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[Illustration: Did she guess what a dainty picture she made?--Page 100]
THE TANGLED SKEIN
By the Same Author
I WILL REPAY
THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL
BY THE GODS BELOVED
THE EMPEROR'S CANDLESTICKS
A SON OF THE PEOPLE
THE TANGLED SKEIN
BY THE BARONESS ORCZY
[Illustration]
LONDON
GREENING & CO., LTD.
1907
All rights reserved
DEDICATION
TO MY LITTLE SON JACK
AND TO HIS SCHOOLMATES AT "RAMSBURY"
BIRCHINGTON-ON-SEA
DEAR BOYS,
It was amongst you all that I wrote the last chapters
of this romance. To you, therefore--to your growing
manhood, your pretty, budding thoughts of chivalry and
honour, which I so loved to see developing in the
tender atmosphere of your dear little school-home by
the sea--I inscribe and dedicate this record of a
noble and good man's life.
EMMUSKA ORCZY.
BIRCHINGTON-ON-SEA
_February, 1907_
Copyright
in
The United Kingdom,
in the
Dominion of Canada,
and in the
United States of America.
CONTENTS
PART I
MIRRAB--THE WITCH
CHAP. PAGE
I. EAST MOLESEY FAIR 11
II. THE WITCH'S TENT 17
III. MISCHIEF BREWING 23
IV. FRIENDS AND ENEMIES 28
V. LADIES AND GALLANTS 33
VI. THE LADY URSULA 41
VII. HIS GRACE OF WESSEX 46
VIII. SILKEN BONDS 52
IX. THE VEILED WITCH 59
PART II
THE LADY URSULA
X. A BEVY OF FAIR MAIDENS 73
XI. THE FAIREST OF THEM ALL 80
XII. INTRIGUES 88
XIII. HIS EMINENCE 93
XIV. THE DESTINIES OF EUROPE 99
XV. THE HAND OF FATE 103
XVI. THE ULTIMATUM 114
XVII. AN ARMED TRUCE 120
XVIII. THE VEILED WITCH 127
PART III
A GAME OF CHESS
XIX. THE PAWNS 139
XX. DEPARTURE 153
XXI. THE BLACK KNIGHT 159
XXII. THE WHITE QUEEN 168
XXIII. CHECK TO THE QUEEN 177
XXIV. CHECK TO THE KING 187
XXV. THE CARDINAL'S MOVE 192
XXVI. THE PROVOCATION 198
XXVII. THE FIGHT 204
XXVIII. THE SEQUEL OF THE COMEDY 210
XXIX. CHECK-MATE 217
PART IV
HIS GRACE OF WESSEX
XXX. THOUGHTS 225
XXXI. MARYE, THE QUEENE 229
XXXII. A BARGAIN 243
XXXIII. IN THE LORD CHANCELLOR'S COURT 252
XXXIV. WESTMINSTER HALL 269
XXXV. THE TRIAL 279
XXXVI. AFTERWARDS 294
XXXVII. THE CARDINAL'S PUPPETS 300
XXXVIII. THE LAST FAREWELL 306
XXXIX. A FORLORN HOPE 314
XL. POOR MIRRAB 318
XLI. THE END 331
PART I
MIRRAB--THE WITCH
THE TANGLED SKEIN
CHAPTER I
EAST MOLESEY FAIR
Even Noailles, in his letters to his royal master, admits that the
weather was glorious, and that the climatic conditions left nothing to
be desired.
Even Noailles! Noailles, who detested England as the land of humid
atmospheres and ill-dressed women!
Renard, who was more of a diplomatist and kept his opinions on the fogs
and wenches of Old England very much to himself, declared
enthusiastically in his letter to the Emperor Charles V, dated October
2nd, 1553, that never had he seen the sky so blue, the sun so bright,
nor the people of this barbarous island more merry than on the memorable
first day of East Molesey Fair: as all who will, may read for themselves
in Vol. III of the Granvelle Papers:--
"_Aulcungs ne pourroient contempler ciel plus bleu soleil plus
brillianct ni peuple plus joieult._"
Yet what have we to do with the opinions of these noble ambassadors of
great and mighty foreign monarchs?
Our own chroniclers tell us that East Molesey Fair was the maddest,
merriest, happiest time the goodly folk of the Thames Valley had had
within memory of the oldest inhabitant.
Was not good Queene Marye, beloved daughter of the great King Henry
VIII, crowned at last? crowned in Westminster Abbey, as all her loyal
subjects had desired that she should be, despite His Grace of
Northumberland and his treasonable faction, whom God and the Queene's
most lawful Majesty would punish all in good time?
In the meanwhile let us be joyful and make merry!
Such a motley crowd as never was seen. Here's a sheriff from London
City, pompous and dignified in dark doublet and hose, with scarlet
mantle and velvet cap; beside him his lady trips right merrily, her
damask kirtle held well above her high-heeled shoes, her flowered
paniers looped in the latest style, with just the suggestion of a
farthingale beneath her robes, to give dignity to her figure and value
to the slimness of her waist.
Here a couple of solemn burgesses in velvet cloaks edged with fur, and
richly slashed doublets, are discussing the latest political events;
whilst a group of Hampton merchants, more soberly clad, appraise the
wares of a cutler lately hailed from Spain.
Then the dames and maidens with puffed paniers of blue or vivid scarlet,
moving swiftly from booth to booth, babbling like so many gaily-plumaged
birds, squabbling with the vendors and chaffing the criers.
Here and there the gaudy uniform of one of the liveried Companies will
attract the eye, anon the dark cloak and close black mask which
obviously hides the Court gallant.
Men of all ranks and of all stations have come out to East Molesey
to-day. Merchants, shopkeepers, workers, aldermen and servants, all with
their womenkind, all with pouches more or less well filled, for who
would go to Molesey Fair but to spend money, to drink, to eat, or to
make merry?
Then there were the 'prentices!
They had no money to spend, save a copper or so to throw to a
mountebank, but nevertheless they contrived to enjoy themselves right
royally.
Such imps of mischief!
No whipping-post to-day! Full licence for all their pranks and madcap
jokes. The torment of all these worthy burgesses out on a holiday.
Oh! these 'prentices!
Hundreds of them out here this afternoon. They've come down from Esher
and Hampton, Kingston and Westminster and London City, like so many
buzzing insects seeking whom they can annoy.
Now on the ground, suddenly tripping a pompous dame off her feet; anon
in rows, some half-dozen of them, elbow to elbow, head foremost,
charging the more serious crowd, and with a hoot and a yell scattering
it like a number of frightened goslings. Yet again at the confect booth,
to the distraction of the vendors of honey-cakes, stealing sugar-plums
and damson cheese, fighting, quarrelling, screeching, their thin legs
encased in hose of faded blue or grey worsted, their jerkins loose,
their shirt sleeves flapping in the breeze, a cool note of white amidst
the dark-coloured gowns of the older men.
Heavens above! what a to-do!
A group of women be-coiffed, apparelled in best kirtles and modish
shoes, were pressing round a booth where pantoufles, embroidered
pouches, kerchiefs, and velveted paniers were laid out in tempting
array.
Just beyond, a number of buxom country wenches, with round red arms,
showing bare to the grilling sun, and laughing eyes, aglow with
ill-concealed gourmandise, were gaping at a mighty display of pullets,
hares, and pigeons, sides of roebuck and haunches of wild boar, ready
spiked, trussed, and skewered, fit to tempt Her Majesty's Grace's own
royal palate.
Sprigs of sweet-scented marjoram, thyme, and wool-blade tastefully
disposed, further enhanced the attractions of this succulent show. 'Twas
enough to make the sweetest mouth water with anticipatory delight. A
brown-eyed, apple-cheeked wench in paniers of brilliant red was
unaffectedly licking her pretty lips.
"This way, mistress, this way!" shouted the vendor of these appetizing
wares. A sturdy fellow, he, with ginger-coloured pate, and wielding a
long narrow-bladed knife in his fleshy hand. "This way! a haunch of buck
from the royal venery! a hare from Her Liege Majesty's own chase! a
pullet from----"
"Nay, thou gorbellied knave!" responded a vendor of drugs and herbs
close by, whose stall was somewhat deserted, and whose temper was
obviously suffering--"Nay! an thou speakest the truth thou art a thief,
but if not, then thou'rt a liar! In either case art fit for the
hangman's rope!"
"This way, my masters! this way!" came in loud, stentorian cries from a
neighbouring booth; "this way for Peter the juggler, the greatest
conjurer the world has ever seen!"
"This way! I pray you, worthy sirs!" this from yet another place of
entertainment, "this way for John the tumbler!"
"Peter the juggler will swallow a cross-bow of steel before your very
eyes!" shouted one crier.
"John the tumbler will climb Saint Ethelburga's steeple without help of
rope or ladder," called the other.
"Peter will show you how to shoe a turkey, how to put salt on a
swallow's tail, and how to have your cake and eat it!"
"John will sit on two stools without coming to the ground!"
"Marry! and ye both lie faster than my mule can trot!" came in hilarious
accents from one of the crowd.
"And Peter the juggler will show thee how to make thy mule trot faster
than thou canst lie, friend," responded Peter's crier unabashed, "and a
mighty difficult task 'twill be, I'll warrant."
Laughing, joking, ogling like some fickle jade, the crowd passed from
booth to booth: now dropping a few coins in Peter the juggler's hat, now
watching the antics of John the tumbler; anon looking on amazed, half
terrified at the evolutions of a gigantic brown bear, led by the nose by
a vigorous knave in leather jerkin and cross-gartered hose, and
accompanied by a youngster who was blowing on a mighty sackbut until his
cheeks looked nigh to bursting.
But adsheart! who shall tell of all the attractions which were set forth
on that memorable day before the loyal subjects of good Queene Marye?
There were the trestles where one could play at ball and knuckle-bone,
or chance and mumchance; another, where evens and odds and backgammon
proved tempting. He who willed could tilt at Weekie, play quoits or
lansquenet, at ball or at the billiards, or risk his coppers on such
games as one-and-thirty, or at the pass ten; he might try his skill,
too, at throwing the dart, or his strength at putting the stone.
There were mountebanks and quacksalvers, lapidaries at work, and
astrologers in their tents. For twopence one could have a bout with the
back-sword or the Spanish tuck, could watch the situations and
conjunctions of the fixed stars and the planets, could play a game of
tennis or pelitrigone, or be combed and curled, perfumed and trimmed so
as to please a dainty mistress's eye.
And through it all the loud bang! bang! bang! of the big drums, the
criers proclaiming the qualities of their wares, the jarring notes of
the sackbut and the allman flute, the screechy viol and the strident
nine-hole pipe, all playing against one another, each striving to drown
the other, and mingling with the laughter of the crowd, the yells of the
'prentices, the babble of the women, formed a huge volume of
ear-splitting cacophony which must have been heard from one end of the
country to the other.
All was noise, merriment, and laughter, save in one spot--an
out-of-the-way, half-hidden corner of the fair, where the sister
streams, the Ember and the Mole, join hands for a space, meet but to
part again, and whence the distant towers and cupolas of Hampton Court
appeared like those of a fairy palace floating in mid-ether, perched
high aloft in the shimmering haze of this hot late summer's afternoon.
CHAPTER II
THE WITCH'S TENT
There are many accounts still extant of the various doings at East
Molesey Fair on this 2nd of October in the year of our Lord 1553, and
several chroniclers--Renard is conspicuous among the latter--make
mention of the events which very nearly turned the gay and varying
comedies of that day into weird and tragic drama.
Certainly the witch's tent was a mistake.
But what would you? No doubt the worthy individual, who for purposes of
mystification called himself "Abra," had tried many means of earning a
livelihood before he and his associate in business took to the
lucrative, yet dangerous trade of necromancy.
He was tall and gaunt, with hooked nose and deep-sunk eyes; he had
cultivated a long, grey beard, and could call forth the powers of Mirrab
the Witch with a remarkably solemn and guttural voice.
As for Mirrab herself, no one was allowed to see her. That was part of
the business. She was a witch, a dealer in magic potions, charms and
philters, a reader of the stars, and--softly be it spoken--a friend and
companion of the devil! She only appeared enveloped in a thick veil,
with divining wand held lightly in her hand, the ends of her gold
tresses alone visible below the heavy covering which swathed her head.
It was the mystery of it all--cheap devices at best--which from the
first had irritated the country-folk who thronged the Fair.
The tent itself was unlike any other ever seen at East Molesey. It stood
high upon a raised wooden platform, to which a few rough steps gave
access. On the right was a tall flagstaff, with black flag emblazoned
with white skull and cross-bones, fluttering lazily in the breeze.
On the left a huge elm tree, with great heavy branches overshadowing the
tent, had been utilized to support a placard bearing the words--
"Mirrab! the World-famed Necromancer!
Sale of Magic Charms and Love Philters
Horoscope Casting and Elixir of Life!"
Perched on the platform, and assisted by a humbler henchman, armed with
big drum and cymbals, the worthy Abra, in high-peaked cap and flowing
mantle covered with strange devices, had all day long invited customers
to his booth by uttering strange, mysterious promises.
"This way, this way, my masters," he would say with imposing solemnity;
"the world-famous necromancer, Mirrab, will evoke for you the spirits of
Mars, of Saturn, or of the moon."
"She will show you the Grand Grimorium. . . !"
Now what was the Grand Grimorium? The very sound of the words suggested
some agency of the devil; no Christian man had ever heard or spoken of
the Grand Grimorium.
"She will show you the use of the blasting rod and the divining wand.
She will call forth the elementary spirits. . . ."
Some people would try to laugh. Who had ever heard of the elementary
spirits? Perhaps if some of the more enlightened town worthies happened
to be nigh the booth, one or two of them would begin to chaff the
necromancer.
"And prithee, friend wizard," a solemn burgher would suggest, "prithee
what are the elementary spirits?"
But Abra was nothing if not ready-witted.
"The elementary spirits," he would explain with imperturbable gravity,
"are the green butterfly, the black pullet, the queen of the hairy
flies, and the screech owl."
The weird nomenclature was enough to make any one's hair stand on end.
Even the sedate burgesses would shake their heads and silently edge
away, whilst their womenkind would run swiftly past the booth, muttering
a quick _Ave_ to the blessed Virgin or kissing the Holy Scapulary hung
beneath their kerchiefs, as their terrified glances met the cabalistic
signs on the black flag.
The humbler country-folk frankly spat upon the ground three times
whenever they caught sight of the flag, and that is a sure way of
sending the devil about his business.
The shadows now were beginning to lengthen.
The towers and cupolas of Hampton Court Palace were studded with gold
and gems by the slanting rays of the setting sun.
It had been a glorious afternoon and, except in the open space
immediately in front of the witch's tent, the fun of the fair had lost
none of its zest.
The witch's booth alone was solitary--weird-looking beneath the
spreading branches of the overhanging elm.
The tent seemed lighted from within, for as the evening breeze stirred
its hangings, gleams of brilliant red, more glowing than the sunset,
appeared in zigzag streaks between its folds.
Behind, and to the right and left of it, the gentle murmur of the sister
streams sounded like ghostly whisperings of evening sprites, busy
spreading their grey mantles over the distant landscape.
As the afternoon wore on, the crowd in the other parts of the Fair had
grown more and more dense, and now, among the plainer garb of the
burgesses and townsfolk, and the jerkins and worsted hose of the yokels,
could be seen quite frequently a silken doublet or velvet trunk, a
masked face perhaps beneath a plumed bonnet, or the point of a sword
gleaming beneath the long, dark mantle, denoting the Court gallant.
Now and then, too, hooded and closely swathed forms would flit quickly
through the crowd, followed by the inquisitive glances of the humbler
folk, as the dainty tip of a broidered shoe or the richly wrought hem of
a silken kirtle, protruding below the cloak, betrayed the lady of rank
and fashion on gay adventure bent.
Most of these veiled figures had found their way up the rough wooden
steps which led to the witch's tent. The fame of Mirrab, the Soothsayer,
had reached the purlieus of the palace, and Abra, the magician, had more
than once seen his lean palm crossed with gold.
"This way, noble lords! this way!"
He was even now trying to draw the attention of two cloaked figures, who
had just emerged in sight of the booth.
Two gentlemen of the Court evidently, for Abra's quick eye had caught a
glimpse of richly chased sword-hilts, as the wind blew the heavy, dark
mantles to one side.
But these gentlemen were paying little heed to the worthy magician's
blandishments. They were whispering excitedly to one another, whilst
eagerly scanning the crowd all round them.
"They were ladies from the Court, I feel sure," said the taller man of
the two; "I swear I have seen the hem of that kirtle before."
"Carramba!" replied the other, "it promised well, but methinks we've
lost track of them now."
He spoke English very fluently, yet with a strong, guttural intonation,
whilst the well-known Spanish oath which he uttered betrayed his
nationality.
"Pardi!" he added impatiently, "I could have sworn that the damsels were
bent on consulting the witch."
"Nay, only on seeing the fun of the Fair apparently," rejoined the
other; "we've lain in wait here now for nigh on half an hour."
"Mirrab the Soothsayer will evoke for you the spirits of the moon, oh
noble lords!" urged Abra, with ever-increasing persuasiveness. "She will
give you the complaisance of the entire female sex."
"What say you, my lord," said the Englishman after a while, "shall we
give up the quest after those elusive damsels and woo these obliging
spirits of the moon? They say the witch has marvellous powers."
"Bah, milor!" rejoined the Spaniard gaily, "a veiled female! Think on
it! Those who have entered yon mysterious tent declare that scarce an
outline of that soothsayer could they glean, beneath the folds of thick
draperies which hide her from view. What is a shapeless woman? I ask
you, milor. And in England, too," he added with affected gallantry which
had more than a touch of sarcasm in it, "where all women are shapely."
"Mirrab, the world-famous necromancer, will bring to your arms the lady
of your choice, oh most noble lords!" continued the persistent Abra,
"even if she were hidden beyond the outermost corners of the earth."
"By my halidame! this decides me," quoth the Englishman merrily. "I pray
you come, my lord. This adventure promises better than the other. And,
who knows?" he added in his turn with thinly-veiled, pleasant irony,
"you Spaniards are so persuasive--the witch, if she be young and fair,
might lift her veil for you."
"Allons!" responded the other, "since 'tis your wish, milor, let us
consult the spirits."
And, standing aside with the courtly grace peculiar to those of his
nationality, he allowed his companion to precede him up the steps which
led to Mirrab's tent.
Then he too followed, and laughing and chattering the two men
disappeared behind the gaudily painted draperies.
Not, however, without tossing a couple of gold pieces into the hands of
the wizard. Abra, obsequious, smiling, thoroughly contented, sat himself
down to rest awhile beside his patient, hard-worked henchman.
CHAPTER III
MISCHIEF BREWING
At some little distance from the mysterious booth a trestle table had
been erected, at which some three or four wenches in hooped paniers and
short, striped kirtles, were dispensing spiced ale and sack to the
thirsty village folk.
Here it was that Mirrab the witch and her attendant wizard were most
freely discussed--with bated breath, and with furtive glances cast
hurriedly at the black flag, which was just visible above the row of
other booths and gayer attractions of the Fair.
There was no doubt that as the evening began to draw in, and the sun to
sink lower and lower in the west, the superstitious terror, which had
all along set these worthy country yokels against the awesome mysteries
of the necromancer's tent, had gradually culminated into a hysterical
frenzy.
At first sullen looks had been cast towards that distant spot, whence
the sound of Abra's perpetual "This way, noble lords, this way!" came
every now and then as a weird and ghostly echo; but now muttered curses
and even a threatening gesture from time to time had taken the place of
angry silence.
As the hard pates of these louts became heated with the foaming ale,
their tempers began to rise, and the girls, with characteristic love of
mischief and gossip, were ready enough to add fuel to the smouldering
flames.
There was also present in the minds of these wenches an obvious feeling
of jealousy against this mysterious veiled witch, who had proved so
attractive to the Court gallants who visited the Fair.
Her supposed charms so carefully hidden beneath thick draperies, were
reputed to be irresistible, and Mistress Dorothy, Susan, and Joan, who
showed their own pretty faces unblushingly, were not sufficiently versed
in mountebanks' tricks to realize that Mirrab's thick veil was, without
doubt, only a means for arousing the jaded curiosity of idlers from the
Court.
Be that as it may, it was an established fact that no one had seen the
soothsayer's face, and that Mistress Dorothy, who was pouring out a huge
tankard of sack for her own attendant swain, was exceedingly annoyed
thereby.
"Bah!" she said contemptuously, as Abra and his magic devices were being
discussed at the table, "he is but a lout. I tell thee, Matthew, that
thou'rt a fool to take count of him. But the woman," she added under her
breath, "is possessed of the devil."
Matthew, the shoemaker, took the tankard, which his sweetheart had
filled for him, in both hands and took a long draught before he made any
reply. Then he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, spat upon the
ground, and looked significantly at the circle of friends who were
gathered round him.
"I tell you, my masters," he said at last with due solemnity, "that I
saw that witch last night fly out from yonder tree astride upon a giant
bat."
"A bat?"
A holy shudder went round the entire assembly. Pretty Mistress Susan
crossed herself furtively, whilst Joan in her terror nearly dropped the
handful of mugs which she was carrying.
Every one hung on the shoemaker's lips.
Short and somewhat tubby of body, Matthew had a round and chubby face,
with pale blue, bulging eyes, and slightly elevated eyebrows, which gave
him the appearance of an overgrown baby. He was for some reason, which
has never transpired to this day, reputed to have wonderful wisdom. His
items of news, gleaned from a nephew who was scullion in the royal
kitchen, were always received with boundless respect, whilst the
connection itself gave him a certain social superiority of which he was
proudly conscious.
Like the true-born orator, Matthew had paused a moment in order to allow
the full strength of his utterance to sink into the minds of his
hearers.
"Aye!" he said after a while, "she flew out from between the branches
and up towards the full moon, clad only----"
A brusque movement and a blush from Mistress Dorothy here stopped the
graphic flow of his eloquence.
"Er--hem--!" he concluded more tamely, "I saw her quite plainly."
"More shame then on thee, master," retorted Dorothy, whose wrath was far
from subsiding, "for thus gazing on the devil's work."
But the matter had become of far too great import to allow of feminine
jealousies being taken into account.
"And I know," added an elderly matron with quaking voice, "that my
sister Hannah's child caught sight of the witch outside her tent this
morning, and forthwith fell into convulsions, the poor innocent lamb."
"She hath the evil eye, depend on it," quoth Dorothy decisively.
The men said nothing. They were sipping their ale in sullen silence, and
looking to Matthew for further expressions of wisdom.
"Those evil spirits have oft a filthy countenance," explained the
shoemaker sententiously, "and no doubt 'twas they helped to convulse
Mistress Hannah's child. Some have four faces--one in the usual place,
another at the back of the head, and one looking out on either side;
others appear with a tall and lean body and bellow like a bull."
"Hast seen them, Matthew?" came in awed whispers from those around.
"Nay! God and the Holy Virgin forbid!" protested Matthew fervently. "God
forbid that I should enter their abode of evil. I should lose my soul."
There was a long, ominous silence, broken only by quickly muttered
invocations to the saints and to Our Lady.
The men looked furtively at one another. The women clung together, not
daring to utter a sound. Mistress Dorothy, all the boldness gone out of
her little heart, was sobbing from sheer fright.
"Friends," said Matthew at last, as if with sudden resolution, "if that
woman be possessed of the devil, what's to be done?"
There was no reply, but obviously they all understood one another, for
each wore a shame-faced look all of a sudden, and dared not meet his
neighbour's eye. But the danger was great. The devil in their midst
would mean poisoned wells, the sweating sickness, some dire calamity for
sure; and it was the duty of every true-hearted countryman to protect
his home and family from such terrible disasters.
Therefore when Matthew in his wisdom said, "What's to be done?" the men
fully understood.
The women, too, knew that mischief was brewing. They drew closer to one
another and shivered with cold beneath their kerchiefs, in spite of the
warmth of this beautiful late summer's afternoon.
"Beware of her, Matthew," entreated Mistress Dorothy tearfully.
She drew a small piece of blue cloth from the bosom of her dress: it was
pinked and broidered, and had the image of the Holy Virgin painted on
one side of it. Quickly she slipped it under her lover's jerkin.
"Take it," she whispered, "the scapulary of Our Lady will protect thee."
This momentous conclave was here interrupted by the approach of the
small detachment of the town guard which had been sent hither to ensure
order amongst the holiday-makers.
Matthew and his friends began ostentatiously to talk of the weather and
other such trifling matters, until after the guard had passed, then once
more they put their heads together.
But this time they bade the women go. What had to be discussed now was
men's work and unfit for wenches' ears.
CHAPTER IV
FRIENDS AND ENEMIES
In the meanwhile the two gallants were returning from their visit to the
witch's tent.
As they came down the steps more than one voice among the passers-by
inquired eagerly--
"What fortune, sirs?"
"In truth she hath strange powers," was the somewhat guarded response.
The two men strolled up to a neighbouring wine-vendor and ordered some
wine. They had thrown their cloaks aside and removed their masks, for
the air was close. The rich, slashed doublets, thus fully displayed, the
fine lace at throat and wrist, the silken hose and chased daggers, all
betokened the high quality and wealth of the wearers.
Neither of them seemed much above thirty years of age; each had the air
of a man in the prime of life, and in the full enjoyment of all the good
things which the world can give.
But in their actual appearance they presented a marked contrast.
The one tall and broad-shouldered, florid of complexion, and somewhat
reddish about the hair and small pointed beard; the other short,
slender, and alert, with keen, restless eyes, and with sensuous lips for
ever curled in a smile of thinly veiled sarcasm.
Though outwardly on most familiar terms together, there was distinctly
apparent between the two men an air of reserve, and even of decided, if
perhaps friendly, antagonism.
"Well, milor Everingham," said the Spaniard after a while, "what say you
to our adventure?"
