'O HIGH AMBITION LOWLY LAID!'
The choughs and ravens which had flapped lazily away, with noisy wings
and harsh croaking, when the Royalists had come to search amongst the
dead and wounded for Ralph de Guader, had settled down to their banquet
again as soon as their disturbers had departed, mistakenly laden with
the body of the Breton knight whom Grillonne had decorated with the
earl's helmet. Their foul beaks were busy with the flesh of the dead
and the eyes of the living.
The harsh clamour of these noisy revellers pierced at length to the
fainting ears of the fallen earl, who was in some measure revived by
the cordial which Grillonne had poured down his throat. Consciousness
came back to him, a poor exchange, under such circumstances, for kind
oblivion. For he could move neither hand nor foot, and the weight upon
his chest was as the oppression of a fearful nightmare--a nightmare
from which there was no awaking. He lay helpless--the living under the
dead!
Above him stretched the twilight sky, still flushed with fleeting,
blood-red clouds, beyond which, from pale green pools of infinite
depth, glimmered, here and there, a silvery star. To the right
stretched the sombre heath, its rising hills crested with fantastic
figures of contorted slain, men and horses stiffened into uncouth and
terrible forms; while groaning wounded were heaped between them, their
panting anguish not less awful than the silence of the dead.
To his left also were witnesses of battle, but not so many, for on that
side the hungry morasses had swallowed them up. To the south and west
the measureless fen stretched to the horizon, crimson to its farthest
verge with the ensanguined glow of the sun, the tall reeds reddened
like warrior's lances that had been dipped in the life-blood of the
foe.
The air was full of the awful scent of wounds and blood, and the weird,
dank odours of the decaying sedges, while the wailing wind piped and
moaned over the wold, swaying the rushes, though scarcely making a
ripple on the protected surfaces of the bottomless lagoons.
Mallard and teal and plover came circling back to their haunts in the
lonely swamps, now that the din of battle, which had frightened them,
was over and done; and, as the twilight deepened, bats and owls came
forth with silent wings to hunt their night-roaming prey.
Ralph's open eyes looked only into the sky, and at the wild,
wind-driven clouds fleeting across the calm, immutable heavens beyond,
as the struggling hosts of mortals fleet over the face of eternity.
His soul was filled with an overwhelming sense of desolation and guilt.
He had brought his fate upon himself, and he must face the Shadow of
the Valley of Death, all forsworn and blood-stained as he was; alone,
helpless. No wife to comfort him, no priest to absolve him,
'Cut off even in the blossoms of his sin,
Unhousel'd, disappointed, unanel'd.'
Against the clear spaces of the sky, he saw, high up, almost above the
clouds, an ordered flight of wild swans passing swiftly westward into
the sunset glow.
Oh, that he were free as they, winged as the wind! His spirit writhed
in fierce rebellion. He put forth all his force in a wild struggle to
drag his limbs from the prisoning mass that detained them, but he could
not lift the ghastly burden that weighted him to earth an inch.
'Mary in heaven, help me!' he groaned. 'I am scarce wounded, and so
strong! It will take me hours to die, and these foul birds will perish
mine eyes!'
The cold sweat burst from his brow, and, as he writhed again, he
somewhat shook his head, and the bells on the jester's cap tinkled.
He quivered with astonishment, and contrived so far to lift his head as
to catch a glimpse of the points of the cape which covered his
shoulders. At first the idea seized him that he was no longer on earth
at all, but in purgatory, and dressed in a jester's garb, in that his
sin had been through the folly of pride and mad ambition. Then, with a
flash, came the joyous thought of Grillonne, the faithful, the ready of
wit, the fertile of resource.
A wild gladness came to him, but as the sky grew dark, and the stars
were obscured by clouds, hope left him again.
'If it were he indeed, he has forgotten me, or has met his death in
trying to save me.'
Then all the joys of earth passed before him in a fair pageant, and he
thought of his young bride with her clear, loving eyes that he might
never see again, and to whom he had been united with such magnificence
scarcely a month before, and who was but a few short miles from the
scene of his present suffering; and at the thought, burning tears
welled from beneath his closed lids and rolled down his bronzed cheeks,
moistening the parti-coloured edges of Grillonne's cape.
'Ah, it is bitter!' he groaned.
