RAGLAN CASTLE.
While he yet spoke, their horses, of their own accord, passed through
the gate which Eccles had thrown wide to admit them, and carried them
into the Fountain court. Here, indeed, was a change of aspect! All that
Dorothy had hitherto contemplated was the side of the fortress which
faced the world--frowning and defiant, although here and there on the
point of breaking into a half smile, for the grim, suspicious,
altogether repellent look of the old feudal castle had been gradually
vanishing in the additions and alterations of more civilised times. But
now they were in the heart of the building, and saw the face which the
house of strength turned upon its own people. The spring sunshine filled
half the court; over the rest lay the shadow of the huge keep, towering
massive above the three-storied line of building which formed the side
next it. Here was the true face of the Janus-building, full of eyes and
mouths; for many bright windows looked down into the court, in some of
which shone the smiling faces of children and ladies peeping out to see
the visitors, whose arrival had been announced by the creaking chains of
the portcullis; and by the doors issued and entered, here a lady in rich
attire, there a gentlemen half in armour, and here again a serving man
or maid. Nearly in the centre of the quadrangle, just outside the shadow
of the keep, stood the giant horse, rearing in white marble, almost
dazzling in the sunshine, from whose nostrils spouted the jets of water
which gave its name to the court. Opposite the gate by which they
entered was the little chapel, with its triple lancet windows, over
which lay the picture-gallery with its large oriel lights. Far above
their roof, ascended from behind that of the great hall, with its fine
lantern window seated on the ridge. From the other court beyond the
hall, that upon which the main entrance opened, came the sounds of heavy
feet in intermittent but measured tread, the clanking of arms, and a
returning voice of loud command: the troops of the garrison were being
exercised on the slabs of the pitched court.
From each of the many doors opening into the court they had entered, a
path, paved with coloured tiles, led straight through the finest of turf
to the marble fountain in the centre, into whose shadowed basin the
falling water seemed to carry captive as into a prison the sunlight it
caught above. Its music as it fell made a lovely but strange and sad
contrast with the martial sounds from beyond.
It was but a moment they had to note these things; eyes and ears
gathered them all at once. Two of the warder's men already held their
horses, while two other men, responsive to the warder's whistle, came
running from the hall and helped them to dismount. Hardly had they
reached the ground ere a man-servant came, who led the way to the left
towards a porch of carved stone on the same side of the court. The door
stood open, revealing a flight of stairs, rather steep, but wide and
stately, going right up between two straight walls. At the top stood
lady Margaret's gentleman usher, Mr. Harcourt by name, who received them
with much courtesy, and conducting them to a small room on the left of
the landing, went to announce their arrival to lady Margaret, to whose
private parlour this was the antechamber. Returning in a moment, he led
them into her presence.
She received them with a frankness which almost belied the stateliness
of her demeanour. Through the haze of that reserve which a consciousness
of dignity, whether true or false, so often generates, the genial
courtesy of her Irish nature, for she was an O'Brien, daughter of the
earl of Thomond, shone clear, and justified her Celtic origin.
'Welcome, cousin!' she said, holding out her hand while yet distant half
the length of the room, across which, upborne on slow firm foot, she
advanced with even, stately motion, 'And you also, reverend sir,' she
went on, turning to Mr. Herbert. 'I am told we are indebted to you for
this welcome addition to our family--how welcome none can tell but
ladies shut up like ourselves.'
Dorothy was already almost at her ease, and the old clergyman soon found
lady Margaret so sensible and as well as courteous--prejudiced yet
further in her favour, it must be confessed, by the pleasant pretence
she made of claiming cousinship on the ground of the identity of her
husband's title with his surname--that, ere he left the castle, liberal
as he had believed himself, he was nevertheless astonished to find how
much of friendship had in that brief space been engendered in his bosom
towards a catholic lady whom he had never before seen.
Since the time of Elizabeth, when the fear and repugnance of the nation
had been so greatly and justly excited by the apparent probability of a
marriage betwixt their queen and the detested Philip of Spain, a
considerable alteration had been gradually wrought in the feelings of a
large portion of it in respect of their catholic countrymen--a fact
which gave strength to the position of the puritans in asserting the
essential identity of episcopalian with catholic politics. Almost forty
years had elapsed since the Gunpowder Plot; the queen was a catholic;
the episcopalian party was itself at length endangered by the extension
and development of the very principles on which they had themselves
broken away from the church of Rome; and the catholics were friendly to
the government of the king, under which their condition was one of
comfort if not influence, while under that of the parliament they had
every reason to anticipate a revival of persecution. Not a few of them
doubtless cherished the hope that this revelation of the true spirit of
dissent would result in driving the king and his party back into the
bosom of the church.