"I say first and foremost, my lord," replied Everingham with studied
gallantry, "that my prophecy proved correct--the mysterious necromancer
was no proof against Spanish wiles; she unveiled at a smile from Don
Miguel, Marquis de Suarez, the envoy of His Most Catholic Majesty."
"Nay," rejoined Don Miguel, affecting not to notice the slight tone of
sarcasm in his friend's pleasant voice, "I scarce caught a glimpse of
the wench's face. The tent was so dark and her movements so swift."
There was a moment's silence. Lord Everingham seemed lost in meditation.
"You are thoughtful, milor," remarked Don Miguel. "Have the genii of the
moon conquered your own usually lively spirits?"
"Nay, I was thinking of the curious resemblance," mused Everingham.
"A resemblance?--to whom?"
"As you say, the tent was dark and the wench's movements swift, yet I
could see that, though coarsely clad and ill-kempt, that witch, whom
they call Mirrab, is the very physical counterpart of the new Court
beauty, the Lady Ursula Glynde."
"The fiancee of the Duke of Wessex!" exclaimed the Spaniard.
"Impossible!"
"Nay, my lord," rejoined Everingham pointedly, "she scarce can be called
His Grace's fiancee as yet. They were children in their cradles when
_her_ father plighted their troth."
The Spaniard made no immediate reply. With an affected, effeminate
gesture he was gently stroking his long, black moustache. Everingham,
on the other hand, was eyeing him keenly, with a certain look of
defiance and challenge, and in a moment the antagonism between the two
men appeared more marked than before.
"But gossip has it," said the Marquis at last, with assumed nonchalance,
"that Lady Ursula's father--the Earl of Truro, was it not?--swore upon
his honour and on his deathbed that she should wed the Duke of Wessex,
whenever he claimed her hand, or live her life in a convent. Nay, I but
repeat the rumour which has reached me," he added lightly; "put me right
if I am in error, my lord. I am but a stranger, and have not yet had the
honour of meeting His Grace."
"Bah!" said Everingham impatiently, "His Grace is in no humour to wed,
nor do the Earl of Truro's deathbed vows bind _him_ in any way."
He took up his bumper, and looking long and thoughtfully into it, he
said with slow emphasis--
"If the Duke of Wessex be inclined to marry, believe me, my lord
Marquis, that it shall be none other than the Queen of England! Whom may
God bless and protect," he added, reverently lifting his plumed hat with
one hand, whilst with the other he held the bumper to his lips and
tossed down the full measure of wine at one draught.
"Amen to that," responded Don Miguel with the same easy nonchalance.
He too drained his bumper to the dregs; then he said quietly--
"But that is where we differ, milor. His Eminence the Cardinal de Moreno
and myself both hope that the Queen of England will wed our master King
Philip of Spain."
Everingham seemed as if he would reply. But with a certain effort he
checked the impatient words which had risen to his lips. Englishmen had
only just begun to learn the tricks and wiles of Spanish diplomacy, the
smiles which hide antagonisms, the suave words which disguise impulsive
thoughts.
Lord Everingham had not wholly assimilated the lesson. He had frowned
impatiently when the question of the marriage of his queen had been
broached by the foreigner. It was a matter which roused the temper of
every loyal Englishman just then; they would _not_ see Mary Tudor wedded
to a stranger. England was beginning to feel her own independence; her
children would not see her under another yoke.
Mary, in spite of her Spanish mother, was English to the backbone.
Tudor-like, she had proved her grit and her pluck when opposing factions
tried to wrest her crown from her. She was Harry's daughter. Her loyal
subjects were proud of her and proud of her descent, and many of them
had sworn that none but an English husband should share her throne with
her.
With the same sarcastic smile still lurking round his full lips the
Spaniard had watched his friend closely the while. He knew full well
what was going on behind that florid countenance, knew the antagonism
which the proposed Spanish marriage was rousing just then in the hearts
and minds of Englishmen of all classes.
But he certainly did not care to talk over such momentous questions at a
country fair, with the eyes and mouths of hundreds of yokels gaping
astonishment at him.
As far as he was concerned the half-amicable discussion was closed. He
and his friend had agreed to differ. According to Spanish ideas,
divergence in political opinions need not interfere with pleasant
camaraderie.
With a genuine desire, therefore, to change the subject of conversation,
Don Miguel rose from his seat and idly scanned the passing crowd.
"Carramba!" he ejaculated suddenly.
"What is it?"
"Our two masks," whispered the Spaniard. "What say you, milor, shall we
resume our interrupted adventure and abandon the tiresome field of
politics for the more easy paths of gallantry?"
And without waiting for his friend's reply, eager, impetuous, fond of
intrigues and mysteries, the young man darted through the crowd in the
direction where his keen eyes had spied a couple of hooded figures,
thickly veiled, who were obviously trying to pass unperceived.
Everingham followed closely on the young Spaniard's footsteps. But the
sun had already sunk low down in the west. Outlines and silhouettes had
become indistinct and elusive. By the time the Marquis de Suarez and his
English friend had elbowed their way through the throng the two
mysterious figures had once more disappeared.
CHAPTER V
LADIES AND GALLANTS
Breathless, half laughing and half crying, very merry, yet wholly
frightened, those same two hooded and masked figures had paused almost
immediately beneath the platform of Mirrab's tent.
They had been running very fast, and, exhausted, were now clinging to
one another, cowering in the deepest shadow of the rough wooden
construction.
"Oh! Margaret sweet," whispered a feminine voice from behind the silken
mask, "I vow I should have died with fright!"
"Think you we have escaped them?" murmured the other feebly.
She who had first spoken, taller than her friend and obviously the
leader of this mad escapade, tiptoed cautiously forward and peered out
into the open space.
"Sh--sh--sh!" she whispered, as she dragged her unwilling companion
after her, "do you see them? . . . right over there . . . they are
running fast . . . Oh! ho! ho! ho!" she laughed suddenly with childish
glee as she clapped her hands together; "but, Margaret dear! . . . did
we not fool them merrily? . . . Oh! I could shriek for joy! Aye, run,
run, run, my fine gallants!" she added, blowing an imaginary kiss to her
distant pursuers, "an you go that way you'll ne'er o'ertake us, e'en
though you raced the wind . . . ha! ha! ha! . . ."
Her laugh sounded a little forced and hysterical, for she had had a
terrible fright, and her companion was still clinging miserably,
helplessly to her side.
"Nay, Ursula, how can you be so merry?" admonished Margaret in a voice
almost choked with tears; "think if the Duchess of Lincoln were to hear
of this adventure--or Her Majesty herself--oh! . . ."
But Ursula's gay, madcap mood was proof against Margaret's tears.
"Oh! oh! oh!" she ejaculated, mimicking her friend's tones of horror.
"Oh!" she added with mock seriousness, "well, then, of course, there
would be trouble, Margaret mine! . . . sweet Margaret! . . . such a
lecture! . . . and oh! oh! oh! such black looks from Her Majesty! . . .
we should e'en--think on it!--have to look demure for at least two days,
until our sins be forgiven us! . . ."
She paused awhile, mischief apparent even beneath the half-transparent
lace which hid her laughter-loving mouth. She drew her trembling
companion closer to her, and, still laughing, she coaxed her gently.
"There, there, sweet," she murmured, "cheer up, I pray thee, cheer up.
. . . See, we have come to the end of our journey. We have baffled those
persistent gallants, and this is the witch's tent. Margaret!" she added
with an impatient tap of the foot, "art a goose to go on crying so? I
vow I'd have come alone had I known thou'rt such a coward."
"Ursula!" said Margaret, somewhat emboldened by her friend's assurance,
"could you guess who were those two gallants?"
"Nay," replied Ursula indifferently, "one of them, methinks, was the
Marquis de Suarez, for I caught sight of his black silk hose, but what
do we care about these nincompoops, Margaret? Come and see the witch--we
have no time to lose."
Eagerly she turned towards the booth, and somewhat awed, anxious, yet
not wholly daring, she gazed up in astonishment at the gaudy draperies,
the tall flagstaff, the weird black flag with its strange device. Then
with sudden resolution she planted her foot upon the bottom step.
"Wilt follow me, sweet?" she asked.
Even as she spoke Abra, in tall peaked cap and flowing mantle, emerged
from within the tent.
Margaret, who was screwing up her courage to follow her friend, gave a
shriek of dismay.
"No! no! no! Ursula!" she said, clinging to the other girl, not daring
to look up at the awesome figure of the lean magician. "I implore you,
give up the thought."
"Give up the thought?" rejoined Ursula, boldly trying to smother her own
superstitious fears, "when I've gone thus far?"
"I cannot think what you want with that horrid witch!" pleaded Margaret.
At sight of Abra's long white beard, his wizard's wand, and cloak
covered with cabalistic signs, even Ursula's courage had begun to ebb.
She had hastily retreated from the steps and followed Margaret once more
within the protecting shelter of the shadows.
"I want to know my fortune, Margaret mine," she said in a voice which
was not quite as firm as before, "and I hear that this witch can see
into the future. 'Tis said that she has marvellous powers."
"Why should you want to know the future?" persisted timid, practical
Margaret; "is not the present good enough for you?"
"His Grace of Wessex comes back to Court to-day," rejoined Ursula,
"after an absence of many months."
"Well?--what of him?"
"What of him? . . . Margaret, art stupid, or art not my friend? . . .
Is it not natural that I should wish to know whether I am to be Duchess
of Wessex or abbess in a holy but uncomfortable convent?"
"Yes, 'tis natural enough," assented Margaret thoughtfully, "but----"
"His Grace has never seen me since I was so long," said Ursula with a
short, impatient sigh, and stretching out a round arm decked with a
sleeve of rich silk and fine lace. "I had a red face then, and pap was
stuffed into my mouth to keep me quiet. You see, I could not have been
madly alluring then."
"And you are beautiful now, Ursula. But of what avail is it? You cannot
wed His Grace of Wessex, for he'll never ask you to be his wife. He'll
marry the Queen. All England wishes it."
"But I wish him to marry me," quoth Ursula with a resolute tap of her
high-heeled shoe against the ground. "Yes, me! and I want that witch
yonder to ask the stars if he will fall in love with me when he sees me,
or if he will yield to those who want to make of him a tool for their
political ambition, and marry an ugly, ill-tempered old woman who
happens to be Queen of England."
"Ursula!"
Margaret's horror, amazement, and awe had rendered her almost
speechless. Ursula's utterance was nearly sacrilegious, in these days
when kings and queens ruled by right divine.
But the young girl continued, quite unabashed by her friend's rebuke.
"Well," she said imperturbably, "you can't deny that the Queen is old!
. . . and ugly! . . . and ill-tempered! . . ."
Margaret, however, was prepared to deny these monstrous statements with
the last breath left in her delicate body. The poor little soul was
frightened out of her wits.
Suppose some one had overheard!--and repeated the tale that two of the
Queen's ladies-in-waiting had called Her Majesty old!--and ugly!--and
ill-tempered!----
Nay, Ursula's madcap freaks were past bearing! and would lead her into
serious trouble one of these days.
"Margaret," whispered the delinquent, who still seemed quite unaware of
the enormity of her offence, "hast thou ever seen His Grace of Wessex?"
"No," replied Margaret curtly, for she was still very wrathful, and
vaguely felt that, at this stage, all references to the Duke were
somehow treasonable.
"Nor I since I was a baby," sighed Ursula; "but see here. . . ."
From beneath the folds of her cloak she drew a chain and locket, and
holding the latter before Margaret's unwilling eyes, she said
ecstatically--
"That's his picture. Isn't he handsome?"
"You've fallen in love with his picture!"
"Madly!"
"Madly indeed!" retorted Margaret.
Ursula once more hid the locket inside her robe. She had regained all
her courage. Once more dragging her weaker companion by the wrist she
turned towards the witch's booth.
Abra, the magician, tired out by his day's exertions, had settled
himself down on a tattered piece of rug outside the tent; there he had
fallen peacefully asleep, his venerable head thrown back, his lean
shanks hanging over the edge of the platform and snoring the snore of
the just. Thus he had failed to spy the two hooded, dainty figures, who
had all along kept within the shadows.
Suddenly through his pleasant slumbers he heard an eagerly whispered--
"Hey! friend!"
Whilst the toe of his shoe was violently tagged at from below.
"Friend, wake!"
"They won't listen!" added an impatient, half-tearful voice.
But already Abra was on his feet. Giving his humble henchman a violent
kick to wake him up, he began to mutter mechanically, even before he was
fully conscious--
"What ho, my masters! consult the world-famous necromancer----"
Bang! bang! bang! on the big drum came automatically from his henchman,
who was only half awake.
"No! no! no!" entreated Ursula, "I prithee not so much noise! We wish to
consult the soothsayer . . . we've brought some money . . . three gold
pieces . . . is that enough? . . . But in the name of Our Lady I beg of
thee not to make so much noise."
Timidly she held up a silken purse towards the astonished wizard. Three
gold pieces!--why, 'twas a fortune, the like of which the worthy Abra
had never beheld in one sum in his life.
To ask him not to make a noise was to demand the impossible. With one
hand he pushed his henchman vigorously to one side. The latter dropped
his cymbals, which rattled off the platform with an ear-splitting crash.
All the while Abra in stentorian tones, and holding back the folds of
the tent, was shouting at the top of his voice--
"This way, ladies! for the great soothsayer Mirrab, the sale of
love-philters and charms, and of the true elixir of life."
"The die is cast, Margaret mine," said Ursula, trying vainly to steady
her voice, which was trembling, and her knees which were shaking beneath
her. "Art coming?--Oh! I--I--feel a little nervous," she admitted in
spite of herself, "and you--oh! how your hand trembles. . . ."
She was frankly terrified now. The noise was so awful, and though she
did not dare look to the right or left of her she was conscious that she
and her friend were no longer alone on the open place. She could hear
the murmur of voices, the sound of idle folk gathering in every
direction.
Her instinct suggested immediate flight, and the abandonment of this mad
adventure while there was yet time, but her pride urged her to proceed.
She gripped Margaret's wrist with a resolute hand and made a quick rush
for the steps.
Alas! she was just two seconds too late. The next instant she felt her
waist seized firmly from behind, whilst a merry voice shouted--
"Cornered at last!"
Wrenching herself free with a sudden twist of her firm young shoulders,
Ursula contrived to liberate herself momentarily. She was dimly
conscious of having caught sight of Margaret in the like plight as
herself.
"Not so fast, fair one," whispered an insinuating voice close to her, "a
word in thy pretty ear."
Oh! the shame of this vulgar adventure! Pursued like some kitchen wench
out on a spree, by a gallant, eager for an idle kiss.
She felt her cheeks tingle underneath her mask; saw and guessed the
short laugh, the shrug of the shoulders of the idlers round, far too
accustomed to these spectacles to take more than passing note of it.
Once more the firm grip had seized her waist. This time she felt herself
powerless to struggle.
"Nay, in the name of heaven, sir," she entreated tearfully, "I pray you
let me go."
"Not until I have caught a nearer sight of those bright eyes, that shine
at me through that cruel mask."
The soft guttural tones revealed the identity of the speaker to Ursula.
She knew Don Miguel well; knew his wild, impudent spirit, his love of
idle flirtations which had already made him the terror of the prim
Queen's Court. She knew that she would not be allowed to escape before
this ridiculous episode had been brought to its usual conclusion.
Oh! how she longed for the Duchess of Lincoln's severe guardianship at
this moment! How bitterly she repented the folly which had prompted her
to drag Margaret along into this wild adventure.
Poor Margaret! she, too, was doing her best to evade the unwelcome
attentions of her gallant! and that magician! and those louts! all
grinning like so many apes at the spectacle.
It was maddening!
And she was helpless!
The next moment the young Spaniard's indiscreet hands had snatched the
protecting mask from her face, and the daintiest and most perfect
picture Nature had ever fashioned stood revealed, blushing with shame
and vexation, before his delighted, slightly sarcastic gaze.
"Ah! luck favours me indeed!" he murmured with avowed admiration, "the
newly-risen star--nay! the brightest sun in the firmament of beauty! the
Lady Ursula Glynde!"
CHAPTER VI
THE LADY URSULA
She was only nineteen then. Not very tall, yet perfectly proportioned,
and with that small, oval face of hers which delighted yet puzzled all
the artists of the epoch.
The dark hood of her cloak had fallen back at the impertinent gesture of
the young Spaniard; her fair hair, slightly touched with warm gold,
escaped in a few unruly curls from beneath the stiff coif of brocade
which encircled her pretty head.
The neck was long; the shoulders, rich, young and firm, gleamed like
ivory beneath the primly folded kerchief of lace of a dead, bluish
white, a striking note of harmonious contrast.
Have not all the rhymesters of the period sung the praises of her eyes?
What shall the poor chronicler add to these poetical effusions, save
that Ursula's eyes were as changeable in colour as were her moods, her
spirits, the expression of her face, and the inflexions of her voice.
And then there was the proud little toss of the head, that contemptuous
curl of the lip which rendered her more desirable than any of her more
yielding companions.
Indeed, Don Miguel felt in luck. His arm was still round her waist. He
felt the young figure stiffen beneath his admiring glances.
The fair one was half mad with rage, and quite adorable in her wrath.
"My lord Marquis, this is an outrage!" she said at last, "and here in
England----"
"Nay, fair one," rejoined the Spaniard with a slight accent of irony,
"even in England, when two ladies, masked and alone, are held prisoners
at nightfall, and in a public place, by their ardent adorers, they must
needs pay ransom for their release. What say you, my lord?" he added,
turning gaily to where his friend held pretty Margaret a not too
unwilling prisoner.
"'Tis but justice," assented Lord Everingham, "and yours the first
prize, Marquis. Fair one," he said, looking down into Margaret's shyly
terrified eyes, "wilt pay toll to me the while?"
"Gentlemen!" proudly protested Lady Ursula, "an there's any honour in
you----"
"Nay! honour lies in snatching a kiss from those sweet lips," rejoined
Don Miguel with a graceful flourish of his plumed hat.
This act of gallantry, however, almost cost him the price of his
victory. Ursula Glynde, born and bred in the country, was the daughter
of a sturdy Cornish nobleman. Accustomed to ride untamed foals, to have
bouts at the broadsword or the poniard with the best man in the county,
she would not yield a kiss or own herself vanquished quite as readily as
the Spaniard seemed to expect.
With a vigorous jerk of the body she had once more freed herself from
the Marquis's grasp, and running up to Margaret, she snatched her by the
hand and dragged her away from Lord Everingham, readjusting her hood and
mask as she flew towards the booth, vaguely hoping for shelter behind
the folds of the tent.
But once more fate interposed relentlessly betwixt her and her attempts
at escape. Two gallants, seeing the episode, eager to have a hand in the
adventure, friends no doubt too of Don Miguel and Everingham, laughingly
barred the way to the steps, just as the two girls had contrived to
reach them. With a cry of disappointment Ursula, still dragging Margaret
after her, tried to double back. But it was too late. Don Miguel and
Lord Everingham were waiting for them on the other side. They were two
to one now, and all chances of escape had hopelessly vanished.
Never had Ursula Glynde felt so mortified in her life.
"Many thanks, gentlemen, for this timely interference," came in mocking
accents from that odious Spaniard. "The ransom, sweet one," he added, as
the chase 'twixt gallants and maids became more general, and the girls
at last felt themselves quite helpless and surrounded.
Ursula's pride alone prevented her from bursting into tears.
"By my faith! here is strange sport!" said a pleasant, slightly mocking
voice suddenly. "What say you, Harry Plantagenet? A lively sight . . .
what? . . . four gallants frightening two ladies!"
Instinctively every one had turned in the direction whence the voice had
come. A man was standing some dozen yards away with mantle tightly drawn
round him, his tall figure stooping to pat and fondle a powerful-looking
boarhound, which clung closely to his side.
He had spoken very quietly, apparently to the dog, whose great ears he
was gently stroking.
Without taking any further heed of the somewhat discomfited gentlemen,
he came forward towards the little group.
"Ladies, your way stands clear," he said, with that same pleasant irony
still apparent in his voice, and without casting more than a cursory
glance at the close hoods and dark masks, which was all that he could
see of the ladies, whom he had so incontinently saved from an unpleasant
position.
"Sir," murmured Ursula, under her breath and without attempting to
move, for she felt as if her knees would give way under her.
"Nay, Madam," rejoined the newcomer lightly, "if my interference has
angered you, I pray you forgive me and I'll withdraw, as these gentlemen
here obviously desire me to do. But an you really wish to escape, my
friend here will assure you that you can do so unmolested. . . . Eh,
Harry? what say you?" he added, once more turning his attention to the
dog.
The boarhound, as if conscious of this appeal to his chivalry, turned a
knowing eye on the two girls.
The four men had been taken so absolutely unawares that during the few
seconds while this brief colloquy took place they had scarcely realised
that an interfering and unknown stranger was trying to hamper them in
their amusements.
They had remained quite speechless, more astonished at the newcomer's
impertinence than wrathful at the interruption; and when the next
instant Ursula and Margaret suddenly fled with unaffected precipitancy,
no one attempted to stop them.
Harry Plantagenet's intelligent eyes followed the retreating figures
until they were out of sight. Then he yawned with obtrusive incivility,
and plainly showed his master that the present company no longer
interested him.
"Well, Harry, old man, shall we go?" said the stranger, calmly turning
on his heel.
But at this final piece of cool insolence Don Miguel de Suarez at last
recovered from his astonishment. This tame ending to an unwarrantable
intrusion was certainly not to his liking, and he, for one, was
unaccustomed to see his whims or caprices thwarted.
In these days tempers ran high, hot blood was allowed free rein, and at
a word or a smile out of place, swords and poniards were soon out of
their sheaths and friendships of yesterday changed to deadly antagonism
in the space of a few minutes.
"Carramba!" swore the young Spaniard, "this passes belief. What say you,
gentlemen?"
And, drawing his long, tapering sword, he barred the way threateningly
to the stranger.
The silence, thus broken, seemed to restore at once to the other three
gallants the full measure of their wrath. One and all following Don
Miguel's example, had put their hands to their sword-hilts.
"Aye! unmask, stranger," said Lord Everingham peremptorily.
"Unmask! unmask!" came in threatening accents from all.
"Unmask, or . . ."
"Or by our Lady!" rejoined the stranger lightly, "you'll all run your
blades into my silken doublet and thus end pleasantly a chivalrous
escapade. Eh?"
One could divine the pleasant, ironical smile lurking behind the thick
curtain of the mask. The Spaniard's blood was boiling with vexation.
Harry Plantagenet gave an impatient whine.
"Your name, stranger, first," commanded Don Miguel haughtily, "then your
sword if you are not a coward; after that I and these gentlemen will
deal with your impudence if you have any left."
There was a moment's silence; the stranger whistled to his dog.
"My sword is at your command," he said; "mine impudence you shall deal
with as you list. . . . My name is Wessex!" he added with a sudden
hauteur which seemed to tower above Don Miguel as the gigantic oak of
the glen towers above the bustling willow beneath.
And he removed the mask from his face.
CHAPTER VII
HIS GRACE OF WESSEX
There are several portraits extant of Robert d'Esclade, fifth Duke of
Wessex, notably the one by Antonio Moro in the Pitti Gallery at
Florence.
But in the somewhat stiff portraiture of that epoch it is perhaps a
little difficult to trace the real image, the inner individuality of one
of the most interesting personalities at the Court of Mary Tudor.
There is, however, a miniature of him, attributed to Holbein, and
certainly drawn by the hand of a great master, which renders with
greater truth and loving accuracy the peculiar charm made up of
half-indolent nonchalance, gracious condescension, and haughty reserve
which characterized the Duke of Wessex.
So justly styled His Grace!
The reserve was so little apparent. The hauteur only came to the surface
in response to unwelcome familiarity. But the debonair indolence was
always there, the lazy droop of the lids, the nonchalant shrug of the
shoulders, when grave matters were discussed, and also that obvious
fastidiousness--a love of everything that was beautiful, from a fine
horse, down to a piece of delicate lace--which annoyed the more
sedate-minded courtiers of the Queen.
And with it all that wonderful virility and vigour, that joy of life and
delight in gaiety and laughter which lent to the grave face at times a
spark of almost boyish exuberance; that mad, merry, proud insouciance,
which throughout his life made him meet every danger--aye! every sorrow
and disgrace--with the same bright smile on his lips.
Scheyfne, in his letters to the emperor, Charles V, says of the Duke of
Wessex that he was insufferably conceited--"il est tres orgueilleux de
sa beaute personelle, laquelle certes est plus que mediocre."
Noailles, too, speaks of him as "moult fatueux et vaniteux de sa
personne."
But it was hardly likely that these foreign delegates, each bent upon
their own schemes, would look with favour upon His Grace. His only merit
in their eyes was that same characteristic indolence of his, which
caused a man of his great wealth and boundless influence to abstain from
politics.
Certes no one could accuse him of intriguing for his own political
advancement. Mary Tudor's own avowed penchant for him was so well known,
that he had but to say the word and the crown of England would be his,
to share with the Queen.
Yet since the death of Edward VI he had not been seen at Court. Small
wonder, therefore, that at sight of the Duke all four men seemed amazed.
"His Grace of Wessex!" they ejaculated in one breath.
But already Lord Everingham had put up his sword and gone to Wessex with
hands outstretched.
"Wessex!" he said with unmistakable delight. "By Our Lady, this is a
joyful surprise!"
The other two Englishmen also shook the Duke warmly by the hand.
"I did not know you were in England, my lord," said the one.
"Right glad are we to welcome you back," added the other.
"Well, Harry, my friend," quoth the Duke gaily, "methinks you and I are
not to be spiked after all."
Harry Plantagenet, however, was looking doubtfully at the young
Spaniard, who had remained somewhat in the background, regarding the
first effusions of his friends with a certain ill-concealed impatience.
With almost human intelligence the dog seemed to understand that here
was a person who was inimical to his master, and in his faithful eyes
there came that unmistakable furtive look and blink, with which dogs
invariably show their mistrust and dislike.
