed +him up bravely. But in the end the impetus of the horses told, the +footmen gave way and fled aside, and the strangers passed them. A +little more skirmishing took place at the gateway, Sir Anthony's men +being deaf to all his attempts to call them off; and then the Clopton +horse got clear, and, shaking their fists and vowing vengeance, rode +off toward the forest. They left two of their men on the field, +however, one with a broken arm and one with a shattered knee-cap; +while the house party, on their side, beside sundry knocks and +bruises, could show one deep sword-cut, a broken wrist, and half a +dozen nasty wounds. + +"My poor little girl!" Sir Anthony whispered to himself, as he gazed +with scared eyes at the prostrate men and the dead horse, and +comprehended what had happened. "This is a hanging business! In arms +against the Queen! What am I to do?" And as he went back to the house +in a kind of stupor, he muttered again, "My little girl! my poor +little girl!" + +I fancy that in this terrible crisis he looked to get support and +comfort from his brother--that old campaigner, who had seen so many +vicissitudes and knew by heart so many shifts. But Ferdinand, though +he thought the event unlucky, had little to say and less to suggest; +and seemed, indeed, to have become on a sudden flaccid and lukewarm. +Sir Anthony felt himself thrown on his own resources. "Who fired the +shot?" he asked, looking about the room in a dazed fashion. "It was +that which did the mischief," he continued, forgetting his own hasty +challenge. + +"I think it must have been Martin Luther," Ferdinand answered. + +But Martin Luther, when he was accused, denied this stoutly. He had +been so far along the Ridgeway, he said, that though he had returned +at once on hearing the shot fired, he had arrived too late for the +fight. The fool's stomach for a fight was so well known that this +seemed probable enough, and though some still suspected him, the +origin of the unfortunate signal was never clearly determined, though +in after days shrewd guesses were made by some. + +For a few hours it seemed as if Sir Anthony had sunk into his former +state of indecision. But when Petronilla came again to him soon after +noon to beg him to go into hiding, she found his mood had altered. "Go +to the Mere Farm?" he said, not angrily now, but firmly and quietly. +"No, girl, I cannot. I have been in fault, and I must stay and pay for +it. If I left these poor fellows to bear the brunt, I could never hold +up my head again. But do you go now and tell Baldwin to come to me." + +She went and told the stern, down-looking steward, and he came up. + +"Baldwin," said the knight when the door was shut, and the two were +alone, "you are to dismiss to their homes all the tenants--who have +indeed been called out without my orders. Bid them go and keep the +peace, and I hope they will not be molested. For you and Father Carey, +you must go into hiding. The Mere Farm will be best." + +"And what of you, Sir Anthony?" the steward asked, amazed at this act +of folly. + +"I shall remain here," the knight replied with dignity. + +"You will be taken," said Baldwin, after a pause. + +"Very well," said the knight. + +The man shrugged his shoulders, and was silent. + +"What do you mean?" asked Sir Anthony in anger. + +"Why, just that I cannot do it," Baldwin answered, glowering at him +with a flush on his dark cheek. "That is what I mean. Let the priest +go. I cannot go, and will not." + +"Then you will be hanged!" quoth the knight warmly. "You have been in +arms against the Queen, you fool! You will be hanged as sure as you +stay here!" + +"Then I shall be hanged," replied the steward sullenly. "There never +was a Cludde hanged yet without one to keep him company. To hear of it +would make my grandsire turn in his grave out there. I dare not do it, +Sir Anthony, and that is the fact. But for the rest I will do as you +bid me." + +And he had his way. But never had evening fallen more strangely and +sadly at Coton before. The rain pattered drearily in the courtyard. +The drawbridge, by Baldwin's order, had been pulled up, and the planks +over the moat in the rear removed. + +"They shall not steal upon us again!" he muttered. "And if we must +surrender, they shall see we do it willingly." + +The tenants had gone to their homes and their wives. Only the servants +remained. They clustered, solemn and sorrowful, about the hearth in +the great hall, starting if a dog howled without or a coal flew from +the fire within. Sir Anthony remained brooding in his own room, +Petronilla sitting beside him silent and fearful, while Ferdinand and +his wife moved restlessly about, listening to the wind. But the +evening and the night wore peacefully away, and so, to the surprise of +everybody, did the next day and the next. Could the sheriff be going +to overlook the matter? Alas! on the third day the doubt was resolved. +Two or three boys, who had been sent out as scouts, came in with news +that there was a strong watch set on the Ridgeway, that the paths +through the forest were guarded, that bodies of armed men were +arriving in the neighboring villages, and that soldiers had been +demanded--or so it was said--from Warwick and Worcester, and even from +a place as far away as Oxford. Probably it was only the sheriff's +prudence which had postponed the crisis; and now it had come. The net +was drawn all round. As the day closed in on Coton and the sun set +angrily among the forest trees, the boys' tale, which grew no doubt in +the telling, passed from one to another, and men swore and looked out +of window, and women wept in corners. In the Tower-room Sir Anthony +sat awaiting the summons, and wondered what he could to save his +daughter from possible rudeness, or even hurt, at the hands of these +strangers. + +There was one man missing from hall and kitchen, but few in the +suspense noticed his absence. The