Now for the tale of the Dun Horse, and Lancaster's great ride from
Lyonesse.
There was no electric power for travel either by airship, road, or
rail. It was hard without money to buy petrol for a car, or drive
one over the broken roads, of districts where there was fighting. A
big bay mare brought Lancaster through Cornwall, and fell dead at his
farm near Tiverton in Devon, the place where the dun horse lived.
Oregon's colour was like the tawny, sunscorched grass of the great
American Desert from whence he came. Such lion-coloured hide had
hidden his ancestors from the ranging tigers, three hundred thousand
years ago when the world was young. Down the back and across withers
and shoulders ran dark brown stripes--the famous endurance lines,
making the figure of the cross. This, again was a cast-back to a
Zebra-striped ancestry of a hundred thousand generations gone. He
stood fifteen hands, a pony like Alexander's Bucephalus or Napoleon's
grey Marengo. His eyes were mad, his ears vicious, his hoofs hard as
iron, his gait a rolling lope, tail and mane all streaming gold, his
neck august, his pride untameable. It stirs one's blood to remember
Oregon.
The dawn was breaking when Lancaster saddled the dun stallion; and
that was the third day of the gale, and burning of London, the
Fifteenth of the Terror.
In all their rainwashed length, the roads showed scarcely any sign of
traffic, but Oregon shied at many a car lying abandoned by the
wayside, at the skeletons of cattle slaughtered and stripped to the
last ounce of meat by bands of starving outlaws from the towns,
sometimes at some poor shapeless heap in the ditch which had to be
passed at full speed. Trees had been blown down across the causeway,
branches and leafage littered by the gale. That which was fallen
lay. In the hollow lands the road was washed out or flooded, the
newly mown hay lay swamped in the sodden fields, and the young crops
beaten flat. The farmers were roughly fortified--every place where
there was food had become a stronghold, and the live-stock driven out
to pasture went always under an armed guard for fear of marauders.
In these days, the folk knew why their old and long-neglected
churches had been so built upon high ground, with such defensible
towers to carry balefires, and loopholed belfries for alarm bells.
The village churches returned to their ancient use as forts of refuge
both for body and spirit. That is why Lancaster found the village
streets abandoned, and the streets of the market towns a solitude.
The ages had rolled back, from the twentieth century even to the
tenth; once again upon the lawless highways the robber bands were out
to pillage and burn. Once again all honest men went armed, the farms
were strongholds, the churches forts of refuge. Once again an
English knight rode a war-horse of the ancient kind, wore the old
chain mail, fought with a lone sword, and dared all for a lost cause.
Have the red roses of Lancaster ever failed from the thorns of our
gardens? Has the royal blood ceased to throb in English hearts? The
ancient roots are still alive to-day, through decades of centuries
the time-honoured chivalry of this dear realm flowers perennial from
the ancient soil. The English archers, the English mariners, the
English engineers--time changes the instruments, not the English
hand. And that the heir apparent of the Imperial Throne rode three
hundred miles in forty hours, is testimony that England is England
still beyond the accident of the centuries.
Lancaster had been badly hurt in the fight with the _Gigantic_, and
now, after eleven days of neglect, the wrench and bad contusions on
his near shoulder made him delirious with pain.
Ranges of hills to cross, and floods to ford, by dip and curve, by
tortuous-winding vales, field, woodland, park, and moor, the road
went swinging on. There were cathedral cities by the way, great
country seats, commons of golden gorse, old road-side inns,
orchard-screened villages. The young Prince saw nothing but the
course, felt nothing but his pain, knew nought but his errand, his
mission to the Queen. Wet to the skin he felt no cold or any
discomfort from the lashing rain, but in his fever and delirium,
dreamed, talked to himself, crooned songs, or followed imaginary
hounds. He could not remember afterwards how he found the way, where
he had baited Oregon, where fed or rested.
It was sunset when he cantered down through Reading, the dun horse
reeling--and forty miles to go. Red shone the glare through a gap in
the wind-torn clouds, red was the glow on mire-stained horse and man,
red on the sky to eastward where London lay. Two hours later he had
traversed the outer suburbs and entered Windsor. Still was the red
glow lingering in the east. He was passed through the castle gate
and in the outer ward he rested Oregon. The Governor held his
stirrup when he left, the Governor's wife gave him a stirrup cup, the
poor knights of Windsor--seventeen old men, sending their message of
love to Margaret.
