THE TOKEN
She was most beautiful to see,
Like a lady of a far countree.
COLERIDGE.
While in attendance on the king at his palace of Shene, the lord
chamberlain, Sir William Stanley, was informed that a young and foreign
lady requested an audience with him. Monina was ushered in--her
extraordinary beauty--her large soft eyes--the fascinating sweetness
of her manner, at once charmed the worthy gentleman. She spoke in good
but accentuated English, and informed Sir William that she came from the
death-bed of the queen of England.
"I know," said Stanley, "that her grace has long been ill, but ----"
"God take her to his mercy," interrupted Monina, "she died last night."
"Is his majesty informed of this event?" Sir William asked.
"It is not yet noon," replied the maiden; "by that hour the messengers
from the convent will arrive. I have reasons for greater speed. I bear
the royal lady's last words to her daughter, the queen Elizabeth; you,
my lord, will favour me by procuring an immediate interview with her
majesty."
Stanley knew the aversion the king had to any private intercourse
between Elizabeth and her mother. He informed his visitor that she must
first obtain the king's permission for this audience, which he did not
believe would be granted; but Monina, without hesitation, declared that
she would apply for it to the king, and requested the chamberlain to
introduce her. Stanley, good-natured but timid, hesitated--she would
not be denied--at last he hit upon an expedient. Henry had gone out
hawking in the park: if she would place herself at the gate on his
return, she might prefer her prayer--he would be near to insure her
being heard.
Noontide was approached. The sport was over, and the royal party on
their return. Henry rode foremost with Morton, while his retinue
followed at a slower pace, conversing gaily about the birds; now and
then hazarding a remark on the war, so oft delayed, at last declared.
They were interrupted by the arrival of Sir William Stanley, who
communicated to the king the tidings of the dowager queen's death. Six
long years had passed since the battle of Stoke, and the commencement of
Elizabeth Woodville's imprisonment. She was forgotten at court. Many
there had never seen her; few remembered her as the reigning queen of
England. Her history was almost like a romance of the olden time; yet,
forgotten during life, her death clouded the hilarity of those who heard
it. Among those most affected by these tidings, as was natural, was her
son, the marquess of Dorset; he hastily rode up to receive from
Stanley's own lips confirmation of the news. Feeling that of late he had
almost forgotten and wholly neglected his mother, a sudden visitation of
remorse was blended with the grief that choked his voice, and blinded
his eyes with tears. Henry, who was attached to him, viewed with pity
the bitter regret of his gay, unheeding kinsman, and bade him, ere ruder
tongues proclaimed it, bear the melancholy tidings to his royal sister.
Dorset, gladly escaping from the throng, rode swiftly forward. Meanwhile
the order of the ride was disturbed. The nobles conversed earnestly
together. After a few questions, Henry remained lost in thought: eager
perhaps to know whether her secret had died with her; and viewing in her
demise one master testimony the less in favour of his young competitor.
Stanley awaited with some inquietude for the moment when they should
encounter Monina. They passed the park gate. She was not there. Henry
pursued his way, and entered the palace. Still she did not appear.
Lord Dorset had ridden on with the speed of a man who seeks to escape
from himself. Death has more power in its mere sound, than the
enchanting touch of a wizard's rod. She was dead--how awful was that
word!--the unfailing friend, his mother! All his remissness towards her
took a monstrous form: he felt that if he had wearied Henry with
prayers, he might have extorted some mitigation of her suffering; and it
would have consoled her in her solitude, to have received the balmy
medicine of filial tenderness, which he had neglected to pay. At that
moment he would have given his marquisate to a beggar, to have purchased
the memory of one action done to soothe her woful end. The pomp of a
funeral--masses for her soul--these were small compensations, which
her arch enemy, even Henry himself, could, and probably would concede.
The voice of affection--the duteous affection of a child--he only
could have afforded; and he had withheld it.
Monina stood at the park gate, attended by her Spanish domestic, whose
singular costume alone must attract regard. "What do you here, maiden?"
cried Dorset; "the king and his court will speedily pass this way: this
is no fitting place for you."
"I am here," she replied, "to see and speak to your king. I come to
prefer a request in the name of one whom God take to his place; she can
disturb him no more."
"You are from Bermondsey--from----" The words choked Dorset. Monina
continued:--"I come from the death-bed of the Lady Elizabeth of
England."