fool had heard the boys' story, and, +unable to remain inactive under such excitement, he presently stole +off in the dusk to the rear of the house. Here he managed to cross the +moat by means of a plank, which he then drew over and hid in the +grass. This quietly managed--Baldwin, be it said, had strictly +forbidden any one to leave the house--Martin made off with a grim +chuckle toward the forest, and following the main track leading toward +Wootton Wawen, presently came among the trees upon a couple of +sentinels. They heard him, saw him indistinctly, and made a rush for +him. But this was just the sport Martin liked, and the fun he had come +for. His quick ear apprised him of the danger, and in a second he was +lost in the underwood, his mocking laugh and shrill taunts keeping the +poor men on the shudder for the next ten minutes. Then the uncanny +accents died away, and, satisfied with his sport and the knowledge he +had gained, the fool made for home. As he sped quickly across the last +field, however, he was astonished by the sight of a dark figure in the +very act of launching his--Martin's--plank across the moat. + +"Ho, ho!" the fool muttered in a fierce undertone. "That is it, is it? +And only one! If they will come one by one, like the plums in the +kitchen porridge, I shall make a fine meal!" + +He stood back, crouching down on the grass, and watched the unknown, +his eyes glittering. The stranger was a tall, big fellow, a formidable +antagonist. But Martin cared nothing for that. Had he not his long +knife, as keen as his wits--when they were at home, which was not +always. He drew it out now, and under cover of the darkness crept +nearer and nearer, his blood glowing pleasantly, though the night was +cold. How lucky it was he had come out! He could hardly restrain the +"Ho, ho!" which rose to his lips. He meant to leap upon the man on +this side of the water, that there might be no tell-tale traces on the +farther bank. + +But the stranger was too quick for him in this. He got his bridge +fixed, and began to cross before Martin could crawl near enough. As he +crossed, however, his feet made a slight noise on the plank, and under +cover of it the fool rose and ran forward, then followed him over with +the stealthiness of a cat. And like a cat too, the moment the +stranger's foot touched the bank, Martin sprang on him with his knife +raised--sprang on him silently, with his teeth grinning and his eyes +aflame. + + + + + CHAPTER XXIV. + + AWAITING THE BLOW. + + +A moment later the servants in the hall heard a scream--a scream of +such horror and fear that they scarcely recognized a human voice in +the sound. They sprang to their feet scared and trembling, and for a +few seconds looked into one another's faces. Then, as curiosity got +the upper hand, the boldest took the lead and all hurried pell-mell to +the door, issuing in a mob into the courtyard, where Ferdinand Cludde, +who happened to be near and had also heard the cry, joined them. +"Where was it, Baldwin?" he exclaimed. + +"At the back, I think," the steward answered. He alone had had the +coolness to bring out a lantern, and he now led the way toward the +rear of the house. Sure enough, close to the edge of the moat, they +found Martin, stooping with his hands on his knees, a great wound, +half bruise, half cut, upon his forehead. "What is it?" Ferdinand +cried sharply. "Who did it, man?" + +Baldwin had already thrown his light on the fool's face, and Martin, +seeming to become conscious of their presence, looked at them, but in +a dazed fashion. "What?" he muttered, "what is what?" + +By this time nearly every one in the house had hurried to the spot; +among them not only Petronilla, clinging to her father's arm, but +Mistress Anne, her face pale and gloomy, and half a dozen womenfolk +who clutched one another tightly, and screamed at regular intervals. + +"What is it?" Baldwin repeated roughly, laying his hand on Martin's +arm and slightly shaking him. "Come, who struck you, man?" + +"I think," the fool answered slowly, gulping down something and +turning a dull eye on the group; "a--a swallow flew by--and hit me!" + +They shrank away from him instinctively and some crossed themselves. +"He is in one of his mad fits," Baldwin muttered. Still the steward +showed no fear. "A swallow, man!" he cried aloud. "Come, talk sense. +There are no swallows flying at this time of year. And if there were, +they do not fly by night, nor give men wounds like that. What was it? +Out with it, now. Do you not see, man," he added, giving Martin an +impatient shake, "that Sir Anthony is waiting?" + +The fool nodded stupidly. "A swallow," he muttered. "Ay, 'twas a +swallow, a great big swallow. I--I nearly put my foot on him." + +"And he flew up and hit you in the face?" Baldwin said, with huge +contempt in his tone. + +Martin accepted the suggestion placidly. "Ay, 'twas so. A great big +swallow, and he flew in my face," he repeated. + +Sir Anthony looked at him compassionately. "Poor fellow!" he said; +"Baldwin, see to him. He has had one of his fits and hurt himself." + +"I never knew him hurt _himself_," Baldwin muttered darkly. + +"Let somebody see to him," the knight said, disregarding the +interruption. "And now come, Petronilla. Why--where has the girl +gone?" + + +Not far. Only round to the other side of him, that she might be a +little nearer to Martin. The curiosity in the other women's faces was +a small thing in comparison with the startled, earnest look in hers. +She gazed at the man with eyes not of affright, but of eager, avid +questioning, while through her parted lips her breath came in gasps. +Her cheek was red and white by turns, and, for her heart--well, it had +seemed to stand still a moment, and now was beating like the heart of +some poor captured bird held in the hand. She did not seem to hear her +father speak to her, and he had to touch her sleeve. Then she started +as though she were awakening from a dream, and followed him sadly into +the house. + +Sadly, and yet there was a light in her eyes which had not been there +five minutes before. A swallow? A great big swallow? And this was +December, when the swallows were at the bottom of the horse-ponds. She +only knew of one swallow whose return was possible in winter. But then +that one swallow--ay, though the snow should lie inches deep in the +chase, and the water should freeze in her room--would make a summer +for her. Could it be that one? Could it be? Petronilla's heart was +beating so loudly as she went upstairs after her father, that she +wondered he did not hear it. + + +The group left round Martin gradually melted away. Baldwin was the +only man who could deal with him in his mad fits, and the other +servants, with a shudder and a backward glance, gladly left him to the +steward. Mistress Anne had gone in some time. Only Ferdinand Cludde +remained, and he stood a little apart, and seemed more deeply engaged +in listening for any sound which might betoken the sheriff's approach +than in hearkening to their conversation. Listen as he might he would +have gained little from the latter, for it was made up entirely of +scolding on one side and stupid reiteration on the other. Yet +Ferdinand, ever suspicious and on his guard, must have felt some +interest in it, for he presently called the steward to him. "Is he +more fool or knave?" he muttered, pointing under hand at Martin, who +stood in the gloom a few paces away. + +Baldwin shrugged his shoulders, but remained silent. "What happened? +What is the meaning of it all?" Ferdinand persisted, his keen eyes on +the steward's face. "Did he do it himself? Or who did it?" + +Baldwin turned slowly and nodded toward the moat. "I expect you will +find him who did it there," he said grimly. "I never knew a man save +Sir Anthony or Master Francis hit Martin yet, but he paid for it. And +when his temper is up, he is mad, or as good as mad; and better than +two sane men!" + +"He is a dangerous fellow," Ferdinand said thoughtfully, shivering a +little. It was unlike him to shiver and shake. But the bravest have +their moods. + +"Dangerous?" the steward answered. "Ay, he is to some, and sometimes." + +Ferdinand Cludde looked sharply at the speaker, as if he suspected him +of a covert sneer. But Baldwin's gloomy face betrayed no glint of +intelligence or amusement, and the knight's brother, reassured and yet +uneasy, turned on his heel and went into the house, meeting at the +door a servant who came to tell him that Sir Anthony was calling for +him. Baldwin Moor, left alone, stood a moment thinking, and then +turned to speak to Martin. But Martin was gone, and was nowhere to be +seen. + +The lights in the hall windows twinkled cheerily, and the great fire +cast its glow half way across the courtyard, as lights and fire had +twinkled and glowed at Coton End on many a night before. But neither +in hall nor chamber was there any answering merriment. Baldwin, coming +in, cursed the servants who were in his way, and the men moved meekly +and without retort, taking his oaths for what they were--a man's +tears. The women folk sat listening pale and frightened, and one or +two of the grooms, those who had done least in the skirmish, had +visions of a tree and a rope, and looked sickly. The rest scowled and +blinked at the fire, or kicked up a dog if it barked in its sleep. + +"Hasn't Martin come in?" Baldwin growled presently, setting his heavy +wet boot on a glowing log, which hissed and sputtered under it. "Where +is he?" + +"Don't know!" one of the men took on himself to answer. "He did not +come in here." + +"I wonder what he is up to now?" Baldwin exclaimed, with gloomy +irritation; for which, under the circumstances, he had ample excuse. +He knew that resistance was utterly hopeless, and could only make +matters worse, and twist the rope more tightly about his neck, to put +the thought as he framed it. The suspicion, therefore, that this +madman--for such in his worst fits the fool became--might be hanging +round the place in dark corners, doing what deadly mischief he could +to the attacking party, was not a pleasant one. + +A gray-haired man in the warmest nook by the fire seemed to read his +thoughts. "There is one in the house," he said slowly and oracularly, +his eyes on Baldwin's boot, "whom he has just as good a mind to hurt, +has our Martin, as any of them Clopton men. Ay, that has he, Master +Baldwin." + +"And who is that, gaffer?" Baldwin asked contemptuously. + +But the old fellow turned shy. "Well, it is not Sir Anthony," he +answered, nodding his head, and stooping forward to caress his +toasting shins. "Be you very sure of that. Nor the young mistress, nor +the young master as was, nor the new lady that came a month ago. No, +nor it is not you, Master Baldwin." + +"Then who is it?" cried the steward impatiently. + +"He is shrewd, is Martin--when the saints have not got their backs to +him," said the old fellow slyly. + +"Who is it?" thundered the steward, well used to this rustic method of +evasion. "Answer, you dolt!" + +But no answer came, and Baldwin never got one; for at this moment a +man who had been watching in front of the house ran in. + +"They are here!" he cried, "a good hundred of them, and torches enough +for St. Anthony's Eve. Get you to the gate, porter, Sir Anthony is +calling for you. Do you hear?" + +There was a great uprising, a great clattering of feet and barking of +dogs, and some wailing among the women. As the messenger finished +speaking, a harsh challenge which penetrated even the courtyard arose +from many voices without, and was followed by the winding of a horn. +This sufficed. All hurried with one accord into the court, where the +porter looked to Baldwin for instructions. + +"Hold a minute!" cried the steward, silencing the loudest hound by a +sound kick, and disregarding