Not in proud pomp nor courtly state;
Him his own thoughts did elevate,
Most happy in the shy recess.
--WORDSWORTH.
The departure of King Henry was the closing of the whole intellectual
and religious world that had been opened to the young Lord Clifford. To
the men of his own court, practical men of the world, there were times
when poor Henry seemed almost imbecile, and no doubt his attack of
melancholy insanity, the saddest of his ancestral inheritances, had
shattered his powers of decision and action; but he was one who ‘saw far
on holy ground,’ and he was a well-read man in human learning, besides
having the ordinary experience of having lived in the outer world, so
that in every way his companionship was delightful to a thoughtful boy,
wakening to the instincts of his race.
To think of being left to the society of the sheep, of dumb Piers and
his peasant parents was dreariness in the extreme to one who had begun
to know something like conversation, and to have his countless questions
answered, or at any rate attended to. Add to this, he had a deep
personal love and reverence for his saint, long before the knowing him
as his persecuted King, and thus his sorrow might well be profound,
as well as rendered more acute by the terror lest his even unconscious
description to his mother might have been treason!
He wept till he could weep no longer, and lay on the ground in his
despair till darkness was coming on, and Piers came and pulled him up,
indicating by gestures and uncouth sounds that he must go home. Goodwife
Dolly was anxiously looking out for him.
‘Laddie, there thou beest at last! I had begun to fear me whether the
robber gang had got a hold of thee. Only Hob said he saw Master Simon
with them. Have they mishandled thee, mine own lad nurse’s darling? Thou
lookest quite distraught.’
All Hal’s answer was to hide his head in her lap and weep like a babe,
though she could, with all her caresses, elicit nothing from him but
that his hermit was gone. No, no, the outlaws had not hurt him, but they
had taken him away, and he would never come back.
‘Ay, ay, thou didst love him and he was a holy man, no doubt, but one of
these days thou shalt have a true knight, and that is better for a young
baron to look to than a saint fitter for Heaven than for earth! Come
now, stand up and eat thy supper. Don’t let Hob come in and find thee
crying like a swaddled babe.’
With which worldly consolations and exhortations Goodwife Dolly brought
him to rise and accept his bowl of pottage, though he could not swallow
much, and soon put it aside and sought his bed.
It was not till late the next day that Simon Bunce was seen riding
his rough pony over the moor. Hal repaired to him at once, with the
breathless inquiry, ‘Where is he?’
‘In safe hands! Never you fear, sir! But best know nought.’
‘O Simon, was I--? Did I do him any scathe?--I--I never knew--I only
told my lady mother it was a saint.’
‘Ay, ay, lad, more’s the pity that he is more saint than king! If my
lady guessed aught, she would be loyal as became your father’s wife, and
methinks she would not press you hard for fear she should be forced to
be aware of the truth.’
‘But Sir Lancelot?’
‘As far as I can gather,’ explained Simon, ‘Sir Lancelot is one that
hath kept well with both sides, and so is able to be a protector. But
down came orders from York and his crew that King Harry is reported to
be lurking in some of these moors, and the Countess Clifford being his
wife, he fell under suspicion of harbouring him. Nay, there was some
perilous talk in his own household, so that, as I understand the matter,
he saw the need of being able to show that he knew nothing; or, if he
found that the King was living within these lands, of sending him a
warning ere avowing that he had been there. So I read what was said to
me.’
‘He knew nothing from me! Neither he nor my lady mother,’ eagerly said
Hal. ‘When I mind me I am sure my mother cut me short when I described
the hermit too closely, lest no doubt she should guess who he was.’
‘Belike! It would be like my lady, who is a loyal Lancastrian at heart,
though much bent on not offending her husband lest his protection should
be withdrawn from you.’
‘Better--O, a thousand times better!--he gave me up than the King!’
‘Hush! What good would that do? A boy like you? Unless they took you
in hand to make you a traitor, and offered you your lands if you would
swear allegiance to King Edward, as he calls himself.’
