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!"