Sir Anthony's voice, which came from the +direction of the gateway. "Let us see if they are at the back too." + +He ran through the passage and, emerging on the edge of the moat, was +at once saluted by a dozen voices warning him back. There were a score +of dark figures standing in the little close where the fight had taken +place. "Right," said Baldwin to himself. "Needs must when the old +gentleman drives! Only I thought I would make sure." + +He ran back at once, nearly knocking down Martin, who with a companion +was making, but at a slower pace, for the front of the house. + +"Well, old comrade!" cried the steward, smiting the fool on the back +as he passed, "you are here, are you? I never thought that you and I +would be in at our own deaths!" + +He did not notice, in the wild humor which had seized him, who +Martin's companion was, though probably at another time it would have +struck him that there was no one in the house quite so tall. He sped +on with scarcely a glance, and in a moment was under the gateway, +where Sir Anthony was soundly rating everybody, and particularly the +porter, who with his key in the door found or affected to find the +task of turning it a difficult one. As the steward came up, however, +the big doors at some sign from him creaked on their hinges, and the +knight, his staff in his hand, and the servants clustering behind him +with lanterns, walked forward a pace or two to the end of the bridge, +bearing himself with some dignity. + +"Who disturbs us at this hour?" he cried, peering across the moat, and +signing to Baldwin to hold up his large lantern, since the others, +uncertain of their reception, had put out their torches. By its light +he and those behind him could make out a group of half a dozen figures +a score of yards away, while in support of these there appeared a +bowshot off, and still in the open ground, a clump of, it might be, a +hundred men. Beyond all lay the dark line of trees, above which the +moon, new-risen, was sailing through a watery wrack of clouds. "Who +are ye?" the knight repeated. + +"Are you Sir Anthony Cludde?" came the answer. + +"I am." + +"Then in the Queen's name, Sir Anthony," the leader of the troop cried +solemnly, "I call on you to surrender. I hold a warrant for your +arrest, and also for the arrest of James Carey, a priest, and Baldwin +Moor, who, I am told, is your steward. I am backed by forces which it +will be vain to resist." + +"Are you Sir Philip Clopton?" the knight asked. For at that distance +and in that light it was impossible to be sure. + +"I am," the sheriff answered earnestly. "And, as a friend, I beg you, +Sir Anthony, to avoid useless bloodshed and further cause for offense. +Sir Thomas Greville, the governor of Warwick Castle, and Colonel +Bridgewater are with me. I implore you, my friend, to surrender, and I +will do you what good offices I may." + +The knight, as we know, had made up his mind. And yet for a second he +hesitated. There were stern, grim faces round him, changed by the +stress of the moment into the semblance of dark Baldwin's; the faces +of men, who though they numbered but a dozen were his men, bound to +him by every tie of instinct, and breeding, and custom. And he had +been a soldier, and knew the fierce joy of a desperate struggle +against odds. Might it not be better after all? + +But then he remembered his womenkind; and after all, why endanger +these faithful men? He raised his voice and cried clearly, "I accept +your good offices, Sir Philip, and I take your advice. I will have the +drawbridge lowered, only I beg you will keep your men well in hand, +and do my poor house as little damage as may be." + +Giving Baldwin the order, and bidding him as soon as it was performed +come to him, the knight walked steadily back into the courtyard and +took his stand there. He dispatched the women and some of the servants +to lay out a meal in the hall. But it was noticeable that the men went +reluctantly, and that all who could find any excuse to do so lingered +round Sir Anthony as if they could not bear to abandon him; as if, +even at the last moment, they had some vague notion of protecting +their master at all hazards. A score of lanterns shed a gloomy, +uncertain light--only in places reinforced by the glow, from the hall +windows--upon the group. Seldom had a Coton moon peeped over the +gables at a scene stranger than that which met the sheriff's eyes, as +with his two backers he passed under the gateway. + + +"I surrender to you, Sir Philip," the knight said with dignity, +stepping forward a pace or two, "and call you to witness that I might +have made resistance and have not. My tenants are quiet in their +homes, and only my servants are present. Father Carey is not here, nor +in the house. This is Baldwin Moor, my steward, but I beg for him your +especial offices, since he has done nothing save by my command." + +"Sir Anthony, believe me that I will do all I can," the sheriff +responded gravely, "but----" + +"But to set at naught the Queen's proclamation and order!" struck in a +third voice harshly--it was Sir Thomas Greville's--"and she but a +month on the throne! For shame, Sir Anthony! It smacks to me of high +treason. And many a man has suffered for less, let me tell you." + +"Had she been longer on the throne," the sheriff put in more gently, +"and were the times quiet, the matter would have been of less moment, +Sir Anthony, and might not have become a state matter. But just +now----" + +"Things are in a perilous condition," Greville said bluntly, "and you +have done your little to make them worse!" + +The knight by a great effort swallowed his rage and humiliation. "What +will you do with me, gentlemen?" he asked, speaking with at least the +appearance of calmness. + +"That is to be seen," Greville said, roughly over-riding his +companion. "For to-night we must make ourselves and our men +comfortable