There was no Queen but Marguerite to the apprehension of Frideswide
Marston.
"Aye, the very same," said Agnes. "Dost know him?"
Frideswide's hood wanted a good deal of settling just at that moment.
"Ay," said she, rather shortly. "Thou wilt not journey ill if Master
Combe look to thy comfort. And maybe it shall be none the worser for
thee if thou tell him thy name is Marston."
Agnes quietly drew her own conclusions, but she asked no questions. She
found, moreover, during the journey, that Master John Combe was
undoubtedly an agreeable travelling companion, doing his utmost to make
others comfortable: and that when she had once informed him that she was
the sister of Frideswide Marston, he appeared to know as much as she did
herself about her home, her relatives, and all that concerned her.
About Frideswide herself he said very little: but Agnes soon perceived
that to talk of her was the surest means of engrossing Master Combe's
attention.
Sheffield was reached at last, and Agnes found to her regret that no one
from Lovell Tower awaited her. She went on to York with the two young
gentlemen, with much less reluctance than she had anticipated: for
though she was indifferent to Master Rotherham, she had come to have a
very sisterly feeling towards John Combe. It was odd that John Combe's
way from York should lie exactly past Lovell Tower: but of course, very
convenient for Agnes. Master Rotherham also offered to attend her
thither; but Agnes civilly declined his offer as giving him unnecessary
trouble. It was late on a Saturday evening in January that Agnes and
John Combe reached Lovell Tower at last.
The family were seated in the hall, where a large fire of thick oaken
logs was blazing, and the men-servants were bringing in the boards and
trestles for rear-supper, the last meal of the day. Fixed tables in the
centre of a room were unknown to our medieval ancestors, though they
were common enough with the Romans, and even with the Anglo-Saxons. They
had leaf-tables, attached to the wall; and wealthy persons indulged in
small round or square tables on three feet: but to a much later period
than this, the setting of tables for meals included the erection of the
table, a mere wide board set upon trestles. We use phrases derived from
this practice when we speak of setting a table, or of an hospitable
board. Over this was laid a fine damask tablecloth, and the silver
_nef_, or ship, was placed in the middle. This was a large salt-cellar,
used as the barometer of rank. The family and their guests sat above
the salt; the servants below it. Silver plates and cups were set for
the former, wooden trenchers and earthen mugs for the latter. To each
person was given a knife and spoon: forks were not invented except for
spices, and were never used to eat with. A clean damask napkin, and a
basin of water, were carried round before and after every meal: but as
neither was changed in the process, the condition in which both reached
the lower end of the board is better left undescribed. Fastidiousness
was out of place in such circumstances, particularly when husband and
wife still ate from the same plate, and for a host to share his plate
with his guest was the highest honour he could do him. Yet our
ancestors' rules of etiquette show that they were fastidious in their
way. Ladies and gentlemen are therein recommended not to wipe their
fingers on the tablecloth, to refrain from all attentions to nose and
hair during meals, to lick their spoons clean before putting them into
the dish--special spoons for helping were never thought of--and above
all things, not to feed their dogs from the table.
Saturday evening being a vigil, the supper consisted of salt ling and
haddock, baked eels, galantine, eggs prepared in different ways, and
various tarts and creams. Wassel bread was set above the salt, maslin
below.
The Lady Idonia sat in a large carved chair near the fire. Lord
Marnell, who had only just entered, and had had a day's hard riding, had
thrown himself on a settle near, with the air of a tired man who was
glad to come back to home comforts.
The settle itself would have been hard comfort, but a well-to-do house
in those days never ran short of cushions, and his Lordship lay on half
a dozen. The Lady Margery was flitting about the table, looking to the
ways of her household, and Dorathie was extremely busy on a strip of
tapestry. The baked eels were just coming in at the door, when the
clear notes of a horn rang outside the gate. It was accompanied--as
that sound always was--by a nervous start from Idonia.
Dorathie never could understand why her grandmother always seemed
alarmed when a horn sounded. She was too young to be told that before
she was born, two horns had so sounded, one of which had brought to
Idonia the news of her widowhood, and the other had heralded the arrival
of persecutors for the faith. For the momentary defection on her part
which followed the latter, Idonia's pardon might be registered in
Heaven, but she had never forgiven herself. Was it any wonder if the
sound of a horn brought back to her shrinking heart both those awful
memories?
