“What is strange, dearest?” But scarcely had this inquiry been made,
when a servant appeared, informing the lovers, that the uncle of the
lady Eleanor had arrived unexpectedly from court, and begged at once to
be allowed to pay his thanks to the brave knight who had rescued his
niece.
* * * * *
It was a fortnight later in our history. A small cavalcade was winding
along a romantic road, late in the afternoon. At its front rode two
knights, completely armed, except as to their heads, which were covered
with light caps, instead of helmets. A palfrey, upon which rode a lady,
and the numerous handmaidens in the group, showed the cavalcade to be
that of a woman of rank.
Suddenly the procession reached the brow of a hill, overlooking a wide
reach of pasture and woodland. An extensive valley stretched below,
through which meandered a stream, that now glittered in the sunlight,
and was now lost to sight as it entered the mazes of the forest. In the
very centre of the valley, and on a gentle elevation, stood a large and
extensive castle, its defences reaching completely around the low hill
upon which it stood. As the prospect broke upon the sight, the two
knights drew in their reins, and the elder turning to the younger one,
whom the reader will instantly recognise as the hero of our tale,
said,—
“Yonder is Torston castle, and in less than an hour we shall be within
its walls.”
“And a noble fortress it is, my lord. I have seen many both in this fair
realm and in France, but few to equal yon proud castle.”
“The landscape is itself a fine one,” said Lord Torston, “though few of
our profession of arms have an eye for beauty.”
“The rudest boor, my lord, could not fail to admire this scene. And yet
it does not seem wholly new to me. I have an indistinct impression of
having beheld something like it before.”
“Perhaps, in some fair valley of France. But we must push on, or we
shall not reach the castle until nightfall.”
A brisker pace, however, soon brought the cavalcade to the outskirts of
the domain. Descending the hill, they passed amid verdant woods and open
lawns, and villages scattered here and there, until they readied the
immediate vicinity of the castle, and in a few minutes more they entered
the large gateway, and drew up in the court-yard. Every thing around
seemed to recall to the mind of the young knight some long forgotten
dream; and when alighting, they entered the hall, with its raised table
at the upper end and the large antlers surmounting the dais, it appeared
to him as if he had returned to some favorite place on which he had been
wont to gaze in days long gone by. Suddenly he paused, looked eagerly
around, placed his hand to his brow, and said—
“My lord, this is strange. It seems to me as if I knew this place, and
every step only reveals some old remembered feature to me. It cannot be
that I have dreamed of it.”
“No, Sir Henry, you have not. You have seen it, but long ago. I have
suspected this for some days, but I am now convinced.”
“My lord,” said the young knight with a bewildered air, “what mean you?
It cannot be, and yet your words, your looks, your gestures, imply
it—am I to find in this castle my birth-place?”
“Yes! my son,” exclaimed the baron, unable longer to control the
emotions, which had been swelling for days in his bosom, “and in me you
find a father,” and opening his arms, his long lost son fell into his
arms.
“I no sooner saw your face,” said the father, when these emotions had
subsided sufficiently to permit an explanation, “than I felt a yearning
towards you, for it reminded me of your mother. But when I heard your
story,” he continued, “it tallied so completely with the loss of my only
son, that I suspected at once that you were my child. Your age, too,
agreed with what his should have been. Unwilling, however, to make known
my belief, I enjoined silence on my niece, determining to bring you here
in order to see if the sight of your birth-place would awaken old
recollections in your bosom. I have succeeded. I do not doubt but that
you are my son,—and now let me lead you to your cousin, who by this
time will have changed her apparel, and be ready to receive us.”
“One moment, only,” said Sir Henry, “I have that here, which as yet I
have shewn to no one. It is a ring I wore on my neck when a child. Here
it is.”
“God be praised, my son,” said the old baron, “for removing every doubt.
This is your mother’s wedding ring, which, after her death, you wore
around your neck,” and the long-separated father and son again embraced,
while tears of joy and thankfulness stole down the old man’s face.
Is it to be supposed that the lady Eleanor looked more coldly on her
lover, now that every difficulty in the way of their union was removed:
or that the young heir was less eager to possess himself of his bride,
because, by wedding her, he would preserve to her the possessions which
otherwise she would lose? Truth compels us to answer both questions in
the negative. Scarcely a month had elapsed before the young knight led
his blooming cousin to the altar, while his new-found father looked on
with a joy which he had thought, as a childless man, he could never more
have experienced. And in the proud array of England’s proudest chivalry,
which met at Torston castle to celebrate the nuptials, no one demeaned
himself more gallantly, or won more triumphs in the lists, than the
young knight, now no longer Harry Bowbent, the soldier of fortune, but
the heir of the richest earldom in the realm.
Clairfait Hall, 1841.
* * * * *