But Don Miguel de Suarez was above all a diplomatist. Capricious and
fond of adventure, not over-scrupulous as to the choice of his
pleasures, yet he never allowed his dearest whim to interfere with
political necessities.
A few seconds' quick reflection soon made it dear to him that a quarrel
with the Duke of Wessex would, at this juncture, greatly endanger his
own popularity at the English Court, and thereby minimize his chances of
carrying through the negotiations entrusted to him by King Philip of
Spain.
Under the leadership of His Eminence the Cardinal de Moreno he certainly
hoped to bring about the marriage of Philip with the Queen of England.
He knew perfectly well that he and his eminent colleague were opposed in
this design by the entire ultra-English faction here, and also that this
faction was composed of practically the whole of the nobility and
chivalry of the realm.
The Duke of Wessex was the pride and hope of this party, for Courtenay,
weak and effeminate, had lost all his partisans. What more natural than
that the most distinguished, most brilliant of Queen Mary's subjects
should share her throne with her?
All this and more passed swiftly through Don Miguel's active brain.
Therefore, as soon as there was a lull in the joyful welcome accorded
to the Duke by his friends, he too stepped forward, having with vigorous
self-will curbed his unruly temper and forced his full, sensuous lips to
a smile. He had realized the expediency of, at any rate, outward
amiability.
"A great name, my lord," he said, bowing with grave ceremony to Wessex,
"and one familiar to me already, though I have not yet been honoured by
seeing you at Court."
The Duke eyed him for the space of two brief seconds, whilst just the
faintest touch of superciliousness seemed to be lurking somewhere at the
back of his neck. But he returned the Spaniard's bow with equal
ceremony. Then he placed his hand on the head of his dog.
"Nay, sir," he said, "my friend here bears a prouder name than mine.
Harry Plantagenet, make your bow to the envoy of His Most Catholic
Majesty. I call him Plantagenet, sir, after our King Harry V, who drove
back the French at Agincourt. Nay, your pardon; this scarce interests
you. You were not born then, and Spain was not yet a kingdom."
He spoke lightly, and none but Everingham's devoted ears caught the
slight tone of impertinence which underlay the bland, seemingly empty
speech.
Don Miguel himself was determined to keep urbane.
"A beautiful creature, indeed," he said suavely; "but you, milor Duke,
do you return to Hampton Court with us this night?"
"Oh!" replied Wessex, "among so many brilliant diplomatists from Spain
there's scarce room for a mere idler like myself."
"Yet we diplomatists are hoping to pit our poor wits against Your
Grace's," added Don Miguel pointedly.
"Against those of my friends perhaps, my lord," rejoined the Duke drily.
"Mine own are incorrigibly idle."
Don Miguel, as was his wont, did not pursue the subject any further. He
was trying to read the refined, distinctly haughty countenance, which
was smiling down at him so pleasantly just now, and taking mental stock
of this antagonist, whom rumour had described to him and to his chief as
the only serious obstacle to the proposed Spanish alliance.
He saw before him a man in the full pride of youth and manhood, tall and
well knit, and wearing with easy grace the elaborate slashes and puffs,
trunks and silk hose, which present fashion had decreed.
The Spaniard's keen and critical eye took in every detail of this
interesting personality: the short, light brown hair worn close to the
head, the fair moustache and delicately refined hands, the richness of
the doublet, the priceless value of the lace at throat and wrist.
"A fop and an idler!" he murmured mentally.
Then he thought of the Queen of England. No longer young, with but
little taste in ornament and dress, and certes quite unversed in all
those wiles, which might have drawn this brilliant butterfly into her
net.
The Spaniard longed to see these two together. The presence of this
formidable adversary gave additional zest to the game he was playing on
the political chess-board.
An unwilling courtier! A love-sick Queen! Carramba! it was interesting.
"When do you return to the Palace, my lord?" Everingham was asking of
the Duke.
"To-night," replied the latter, "by our gracious Liege Lady's own
command."
"To-night then?"
"Without fail. Harry Plantagenet and I will present our humble respects
to Her Majesty."
"'Tis au revoir then, Your Grace," quoth Don Miguel. "We meet again
to-night."
"At your service, my lord Marquis."
Still smiling amicably the Spaniard took his leave, soon followed by two
of his companions. Lord Everingham too was about to depart, but he felt
Wessex' detaining hand on his arm.
"That unpleasant-looking Spaniard? . . ." queried the Duke.
"Don Miguel, Marquis de Suarez," replied Everingham, "envoy of His
Majesty, the King of Spain."
"Aye, I knew all that. I was merely reflecting that if he happen to be a
specimen of our Liege Lady's Court, meseems I were a fool to go back to
it."
"Come back to it with me now," urged his friend earnestly.
"Not till to-night. Do not grudge me these few last hours of freedom. By
Our Lady! I meant to consult the famous witch, like a sober burgher out
on a holiday. But in the name of all the saints in the calendar let us
forget there are such things as Spaniards at the English Court just
now."
He laughed, a half weary, wholly pleasant laugh, as, followed by his
dog, he led his friend in the opposite direction to that in which Don
Miguel had rapidly walked away.
CHAPTER VIII
SILKEN BONDS
Wessex and Everingham had readjusted their masks and wrapped their
cloaks around them, ere they once more mingled with the crowd which
still thronged around the gaily decked booths.
The evening now was rapidly drawing in. Hampton Court, in the
fast-gathering haze beyond, looked grey and ghostlike, with brightly
illumined windows beginning to gleam here and there.
With an impatient frown, Wessex deliberately turned his back on the
gorgeous pile: it represented boredom to him, politics and dullness, and
he loved gaiety, sunshine, and laughter, these merry-makers here, the
pretty country wenches with their bare arms and neat ankles showing
beneath their brightly coloured robes.
Everingham was silent as he followed his friend through the crowd. But
Wessex' laugh was always infectious, and he seemed in a merry mood
to-night. Harry Plantagenet alone seemed morose; he disapproved of all
these country louts, who were over free with their caresses. He kept
close to his master's heel, and only gave an occasional growl, when some
impudent 'prentice dared to come too nigh.
"Well, Harry, old friend," said the Duke after a while, "shall we go and
consult the witch, or wait until the stars are out? Friend Everingham
here is none too good company to-night, eh? In thine ear, proud
Plantagenet, he hath designs on our freedom. But the soothsayer shall
cast our horoscope, and look into our future, see if you are to become
chief lapdog to the Queen of England, or if we are both of us to fall in
bondage to the mistress plighted to us by an uncomfortable old
gentleman, who had not consulted us in the matter. 'Sdeath man," he
added, suddenly looking straight into Everingham's serious face, "why do
you look so grave? Tell me, pending that witch's starlit lies, what's
your best news?"
"By my faith!" responded Everingham simply, "the best news is Your
Grace's return. 'Twas an ill wind that wafted you away from Court."
"Aye! 'twas the wind of infinite boredom wafted my Grace away," replied
the Duke with a smile. "Confess, friend, that the Court cannot be
alluring with the Queen telling her beads, the foreign ambassadors
ruling England, the Privy Council at loggerheads, the people grumbling,
and the ladies yawning. Brrr!"
He gave a mock shiver, and seemed not to notice the quick look of
reproach cast at him by his friend.
"And out of sheer boredom," quoth Everingham with a sigh of deep
disappointment, "you piqued the Queen of England."
Wessex did not reply at once. At Everingham's tone of rebuke a slight
frown had contracted his forehead, and that certain look of hauteur,
never wholly absent from his face, at once became more apparent.
There was more than mere camaraderie between these two men: unity of
thought, similarity of tastes and education, a great and overwhelming
love for their own country, together with mutual understanding and
appreciation, had long ago knit the ties of friendship closely between
them. It was generally admitted by every one that Lord Everingham might
venture on a ground of familiarity with His Grace which no one else
quite dared to tread.
This time too, after that instant's hesitation, the reserve which every
now and then seemed entirely to detach the Duke of Wessex from his
surroundings, quickly disappeared again. The pleasant smile returned to
the proud lips, he shrugged his shoulders and said simply--
"Is the Queen of England piqued?"
"Can you ask?" rejoined the other with increased vehemence.
Then he checked himself abruptly, feeling no doubt how useless it was to
discuss such matters seriously just now.
"The only woman," he added, falling in once more with his friend's
lighter mood, "the only woman whose blandishments His Grace of Wessex
has ever been known to resist."
"And that with difficulty," concluded the Duke gaily. "But you see,
friend," he added with mock gravity, "with a Tudor you never can tell;
you might lose your heart one day and your head the next."
"Mary Tudor loves you too well . . ." protested Lord Everingham.
"She is the daughter of King Harry VIII, remember, and would threaten me
with the block or the rack at every indiscretion."
He paused, then added quaintly--
"And I would commit so many."
"A woman who loves always forgives," urged his friend.
"A woman, my good Everingham, will forgive a grave infidelity--perhaps!
but not a number of little indiscretions. Mine," he added with a light
sigh, "would be the little indiscretions."
"And while you fled from Court the Queen of England has almost promised
to wed the Spanish king," said Everingham bitterly.
He watched his friend keenly as he spoke and paused a moment before he
added pointedly--
"'Twill be a proud day for the peers of England when they bow the knee
to their Liege Lord, a foreign king."
Wessex shrugged his broad shoulders and turned to where a pretty wench,
dispensing ale to a scarlet-cloaked burgher, formed a picture pleasing
to his artistic eye.
Everingham, somewhat proud of his own diplomatic skill, had noted,
however, a certain stiffening of His Grace's figure at the vision which
had been conjured before him.
That of a Wessex bending the knee before a Spaniard.
"You were away," continued Everingham, eager to goad his friend into
speech, "and my Lord Cardinal and Don Miguel know how to blow upon the
flames of Mary's jealousy. Your influence can still save England, my
lord," he added with great earnestness, "let not your enemies say that
fear of a woman keeps you from exerting it."
"H'm! do they say that?" mused Wessex quaintly, whilst a smile, which
almost might be called boyish, altered the whole expression of his
serious face. "By my faith! but they are right. One's enemies usually
are."
He drew his friend away from the immediate vicinity of a jabbering
crowd, into a dark corner formed by one of the booths. Everingham,
thinking that at last he had led Wessex into a graver train of thought,
failed to notice the humorous twinkle of the eyes which had so palpably
struggled to the surface.
"It is the fear of a woman has kept me away from Court," he whispered
solemnly, "but that woman is not the Queen of England."
"Who is it then?"
"In your ear, friend . . . 'tis the Lady Ursula Glynde."
Everingham could scarce suppress a movement of intense satisfaction.
Lady Ursula! beautiful, exquisite Lady Ursula was the one
stumbling-block on which the schemes of his faction might become
hopelessly shattered.
Wessex was nominally plighted to the lady. True, 'twas an engagement
undertaken by the lady's own father, without the consent of the parties
chiefly concerned. But in Tudor England there was a curious adherence to
such solemnly plighted troths, which might have proved a bar to the
Duke's sense of absolute freedom.
If, however, he looked upon this unnatural and monstrous pledge with the
lightness which it fully deserved, if he considered himself at liberty
to break the imaginary bonds which held him to Lady Ursula, then the
work of his partisans would become comparatively easy.
They had always hoped and fully intended to overcome His Grace's
scruples in the matter, and fondly thought that they would succeed. But
since the Duke himself looked indifferently upon this so-called troth,
why, Everingham himself was the first to feel the keenest satisfaction
at the thought.
"You dislike the lady then?" he asked with unfeigned delight.
"I have never seen her," retorted Wessex placidly. "At any rate, not
since she was in her cradle. I certainly didn't like her then."
"She is very beautiful," remarked Everingham, with a somewhat shamefaced
recollection of his previous adventure, "but----"
"She might be a veritable angel, yet she would frighten me."
A mock shudder passed through his tall, athletic frame, and taking his
friend's arm in his, he whispered confidentially, "Think of it, my lord!
A woman whom duty _compels_ one to love--Brrr!--Her own father plighted
our troth; I am left comparatively free, yet if I do not wed Lady
Ursula, she is doomed to end her days in a convent. . . . A matter of
honour--what? . . . Yet I--I, who could love any woman," he added
emphatically, "be she queen or peasant--that is--h'm!--if I were really
put to it--find the very thought of my promised bride abhorrent. She is
the one woman in all the world whom I could never love--never! . . . I
know it! So I ran away from Court, not because I feared one woman loved
me too much, but because I knew I should love one woman too little."
He had spoken so light-heartedly, so gaily, that in spite of the grave
issues at stake Everingham could not help but laugh.
"Nay! perhaps you exaggerate the danger," he said. "The Lady Ursula
might prefer the convent to being a duchess. She has never seen Your
Grace, she is rich and high-born, she may be pious----"
"Or perverse," responded Wessex. "I've never met a woman yet who didn't
want--badly--the thing she mightn't get."
"Is England then a woman," queried Everingham with renewed earnestness,
"since she wants Wessex?"
But the Duke was not prepared to follow his friend to-night into
sentimental, ultra-patriotic bypaths. He was not altogether inclined to
sacrifice his liberty for the sake of ousting the Spanish king from his
proposed English throne.
Nevertheless he rejoined more gravely than was his wont.
"Does England really want me?" he said with gentle irony. "Nay!" he
added, restraining with one hand Everingham's exuberant protests, "I
know! I know! you all think so, and that I am an unhallowed idler,
letting my country drift into the arms of the foreigner. Do not deny it,
friend. . . . Perhaps I am. . . . Nay! we'll say, indeed I am. . . .
There! there! calm your fears. Have I not told you that Her Majesty hath
commanded my presence at Court? We'll set our poor wits to oust Spanish
diplomacy, and I must trust my luckiest star to inspire in the Lady
Ursula a wholesome desire for the convent; for I tell thee, friend, that
if she holds me to my silken bonds, I will at once repair to the
outermost corner of the earth and thence drop into vacancy, or take
flight to the blue dome of heaven above."
"God protect Your Grace," rejoined Everingham with grave solemnity. "Ah!
I fear no Spanish influence now," he added enthusiastically. "You'll
save England, my lord, and the gratitude of the nation will be at your
feet."
Wessex smiled, shrugged his shoulders, and without further allusion to
more serious subjects the two men mingled once more among the crowd.
CHAPTER IX
THE VEILED WITCH
Outside the witch's tent all was silent and deserted. Darkness had
gradually crept in, and with it--as far as the rest of the Fair was
concerned--additional noise and exuberant gaiety.
Huge torches of gum and resin flickered at the entrance of every booth,
throwing quaint red lights, and deep, mysterious shadows all round,
distorting the faces of the gaping multitude, and of the criers, until
they looked like fantastic figures, wizards all from some neighbouring
Brocken.
Whether the world-famous necromancer, Mirrab, and her attendant genii
were lacking in business or no, no one could say, for there was no torch
outside their tent, and Abra had ceased to lure the passer-by. The open
place in front of the platform was dark and still.
Suddenly from out the shadows something seemed to move forward, whilst a
mysterious "Hist! hist!" came echoing from more than one direction.
Gradually the sound became more distinct, dark figures emerged from
every side, and presently a compact group of moving, whispering people
congregated some few yards away from the booth. Then a voice, still low
and muffled, but firm and emphatic, detached itself from the ghostlike
murmur around.
"My masters, I call upon you to witness! . . . The Scriptures say, 'Let
no witch live.' . . . Shall we disobey the Scriptures and allow that
witch to live? . . . She is possessed, and the devil dwells in that
booth."
Groans and threatening curses greeted this peroration. The speaker
raised his voice somewhat.
"Will you allow Satan to remain amongst you?"
"No! no! no!" came in excited accents from the little crowd.
"And I say death to the witch!" added the leading voice solemnly.
"Death to the witch!" came in weird echoes from all around.
Then there was silence. The dark heads bent closer together.
"What wilt thou do, Matthew?" whispered one voice with awed timidity.
"Let her burn, I say," replied the learned village oracle; "'tis the
only way of getting rid of Satan."
It had been a hot day. The heads of this pack of country folk had been
overheated with sack and spiced ale; an unreasoning, maniacal terror,
with superstition for its basis, had completed the work of completely
addling their loutish brains. All day there had been talk of this veiled
witch, these strange spirits and weird monsters which she was reputed to
conjure up at will. Thoughts of poisoned wells, of sweating sickness, of
hell-fire raged through these poor misguided fellows' minds.
What did they know of charlatanism or trickery? To them it was all real,
living, awesome, terrible. The devil was a person with glowing eyes, two
horns, and a forked tail, who caused innocent people to fall flat on
their backs and foam at the mouth.
Every malady then unknown to science was ascribed to hellish agency. And
here, within a few yards, was an unearthly creature who actually
consorted with the creator of all evil, who wilfully brought him up from
his burning abode below the earth, and let him loose upon this peaceful
village and its God-fearing inhabitants.
"Nay! burn her! burn her!" they shouted, brandishing their sticks,
emboldened through their very cowardice into deeds they would otherwise
never have contemplated without a shudder.
And they shouted in order to keep up their exaltation and their
excitement; the devil is known to favour whisperings.
"After me, my masters," continued Matthew, who was still the leader of
this insane band of mischievous fools, "after me. Remember there's
salvation for our sins if we burn the witch."
With another wild shout the little crowd made a rush for the platform of
the booth, just as Abra and his henchman, attracted by the strangeness
of the noise, came out of the tent to see what might be amiss.
Before they had time to utter a sound of protest the two men were seized
by the crowd and dragged down the steps with violence. The people had no
time to trouble about a lout such as he. They wanted the witch herself,
now, at once, while their blood was up and boiling; and the guard might
come round at any moment and frustrate them in their will.
"Out of the way, lout! out of the way! or thou'lt burn alongside of thy
damned witch!"
Abra had fallen on his knees, understanding only too well the danger
which was threatening him. He had known all along what terrible risks he
was taking. 'Twas not well in these days to tamper with the
supernatural. But he had trusted to the good temper of holiday-makers,
whilst the certain patronage of rich burghers and Court gallants had
proved an overwhelming temptation to his greed of gain. For the wench he
cared but little. He had picked her out of the gutter one day, a
starving little slut, and had used her as a tool--a willing one
enough--for his own pecuniary ends.
Even now, with a cursing throng of maniacs round him, he only thought of
his own safety. Mean, abject, and cowardly, he fell upon his knees.
"Merciful heavens, my masters," he pleaded.
But the crowd was not in a humour to listen. The men kicked him on one
side, and he fell up against his miserable companion, who was too
terror-stricken to move.
Then there was another rush up to the platform. Without thought or
pause, for these would have been fatal to the resolute purpose in view,
and might give the devil time to look after his own.
From within the tent there came now a frantic shriek of terror. The next
moment, the foremost among the crowd had pushed aside the gaudy
draperies, and that one shriek was answered by a dozen awesome,
horrified curses.
There was the witch at last. A poor trembling girl, scarce out of her
teens, with beautiful, delicate features, and an abundance of golden
hair falling round her shoulders; her mysterious veil--a bit of showy
tinsel--lying in a heap on the floor. Nothing supernatural or devilish
about her, surely. Quaint, perhaps, because of that singular beauty of
face and skin which seemed so ill-assorted with the sordidness of her
surroundings. One of Nature's curious freaks, this kitchen wench with a
head which would have graced a duchess, her interesting personality
merely the prey of a common charlatan, who used her for vulgar,
senseless trickery.
For the moment her beauty was distorted through the dawning of an awful
terror. To a sane man she would only have seemed a wretched, miserable,
frightened woman. But not so to the ale-sodden, overheated minds of
these excited creatures, blinded by an almost maniacal fear.
To them she looked supernaturally tall, supernaturally weird, with great
glowing eyes and tongues of flame illumining her person.
"The witch!" they shouted, "the witch! the witch!"
"What do you want with me?" murmured the poor girl.
Egged on by their passions they smothered their terror. They seized her
violently by the wrists and dragged her out of her lair and on to the
platform, where the rest of the crowd were pressing.
A shout of exultation, of hellish triumph, greeted the appearance of the
wretched woman. Not a spark of pity was aroused by her helplessness, her
obvious, abject terror.
"The witch! the witch! death to the witch!"
They seemed to be fanning their own passions, adding fuel to the flames
of their insensate wrath.
There was the source of all the evil which might have befallen the
peaceful valley of the Thames! the creature with the evil eye, the
dispenser of misery and death!
They had forgotten the guard now. Their lawlessness knew no bounds. But
for the incessant din of the merry-makers at the Fair, the banging of
the drums, and the shouts of the criers, their own yells of execration,
their violent curses, and the shrieks of the captive girl could not have
failed to attract attention.
But every one was busy laughing and enjoying the last hours of this
happy day. No one came to interfere in this devilish work which was
about to be consummated.
And every word the poor woman uttered but brought further vituperation
upon her.
She shouted, "Help!"
"Hark, my masters," sneered Matthew loftily, "she calls to Satan for
help."
"What will you do with me?" she pleaded. "I've done you no wrong."
"Thou hast brought the devil in our midst."
"No! no!"
"I saw thee riding on a broomstick--going to thy Sabbath revels."
"'Tis false!"
"Tie her to the pole--quick!"
The so-called witch, the friend of Satan and of all the powers of
darkness, fell upon her knees in an agony of the wildest despair.
Realizing her position, the terrible doom which was awaiting her, her
whole figure seemed to writhe with the agony of her horror. She dragged
herself to Matthew's knees--he seemed to be leading the others--she
wrenched her arms free from those who held her and threw them round him.
She forced her voice to gentleness and pleading, tried to appeal to what
was a stone wall of unconquerable prejudice.
"Sirs, kind sirs," she entreated, "you would not harm a poor girl who
had done you no wrong? . . . you won't harm me--you won't. . . . Oh,
God!" she shrieked in her frenzy, "you wouldn't--you wouldn't--Holy
Virgin, protect me----"
A rough hand was placed over her mouth and her last yells were smothered
as she was ruthlessly dragged away.
Then with two or three leather belts she was securely tied to the
flagstaff, whilst a thick woollen scarf was wound round her face and
neck, leaving only the eyes free to roam wildly on the awful scene
around.
Awful indeed!
Man turned to savage beast in the frenzy of his own fear.
Swift and silent, like so many rodents in the night, the men began
collecting bits of wood, broke up their sticks into small pieces, tore
branches down from the old elm tree.
Matthew the while, still the ringleader of this dastardly crew, was
directing these gruesome operations.
"Hist!" he admonished incessantly, "not so much noise. . . . We don't
want the guard to come this way, do we? . . . Now, John the smith,
quick, where's thy resin? . . . James the wheelwright, thy tinder,
friend. . . . Here! these faggots are not close enough. . . . Some more
on the left there!"
And the men, as alert as their clumsy bodies would allow, as quick as
the darkness would permit, groaning, sweating, falling up against one
another, worked with a will to accomplish the end which they had in
view.
To burn the witch!
And she, the woman, her poor wits almost gone at sight of this fast
approaching, inevitable doom, did not attempt to struggle. Had the gag
been removed from her mouth she would not have uttered a sound.
Nature, more merciful than her own children, had paralysed the brain of
the wretched girl and left her semi-imbecile, crazed, watching now with
uncomprehending eyes the preparations for her own appalling death.
"Watch how the witch will burn!" said Matthew in a hoarse whisper. "Her
soul will fly out of her mouth, and it'll be shaped like a black cat."
They had all descended the steps and were standing in a semicircle on
the turf below, looking up at the miserable holocaust which they were
about to offer up to their own cowardly superstition.
James the wheelwright was busy with his tinder, with John the smith
bending over him, ready with a resin torch, which would start the
conflagration.
And Mirrab, looking down on them with lack-lustre, idiotic eyes! Her
body had fallen in a strange, shapeless heap across the leather bonds
which held her, her feet were buried in the pile of faggots, whilst her
fingers worked convulsively behind the flagstaff to which they were
tied.
Ye gods, what a spectacle!
The Duke of Wessex, having taken leave of his friend, had been idly
strolling towards the witch's booth, always closely followed by faithful
Harry Plantagenet. At first sight of a group of men dimly outlined in
the darkness he scarcely realized what was happening.
The fitful flicker of the torch, as the resin became ignited, threw the
more distant figure of the woman into complete gloom.
Then there was a sudden shout of triumph. The torch was blazing at last.
"The holy fire! . . . Burn the witch!"
John the smith, holding the torch aloft, inspired by the enthusiasm of
his friends, had turned towards the steps.
For the space of one second the red glow illumined that helpless bundle
of gaudy tinsel only dimly suggesting a woman's form beneath it, which
hung limply from the flagstaff.
Then Wessex understood.
He had already drawn nigh, attracted by idle curiosity, but now with one
bound he reached the steps. Striking out with his fists at two or three
men who barred the way, he suddenly stood confronting these miscreants,
the light of the torch glowing on the rich silk of his doublet, the
jewelled agraffe of his hat, his proud, serious face almost distorted by
overwhelming wrath.
"What damnable piece of mischief is this?" he said peremptorily.
He had scarcely raised his voice, for they were all silent, having
retreated somewhat at sight of this stranger who barred the way.
The instinct of submission and deference to the lord was inborn in the
country lout of these days. Their first movement was one of respectful
awe. But this was only momentary. The excitement was too great, too
real, to give way to this gallant, alone with only an elegant sword to
stand between him and the mad desire for the witch's death.
"Out of the way, stranger!" shouted Matthew lustily from the rear of the
group, "this is no place for fine gentlemen. Up with thy torch, John the
smith! No one interferes here!"
"No! no! forward, John the smith!" exclaimed the others as with one
voice.
But John the smith, torch in hand, could not very well advance. The fine
gentleman was standing on the steps above him with a long pointed sword
in his hand.
"The first one of you who sets foot on these steps is a dead man," he
had said as soon as the shouts had subsided.
John the smith did not altogether care to be that notable first.
"Here! Harry, old friend," added the Duke, calling his dog to his side,
"you see these miscreants there, when I say 'Go!' you have my permission
to spring at the throat of the man who happens to be on these steps at
the time."