"Guests, I ween!" said Lord Marnell, not altering his position on the
settle, where he lay with both arms thrown back and beneath his head.
"Dear heart, who shall they be, trow?" responded his wife.
The slip of tapestry dropped from the fingers of Dorathie, who had
rushed to the door, and was peering through the crack to make such
discoveries as she could.
"Doll! Dorathie! Doll, I say!" cried the scandalised Lady Marnell to
her curiosity-stricken heiress. "Come back this minute! Where be thy
manners?"
Dorathie's obedience, rather than her manners, produced a reluctant
retreat from the door. The gate was heard to open and shut, the clatter
of horses came into the paved court-yard, there was the sound of a
little bustle and several voices without, and then through the door one
voice that all recognised with exclamations of pleasure, the rather
because it was one of the last which they expected to hear.
"Agnes, sweet heart!"
"Annis, my dear maid!"
"O Annis, hast come back?--_hast_ come back!"
Lord Marnell was up in an instant, his wife warmly embracing her
step-daughter, and Dorathie clinging to her as though she had not seen
her for a life-time. Agnes returned the greetings as warmly as they
were given, and when all the kisses and blessings were over, presented
John Combe.
There was a cordial welcome for Queen Marguerite's henchman at Lovell
Tower, and he was of course desired to remain there as long as it suited
his convenience. Any thing less would have been very rude in the eyes
of the fifteenth century. Agnes had a shrewd suspicion that Lovell Tower
was the real destination of the guest, and that before he left that
place he would find that a little private conversation with Lord Marnell
was the thing that suited his convenience. She was not mistaken.
Before John Combe had stayed a fortnight at Lovell Tower, Agnes and
Dorathie were informed by their mother that they were henceforward to
regard that gentleman in the light of a brother-in-law elect. Agnes
received with a quiet smile the communication which she had been
expecting; Dorathie with ecstatic excitement an idea entirely new to
her.
"But"--she suddenly exclaimed, ceasing her transports--"will Frid have
to go away, or stay away? Won't she come home?"
"She will come home first, surely," answered her mother, "for she will
be wed from hence: afterward, Master Combe hath some desire to dwell in
this vicinage, though if it shall be compassed I yet know not."
"Oh, how jolly should that be!" cried Dorathie, "to have Frid but a step
off, and run in and out!"
Lady Margery laughed. "A good step, I take it, my little maid.
Howbeit, I trust thou mayest have thy wish."
It was on that very evening that Maurice Carew, who had been to York on
business, came in with an important piece of news. The Princess of
Wales was found. Found, by the man whom she most dreaded, in the guise
of a cookmaid, at a "mean house" in the City of London,--dragged out
from her seclusion, and placed under the care of her uncle, Archbishop
Neville, with permission to hold intercourse with Queen Marguerite,--the
only kindness that could be done to that lonely, widowed, orphan girl.
Of all the quarrels that had ever taken place between Clarence and
Gloucester, the worst ensued upon this point. The royal family went to
Shene on the sixteenth of February "to pardon," but little pardon was in
the hearts of the brothers, who were quarrelling all the way. The King,
with whom Gloucester was always the favourite, tried to persuade
Clarence to more amiability: but all the concession that could be wrung
from the latter was--
"He may well have my Lady my sister-in-law, but she and my wife shall
part no livelihood!"
In other words, Clarence did not care how soon the Princess married, so
long as she remained a portionless bride, and the Warwick property was
left undivided to his children. To do Gloucester credit--the rather
since little credit can be done him--he does not seem to have been
anxious about the property at that time. It was Anne herself whom he
wanted: and he was astute enough to see that if he once got hold of her,
the property could be agitated for at leisure.
Not many days after this news had been a nine days' wonder, Lady Darcy
informed Frideswide that my Lady Anne Grey had petitioned her mother for
her, and she was to be transferred to her service. Frideswide was
exceedingly pleased, the rather because she could thus serve the Duke
far better than at Coldharbour. She had heard something of Lady Anne
from Agnes: but she was hardly prepared for the thin white face and
burning eyes which struck to her heart when she saw her new mistress.
