THE RETURN OF THE BRIDE
"Prince Louis," continued Ivan, turning to the Prince, "we are keeping
these holy men needlessly, as well as disappointing the good folk of
Courtland of their spectacle. There is no need that we should stand here
any longer. We have matters to discuss with this gentleman and--his
wife. Have I your leave to bring them together in the Palace? We may
have something to say to them more at leisure."
But the Prince of Courtland made no answer. His late fears of the Black
Death, the astonishing turn affairs had taken, the discovery that his
wife was not his wife, the slowly percolating thought that his invasion
of Kernsberg, his victories there, and his triumphal re-entry into his
capital, had all been in vain, united with his absorbing fear of
ridicule to deprive him of speech. He moved his hand angrily and began
to descend the stairs towards the waiting horses.
Prince Ivan turned towards Maurice von Lynar.
"You will come with me to the Palace under escort of these gentlemen of
my staff," he said, with smiling equality of courtesy; "there is no need
to discuss intimate family affairs before half the rabble of Courtland."
He bowed to Maurice as if he had been inviting him to a feast. Maurice
looked about the crowded square, and over the pennons of the Cossacks.
He knew there was no hope either in flight or in resistance. All the
approaches to the square had been filled up with armed men.
"I will follow!" he answered briefly.
The Prince swept his plumed hat to the ground.
"Nay," he said; "lead, not follow. You must go with your wife. The
Prince of Muscovy does not precede a lady, a princess,--and a bride!"
So it came about that Margaret, after all, descended the cathedral steps
on her husband's arm.
And as the cavalcade rode back to the Palace the Princess was in the
midst between the Sparhawk and Prince Wasp, Louis of Courtland pacing
moodily ahead, his bridle reins loose upon his horse's neck, his chin
sunk on his breast, while the rabble cried ever, "Largesse! largesse!"
and ran before them casting brightly coloured silken scarves in the way.
Then Prince Ivan, summoning his almoner to his side, took from him a bag
of coin. He dipped his fingers deeply in and scattered the coins with a
free hand, crying loudly, "To the health and long life of the Princess
Margaret and her husband! Health and riches and offspring!"
And the mob taking the word from him shouted all along the narrow
streets, "To the Princess and her husband!"
But from the hooded dormers of the city, from the lofty gable spy-holes,
from the narrow windows of Baltic staircase-towers the good wives of
Courtland looked down to see the great folk pass. And their comment was
not that of the rabble. "Married, is she?" they said among themselves.
"Well, God bless her comely face! It minds me of my own wedding. But, by
my faith, I looked more at my Fritz than she doth at the Muscovite. I
declare all her eyes are for that handsome lad who rides at her left
elbow----"
"Nay, he is not handsome--look at his face. It is as white as a
new-washen clout hung on a drying line. Who can he be?"
"Minds me o' the Prince's wife, the proud lady that flouted him,
mightily he doth--I should not wonder if he were her brother."
"Yes, by my faith, dame--hast hit it! So he doth. And here was I racking
my brains to think where I had seen him before, and then, after all, I
never _had_ seen him before!"
"A miracle it is, gossip, and right pale he looks! Yet I should not
wonder if our Margaret loves him the most. Her eyes seek to him. Women
among the great are not like us. They say they never like their own
husbands the best. What wouldst thou do, good neighbour Bette, if I
loved your Hans better than mine own stupid old Fritz! Pull the strings
off my cap, dame, sayst thou? That shows thee no great lady. For if thou
wast of the great, thou wouldst no more than wave thy hand and say, 'A
good riddance and a heartsome change!'--and with that begin to make love
to the next young lad that came by with his thumbs in his armholes and a
feather in his cap!"
"And what o' the childer--the house-bairns--what o' them? With all this
mixing about, what comes o' them--answer me that, good dame!"
"What, Gossip Bette--have you never heard? The childer of the great,
they suck not their own mothers' milk--they are not dandled in their own
mothers' arms. They learn not their Duty from their mothers' lips. When
they are fractious, a stranger beats them till they be good----"
"Ah," cried the court of matrons all in unison, "I would like to catch
one of the fremit lay a hand on my Karl--my Kirsten--that I would! I
would comb their hair for them, tear the pinner off their backs--that I
would!" "And I!" "And I!"
"Nay, good gossips all," out of the chorus the voice of the dame learned
in the ways of the great asserted itself; "that, again, proves you all
no better than burgherish town-folk--not truly of the noble of the land.
For a right great lady, when she meets a foster-nurse with a baby at the
breast, will go near and say--I have heard 'em--'La! the pretty thing--a
poppet! Well-a-well, 'tis pretty, for sure! And whose baby may this
be?'
"'Thine own, lady, thine own!'"
At this long and loud echoed the derision of the good wives of
Courtland. Their gossip laughed and reasserted. But no, they would not
hear a word more. She had overstepped the limit of their belief.
