When the ceremony was over, and every one on the platform and steps of
the throne moved a little in order to make way for the royal personages,
making a slight momentary confusion, Adonis crept up behind Don John,
and softly touched his sleeve to attract his attention. Don John looked
round quickly, and was annoyed to see the dwarf there. He did not notice
the fact that Doña Ana de la Cerda was watching them both, looking
sideways without turning her head.
"It is a matter of importance," said the jester, in a low voice. "Read
it before supper if you can."
Don John looked at him a moment, and turned away without answering, or
even making a sign that he understood. The dwarf met Doña Ana's eyes,
and grew slowly pale, till his face was a yellow mask; for he feared
her.
The door on the other side of the throne was opened, and the King and
Queen, followed by Don John, and preceded by the Master of Ceremonies,
went out. The dwarf, who was privileged, went after them with his
strange, rolling step, his long arms hanging down and swinging
irregularly, as if they did not belong to his body, but were only
stuffed things that hung loose from his shoulders.
As on all such state occasions, there were separate suppers, in separate
apartments, one for the King, and one for the ministers of state and the
high courtiers; thirdly, a vast collation was spread in a hall on the
other side of the throne room for the many nobles who were but guests at
the court and held no office nor had any special privileges. It was the
custom at that time that the supper should last an hour, after which all
reëntered the throne room to dance, except the King and Queen, who
either retired to the royal apartments, or came back for a short time
and remained standing on the floor of the hall, in order to converse
with a few of the grandees and ambassadors.
The royal party supped in a sombre room of oval shape, dark with
tapestries and splendid with gold. The King and Queen sat side by side,
and Don John was placed opposite them at the table, of which the shape
and outline corresponded on a small scale with those of the room. Four
or five gentlemen, whose office it was, served the royal couple,
receiving the dishes and wines from the hands of the chief butler; and
he, with two other servants in state liveries, waited on Don John.
Everything was most exactly ordered according to the unchangeable rules
of the most formal court in Europe, not even excepting that of Rome.
Philip sat in gloomy silence, eating nothing, but occasionally drinking
a little Tokay wine, brought with infinite precaution from Hungary to
Madrid. As be said nothing, neither the Queen nor Don John could speak,
it being ordained that the King must be the first to open his lips. The
Queen, however, being young and of a good constitution in spite of her
almost delicate appearance, began to taste everything that was set
before her, glancing timidly at her husband, who took no notice of her,
or pretended not to do so. Don John, soldier-like, made a sparing supper
of the first thing that was offered to him, and then sat silently
watching the other two. He understood very well that his brother wished
to see him in private, and was annoyed that the Queen should make the
meal last longer than necessary. The dwarf understood also, and smiled
to himself in the corner where he stood waiting in case the King should
wish to be amused, which on that particular evening seemed far from
likely. But sometimes he turned pale and his lips twisted a little as if
he were suffering great pain; for Don John had not yet read the letter
that was hidden in his glove; and Adonis saw in the dark corners of the
room the Princess of Eboli's cruel half-closed eyes, and he fancied he
heard her deep voice, that almost always spoke very sweetly, telling him
again and again that if Don John did not read her letter before he met
the King alone that night, Adonis should before very long cease to be
court jester, and indeed cease to be anything at all that 'eats and
drinks and sleeps and wears a coat'--as Dante had said. What Doña Ana
said she would do, was as good as done already, both then and for nine
years from that time, but thereafter she paid for all her deeds, and
more too. But this history is not concerned with those matters, being
only the story of what happened in one night at the old Alcazar of
Madrid.
King Philip sat a little bent in his chair, apparently staring at a
point in space, and not opening his lips except to drink. But his
presence filled the shadowy room, his large and yellowish face seemed to
be all visible from every part of it, and his still eyes dominated
everything and every one, except his brother. It was as if the
possession of some supernatural and evil being were stealing slowly upon
all who were there; as if a monstrous spider sat absolutely motionless
in the midst of its web, drawing everything within reach to itself by
the unnatural fascination of its lidless sight--as if the gentlemen in
waiting were but helpless flies, circling nearer and nearer, to be
caught at last in the meshes, and the Queen a bright butterfly, and Don
John a white moth, already taken and soon to be devoured. The dwarf
thought of this in his corner, and his blood was chilled, for three
queens lay in their tombs in three dim cathedrals, and she who sat at
table was the fourth who had supped with the royal Spider in his web.