here." + +"Certainly--with Sir Anthony's leave, Sir Thomas Greville," quoth a +voice from behind. "But only so!" + + +More than one started violently, while the Cludde servants almost to a +man spun round at the sound of the voice--my voice, Francis Cludde's, +though in the darknesss no one knew me. How shall I ever forget the +joy and lively gratitude which filled my heart as I spoke; which +turned the night into day, and that fantastic scene of shadows into a +festival, as I felt that the ambition of the last four years was about +to be gratified. Sir Anthony, who was one of the first to turn, peered +among the servants. "Who spoke?" he cried, a sudden discomposure in +his voice and manner. "Who spoke there?" + +"Ay, Sir Anthony, who did?" Greville said haughtily. "Some one +apparently who does not quite understand his place or the state of +affairs here. Stand back, my men, and let me see him. Perhaps we may +teach him a useful lesson." + +The challenge was welcome, for I feared a scene, and to be left face +to face with my uncle more than anything. Now, as the servants with a +loud murmur of surprise and recognition fell back and disclosed me +standing by Martin's side, I turned a little from Sir Anthony and +faced Greville. "Not this time, I think, Sir Thomas," I said, giving +him back glance for glance. "I have learned my lesson from some who +have fared farther and seen more than you, from men who have stood by +their cause in foul weather as well as fair; and were not for mass one +day and a sermon the next." + +"What is this?" he cried angrily. "Who are you?" + +"Sir Anthony Cludde's dutiful and loving nephew," I answered, with a +courteous bow. "Come back, I thank Heaven, in time to do him a +service, Sir Thomas." + +"Master Francis! Master Francis!" Clopton exclaimed in remonstrance. +He had known me in old days. My uncle, meanwhile, gazed at me in the +utmost astonishment, and into the servants' faces there flashed a +strange light, while many of them hailed me in a tone which told me +that I had but to give the word, and they would fall on the very +sheriff himself. "Master Francis," Sir Philip Clopton repeated +gravely, "if you would do your uncle a service, this is not the way to +go about it. He has surrendered and is our prisoner. Brawling will not +mend matters." + +I laughed out loudly and merrily. "Do you know, Sir Philip," I said, +with something of the old boyish ring in my voice, "I have been, since +I saw you last, to Belgium and Germany, ay, and Poland and Hamburg! Do +you think I have come back a fool?" + +"I do not know what to think of you," he replied dryly, "but you had +best----" + +"Keep a civil tongue in your head, my friend!" said Greville with +harshness, "and yourself out of this business." + +"It is just this business I have come to get into, Sir Thomas," I +answered, with increasing good humor. "Sir Anthony, show them that!" I +continued, and I drew out a little packet of parchment with a great +red seal hanging from it by a green ribbon; just such a packet as that +which I had stolen from the Bishop's apparitor nearly four years back. +"A lantern here!" I cried. "Hold it steady, Martin, that Sir Anthony +may read. Master Sheriff wants his rere-supper." + +I gave the packet into the knight's hand, my own shaking. Ay, shaking, +for was not this the fulfillment of that boyish vow I had made in my +little room in the gable yonder, so many years ago? A fulfillment +strange and timely, such as none but a boy in his teens could have +hoped for, nor any but a man who had tried the chances and mishaps of +the world could fully enjoy as I was enjoying it. I tingled with the +rush through my veins of triumph and gratitude. Up to the last moment +I had feared lest anything should go wrong, lest this crowning +happiness should be withheld from me. Now I stood there smiling, +watching Sir Anthony, as with trembling fingers he fumbled with the +paper. And there was only one thing, only one person, wanting to my +joy. I looked, and looked again, but I could not anywhere see +Petronilla. + +"What is it?" Sir Anthony said feebly, turning the packet over and +over. "It is for the sheriff; for the sheriff, is it not?" + +"He had better open it then, sir," I answered gayly. + +Sir Philip took the packet and after a glance at the address tore it +open. "It is an order from Sir William Cecil," he muttered. Then he +ran his eye down the brief contents, while all save myself pricked +their ears and pressed closer, and I looked swiftly from face to face, +as the wavering light lit up now one and now another. Old familiar +faces for the most part. + +"Well, Sir Philip, will you stop to supper?" I cried with a laugh, +when he had had time, as I judged, to reach the signature. + +"Go to!" he grunted, looking at me. "Nice fools you have made of us, +young man!" He passed the letter to Greville. "Sir Anthony," he +continued, a mixture of pleasure and chagrin in his voice, "you are +free! I congratulate you on your luck. Your nephew has brought an +amnesty for all things done up to the present time save for any life +taken, in which case the matter is to be referred to the Secretary. +Fortunately my dead horse is the worst of the mischief, so free you +are, and amnestied, though nicely Master Cecil has befooled us!" + +"We will give you another horse, Sir Philip," I answered. + +But the words were wasted on the air. They were drowned in a great +shout of joy and triumph which rang from a score of Cludde throats the +moment the purport of the paper was understood; a shout which made the +old house shake again, and scared the dogs so that they fled away into +corners and gazed askance at us, their tails between their legs; a +shout that was plainly heard a mile away in half a dozen homesteads +where Cludde men lay gloomy in their beds. + +By this time my uncle's hand was in mine. With his other he took off +his hat. "Lads!" he cried huskily, rearing