Harry Plantagenet no doubt understood what was expected of him. His
great jaws were slightly open, showing a powerful set of very
unpleasant-looking teeth; otherwise for the moment he looked placid
enough. He stood at the very top of the steps, his head on a level with
his master's shoulder, and was wagging his tail in a pleasant, friendly
spirit.
Matthew, however, had, not unjustly up to now, earned the respect of his
friends. Whilst John the smith was still hesitating, he had already made
a quick mental calculation that one Court gallant and his dog could be
no real match against five-and-twenty lusty fellows with hard fists, who
were determined to get their own way.
He elbowed his way to the front, pushed the smith aside, and began
peremptorily--
"Stranger!----"
"Call me not stranger, dolt, I am the Duke of Wessex, and if thou dost
not immediately betake thyself elsewhere, I'll have thee whipped till
thou bleed. Now then, ye louts!" he added, addressing the now paralysed
group of men, "off with your caps in my presence--quick's the word!"
There was dead silence, broken only by an occasional groan of real,
tangible fright.
"The Duke of Wessex! Merciful heavens! he'll have us all hanged!"
murmured Matthew as he fell on his knees.
One by one, still in complete silence, the caps were doffed. His Grace
of Wessex! Future King of England mayhap! And they had dared to threaten
him!
"Holy Virgin protect the lot of us!"
One man, more alert than his fellows, well in the rear of the group,
began crawling away on hands and knees, hoping to escape unobserved. One
or two saw his intention and immediately followed him. John the smith
had already dropped his torch, which lay smouldering on the ground.
There was a distinct movement in the direction of general retreat.
"Well," laughed the Duke good-naturedly, "have you done enough mischief?
. . . Get ye gone, all of you!--or shall I have to call the guard and
have you all whipped for a set of dastardly cowards, eh? . . . Or better
still, hanged, as your leader and friend here suggests--what?"
They had no need to be told twice. Still silently they picked up their
caps, one or two of them scratched their addled pates. They were ashamed
and really frightened, and had quite forgotten all about the witch.
There's nothing like real, personal danger to allay imaginary terrors.
The devil was all very well, but he was a long way off, and for the
moment invisible, whilst His Grace of Wessex was really there, and he
was--well! he was His Grace of Wessex, and that's all about it.
One by one they edged away, and the darkness soon swallowed them up. The
Duke never moved until the last of them had gone, leaving only Abra and
his henchman cowering in terror beside the platform.
From behind a bank of clouds the pale, crescent moon suddenly emerged
and threw a faint silvery light on the now deserted scene of the
dastardly outrage.
"Well, Harry, my friend, I think that's the last of them . . ." said
Wessex lightly as he finally put up his sword and mounted the steps to
the platform.
Mirrab's long strands of golden hair hung like a veil over her face and
breast; she had straightened herself out somewhat, but her head was
still bent. Her tottering reason was very slowly and gradually returning
to her.
She did not even move whilst Wessex undid the leather belts which tied
her to the flagstaff, and with his heel kicked the faggots to one side.
She seemed as unconscious now of her safety as she had been a short
while ago of her impending doom.
As her last bonds were severed she fell like a shapeless bundle on her
knees.
He never looked at her. What was she but a poor tattered wreck of
humanity, whom his timely interference had saved from an appalling
death? But he was very sorry for her, because she was a woman, and had
just gone through indescribable sufferings; in that gentle, impersonal
pity, there was no room for the mere curiosity to know what she was
like.
Before he finally turned to go, he placed a well-filled purse on the
ground, not far from where she was cowering, and said very kindly--
"Take my advice, girl, and do not get thyself into any more mischief of
this sort. Next time there might be no one nigh to get thee out of
trouble. Come, Harry," he added, calling to his dog, "time is getting
late."
At the foot of the steps he came across the shrinking forms of Abra and
his companion. The Duke paused for a moment and said more sternly--
"As for thee, sirrah, get thee gone, bag and baggage, thy tents and thy
trickeries, before the night is half an hour older. The guard shall be
sent to protect thee; but if thou art still here an hour hence, those
sobered ruffians will have returned, and nothing'll save thee and thy
wench a second time."
He waited for no protestations from the abject wizard, and turned his
steps towards the river.
As he was crossing the open space, however, he suddenly felt a tight
grip on his cloak; he turned, yet could see nothing, for the capricious
moon had once more hidden her light behind a passing cloud, and the
darkness, by contrast, seemed all the more intense.
But he heard a sound which was very like a sob, and then a murmur which
had a curious ring of passion in it--
"Thou hast saved my life . . . 'tis thine . . . I give it thee! . . .
Henceforth, whene'er I read the starlit firmament I'll pray to God that
the most glorious star in heaven shall guide thy destiny!"
He gave a pleasant laugh, gently disengaged his cloak, and without
another word went his way.
PART II
THE LADY URSULA
CHAPTER X
A BEVY OF FAIR MAIDENS
Never in all her life had Her Grace of Lincoln experienced anything so
awful.
Her very coif, usually a pattern of propriety, looked awry and scarcely
sober on her dear old head, whilst her round, chubby face, a beautiful
forest of tangled wrinkles, expressed the most dire distress, coupled
with hopeless, pathetic bewilderment.
"Well?" she repeated over and over again in breathless eagerness.
She seemed scarce to notice the pretty picture before her--two young
girls standing with arms linked round one another's waists, eyes aglow
with excitement, and cheeks made rosy with the palpitating intensity of
the narrative.
Yet was not Her Grace justly proud of the flock of fair maids committed
to her charge? What more charming than these two specimens of austere
Queen Mary's dainty maids-of-honour, with their slim figures in the
stiff corsets and unwieldy farthingales, their unruly curls held in
becomingly by delicate lace coifs, and the sombre panelling of the room
throwing up in harmonious contrast the vivid colouring of robes and
kerchiefs, of lace and of complexion?
But to-day the Duchess of Lincoln had no eye for the charming sight.
Leaning well forward in her high, straight-backed chair, her fat,
be-ringed fingers were beating a veritable devil's tattoo against its
brocaded arms.
"Alicia, girl, why don't you go on?" she added impatiently. "La! I vow
the wench'll make me die of choler."
Alicia, in the eagerness of telling her thrilling story, had somewhat
lost her breath; but now she made a vigorous effort to resume.
"Well," she said, "Your Grace must remember the night was very dark.
Barbara and I were strolling by the low wall, when suddenly the clouds
parted, the river was flooded with light, and just below us, not ten
paces away, we saw----"
But here she broke off suddenly. A look of genuine distress crossed her
piquant little face; she looked inquiringly at her companion, then at
the Duchess, whilst her merry eyes began to fill with tears.
"Oh! I scarce like to repeat it," she said hesitatingly at last, "for
truly I love her so."
But Her Grace was in no mood to pander to girlish sentimentality just
now. Her small round eyes, usually alive with good-nature and
kindliness, were looking positively stern.
"Go on, child," she commanded, "cannot you see that I am verily sitting
on pins? Was it--was it the Lady Ursula you saw?"
"Nay, madam," protested Alicia feebly, "'twas Barbara saw her--I do not
believe that it was Ursula."
"She was wrapped in a dark cloak from head to foot," here interposed the
other young maid. "When we called she looked up, but, seeing us,
immediately fled along the bank."
"Then the clouds obscured the moon again, and we saw nothing more,"
resumed Alicia. "Barbara may have been mistaken."
Barbara nodded, quite longing to convince herself that she had indeed
been mistaken. The two girls were getting more and more confused.
Clearly they had no wish to get their absent friend into trouble, and,
having been led into relating their experiences of the night before,
they tardily realized that they were collecting storm-clouds over Lady
Ursula's unsuspecting head.
With all her good-nature the Duchess was a stern disciplinarian, taking
herself and her duties very seriously. When the Queen entrusted her with
the formation of her own immediate feminine entourage, she also
expressed a desire that her maids-of-honour and ladies-in-waiting should
be models of decorum and veritable patterns of all the virtues.
The Court, which had been little else than a name in the old and gloomy
palace of Richmond and the simple household at Esher, had seen some of
its old glories revived since Mary's proclamation as sole and royal
liege lady, Queen Sovereign of England.
Before and since the coronation, Hampton Court had once more become
alive with merriment and laughter, with tennis and bowling games,
jousts, suppers, and balls even, as in the best days of King Harry.
Young people, who had been only temporarily sobered through the raging
political conflicts of the past few months, quickly reasserted their
desire for gaiety and splendour, and the Queen herself, somewhat
softened with the joy of seeing England's loyalty towards her, tacitly
acquiesced in this return to the ancient magnificence of her father's
court.
Moreover, there were the foreign ambassadors to entertain, all eager to
secure the Queen's hand for their respective royal masters, and in the
meanwhile equally ready to be impressed with the luxuries of the English
Court and the beauty and grace of its ladies.
The Duchess of Lincoln's task was certes no easy one, since it involved
the keeping in order of a very attractive, pleasure-loving, highly
unruly little flock.
So far, however, nothing serious had occurred to disturb her
equanimity. The maids-of-honour placed under her charge had quickly
succumbed to the charm of Her Grace's kindliness, and were easily ruled
with the rod of good-nature.
Some scoldings and lectures, an admonition now and then, or a threat of
more severe punishment, had readily quelled any incipient
insubordination.
But since the arrival of Lady Ursula Glynde at the Palace matters had
become more serious. The child was so terribly independent, so
self-willed and unruly, and with it all so sweet and lovable, that the
Duchess found all her scoldings of absolutely no avail.
Ursula defied her, then kissed and fondled her, rendering her absolutely
helpless and defying her authority.
When it was discovered that the naughty child had, on the very day
following Her Majesty's coronation, visited East Molesey Fair, masked
and veiled, and attended only by weak-willed, silly Margaret Cobham, Her
Grace felt nigh to having the palsy. But even that unseemly escapade was
nothing in comparison with the terrible revelations which had recently
come to Her Grace's ears. One or two rumours had already gained currency
that one of Her Majesty's maids-of-honour had been seen alone and at
night outside the purlieus of the Palace. So far, fortunately, the Queen
knew nothing of this, nor had it been talked about among the gentlemen
of the Court.
Heavens above! if such a thing were to happen! . . .
"A scandal!" moaned the Duchess piteously, "a scandal in my department!
Oh, I shall never survive it! If Her Majesty should hear of it, who is
so austere, so pious! . . . And with my lord Cardinal staying in the
Palace just now. . . . What would he think of the morals of an English
Court! . . . Oh! the naughty, wicked child, thus to bring disgrace upon
us all."
Some of the rumours anent Lady Ursula's mysterious nightly wanderings
had already reached her; she had placed the other girls under severe
cross-examination, and finally elicited from them the confirmation of
her worst fears.
"Nay, madam," rejoined Alicia, tardily smitten with remorse, "I feel
sure she means no harm. Ursula is gay, a madcap, full of fun, but she is
too proud to stoop to an intrigue."
"Aye! but, child, she hath vanity," said the Duchess, shaking her grey
curls, "and vanity is an evil counsellor. And, remember, 'tis not the
first time she has been seen alone, at night, outside the purlieus of
the garden. The Lord protect us! I should never survive a scandal."
"An Your Grace would believe me," added Barbara consolingly, "I think
'tis but a bit of foolish curiosity on the Lady Ursula's part."
But Her Grace would not be consoled.
"Curiosity?" she said. "Alas! 'tis an evil moment when curiosity leads a
maiden out of doors at night . . . alone . . . Oh!"
And she made a gesture of such horror, there was such a look of stern
condemnation in her kind old face, that the two girls began to feel
really afraid as to what might befall that madcap, Ursula Glynde.
No one had ever seen the Duchess actually angry.
They were all ready to take up the cudgels for the absent girl now.
"Nay! 'tis harmless curiosity enough," said Alicia hotly. "Ursula is
being very badly treated."
"Badly treated!" exclaimed Her Grace.
"Aye! she is affianced to the Duke of Wessex."
"Well, and what of it, child?"
"What of it?" retorted the girl indignantly, "she is never allowed to
see him. The moment His Grace is expected to arrive in the Queen's
presence, 'tis--'Lady Ursula, you may retire. I shall not need your
services to-day.'"
And looking straight down her pretty nose, dainty Lady Alicia Wrenford
pursed her lips and put on the starchy airs of a soured matron of forty.
The Duchess of Lincoln threw up her hands in horror.
"Fie on you, child!" she said sternly, "mimicking Her Majesty."
"'Tis quite true what Alicia says," here interposed Barbara, pouting;
"everything is done to keep Ursula out of His Grace's way. And we, too,
are made the scapegoats of this silly intrigue."
"Barbara, I forbid you to talk like that!"
"I mean nothing disrespectful, madam, yet 'tis patent to every one. Why
are we relegated to this dreary old chamber this brilliant afternoon,
when my lord the Cardinal and all the foreign ambassadors are at the
Palace? Why are we not allowed to join the others at tennis, or watch
the gentlemen at bowls? Why were Helen and Margaret kept from seeing the
jousts? Why? Why? Why?"
She was stamping her little foot, eager, impatient, excited. The Duchess
felt somewhat bewildered before this hurricane of girlish wrath.
"Because Her Majesty ordered it thus, child," she said in a more
conciliatory spirit; "she hath not always need of all her
maids-of-honour round her."
"Nay! that's not the reason," rejoined Barbara, "and Your Grace is too
clever to believe it."
"You are a silly child and----"
"Then we are all silly, for 'tis patent to us all. 'Tis Ursula who is
being kept wilfully away from the Court, or rather from seeing His Grace
of Wessex, and in order not to make these machinations too obvious, some
of us are also relegated in the background in her company."
"And 'tis small wonder that Ursula should wish to catch sight of the man
whom her father vowed she should wed or else enter into a convent,"
concluded Alicia defiantly.
Her Grace was at her wits' ends. Too clever not to have noticed the
intrigue to which the girls now made reference, she would sooner have
died than owned that her Queen was acting wrongfully or even pettily.
However, for the moment she was spared the further discussion of this
unpleasant topic, for a long, merry, girlish laugh was suddenly heard
echoing through the great chambers beyond.
"Hush!" said the Duchess with reassumed severity, "'tis that misguided
child herself. Now remember, ladies, not a word of all this. I must
learn the truth on this scandal, and will set a watch to-night. But not
a word to her."
The next moment the subject of all this animated conversation threw open
the heavy oak door of the room. She came running in, with her fair hair
flying in a deliriously mad tangle round her shoulders, her eyes dancing
with glee, whilst above her head she was, with one small hand,
flourishing a small piece of paper, the obvious cause of this apparently
uncontrollable fit of girlish merriment.
CHAPTER XI
THE FAIREST OF THEM ALL
The Duchess was frowning for all she was worth. Alicia and Barbara tried
to look serious, but were obviously only too ready to join in any frolic
which happened to be passing in Ursula Glynde's lively little head.
"Oh!" said the latter, as soon as she had partially recovered her
breath. "Oh! I vow 'tis the best of the bunch."
With the freedom of a spoilt child, who knows how welcome are its
caresses, Ursula sidled up to the Duchess of Lincoln and sat down upon
the arm of her chair.
"Your Grace, a share of your seat I entreat," she said gaily, heedless
of stern looks. "Nay! I'll die of laughing unless you let me read you
this."
"Child! child!" admonished the Duchess, still trying to look severe,
"this loud laughter is most unseemly--and your cheeks all ablaze! What
is it now?"
"What is it, sweet Grace?" responded the young girl. "A poem! Listen!"
She smoothed out the piece of paper, spread it out upon her knee and
began reading solemnly:--
"If all the world were sought so farre
Who could find such a wight?
Her beauty twinkleth like a starre
Within the frosty night.
Her roseall colour comes and goes
With such a comely grace,
More ruddier too than doth the rose,
Within her lively face."
"And beneath this sonnet," she continued, "a drawing--see!--a heart
pierced by a dagger. _His_ heart--_my_ beauty which twinkleth like a
starre!"
Who could resist the joy and gladness, the freshness, the youth, the
girlishness which emanated from Ursula's entire personality? The two
other girls pressed closely round her, giggling like school-children at
sight of the rough, sentimental device affixed to the love poem.
The Duchess vainly endeavoured to keep up a semblance of sternness, but
she could not meet those laughing eyes, now dark, now blue, now an
ever-changing grey, alive with irrepressible mischief, yet full of
loving tenderness. She felt that her wrath would soon melt in the
sunshine of that girlish smile.
"Lady Ursula, this is most unseemly," she said as coldly as she could.
"How came you by this poem?"
Ursula threw her arms round the feebly-resisting old dame.
"Hush!" she whispered, "in your dear old ears! I found it, sweet Duchess
. . . beside my stockings . . . when I came out of my bath!"
"Horror!"
"Now, Duchess! dear, sweet, darling, beautiful Duchess, tell me, who
think you wrote this poem? And who--_who_ think you placed it near my
stockings?"
The Duchess was almost speechless, partly through genuine horror, but
chiefly because a sweet, fresh face was pressed closely to her old
cheek.
"'Twas not the Earl of Norfolk," continued Ursula meditatively. She
seemed quite unconscious of the enormity of her offence, and sought the
eyes of her young friends in confirmation of these various surmises. "He
cannot write verses. Nor could it be my lord of Overcliffe, for he would
not know where to find my stockings."
"The vanity of the child!" sighed Her Grace. "Think you these great
gentlemen would write verses to a chit of a girl like you?"
But her kind eyes, resting with obvious pride on the dainty figure
beside her, belied the severity of her words.
"Yes," replied Ursula decisively, "bad ones!--not such beautiful verses
as these."
Then she went on with her conjectures.
"And there's my lord of Everingham, and the Marquis of Taunton, and----"
"His Grace of Wessex," suggested Alicia archly, despite the Duchess's
warning frown.
"Alas, no!" sighed Ursula, "for he has never been allowed to see me."
"Ursula!" came in ever-recurring feeble protests from the old dowager.
But the young girl was wholly unabashed.
"But he _will_ see me--before to-night," she said.
The others exchanged significant glances.
"To-night?"
"Yes! What have I said? Why do you all look like that?"
"Because your conduct, child, is positively wanton," said the Duchess.
But Ursula only hugged the kind old soul all the more closely.
"Now--now," she coaxed, "don't be angry, darling. There!--look!" she
added with mock horror, "your coif is all awry."
With deft fingers she rearranged the delicate lace cap over Her Grace's
white curls.
"So," she said, "now you look pretty again--and your nice, fat cheeks
have the sweetest of dimples. Nay, I vow, all these young gallants only
sigh with love for me because _you_ frown on them so!"
"What a madcap!" sighed the Duchess, mollified.
"You won't be angry with me?" queried the girl earnestly.
"Nay! that depends what mad pranks you have been after."
"Sh--sh!--sh!--'tis a deadly secret. Barbara, Alicia, come a little
closer."
She paused a moment, whilst all three of them crowded round Her Grace of
Lincoln's chair.
Then Ursula said solemnly--
"The Queen is in love with my future husband!"
The Duchess of Lincoln nearly fell backwards in a faint.
"Ursula!" she gasped.
"Nay, that's not the secret," continued Ursula, quite unperturbed, "for
that is town-talk, and every one at Court knows that she won't let him
see me for fear he should fall in love with me. And my lord Cardinal is
furious because he wants the Queen to marry Philip of Spain, and he is
wishing His Grace of Wessex down there, where all naughty Cardinals go."
"Child! . . . child! . . ."
"But the days are slipping by, darling," added the young girl, with just
a shade of seriousness in her eyes. "All these intriguers may fight as
much as they like, but if I do not wed His Grace of Wessex, if he should
be inveigled into marrying the Queen, I must to the convent. My dear
father made me swear it on his deathbed, when I was beside myself with
grief, and scarce knew what I did. 'There is but one true gentleman to
whom I would trust my child,' he said to me; 'swear to me, Ursula, that
if Wessex claims you not, that you will never marry any one else, but
spend your days in happy singleness in a convent. Swear it, little one.'
He was so ill, so dear, I swore and----"
"The convent is the proper place for such a feather-brain as yourself,"
concluded the Duchess with as gruff a voice as she could command.
"But I do not wish to be a nun," protested Ursula, as tears began to
gather in her eyes, "and I do want to wed Wessex, who is handsome--and
gallant--and witty--and--and," she added coquettishly, "when he sees
me--I vow he'll not let me go to a convent either, so----"
She leant closer to the kind dowager and once more whispered
confidentially in her ear.
"So, as the Queen is engaged in prayers for at least half an hour, I've
sent His Grace word by one of the pages that the Duchess of Lincoln
desired his presence in this chamber--here!"
But this was really past bearing.
"I! . . ." exclaimed the Duchess in horror. "I? . . . desire his
presence? . . . Merciful heavens! what will His Grace think?"
Once more Ursula, like the veritable child that she was, was dancing
like mad round the room, now alone, clapping her tiny hands together,
then seizing one of her companions by the waist, she whirled with her,
round and round, until she fell back breathless against the Duchess's
chair. And all the while her tongue went prattling on, now talking at
top speed, anon singing out the words in the madness of her glee.
"And he is coming, dear Duchess," she said. "'He'll attend upon Her
Grace at once!' these were his words to that pet of a page, and he'll
see me--and--and----"
Now she paused, kneeling beside her old friend, putting coaxing arms
round the bulky figure of the kind soul.
"But don't tell him my name all at once, Duchess darling," she whispered
entreatingly; "let him fall in love with me without knowing that I am
his affianced bride--for that might prejudice him against me. Just
mumble something when he asks my name, and let me do the rest. Give me
another kiss, darling. Alicia--Alicia," she cried in feverish anxiety,
"is my kerchief straight at the back? and--and--oh, my hair!"
Still in that same madly-excited mood, she ran to a small oval mirror
which hung on one of the walls, close to the great bay window.
The Duchess during that brief moment's respite tried to collect her
scattered wits.
"But oh! what shall I say to His Grace?" she moaned distractedly.
"Child! child! to your folly there is no end!"
A quickly smothered shriek from Ursula now brought the other girls to
her side in the embrasure. She was pointing across the court to the
gateway beneath the clock tower.
"He is coming!" she cried, with a slightly nervous tremor in her voice.
"It is he, with my lord Everingham; they are laughing and talking
together. . . . Oh, how handsome he looks!" she added enthusiastically.
"My future husband, _my_ lord, not the Queen's--mine own, mine own!
Alicia, tell me, hast ever seen a more goodly sight than that of _my_
future husband in that beautiful silken doublet and with that dear, dear
dog of his walking so proudly behind him? Harry Plantagenet, thou'rt a
lucky dog, and I'll kiss thee first, and--and----"
Then she ran back to the Duchess.
"Two minutes to mount the stairs, two more to cross the Great Hall, then
the watching chamber, the presence chamber. . . . In six minutes he will
be here--hush!--I hear a footstep! . . . Holy Virgin, how my heart
beats!"
There had come a discreet knock at the door. All four women were too
excited to respond, but the next moment the door was opened and a young
page, dressed in the same gorgeous livery which Henry VIII had
originally prescribed, entered and bowed to the ladies.
Then he turned to the Duchess of Lincoln.
"Her Majesty the Queen desires the immediate presence of Her Grace and
of her maids-of-honour in the Oratory."
There was dead silence in the room whilst the page once more bowed in
the elaborate manner ordained by Court etiquette; then he walked
backwards to the door, and stood there, holding it open ready for the
ladies to pass.
"No, no, no!" whispered Ursula excitedly, as the Duchess immediately
rose to obey.
"Ladies!" commanded Her Grace.
"One minute, darling," entreated Ursula, "just one short little minute!"
But where the Queen's commands were concerned Her Grace of Lincoln was
adamant.
"Ladies!" she ordered once more.
Alicia and Barbara, though terribly disappointed at the failure of the
exciting conspiracy, were ready enough to obey. Ursula wildly ran back
to the window.
"I can see his silhouette and that of my lord Everingham slowly moving
across the Great Hall," she said.
"Oh! why is he so slow?"
The Duchess turned to the page.
"Precede!" she commanded. "We'll follow."
She then pointed to the door. Alicia and Barbara, endeavouring to look
grave, walked out with becoming dignity.
Her Grace went up to Ursula, who was still clinging to the window
embrasure with passionate obstinacy.
"Lady Ursula Glynde," she said sternly, "if you do not obey Her
Majesty's commands instantly, you'll be dismissed the Court this very
day."
And while His Grace of Wessex was slowly wending his way towards the
chamber where he had been so eagerly expected, Lady Ursula, defiant and
rebellious, was being peremptorily marshalled off in an opposite
direction.
CHAPTER XII
INTRIGUES
When Wessex, accompanied by his friend, reached the room which so lately
was echoing with merry girlish laughter, he was met by a page, deputed
by the Duchess of Lincoln to present her excuses to His Grace for her
non-appearance.
"Nay! marry, this is the bravest comedy ever witnessed," laughed the
Duke, when the boy had gone.
"What, my lord?" asked Everingham with seeming unconcern.
"A comedy, friend, in which the Queen, Her Grace of Lincoln, you, and
His Eminence the Cardinal, all play leading roles."
"I don't understand."
"Well done, man! Nay! I know not yet which of you will win; but this I
know, that whilst I do my best to whisper sweet nothings in Her
Majesty's ear, you are pleased, the Cardinal is furious, and the Duchess
of Lincoln discreetly keeps my affianced bride out of my way."
"For this at least Your Grace should be grateful," rejoined his friend
with a smile.
"Grateful that other people should guide my destiny for me? Well,
perhaps! 'Twould certes have been ungallant to flee from danger, when
danger takes the form of a future wife. I cannot picture myself saying
to a lady: 'Madam, honour demands that I should wed you, and thus hath
put it out of my power ever to love you.' But since the Lady Ursula is
so unapproachable, marry!--methinks I am almost free!"
"Perchance it is the lady herself who avoids Your Grace."
