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JUDITH SHAKESPEARE
HER LOVE AFFAIRS AND OTHER ADVENTURES
By WILLIAM BLACK
Author of "A Daughter of Heth," "Madcap Violet," "A Princess of Thule,"
"White Wings," "Yolande," etc., etc.
A. L. BURT COMPANY, PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK
JUDITH SHAKESPEARE.
CHAPTER I.
AN ASSIGNATION.
It was a fair, clear, and shining morning, in the sweet May-time of the
year, when a young English damsel went forth from the town of
Stratford-upon-Avon to walk in the fields. As she passed along by the
Guild Chapel and the Grammar School, this one and the other that met her
gave her a kindly greeting; for nearly every one knew her, and she was a
favorite; and she returned those salutations with a frankness which
betokened rather the self-possession of a young woman than the timidity
of a girl. Indeed, she was no longer in the first sensitive dawn of
maidenhood--having, in fact, but recently passed her five-and-twentieth
birthday--but nevertheless there was the radiance of youth in the
rose-leaf tint of her cheeks, and in the bright cheerfulness of her
eyes. Those eyes were large, clear, and gray, with dark pupils and dark
lashes; and these are a dangerous kind; for they can look demure, and
artless, and innocent, when there is nothing in the mind of the owner of
them but a secret mirth; and also--and alas!--they can effect another
kind of concealment, and when the heart within is inclined to soft pity
and yielding, they can refuse to confess to any such surrender, and can
maintain, at the bidding of a wilful coquetry, an outward and obstinate
coldness and indifference. For the rest, her hair, which was somewhat
short and curly, was of a light and glossy brown, with a touch of
sunshine in it; she had a good figure, for she came of a quite notably
handsome family; she walked with a light step and a gracious carriage;
and there were certain touches of style and color about her costume
which showed that she did not in the least undervalue her appearance.
And so it was "Good-morrow to you, sweet Mistress Judith," from this one
and the other; and "Good-morrow, friend So-and-so," she would answer;
and always she had the brightest of smiles for them as they passed.
Well, she went along by the church, and over the foot-bridge spanning
the Avon, and so on into the meadows lying adjacent to the stream. To
all appearance she was bent on nothing but deliberate idleness, for she
strayed this way and that, stooping to pick up a few wild flowers, and
humming to herself as she went. On this fresh and clear morning the air
seemed to be filled with sweet perfumes after the close atmosphere of
the town; and if it was merely to gather daisies, and cuckoo-flowers,
and buttercups, that she had come, she was obviously in no hurry about
it. The sun was warm on the rich green grass; the swallows were dipping
and flashing over the river; great humble-bees went booming by; and far
away somewhere in the silver-clear sky a lark was singing. And she also
was singing, as she strayed along by the side of the stream, picking
here and there a speedwell, and here and there a bit of self-heal or
white dead-nettle; if, indeed that could be called singing that was but
a careless and unconscious recalling of snatches of old songs and
madrigals. At one moment it was:
Why, say you so? Oh no, no, no;
Young maids must never a-wooing go.
And again it was:
Come, blow thy horn, hunter!
Come, blow thy horn, hunter!
Come, blow thy horn, jolly hunter!
And again it was:
For a morn in spring is the sweetest thing
Cometh in all the year!
And in truth she could not have lit upon a sweeter morning than this
was; just as a chance passer-by might have said to himself that he had
never seen a pleasanter sight than this young English maiden presented
as she went idly along the river-side, gathering wild flowers the while.
But in course of time, when she came to a part of the Avon from which
the bank ascended sharp and steep, and when she began to make her way
along a narrow and winding foot-path that ascended through the
wilderness of trees and bushes hanging on this steep bank, she became
more circumspect. There was no more humming of songs; the gathering of
flowers was abandoned, though here she might have added a wild hyacinth
or two to her nosegay; she advanced cautiously, and yet with an
affectation of carelessness; and she was examining, while pretending not
to examine, the various avenues and open spaces in the dense mass of
foliage before her. Apparently, however, this world of sunlight and
green leaves and cool shadow was quite untenanted; there was no sound
but that of the blackbird and the thrush; she wandered on without
meeting any one. And then, as she had now arrived at a little dell or
chasm in the wood, she left the foot-path, climbed up the bank, gained
the summit, and finally, passing from among the bushes, she found
herself in the open, at the corner of a field of young corn.