'Not more bitter for thee than for the scores and tens of scores thou
hast led into like misery,' said awakened conscience grimly.
'_Mea culpa! mea culpa!_' murmured the unfortunate warrior in his
anguish. 'My days have been evil in the land. I have sought not the
will of Heaven, but mine own vain-glory. But oh, Mary Mother, let not
my sins be visited on the head of my sweet lady! as thou wert a woman,
protect her from all harm! Sure William will be merciful to his
kinswoman.'
Dismal indeed were the thoughts that chased each other across his
restless brain, which seemed to make up by its activity for the
enforced stillness of his body. Visions crowded upon him of his castle
of Blauncheflour in flames, and his lady in the power of insulting
or--and it was little less terrible to his ambitious, jealous
spirit--too-courteous conquerors, some one of whom might, perchance,
find favour in her eyes and drive his memory from her heart.
At length, however, as the stillness of the night fell over the plain,
broken only by the moaning wind or the agonised groan of some
fellow-sufferer, he grew calmer, and a deep resignation flooded his
breast.
'_Mea culpa!_' he murmured again. Death seemed inevitable, and he bowed
his spirit humbly to accept it.
Hark!--
The mingled anguish and joy of hope awaked once more. For the silence
was broken by a sound so faint that his listening ears could scarce
detect its repetition, distracted as they were by the tumultuous pulses
which throbbed at the possibility of escape. Yet why hope rather than
fear? Why should the sound of approaching steps mean friends rather
than foes?
The fact grew certain. Steps were approaching, and were accompanied by
a clash of arms that betokened soldiery.
How he strained to catch every faint sound that might indicate the
direction in which these, his fellow-men, alive and strong and capable
of help, were moving!
'St. Nicholas befriend me! If the miracle is wrought that I be rescued
from this living tomb, I vow to make pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre
before my days are done!'
Then he shuddered in sick misery lest the band should pass him by!
Better a blow from the _misericorde_ of an enemy, than the languishing
torture of his present position.
Others thought so too, for he heard more than one piteous cry for help.
Then he, the proud earl, lifted up a feeble voice and craved
deliverance, even by death!--
And it came.
'Here! here! This way, my lads, this way!' cried the familiar voice of
the faithful jester. 'Look you, galliards, there is my famous cap and
cape! Saints be praised! He wears them still. The Lord grant there is a
living skull in the cap. I shrewdly thought I heard him squeak!'
'Ay, Grillonne, thou didst, sure enough!' cried the earl; and the
revulsion of feeling from despair to hope was so great that he fainted
again.
When he revived, his head was in Grillonne's arms, and the intolerable
weight of the slain who had fallen above him was removed from his
limbs, which, however, were so numbed that he could not move them.
Half-a-dozen stout fellows, archers, slingers, and spearmen, were
bustling about him, dimly visible by the light of a horn lantern which
one of them carried.
Grillonne, seeing his eyes open, instantly held a flask to his lips,
and when the draught had helped his revival, nodded sagely.
''Tis well to be taken for a fool sometimes, nuncle.' he remarked,
twitching his tinkling cap from the earl's head. 'Thy fine helmet has
been carried off in triumph to the enemy's camp on the corse of poor
Sir Guy de Landerneau, whom I bedecked with it; seeing that, as they
had already killed him as dead as a Norwich red herring, they could do
him no further hurt. 'Twill have given us time even if they discover
the cheat, as most like they will, for so many of them are full well
acquainted with thy noble hawk nose.'
'Ah, Grillonne ready-wit,' said the earl, 'St. Nicholas reward thee!
That prince of hypocrisy, Lanfranc, may say that jesters have no hope,
and are doomed without fail to the worm that dieth not and the fire
that knows no quenching![5] But I tell thee, Grillonne, he in hell
shall pray to thee in heaven as Dives to Lazarus!' and the groaning
noble kissed the hand that lay upon his breast, albeit the member
belonged to one of that despised class, for death is a greater leveller
than any democrat or republican of them all, and Ralph de Guader had
held long converse with him.
[5] 'D. Have jesters hope? M. None. In their whole design
they are the ministers of Satan. Of them it is said: "They
have not known God, therefore God hath despised them, and
the Lord shall have them in derision, for mockers shall be
mocked."'--Lanfranc's _Elucidarium_, p. 256, quoted by Hook,
_Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury_.