"Nay! undoubtedly she does. Poor girl! how she must hate the very
thought of me. Her dear father, I fear me, was wont to sing my praises
in her childish ears; now that she hath arrived at years of discretion,
my very name must have become an obsession to her. Obviously even a
convent must be preferable. Then why this mad desire to keep us apart?
Mutual understanding would do that soon enough."
The two men had once more turned to go back the way they came; slowly
they strolled across the vast and lofty rooms and through the Great
Hall, which, deserted at this time of day, was the scene of so much
gaiety and magnificence during the evening hours.
"Your Grace, methinks, must be mistaken," said Everingham after a while;
"there is, at any rate on the part of your friends, no desire to keep
you and the Lady Ursula apart; you are best judge of your own honour, my
lord, and no one would presume to dictate to you; but the most sensitive
conscience in England could but hold the opinion that, whilst the lady
may feel bound by her promise to her father, you are as free as
air--free to wed whom you choose."
"By the mass! what an anomaly, friend! Free to wed! free to wear
fetters! the most terrible chains ever devised by the turpitude of man."
"Marriage is a great institution----"
"Nay! 'tis an evil one, contrived out of malice by priests and old maids
to enchain a woman who would rather be free to a man who speedily
becomes bored."
"Nay! but when that woman is a queen?"
"Take off her crown and what is she, friend?" rejoined His Grace
lightly. "A woman . . . to be desired, of course, to be loved, by all
means--but at whose feet we should only recline long enough to make all
other men envious, and one woman jealous."
Everingham frowned. He hated this flippant, careless mood of his friend.
He did not understand it. To him the idea of such a possibility as a
union with the Queen of England was so great, so wonderful, so
superhuman almost, that he felt that the man who deserved such
incommensurate honour should spend half his days on his knees, thanking
God for such a glorious destiny.
That Wessex hung back when Mary herself was holding out her hand to him
seemed to this enthusiast almost a sacrilege.
"But surely you have ambition, my lord?" he said at last.
"Ambition?" replied Wessex with characteristic light-heartedness. "Yes,
one!--to be a boy again."
"Nay! an you were that now, you could not understand all that England
expects of you. The Queen is harassed by the Cardinal and the Spanish
ambassador. Philip but desires her hand in order to lay the iron heel of
Spain upon the neck of submissive England. Your Grace can save us all.
Mary loves you, would wed you to-morrow."
"And send me to the block for my infidelities--supposed or real--the day
after, and be free to wed Philip or the Dauphin after all."
"I'll not believe it."
"Friend! do you know what you ask of me? To marry--that is to say to
give up all that makes life poetic, beautiful, amusing, the love which
lasts a day, the delights which live one hour, woman in her most
alluring aspect, the unattainable; and in exchange what do you offer
me--the smaller half of a crown."
"The gratitude of a nation . . ." protested Everingham.
"Ah! A woman, however fickle she may be, is more constant than a nation
. . . As for gratitude? . . . nay, my lord . . . let us not speak of the
gratitude of nations."
"This is not your last word, friend," pleaded Lord Everingham earnestly.
They had reached the foot of the stairs, and were once more under the
gateway of the clock tower, where Lady Ursula Glynde had caught sight of
them from the great bay-window opposite.
It was a glorious afternoon. October, always lovely in England, was more
beautiful and mellow this year than it had ever been. Wessex paused a
moment, with his slender hand placed affectionately on his friend's
shoulder. He looked round him--at the great windows of the hall, the
vast enclosure of the Base Court beyond, the distant tower of the chapel
visible above the fantastic roofs and gables of Henry VIII's chambers,
the massive, imposing grandeur of the great pile which had seen so many
tragedies, witnessed so many sorrows, so many downfalls, such treachery
and such horrible deaths. A shudder seemed to go through his powerful
frame, a look of resolution, of pride, and of absolute disdain crept
into his lazy, deep-set eyes. Then he said quietly--
"That is my last word, friend. I'll never be made a puppet on which to
hang the cloak of political factions and intrigues. My life belongs to
my country, but neither my liberty nor my self-respect. If my friendship
will help to influence the Queen into refusing to wed the King of Spain
I'll continue to exert it to the best of my ability, but I'll not become
Her Majesty's lapdog, nor the tool of my friends."
Then once more the hardness and determination vanished from his face;
the nonchalance and careless idleness of the grand seigneur was alone
visible now.
With easy familiarity he linked his arm through that of Everingham.
"Shall we rejoin Her Majesty on the terrace?" he said lightly. "She will
have finished her orisons, and will be awaiting us. Come, Harry!"
CHAPTER XIII
HIS EMINENCE
A merry company was gathered on the terrace, which, fronting the
ill-fated Cardinal Wolsey's rooms, descended in elegantly sloping grades
down to the old Pond Garden, giving an exquisite view across the tall,
trim hedges, the parterres gay with late summer flowers, and the green
bosquets of lilac and yew, to the serpentine river and distant landscape
beyond.
Mary Tudor had indeed finished her afternoon orisons. She had recited
her rosary in the chapel, kneeling before the altar and surrounded by
her maids-of-honour: no doubt she had prayed for the Virgin's help to
aid her in the accomplishment of the one great wish which lay so near to
her heart.
She was this afternoon expecting the arrival of a special envoy from His
Holiness the Pope, and had to curtail her prayers in consequence. She
had strolled back to the terrace, because His Eminence the Cardinal de
Moreno was there, the ambassador of His Most Catholic Majesty the King
of Spain, also the Duc de Noailles, who represented the King of France,
and Scheyfne, who watched over the interests of the Emperor Charles V in
this game of political conflicts, wherein the hand of the Queen of
England was the guerdon.
Mary Tudor watched them all with a sleepy eye. She felt dreamy and
contented this beautiful afternoon: was not the envoy from Rome bringing
her a special blessing from His Holiness? and what could that blessing
be but the love of the one man in all the world to whom she would
gladly have given her hand to hold and her lips to kiss?
She sighed as she settled herself down on the straight-backed chair
which she affected. Noailles and Scheyfne hurried eagerly towards her.
His Eminence bowed low as she approached, but her eyes wandered
restlessly round her in search of the one form dear to her, and she
frowned impatiently when she missed the proud, handsome face, whose
smile alone could bring hers forth in response.
She listened with but half an ear to Noailles' platitudes, or to His
Eminence's smooth talk, until close by she heard the well-known step.
She did not turn her head. Her heart, by its sudden, rapid beating, had
told her that he was there.
Mary Tudor was not quite forty then, a woman full of the passionate
intensity of feeling, characteristic of the Tudors, neither beautiful
nor yet an adept at women's wiles; but when she heard Wessex' footsteps
on the flagstones of the terrace, her whole face lighted up with that
radiance which makes every woman fair--the radiance of a whole-hearted
love.
"Nay, my lord Cardinal," she said with sudden impatience, "Your Eminence
has vaunted the beauties of Spain long enough to-day. I feel sure," she
added, half turning towards Wessex, "that His Grace, though a truant
from our side, will hold a brief for Merrie England against you."
The Duke, as he approached, scanned with a lazy eye the brilliant
company gathered round the Queen; an amused smile, made up partly of
sarcasm, wholly of insouciance, glimmered in his eyes as he caught the
frown, quickly suppressed, which appeared on the Cardinal's shrewd,
clever face.
"Nay, His Eminence hath but to look on our Sovereign Lady," he said, as
he gallantly kissed the tips of the royal hand, graciously extended to
him, "to know that England hath naught to envy Spain."
Mary, with the rapid intuition of the woman who loves, seemed to detect
a more serious tone in Wessex' voice than was his wont. She looked
inquiringly at him. The thoughts, engendered in his mind by Everingham's
earnestness and enthusiasm, had left their shadow over his lighter mood.
"You look troubled, my lord!" she said anxiously.
"What trouble I had Your Grace's presence has already dispelled," he
replied gently.
It amused him to watch the discomfited faces of his political
antagonists, whose presence now Mary seemed completely to ignore. Her
whole personality was transformed in his presence: she looked ten years
younger; her heavy, slow movements appeared suddenly to gain in
elasticity.
She rose and beckoned to Wessex to accompany her. Neither Noailles nor
Scheyfne cared to follow, fearing a rebuke.
His Eminence the Cardinal de Moreno alone, seeing her turn towards the
gardens, ventured on a remark.
"At what hour will Your Majesty deign to receive the envoy of His
Holiness?" he asked unctuously.
"As soon as he arrives," replied the Queen curtly.
His Eminence watched the two figures disappearing down the stone steps
of the terrace. There was a troubled, anxious look in his keen eyes. The
first inkling had just dawned upon him that perhaps he might fail in his
mission after all.
A new experience for the Cardinal de Moreno.
When Philip of Spain desired to wed Mary of England he chose the one man
in all Europe most able to carry his wishes through. A perfect grand
seigneur, veritable prince of the Church, but a priest only in name, for
he had never taken Holy Orders, His Eminence shone in every circle
wherein he appeared, through the brilliancy of his intellect, the charm
and suavity of his manner, and above all by that dominating personality
of his, which _willed_ so strongly what he desired to obtain.
Willed it at times--so his enemies said--without scruple. Well, perhaps!
and if so, why not? would be His Eminence's own argument.
Heaven had given him certain weapons: these he used in order to get
Heaven's own ends. And in the mind of the Cardinal de Moreno, Heaven was
synonymous with the political interests of the Catholic Church. England
was too fine a country to be handed over to the schismatic sect without
a struggle, the people were too earnest, too deeply religious to be
allowed to remain in the enemy's camp.
And His Eminence was not only fighting for an important political
alliance for his royal master, but also for the reconquest of Catholic
England. Wessex, a firm yet unostentatious adherent of the new faith,
was to him an opponent in every sense.
When the Cardinal first landed in England he had been assured that the
volatile and nonchalant Duke would never become a serious obstacle to
Spanish plans.
The Duke? Perhaps not. But there was the Queen herself, half sick for
love! and women's follies have ere now upset the most deeply laid, most
important plans.
"Ah, my friend!" sighed His Eminence with ill-concealed irritation, as
the Marquis de Suarez came idly lounging beside him, "alas! and
alack-a-day! when diplomacy hath to reckon with women. . . . Look at
that picture!" he added, pointing with be-ringed, slender, tapering
finger to the figures of Wessex and Mary Tudor disappearing amid the
bosquets of the park, "and think that the destinies of Europe depend
upon how a woman of forty can succeed in chaining that butterfly."
Don Miguel too had followed with frowning eyes the little comedy just
enacted upon the terrace. His intellect, though perhaps not so keen as
that of his chief, was nevertheless sufficiently on the alert to
recognize that Mary Tudor had distinctly intended to administer a snub
to the entire diplomatic corps, by her marked preference for Wessex'
sole company.
"Chance certainly, seems against your schemes and mine, my lord
Cardinal," he said; "for that butterfly is heart-free and indolent,
whilst the woman of forty is a queen."
"Indolent, yes," mused His Eminence, "but ambitious?"
"His friends will supply the ambition," rejoined Don Miguel; "and the
Crown of England is a heavy prize."
The Cardinal did not speak for a moment. He seemed buried in thought.
"I was thinking of the beautiful Lady Ursula Glynde," he said
meditatively after a while.
"Beautiful indeed. But His Grace is never allowed to see her."
"But when he does----"
"Oh! if I judge him rightly, when he does see her--she is passing
beautiful, remember--his roving fancy will no doubt be enchained
for--shall we say--half an hour--perhaps half a day. . . . What then?"
"Half an hour!" mused the Cardinal. "Much may be done in half an hour,
my lord Marquis."
"Bah!"
"In half an hour a woman, even if she be a queen, might become piqued
and jealous, and the destinies of Europe will be shaped accordingly."
His keen grey eyes were searching the bosquets, trying to read what went
on behind the dark yew hedges of the park.
"To think that the fate of Catholic Europe should depend upon the chance
meeting of a young girl and a Court gallant," sighed Don Miguel
impatiently.
"The fate of empires has hung on more slender threads than these ere
now, my son," rejoined His Eminence quietly; "diplomacy is the art of
seeming to ignore the great occasions whilst seizing the small
opportunity."
He said nothing more, for at that same moment there came to his ears,
gently echoing across the terrace, the sound of a half-gay,
half-melancholy ditty. A pure, girlish voice was singing somewhere
within the Palace, like a young caged bird behind the bars, at sight of
the brilliant sunshine above.
Don Miguel gave a short sarcastic laugh.
"The Lady Ursula's voice," he said.
Then he pointed to the more distant portion of the garden, where Wessex
and Mary were once more seen strolling slowly back towards the terrace.
A look of expectancy, of shrewd and sudden intuition crept into the
Cardinal's handsome face. The eyes lighted up as if with a quick,
bright, inward vision, whilst the thin lips seemed to close with a snap,
as if bent on guarding the innermost workings of the mind.
He took his breviary from his pocket and began walking along the
flagstones of the terrace in the direction whence the song had come. His
head was bent; apparently he was deeply absorbed in the Latin text.
Don Miguel had not followed him. He knew that his chief wished to be
alone. He watched the crimson robes slowly fading away into the
distance. The Cardinal presently disappeared round the angle formed by
Wolsey's rooms. Beyond these were the fine chambers built by Henry VIII.
The sweet song still came from there, wafted lightly on the summer
breeze.
CHAPTER XIV
THE DESTINIES OF EUROPE
Five minutes later His Eminence's brilliantly clad figure once more
reappeared round the angle of the Palace. The breviary was no longer in
his hands.
A few moments later he had joined Don Miguel, and together the two men
watched the Queen and Wessex, as they drew nearer to the terrace steps.
A smile was on His Eminence's lips, suave, slightly sarcastic, and at
the same time triumphant, yet at this very instant when he seemed so
pleased with himself, or with events in general, Mary Tudor was looking
with loving anxiety in His Grace of Wessex' eyes.
"I seem unable to cheer you to-day, my dear lord," she said. "What has
become of your usual gay spirits?"
"Gone eavesdropping on my lord Cardinal," replied the Duke with a smile,
as he spied the crimson robes on the top of the steps, "to find out how
soon a King of Spain will rule over England and capture the heart of our
Queen."
Mary paused and suddenly laid an eager hand on his wrist.
"Methought you cared nothing for the affairs of state," she said with
some sadness, "and still less as to who shall rule over the heart of
your Queen."
"Shall I dismiss the Spanish ambassador?" she added in an excited
whisper, "and His Eminence?--and M. de Noailles? . . . all of them?
. . . I have not yet given my answer. Will you dictate it, my lord?"
He looked up and saw the Cardinal's piercing eyes fixed steadily upon
him. For one moment he hesitated. His Eminence looked so sure of
himself, so proud of his ascendency over this impulsive woman, that just
for the space of five seconds the thought crossed his mind that he would
yield to the entreaties of his friends, and wrest the crown of England
from the grasping hands of these foreigners, all eagerly waiting to
snatch it for themselves.
As the Cardinal himself had said, but a short while ago, "the destinies
of empires oft hang on more slender threads than these." No doubt none
knew better than the shrewd Spaniard himself, how nigh he was at that
moment to losing the great game which he played.
Who knows?--if at this instant the sudden commotion on the terrace had
not stopped the words on Wessex' lips, how different might have been the
destinies of England! But just as His Grace would have spoken, the
major-domo's voice rang out:--
"The envoy of His Holiness the Pope awaits Her Majesty in the audience
chamber."
"The envoy of His Holiness," said His Eminence with his usual suavity,
as he stepped forward to meet the Queen, "and I am to have the honour of
introducing him to your Majesty."
The major-domo, who had announced the news, was standing at some little
distance with the pages who had accompanied him. The rest of the Court
had dispersed when Mary strolled off with the Duke; only two or three
ladies, in immediate attendance on the Queen, were laughing and
chattering close by.
The Palace itself seemed astir with new movement and life, horses were
stamping in the flagged courts, men were heard running and shouting,
whilst the rhythmic sound of a brass trumpet at intervals announced the
important arrival.
But through all this noise and bustle, the sweet, sad ditty sung by a
fresh young voice still seemed to fill the air.
Mary was visibly chafing under this sudden restraint put upon her by
rigid ceremonial. His Holiness' envoy could not be kept waiting, though
she, poor woman, was burning with desire to prolong the happy
_tete-a-tete_ with the man she loved.
She felt His Eminence's eyes watching her every movement. She threw him
a defiant look, then peremptorily ordered the major-domo and the pages
to precede her.
His Grace of Wessex, on the other hand, seemed obviously relieved. He
had turned his head in the direction whence came that girlish song, and
appeared to be listening intently.
"Will you accompany us, my lord?" said the Queen in a tone of obvious
command. "I must not keep the envoy of His Holiness waiting, and have
need of your presence."
She placed her hand on his arm. Respect and chivalry compelled him to
obey, yet he seemed loath to go.
"The Lady Ursula's song seems to fascinate His Grace of Wessex,"
whispered Don Miguel in His Eminence's ear.
"Hush! the small opportunity, my lord Marquis," whispered the Cardinal
in reply.
"Have I the honour of following Your Majesty?" he added respectfully,
bowing to the Queen.
"Nay, on our left, Your Eminence," rejoined Mary coldly.
Her right hand was still on Wessex' arm, and slowly, as if reluctantly,
she began to move in the direction of the Palace. Don Miguel, at an
almost imperceptible sign from his chief, had quickly disappeared down
the terrace steps.
"Ah! my breviary!" suddenly exclaimed His Eminence in great
perturbation. "I forgot it on the terrace!--the Nuncio will desire a
prayer, and I am helpless without my Latin text! . . . If Your Majesty
will deign to forgive one moment. . . ."
He made a movement as if he would turn back.
From the further end of the terrace the young singer was continuing her
song.
"Will Your Eminence allow me?" said the Duke of Wessex with alacrity.
"With pleasure, my dear lord," responded the Cardinal urbanely. "Ah! had
I your years and you mine, 'twere my pleasure to serve you. . . . And
Her Majesty will excuse . . ." he added pointedly, for His Grace was
quite ready to withdraw, whilst Mary was equally prepared to stop him
with a look. "Will Your Majesty deign to place your hand on my arm? The
envoy of His Holiness the Pope awaits your Most Catholic Majesty."
He was standing before her, outwardly respectful and full of deference.
The pages and ladies had already disappeared within the Palace, whilst
the Duke of Wessex, taking the Queen's silence for consent, had turned
back towards the distant part of the terrace.
Mary, with all her weaknesses where her affections were concerned, was
too proud to let this Spaniard see that she felt baffled and not a
little humiliated. She guessed that this had been a ruse, a trap into
which she had fallen. How it had all been done she knew not, but she
could easily guess why.
She smothered the angry words which had risen to her lips, and without
looking either to the right or left of her, she walked quickly towards
the Palace.
CHAPTER XV
THE HAND OF FATE
Ursula had had a good cry.
She was a mere girl, only just out of her teens; she had been hideously
disappointed and had given way to a paroxysm of tears, just like a child
that has been cheated of its toys.
As far as her actual feelings for Wessex were concerned, she scarcely
troubled to analyse them. As a tiny child she had worshipped the gallant
boy, who had always been pointed out to her as the pattern of what an
English nobleman should be, and moreover as the future husband who was
to rule over her destiny.
No doubt that the Earl of Truro, lying on his deathbed, had but little
real perception of what he was doing, when he forced his daughter to
swear that she would marry Wessex or remain single to the end of her
days.
But Ursula was thirteen years old then, and held an oath to her father
to be the most sacred thing in the world. She had not seen Wessex for
some years, but her girlish imagination had always endowed him with all
those chivalrous attributes which her own father, whom she idolized, had
already ascribed to him.
Love? Well, it scarce could be called that as yet. In spite of her score
of years, Ursula had remained a child in thought, in feelings, in
temperament. She had spent the last six or seven years within the
precincts of old Truro Castle, watched over by her late father's
faithful servants, who brought her up and worshipped her, taught her
what they knew, and obeyed her implicitly.
Her one idea, however, had remained, that of a marriage with Wessex. By
right and precedence she could claim a place in the Queen of England's
immediate entourage. As soon as she was old enough she asserted this
claim, and journeyed to Esher in charge of an old aunt, who had
supervised her education since her father's death.
Since then her one desire had been to meet the man to whom she had
pledged her troth. She had seen him, oh! scores of times, since the day
on which he came back to the Court, but Mary Tudor, bent on winning his
love, had resolutely kept him away from the beautiful girl who, she
instinctively felt, would prove a formidable rival.
It had been easy enough up to now. His Grace, partly in order to please
his friends, even if only half believing that his influence would
prevent Mary Tudor from contracting an alien marriage, had been in
constant attendance on the Queen.
Ursula, on the other hand, had been relegated into the background. She
knew this well and chafed at the restraint. Something seemed to tell her
that if she could but see the Duke he would easily realize that it would
not be very hard to fulfil the old earl's promise. She knew that she was
beautiful, her own mirror and the admiration of the Court gallants had
already told her that, and at the same time she felt within herself a
magnetism which must inevitably draw him towards her.
But time was speeding on. Ursula's quick intelligence had very soon
grasped the threads of the present political situation, whilst Mary
Tudor, on the other hand, made no secret of her love for Wessex. The
young girl was well aware of the many intrigues which were being hatched
round the personality of the man whom she looked upon as her affianced
husband, and guessed how much these were aided by the enamoured Queen.
His Eminence the Cardinal, the Duc de Noailles, Scheyfne, Don Miguel de
Suarez, all were seeking to obtain a definite promise from Mary. The
English faction, on the other hand, hoped to force the Duke into a
marriage which was obviously distasteful to him.
Ursula, in the midst of these contending parties, was, nevertheless,
determined to gain her end. Too unsophisticated to attempt a serious
intrigue, she relied on her woman's instinct to guide her to success.
Her little plot to bring His Grace to her presence that afternoon had
failed, probably owing to the Queen's keen acumen; and the young girl,
for the first time since her arrival at Court, felt genuinely mortified
and not a little despairing of ultimate triumph.
The Duke, evidently, had no desire to meet her, or he would have
accomplished that end somehow. There was not much that His Grace wished
that did not sooner or later come to pass.
Obviously, for the moment, he was glad enough to remain free of those
bonds which truly were none of his making. Chivalry alone might tempt
him to fulfil Lord Truro's dying wishes, for the late Earl and the
Duke's own father had been the closest of friends. Ursula's pride,
however, would not allow her to appeal to that chivalry; what she wanted
was to gain his love.
Out of her childish admiration for the boy had grown a kind of poetic
interest in the man, more than fostered by the great popularity enjoyed
by Wessex, and the praises of his personality sung on every side. Ursula
was still too young to be in love with aught else save with love itself,
with her own imaginative fancy, her own conception of what her future
husband should be.
He should be good to look at--like Wessex. High-born and gracious--like
Wessex. A king among men, witty and accomplished--like Wessex.
"Holy Virgin! let me have him for mine own!" was her constant, childish
prayer.
The girl was not yet a woman.
Thus musing and meditating, she strolled out into the garden, singing as
she went. All the maids-of-honour had been bidden to wait on Her Majesty
in the audience chamber, save Lady Ursula Glynde and Mistress Margaret
Cobham, whose services would not be required. The Duchess of Lincoln,
shrewdly guessing from this summons that His Grace of Wessex was in the
Queen's company, had given the two young maids leave to wander whither
they pleased.
Lazy Margaret had pleaded a headache and curled herself up in a
window-embrasure with the express intention of doing nothing at all; but
Ursula, with a burning desire for freedom and a longing for flowers,
birds, and sunshine, had wandered out into the open.
A parterre of marguerites was laid out close to the terrace. Mooning,
dreaming, singing, she had picked a bunch of these and was mechanically
plucking their snow-white petals one by one.
Did she guess what a dainty picture she made, as she stood for one
moment beside the pond, her shimmering gown of delicate white glistening
against a background of dark green yews, her fair hair shining like gold
beneath the soft rays of the October sun? Her sweet face was bent down,
earnestly intent upon consulting the flowery oracle: a delicate shadow,
that soft pearly grey tone beloved of Rubens, fell upon her girlish
breast, her soft round arms, the dainty hands which held the marguerite.
"He loves me," she said, half audibly, "a little . . . passionately
. . . not at all. He loves me . . . a little. . . ."
So wrapped up was she in these important rites, that she did not hear a
muffled footstep upon the gravel. The next moment she felt two firm
hands upon her waist, whilst a laughing voice completed the daisy's
prophecy,--
"Passionately!"
She gave a little gasp, but did not immediately turn to look who the
intruder was. Her woman's instinct had told her that, and then she
knew--or guessed--the sound of his voice. The moment had come at last.
It had been none of her seeking; she did not pause to think how it had
all happened, she only felt that he was near her and that her life's
happiness depended on whether he thought her fair.
The pleasant little demon of girlish coquetry whispered to her that, in
the midst of this poetic setting of an old-world garden, he would be
hard to please indeed if he did not fall a victim to her smile.
She turned and faced him.
"Ah!" she said, with a little cry of feigned surprise, "His Grace of
Wessex! . . . I . . . I vow you frightened me, my lord . . . I thought
this part of the garden quite deserted, and . . . and the Duke of Wessex
at the feet of the Queen."
She looked divinely pretty as she stood there before him, a delicate,
nervous little blush suffusing her young cheeks, her eyes veiled by a
fringe of lashes slightly darker than her golden hair. As dainty a
picture as this fastidious man had ever gazed upon.
"At your feet, fair one," he replied, with undisguised admiration
expressed in his every look, "and burning with jealousy at thought of
him, for whose sake your sweet fingers plucked the petal of that
marguerite."
She still held the flower, half stripped of its petals; he put out his
hand in order to take it from her, or perhaps merely for the sake of
touching for one second the soft velvet of her own.
Harry Plantagenet, close by, had stretched himself out lazily in the
sun.
"Oh!" said Ursula, a little confused, still a little shy and nervous,
"that . . . that was for a favourite brother who is absent . . . and I
wished to know if he had not forgotten me."
"Impossible," he replied with deep conviction, "even for a brother."