Adonis watched him, and the penetrating fear he had long known crept all
through him like the chill that shakes a man before a marsh fever, so
that he had to set his teeth with all his might, lest they should
chatter audibly. As he looked, he fancied that in the light of the waxen
torches the King's face turned by degrees to an ashy grey, and then more
slowly to a shadowy yellow again, as he had seen a spider's ugly body
change colour when the flies came nearer, and change again when one was
entangled in the threads. He thought that the faces of all the people in
the room changed, too, and that he saw in them the look that only near
and certain death can bring, which is in the eyes of him who goes out
with bound hands, at dawn, amongst other men who will see the rising sun
shine on his dead face. That fear came on the dwarf sometimes, and he
dreaded always lest at that moment the King should call to him and bid
him sing or play with words. But this had never happened yet. There were
others in the room, also, who knew something of that same terror, though
in a less degree, perhaps because they knew Philip less well than the
jester, who was almost always near him. But Don John sat quietly in his
place, no more realizing that there could be danger than if he had been
charging the Moors at the head of his cavalry, or fighting a man hand to
hand with drawn swords.
But still the fear grew, and even the gentlemen and the servants
wondered, for it had never happened that the King had not at last broken
the silence at supper, so that all guessed trouble near at hand, and
peril for themselves. The Queen grew nervous and ceased to eat. She
looked from Philip to Don John, and more than once seemed about to
speak, but recollected herself and checked the words. Her hand shook and
her thin young nostrils quivered now and then. Evil was gathering in the
air, and she felt it approaching, though she could not tell whence it
came. A sort of tension took possession of every one, like what people
feel in southern countries when the southeast wind blows, or when,
almost without warning, the fresh sea-breeze dies away to a dead calm
and the blackness rises like a tide of pitch among the mountains of the
coast, sending up enormous clouds above it to the pale sky, and lying
quite still below; and the air grows lurid quickly, and heavy to breathe
and sultry, till the tempest breaks in lightning and-thunder and
drenching rain.
In the midst of the brewing storm the dwarf saw only the Spider in its
web, illuminated by the unearthly glare of his own fear, and with it the
frightened butterfly and the beautiful silver moth, that had never
dreamed of danger. He shrank against the hangings, pressing backwards
till he hurt his crooked back against the stone wall behind the
tapestry, and could have shrieked with fear had not a greater fear made
him dumb. He felt that the King was going to speak to him, and that he
should not be able to answer him. A horrible thought suddenly seized
him, and he fancied that the King had seen him slip the letter into Don
John's glove, and would ask for it, and take it, and read it--and that
would be the end. Thrills of torment ran through him, and he knew how it
must feel to lie bound on the rack and to hear the executioner's hands
on the wheel, ready to turn it again at the judge's word. He had seen a
man tortured once, and remembered his face. He was sure that the King
must have seen the letter, and that meant torment and death, and the
King was angry also because the court had cheered Don John. It was
treason, and he knew it--yet it would have been certain death, too, to
refuse to obey Doña Ana. There was destruction on either side, and he
could not escape. Don John had not read the writing yet, and if the King
asked for it, he would probably give it to him without a thought,
unopened, for he was far too simple to imagine that any one could accuse
him of a treasonable thought, and too boyishly frank to fancy that his
brother could be jealous of him--above all, he was too modest to suppose
that there were thousands who would have risked their lives to set him
on the throne of Spain. He would therefore give the King the letter
unopened, unless, believing it to be a love message from some foolish
woman, he chose to tear it up unread. The wretched jester knew that
either would mean his own disgrace and death, and he quivered with agony
from head to foot.
The lights moved up and down before his sight, the air grew heavier, the
royal Spider took gigantic proportions, and its motionless eyes were
lurid with evil It was about to turn to him; he felt it turning already,
and knew that it saw him in his corner, and meant to draw him to it,
very slowly. In a moment he should fall to the floor a senseless heap,
out of deadly fear--it would be well if his fear really killed him, but
he could not even hope for that. His hands gripped the hangings on each
side of him as he shrank and crushed his deformity against the wall.
Surely the King was taming his head. Yes--he was right. He felt his
short hair rising on his scalp and unearthly sounds screamed in his
ears. The terrible eyes were upon him now, but he could not move hand or
foot--if he had been nailed to the wall to die, he could not have been
so helpless.
Philip eyed him with cold curiosity, for it was not an illusion, and he
was really looking steadily at the dwarf. After a long time, his
protruding lower lip moved two or three times before he spoke. The
jester should have come forward at his first glance, to answer any
question asked him. Instead, his colourless lips were parted and tightly
drawn back, and his teeth were chattering, do what he could to close
them. The Queen and Don John followed the King's gaze and looked at the
dwarf in surprise, for his agony was painfully visible.