Now if any one had noticed the quick and searching look that she flashed
all around on the moment of her emerging from the brush-wood--the
swiftness of lightning was in that rapid scrutiny--he might have had
some suspicion as to the errand that had brought her hither; but in an
instant her eyes had recovered their ordinary look of calm and
indifferent observation. She turned to regard the wide landscape spread
out below her; and the stranger, if he had missed that quick and eager
glance, would have naturally supposed that she had climbed up through
the wood to this open space merely to have a better view. And indeed
this stretch of English-looking country was well worth the trouble,
especially at this particular time of the year, when it was clothed in
the fresh and tender colors of the spring-time; and it was with much
seeming content that this young English maiden stood there and looked
abroad over the prospect--at the placid river winding through the lush
meadows; at the wooden spire of the church rising above the young
foliage of the elms; at here and there in the town a red-tiled house
visible among the thatched roofs and gray walls and orchards--these
being all pale and ethereal and dream-like in the still sunshine of this
quiet morning. It was a peaceful English-looking picture that ought to
have interested her, however familiar it may have been; and perhaps it
was only to look at it once more that she had made her way up hither;
and also to breathe the cool sweet air of the open, and to listen to
the singing of the birds, that seemed to fill the white wide spaces of
the sky as far as ever she could hear.
Suddenly she became aware that some one was behind her and near her, and
instantly turning, she found before her an elderly man with a voluminous
gray beard, who appeared to affect some kind of concealment by the way
he wore his hat and his long cloak.
"God save you, sweet lady!" he had said, almost before she turned.
But if this stranger imagined that by his unlooked-for approach and
sudden address he was likely to startle the young damsel out of her
self-possession, he knew very little with whom he had to deal.
"Good-morrow to you, good Master Wizard," said she, with perfect
calmness, and she regarded him from head to foot with nothing beyond a
mild curiosity. Indeed, it was rather he who was embarrassed. He looked
at her with a kind of wonder--and admiration also; and if she had been
sufficiently heedful and watchful she might have observed that his eyes,
which were singularly dark, had a good deal of animation in them for one
of his years. It was only after a second or so of this bewildered and
admiring contemplation of her that he managed to say, in a grave and
formal voice, something in praise of her courage in thus keeping the
appointment he had sought.
"Nay, good sir," said she, with much complacency, "trouble not yourself
about me. There is no harm in going out to gather a few flowers in the
field, surely. If there be any danger, it is rather you that have to
fear it, for there is the pillory for them that go about the country
divining for gold and silver."
"It is for no such vain and idle purposes that I use my art," said he;
and he regarded her with such an intensity of interest that sometimes he
stumbled forgetfully in his speech, as if he were repeating a lesson but
ill prepared, "It is for the revelation of the future to them that are
born under fortunate planets. And you are one of these, sweet lady, or I
would not have summoned you to a meeting that might have seemed perilous
to one of less courage and good heart. If it please you to listen, I can
forecast that that will befall you----"
"Nay, good sir," said she, with a smile, "I have heard it frequently,
though perhaps never from one so skilled. 'Tis but a question between
dark and fair, with plenty of money and lands thrown in. For that
matter, I might set up in the trade myself. But if you could tell me,
now----"
"If I were to tell you--if by my art I could show you," said he, with a
solemnity that was at least meant to be impressive (though this young
maid, with her lips inclining to a smile, and her inscrutable eyes, did
not seem much awe-stricken)--"if I could convince you, sweet lady, that
you shall marry neither dark nor fair among any of those that would now
fain win you--and rumor says there be several of those--what then?"
"Rumor?" she repeated, with the color swiftly mantling in her face. But
she was startled, and she said, quickly, "What do you say, good wizard?
Not any one that I know? What surety have you of that? Is it true? Can
you show it to me? Can you assure me of it? Is your skill so great that
you can prove to me that your prophecy is aught but idle guessing? No
one that I have seen as yet, say you? Why," she added half to herself,
"but that were good news for my gossip Prue."