"Your Grace is pleased to flatter."
"The truth spoken to one so fair must ever seem a flattery."
"Your Grace. . . ."
He loved to watch the colour come and go in her face, the dainty,
girlish movements, simple and unaffected, that little curl which looked
like living gold beside the small, shell-like ear. His passionate love
for the beautiful was more than satiated at the exquisite picture before
him, and then she had such a musical and tender voice; he had heard her
singing just now.
"But you seem to know me, fair one," he said after a while.
"Who does not know His Grace of Wessex?" she responded, making a pretty
curtsy.
"Then let me be even with you, sweet singer, and tell me your name."
Ursula darted a sudden shy look at him. Obviously he was conveying the
truth; he did not know who she was.
A quick thought crossed her mind; she looked demurely down her nose and
said placidly,--
"My name is Fanny."
"Fanny?"
"Yes . . . you do not like it?"
"I didn't before," he said with a smile, "but now I adore it."
"I am getting to like it better too," she added thoughtfully.
"But, sweet Fanny, tell me how is it I never have seen you before."
"Your Grace does not know all the ladies of the Court."
"No! but I thought I knew all the pretty ones. Yet meseems that beauty
was but an empty word now that I have seen its queen."
"Ah, my lord! I fear me your reputation doth not wrong you after all!"
she added with a quaint little sigh.
"Why? What is my reputation?"
"They call you fickle, and say the Duke of Wessex loves many women a
little . . . but constantly, not at all."
He came a step closer to her, and tried to meet her eyes.
"Then will you let me prove them wrong?" he said with sudden
seriousness, which perhaps then he could not himself have accounted for.
"I? . . ." she said artlessly, "what must I do for that?"
"Anything you like," he replied.
"Nay, I have no power; for I fear me nothing short of putting Your Grace
under lock and key would cure you of that fickleness."
"Then put me under lock and key," he suggested gaily.
"In an inaccessible tower?"
"Wherever you please."
She gave a merry, happy little laugh, for he was standing quite close to
her now, his proud head slightly bent so that the quick, whispered words
might easily reach her ears; and there was an unmistakable look of
ardent admiration in his eyes. A demon of mischief suddenly seized her.
She wondered whether he had guessed who she was and tried to nettle him
into betraying himself.
"And to whom shall I give the key of that tower?" she said demurely. "To
the Lady Ursula Glynde?"
"No," he replied. "Come inside and throw the key out of the window."
"But the Lady Ursula?" she persisted.
He made a quick gesture of mock impatience.
"What wanton cruelty to mention that name now," he said, "when mine ears
are tuned to 'Fanny.'"
"Tis wrong they should be so tuned--Lady Ursula, they say, is your
promised wife."
"But I do not love her . . . never could love her whilst----
"They say she is not ill-favoured."
"Ill-favoured to me, like the bitter pills the medicine man gives us,
whilst you----"
Once more she interrupted him quickly.
"You have never seen her," she protested, "you do not even know what she
is like."
"Nay, I can guess. The Glyndes are all alike--sandy, angular,
large-footed. . . ."
She laughed, a long, merry, rippling laugh which set his ears tingling
with the desire to hear it once again. Ursula was indeed enjoying
herself thoroughly.
"They all have brown eyes," he continued gaily, "and just now I feel as
if I could not endure brown eyes."
She cast down her own, veiling them with her long lashes.
"What eyes could Your Grace best endure for the moment?" she said, with
the same tantalizing demureness.
But something magnetic must have passed at that moment between these two
young people, some subtle current from him to her, which forced the
innocent young girl to raise her eyes almost against her will. He looked
straight into their wonderful depths, and murmured softly,--
"The very bluest of the blue, and yet so grey, that I should feel they
must somehow be green. . . ."
A little shudder had gone through her when first she met his ardent
gaze; she tried to free herself from a sudden strange and delicious
feeling of obsession, and said with somewhat forced merriment now:
"The Queen has greenish eyes, and Lady Ursula's are grey."
Then she held out the marguerite to him.
"Would you like to know which you love best?" she added. "Consult the
marguerite, and take one petal at a time."
But he took the hand which held the flower.
"One petal at a time," he whispered. He took the slender fingers and
kissed each in its turn: "This the softest . . . that the whitest . . .
all rose-tipped . . . and a feast for the gods. . . ."
"My lord! . . ."
"Now you are frowning--you are not angry?"
"Very angry!"
"I'll make amends," he said humbly.
"How?"
"Give me the other hand, and I'll show you."
"Nay! I cannot do that, for we are told that the left hand must never
know what the right hand doeth."
"It shall not," he rejoined earnestly, "for I'll tell it a different
tale."
"What is it?"
"Give me the hand and you shall know."
Overhead in the green bosquets of yew a group of starlings began to
twitter. The sun was just beginning to sink down in the west, throwing
round the head of the fair young girl an aureole of gold. He stood
watching her, happy in this the supreme moment of his life. A magic veil
seemed to envelop him and her, shutting out all that portion of the
world which was not poetic and beautiful; and she, the priestess of this
exquisite new universe in which he had just entered, was smilingly
holding out her dainty hand to him.
He seized it, and a sudden wave of passion caused him to bend over it
and to kiss its soft rosy palm.
"Nay, my lord," she murmured, confused, "that Your Grace should think of
such follies!"
"Yet, when you look at me," he said, "I think of worse follies still."
"Women say that there is no worse folly than to listen to His Grace of
Wessex."
"Do you think they are right?"
"How can I tell?"
"By listening to me for half an hour."
"Here, in this garden?"
"No! . . . there! . . . by the river. . . ."
And he pointed beyond the enclosure of the garden, there where the soft
evening breeze gently stirred the rushes in the stream.
"Oh! . . . what would everybody say?" she exclaimed in mock alarm.
"Nothing! envy of my good fortune would make them dumb."
"But the Queen will be asking for you, and the Duchess of Lincoln
wondering where I am."
"They shall not find us . . . for we'll pull the boat beyond the reeds
. . . just you and I alone . . . with the gloaming all round us . . .
and the twitter of the birds when they go to rest. Shall we go? . . ."
Her heart had already consented. His voice was low and persuasive, a
strange earnestness seemed to vibrate through it, as he begged her to
come with him.
Slowly she began to walk by his side towards the stream. She seemed
scarcely alive now, a being from another world wandering in the land of
dreams. He said nothing more, for the world was too beautiful for
speech. Youth, love, delight were coursing through his veins, and as he
led the young girl towards the bank it seemed to him as if he were
taking her away from this dull world of prose and humanity, far, far
away through mysterious golden gates beyond the sunset, to a land where
she would reign as queen.
The river beckoned to them, and the soft, misty horizon seemed to call.
The intoxicating odour of summer's dying roses filled the air, whilst in
the distance across the stream a nightingale began to sing.
CHAPTER XVI
THE ULTIMATUM
The envoy of His Holiness had departed.
Mary Tudor had dismissed her ladies, for she wished to speak with the
Cardinal de Moreno alone.
Throughout the audience with the papal Nuncio, His Eminence had already
seen the storm-clouds gathering thick and fast on the Queen's brow. His
Grace of Wessex, gone to fetch a breviary left accidentally on the
terrace-coping, had been gone half an hour, and moreover had not yet
returned.
Her Majesty had sent a page to request His Grace's presence. The page
returned with the intimation that His Grace could not be found.
Someone had spied him in the distance walking towards the river, in
company with a lady dressed in white.
Then the storm-clouds had burst.
The Queen peremptorily ordered every one out of the room, then she
turned with real Tudor-like fury upon His Eminence.
"My lord Cardinal," she said in a quivering voice, which she did not
even try to steady, "an you had your master's wishes at heart, you have
indeed gone the wrong way to work."
The Cardinal's keen grey eyes had watched Mary's growing wrath with much
amusement. What was a woman's wrath to him? Nothing but an asset, an
additional advantage in the political game which he was playing.
Never for a moment did he depart, however, from his attitude of deepest
respect, nor from his tone of suave urbanity.
"I seem to have offended Your Majesty," he said gently; "unwittingly, I
assure you. . . ."
But Mary was in no mood to bandy polite words with the man who had
played her this clever trick. She was angered with herself for having
fallen into so clumsy a trap. A thousand suggestions now occurred to her
of what she might have done to prevent the meeting between Wessex and
Ursula, which the Cardinal had obviously planned.
"Nay! masks off, I pray Your Eminence," she said, "that trick just now
with your breviary . . . Own to it, man! . . . own to it . . . are you
not proud to have tricked Mary Tudor so easily?"
She was trembling with rage, yet looked nigh to bursting into tears. A
shade almost of pity crossed His Eminence's cold and clever face. It
seemed almost wantonly useless to have aided Fate in snatching a young
and handsome lover from this ill-favoured, middle-aged woman.
But the Cardinal never allowed worldly sentiments of any kind to
interfere, for more than one or two seconds, with the object he had in
view. The look of pity quickly faded from his eyes, giving place to the
same mask of respectful deference.
"My breviary?" he said blandly. "Nay! I am still at a loss to
understand. . . . Ah, yes! I remember now. . . . I had left it on the
balustrade. His Grace of Wessex, a pattern of chivalry, offered to fetch
it for me, and----"
"A fine scheme indeed, my lord," interrupted the Queen impatiently, "to
send the Duke of Wessex courting after my waiting-maid."
"The Duke of Wessex?" rejoined His Eminence with well-played
astonishment. "Nay, methought I spied him just now in the distance,
keeping the vows he once made to the Lady Ursula Glynde."
"I pray you do not repeat that silly fairy-tale. His Grace made no
promise. 'Twas the Earl of Truro desired the marriage, and the Duke had
half forgotten this, until Your Eminence chose to interfere."
"Nay! but Your Majesty does me grave injustice. What have the amours of
His Grace of Wessex to do with me, who am the envoy of His Most Catholic
Majesty the King of Spain?"
"'Twere wiser, certainly," retorted Mary coldly, "if the King of Spain's
envoy did not concern himself with rousing the Queen of England's
anger."
His Eminence smiled as amiably, as unconcernedly as before. Throughout
the length of a very distinguished career he had often been obliged to
weather storms of royal wrath. He was none the worse for it, and knew
how to let the floods of princely anger pass over his shrewd head,
without losing grip of the ground on which he stood. Nothing ever
ruffled him. Supremely conscious of his own dignity, justly proud of his
position and attainments, he had, at the bottom of his heart, a complete
contempt for those exalted puppets of his own political schemes. Mary
Tudor, a weak and soured woman, an all-too-ready prey of her own
passions, swayed hither and thither by her loves and by her hates, was
nothing to this proud prince of the Church but a pawn in a European game
of chess. It was for his deft fingers to move this pawn in the direction
in which he list.
"Nay," he said, with gentle suavity, "my only desire is to rouse in the
heart of the Queen of England love for my royal master, the King of
Spain. He is young and goodly to look at, a faithful and gallant
gentleman, whom it will be difficult to lure from Your Grace's side,
once you have deigned to allow him to kneel at your feet."
"You speak, my lord, as if you were sure of my answer."
"Sure is a momentous word, Your Majesty. But I hope----"
"Nay! 'tis not yet done, remember," retorted Mary, with ever-increasing
vehemence, "and if this trick of yours should succeed, if Wessex weds
the Lady Ursula, then I _will_ send my answer to your master, and it
shall be 'No!'"
There was a quick, sudden flash in the Cardinal's eye, a look of
astonishment, perhaps, at this unexpected phase of feminine jealousy. Be
that as it may, it was quickly veiled by an expression of pronounced
sarcasm.
"As a trophy for the vanity of His Grace of Wessex?" he asked pointedly.
"No!--merely as a revenge against your interference. So look to it, my
lord Cardinal; the tangle in the skein was made by your hand. See that
you unravel it, or you and the Spanish ambassador leave my Court
to-morrow."
With a curt nod of the head she dismissed him from her presence. He was
far too shrewd to attempt another word just now. Perhaps for the first
time in his life he felt somewhat baffled. He had allowed his own
impatience to outrun his discretion--an unpardonable fault in a
diplomatist. He blamed himself very severely for his attempt at
brusquing Fate. Surely time and the Duke's own fastidious disposition
would have parted him from Mary quite as readily as this sudden meeting
with beautiful Lady Ursula.
The Cardinal had withdrawn from the Queen's presence after an obeisance
marked with deep respect. He wished to be alone to think over this new
aspect of the situation. Through the tall bay windows of the Great Hall
which he traversed, the last rays of the setting sun came slanting in.
His Eminence glided along the smooth oak floors, his crimson robes
making but a gentle frou-frou of sound behind him, a ghostlike,
whispering accompaniment to his perturbed thoughts. Somehow the softness
of the evening air lured him towards the terrace and the gardens. There
lacked an hour yet to supper-time, and Mary Tudor was scarce likely to
be in immediate need of His Eminence's company.
He crossed the Clock Tower gates and soon found himself once more on the
terrace. The gardens beyond looked tenderly poetic in the fast-gathering
dusk. The Cardinal's shrewd eyes wandered restlessly over the parterres
and bosquets, vainly endeavouring to spy the silhouettes of two young
people, whom his diplomacy had brought together and whom his shrewd wit
would have to part again.
He descended the terrace steps and slowly walked towards the pond,
where, but an hour ago, a sweet and poetic idyll had been enacted. There
was nothing to mark the passage of a fair young dream, born this lovely
October afternoon, save a few dead marguerites and the scattered flakes
of their snow-white petals.
The Cardinal's footsteps crushed them unheeded. He was thinking how best
he could dispel that dream, which he himself had helped to call forth.
"Woman! woman!" he sighed impatiently as he looked back upon the
graceful outline of the Palace behind him, "thy moods are many and thy
logic scant."
"A tangled skein indeed," he mused, "which will take some unravelling.
If Wessex weds the Lady Ursula, the Queen will say 'No' to Philip, out
of revenge for my interference. She'll turn to Noailles mayhap and wed
the Dauphin to spite me, or keep him and Scheyfne dangling on awhile
whilst trying to reconquer the volatile Duke's allegiance. But if Wessex
does not wed the Lady Ursula . . . what then? Will his friends prevail?
Yet there's more obstinacy than indolence in his composition, I fancy,
and the dubious position of King Consort would scarce suit his proud
Grace. Still, if I do not succeed in parting those two young people whom
my diplomacy hath brought together, then Mary Tudor sends me and the
Spanish Ambassador back to Philip to-morrow."
CHAPTER XVII
AN ARMED TRUCE
So intent was His Eminence in these complicated musings that he scarcely
noticed how fast the shadows gathered round him. He had gradually
wandered down towards the low wall which divided the Palace gardens from
the river beyond.
He had always been very partial to this remote portion of the grounds,
for it was little frequented, and he felt that here at least in his
lonely walks he could lay aside that mask of perpetual blandness which
he was obliged to wear all day, whatever his moods might be.
It was seldom that he met anybody when his footsteps led him thus far.
Great was his astonishment therefore when he suddenly spied a figure
leaning over the wall, evidently intent on prying into the darkness
below.
The Cardinal drew nearer and recognized Lord Everingham, the closest
friend, the most intimate companion His Grace of Wessex was known to
have.
The young man had not heard His Eminence's footsteps on the sanded path;
he started on hearing his name.
"Ah! my lord Everingham," said the Cardinal lightly. "I little thought
to see any one here. I myself am fond of communing with Nature in these
gathering shadows; but you are a young man, there are gayer attractions
for you within the Palace."
It was too dark by now even for His Eminence's keen eyes to read the
expression on Lord Everingham's face. The astute diplomatist, however,
more than guessed what the young man's purpose was in thus scanning the
river. His Grace of Wessex had not yet returned to the Palace, and it
was generally known throughout the Court circle that Her Majesty was
furious at his absence.
The Cardinal's ruse in the early part of the afternoon had been the
subject of universal gossip; sundry rumours had also been current that
the Duke had been seen in the company of the Queen's most beautiful
maid-of-honour.
"Verily," thought His Eminence, "His Grace's partisans must be on
tenterhooks. All along they must have dreaded this meeting, which chance
and diplomacy has so unexpectedly brought about."
Was not Wessex' position with regard to the Lady Ursula a peculiar one?
Tied to her and yet free, affianced, yet not necessarily bound, his own
attitude towards her was sure to be influenced by the girl's own
personality.
And every cavalier and diplomatist now at Hampton Court readily conceded
that the daughter of the Earl of Truro was the most beautiful woman in
England, and the most likely to captivate the roving fancy of His Grace.
No wonder that my lord of Everingham was anxious for the Duke's return,
before the Queen's access of pique and jealousy had found vent in sudden
revenge. But the young Englishman had no desire to display this anxiety
before his triumphant opponent.
"Like your Eminence," he said carelessly, "I was lured into the garden
by the softness of the air. The river looked so cool and placid, and
'tis not often one can hear the nightingale in October."
"Nay! your sudden fancy for the evening breeze is entirely my gain, my
dear lord," rejoined the Cardinal in his most suave manner; "as a matter
of fact I was, even at this moment, meditating how best I could secure
an interview with you."
"With me?"
"Yes. Are you not His Grace of Wessex' most intimate friend?"
"I have indeed that honour," replied Everingham stiffly, "but I do not
quite understand how----"
"How the matter concerns me?" interrupted His Eminence pleasantly. "An
you will allow me, I can explain. Shall we walk along this path? I thank
you," he added courteously, as the young man, after a moment's
hesitation, turned to walk beside him.
"Have I been misinformed," continued the Cardinal, "or is it a fact that
your lordship is about to quit Hampton Court?"
"Only for a very few weeks," rejoined Everingham. "Her Majesty has
entrusted me with an amicable mission to the Queen Regent of Scotland. I
start for town to-night on my way North."
"Ah! then I am only just in time," said His Eminence.
"In time for what?"
"In time to correct what we poor mortals are all liable to make, my
lord--an error."
"Indeed!" said Everingham, with a touch of sarcasm. "Your Eminence must
make so few."
"Nay! but the error this time is none of my making, my lord. 'Tis you, I
think, who look upon me as an enemy."
"Oh! . . . your Eminence . . ." protested the young man.
"Well, an antagonist, if you will. Confess that you thought--and still
think--that I have been scheming to bring the Duke of Wessex to the feet
of Lady Ursula Glynde, his promised wife."
"A scheme in which Your Eminence succeeded over well, I fancy," retorted
Everingham bitterly.
"But that is where you are in error, my dear lord; for, believe me,
that, at the present moment, my sole desire is to put an insuperable
barrier between His Grace and that beautiful young lady."
"Your sole desire, my lord?"
As the night was dark Everingham could see nothing of His Eminence's
expression of face. If he had, he probably would only have seen the same
mask of polite blandness which the Cardinal usually wore.
The young man, certes, was no match for these astute Spaniards, who had
all the wiles and artifices of diplomacy at their finger-tips; his love
for Wessex and the earnestness of his own political views gave him a
certain amount of shrewdness, but even that shrewdness was at fault in
the face of this extraordinary statement suddenly made by the Cardinal.
"You are surprised?" commented His Eminence.
"Boundlessly, I confess."
"Ah! Diplomacy is full of surprises. But you are pleased?"
Everingham, however, was not prepared to admit anything to this man,
whose face he could not read, but whose tortuous ways he more than half
mistrusted.
"I hardly know how to understand Your Eminence," he said guardedly. "I
need hardly say that my fondest hope was to see Queen Mary wedded to
Wessex, for that is common knowledge. But since His Grace's meeting with
the beautiful Lady Ursula, I fully expect to hear him declare his
intention of keeping his troth to her."
"You think her so very irresistible, then?--or His Grace so very
susceptible?"
"I think that the Duke has always kept at the back of his mind an idea
that he was in some measure bound to Lady Ursula."
"Let us add, my lord, that the charm and grace of the lady will
inevitably tend to develop that idea. Eh?"
"And that Your Eminence will probably triumph in consequence."
"You, therefore, my lord, have by now set your heart on undoing what
to-day's chance meeting may, perchance, have accomplished. By you I also
mean your friends, the nobility and gentry of England, who would mourn
to see His Grace wedded to Lady Ursula Glynde."
"Our loss will be your Eminence's gain, probably," rejoined Everingham
with a sigh.
The Cardinal waited a moment before he continued the conversation. He
had deliberately sought this interchange of ideas. Openness and
frankness in matters political were not usually a part of His Eminence's
programme, but this evening he seemed desirous to gain this young
Englishman's confidence.
"But," he said after a while, with charming bonhomie, "but suppose that
instead of gloating in the triumph which you, my lord, so readily
prophesy--suppose that I were to ask you to let me help you--you and
your friends--in parting the volatile Duke from his latest flame? . . .
Would you accept my help?"
"Your Eminence . . . I . . ." murmured Everingham, somewhat at a loss
what to say.
"You would wish to consult with your friends, eh?" continued the
Cardinal placidly. "Lord Derby, Lord Bath, the Earl of Oxford--nay, the
whole string of patriotic Englishmen who desire to see one of their own
kind on the English throne, and naturally look upon me as a monster of
artifice and vice."
"Your Eminence . . ." protested Everingham.
"Yet what are we but political antagonists, who can honour one another
in private, whilst rending one another to pieces on the arena of public
life? Do you not agree with me, my lord?"
"Certainly."
"Then why should you disdain my help, now that--momentarily--we have the
same object in view?"
"I am _hors de cause_, Your Eminence, as I have only the next few hours
at my disposal. After that I go to Scotland."
"Much may be done in a few hours, my lord, with an ounce of luck and a
grain of tact."
"But I do not understand why Your Eminence should be at one with me and
my friends over this."
The Cardinal smiled with gentle benevolence. Versed though he was in all
the tricks and deceptions which were an integral part of his calling, no
one knew better than he did the value of an occasional truth. With easy
familiarity he linked his arm in that of his interlocutor.
"Nay! your lordship mocks me," he said with a light sigh. "From your
conversation I have already gathered that you and your friends suspect
me of having brought about this unwelcome meeting 'twixt His Grace of
Wessex and Lady Ursula Glynde. Is it not so?"
"Marry . . ." began Everingham with some hesitation.
"I pray you do not trouble to deny it. Let us admit that it is so. Do
you not think then that Queen Mary will have a like suspicion as
yourself?"
"Probably."
"And will, in consequence, turn the floods of her wrath on my innocent
head. A woman angered is capable of anything, my lord. My position at
this Court would become untenable. My mission probably would fail. Let
us say that by endeavouring to part His Grace from the Lady Ursula, I
would wish to give Her Majesty proof of the fact that I bore no part in
their chance meeting."
"I understand," rejoined Everingham, still vaguely suspicious of any
ulterior motive lurking behind the Cardinal's apparent frankness, "but
. . ."
"Once His Grace is effectually parted from his new flame, the game will
stand once more as it did before the unfortunate episode of this
afternoon . . . unfortunate alike to your interests and to mine. Is that
not so?"
"Certainly."
"I feel, therefore, that until then we ought to be . . . well! if not
friends exactly . . . at least allies."
"Only to resume hostilities again, Your Eminence?"
"By all means."
"Once His Grace has ceased to think of Lady Ursula, I and my party will
once more work heart and soul to bring about the alliance of Wessex with
the Queen."
"And I to win the Queen's hand for Philip of Spain. Until then? . . ."
"Armed truce, Your Eminence."
"And you will accept my help? It may be worth having, you never can
tell," quoth His Eminence with a sarcastic smile, which Everingham could
not perceive in the darkness.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE VEILED WITCH
Lord Everingham felt not a little perplexed. The Cardinal seemed bent on
pressing his point, and on obtaining a definite promise of friendship,
whilst the young man would have preferred to leave the matter _in statu
quo_, a condition of open and avowed enmity.
Moreover he would have wished to speak with some of his friends. Lord
Sussex and the Earl of Oxford were staying at the Palace. Sir Henry
Jerningham, Arundel, Cheyne, Paget, all hot partisans of Wessex, could
easily be communicated with. In the meanwhile Everingham was racking his
brain for the right word to say: the retort courteous, which would not
hopelessly alienate His Eminence, if indeed he was seeking temporary
friendship.
Chance and a zealous night watchman put an abrupt end to Lord
Everingham's perplexity; even when he was about to speak, a gruff voice
which seemed to come right out of the darkness interrupted him with the
well-known call--
"Who goes there?"
Almost immediately afterwards the strong light of a lanthorn was
projected on the figure of the Cardinal.
"How now, friend," quoth His Eminence presently, "art seeking for the
truth with that lanthorn of thine?"
But already the knave, having recognized the brilliant crimson robes and
realized the high quality of their august wearer, had lost himself in a
veritable maze of humble apologies.
"I crave Your Eminence's merciful pardon," he stammered. "I did not
think . . . I am on duty . . . I . . ."
His thin, shrivelled form was scarce distinguishable in the gloom, only
his old face, with large bottle-nose, and his pale, watery eyes appeared
grotesque and quaint in the yellowish light of his lanthorn.
"Then fulfil thy duties, friend," rejoined the Cardinal, who made it a
point always to speak kindly and urbanely, even to the meanest lout.
The man made a low obeisance and would have kissed His Eminence's hand,
but the latter withdrew it gently.
"Are there marauders about, friend watchman?" he condescended to ask, as
the man prepared to go. "Thou dost not appear to be very strong, nor yet
stoutly armed."
"Your Eminence's pardon," replied the man, "'tis for a woman I am told
to watch."
"A woman?"
"By Her Grace the Duchess of Lincoln's orders."
"Ah!" remarked His Eminence, with sudden interest.
"Mayhap some thief or vagrant, Your Eminence."
"Aye, mayhap! Then go thy way, good watchman; we'll not hinder thee."
Slowly the man shuffled off, dangling his lanthorn before him. The
Cardinal watched the patch of brilliant light until it disappeared
behind a projecting bosquet.
His Eminence had been exceedingly thoughtful.
"Know you aught of this, my lord?" he asked of Lord Everingham, who also
seemed wrapped in meditation.