She might keep in her service as long as Lady Anne should live, and not
defer her wedding. The interview in the presence of the Duchess was
very short, and question and answer were brief on both sides. But the
engagement was effected, and Lord Marnell was fully satisfied with the
transfer. He was glad, he said, to win both his poor doves from the
clutches of that kite of a woman. Had Frideswide remained at
Coldharbour, he would have hastened her marriage in order to get her
away. Now there was no need to do it.
The first night that Frideswide spent in her new home, she was required
to attend her young lady at her _coucher_. Mr. Grey was not at home; he
rarely was so. Noble ladies never had the privilege of a room to
themselves in the Middle Ages. When their husbands were away, and often
when they were not, a female attendant must occupy the pallet bed, which
ran on castors underneath the state bed, and was pulled out when
required. Frideswide found herself appointed to the pallet bed this
first night--an unusual promotion, since it argued some amount of
attachment and confidence on the part of the mistress. The _coucher_
was very silent, the only remarks made having reference to the business
in hand. But when Frideswide, having finished her duties, had hastily
undressed and lain down, the silence was broken.
"Frideswide, art thou in Agnes' secrets?"
"That is somewhat more than I can answer, my Lady. I wis a thing or
twain of hers."
"Did she ever speak unto thee of--of my Lord my father?"
"I think it was I that spake to her," answered Frideswide, softly.
"Hast thou seen him?" The tone was painfully eager.
"My Lady, may I speak out?"
"That is it I would have thee do."
"Doth your Ladyship mind a certain even in winter that his Lordship came
to Coldharbour, and, as I think, had speech of yourself?"
"Mind it? Yes, and shall while my life lasts!"
"My Lady, his Lordship had ere that been tarrying with the Queen at
Harfleur, and he was pleased to require of me a letter to my sister the
which should serve him as a passport to your Ladyship's presence."
"He came hither by thy means, Frideswide?"
"Mine and hers, my Lady."
"Which of you knows him better?"
"Methinks, I, by much, Madam."
"Frideswide, art thou willing to be his true friend and mine?"
"Trust me, my Lady."
"Which Rose dost thou wear?"
A delicate question to answer, when the questioner was a daughter of the
House of York! But Frideswide Marston never hesitated.
"The Red, Madam, from my cradle; and shall so do to my coffin."
"So do I," said Lady Anne, quietly, "down in mine heart, Frideswide. He
wears it; and what he is, I am. Ah, would I could pass further!--'Where
thou goest, I will go, and where thou lodgest, I will lodge.' I had
asked God no more. Yet at the least, his people can be my people, as his
God is my God. And may-be, when he dies, if not where, then may I die
and be buried."
"My Lady, you are young to count on dying."
"It seems long since I counted on living," she said in a low voice.
"Life is not worth much, Frideswide."
Frideswide knew too much to ask why. But she knew that for her, under
similar circumstances, life would have gone on; and she wondered whether
her physical nature were stronger than that of Lady Anne, or her moral
nature more blunt and hard.
"I mind," said Lady Anne, in the same tone, "once hearing my Lady of
Clarence my aunt to say that none save weak folks brake their hearts. I
reckon I must be weak. For mine is broken. I misdoubt if it were ever
otherwise than weak and easily shattered. It has not taken much to
break it. Thou mayest despise me if thou wilt."
"None less, Madam! It would be impossible."
"Would it?" she answered, rather wistfully. "Yet methinks thy nature is
far stronger than mine. The blows which have crushed me into a poor
handful of dust should have rebounded from thee with scarce a bruise. I
can see it in thy face; and thy sister is like thee."
"It may be so, my Lady. But I take it, He told us to pity the weak, who
is a God so strong and patient, and who was crucified through weakness
for our sakes. Is it not in His strength we can do all things?"
"Dost thou know Him, Frideswide?"
"Aye so, my Lady."
"Then thou wilt be a comfort to me--in what is coming. It will not be
long, Frideswide. Dost thou know that?"
Frideswide's voice was very low and tender as she said, "Ay, my Lady. I
think it will not be long." She had more hardihood than Agnes, and
spoke out her thoughts instead of feeling them in silence.