"He looks as if he were in an ague," observed Philip, as though he were
watching a sick dog.
He had spoken at last, and the fear of silence was removed. An audible
sigh of relief was heard in the room.
"Poor man!" exclaimed the Queen. "I am afraid he is very ill!"
"It is more like--" began Don John, and then he checked himself, for he
had been on the point of saying that the dwarfs fit looked more like
physical fear than illness, for he had more than once seen men afraid of
death; but he remembered the letter in his glove and thought the words
might rouse Philip's suspicions.
"What was your Serene Highness about to say?" enquired the King,
speaking coldly, and laying stress on the formal title which he had
himself given Don John the right to use.
"As your Majesty says, it is very like the chill of a fever," replied
Don John.
But it was already passing, for Adonis was not a natural coward, and the
short conversation of the royal personages had broken the spell that
held him, or had at least diminished its power. When he had entered the
room he had been quite sure that no one except the Princess had seen him
slip the letter into Don John's glove. That quieting belief began to
return, his jaw became steady, and he relaxed his hold on the
tapestries, and even advanced half a step towards the table.
"And now he seems better," said the King, in evident surprise. "What
sort of illness is this, Fool? If you cannot explain it, you shall be
sent to bed, and the physicians shall practise experiments upon your
vile body, until they find out what your complaint is, for the
advancement of their learning."
"They would advance me more than their science, Sire," answered Adonis,
in a voice that still quaked with past fear, "for they would send me to
paradise at once and learn nothing that they wished to know."
"That is probable," observed Don John, thoughtfully, for he had little
belief in medicine generally, and none at all in the present case.
"May it please your Majesty," said Adonis, taking heart a little, "there
are musk melons on the table."
"Well, what of that?" asked the King.
"The sight of melons on your Majesty's table almost kills me," answered
the dwarf.
"Are you so fond of them that you cannot bear to see them? You shall
have a dozen and be made to eat them all. That will cure your abominable
greediness."
"Provided that the King had none himself, I would eat all the rest,
until I died of a surfeit of melons like your Majesty's great-grandsire
of glorious and happy memory, the Emperor Maximilian."
Philip turned visibly pale, for he feared illness and death as few have
feared either.
"Why has no one ever told me that?" he asked in a muffled and angry
voice, looking round the room, so that the gentlemen and servants shrank
back a little.
No one answered his question, for though the fact was true, it had been
long forgotten, and it would have been hard for any of those present to
realize that the King would fear a danger so far removed. But the dwarf
knew him well.
"Let there be no more melons," said Philip, rising abruptly, and still
pale.
Don John had suppressed a smile, and was taken unawares when the King
rose, so that in standing up instantly, as was necessary according to
the rules, his gloves slipped from his knees, where he had kept them
during supper, to the floor, and a moment passed before he realized that
they were not in his hand. He was still in his place, for the King had
not yet left his own, being engaged in saying a Latin grace in a low
tone, He crossed himself devoutly, and an instant later Don John stooped
down and picked up what he had dropped. Philip could not but notice the
action, and his suspicions were instantly roused.
"What have you found?" he asked sharply, his eyes fixing themselves
again.
"My gloves, Sire. I dropped them."
"And are gloves such precious possessions that Don John of Austria must
stoop to pick them up himself?"
Adonis began to tremble again, and all his fear returned, so that he
almost staggered against the wall. The Queen looked on in surprise, for
she had not been Philip's wife many months. Don John was unconcerned,
and laughed in reply to the question.
"It chances that after long campaigning these are the only new white
gloves Don John of Austria possesses," he answered lightly.
"Let me see them," said the King, extending his hand, and smiling
suddenly.
With some deliberation Don John presented one of the gloves to his
brother, who took it and pretended to examine it critically, still
smiling. He turned it over several times, while Adonis looked on,
gasping for breath, but unnoticed.
"The other," said Philip calmly.
Adonis tried to suppress a groan, and his eyes were fixed on Don John's
face. Would he refuse? Would he try to extract the letter from the glove
under his brother's eyes? Would he give it up?
Don John did none of those things, and there was not the least change of
colour in his cheek. Without any attempt at concealment he took the
letter from its hiding-place, and held out the empty glove with his
other hand. The King drew back, and his face grew very grey and shadowy
with anger.
"What have you in your other hand?" he asked in a voice indistinct with
passion.
"A lady's letter, Sire," replied Don John, unmoved.
"Give it to me at once!"