The king, on the other hand, while only too glad to receive what aid he
might from the loyal families of the old religion, yet saw that much
caution was necessary lest he should alienate the most earnest of his
protestant friends by giving ground for the suspicion that he was
inclined to purchase their co-operation by a return to the creed of his
Scottish grandmother, Mary Stuart, and his English
great-great-grand-mother, Margaret Tudor.
On the part of the clergy there had been for some time a considerable
tendency, chiefly from the influence of Laud, to cultivate the same
spirit which actuated the larger portion of the catholic priesthood; and
although this had never led to retrograde movement in regard to their
politics, the fact that both were accounted by a third party, and that
far the most dangerous to either of the other two, as in spirit and
object one and the same, naturally tended to produce a more indulgent
regard of each other than had hitherto prevailed. And hence, in part, it
was that it had become possible for episcopalian Dr. Bayly to be an
inmate of Raglan Castle, and for good, protestant Matthew Herbert to
seek refuge for his ward with good catholic lady Margaret.
Eager to return to the duties of his parish, through his illness so long
neglected, Mr. Herbert declined her ladyship's invitation to dinner,
which, she assured him, consulting a watch that she wore in a ring on
her little finger, must be all but ready, seeing it was now a quarter to
eleven, and took his leave, accompanied by Dorothy's servant to bring
back the horse--if indeed they should be fortunate enough to escape the
requisition of both horses by one party or the other. At present,
however, the king's affairs continued rather on the ascendant, and the
name of the marquis in that country was as yet a tower of strength.
Dorothy's horse was included in the hospitality shown his mistress, and
taken to the stables--under the mid-day shadow of the Library Tower.
As soon as the parson was gone, lady Margaret touched a small silver
bell which hung in a stand on the table beside her.
'Conduct mistress Dorothy Vaughan to her room, wait upon her there, and
then attend her hither,' she said to the maid who answered it. 'I would
request a little not unneedful haste, cousin,' she went on, 'for my lord
of Worcester is very precise in all matters of household order, and
likes ill to see any one enter the dining-room after he is seated. It is
his desire that you should dine at his table to-day. After this I must
place you with the rest of my ladies, who dine in the housekeeper's
room.'
'As you think proper, madam,' returned Dorothy, a little disappointed,
but a little relieved also.
'The bell will ring presently,' said lady Margaret, 'and a quarter of an
hour thereafter we shall all be seated.'
She was herself already dressed--in a pale-blue satin, with full skirt
and close-fitting, long-peaked boddice, fastened in front by several
double clasps set with rubies; her shoulders were bare, and her sleeves
looped up with large round star-like studs, set with diamonds, so that
her arms also were bare to the elbows. Round her neck was a short string
of large pearls.
'You take no long time to attire yourself, cousin,' said her ladyship,
kindly, when Dorothy returned.
'Little time was needed, madam,' answered Dorothy; 'for me there is but
one colour. I fear I shall show but a dull bird amidst the gay plumage
of Raglan. But I could have better adorned myself had not I heard the
bell ere I had begun, and feared to lose your ladyship's company, and in
very deed make my first appearance before my lord as a transgressor of
the laws of his household.'
'You did well, cousin Dorothy; for everything goes by law and order
here. All is reason and rhyme too in this house. My lord's father,
although one of the best and kindest of men, is, as I said, somewhat
precise, and will, as he says himself, be king in his own
kingdom--thinking doubtless of one who is not such. I should not talk
thus with you, cousin, were you like some young ladies I know; but there
is that about you which pleases me greatly, and which I take to indicate
discretion. When first I came to the house, not having been accustomed
to so severe a punctuality, I gave my lord no little annoyance; for,
oftener than once or twice, I walked into his dining-room not only after
grace had been said, but after the first course had been sent down to
the hall-tables. My lord took his revenge in calling me the wild
Irishwoman.'
Here she laughed very sweetly.
'The only one,' she resumed, 'who does here as he will, is my husband.
Even lord Charles, who is governor of the castle, must be in his place
to the moment; but for my husband--.'
The bell rang a second time. Lady Margaret rose, and taking Dorothy's
arm, led her from the room into a long dim-lighted corridor. Arrived at
the end of it, where a second passage met it at right angles, she
stopped at a door facing them.
'I think we shall find my lord of Worcester here,' she said in a
whisper, as she knocked and waited a response. 'He is not here,' she
said. 'He expects me to call on him as I pass. We must make haste.'