"What demand would you make on his majesty?" said the marquess; "do you
seek a guerdon for your pains? Speak, then, to me--I am her son."
He was about to draw forth his purse; but her look, which grew animated,
prevented him, as she said, "I come on a holy errand. The dying lady
commanded me to convey her last words to her royal daughter. I seek
permission from your king to fulfil her wish."
Dorset was thoughtless and eager. He saw no objection that Henry could
have that his sister should have the last message from her now dead
parent; so without hesitation he told the maiden that by Henry's
permission he was now about to communicate the sad intelligence to the
queen, and that she might accompany him.
It is thus by small invisible threads that Fate weaves the intricate web
of our lives. All hung by the slenderest tissue: had Monina seen Henry,
most assuredly he would have prevented the interview she sought, and
have used his utmost craft to discover whether the fatal secret made a
part of the queen's message. Now his sagacity, his caution, his severity
were of no avail. Monina stood in the presence of his wife.
Six years had considerably altered Elizabeth; habitual fear had
engendered a moral timidity, which was not natural to her, for she was
the daughter of a proud race: her sweetness, her affectionate
disposition still remained; but her soul was sad, and she looked pale
and inanimate. The news of her mother's death moved her to tears. One
expression of bitter regret burst from her lips; it was mingled with
blame of her consort; and she checked herself, while she wept still more
abundantly. Dorset felt uneasy at the sight of female tears; he longed
to escape. Monina's request for a private interview came to liberate
him; he presented her to his sister, and hurried away.
Elizabeth eagerly asked many questions concerning her mother's dying
moments. The Spanish maiden, wondering at her own success, fearful of
interruption, presented the missal, and then hastened to declare the
motive for which it was sent. She opened the jewelled clasps, and showed
the queen the prayer written in her mother's hand on a blank leaf of the
brilliantly-illuminated pages. Rapidly the enthusiastic girl detailed
the escape, the exile of the duke of York, while Elizabeth, not daring
to believe her own senses, astounded, terrified, looked with largo open
eyes on the animated countenance of her lovely visitant. Before Monina
paused, or gave time for an answer, they were interrupted by the
entrance of Sir William Stanley. He started when he saw Monina, nor did
the confused look of his queen, as she hastily closed the fatal volume,
tend to reassure him. He came to announce a visit from Henry to
Elizabeth. Frightened at what he saw, he hardly permitted a slight
interchange of greeting, but hurried Monina away, through a door hid by
the tapestry, down a narrow staircase into a garden, and then by a small
gate that opened on a court. In this court was placed the entrance to
the apartments of the pages and esquires of the king. Stanley unlocked
the gate cautiously, hesitating before he permitted his fair companion
to pass on, in the fear that some mischievous boy or prying servitor
might be there to wonder at and question wherefore he led the maiden
from the queen's garden through a door, sacred, and never opened, into
the resort of wild and dissolute youth. As he unclosed the wicket, at
its very entrance, standing so that in spite of every caution a full
view of Monina was at once afforded, stood a young man, whose
countenance bespoke him to be ever on the alert for gamesome tricks or
worse mischief. His first aspect was that of recklessness; his second
spoke of baser habits; and athwart both broke gleams now of better
feelings, now of desperate passion. He had heard the rusty bolts move,
and perceived the slow opening of the door. Knowing how sacred was the
respect enforced towards this ingress to the queen's retirement, he
stood close to discover and shame any intruder. "In good season, my Lord
Chamberlain!" he at first exclaimed, vexed to find no cause for taunt,
till perceiving his fair companion, the expression of his countenance
changed to irony, as he cried, "Whither so fast and fearfully, my good
lord? Does her grace deal in contraband; and art thou the huckster?"
"As ill luck will have it, wild Robin Clifford!" cried Stanley, angrily.
"Nay, we are brothers in wildness now, fair sir," retorted the other;
"and I claim my part here."
Clifford approached Monina; but Stanley interposed. "Waste your ribaldry
on me, good knight, but spare this child. Let us pass in all speed, I
pray you."
Monina drew back; but Clifford still followed. "Child! In good hour she
is young; and but that burning suns have made her cheek tawny, I might
call her fair. She is well worth your pains, and I praise them. Sweet
mistress, I am beholden to my Lord Chamberlain for making us friends."