"That, your Majesty, is a request I will not grant to any gentleman in
Spain."
He undid a button of his close-fitting doublet, thrust the letter into
the opening and fastened the button again, before the King could speak.
The dwarf's heart almost stood still with joy,--he could have crawled to
Don John's feet to kiss the dust from his shoes. The Queen smiled
nervously, between fear of the one man and admiration for the other.
"Your Serene Highness," answered Philip, with a frightful stare, "is the
first gentleman of Spain who has disobeyed his sovereign."
"May I be the last, your Majesty," said Don John, with a courtly gesture
which showed well enough that he had no intention of changing his mind.
The King turned from him coldly and spoke to Adonis, who had almost got
his courage back a second time.
"You gave my message to his Highness, Fool?" he asked, controlling his
voice, but not quite steadying it to a natural tone.
"Yes, Sire."
"Go and tell Don Antonio Perez to come at once to me in my own
apartments."
The dwarf bent till his crooked back was high above his head, and he
stepped backwards towards the door through which the servants had
entered and gone out. When he had disappeared, Philip turned and, as if
nothing had happened, gave his hand to the Queen to lead her away with
all the prescribed courtesy that was her due. The servants opened wide
the door, two gentlemen placed themselves on each side of it, the chief
gentleman in waiting went before, and the royal couple passed out,
followed at a little distance by Don John, who walked unconcernedly,
swinging his right glove carelessly in his hand as he went. The four
gentlemen walked last. In the hall beyond, Mendoza was in waiting with
the guards.
A little while after they were all gone, Adonis came back from his
errand, with his rolling step, and searched for the other glove on the
floor, where the King had dropped it. He found it there at once and hid
it in his doubtlet. No one was in the room, for the servants had
disappeared as soon as they could. The dwarf went quickly to Don John's
place, took a Venetian goblet full of untasted wine that stood there and
drank it at a draught. Then he patted himself comfortably with his other
hand and looked thoughtfully at the slices of musk melon that lay in the
golden dish flanked by other dishes full of late grapes and pears.
"God bless the Emperor Maximilian!" he said in a devout tone. "Since he
could not live for ever, it was a special grace of Providence that his
death should be by melons."
Then he went away again, and softly closed the door behind him, after
looking back once more to be sure that no one was there after all, and
perhaps, as people sometimes do on leaving a place where they have
escaped a great danger, fixing its details unconsciously in his memory,
with something almost akin to gratitude, as if the lifeless things had
run the risk with them and thus earned their lasting friendship. Thus
every man who has been to sea knows how, when his vessel has been hove
to in a storm for many hours, perhaps during more than one day, within a
few miles of the same spot, the sea there grows familiar to him as a
landscape to a landsman, so that when the force of the gale is broken at
last and the sea subsides to a long swell, and the ship is wore to the
wind and can lay her course once more, he looks astern at the grey water
he has learned to know so well and feels that he should know it again if
he passed that way, and he leaves it with a faint sensation of regret.
So Adonis, the jester, left the King's supper-room that night, devoutly
thanking Heaven that the Emperor Maximilian had died of eating too many
melons more than a hundred and fifty years ago.
Meanwhile, the King had left the Queen at the door of her apartments,
and had dismissed Don John in angry silence by a gesture only, as he
went on to his study. And when there, he sent away his gentlemen and
bade that no one should disturb him, and that only Don Antonio Perez,
the new favourite, should be admitted. The supper had scarcely lasted
half an hour, and it was still early in the evening when he found
himself alone and was able to reflect upon what had happened, and upon
what it would be best to do to rid himself of his brother, the hero and
idol of Spain.
He did not admit that Don John of Austria could be allowed to live on,
unmolested, as if he had not openly refused to obey an express command
and as if he were not secretly plotting to get possession of the throne.
That was impossible. During more than two years, Don John's popularity,
not only with the people, but with the army, which was a much more
serious matter, had been steadily growing; and with it and even faster
than it, the King's jealousy and hatred had grown also, till it had
become a matter of common discussion and jest among the soldiers when
their officers were out of hearing.
But though it was without real cause, it was not without apparent
foundation. As Philip slowly paced the floor of his most private room,
with awkward, ungainly steps, stumbling more than once against a cushion
that lay before his great armchair, he saw clearly before him the whole
dimensions of that power to which he had unwillingly raised his brother.