"My daughter," said this elderly person, in slow and measured tones, "it
is not to all that the stars have been so propitious at their birth."
"Good sir," said she, with some eagerness, "I beseech you to forgive me
if I attend you not; but--but this is the truth, now, as to how I came
in answer to your message to me. I will speak plain. Perchance rumor
hath not quite belied herself. There may be one or two who think too
well of me, and would have me choose him or him to be my lover;
and--and--do you see now?--if there were one of those that I would fain
have turn aside from idle thoughts of me and show more favor to my dear
cousin and gossip Prudence Shawe--nay, but to tell the truth, good
wizard, I came here to seek of your skill whether it could afford some
charm and magic that would direct his heart to her. I have heard of such
things----"
And here she stopped abruptly, in some confusion, for she had in her
eagerness admitted a half-belief in the possible power of his witchcraft
which she had been careful to conceal before. She had professed
incredulity by her very manner; she had almost laughed at his
pretensions; she had intimated that she had come hither only out of
curiosity; but now she had blundered into the confession that she had
cherished some vague hope of obtaining a love-philtre, or some such
thing, to transfer away from herself to her friend the affections of one
of those suitors whose existence seemed to be so well known to the
wizard. However, he soon relieved her from her embarrassment by assuring
her that this that she demanded was far away beyond the scope of his
art, which was strictly limited to the discovery and revelation of such
secrets as still lay within the future.
"And if so, good sir," said she, after a moment's reflection, "that were
enough, or nearly enough, so that you can convince us of it."
"To yourself alone, gracious lady," said he, "can I reveal that which
will happen to you. Nay, more, so fortunate is the conjunction of the
planets that reigned at your birth--the _ultimum supplicium auri_ might
almost have been declared to you--that I can summon from the ends of the
earth, be he where he may, the man that you shall hereafter marry, or
soon or late I know not; if you will, you can behold him at such and
such a time, at such and such a place, as the stars shall appoint."
She looked puzzled, half incredulous and perplexed, inclined to smile,
blushing somewhat, and all uncertain.
"It is a temptation--I were no woman else," said she, with a laugh.
"Nay, but if I can see him, why may not others? And if I can show them
him who is to be my worshipful lord and master, why, then, my gossip
Prue may have the better chance of reaching the goal where I doubt not
her heart is fixed. Come, then, to prove your skill, good sir. Where
shall I see him, and when? Must I use charms? Will he speak, think you,
or pass as a ghost? But if he be not a proper man, good wizard, by my
life I will have none of him, nor of your magic either."
She was laughing now, and rather counterfeiting a kind of scorn; but she
was curious; and she watched him with a lively interest as he took forth
from a small leather bag a little folded piece of paper, which he
carefully opened.
"I cannot answer all your questions, my daughter," said he; "I can but
proceed according to my art. Whether the person you will see may be
visible to others I know not, nor can I tell you aught of his name or
condition. Pray Heaven he be worthy of such beauty and gentleness; for I
have heard of you, gracious lady, but rumor had but poor words to
describe such a rarity and a prize."
"Nay," said she, in tones of reproof (but the color had mounted to a
face that certainly showed no sign of displeasure), "you speak like one
of the courtiers now."
"This charm," said he, dropping his eyes, and returning to his grave
and formal tones, "is worth naught without a sprig of rosemary; that
must you get, and you must place it within the paper in a threefold
manner--thus; and then, when Sol and Luna are both in the
descendant--but I forget me, the terms of my art are unknown to you; I
must speak in the vulgar tongue; and meanwhile you shall see the charm,
that there is nothing wicked or dangerous in it, but only the
wherewithal to bring about a true lovers' meeting."
He handed her the open piece of paper; but she, having glanced at the
writing, gave it him back again.
"I pray you read it to me," she said.
He regarded her for a second with some slight surprise; but he took the
paper, and read aloud, slowly, the lines written thereon:
"Dare you haunt our hallowed green?
None but fairies here are seen.
Down and sleep,
Wake and weep,
Pinch him black, and pinch him blue,
That seeks to steal a lover true,
When you come to hear us sing,
Or to tread our fairy ring,
Pinch him black, and pinch him blue--
Oh, thus our nails shall handle you!"