"And I shall be glad," said Lady Anne gently. "Only I hope my father may
not be long after me. Though we have met of late but so seldom, yet I
know the world will seem darker and colder to him when I am gone out of
it. I am all he has save God; and he is all that I have."
Frideswide's eyes were wet; but she made no reply.
"I used to have a fair dream once--too fair to be true. I reckoned that
we might have dwelt together, he and I, in some quiet cot in a green
glade, where no strangers should come near us, and none seek to take us
from each other. But--it was not to be."
"Not here, Madam. Yet will it not be--hereafter?"
"I feel as though I knew little of what will be hereafter. It will be
as God wills; and His will is good. I lack rest sorely--so does my
father: and we miss each other very, very much. I suppose our Lord can
give us what we need; and as to how, and when, and where--He will know.
We have only to wait. Only--I am so weary!"
And she turned on her pillow with a heavy sigh. Weary of life and all
that was in it--and she only just eighteen! Frideswide would have given
much to comfort her: but she did not know what to say.
"Our Lord was weary Himself," she said at last.
"Aye, and the memory should rest me. But it doth not so. I seem to
have sunk beneath all that--down into the great depths where no words
can reach me. Only His own voice, when He shall come and lay His hand
upon me, and say, 'Arise, and come away.' I reckon I shall be strong
enough to rise up then. Now, I only want to lie and wait for it.
Frideswide, dost thou know what gladness feels like? It is so long
sithence I have felt it, that I can barely remember."
"Yes, Madam, I know it well."
"And I do not, save in flashes," said Lady Anne again in that wistful
tone. "I marvel how it will come to me. I suppose it will come."
She spoke as if she thought it hardly possible.
"Madam, saith not the Psalmist, 'Thou hast put gladness in mine heart?'
Methinks that is God's gift as much as grace or mercy."
"Then I will ask Him to put it there," she said, with that childlike
simplicity which was a part of her character. "Frideswide, methinks it
shall be another way of saying to Him, 'Lord, let me die!'"
And Frideswide knew it was so.
"My maid," said the mistress after a moment's pause, "who was it led
thee into the ways of God?"
Frideswide could hardly tell. It had always been so, as it seemed to
her. She could barely remember her mother; but first her aunt, and then
her stepmother, and always her father, had brought her up in the Lollard
faith since her world began. But friends, after all, however faithful
and loving, can only lead us into the Court of Israel: the Lord of the
Temple must draw aside the veil, and admit His priests Himself into the
holy place.
"I can tell thee who it was that led me," resumed Lady Anne, "and let it
cheer thee, my maid, to do God's work on them that thou hast opportunity
to reach. It was one that I cannot in any wise remember--my Lady my
grandmother. She was sometime the Lady Anne de Montacute, a daughter of
my Lord of Salisbury that died for King Richard at Cirencester: and she
bred up first my father, and after, me, in that which she had learned
from her father. I cannot recall her face, essay it as I may: but her
doctrine abides with me. 'Tis true, I might have minded it less had not
my father kept me thereto belike: for the which reason, may-be, it hath
alway seemed me that to love him and to love God went together. They
were diverse sides of the same medal. I might say that either came of
itself, as I learned the other. Once on a time I seemed to come at God
through him: and now--I can come at him only through God. And the day
when I shall have both, Frideswide, will be the day when I shall know
what like it is to feel glad. But, O my God, was there no other way to
bring it?--was there no other way!"
"'There are delights in Thy right hand unto the end,'"[#] softly quoted
Frideswide. "And, dear my Lady, surely they will be the sweetest unto
them that had the fewest delights here below."
[#] Psalm xvi. 10.
The answer came in another quotation from the same Book. "'I am poor
and needy; the Lord is mine help. My helper and my deliverer art Thou:
tarry not, O my God!'"[#]
[#] Psalm xi. 17.
*CHAPTER X.*
*AT THE PARCHMENT-MAKER'S.*
"My life hath been a search for Thee,
'Mid thorns left red with Thy dear blood;
In many a dark Gethsemane
I seemed to stand where Thou hadst stood:
And, scorned in this world's judgment-place,
At times, through tears, to catch Thy face."
--ROBERT, EARL LYTTON.
The shadow was falling very low on the sun-dial in a small back yard
looking into the fields to the north of Chicken Lane, which crossed the
Fleet River, one end abutting upon Lither Lane (running northwards from
Holborn) and the other entering Smithfield at its north-western corner.