Grillonne raised the hand which had been so honoured to his own lips
and added some hearty smacks to the aristocratic salute it had
received.
'Nay, my dear lord,' he said in a rather husky voice, 'I would fain lay
that hand up in lavender and take it to heaven with me when I die,
since thou thinkest I have hope to get there. But alack! we have rough
work before us to prevent thee from getting thither before thy palace
is prepared for thee. Thou art not saved yet by a very long chalk. If
St. Nicholas is half so generous as thou deemest, he will give me my
reward at once, like a free-handed gentleman, in the shape of success
to the safe ending of my undertaking; nor must we spend further time in
palaver.'
He beckoned to the men who were with him, and four of them came forward
with a litter roughly woven of osiers, of which a plentiful supply was
near at hand. Grillonne and another lifted the earl into it, and they
set off at a rapid pace, the jester guiding them along the smoothest
path; and watching over his charge with tender care.
To De Guader it seemed as if he were couched on pillows of softest
down, notwithstanding his wounds and the pain the motion caused him,
for the joy of being rescued from his horrible entombment, and of
having yet a chance of life and love, was so intense that he seemed to
be in a dream of bliss.
His eyes filled with grateful tears each time that a gleam from the
lantern gave him a fitful glimpse of Grillonne's face. Never had he
thought to be so glad to look on that wizened, whimsical countenance,
with its oblique eyes twinkling with mingled malice and affection, and
which seemed almost quainter under the conical steel-cap with the
nasal, in which he had ensconced it on giving up his cap to the earl,
than in that strange headgear itself.
The way was no flowery one either. Slain men and horses encumbered the
bearers at every step, and more than one pitiful voice from some
wounded wretch, in such plight as the earl had just been rescued from,
besought them in mercy to stop and give aid, for the sake of Mary
Mother and the saints in heaven. Most pitiful of all was the cry for
'Water, for the love of Christ!' from men whose limbs were actually
immersed in the rippling edges of the meres or engulfed in the slimy
ooze, and who were so faint from wounds, or so set fast by the slain
above them, that they could reach no drop wherewith to moisten their
parched lips and slake the burning death-thirst which tormented them.
But they cried to deaf ears; nay, when entreating arms were thrown
around the limbs of the litter-bearers, a sharp cut across the knuckles
with dagger or anlace speedily unclasped the detaining fingers, whether
they belonged to friend or foe.
It was rough treatment, but the men were risking their lives in their
endeavour to save that of the earl, and delay would have been fatal
both to him and to themselves. The fact that the body of Sir Guy de
Landerneau had been removed by the enemy proved that they desired to
make certain of De Guader's fate, and on finding their mistake they
might at any time return to rectify it.
The moon had risen by this, and shone between the swift fleeting clouds
that sped across the sky. By her light and the uncertain glimmer of the
lantern, Ralph saw that two of his rescuers wore the winged helms and
long moustaches and golden torcs distinguishing the costume of the
Danes. His heart leapt with hope that the messengers he had despatched
to the court of King Sweyn had moved the warlike monarch to seize the
opportunity of striking a blow at his ancient enemy, William of
Normandy, and had sent him timely reinforcements. But their progress
was too rapid for speech, and whatever might be his curiosity, he had
to lie passive in his litter and allow himself to be borne
whithersoever his rescuers pleased.
And by what a weird and desolate pathway did they bear him!
Heading, apparently, for the very heart of the fen that stretched
westward as far as eye could reach, its level surface unbroken by tree
or hill, and only varied by beds of tall reeds and snake-like pools of
still, dark water, the surfaces of which were scarcely rippled by the
gusty breeze, they advanced steadily for the better part of an hour.
The fitful light of the half shrouded moon cast ghastly gleams upon the
waving plumes of the flowering sedges and white tufts of the
meadow-sweet, whose strong and somewhat sickly perfume mingled,
strangely luscious, with the dank odours of peat and decaying rushes
and grasses. Now and again some frightened bird flew screaming from its
roosting-place, or dusky water-rat glided hastily into thicker cover,
or plunged with a flop into the water, while the pipe of the curlew, or
boom of the bittern, sounded from afar off in the melancholy marshes.
The loneliness was intense, and seemed but accentuated by the presence
of bird and beast.
[Illustration: The Rescue of the Earl.]