his tall form in our midst; +"a cheer for the Queen! God keep her safe, and long may she reign!" + +This was universally regarded as the end of what they still proudly +call in those parts "the Coton Insurrection!" When silence came again, +every dog, even the oldest and wisest, had bayed himself hoarse and +fled to kennel, thinking the end of the world was come. My heart, as I +joined roundly in, swelled high with pride, and there were tears in my +eyes as well as in my uncle's. But there is no triumph after all +without its drawback, no fruition equal to the anticipation. Where was +Petronilla? I could see her nowhere. I looked from window to window, +but she was at none. I scanned the knot of maids, but could not find +her. Even the cheering had not brought her out. + +It was wonderful, though, how the cheers cleared the air. Even Sir +Thomas Greville regained good humor, and deigned to shake me by the +hand and express himself pleased that the matter had ended so happily. +Then the sheriff drew him and Bridgewater away, to look to their men's +arrangements, seeing, I think, that my uncle and I would fain be alone +awhile; and at last I asked with a trembling voice after Petronilla. + + +"To be sure," Sir Anthony answered, furtively wiping his eyes. "I had +forgotten her, dear lad. I wish now that she had stayed. But tell me, +Francis, how came you back to-night, and how did you manage this?" + +Something of what he asked I told him hurriedly. But then--be sure I +took advantage of the first opening--I asked again after Petronilla. +"Where has she gone, sir?" I said, trying to conceal my impatience. "I +thought that Martin told me she was here; indeed, that he had seen her +after I arrived." + +"I am not sure, do you know," Sir Anthony answered, eying me absently, +"that I was wise, but I considered she was safer away, Francis. And +she can be fetched back in the morning. I feared there might be some +disturbance in the house--as indeed there well might have been--and +though she begged very hard to stay with me, I sent her off." + +"This evening, sir?" I stammered, suddenly chilled. + +"Yes, an hour ago." + +"But an hour ago every approach was guarded, Sir Anthony," I cried in +surprise. "I had the greatest difficulty in slipping through from the +outside myself, well as I know every field and tree. To escape from +within, even for a man, much less a woman, would have been impossible. +She will have been stopped." + +"I think not," he said, with a smile at once sage and indulgent--which +seemed to add, "You think yourself a clever lad, but you do not know +everything yet." + +"I sent her out by the secret passage to the mill-house, you see," he +explained, "as soon as I heard the sheriff's party outside. I could +have given them the slip myself, had I pleased." + +"The mill house?" I answered. The mill stood nearly a quarter of a +mile from Coton End, beyond the gardens, and in the direction of the +village. I remembered vaguely that I had heard from the servants in +old days some talk of a secret outlet leading from the house to it. +But they knew no particulars, and its existence was only darkly +rumored among them. + +"You did not know of the passage," Sir Anthony said, chuckling at my +astonishment. "No, I remember. But the girl did. Your father and his +wife went with her. He quite agreed in the wisdom of sending her away, +and indeed advised it. On reaching the mill, if they found all quiet +they were to walk across to Watney's farm. There they could get horses +and might ride at their leisure to Stratford and wait the event. I +thought it best for her; and Ferdinand agreed." + +"And my father--went with her?" I muttered hoarsely, feeling myself +growing chill to the heart. Hardly could I restrain my indignation at +Sir Anthony's folly, or my own anger and disappointment--and fear. For +though my head seemed on fire and there was a tumult in my brain, I +was cool enough to trace clearly my father's motives, and discern with +what a deliberate purpose he had acted. "He went with her?" + +"Yes, he and his wife," the knight answered, noticing nothing in his +obtuseness. + +"You have been fooled, sir," I said bitterly. "My father you should +have known, and for his wife, she is a bad, unscrupulous woman! Oh, +the madness of it, to put my cousin into their hands!" + +"What do you mean?" the knight cried, beginning to tremble. "Your +father is a changed man, lad. He has come back to the old faith and in +a dark hour too. He----" + +"He is a hypocrite and a villain!" I retorted, stung almost to madness +by this wound in my tenderest place; stung indeed beyond endurance. +Why should I spare him, when to spare him was to sacrifice the +innocent? Why should I pick my words, when my love was in danger? He +had had no mercy and no pity. Why should I shrink from exposing him? +Heaven had dealt with him patiently and given him life; and he did but +abuse it. I could keep silence no longer, and told Sir Anthony all +with a stinging tongue and in gibing words; even, at last, how my +father had given me a hint of the very plan he had now carried out, of +coming down to Coton, and goading his brother into some offense which +might leave his estate at the mercy of the authorities. + +"I did not think he meant it," I said bitterly. "But I might have +known that the leopard does not change its spots. How you, who knew +him years ago, and knew that he had plotted against you since, came to +trust him again--to trust your daughter to him--passes my fancy!" + +"He was my brother," the knight murmured, leaning white and stricken +on my shoulder. + +"And my father--heaven help us!" I rejoined. + + + + + CHAPTER XXV. + + IN HARBOR AT LAST. + + +"We must first help ourselves," Sir Anthony answered sharply; rousing +himself with wonderful energy from the prostration into which my story +had thrown him. "I will send after her. She shall be brought