"I suspect something of it," replied the young man slowly. "There is a
story afloat--gossip, I thought it--that one of the Queen's
maids-of-honour has been playing some curious pranks at night . . . and
in disguise. . . ."
"Indeed? Know you who the lady is?"
"No! nor can I even guess. All the maids-of-honour are young and full of
fun, and no doubt the girlish pranks were harmless enough, but Her
Majesty is very austere and rigidly stern where questions of decorum are
concerned."
"So the Duchess of Lincoln, like a watchful dragon, would catch the fair
miscreant _in flagrante delicto_, eh?" continued His Eminence.
Mechanically he turned to walk along the path recently followed by the
night watchman. His Eminence would have scorned the idea of any
superstition influencing his precise, calculating mind, but,
nevertheless, he had a strange belief in the guiding hand of Chance, and
somehow at the present moment he had an unaccountable presentiment, that
this gossip anent some young girl's frolic would in some way exercise an
influence on his present schemes.
As if in immediate answer to these very thoughts a woman's frightened
scream was suddenly heard close by, followed by muttered curses in the
watchman's gruff voice.
"What was that?" exclaimed Everingham involuntarily.
"The lady _in flagrante delicto_, meseems," rejoined the Cardinal
quietly.
And both men began to walk more rapidly in the direction whence had come
the woman's scream. The next few moments brought them upon the scene,
and soon in the gloom they distinguished the figure of the old watchman
apparently struggling with a woman, whose head and shoulders were
enveloped in some sort of veil or hood. The lanthorn, evidently
violently thrown on the ground, had rolled down the path some little
distance from this group.
The woman was making obvious and frantic efforts to get away, whilst the
old watchman exerted all his strength to keep tight hold of her wrists.
"What is it to thee, man, what I am doing here?" the woman gasped in the
midst of her struggles. "Let me go, I say!"
She was evidently not very strong, for the old watchman, shrivelled and
shrunken though he was, had already mastered her. She had lost her
balance, and was soon down on her knees. With a vigorous wrench the man
contrived to force her arms behind her back; he held them there with one
hand, and with the other was groping in his wallet for a length of rope.
"Not before thou hast given a good account of thyself before the Duchess
of Lincoln, my wench!" he said, as he threw the rope round her shoulders
and very dexterously contrived to pinion her arms behind her.
"Her Grace?" she murmured contemptuously. "I have naught to do with Her
Grace. . . . Let me go, man; thou hast no right to tie me thus."
"Now then, my girl, get up, will ye? and come along quietly with me.
. . . I'll not hurt ye . . . if ye come along quietly."
The man helped her to struggle to her feet. Her veil or cloak had
evidently fallen from her head, for the Cardinal and Lord Everingham,
who were silently, and with no small measure of curiosity, watching the
strange spectacle, caught the glint of a woman's face and of bright
golden hair.
The watchman was trying to lead her away towards the Palace.
"Let me go, I tell thee," muttered the girl with persistent obstinacy.
"I have important business here, and . . ."
But the old man laughed derisively.
"Important business? . . . and prithee with whom, wench?"
"With the Duke of Wessex . . ." she retorted after a slight hesitation,
"There! . . . now wilt let me go?"
But the watchman laughed more immoderately than before.
"Oho! . . . ho! ho! ho! that's a likely tale, my wench, there's many a
young woman has business with His Grace, I'll warrant. . . . But thou'st
best tell that tale to the Duchess of Lincoln first. . . . Business with
the Duke of Wessex . . . ha! ha! ha! . . ."
"My friend," here interposed a gentle, very urbane voice, "meseems thy
zeal somewhat outruns thy discretion. If this child has indeed business
with the Duke of Wessex, His Grace might prefer that thou shouldst keep
a quieter tongue in thy head."
The Cardinal, at sound of the Duke's name, had gradually drawn nearer to
the group. Lord Everingham, impelled by the same natural curiosity, had
followed him.
"You would wish to speak with His Grace, child?" continued His Eminence
with that same gentle benevolence which inspired an infinity of
confidence in the unwary. "Do you know him?"
The watchman, astonished, abashed, very highly perplexed at this
unexpected interference, was rendered absolutely speechless. The girl
had turned defiantly on her new interlocutor, whose outline she could
but vaguely distinguish in the darkness.
"What's it to you?" she retorted with obvious suspicion and mistrust.
"Not much I own," replied the Cardinal with imperturbable kindliness; "I
only thought that being alone and perhaps frightened you would be glad
of some help."
"Your Eminence . . ." stammered the watchman, who was trying to recover
his speech.
"Silence!" commanded His Eminence. "I wish to speak with this young
woman alone."
The worthy watchman had naught to do but to obey. There was no
questioning an order given by so great a lord as the Cardinal de Moreno
himself. The good man discreetly withdrew, His Eminence quietly waiting
until he was out of earshot.
"Now, child, have no fear," said the Cardinal gently. "Tell me . . . you
wish to speak with the Duke of Wessex?"
She turned resolutely towards him.
"You'll take me to him?" she asked.
"Perhaps," he replied.
A great struggle must have been raging within her. Even through the
gloom His Eminence could see her shoulders and breast working
convulsively, whilst her breath came and went in quick, feverish gasps.
"I have been watching in the gardens at night," she murmured at last;
"for he is a great lord, and I dared not approach him by day. He saved
my life . . . and I can read the stars. . . . I see that a great danger
threatens him. . . .
"Oh! I must warn him," she added in a sudden outburst of passionate
vehemence. "I must go to him . . . I must."
Lord Everingham tried to interpose, but His Eminence restrained him with
a quick touch upon his arm. The Cardinal's hands were beautiful, white
and caressing as those of a woman, delicately scented and be-ringed. He
passed them gently over the girl's head, whilst he whispered softly--
"So you shall, child . . . so you shall. . . . Then, tell me . . . His
Grace saved your life, you say? and you are very grateful to him, of
course . . . more than that, perhaps . . . you love him very dearly, eh?
. . ."
"What's that to you?" retorted the girl sullenly.
Lord Everingham once more made as if he would interrupt this curious
interrogatory. His loyalty to his friend rebelled against this prying
into matters which might prove unpleasant for Wessex.
That the girl was no Court lady out on some mad frolic was patent
enough, whilst the passionate ring of her voice, when she mentioned the
Duke's name, proved very clearly that she had seen him, and seeing him
had perhaps learnt to love him.
Who knows? Some secret intrigue, not altogether avowable, might lie at
the bottom of this strange adventure. Everingham's heart misgave him at
the thought that Wessex' most open enemy should perhaps learn a secret
hitherto kept from all his friends.
The girl, on the other hand, seemed willing to trust the Cardinal. She
repeated doggedly once or twice--
"You'll take me to him? . . . at once? . . ."
"If I can," replied His Eminence, still very protecting, very suave and
kind, "but not just now. . . . His Grace is with the Queen . . . you are
too sensible and earnest, I feel sure, to wish to intrude upon him.
. . . But will you not trust me a little while? . . . and I promise you
that you shall see him."
"Nay! I've nothing to lose by trusting you or any one," she replied. "If
you do not take me to him, I'll find my way alone."
"Come, that's brave independence. But, child, if I am to help you with
His Grace of Wessex, I must at least know who you are."
"They call me Mirrab."
At sound of the name Everingham started. One or two vague recollections,
in connection with the soothsayer of East Molesey Fair, seemed to be
chasing one another in his mind, but he could not give them definite
shape.
A strange feeling, made up of uneasiness and shame, coupled with
excitement and intense curiosity, caused him to go and pick up the
watchman's lanthorn, which lay on the ground close by.
When he was near the girl again he held it up, and the light fell full
on her face.
Then he remembered.
It was Mirrab, the necromancer, the kitchen wench, used by a vulgar
trickster to hoodwink some gullible burgesses and their dames at the
village fair, but whom Nature had, in one of her unaccountable freaks,
endowed with the same golden hair, the same exquisite features, the same
deep and wonderful eyes, as the most beautiful woman at Mary Tudor's
court, the Lady Ursula Glynde.
The veil which usually enveloped Mirrab's head had fallen round her
shoulders; her dress was of coarse woollen stuff, open at the neck and
short in the sleeves; the arms and hands, rough and clumsy in shape,
betrayed the girl's humble origin, and the likeness to Lady Ursula was
confined to the face and hair. But it was there, nevertheless; quite
unmistakable, even bewildering to the two men who were gazing,
speechless, at this strange spectacle.
Then Everingham put down the lanthorn. He dared not look at the
Cardinal, half fearing, perhaps, that the wild thoughts and schemes
which had suddenly arisen in his mind at sight of this extraordinary
freak of nature should have already found more definite shape in His
Eminence's astute and far-seeing brain.
Strangely enough, at this moment, the practised diplomatist, the wily
and unscrupulous Spaniard, met the more simple-souled Englishman on
common ground, and at once felt sure of his co-operation.
Both had the same end in view: a desire to break up any relationship
which may have sprung up between the Duke of Wessex and the beautiful
young girl, of whom this otherwise coarse wench was the perfect physical
counterpart. But the Spaniard was the quicker in thought and in action.
Whilst Everingham still vaguely wondered how the extraordinary
resemblance might be utilized to gain that great end which he had in
view, the Cardinal had already formed and matured a plan.
He took the veil from Mirrab's shoulders and once more drew it over her
head. Then he undid the clumsy knot with which the watchman had pinioned
her hands. Mirrab remained perfectly passive the while; she seemed under
the magic spell of the soft, velvety hands, which had, as it were, taken
possession of her person.
The two men had not exchanged one word since the light of the lanthorn
had revealed the strange secret to them; they seemed to be acting in
perfect accord. There was no longer any need for protestation of outward
friendship, or for cementing the compact of temporary alliance.
Everingham once more picked up the lanthorn and went in search of the
watchman, in order to dismiss him with a word of command and to ensure
his silence with a threat and a few silver coins. The man, of course,
knew nothing of the importance of the event which he had unwittingly
brought about. He may have vaguely wondered in his mind why His Eminence
the Spanish Cardinal should take such a keen interest in a female
vagrant, found trespassing on royal ground. But the few pieces of silver
given to him by the noble lord, soon silenced even this transitory
astonishment.
Stolidly he resumed his nightly round, satisfied that he need no longer
look for lurking thieves in the park.
When Everingham, having seen the last of the watchman, returned to the
spot where he had left His Eminence and Mirrab, he found that both had
disappeared.
PART III
A GAME OF CHESS
CHAPTER XIX
THE PAWNS
The evening banquet had been anything but gay.
The Queen, as was oft her wont, had hardly said a word. The Cardinal de
Moreno looked thoughtful and His Grace of Wessex was singularly silent.
Directly after supper Her Majesty retired to her own apartments,
accompanied by her ladies, leaving behind her that desultory atmosphere
of dull and purposeless conversation, which hangs round a supper table
in the absence of the fair sex.
The brilliant assembly broke up into small groups. The Earl of Pembroke
and two or three other lords were leaving for Scotland towards midnight;
their friends gathered round them to bid them God-speed. In the deep
embrasure of the great bay His Grace of Wessex was in earnest conference
with Lord Winchester and Sir William Drury, whilst at one end of the
long centre table half a dozen young gallants were idling over a game of
hazard.
But there was a feeling of obsession in the air--a sense as if something
momentous was about to happen. Whispered rumours, more or less
conflicting, were afloat, yet nothing definite was known. On the other
hand, idle, far-stretched gossip was rife and was even growing in
extravagance as the evening wore on.
No one had been present on the terrace to witness the little incident
which occurred there earlier in the afternoon save the three
distinguished actors in the brief comedy scene. Obviously from them
nothing could be gleaned. The Queen and the Cardinal would not be like
to enlighten the curious, whilst the Duke of Wessex, at all times
reserved and unapproachable, could not be asked to give his version of
the event.
The foreign envoys had very soon followed the example set by Her Majesty
and withdrawn from the circle, which seemed more hostile to them than
usual to-night. The Cardinal de Moreno and the Marquis de Suarez were
the first to go. They occupied the magnificent suite of chambers wherein
ill-fated Wolsey had lived, schemed, and fallen. The more sumptuous
series of rooms beyond--those built with lavish extravagance by King
Henry VIII for his own personal use--had been placed at the disposal of
His Grace of Wessex and his numerous retinue.
Between the Duke's apartments and those allotted to the envoys of the
King of Spain was the fine audience chamber, used by the Queen herself
or by her more distinguished guests for the reception of important
visitors. It was here that Lord Everingham, anxious, perturbed, vaguely
ashamed of his own actions, had sought out the Cardinal de Moreno after
the banquet and begged for an interview.
His Eminence, suave, urbane, a veritable mirror of benevolence, had
received him with a smile of welcome on his lips and a wealth of kindly
reproach in his eyes.
"Ah, my lord!" he said to the young man, as soon as the servants had
withdrawn, "Nature, I fear me, hath not intended you for a diplomatist."
"How so?"
"This interview to-night, with me--was it necessary?"
"I could not rest," said Everingham impulsively, "until----"
"Until you had proclaimed it to the entire Court in general, and to His
Grace of Wessex in particular, that you had a secret understanding with
his political rival, the Spanish ambassador," rejoined His Eminence
drily.
"An interview . . ."
"Have you ever honoured me thus before, my lord?--you or any of your
friends?"
"No . . . perhaps not . . . I only requested a brief _tete-a-tete_.
. . ."
"And had I refused that dangerous _tete-a-tete_, what would you have
done?"
"Demanded it," replied Everingham hotly. "I must know what has happened,
and what you intend to do."
His Eminence threw a quick look at the young man, a look half of pity,
half of contempt. For a moment it seemed as if an angry retort hovered
upon his lips. But he merely shrugged his shoulders and said blandly--
"You are very expert at the game of chess, my lord, so they tell me."
"I have played it a great many times," rejoined Everingham, a little
astonished at the sudden transition.
"Ah! and have become very proficient, I understand. Will you honour me
by playing a game with me?"
"Now?"
"Why not?"
"The lateness of the hour . . . I start for Scotland almost directly."
"Yet in spite of these difficulties you sought a casual interview with
an avowed political enemy."
"No one need know . . ." stammered the young man, slightly abashed.
"Every one inside this Palace knows by now that my lord of Everingham,
the intimate friend at His Grace of Wessex, is closeted alone with the
envoy of His Majesty the King of Spain," rejoined His Eminence with
slow emphasis. "Believe me, my lord, a game of chess is the wisest
course."
"Will you tell me first . . ."
"I can tell your lordship nothing, except across the chess board."
"Well! . . . since you wish it . . ."
"My wishes have naught to do with this matter. I was following the most
elementary dictates of prudence."
He touched the handbell and rang. A liveried servant appeared.
"Had I not told thee, sirrah," said His Eminence, "that my lord
Everingham had kindly consented to give me my _revanche_ at chess ere he
departed? How is it that the board has not been prepared?"
"I crave Your Eminence's most humble pardon," protested the man in
confusion. "I had not understood . . ."
"Not understood?" laughed the Cardinal good-naturedly. "Marry! the knave
doth impugn my knowledge of the English tongue."
"I would not presume, Your Eminence . . ."
"Tush, man! hold thy tongue and repair thy negligence. Where's the
board? His lordship hath but an hour to spare."
Everingham watched with ill-concealed impatience the elaborate
preparations made for the game. He thought it quite unnecessary, and had
he dared he would have refused to join in the senseless deception. But
in this matter he had ceased to trust his own judgment, and, much
against his will, was allowing the Cardinal to take the lead. He felt
out of his own intellectual depths in this slough of intrigue wherein he
had so impulsively ventured, and out of which he now felt incapable of
extricating himself.
Simple-minded and loyal to the core, he had a horror of any treachery
against his friend. No other consideration would ever have prompted him
to join in an underhand scheme with the Spanish Cardinal, save his own
earnest faith in the ultimate good which would accrue therefrom, both to
the country at large and to Wessex himself. With his whole heart and
soul he believed that, at this moment, the Duke's marriage with Lady
Ursula Glynde would be nothing short of a national calamity.
Reluctantly, he sat down to the board at last. His Eminence, opposite to
him, was shading his face with his delicate white hand, and at first
seemed absorbed in the intricacies of the game. Two servitors were still
busy about the room. One of them asked if His Eminence would desire more
light.
But the Cardinal preferred the fitful flicker of a few wax tapers. He
liked the fantastic shadows which left the greater part of the vast
chamber in gloom. Lord Everingham was a noted and very proficient
player; His Eminence was enjoying the game thoroughly.
"Check to your king, my lord Cardinal," said the young Englishman at
last.
"Only a temporary check, you see, my lord," rejoined His Eminence, as
with slender, tapering fingers he moved one of the ivory pieces on the
board. "By the help of this one little pawn, the safety of the whole
combination is assured, and 'tis your knight now which is in serious
danger."
"Not serious, I think, Your Eminence, and once more check to your king."
Even as he spoke the two servitors finally left the room, closing the
heavy doors noiselessly behind them.
"Oh!" said the Cardinal thoughtfully, "this will necessitate a bolder
move on my part. You mark, my son," he added as soon as he had made a
move, "how beautifully Nature herself plays into our hands: you and I
desired to part His Grace of Wessex effectually and for ever from his
beautiful affianced bride. Two hours ago this seemed impossible, and
lo!--a girl comes across our path: low-born, brainless, probably a
wanton, yet the very physical counterpart of virtuous Lady Ursula,
and----"
"Check," said Everingham drily, as he moved his castle.
"Nay! nay! we'll once more move this little pawn," rejoined His
Eminence, with his usual pleasant benevolence, "and see how simple the
plan becomes."
"'Tis of that plan I longed to hear."
"So you shall, my son, so you shall," said the Cardinal very kindly.
"What would you wish to know?"
"The girl Mirrab?--Where is she?"
"In Don Miguel de Suarez rooms, dressing herself in quaint finery,
collected for the purpose by my faithful servant Pasquale, who has a
valuable female friend in the Queen's own entourage. A silk kirtle, rich
white robes, some fantastic ornaments for the hair, and the likeness
'twixt our Mirrab and the high-born Lady Ursula will be more strangely
apparent than ever. Your turn to move, my lord. I pray you do not lose
the thread of this interesting game."
"'Tis easy enough to lose oneself in the mazes of Your Eminence's
diplomacy," quoth the young man anxiously. "Having dressed the girl up
in all that finery, what do you propose to do?"
His Eminence was silent for awhile; he seemed absorbed in an elaborate
strategical combination, directed against his opponent's king. Then he
moved his queen right across the board and said quietly--
"What do I propose to do, my lord? Only, with the aid of that diplomacy
which you English affect to despise, contrive that His Grace of Wessex
should see a lady--whom he will naturally mistake for the Lady Ursula
Glynde--in a highly compromising situation, and the love idyll begun
this afternoon will abruptly end to-night."
"But how?"
"Ah, my lord! surely we must trust Chance a little. The fickle jade has
served us well already."
"I'll not allow a pure woman's reputation to be sullied by any dastardly
trick . . ." began Everingham hotly.
"Pray, my lord, what is your definition of a dastardly trick?" rejoined
His Eminence suavely. "Is it the use made by a political opponent of
every means, fair or foul, to accomplish his own aims, which he
considers great and just? or is it the work of a friend--an intimate,
confidential friend--joining issue for the like purpose? Nay, nay!
understand me, my dear lord," he added, with an infinity of gentle
kindliness expressed in the almost paternal tone of his voice, "'twas
not I, remember, who ever thought to blame you. Your aims and ambitions
are as selfless as mine own: for the moment our purpose is the same.
Will you honour me by allowing me to show you the way of attaining that
purpose, quickly and surely? I'll not ask you to lend me a hand. I would
gladly have kept from you the knowledge of my own intricate diplomacy.
Why should you fear for the Lady Ursula? Is her reputation in your eyes
of greater moment than the success of your schemes?--yours and all your
faction, remember."
"Ah! there you have me, my lord," rejoined Everingham with a sigh. "All
England is at one with us in a burning desire to see Wessex wedded to
our Queen. But this is where your diplomacy escapes me. Once Wessex is
turned away from the Lady Ursula, he will, we hope, naturally turn to
the Queen, who loves him passionately, and . . . Check!" he added,
moving one of his pieces.
"Ah! you press me hard. Your lordship is a skilful player," said the
Cardinal, intently studying the board. "As for me, you see I seem to
move my pawns somewhat aimlessly. For the moment, I wish to part His
Grace of Wessex from Lady Ursula . . . after that--we shall see."
Everingham was silent. A truly bitter conflict was raging in his simple
heart. Loyalty to his friend, love for his country, and an overwhelming
anxiety for its welfare, cried out loudly within him. The very thought
of meeting Wessex face to face at this moment was terrible to him, and
yet he would not undo what he had already done, and would not thwart the
Spaniard's tortuous schemes by betraying them to the Duke.
The purpose which he had in view blinded him to everything save the hope
of its ultimate achievement. At this moment he felt that, if Wessex
shared Mary Tudor's throne with her, so much that was great and good
would come to England thereby, that all petty considerations of
temporary disloyalty, or the reputation of one innocent woman, would
quickly vanish into insignificance.
The very feelings of remorse and of shame which he was experiencing at
this moment strengthened him in his faith, for he was suffering keenly
and acutely to the very depths of his honest heart, and he imagined that
he was earning a crown of martyrdom thereby; he believed that by
trampling on his own prejudices and jeopardizing his friendship with the
man he loved and honoured best in all the world, he was adding to the
cause, which he held to be sacred, the additional lustre of
self-sacrifice.
His Eminence no doubt knew all this. With his intimate knowledge of the
foibles of mankind, he found it an easy task enough to probe the inner
thoughts of the transparent soul before him. He divined the young man's
doubts and fears, the battle waged within him betwixt an abstruse
political aim and his own upright nature. The game was continued in
silence, Everingham's state of mind being revealed in the one bitter
sigh--
"Ah! I go away with a heavy heart, feeling that I have helped to commit
a treachery."
The Cardinal looked benevolently compassionate. At heart he was more
than glad to think that this blundering Englishman would be well out of
the way. Could he have foreseen the marvellous turn by which Fate meant
to aid him in his intrigue, he would never have made overtures to so
clumsy an ally as Lord Everingham. But at the time he had been driven
into a corner through the furious jealousy of the Queen, who had
well-nigh staggered him.
His Eminence then did not know how to act. For the first time in his
life he had been completely outwitted by the events which he himself had
helped to bring about. They had shaped themselves in exact opposition to
his keenest expectations. How to part Wessex from Lady Ursula, with whom
his volatile Grace was probably by then more than half in love, became
an almost insolvable problem.
The Queen's ultimatum was almost a fiat. His Eminence saw himself and
his retinue ignominiously quitting the English Court and
returning--baffled, vanquished, humbled--to the throne of an infuriated
monarch, who never forgave and always knew how to punish.
In despair the Cardinal had turned to an ally. He knew that His Grace
was quite inaccessible. Towards all the foreign ambassadors the Duke of
Wessex was always ensconced behind a barrier of unbendable hauteur and
of frigid reserve. It would have been impossible to attack the lady of
his choice openly, and in offering his own help to Everingham His
Eminence vaguely hoped to arrive at some half-hidden mystery, a secret
perhaps in His Grace's life which would have helped him to strike in the
dark.
Then Fate interposed: exactly ten minutes too late, and when the
Cardinal had already saddled himself with an over-scrupulous,
vacillating, ultra-honest ally. He could not now throw him over without
endangering the success of his own schemes, and therefore brought all
his powers of dissimulation into play to effectually hide the impatience
which he felt.
The entrance of Don Miguel, Marquis de Suarez, created a diversion.
"Ah, my dear Marquis," said His Eminence, with a sigh of relief, "your
arrival is most opportune. I pray you help me to persuade Lord
Everingham that we are not scheming black treachery against His Grace of
Wessex."
Don Miguel came forward, a smile of the keenest satisfaction upon his
lips.
"Why treachery?" he said lightly.
But Everingham, having heard all that there was to know, was now in a
hurry to depart. Having made up his mind to go through with his purpose
to the end, he had but one wish--to turn his back upon the events which
he had helped to bring about, and let them take their course.
With it all he felt a keen antipathy for these two plotters who had
drawn him into their net. Whilst acting in concert with these Spaniards,
he had an overwhelming desire to insult them or throw his contempt in
their smooth, clever faces.
"Check and mate, my lord Cardinal," he said drily, as he took advantage
of His Eminence's absence of mind to bring the game to a successful
close. Then he rose to go. He was already booted and spurred for his
journey northwards, and had unhitched his sword-belt when settling down
to play. Whilst he was buckling it on again, Don Miguel approached him.
"I entreat you, milor, do not talk of treachery," said the young
Spaniard earnestly. "Believe me that in this matter, your conscience is
over-sensitive. After all, what does His Eminence propose? Only this,
that for a little while--a few days only perhaps--His Grace of Wessex
should be led to believe, through the testimony of his own eyes, that
the Lady Ursula Glynde is not altogether worthy to become Duchess of
Wessex. The wench Mirrab will play her part unconsciously, and therefore
to perfection. No one but His Grace shall be witness of the scene which
we propose to enact, and though his disenchantment will be complete, do
you think that he will greatly suffer thereby? Surely you do not imagine
that he has fallen seriously in love with Lady Ursula in one hour: his
own amour-propre will suffer a very transitory pang _et tout sera dit_."
"The Duke of Wessex will never break his heart or quarrel with a friend
for the sake of a woman," added the Cardinal in his smooth, gentle
voice.
"Like the bee, His Grace lingers over a flower only whilst he finds the
perfume sweet," continued Don Miguel. "If he thinks the Lady Ursula
false, he will turn to some other pretty maid with an indulgent smile
for woman's frailty."
All this sounded plausible enough, and Lord Everingham, at war with his
own conscience, was only too willing to be persuaded that he was in no
way wronging his friend. One scruple, however, still held him back and
would not be denied.
"There is one person in all this, my lord Marquis," he said, "whom I
notice you and His Eminence scarce trouble to think about."
