Five minutes later Lemprière of Rozel, as butler to the Queen, saw a
sight of which he told to his dying day. When, after varied troubles
hereafter set down, he went back to Jersey, he made a speech before
the royal court, in which he told what chanced while Elizabeth was at
chapel.
“There stood I, butler to the Queen,” he said, with a large gesture,
“but what knew I of butler’s duties at Greenwich Palace! Her Majesty
had given me an office where all the work was done for me. Odd’s
life! but when I saw the Gentleman of the Rod and his fellow get down
on their knees to lay the cloth upon the table, as though it was an
altar at Jerusalem, I thought it time to say my prayers. There was
naught but kneeling and retiring. Now it was the saltcellar, the
plate, and the bread; then it was a Duke’s Daughter--a noble soul as
ever lived--with a tasting-knife, as beautiful as a rose; then
another lady enters who glares at me, and gets to her knees as does
the other. Three times up and down, and then one rubs the plate with
bread and salt, as solemn as St. Ouen’s when he says prayers in the
royal court. Gentles, that was a day for Jersey. For there stood I as
master of all, the Queen’s butler, and the greatest ladies of the
land doing my will--though it was all Persian mystery to me, save
when the kettle-drums began to beat and the trumpet to blow, and in
walked bareheaded the yeomen of the guard, all scarlet, with a golden
rose on their backs, bringing in a course of twenty-four gold dishes,
and I, as Queen’s butler, receiving them.
“Then it was I opened my mouth, amazed at the endless dishes filled
with niceties of earth, and the Duke’s Daughter pops onto my tongue a
mouthful of the first dish brought, and then does the same to every
yeoman of the guard that carried a dish--that her notorious Majesty
be safe against the hand of poisoners. There was I, fed by a Duke’s
Daughter; and thus was Jersey honored; and the Duke’s Daughter
whispers to me, as a dozen other unmarried ladies enter, ‘The Queen
liked not the cut of your frieze jerkin better than do I, seigneur.’
With that she joins the others, and they all kneel down and rise up
again, and, lifting the meat from the table, bear it into the Queen’s
private chamber.
“When they return, and the yeomen of the guard go forth, I am left
alone with these ladies, and there I stand with twelve pairs of eyes
upon me, little knowing what to do. There was laughter in the faces
of some, and looks less taking in the eyes of others; for my Lord
Leicester was to have done the duty I was set to do that day, and he
the greatest gallant of the kingdom, as all the world knows. What
they said among themselves I know not, but I heard Leicester’s name,
and I guessed that they were mostly in the pay of his soft words.
But the Duke’s Daughter was on my side, as was proved betimes when
Leicester made trouble for us who went from Jersey to plead the cause
of injured folk. Of the earl’s enmity to me--a foolish spite of a
great nobleman against a Norman-Jersey gentleman--and of how it
injured others for the moment, you all know; but we had him by the
heels before the end of it, great earl and favorite as he was.”
In the same speech Lemprière told of his audience with the Queen,
even as she sat at dinner, and of what she said to him; but since his
words give but a partial picture of events, the relation must not be
his.
When the Queen returned from chapel to her apartments, Lemprière was
called by an attendant, and he stood behind the Queen’s chair until
she summoned him to face her. Then, having finished her meal and
dipped her fingers in a bowl of rose-water, she took up the papers
Leicester had given her--the Duke’s Daughter had read them aloud as
she ate--and said:
“Now, my good Seigneur of Rozel, answer me these few questions:
First, what concern is it of yours whether this Michel de la Forêt be
sent back to France or die here in England?”
“I helped to save his life at sea--one good turn deserves another,
your high-born Majesty.”
The Queen looked sharply at him, then burst out laughing.
“God’s life, but here’s a bull making epigrams!” she said. Then her
humor changed. “See you, my butler of Rozel, you shall speak the
truth, or I’ll have you where that jerkin will fit you not so well a
month hence. Plain answers I will have to plain questions, or De
Carteret of St. Ouen’s shall have his will of you and your precious
pirate. So bear yourself as you would save your head and your
honors.”
Lemprière of Rozel never had a better moment than when he met the
Queen of England’s threats with faultless intrepidity. “I am
concerned about my head, but more about my honors, and most about my
honor,” he replied. “My head is my own, my honors are my family’s,
for which I would give my head when needed, and my honor defends both
until both are naught--and all are in the service of my Queen.”
Smiling, Elizabeth suddenly leaned forward, and, with a glance of
satisfaction towards the Duke’s Daughter, who was present, said:
“I had not thought to find so much logic behind your rampant skull,”
she said. “You’ve spoken well, Rozel, and you shall speak by the book
to the end, if you will save your friends. What concern is it of
yours whether Michel de la Forêt live or die?”
“It is a concern of one whom I’ve sworn to befriend, and that is my
concern, your ineffable Majesty.”
“Who the friend?”
“Mademoiselle Aubert.”
“The betrothed of this Michel de la Forêt?”
“Even so, your exalted Majesty. But I made sure De la Forêt was dead
when I asked her to be my wife.”
“Lord! Lord! Lord! hear this vast infant, this hulking baby of a
seigneur, this primeval innocence! Listen to him, cousin,” said the
Queen, turning again to the Duke’s Daughter. “Was ever the like of it
in any kingdom of this earth? He chooses a penniless exile--he, a
butler to the Queen, with three dove-cotes and the perquage--and a
Huguenot withal. He is refused; then comes the absent lover oversea,
to shipwreck; and our seigneur rescues him, ‘fends him; and when yon
master exile is in peril, defies his Queen’s commands”--she tapped
the papers lying beside her on the table--“then comes to England with
the lady to plead the case before his outraged sovereign, with an
outlawed buccaneer for comrade and lieutenant. There is the case,
is’t not?”