So Lancaster crossed the Thames and entered London. The dun horse
kept his splendid rolling lope, but drooped his head and jarred his
rider now--with yet another twenty miles to go. The elms of Eton
were swaying overhead, there were the playing fields, yonder the
school--and Lancaster's heart was singing. As Oregon splashed by, he
waved his helmet--a red gleam caught the silver. He turned into a
long, dark avenue, villas on either hand, screened by young plane
trees--lightless, desolate. Then followed mile after mile of town
more lonely than the fields; street after street, dead, silent,
horrible, and always the red glow quickened in the east. Was it the
dawn already, the dawn breaking on an abandoned world?
Out of the vague night ahead, massed roofs went up stark to the
flushed red jagged driving clouds, when a man started out of the
shadows close ahead--an old grey man in a priest's cassock,
brandishing a red-edged crucifix. Oregon shied; then, under lash of
spurs, reared up pawing the air.
"Beware!" shrieked the priest. "Beware! Babylon is fallen--Babylon
the Great is fallen--is fallen! The scarlet whore reigns yonder, and
vengeance descends from Heaven on her crimes. You're riding headlong
to destruction! Back!"
The trooper lashed his horse with the flat of his sword, and far away
behind him heard the cry, "Babylon is fallen--is fallen!"
The pools were red, the mire was red, the wide street red as blood
under an immensity of glowing, rolling smoke, and ever in front the
near horizons lifted against great heaps of flame. Down a bye-street
to the left a house burned furiously, but the pavement in front of it
was empty. Hollow echoes rang to the horse's tramp, but the vacant
silence ahead showed never a sign of man. Was the lost capital
wholly abandoned?
Here a row of shops had been sacked, their wares thrown wide across
the roadway. Beyond, the street was blocked with acres of ruins, and
circling round back ways to find a passage, Lancaster heard gun
shots, saw the flicker of torches; then, turning a corner, came
suddenly upon a blood-stained drunken mob plundering houses. Spoil
was scattered everywhere; dead men and drunk sprawled on the litter;
tables were spread upon the pavement; orators were wrangling over
their wine--a Republican court in session for the trial of three
gentlewomen, who stood in drenched night-robes lashed together with
ropes.
Lancaster charged that court, rode the judges under, cut them down,
forgot his message to the Queen, forgot the saving of the
gentlewomen, vaguely supposed that the fight was a dream to be
enjoyed, and went on slaughtering. He was surrounded, he was
attacked on all sides; men were firing upon him from the houses on
all sides--then something struck off his helmet, blinding his eyes,
and Oregon, maddened with the burning pain of a torch against his
flank, broke away screaming at a headlong gallop.
* * * * *
The empty street reached away between gaunt, enormous ruins under a
sky of flame and roaring thunder, when Lancaster reined Oregon to a
walk, borne slowly forward by a hurricane of wind; wiped the blood
from his eyes, and, looking about him, knew that this was
Knightsbridge. A body of cavalry swung down through the gates of the
park, wheeled half-right, and broke to a trot directly athwart his
course, their silver armour glowing with ruby light--a squadron of
the Guard.
* * * * *
"_Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell.
For wickedness is in their dwellings._"
Miss Temple was reading at our Lady's bedside, and her voice went on
slowly, monotonously through the terrible minatory Psalms.
"_Break their teeth, O God, in their mouths. Break out the great
teeth of the young lions._"
"Dear me," said Margaret, in her pillows; "how dreadfully
uncomfortable."
"Not asleep yet?" asked the old woman, reproachfully.
"Not asleep yet"; Margaret uttered a quivering sigh. "Please,
dearest, draw all the curtains back. If I could see the windows, I
wouldn't think I was in the grave--that would be better."
Miss Temple laid her Bible reverently aside; then moving slowly
across the room, drew back the curtains. The wreck of Whitehall had
shattered all the glass, and now the windows were filled with oiled
paper. The scarlet glare of the night shone fiercely in, the wind of
the fire roared like a storm at sea. Miss Temple came back to her
place, and our Lady reached out one shaking hand to feel a little
comfort from her touch.
"Dearest," she whispered, "do you believe in ghosts?"
"We are forbidden," answered the governess, "to have any dealings
with the departed."