Over the sundial for a moment bent a youth of some twenty years or more,
clad in a buff jerkin and working apron. His face was remarkable for
the extremely good-humoured expression of the lips, and for the perfect
frankness of the clear, honest eyes. Having satisfied himself as to the
time of day, he re-entered the house by the back-door, which led him
into a low, narrow room, fitted with a long table and sundry benches.
Here half-a-dozen men and boys were at work, some engaged in preparing
skins for use by scraping off the hair, some arrived at the further
stages of straining or bleaching, some at the concluding point of
cutting the parallelograms of parchment, the manufacture of which was
manifestly their trade.
"Put up work, lads'" said the young man, as he came in, in a tone which
showed him, notwithstanding his youth, to be the master. "The
'prentice-lads may be gone. I have more ado yet with Dick and Robin."
He was obeyed with that alacrity which usually finds its way into the
cessation of work more readily than into its commencement, and one of
the men, with the three apprentices, shouldered their tools and
departed, exchanging "God be wi' you!" with the rest. When they were
gone, and the two men remaining had gathered their tools into baskets,
one of them said,--
"Monition to-night, Master?"
"Even so, Dick. Come you both into the kitchen."
The two men nodded, and followed their master into a small but cheerful
kitchen, where a large fire blazed in the wide chimney. In a wooden
chair in the chimney corner, propped up by cushions, sat a silver-haired
old woman, and a girl in the chimney corner at work, while an elder girl
and a middle-aged woman were arranging forms as though some gathering of
persons was expected.
"Time, Jack?" said the old woman.
"Aye so, Mother," returned he cheerily, setting to work with the forms.
He called her mother, for none other had he ever known: but the old
woman was really the grandmother of the young man and the girls. The
middle-aged woman was their one servant.
"There!" said Jack at length, glancing over the forms when the
arrangement was finished. "Me reckoneth those shall be so many as we
are like to have need."
"Who be a-coming, Jack?"
"No more than custom is, Mother--without Will Sterys bring yon friend of
his that he spake of t'other night. Very like he may."
"Who shall he be?"
"I wot not, Mother: only Will said he was one safe to be trusted."
Before the words were well out of Jack's lips, a low knock came on the
house-door--a peculiar knock; three little taps, a pause, two more.
"Here they come," said Jack, and darted to the door.
A somewhat motley assemblage dropped in by twos and threes. Here came a
lame man on crutches; a blind man led by a girl; two wan, tired-looking
women; a very old man, bent nearly double; another woman; a young man in
his prime. All, however, had as yet one peculiarity--they were dressed
in a style which indicated that many of the good things of this life had
not come in their way. There was a pause while they spoke kind
greetings to the family and each other: and then, at another low knock,
Jack let in first one man, and a minute afterwards, two more. All the
guests expected had evidently now arrived, for Jack bolted the door and
returned to the kitchen.
The man who came by himself, first of the concluding three, proved to be
a monk of the Order of St. Austin: a man of about thirty, spare and
active, with keen dark eyes which looked as if they saw every thing at
once. Coming in with uplifted hand in the traditional attitude of
blessing, and "Christ's peace be on all here!" he took his stand at a
small table, and unfastened from his girdle one of those leather books
bound with a projecting end and a knot, for the purpose of being carried
in that manner. This he set down on the table, and waited a moment for
the other two to appear.
These last arrivals were both wrapped in cloaks, as though they were
anxious not to be recognised. The first, throwing his cloak off, showed
that he was dressed in livery, in a style peculiar to the latter half of
the Middle Ages. He wore a tabard, or loose short coat, something like
a smock-frock in shape, but only reaching to the hips; with wide sleeves
which ended at the elbow. The right half of this coat was blue; the
left half blue and red in stripes, with yellow fleurs-de-lis worked on
the blue stripes. On his left arm, just below the shoulder, was
embroidered a silver cresset filled with red and yellow flames. In days
when every servant bore his master's badge, and every body knew whose
badge it was, no one could doubt for a moment whence this man came. The
fiery cresset, borne aloft on the silvered pole, was the familiar badge
of the De Holands, Dukes of Exeter.