"Why, 'tis like what my father wrote about Herne the Hunter," said she,
with a touch of indifference; perhaps she had expected to hear something
more weird and unholy.
"Please you, forget not the rosemary; nothing will come of it else," he
continued. "Then this you must take in your hand secretly, and when no
one has knowledge of your outgoing; and when Luna--nay, but I mean when
the moon has risen to-night so that, standing in the church-yard, you
shall see it over the roof of the church, then must you go to the
yew-tree that is in the middle of the church-yard, and there you shall
scrape away a little of the earth from near the foot of the tree, and
bury this paper, and put the earth firmly down on it again, saying
thrice, _Hieronymo! Hieronymo! Hieronymo!_ You follow me, sweet lady?"
"'Tis simple enough," said she, "but that on these fine evenings the
people are everywhere about; and if one were to be seen conjuring in the
church-yard----"
"You must watch your opportunity, my daughter," said he, speaking with
an increased assumption of authority. "One minute will serve you; and
this is all that needs be done."
"Truly? Is this all?" said she, and she laughed lightly. "Then will my
gallant, my pride o' the world, my lord and master, forthwith spring out
of the solid ground? God mend me, but that were a fearful meeting--in a
church-yard! Gentle wizard, I pray you----"
"Not so," he answered, interrupting her. "The charm will work there; you
must let it rest; the night dews shall nourish it; the slow hours shall
pass over it; and the spirits that haunt these precincts must know of
it, that they may prepare the meeting. To-night, then, sweet lady, you
shall place this charm in the church-yard at the foot of the yew-tree,
and to-morrow at twelve of the clock----"
"By your leave, not to-morrow," said she, peremptorily. "Not to-morrow,
good wizard; for my father comes home to-morrow; and, by my life, I
would not miss the going forth to meet him for all the lovers between
here and London town!"
"Your father comes home to-morrow, Mistress Judith?" said he, in
somewhat startled accents.
"In truth he does; and Master Tyler also, and Julius Shawe--there will
be a goodly company, I warrant you, come riding to-morrow through
Shipston and Tredington and Alderminster; and by your leave, reverend
sir, the magic must wait."
"That were easily done," he answered, after a moment's thought, "by the
alteration of a sign, if the day following might find you at liberty.
Will it so, gracious lady?"
"The day after! At what time of the day?" she asked.
"The alteration of the sign will make it but an hour earlier, if I
mistake not; that is to say, at eleven of the forenoon you must be at
the appointed place----"
"Where, good wizard!" said she--"where am I to see the wraith, the
ghost, the phantom husband that is to own me?"
"That know I not myself as yet; but my aids and familiars will try to
discover it for me," he answered, taking a small sun-dial out of his
pocket and adjusting it as he spoke.
"And with haste, so please you, good sir," said she, "for I would not
that any chance comer had a tale of this meeting to carry back to the
gossips."
He stooped down and placed the sun-dial carefully on the ground, at a
spot where the young corn was but scant enough on the dry red soil, and
then with his forefinger he traced two or three lines and a semicircle
on the crumbling earth.
"South by west," said he, and he muttered some words to himself. Then he
looked up. "Know you the road to Bidford, sweet lady?"
"As well as I know my own ten fingers," she answered.
"For myself, I know it not, but if my art is not misleading there should
be, about a mile or more along that road, another road at right angles
with it, bearing to the right, and there at the junction should stand a
cross of stone. Is it so?"
"'Tis the lane that leads to Shottery; well I know it," she said.
"So it has been appointed, then," said he, "if the stars continue their
protection over you. The day after to-morrow, at eleven of the forenoon,
if you be within stone's-throw of the cross at the junction of the
roads, there shall you see, or my art is strangely mistaken, the man or
gentleman--nay, I know not whether he be parson or layman, soldier or
merchant, knight of the shire or plain goodman Dick--I say there shall
you see him that is to win you and wear you; but at what time you shall
become his wife, and where, and in what circumstances, I cannot reveal
to you. I have done my last endeavor."