In the dimness of the cloudy night, with the uncertain bursts of
moonlight, that seemed to make the chaos of scarce divided earth and
water but more difficult to distinguish, the men who bore the earl
threaded their way through the bewildering maze, with an unerring
celerity and absence of hesitation that proved them to be no strangers
to its mysterious solitude.
At length they halted, beside a channel less overgrown with weeds and
rushes than the many they had passed, and which was, in fact, the Great
Ouse River.
One of the party put a horn to his lips and sounded a couple of mots.
His summons was answered from the water, and in a few seconds a boat
impelled by eight sturdy oarsmen shot forth from a bend in the river
and drew to the bank. The earl was speedily put on board, with the
faithful Grillonne at his head, and his bearers embarked, some with
him, some in a second boat which had come in the wake of the first.
De Guader confided himself utterly to the safe keeping of his jester,
and the rhythmic sound of the oars, which he believed were every moment
bringing him nearer to liberty, soothed him inexpressibly. He fell into
a drowsy sleep of exhaustion, never really losing consciousness, but
devoid of all impatience, and almost of all curiosity as to whither he
was being taken.
But the splash of the oars ceased at length, and the keel of the boat
grated on the shore of a small island, raising a modest crown a little
above the level of the surrounding fen. It was protected by an
earthwork somewhat similar in construction to the great dykes with
which Cambridge is seamed, the Devil's Dyke, Fleamdyke, and others,
and, had the light served, the low turrets of a long, rambling,
two-storied house might have been seen behind its shelter.
A summons was given by a few mots on the horn, and in answer a deep
voice threw a challenge across the sullen surface of the waters,--
'Who goes there?'
'St. Nicholas for Guader!'
A rattle of chains and hoarse creaking of bolts and hinges followed,
and a heavy gate was slowly lifted, which admitted the boats into an
inner moat. They glided in and moored their vessels at a small landing
stage on the opposite side, the gate closing instantly behind them.
As they did so, the sentry asked anxiously, in a low voice and in the
Saxon tongue, 'What cheer?'
'All's well!' was the answer.
'St. Eadmund be praised!' ejaculated the sentry fervently; and the
earl's heart leapt with a thrill of joy and gratitude to the poor
unknown soldier who cared about his safety, so infinitely precious had
the humblest human sympathy become to him since those dreadful hours
when he had thought himself doomed to quit the cheerful earth and the
faces of his fellow-men for evermore!
Inside the enclosure a party of wild-looking ceorls surrounded them,
with shaggy locks and rude jerkins of sheepskin, armed with pikes and
staves for the most part, but some few better clad, and bearing the
terrible seax; their brawny necks half hidden by their unshorn beards,
which hung in tow-coloured elf-locks round their weather-beaten and
scarred faces. Amongst them were one or two tall fellows, dressed, like
those in the party of rescuers who had attracted De Guader's attention,
in Danish mode.
This much he gathered by the fitful moonlight and the feeble light of
lanterns carried by the men. Question and answer followed quick between
his bearers and their rough colleagues, but he could comprehend little
of what they said, for they spoke in all manner of tongues and
dialects.
'Thou hast had a harsh ride, I fear me, good nuncle,' said Grillonne,
bending over his beloved master with tender solicitude. 'Gramercy! 'Tis
a God-forsaken hole we have brought thee to; but beggars must not be
choosers, and let us hope that the archbishop's people will keep their
pious noses from sniffing thee out in it! Troth! if they venture them
here, I parry, some of these stout carles will slit them for them
parlous quick!'
'Methinks any corner of the earth is better than being quite out of it,
Grillonne,' returned the earl, with a gentle smile. 'I am not like to
be critical; but in good sooth I would fain know the title of my host?'
'I scarce know it myself, good my lord,' replied the jester. ''Tis a
Saxon, or more properly Anglo-Danish thegn, whose son went shares in
thy escapade, and has got a maimed foot for his share of the booty,
they tell me. The father and son have had a price on their heads since
Hereward Leofricsson's downfall, and have a natural fellow-feeling for
thy discomfiture, sweet nuncle.'