He was running on thus; but Monina, collecting her spirits, raised her
large eyes on him. His name had caught her ear; she remembered partly
having seen him on the night of their flight from Tournay; and frequent
mention had subsequently been made of him by the cousins. She
began--"Sir Robert Clifford, I know you will not harm me."
"Thanks for that knowledge, pretty one," cried the youth; "old
grey-beards only, with frozen hearts (pardon me, Sir William!), could
injure thee; thou art sure of good from tall fellows (though in troth
tall I am not) like me."
Sir William writhed with impatience; again and again he would have
interrupted the intruder. Monina replied:--"We have met before--when
you served him I now serve. I speak in his name: for the sake of Perkin
Warbeck, detain me no longer. Noble sir, I attend you. Sir Clifford
yields respect to the words I have spoken."
"They are strange indeed, maiden," he replied, "and I must hear more of
this. We have met before, I now believe; and we must meet again.
Meanwhile, I will keep off bird-catchers till you and his reverence get
clear of these limed twigs. Ah! I see a gallant; I will go draw William
d'Aubigny aside while you pass forth."
And now again Sir William proceeded on his expedition, and conducted his
gentle companion beyond the precincts of the palace. As they parted one
from the other, Monina, in a brief, energetic manner, delivered the
message of the departed queen to the good chamberlain: he was more
disconcerted than surprised, and the reflection that Clifford was a
party to the secret, added to his consternation. He felt how far he was
compromised by the introduction of Monina to the young queen; fear for a
while palsied his better feelings: he replied only by entreating her not
to remain longer in London, but to embark in all haste for France: he
then quitted her, yet again came back to ask where she sojourned in
town, and turned away a second time, as if to escape from his better
self, and from the interest he felt in King Edward's son, which impelled
him to ask a thousand questions.
He returned to the courtyard of the palace, and found Clifford pacing
its length in deep thought. Monina's words had awakened a thousand ideas
in his unquiet bosom. Since the event to which she referred, when he
delivered Richard from Frion's hands, he had run a headlong, ruinous
course. No character can be wholly evil; and Clifford's was not
destitute of good, though overgrown and choked up by weedy vices, so
that his better nature too often served but as a spur and incentive to
folly and crime. He was generous; but that led to rapacity; since,
unable to deny himself or others, if he despoiled himself one day, on
the next he engaged in the most desperate enterprises to refill the
void. He was bold--that made him fearless in doing wrong; and to drown
the gentle spirit of humanity, which, too often for his own peace,
sprung up in his heart, he hardened himself in selfishness; then, as his
sensitive, undisciplined nature received new impressions, he was
cowardly, cruel, and remorseless. He had never forgotten the princely
boy he had saved: he turned to that recollection as to one of the few
oases of virtue in the far extended desert of ill, over which, in hours
of satiety or despondency, his sickening memory wandered. Indeed, he was
yet too young to be decidedly vicious: for at one-and-twenty a thousand
mere human impulses, unrepressed by worldly wisdom, occasion sallies of
kindly sympathy. The worst was, that Clifford was a ruined man: his
fortunes were nought, his reputation shaken on its base; he veiled, by
an appearance of hilarity and recklessness, the real despair that gnawed
at his heart, when he considered all that he might have been--the worse
than nothing that he was. Hitherto he had, to a great degree, blinded
the world, and he longed for some adventure, some commotion, either
public or private, that should refill his emptied money-bags, and paint
him fair in men's eye's: all these considerations mingled incongruously
to make him wish to know more of the outcast duke. He awaited the return
of Stanley--he learned the name of the Spanish girl: as they spoke,
both became aware that the other possessed a secret each dreaded to
avow. Clifford first dashed through the flimsy barrier of useless
discretion, and related his adventure at Lisle; meantime Sir William
broke forth in lamentation, that young Richard should have been induced
to quit the security of private life, to enter on an unequal and bloody
contest, which could only end in destruction to himself and his
partizans, while England would again be made the tomb of the Irish (the
landing of Richard at Cork was all that was then known), whom he might
allure from their woods and bogs to ravage the more gifted sister isle.
A new light was let in on Clifford at these words. Was the game already
playing--the box shaken--the die about to fall? This required his
attention, and determined his half-formed purpose of visiting, that same
night, the daughter of de Faro.