"Eh, sire, I intend to. You left England undefended that you might
posture a little in the eyes of Europe. And meanwhile a woman
preserves England, a woman gives you Scotland as a gift, and in return
asks nothing--God have mercy on us!--save that you nightly chafe your
feet with a bit of woollen. You hear of it--and inquire, '_Where is
Madame de Salisbury?_' Here beyond doubt is the cock of Aesop's
fable," snarled John Copeland, "who unearthed a gem and grumbled that
his diamond was not a grain of corn."
"You shall be hanged at dawn," the King replied. "Meanwhile spit out
your venom."
"I say to you, then," John Copeland continued, "that to-day you are
master of Europe. I say to you that, but for this woman whom for
twenty years you have neglected, you would to-day be mouldering in some
pauper's grave. Eh, without question, you most magnanimously loved
that shrew of Salisbury! because you fancied the color of her eyes,
Sire Edward, and admired the angle between her nose and her forehead.
Minstrels unborn will sing of this great love of yours. Meantime I say
to you"--now the man's rage was monstrous--"I say to you, go home to
your too-tedious wife, the source of all your glory! sit at her feet!
and let her teach you what love is!" He flung away the dagger. "There
you have the truth. Now summon your attendants, my très beau sire, and
have me hanged."
The King made no movement. "You have been bold--" he said at last.
"But you have been far bolder, sire. For twenty years you have dared
to flout that love which is God's noblest heritage to His children."
King Edward sat in meditation for a long while. The squinting of his
left eye was now very noticeable. "I consider my wife's clerk," he
drily said, "to discourse of love in somewhat too much the tone of a
lover." And a flush was his reward.
But when this Copeland spoke he was like one transfigured. His voice
was grave and very tender, and he said:
"As the fish have their life in the waters, so I have and always shall
have mine in love. Love made me choose and dare to emulate a lady,
long ago, through whom I live contented, without expecting any other
good. Her purity is so inestimable that I cannot say whether I derive
more pride or sorrow from its preeminence. She does not love me, and
she will never love me. She would condemn me to be hewed in fragments
sooner than permit her husband's finger to be injured. Yet she
surpasses all others so utterly that I would rather hunger in her
presence than enjoy from another all which a lover can devise."
Sire Edward stroked the table through this while, with an inverted
pen. He cleared his throat. He said, half-fretfully:
"Now, by the Face! it is not given every man to love precisely in this
troubadourish fashion. Even the most generous person cannot render to
love any more than that person happens to possess. I have read in an
old tale how the devil sat upon a cathedral spire and white doves flew
about him. Monks came and told him to begone. 'Do not the spires show
you, O son of darkness' they clamored, 'that the place is holy?' And
Satan (in this old tale) replied that these spires were capable of
various interpretations. I speak of symbols, John. Yet I also have
loved, in my own fashion,--and, it would seem, I win the same reward
as you."
The King said more lately: "And so she is at Stirling now? hobnob with
my armed enemies, and cajoling that red lecher Robert Stewart?" He
laughed, not overpleasantly. "Eh, yes, it needed a bold person to
bring all your tidings! But you Brabanters are a very thorough-going
people."
The King rose and flung back his high head. "John, the loyal service
you have done us and our esteem for your valor are so great that they
may well serve you as an excuse. May shame fall on those who bear you
any ill-will! You will now return home, and take your prisoner, the
King of Scotland, and deliver him to my wife, to do with as she may
elect. You will convey to her my entreaty--not my orders, John,--that
she come to me here at Calais. As remuneration for this evening's
insolence, I assign lands as near your house as you can choose them to
the value of £500 a year for you and for your heirs."
You must know that John Copeland fell upon his knees before King
Edward. "Sire--" he stammered.
But the King raised him. "No, no," he said, "you are the better man.
Were there any equity in fate, John Copeland, your lady had loved you,
not me. As it is, I must strive to prove not altogether unworthy of my
fortune. But I make no large promises," he added, squinting horribly,
"because the most generous person cannot render to love any more than
that person happens to possess. So be off with you, John
Copeland,--go, my squire, and bring me back my Queen!"
Presently he heard John Copeland singing without. And through that
instant, they say, his youth returned to Edward Plantagenet, and all
the scents and shadows and faint sounds of Valenciennes on that
ancient night when a tall girl came to him, running, stumbling in her
haste to bring him kingship. "She waddles now," he thought forlornly.
"Still, I am blessed." But Copeland sang, and the Brabanter's heart
was big with joy.
Sang John Copeland:
"Long I besought thee, nor vainly,
Daughter of Water and Air--
Charis! Idalia! Hortensis!
Hast thou not heard the prayer,
When the blood stood still with loving,
And the blood in me leapt like wine,
And I cried on thy name, Melaenis?--
That heard me, (the glory is thine!)
And let the heart of Atys,
At last, at last, be mine!
"Falsely they tell of thy dying,
Thou that art older than Death,
And never the Hörselberg hid thee,
Whatever the slanderer saith,
For the stars are as heralds forerunning,
When laughter and love combine
At twilight, in thy light, Melaenis--
That heard me, (the glory is thine!)
And let the heart of Atys,
At last, at last, be mine!"