The time had been short, but the means used had been great, for they had
been intended to be means of destruction, and the result was tremendous
when they turned against him who used them. Philip was old enough to
have been Don John's father, and he remembered how indifferent he had
been to the graceful boy of twelve, whom they called Juan Quixada, when
he had been brought to the old court at Valladolid and acknowledged as a
son of the Emperor Charles. Though he was his brother, Philip had not
even granted him the privilege of living in the palace then, and had
smiled at the idea that he should be addressed as "Serene Highness."
Even as a boy, he had been impatient to fight; and Philip remembered how
he was always practising with the sword or performing wild feats of
skill and strength upon half-broken horses, except when he was kept to
his books by Doña Magdalena Quixada, the only person in the world whom
he ever obeyed without question. Every one had loved the boy from the
first, and Philip's jealousy had begun from that; for he, who was loved
by none and feared by all, craved popularity and common affection, and
was filled with bitter resentment against the world that obeyed him but
refused him what he most desired.
Little more than ten years had passed since the boy had come, and he had
neither died a natural death nor fallen in battle, and was grown up to
young manhood, and was by far the greatest man in Spain. He had been
treated as an inferior, the people had set him up as a god. He had been
sent out to command expeditions that be might fail and be disgraced; but
he had shown deeper wisdom than his elders, and had come back covered
with honour; and now he had been commanded to fight out the final battle
of Spain with the Moriscoes, in the hope that he might die in the fight,
since he could not be dishonoured, and instead he had returned in
triumph, having utterly subdued the fiercest warriors in Europe, to reap
the ripe harvest of his military glory at an age when other men were in
the leading-strings of war's school, and to be acclaimed a hero as well
as a favourite by a court that could hardly raise a voice to cheer for
its own King. Ten years had done all that. Ten more, or even five, might
do the rest. The boy could not be without ambition, and there could be
no ambition for him of which the object should be less than a throne.
And yet no word had been breathed against him,--his young reputation was
charmed, as his life was. In vain Philip had bidden Antonio Perez and
the Princess of Eboli use all their wits and skill to prove that he was
plotting to seize the crown. They answered that he loved a girl of the
court, Mendoza's daughter, and that besides war, for war's sake, he
cared for nothing in the world but Dolores and his adopted mother.
They spoke the truth, for they had reason to know it, having used every
means in their power to find out whether he could be induced to quarrel
with Philip and enter upon a civil war, which could have had but one
issue, since all Spain would have risen to proclaim him king. He had
been tempted by questions, and led into discussions in which it seemed
certain that he must give them some hope. But they and their agents lost
heart before the insuperable obstacle of the young prince's loyalty. It
was simple, unaffected, and without exaggeration. He never drew his
sword and kissed the blade, and swore by the Blessed Virgin to give his
last drop of blood for his sovereign and his country. He never made
solemn vows to accomplish ends that looked impossible. But when the
charge sounded, he pressed his steel cap a little lower upon his brow,
and settled himself in the saddle without any words and rode at death
like the devil incarnate; and then men followed him, and the impossible
was done, and that was all. Or he could wait and watch, and manoeuvre
for weeks, until he had his foe in his hand, with a patience that would
have failed his officers and his men, had they not seen him always ready
and cheerful, and fully sure that although he might fail twenty times to
drive the foe into the pen, he should most certainly succeed in the
end,--as he always did.
Philip paced the chamber in deep and angry thought. If at that moment
any one had offered to rid him of his brother, the reward would have
been ready, and worth a murderer's taking. But the King had long
cherished the scheme of marrying Don John to Queen Mary of
Scotland,--whose marriage with Bothwell could easily be annulled--in
order that his presumptuous ambition might be satisfied, and at the same
time that he might make of his new kingdom a powerful ally of Spain
against Elizabeth of England. It was for this reason that he had long
determined to prevent his brother's marriage with Maria Dolores de
Mendoza. Perez and Doña Ana de la Cerda, on the other hand, feared that
if Don John were allowed to marry the girl he so devotedly loved, he
would forget everything for her, give up campaigning, and settle to the
insignificance of a thoroughly happy man. For they knew the world well
from their own point of view. Happiness is often like sadness, for it
paralyzes those to whose lot it falls; but pain and danger rouse man's
strength of mind and body.
Yet though the King and his treacherous favourite had diametrically
opposite intentions, a similar thought had crossed the minds of both,
even before Don John had ridden up to the palace gate late on that
afternoon, from his last camping ground outside the city walls. Both had
reasoned that whoever was to influence a man so straightforward and
fearless must have in his power and keeping the person for whom Don John
would make the greatest sacrifice of his life; and that person, as both
knew, was Dolores herself. Yet when Antonio Perez entered Philip's
study, neither had guessed the other's thought.
* * * * *