"Hush, dearest; there's no need to be rude to these poor spirits,
wrenched so suddenly from their bodies, taken all by surprise, shy at
appearing undressed as it were, and they come here to see if their
Queen cares. They come and go all night long, my dead; and they
would think me so heartless if they found me asleep. I must not
speak to them--that would be wrong--but they may hear me telling you
that I care--I care--I care, and they will tell all the dead that I
care."
"Child," said Miss Temple, fearfully, "don't think of such things.
It's horrible."
"That they should die, and I not even mourn? You wouldn't have me a
coward, dearest, would you? If I didn't care, if I didn't mourn, why
all these millions of the dead would come to haunt me, to accuse me.
Am I not guilty of their blood!"
"You saved the honour of England."
"And at what a price! What is the honour of England! It's like some
awful heathen god, whose altar runs with blood, the blood of innocent
men, and women like you and me, and little children. How can you
talk of our honour! I wish--how I wish--if I had only known. If it
were all to do again I'd let Ulster sell us body and soul to Russia,
drag our honour in the mud, set up our shame where every one could
see, and call the shame salvation. Yes, I would rather marry
Alexander, or be torn to pieces, or burned at the stake, than pay the
price of honour."
When Miss Temple needed guidance, it was her custom to open her
Bible, take a passage at random, and then with fiendish ingenuity
twist the text into agreement with her own views. From the most
unpromising materials she got the most surprising results. Now the
pages fell apart in II. Samuel, and when her eye lit upon "_Elhanan
the son of Dodo_," with a small local directory to follow, she felt
rather ill-used. Turning resentfully, she came upon the pedigree in
I. Chronicles. She had to fall back on general principles, and
flashed her indignant eyes on Margaret.
Margaret was asleep. All curled up, her dear head resting on one
outstretched arm, fairily delicate she lay at peace. The lines of
sorrow were smoothed away, her eyes--a moment ago so big, so dark
with horror--were veiled now with the eyelids of a child. Down
through the lurid shadow of the room, flamelight played and
flickered, glowed on the ivory pallor of her skin, and made a dainty
mimicry of health. She seemed the Margaret of other days, Queen of
the May, our Lady of the Spring, before love kindled and grief aged
her heart.
Hush! The child sleeps, and the woman must wake to pain.
If you would know the measure of a woman, judge not by her virtues,
neither by her sins--God will judge these. How much did she love?
How much did men worship her? The love that men bore to Helen,
Cleopatra, Guinevere, illumine the history of nations, as it changed
the rhythm of their times. How have men worshipped Elizabeth, and
Victoria, and Margaret, each in her time, the Queen of all men's
love? The conquerors laid Empires at their feet. The holy ideal of
chivalric worship inspired the noblest literature, the highest art
and the profoundest learning. Whole eras are illuminated by the
glamour and the glory of such unselfish homage, that could bind men
together, sweeten the common life, sanctify duty, and make death a
rite.
Hush! England sleeps! The spirits of the slain, hovering in the
flamelight and the lurid green-grey shadows, are pleading to God that
He will have compassion on the Queen.
With savage satisfaction, Miss Temple watched. Margaret asleep at
last! For a minute, for two minutes, then our Lady's voice rang loud
through the room.
"Lyonesse!" she cried. "Lyonesse!" And starting broad awake, lifted
herself in the bed, her gaunt face beaded with sweat, her dark eyes
staring broad awake. Then she fell back with a moan, and clutched at
Miss Temple's hands, and held them fast.
"Oh, why did you let me sleep?" she whispered. "I fought so hard to
keep awake."
"You must have sleep or you'll lose your senses, child."
"I dared not sleep," said Margaret, trembling, "lest I should see him
dead!"
"Margaret, these fancies are dangerous."
"This is the fourth time, dearest. He was in a little ship, so small
you could have put it in this room, and far down underneath, river,
and lake, and forest streaming past. He was all alone, the
blood-stained bandage loose about his head, and he lay in his harness
dead, except for his eyes. Only his eyes were alive watching me,
speaking to me."
Miss Temple read the rest in Margaret's eyes, and turned her face
away lest the Queen should see.
Even as the desert hungers for the rain, so Margaret craved for
Brand. She could not tell Miss Temple that she loved him; the wise
old governess pretended not to know, and thus the secret was shared
by two sweet women with delicate reticence and understanding, marred
by no words while every word would hurt.
"Dearest," our Lady whispered, "did you ever love?"
"Love!" Miss Temple's eyes went red. "What's love to me? Is this a
time to think of love--to talk of love? Get to your prayers, child,
this is no time for love."