back. Ho! +Baldwin! Martin!" he cried loudly. "Send Baldwin hither! Be quick +there!" + +Out of the ruck of servants in and about the hall, Baldwin came +rushing presently, wiping his lips as he approached. A single glance +at our faces sobered him. "Send Martin down to the mill!" Sir Anthony +ordered curtly. "Bid him tell my daughter if she be there to come +back. And do you saddle a couple of horses, and be ready to ride with +Master Francis to Watney's farm, and on to Stratford, if it be +necessary. Lose not a minute; my daughter is with Master Ferdinand. My +order is that she return." + +The fool had come up only a pace or two behind the steward. "Do you +hear, Martin?" I added eagerly, turning to him. My thoughts, busy with +the misery which might befall her in their hands, maddened me. "You +will bring her back if you find her, mind you." + +He did not answer, but his eyes glittered as they met mine, and I knew +that he understood. As he flitted silently across the court and +disappeared under the gateway, I knew that no hound could be more +sure, I knew that he would not leave the trail until he had found +Petronilla, though he had to follow her for many a mile. We might have +to pursue the fugitives to Stratford, but I felt sure that Martin's +lean figure and keen dark face would be there to meet us. + +Us? No. Sir Anthony indeed said to me, "You will go of course?" +speaking as if only one answer were possible. + +But it was not to be so. "No," I said, "you had better go, sir. Or +Baldwin can be trusted. He can take two or three of the grooms. They +should be armed," I added, in a lower tone. + +My uncle looked hard at me, and then gave his assent, no longer +wondering why I did not go. Instead he bade Baldwin do as I had +suggested. In truth my heart was so hot with wrath and indignation +that I dared not follow, lest my father, in his stern, mocking way, +should refuse to let her go, and harm should happen between us. If I +were right in my suspicions, and he had capped his intrigue by +deliberately getting the girl I loved into his hands as a hostage, +either as a surety that I would share with him if I succeeded to the +estates, or as a means of extorting money from his brother, then I +dared not trust myself face to face with him. If I could have mounted +and ridden after my love, I could have borne it better. But the curse +seemed to cling to me still. My worst foe was one against whom I could +not lift my hand. + +"But what," my uncle asked, his voice quavering, though his words +seemed intended to combat my fears, "what can he do, lad? She is his +niece." + +"What?" I answered, with a shudder. "I do not know, but I fear +everything. If he should elude us and take her abroad with him--heaven +help her, sir! He will use her somehow to gain his ends--or kill her." + +Sir Anthony wiped his brow with a trembling hand. "Baldwin will +overtake them," he said. + +"Let us hope so," I answered. Alas, how far fell fruition short of +anticipation. This was my time of triumph! "You had better go in, +sir," I said presently, gaining a little mastery over myself. "I see +Sir Philip has returned; from settling his men for the night. He and +Greville will be wondering what has happened." + +"And you?" he said. + +"I cannot," I answered, shaking my head. + + +After he had gone I stood a while in the shadow on the far side of the +court, listening to the clatter of knives and dishes, the cheerful hum +of the servants as they called to one another, the hurrying footsteps +of the maids. A dog crept out, and licked my hand as it hung nerveless +by my side. Surely Martin or Baldwin would overtake them. Or if not, +it still was not so easy to take a girl abroad against her will. + +But would that be his plan? He must have hiding-places in England to +which he might take her, telling her any wild story of her father's +death or flight, or even perhaps of her own danger if her whereabouts +were known. I had had experience of his daring, his cunning, his +plausibility. Had he not taken in all with whom he had come into +contact, except, by some strange fate, myself. To be sure Anne was not +altogether without feeling or conscience. But she was his--his +entirely, body and soul. Yes, if I could have followed, I could have +borne it better. It was this dreadful inaction which was killing me. + +The bustle and voices of the servants, who were in high spirits, so +irritated me at last that I wandered away, going first to the dark, +silent gardens, where I walked up and down in a fever of doubt and +fear, much as I had done on the last evening I had spent at Coton. +Then a fancy seized me, and turning from the fish-pond I walked toward +the house. Crossing the moat I made for the church door and tried it. +It was unlocked. I went in. Here at least in the sacred place I should +find quietness; and unable to help myself in this terrible crisis, +might get help from One to whom my extremity was but an opportunity. + +I walked up the aisle and, finding all in darkness, the moon at the +moment being obscured, felt my way as far as Sir Piers' flat monument, +and sat down upon it. I had been there scarcely a minute when a faint +sound, which seemed rather a sigh or an audible shudder than any +articulate word, came out of the darkness in front of me. My great +trouble had seemed to make superstitious fears for the time +impossible, but at this sound I started and trembled; and holding my +breath felt a cold shiver run down my back. Motionless I peered before +me, and yet could see nothing. All was gloom, the only distinguishable +feature being the east window. + +What was that? A soft rustle as of ghostly garments moving in the +aisle was succeeded by another sigh which made me rise from my seat, +my hair stiffening. Then I saw the outline of the east window growing +brighter and brighter, and I knew that the moon was about to shine +clear of the clouds, and longed