The second passage, in which were several curves and sharp turns, led
them to a large room, nearly square, in which were two tables covered
for about thirty. By the door and along the sides of the room were a
good many gentlemen, some of them very plainly dressed, and others in
gayer attire, amongst whom Dorothy, as they passed through, recognised
her cousin Scudamore. Whether he saw and knew her she could not tell.
Crossing a small antechamber they entered the drawing-room, where stood
and sat talking a number of ladies and gentlemen, to some of whom lady
Margaret spoke and presented her cousin, greeting others with a familiar
nod or smile, and yet others with a stately courtesy. Then she said,
'Ladies, I will lead the way to the dining-room. My lord marquis would
the less willingly have us late that something detains himself.'
Those who dined in the marquis's room followed her. Scarcely had she
reached the upper end of the table when the marquis entered, followed by
all his gentlemen, some of whom withdrew, their service over for the
time, while others proceeded to wait upon him and his family, with any
of the nobility who happened to be his guests at the first table.
'I am the laggard to-day, my lady,' he said, cheerily, as he bore his
heavy person up the room towards her. 'Ah!' he went on, as lady Margaret
stepped forward to meet him, leading Dorothy by the hand, 'who is this
sober young damsel under my wild Irishwoman's wing? Our young cousin
Vaughan, doubtless, whose praises my worthy Dr. Bayly has been sounding
in my ears?'
He held out his hand to Dorothy, and bade her welcome to Raglan.
The marquis was a man of noble countenance, of the type we are ready to
imagine peculiar to the great men of the time of queen Elizabeth. To
this his unwieldy person did not correspond, although his movements were
still far from being despoiled of that charm which naturally belonged to
all that was his. Nor did his presence owe anything to his dress, which
was of that long-haired coarse woollen stuff they called frieze, worn,
probably, by not another nobleman in the country, and regarded as fitter
for a yeoman. His eyes, though he was yet but sixty-five or so, were
already hazy, and his voice was husky and a little broken--results of
the constantly poor health and frequent suffering he had had for many
years; but he carried it all 'with'--to quote the prince of courtesy,
sir Philip Sydney--'with a right old man's grace, that will seem
livelier than his age will afford him.'
The moment he entered, the sewer in the antechamber at the other end of
the room had given a signal to one waiting at the head of the stair
leading down to the hall, and his lordship was hardly seated,
ere--although the kitchen was at the corner of the pitched court
diagonally opposite--he bore the first dish into the room, followed by
his assistants, laden each with another.
Lady Margaret made Dorothy sit down by her. A place on her other side
was vacant.
'Where is this truant husband of thine, my lady?' asked the marquis, as
soon as Dr. Bayly had said grace. 'Know you whether he eats at all, or
when, or where? It is now three days since he has filled his place at
thy side, yet is he in the castle. Thou knowest, my lady, I deal not
with him, who is so soon to sit in this chair, as with another, but I
like it not. Know you what occupies him to day?'
'I do not, my lord,' answered lady Margaret. 'I have had but one glimpse
of him since the morning, and if he looks now as he looked then, I fear
your lordship would be minded rather to drive him from your table than
welcome him to a seat beside you.'
As she spoke, lady Margaret caught a glimpse of a peculiar expression on
Scudamore's face, where he stood behind his master's chair.
'Your page, my lord,' she said, 'seems to know something of him: if it
pleased you to put him to the question--'
'Hey, Scudamore!' said the marquis without turning his head; 'what have
you seen of my lord Herbert?'
'As much as could be seen of him, my lord,' answered Scudamore. 'He was
new from the powder-mill, and his face and hands were as he had been
blown three times up the hall chimney.'
'I would thou didst pay more heed to what is fitting, thou monkey, and
knewest either place or time for thy foolish jests! It will be long ere
thou soil one of thy white fingers for king or country,' said the
marquis, neither angrily nor merrily. 'Get another flask of claret,' he
added, 'and keep thy wit for thy mates, boy.'
Dorothy cast one involuntary glance at her cousin. His face was red as
fire, but, as it seemed to her, more with suppressed amusement than
shame. She had not been much longer in the castle before she learned
that, in the opinion of the household, the marquis did his best, or
worst rather, to ruin young Scudamore by indulgence. The judgment,
however, was partly the product of jealousy, although doubtless the
marquis had in his case a little too much relaxed the bonds of
discipline. The youth was bright and ready, and had as yet been found
trustworthy; his wit was tolerable, and a certain gay naivete of speech
and manner set off to the best advantage what there was of it; but his
laughter was sometimes mischievous, and on the present occasion Dorothy
could not rid herself of the suspicion that he was laughing in his
sleeve at his master, which caused her to redden in her turn. Scudamore
saw it, and had his own fancies concerning the phenomenon.