Meanwhile they had reached the entrance of the house, and the earl was
borne into a long barnlike hall, very sparsely furnitured, with a table
running almost from one end of it to the other, and rude settles and
stools placed against it, as in preparation for a meal. At one end was
an archway leading into another apartment, which seemed, to judge by
the heat and the savoury odours, the noises of pots and kettles and
other indications which came from it, to be a kitchen; while at the
other end was a cheerful fire of peat, beside which sat an aged warrior
wearing the Anglo-Danish tunic and cross-gartered hose, his white hair
flowing back over his shoulders and his grizzled beard growing close up
his cheeks, so that it seemed almost to meet the bushy white eyebrows
that shaded his bright blue eyes. His baldric was richly worked with
gold, and he wore massive gold bracelets on his arms.
Beside him stood a broad-shouldered, athletic young man in similar
garb; his thick fair hair surrounding his head like a lion's mane, and
his long moustaches and golden beard showing lighter than the bronzed
skin of his cheeks and chest; his eyes as bright and blue as those of
his father, and his neck and sinewy arms covered with tattoo marks. But
the linen tunic he wore was drabbled with mud and gore, and one of his
feet was swathed in bandages, through which the crimson stains would
force their way, and his muscular hand grasped the arm of his father's
carved oak chair to ease his weight somewhat from the wounded foot.
On the opposite side of the large open fireplace sat a monk in the
habit of the Black Friars, and near by a stately lady, wearing the
headrail and flowing robes which had been the fashion in the time of
the Confessor; while a bevy of damsels waited behind her, looking
towards the wounded earl with curious eyes.
The old thegn rose as the bearers brought their noble burden forward,
advanced to the litter, and, bowing with great dignity, said in his own
tongue,--
'By the Holy Cross! my heart is glad to see thee safe beneath my roof,
oh, valorous earl! Would that Ealdred Godwinsson had means to offer
fitting hospitality to the son of Ralph the Staller, in whose hand his
own has been placed and under whose standard he has fought in many a
hard field! Alas! the glory of his house has faded! Barely can he save
his last days from the fury of his foes by hiding in this wilderness of
the meres! But to such as he possesses, thrice welcome, noble earl! Had
not age and infirmity clogged his steps as securely as chains of iron,
he had sallied forth to thy rescue himself. Had not a spear-thrust in
the instep, got this morn while fighting in thy ranks, crippled Leofric
his son, that son had gone forth to seek thee.' Here the younger man
bowed deeply in token of assent and reverence. 'It boots not! His
followers have been true, and thou art here.'
'Brave thegn,' returned De Guader, raising himself as far as possible
in his litter, 'I thank thee for thy fidelity to a ruined and defeated
man! The saints forefend that my presence bring evil to thy retreat!'
'Nay,' answered Ealdred, 'had those who would harm us the wit to track
us, we had perished long since. But thou art sore wounded! Berwine, the
widow of mine eldest-born, shall leech thy hurts.'
A couch was prepared in a recess near the fireplace, and the earl was
placed thereon. Cordials and delicate soups, with omelettes of plovers'
eggs, were brought to tempt his appetite, and the young thegn's widow
examined his wounds, pansed and dressed them with soothing unguents,
and finally bound them up in linen of her own weaving, and with the
greatest tenderness and skill.
Meanwhile the stalwart fellows who had borne the stricken noble so far
upon their strong shoulders,--no light burden, sheathed as he was in
all his mail!--with Grillonne and others, were regaled with the savoury
messes whose odours had assailed them with such enticing welcome
through the kitchen door as they entered, and, in sooth, they had a
_menu_ fit for a king.
Stewed and fried eel, pike and lampreys in pasties, roast gossander,
curlew, and snipe!--fare fit for an epicure, and by no means cavilled
at by the hungry men before whom it was served--add thereto good cider
and ale.
For this island in the meres was the home of innumerable wildfowl, and
fish as many crowded the waters around it. 'Wild swannes, gossanders,
water-crows, hernes, hernshaws, cranes, curlewes, mallard, teele,
bytters, knotts, styntes, godwytts, widgeons, smeaths, puffins, and
many sorts of gulls; eels, pike, pickerel, perch, roach, barbel,
lampreys, and sometimes a royal-fish' (turbot or sturgeon?); so that,
as the chronicler relates of Hereward's refuge in the neighbouring Isle
of Ely, foemen might sit blockading the place for seven years without
'making one hunter cease to set his nets or one fowler to deceive the
birds with springe and snare.'
In this asylum we will leave the earl, and see how it fares with
Blauncheflour.