‘Never, though I were cut into quarters!’ averred Hal, with a fierce
gesture, clasping his staff. ‘But the King? Where and what have they
done with him?’
‘Best not to know, my lord,’ said Simon. ‘In sooth, I myself do not know
whither he is gone, only that he is with friends.’
‘But who--what were they? They looked like outlaws!’
‘So they were; many a good fellow is of Robin of Redesdale’s train.
There are scores of them haunting the fells and woods, all Red Rose men,
keeping a watch on the King,’ replied Simon. ‘We had made up our minds
that he had been long enough in one place, and that he must have taken
shelter the winter through, when I got notice of these notions of Sir
Lancelot, and forthwith sent word to them to have him away before worse
came of it.’
‘Oh! why did you not let me go with him? I would have saved him, waited
on him, fought for him.’
‘Fine fighting--when there’s no getting you to handle a lance, except
as if you wanted to drive a puddock with a reed! Though you have been
better of late, little as your hermit seemed the man to teach you.’
‘He said it was right and became a man! Would I were with him! He, my
true King! Let me go to him when you know where, good Simon. I, that am
his true and loving liegeman, should be with him.’
‘Ay! when you are a man to keep his head and your own.’
‘But I could wait on him.’
‘Would you have us bested to take care of two instead of one, and my
lady, moreover, in a pother about her son, and Sir Lancelot stirred to
make a hue and cry all the more? No, no, sir, bide in peace in the safe
homestead where you are sheltered, and learn to be a man, minding your
exercises as well as may be till the time shall come.’
‘When I shall be a man and a knight, and do deeds of derring-do in his
cause,’ cried Hal.
And the stimulus drove him on to continual calls to Hob, in Simon’s
default, to jousts with sword or spear, represented generally by staves;
and when these could not be had, he was making arrows and practising
with them, so as to become a terror to the wild ducks and other
neighbours on the wolds, the great geese and strange birds that came
in from the sea in the cold weather. When it was not possible to go far
afield in the frosts and snows, he conned King Henry’s portuary, trying
to identify the written words with those he knew by heart, and sometimes
trying to trace the shapes of the letters on the snow with a stick;
visiting, too, the mountains and looking into the limpid grey waters of
the lakes, striving hard to guess why, when the sea rose in tides, they
were still. More than ever, too, did the starry skies fill him with
contemplation and wonder, as he dwelt on the scraps alike of astronomy,
astrology, and devotion which he had gathered from his oracle in the
hermitage, and longed more and more for the time to return when he
should again meet his teacher, his saint, and his King.
Alas! that time was never to come. The outlawed partisans of the
Red Rose had secret communications which spread intelligence rapidly
throughout the country, and long before Sir Lancelot and his lady knew,
and thus it was that Simon Bunce learnt, through the outlaws, that poor
King Henry had been betrayed by treachery, and seized by John Talbot
at Waddington Hall in Lancashire. Deep were the curses that the outlaws
uttered, and fierce were the threats against the Talbot if ever he
should venture himself on the Cumbrian moors; and still hotter was their
wrath, more bitter the tears of the shepherd lord, when the further
tidings were received that the Earl of Warwick had brought the gentle,
harmless prince, to whom he had repeatedly sworn fealty, into London
with his feet tied to the stirrups of a sorry jade, and men crying
before him, ‘Behold the traitor!’
The very certainty that the meek and patient King would bear all with
rejoicing in the shame and reproach that led him in the steps of his
Master, only added to the misery of Hal as he heard the tale; and he lay
on the ground before his hut, grinding his teeth with rage and longing
to take revenge on Warwick, Edward, Talbot--he knew not whom--and
grasping at the rocks as if they were the stones of the Tower which he
longed to tear down and liberate his beloved saint.
Nor, from that time, was there any slackness in acquiring or practising
all skill in chivalrous exercises.