"What, not to know her child--her own flesh and blood? Out on her!"
cried every mother who had felt about her neck the clasp of tiny hands,
or upon her breast the easing pressure of little blind lips. "Good dame,
no; you shall not hoodwink us. Were she deaf and dumb and doting, a
mother would yet know her child. 'Tis not in nature else! Well, thanks
be to Mary Mother--she who knew both wife-pain and mother-joy, we, at
least, are not of the great. We may hush our own bairns to sleep, dance
with them when they frolic, and correct them when they be
naughty-minded. Nevertheless, a good luck go with our noble lady this
day! May she have many fair children and a husband to love her even as
if she were a common woman and no princess!"
So in little jerks of blessing and with much head-shaking the good wives
of Courtland continued their congress, long after the last Cossack lance
with its fluttering pennon had been lost to view down the winding
street.
For, indeed, well might the gossips thank the Virgin and their patron
saints that they were not as the poor Princess Margaret, and that their
worst troubles concerned only whether Hans or Fritz tarried a little
over-long in the town wine-cellars, or wagered the fraction of a penny
too much on a neighbour's cock-fight, and so returned home somewhat
crusty because the wrong bird had won the main.
* * * * *
But in the Prince's palace other things were going forward. Hitherto we
have had to do with the Summer Palace by the river, a building of no
strength, and built more as a pleasure house for the princely family
than as a place of permanent habitation. But the Castle of Courtland was
a structure of another sort.
Set on a low rock in the centre of the town, its walls rose continuous
with its foundations, equally massive and impregnable, to the height of
over seventy feet. For the first twenty-five neither window nor grating
broke the grim uniformity of those mighty walls of mortared rock. Above
that line only a few small openings half-closed with iron bars evidenced
the fact that a great prince had his dwelling within. The main entrance
to the Castle was through a gateway closed by a grim iron-toothed
portcullis. Then a short tunnel led to another and yet stronger
defence--a deep natural fosse which surrounded the rock on all sides,
and over which a drawbridge conducted into the courtyard of the
fortress.
The Sparhawk knew very well that he was going to his death as he rode
through the streets of the city of Courtland, but none would have
discovered from his bearing that there was aught upon his mind of graver
concern than the fit of a doublet or, perhaps, the favour of a pretty
maid-of-honour. But with the Princess Margaret it was different. In
these last crowded hours she had quite lost her old gay defiance. Her
whole heart was fixed on Maurice, and the tears would not be bitten back
when she thought of the fate to which he was going with so manly a
courage and so fine an air.
They dismounted in the gloomy courtyard, and Maurice, slipping quickly
from his saddle, caught Margaret in his arms before the Muscovite could
interfere. She clung to him closely, knowing that it might be for the
last time.
"Maurice, Maurice," she murmured, "can you forgive me? I have brought
you to this!"
"Hush, sweetheart," he answered in her ear; "be my own dear princess. Do
not let them see. Be my brave girl. They cannot divide our love!"
"Come, I beg of you," came the dulcet voice of Prince Ivan behind them;
"I would not for all Courtland break in upon the billing and cooing of
such turtle-doves, were it not that their affection blinds them to the
fact that the men-at-arms and scullions are witnesses to these pretty
demonstrations. Tarry a little, sweet valentines--time and place wait
for all things."
The Princess commanded herself quickly. In another moment she was once
more Margaret of Courtland.
"Even the Prince of Muscovy might spare a lady his insults at such a
time!" she said.
The Prince bared his head and bowed low.
"Nay," he said very courteously; "you mistake, Princess Margaret. I
insult you not. I may regret your taste--but that is a different matter.
Yet even that may in time amend. My quarrel is with this gentleman, and
it is one of some standing, I believe."
"My sword is at your service, sir!" said Maurice von Lynar firmly.
"Again you mistake," returned the Prince more suavely than ever; "you
have no sword. A prisoner, and (if I may say so without offence) a spy
taken red-hand, cannot fight duels. The Prince of Courtland must settle
this matter. When his Justiciar is satisfied, I shall most willingly
take up my quarrel with--whatever is left of the most noble Count
Maurice von Lynar."
To this Maurice did not reply, but with Margaret still beside him he
followed Prince Louis up the narrow ancient stairway called from its
shape the couch, into the gloomy audience chamber of the Castle of
Courtland.
They reached the hall, and then at last, as though restored to power by
his surroundings, Prince Louis found his tongue.
"A guard!" he cried; "hither Berghoff, Kampenfeldt! Conduct the Princess
to her privy chamber and do not permit her to leave it without my
permission. I would speak with this fellow alone."
Ivan hastily crossed over to Prince Louis and whispered in his ear.
In the meantime, ere the soldiers of the guard could approach, Margaret
cried out in a loud clear voice, "I take you all to witness that I,
Margaret of Courtland, am the wife of this man, Maurice von Lynar, Count
von Löen. He is my wedded husband, and I love him with all my heart!
According to God's holy ordinance he is mine!"
"You have forgotten the rest, fair Princess," suggested Prince Ivan
subtly--"_till death you do part!_"