"Nay do not hold me ungrateful," she said, though there was a smile on
her lips, "but surely, good sir, what your skill has done, that it can
also undo. If it have power to raise a ghost, surely it has power to lay
him. And truly, if he be a ghost, I will not have him. And if he be a
man, and have a red beard, I will not have him. And if he be a
slape-face, I will have none of him. And if he have thin legs, he may
walk his ways for me. Good wizard, if I like him not, you must undo the
charm."
"My daughter, you have a light heart," said he, gravely. "May the
favoring planets grant it lead you not into mischief; there be unseen
powers that are revengeful. And now I must take my leave, gracious lady.
I have given you the result of much study and labor, of much solitary
communion with the heavenly bodies; take it, and use it with heed, and
so fare you well."
He was going, but she detained him.
"Good sir, I am your debtor," said she, with the red blood mantling in
her forehead, for all through this interview she had clearly recognized
that she was not dealing with any ordinary mendicant fortune-teller.
"So much labor and skill I cannot accept from you without becoming a
beggar. I pray you----"
He put up his hand.
"Not so," said he, with a certain grave dignity. "To have set eyes on
the fairest maid in Warwickshire--as I have heard you named--were surely
sufficient recompense for any trouble; and to have had speech of you,
sweet lady, is what many a one would venture much for. But I would
humbly kiss your hand; and so again fare you well."
"God shield you, most courteous wizard, and good-day," said she, as he
left; and for a second she stood looking after him in a kind of wonder,
for this extraordinary courtesy and dignity of manner were certainly not
what she had expected to find in a vagabond purveyor of magic. But now
he was gone, and she held the charm in her hand, and so without further
ado she set out for home again, getting down through the brushwood to
the winding path.
She walked quickly, for she had heard that Master Bushell's daughter,
who was to be married that day, meant to beg a general holiday for the
school-boys; and she knew that if this were granted these sharp-eyed
young imps would soon be here, there, and everywhere, and certain to spy
out the wizard if he were in the neighborhood. But when she had got
clear of this hanging copse, that is known as the Wier Brake, and had
reached the open meadows, so that from any part around she could be seen
to be alone, she had nothing further to fear, and she returned to her
leisurely straying in quest of flowers. The sun was hotter on the grass
now; but the swallows were busy as ever over the stream; and the great
bees hummed aloud as they went past; and here and there a white
butterfly fluttered from petal to petal; and, far away, she could hear
the sound of children's voices in the stillness. She was in a gay mood.
The interview she had just had with one in league with the occult powers
of magic and witchery did not seem in the least to have overawed her.
Perhaps, indeed, she had not yet made up her mind to try the potent
charm that she had obtained; at all events the question did not weigh
heavily on her. For now it was,
Oh, mistress mine, where are you roaming?
and again it was,
For a morn in spring is the sweetest thing
Cometh in all the year!
and always another touch of color added to the daintily arranged
nosegay in her hand. And then, of a sudden, as she chanced to look
ahead, she observed a number of the school-boys come swarming down to
the foot-bridge; and she knew right well that one of them--to wit, young
Willie Hart--would think a holiday quite thrown away and wasted if he
did not manage to seek out and secure the company of his pretty cousin
Judith.
"Ah! there, now," she was saying to herself, as she watched the
school-boys come over the bridge one by one and two by two, "there, now,
is my sweetheart of sweethearts; there is my prince of lovers! If ever I
have lover as faithful and kind as he, it will go well. 'Nay, Susan,'
says he, 'I love you not; you kiss me hard, and speak to me as if I were
still a child; I love Judith better.' And how cruel of my father to put
him in the play, and to slay him so soon; but perchance he will call him
to life again--nay, it is a favorite way with him to do that; and pray
Heaven he bring home with him to-morrow the rest of the story, that Prue
may read it to me. And so are you there, among the unruly imps, you
young Prince Mamillius? Have you caught sight of me yet, sweetheart
blue-eyes? Why, come, then; you will outstrip them all, I know, when you
get sight of Cousin Judith; for as far off as yon are, you will reach me
first, that I am sure of; and then, by my life, sweetheart Willie, you
shall have a kiss as soft as a dove's breast!"
And so she went on to meet them, arranging the colors of her straggling
blossoms the while, with now and again a snatch of careless song:
Come, blow thy horn, hunter!
Come, blow thy horn, hunter!
Come, blow thy horn--jolly hunter!