to turn and fly, yet did not dare to +move. + +Suddenly the light fell on the altar steps and disclosed a kneeling +form which seemed to be partly turned toward me as though watching me. +The face I could not see--it was in shadow--and I stood transfixed, +gazing at the figure, half in superstitious terror and half in wonder; +until a voice I had not heard for years, and yet should have known +among a thousand, said softly, "Francis!" + +"Who calls me?" I muttered hoarsely, knowing and yet disbelieving, +hoping and yet with a terrible fear at heart. + +"It is I, Petronilla!" said the same voice gently. And then the form +rose and glided toward me through the moonlight. "It is I, Petronilla. +Do you not know me?" said my love again; and fell upon my breast. + + * * * * * + +She had been firmly resolved all the time not to quit her father, and +on the first opportunity had given the slip to her company, while the +horses were being saddled at Watney's farm. Stealing back through the +darkness she had found the house full of uproar, and apparently +occupied by strange troopers. Aghast and not knowing what to do, she +had bethought herself of the church and there taken refuge. On my +first entrance she was horribly alarmed. But as I walked up the +aisle, she recognized--so she has since told me a thousand times with +pride--my footstep, though it had long been a stranger to her ear, and +she had no thought at the moment of seeing me, or hearing the joyful +news I brought. + + +And so my story is told. For what passed then between Petronilla and +me lies between my wife and myself. And it is an old, old story, and +one which our children have no need to learn, for they have told it, +many of them for themselves, and their children are growing up to tell +it. I think in some odd corner of the house there may still be found a +very ancient swallow's nest, which young girls bring out and look at +tenderly; but for my sword-knot I fear it has been worn out these +thirty years. What matter, even though it was velvet of Genoa? He that +has the substance, lacks not the shadow. + +I never saw my father again, nor learned accurately what passed at +Watney's farm after Petronilla was missed by her two companions. But +one man, whom I could ill spare, was also missing on that night, whose +fate is still something of a mystery. That was Martin Luther. I have +always believed that he fell in a desperate encounter with my father, +but no traces of the struggle, or his body were ever found. The track +between Watney's farm and Stratford, however, runs for a certain +distance by the river; and at some point on this road I think Martin +must have come up with the refugees, and failing either to find +Petronilla with them, or to get any satisfactory account of her, must +have flung himself on my father and been foiled and killed. The exact +truth I have said was never known, though Baldwin and I talked over it +again and again; and there were even some who said that a servant much +resembling Martin Luther was seen with my father in the Low Countries +not a month before his death. I put no credence in this, however, +having good reason to think that the poor fool--who was wiser in his +sane moments than most men--would never have left my service while the +breath remained in his body. + +I have heard it said that blood washes out shame. My father was killed +in a skirmish in the Netherlands shortly before the peace of Chateau +Cambresis, and about three months after the events here related. I +have no doubt that he died as a brave man should; for he had that +virtue. He held no communication with me or with any at Coton End +later than that which I have here described; but would appear to have +entered the service of Cardinal Granvelle, the governor of the +Netherlands, for after his death word came to the Duchess of Suffolk +that Mistress Anne Cludde had entered a nunnery at Bruges under the +Cardinal's auspices. Doubtless she is long since dead. + +And so are many others of whom I have spoken--Sir Anthony, the +Duchess, Master Bertie, and Master Lindstrom. For forty years have +passed since these things happened--years of peaceful, happy life, +which have gone by more swiftly, as it seems to me in the retrospect, +than the four years of my wanderings. The Lindstroms sought refuge in +England in the second year of the Queen, and settled in Lowestoft +under the Duchess of Suffolk's protection, and did well and flourished +as became them; nor indeed did they find, I trust, others ungrateful, +though I experienced some difficulty in inducing Sir Anthony to treat +the Dutch burgher as on an equality with himself. Lord Willoughby de +Eresby, the Peregrine to whom I stood godfather in St. Willibrod's +church at Wesel, is now a middle-aged man and my very good friend, the +affection which his mother felt for me having descended to him in full +measure. She was indeed such a woman as Her Majesty; large-hearted and +free-tongued, of masculine courage and a wonderful tenderness. And of +her husband what can I say save that he was a brave Christian--and in +peaceful times--a studious gentleman. + +But it is not only in vacant seats and gray hairs that I trace the +progress of forty years. They have done for England almost all that +men hoped they might do in the first dawn of the reign. We have seen +great foes defeated, and strong friends gained. We have seen the +coinage amended, trade doubled, the Exchequer filled, the roads made +good, the poor provided for in a Christian manner, the Church grown +strong; all this in these years. We have seen Holland rise and Spain +decline, and well may say in the words of the old text, which my +grandfather set up over the hall door at Coton, "_Frustra, nisi +Dominus_." + + + + + THE END. + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Story of Francis Cludde, by Stanley J. 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