“I swore to be her friend,” answered Lemprière, stubbornly, “and I
have done according to my word.”
“There’s not another nobleman in my kingdom who would not have
thought twice about the matter, with the lady aboard his ship on the
high seas--’tis a miraculous chivalry, cousin,” she added to the
Duke’s Daughter, who bowed, settled herself again on her velvet
cushion, and looked out of the corner of her eyes at Lemprière.
“You opposed Sir Hugh Pawlett’s officers who went to arrest this De
la Forêt,” continued Elizabeth. “Call you that serving your Queen?
Pawlett had our commands.”
“I opposed them but in form, that the matter might the more surely be
brought to your Majesty’s knowledge.”
“It might easily have brought you to the Tower, man.”
“I had faith that your Majesty would do right in this, as in all
else. So I came hither to tell the whole story to your judicial
Majesty.”
“Our thanks for your certificate of character,” said the Queen, with
amused irony. “What is your wish? Make your words few and plain.”
“I desire before all that Michel de la Forêt shall not be returned to
the Medici, most radiant Majesty.”
“That’s plain. But there are weighty matters ’twixt France and
England, and De la Forêt may turn the scale one way or another. What
follows, beggar of Rozel?”
“That Mademoiselle Aubert and her father may live without let or
hindrance in Jersey.”
“That you may eat sour grapes ad eternam? Next?”
“That Buonespoir be pardoned all offences and let live in Jersey on
pledge that he sin no more, not even to raid St. Ouen’s cellars of
the muscadella reserved for your generous Majesty.”
There was such humor in Lemprière’s look as he spoke of the
muscadella that the Queen questioned him closely upon Buonespoir’s
raid; and so infectious was his mirth as he told the tale that
Elizabeth, though she stamped her foot in assumed impatience, smiled
also.
“You shall have your Buonespoir, seigneur,” she said; “but for his
future you shall answer as well as he.”
“For what he does in Jersey Isle, your commiserate Majesty?”
“For crime elsewhere, if he be caught, he shall march to Tyburn,
friend,” she answered. Then she hurriedly added: “Straightway go and
bring mademoiselle and her father hither. Orders are given for their
disposal. And to-morrow at this hour you shall wait upon me in their
company. I thank you for your services as butler this day, Monsieur
of Rozel. You do your office rarely.”
* * * * *
As the seigneur left Elizabeth’s apartments he met the Earl of
Leicester hurrying thither, preceded by the Queen’s messenger.
Leicester stopped and said, with a slow, malicious smile, “Farming is
good, then--you have fine crops this year on your holding?”
The point escaped Lemprière at first, for the favorite’s look was all
innocence, and he replied: “You are mistook, my lord. You will
remember I was in the presence-chamber an hour ago, my lord. I am
Lemprière, Seigneur of Rozel, butler to her Majesty.”
“But are you, then? I thought you were a farmer and raised cabbages.”
And, smiling, Leicester passed on.
For a moment the seigneur stood pondering the earl’s words and
angrily wondering at his obtuseness. Then suddenly he knew he had
been mocked, and he turned and ran after his enemy; but Leicester had
vanished into the Queen’s apartments.
The Queen’s fool was standing near, seemingly engaged in the light
occupation of catching imaginary flies, buzzing with his motions. As
Leicester disappeared he looked from under his arm at Lemprière. “If
a bird will not stop for the salt to its tail, then the salt is
damned, Nuncio; and you must cry _David!_ and get thee to the
quarry.”
Lemprière stared at him swelling with rage; but the quaint smiling of
the fool conquered him, and, instead of turning on his heel, he
spread himself like a Colossus and looked down in grandeur. “And
wherefore cry _David!_ and get quarrying?” he asked. “Come, what
sense is there in thy words when I am wroth with yonder nobleman?”
“Oh, Nuncio, Nuncio, thou art a child of innocence and without
history. The salt held not the bird for the net of thy anger,
Nuncio; so it is meet that other ways be found. David the ancient put
a stone in a sling, and Goliath laid him down like an egg in a
nest--therefore, Nuncio, get thee to the quarry. Obligato, which is
to say Leicester yonder, hath no tail--the devil cut it off and wears
it himself. So let salt be damned, and go sling thy stone!”
Lemprière was good-humored again. He fumbled in his purse and brought
forth a gold-piece. “Fool, thou hast spoken like a man born sensible
and infinite. I understand thee like a book. Thou hast not folly, and
thou shall not be answered as if thou wast a fool. But in terms of
gold shalt thou have reply.” He put the gold-piece in the fool’s hand
and slapped him on the shoulder.
“Why now, Nuncio,” answered the other, “it is clear that there is a
fool at court, for is it not written that a fool and his money are
soon parted? And this gold-piece is still hot with running ‘tween
thee and me.”
Lemprière roared. “Why, then, for thy hit thou shalt have another
gold-piece, gossip. But see”--his voice lowered--“know you where is
my friend, Buonespoir the pirate? Know you where he is in durance?”
“As I know marrow in a bone I know where he hides, Nuncio; so come
with me,” answered the fool.
“If De Carteret had but thy sense we could live at peace in Jersey,”
rejoined Lemprière, and strode ponderously after the light-footed
fool, who capered forth, singing:
“Come hither, O come hither,
There’s a bride upon her bed;
They have strewn her o’er with roses,
There are roses ’neath her head:
Life is love and tears and laughter,
But the laughter it is dead--
Sing the way to the valley, to the valley!--
Hey, but the roses they are red!”