"Who is that, milor?"
"The Lady Ursula Glynde!"
"Bah! What of her?"
"A girl's reputation, my lord, is in England held to be sacred."
"Why should her reputation suffer? Who will gossip of this affair? You?
I'll not believe it! His Grace of Wessex?--perish the thought. Nay! to
satisfy that over-sensitive conscience of yours, milor, may I remind
you that you are not pledged to secrecy. If on your return from Scotland
you find that the Lady Ursula's reputation has suffered in any way
through the little scheme which we purpose, you will be at liberty to
right the innocent and to confound the guilty. Is that not so, Your
Eminence?"
"You have said it, my son," replied the Cardinal.
"Well, are you satisfied, milor?" queried Don Miguel, who at an
impatient sign from the Cardinal was courteously leading Everingham
towards the door.
"I feel somewhat easier in my mind, perhaps," responded the young man.
"I dare admit that His Eminence and yourself are more right in your
surmises than I am. But I have the honour of calling His Grace of Wessex
my friend, and I have an earnest wish in my heart that I could stay
another twenty-four hours here, to see that no grievous harm come to him
from all this."
With a heavy sigh he finally took up his cloak and bade adieu to the two
Spaniards.
Don Miguel escorted him as far as the cloisters, until a servitor took
charge of his lordship. Then he turned back to the audience chamber,
where he found His Eminence sitting placidly in a high-backed arm-chair.
"Marry! this was the most unprofitable half-hour I have ever spent in my
life," quoth the Cardinal with a half-smothered yawn, and speaking in
his own native tongue. "These English are indeed impossible with their
scruples and their conscience, their friendships and their prejudices.
Carramba! what would become of Europe if such follies had to be pandered
to?"
"By the Mass! 'tis a mighty lucky chance which hath sent that blundering
young fool to the frozen kingdom of Scotland to-night," rejoined Don
Miguel with a laugh.
"Chance, my son, is an obedient slave and a cruel mistress. Let us yoke
her to our war-chariot whilst she seems amenable to our schemes. I'll
now retire to chapel and read my breviary there until Her Majesty hath
need of me for her evening orisons. Her curiosity will not allow her to
dispense with my services to-night, though she showed me the cold
shoulder throughout the banquet. There's a good deal which devolves upon
you, my son. Seek out His Grace of Wessex as soon as you can for the
special interview which we have planned. I pray you be light-hearted and
natural. It should not be a difficult task for Don Miguel de Suarez to
play the part of a young and callous reprobate. I, the while, will watch
my opportunity, and will have our dramatic little scene well in
rehearsal by the time the Duke retires to his own apartments. He must
cross this audience chamber to reach them. . . . There shall be no
garish light . . . only an open window and the moon if she will favour
us. . . . One short glimpse at the wench shall be sufficient. . . . I
will contrive that it be brief but decisive. . . . Your talk with His
Grace will have paved the way. . . . I will contrive . . . Chance will
aid me, but I _will_ contrive."
The voice was changed. It was no longer suave now, but harsh and
determined, cruel too in its slow, cold monotones. His Eminence paused
awhile, then said more quietly--
"What is the wench doing now?"
"Gazing in wrapt admiration at her own face in the mirror," replied Don
Miguel lightly, "and incessantly talking of the Duke of Wessex, whom she
vows she will see before the dawn. She mutters a good deal about the
stars, and some danger which she says threatens her dear lord. Ha! ha!
ha!"
His laugh sounded hoarse and bitter, and there was a glimmer of hatred
in his deep-set, dark Spanish eyes. There was obviously no love lost
here 'twixt His Grace and these schemers, for His Eminence's bland
unctuousness looked just now as dangerous as the younger man's hate.
"Does she talk intelligently?" asked the Cardinal.
"Intelligently? No!" quoth Don Miguel. "Awhile ago she talked
intelligibly enough, but three bumpers of heavy Spanish wine have addled
her feeble wits by now. I doubt me but the wench was always half crazed.
I thought so when I saw her in that booth, covered with tinsel and
uttering ridiculous incantations."
"She might prove dangerous too," remarked His Eminence softly.
"To the man who thwarted her--yes!"
"Then, if His Grace should find out the deception, and, mayhap, were
none too lenient with her, she would . . ."
He did not complete the sentence, and after a moment or two said
blandly--
"In either case, meseems, chance is bound to favour us. Our good
Pasquale shall see that the wench is provided with a short dagger, eh?
. . . of English make . . . and with unerring and . . . poisoned blade.
. . . What? . . ."
There was silence between the two men after that. The thought which now
reigned in both their minds was too dark to be put into more precise
words.
Don Miguel took up a cloak, which was lying on a chair, and wrapped it
round him. His Eminence drew a breviary from his pocket and settled
himself more comfortably in the high-backed chair. Don Miguel turned to
go, but at the door he paused and came back close to where the Cardinal
was sitting. Then he said quietly--
"Is Your Eminence prepared for _that_ eventuality too?"
"We must always be prepared for any eventuality, my son," replied the
Cardinal gently.
Then he became absorbed in his breviary, whilst Don Miguel slowly
strolled out of the room.
CHAPTER XX
DEPARTURE
Everingham could not leave the Palace without bidding farewell to
Wessex. For the first time in his life he wished to avoid his friend,
yet feared to arouse suspicion, mistrust--what not? in the heart of the
man whom he was so unwillingly helping to deceive. He half feared now
the frank and searching eyes which had always rested on him with
peculiar kindness and friendship; he almost dreaded having to grasp the
slender, aristocratic hand, which had ever been extended to him in
loyalty and truth.
Nevertheless in his heart there was no desire to draw back. During his
lengthy colloquy with His Eminence he had weighed all the consequences
of his own actions; though misguided perhaps as to the means, led away
by a stronger will than his own, his purpose was pure and his aim high;
and though he had tortured his brain with conjectures and fears, he
could not see any danger to Wessex in the intrigue devised against him.
As for Lady Ursula, he swore to himself that no harm should ultimately
come to her. She would be a tool, a necessary pawn in this game of
cross-purposes, which had the freedom and greatness of England for its
ultimate aim.
With a firm step Everingham reached the Great Hall, where one by one the
company was slowly dispersing. The Earl of Pembroke had gone to his
rooms to prepare for the journey; his friends were ready in the
Fountain Court to bid him a final farewell. Some of the younger men
were still whispering in groups in various parts of the hall, whilst
others were continuing their game of hazard.
Everingham took a rapid look round. There, in the embrasure on the dais,
Wessex was conversing with the Earl of Oxford, whilst faithful Harry
Plantagenet lay calmly sleeping at his feet. The Duke's grave face
lighted up at sight of his friend.
"I thought I should have missed you," he said, grasping the young man
warmly by the hand. "My lord of Oxford was just telling me that he
thought you would be starting anon."
"Should I have gone without your God-speed?"
"I trust not indeed. But your game of chess, meseems, must have been
very engrossing."
Lord Everingham felt himself changing colour. Fortunately his back was
to the light, and the Duke could not have seen the slight start of alarm
which followed his simple remark. In a flash Everingham had realized how
true had been His Eminence's conjecture. Wessex had already heard of the
interview in the audience chamber. The game of chess had undoubtedly
proved a useful explanation for so unusual an incident.
"Oh! His Eminence is passionately fond of the game," rejoined Everingham
as lightly as he could, "and I could not help but accede to his request
for a final battle of skill with him, since probably I may not see him
on my return."
But he felt His Grace's earnest eyes fixed searchingly upon him. A wild
longing seized him to throw off the mantle of diplomacy, which became
him so ill, and to give a word of timely warning to his friend. The
sight of the beautiful boarhound, so faithful, so watchful, at the feet
of his master, became almost intolerable to his overwrought mind.
Perhaps he would have spoken even now, at this eleventh hour, when from
the court outside there came the sharp sound of bugle-call.
Harry Plantagenet, roused from his light sleep, had pricked his ears.
"I fear me 'tis to horse, friend," said Wessex, with a light tone of
sadness, "Marry! it likes me not to see you depart. Harry Plantagenet
and I will miss you sorely in this dull place, and I will miss your
loyal hand amongst so many enemies."
"Enemies, my dear lord!" protested Everingham warmly. "Look around this
Great Hall at this moment. Now that the foreign ambassadors have
departed, do you see aught but friends? Nay more, adherents, partisans,
faithful subjects, an you choose," he added significantly.
"Friends to-day," mused His Grace, "enemies perhaps to-morrow."
"Impossible."
"Even if . . . But by the Lord Harry, this is no time to talk of my
affairs," rejoined Wessex light-heartedly. "Farewell, friends, and
God-speed. . . . Harry, make your bow to the most loyal man in
England--you'll not see his like until he return from Scotland. In your
ear, my dear lord, I pray you be not astonished if when that happy
eventuality occurs, you find me no longer a free man. Come, Harry, shall
we bid him adieu at the gates?"
He linked his arm in that of Everingham, the group of gentlemen parted
to let him pass, then closed behind him, and followed him and his friend
out of the hall. Every one was glad of a diversion from the oppressive
atmosphere of the last few hours. Many murmured: "God bless Your Grace!"
as he passed through the brilliant assembly exchanging a word, a merry
jest with his friends, a courteous bow or gracious smile with the casual
acquaintances.
His popularity at this moment was at its height. Nothing would have
caused greater joy in England than the announcement of his plighted
troth to the Queen. Yet if these gentlemen, who so eagerly pressed round
him as he escorted his dearest friend through the hall, had been gifted
with the knowledge of their fellow-creatures' innermost thoughts, they
might have read in His Grace's heart the opening chapters of a romance
which would have changed their enthusiasm into bitter disappointment.
They would have seen that in that heart, wherein they hoped to see their
Queen enthroned, there now reigned a dainty image, that of a young girl
dressed in shimmering white, with ruddy golden hair falling loosely
about her shoulders, and deep, dark eyes, now blue, now grey, now
inscrutably black, the mirrors of a pure, innocent, joyous soul within.
As for Everingham, all his desire to warn Wessex had vanished with the
latter's lightly spoken allusion to the incident of this afternoon. He
was now only conscious of a desire to get away, and thus leave events to
shape their course according to the dictates of my lord Cardinal.
Everything was ready for the departure. The gentlemen who composed the
mission sent by Mary Tudor to the Queen Regent of Scotland were
proceeding to Edinburgh by water. They would ride to Greenwich to-night,
then embark in the early dawn.
The horses were pawing the ground impatiently; every one had assembled
in the Fountain Court, which presented an animated and picturesque
spectacle, with the crowd of servants and the numerous retinue which was
to accompany the Earl of Pembroke to Scotland. A number of torch-bearers
lent fantastic aspect to the scene, for a lively breeze had sprung up,
blowing the fitful flames hither and thither, bringing into bold relief
now the richly caparisoned steed of one of the noblemen, now the steel
helmets of the military escort, anon throwing everything into deep,
impenetrable shadow whilst touching with weird, red light some
grotesque vane or leaden waterspout on the walls of the Palace.
The Earl of Pembroke took a long farewell from His Grace of Wessex.
Himself one of the most fervent adherents of the Duke, he was longing
for a word, a promise however vague, that the much-desired alliance
would indeed soon take place.
Wessex lingered some time beside Everingham. He seemed strangely loath
to part from his fondest friend just now. The crowd around him were
chattering merrily, the young men feeling the usual, natural
exhilaration of manhood at sight of this goodly cavalcade, and the sound
of clattering arms, the champing of bits, and quick, sharp calls to
assemble.
Then, at a given moment, one of the bays of King Henry's presence
chamber was thrown open, and the Queen herself appeared at the window. A
shout of welcome was raised, such as could only come from faithful and
loyal hearts.
Mary was surrounded by some of her ladies. The strong light of the room
was behind her, so that she appeared as a silhouette, dignified, rather
stiff in her corseted panier of rich brocade, her head slightly bent
forward as if in anxious search of some one in the crowd.
"God bless our Queen," said the Duke of Wessex loudly, and the words
were taken up again and again by two hundred lusty throats, gentlemen
and servants all alike, and the cry echoed against the massive walls of
old Hampton Court like a solemn prayer.
Not a few voices then added: "God bless His Grace of Wessex!" The Queen
had recognized the Duke's voice. When she heard this second cry, every
one noticed that she pressed her hand to her heart, as if overcome with
emotion. Then she waved an adieu from the window and hastily retired
within.
The signal for departure was given. A few belated gentlemen quickly
sprang to the stirrup--Everingham being among the last. With a deafening
noise of clattering steel the military escort led the way, the halberds
gleaming like tongues of flame in the torchlight as the men-at-arms
lowered them in order to pass through the gates.
Then followed the Earl of Pembroke with Lord Everingham by his side, and
the other gentlemen of the mission in close proximity. The retinue of
servants and another detachment of men-at-arms completed the cortege.
Some of the younger men followed the cavalcade on foot through the gate
and thence across the Base Court, even as far as the bridge and beyond.
The older ones, however, began to disperse. With a sigh, the Duke of
Wessex called to his dog, who had followed the exciting proceedings with
the keenest canine enthusiasm.
"Ah, Harry, old friend!" he said with a tinge of sadness. "Why did not
Providence fashion my Grace into some humbler personality? You and I
would have been the happier, methinks."
Harry Plantagenet yawned ostentatiously in acquiescence, then he
blinked, and seemed to say, as if in echo of his master's thoughts--
"Marry! but there are compensations, you know!"
"Only since this afternoon!" commented His Grace under his breath, as he
finally turned his steps in the direction of his own apartments.
CHAPTER XXI
THE BLACK KNIGHT
As the Duke of Wessex was crossing one of the large rooms of the wing
which divides the old Fountain Court from the Cloister Green, he
suddenly heard himself called by name.
"Luck favours me indeed," said a voice from out the gloom. "His Grace of
Wessex an I mistake not."
At this hour of the evening these rooms were usually deserted, and left
but dimly illumined by a few wax tapers placed in tall, many-armed
candelabra, the flickering light of which failed to penetrate into the
distant corners of the vast, panelled chambers. Wessex could only see
the dim outline of a man coming towards him.
"At your service, fair sir, whoever you may be," he responded lightly,
"but by the Mass! meseems you must claim kinship with the feline species
to be able to distinguish my unworthy self in the dark."
"Nay! 'twas my wish which fathered my thoughts. I had hoped to meet Your
Grace here, and was on the look out."
"The Marquis de Suarez," rejoined Wessex, as the young Spaniard now came
within the circle of light projected by the candelabra. "You wished to
speak with me, sir?"
"I would claim this privilege of Your Grace's courtesy."
"Indeed, I am ever at your service," replied the Duke, not a little
astonished at the request.
Since his first meeting with Don Miguel at East Molesey Fair he had only
exchanged a very few words with the Spaniard, and the latter seemed even
to have purposely avoided him during the past few days. To this His
Grace had paid no attention. The foreign envoys at present staying in
the Palace were exceedingly antipathetic to him, and beyond the social
amenities of Court life he had held no intercourse with any of them.
Rivals all of them, they nevertheless joined issue with one another in
their hostile attitude towards the man, who was the formidable
stumbling-block to all their diplomatic intrigues.
The Duke himself, in spite of his haughty aloofness from party politics,
knew full well how great was the enmity which his personality aroused in
the minds of all the strangers at Mary's court.
He was certainly much more amused than disturbed by this generally
hostile attitude towards himself, and many a time did the various
ambassadors have to suffer, with seeming good-nature, the pointed and
caustic shafts aimed at them by His Grace's ready wit.
No wonder, therefore, that Wessex looked with some suspicion on this
sudden change of front on the part of one of his most avowed
antagonists.
"How can I have the honour of serving an envoy of the King of Spain?" he
continued lightly.
But Don Miguel appeared in no hurry to speak. His manner seemed to have
completely altered. As a rule he was a perfect model of self-possession
and easy confidence, with just a reflection of his distinguished
chief's, the Cardinal's, own suavity of manner apparent in all his ways.
Now he was obviously ill at ease, shy and nervous, and with a marked
desire to be frank, yet too bashful to give vent to so boyish an
outburst.
There was in his dark eyes, too, a look almost of appeal towards the
Duke to meet his sudden access of friendliness half-way. All this Wessex
had already noticed with the one quick glance which he cast at the young
Spaniard. He motioned him to a chair and himself leant lightly against
the edge of the table.
Don Miguel took this to be an encouragement to proceed.
"Firstly, your Grace's pardon if I should unwillingly transgress," he
began.
"My pardon?" rejoined the Duke, much amused at the Marquis' obvious
embarrassment. "'Tis yours already. But how transgress?"
"By the asking of a question which Your Grace might deem indiscreet."
"Nay, my lord," quoth the Duke gaily, "no question need be indiscreet,
though answers often are."
"Your Grace is pleased to laugh . . . but in this case . . . I . . .
that is . . . I hardly know how to put it . . . yet I would assure Your
Grace . . ."
"By Our Lady, man!" cried Wessex with a slight show of impatience,
"assure me no assurances, but tell me what you wish to say."
"Well then! since I have Your Grace's leave. . . . My object is this.
. . . Court gossip has it that you are affianced to the Lady Ursula
Glynde."
The Duke did not reply. Don Miguel looked up and saw a quaint smile
hovering round His Grace's lips. The young Spaniard, though an earnest
and even proficient reader of other men's thoughts, did not quite
understand the meaning of that smile: it seemed wistful yet triumphant,
full of gaiety and yet with a suspicion of that strange and delicious
melancholy, which is never quite inseparable from a great happiness.
But as he seemingly was meeting with no rebuff, the Marquis continued
more boldly--
"And . . . but Your Grace must really pardon me. . . . I hardly know
how to put it so as not to appear impertinent . . . but 'tis also said
that you do not wish to claim the lady's hand."
"Marry! . . ." rejoined the Duke with a laugh. Then he paused, as if in
the act of recalling his somewhat roving thoughts, and said more
coldly--
"You must pardon me, my lord, if I do not quite perceive in what manner
this may concern you."
"I pray Your Grace to have patience with me yet a while longer. I will
explain my purpose directly. For the moment I will entreat you, an you
will, to answer my question. It is a matter of serious moment to me, and
you would render me eternally your debtor."
None knew better in these days than did the high-born Spaniards, all the
many little tricks of voice and gesture which go to make up the abstruse
and difficult art of diplomacy. Don Miguel at this juncture looked so
frank, so boyish, and withal so earnest, that the Duke of
Wessex--himself the soul of truth and candour--never even suspected that
the young man was but playing a part and enacting a scene, which he had
rehearsed under the skilful management of His Eminence the Spanish
Cardinal.
Wessex, ever ready to see the merry side of life, ever ready for gaiety
and brightness, felt completely disarmed, glad enough to lay aside the
cold reserve which the foreign envoys themselves had called forth in
him. He liked the Marquis under this new semblance of boyish
guilelessness, and returned his tone of deferential frankness with one
of easy familiarity.
"The question, my lord, is somewhat difficult to answer," he said with
mock seriousness, the while a gay laugh was dancing in his eyes. "You
see, there are certain difficulties in the way. The Lady Ursula is a
Glynde . . . and all the Glyndes have brown eyes. . . . Now at this
moment I feel as if I could never love a brown eye again."
"The Lady Ursula is very beautiful," rejoined the Spaniard.
"Possibly--but you surprise me."
"Your Grace has never seen her?"
"Never, since she was out of her cradle."
"I have the advantage of Your Grace, then."
"You know her, my lord? . . ."
"Intimately!" said Don Miguel, with what seemed an irresistible impulse.
Then he checked his enthusiasm with a visible effort, and stammered with
a return of his previous nervousness--
"That is . . . I . . ."
"Yes?" queried the Duke.
"That is the purport of my importunity, my lord," said the young man,
springing to his feet and speaking once more in tones of noble candour.
"I would have asked Your Grace that, since you do not know the Lady
Ursula, since you have no wish to claim her hand, if some one else
. . ."
"If the Lady Ursula honoured some one else than my unworthy self. . . .
Is that your meaning, my lord?" queried Wessex, as Don Miguel had made a
slight pause in his impetuous speech.
"If I . . ."
"You, my lord?"
"I would wish to know if I should be offending Your Grace?"
"Offending me?" cried Wessex joyfully. "Nay, my lord, why were you so
long in telling me this gladsome news? . . . Offending me? . . . you
have succeeded in taking a load from my conscience, my dear Marquis. So
you love the Lady Ursula Glynde? . . . Ye heavens! what a number of
circumlocutions to arrive at this simple little fact! You love her . . .
she is very beautiful . . . and she loves you. Where did you first see
her, my lord?"
"At East Molesey Fair. . . . Your Grace intervened . . . you must
remember!"
"Most inopportunely, meseems. I must indeed crave your pardon. And since
then?"
"The acquaintanceship, perhaps somewhat unpleasantly begun, has ripened
into . . . friendship."
"And thence into love! Nay, you have my heartiest congratulations, my
lord. The Glyndes are famous for their virtue, and since the Lady Ursula
is beautiful, why! your Court will indeed be graced by such a pattern of
English womanhood."
"Oh!" said the Spaniard, with a quick gesture of deprecation.
"Nay! you must have no fear, my lord. Since you have honoured me by
consulting my feelings in the matter, it shall be my pride and my
delight to further your cause, and that of the Lady Ursula . . . if
indeed she will deign to express her wishes to me. . . . I hereby give
you a gentleman's word of honour that I consider the promise, which she
made to her father in her childhood, in no way binding upon her now.
. . . As for the future, I swear that I will obtain Her Majesty's
consent to your immediate marriage."
"Nay! I pray you, not so fast!" laughed Don Miguel lightly. "Neither the
Lady Ursula nor I have need of Her Majesty's consent. . . ."
"But methought----"
"'Twas not I who spoke of marriage, remember!"
"Then you have completely bewildered me, my lord," rejoined Wessex with
a sudden frown. "I understood----"
"That I am the proudest of men, certainly," quoth Don Miguel with a
sarcastic curl of his sensual lip, "but 'twas Your Grace who spoke of
the lady's virtue. I merely wished to know if I should be offending
Your Grace if . . ."
He laughed and shrugged his shoulders. The laugh grated unpleasantly on
Wessex' ear, and the gesture savoured of impertinence. The Marquis'
manner had suddenly undergone a change, which caused the Duke's every
nerve to tingle.
"If what?" he queried curtly. "The devil! sir, cannot you say what you
do mean?"
"Why should I," replied the Spaniard, "since your Grace has already
guessed? You will own that I have acted _en galant homme_, by thinking
of your wishes. You will not surely desire to champion that much-vaunted
virtue of the Glyndes."
"Then what you mean, sir, is that . . ."
"I cannot speak more plainly, my lord, for that among gentlemen is quite
impossible. But rumours fly about quickly at Court, and I feared that
Your Grace might have caught one, ere I had the chance of assuring you
that I recognize the priority of your claim. But now you tell me that
you have no further interest in the lady, so I am reassured. . . . We
foreigners, you know, take passing pleasures more lightly than you
serious-minded English . . . and if the lady be unattached . . . and
more than willing . . . why should we play the part of Joseph? . . . a
ridiculous role at best, eh, my lord? . . . and one, I think, which Your
Grace would ever disdain to play. . . . As for me, I am quite reassured
. . . Au revoir to Your Grace. . . ."
And before Wessex had time to utter another word, Don Miguel, still
laughing, went out of the room.
The Duke felt a little bewildered. The conversation had gone through
such a sudden transition, that at the time, he had hardly realized
whether it touched him deeply or not.
Owing to Ursula's girlish little ruse, he was totally unaware of her
identity with the lady who had been the subject of this very distasteful
discussion. To him Lady Ursula Glynde was both unknown and
uninteresting. His meeting with beautiful, exquisite "Fanny" had driven
all thoughts of other women from his mind.
But with all his volatile disposition, where women were concerned, the
Duke of Wessex was nevertheless imbued with a strong and romantic
feeling of chivalry towards the entire sex, and Don Miguel's disdainful
allusions to the lady who might have been Duchess of Wessex had left his
finger-tips itching with the desire to throw his glove in the impudent
rascal's face.
Harry Plantagenet, who throughout the interview had openly expressed his
disapproval of his master's interlocutor, gave an impatient little
whine. He longed for the privacy of his own apartments, the warmth of
the rugs laid out specially for him.
"Harry, old friend!" said Wessex thoughtfully, "what the devil, think
you, that young reprobate meant?"
He took the dog's beautiful head between his hands and looked straight
into the honest, faithful eyes of his dear and constant companion.
"Marry!" he continued more lightly, "you may well look doubtful, you
wise philosopher, for you know the Glyndes as well as I do. You remember
old Lady Annabel, whose very look would stop your tail from wagging, and
Charles, stodgy, silent, serious Charles, who never drank, never
laughed, had probably never seen a woman's ankle in his life. And then
the Lady Ursula . . . a Glynde . . . do you mind me, old Harry? . . .
therefore as ugly, as a combination of virtue and Scotch descent can
make any woman. . . . Yet, if I caught the rascal's meaning, neither
Scotch descent nor ill looks have proved a shield for the lady's virtue!
. . . Well, 'tis no business of ours, is it, old Harry? Let us live and
let live. . . . Perhaps Lady Ursula is not ugly . . . perchance that
unpleasant-looking Spaniard doth truly love her . . . and who are we,
Harry, you and I, that we should prove censorious? Let us to our
apartments, friend, and meditate on woman's frailty and on our own . . .
especially on our own . . . we are mere male creatures, and women are so
adorable! even when they bristle with virtues like a hedgehog . . . but
like him too, are cushioned beneath those bristles with a hundred
charming, fascinating sins. . . . Come along, friend, and let us
meditate why sin . . . sin of a certain type, remember, should be so
enchantingly tempting."
Harry Plantagenet was a philosopher. He had seen his master in this kind
of mood before. He wagged his tail as if to express his approval of the
broad principles thus submitted for his consideration, but at the same
time he showed a distinct desire that his master should talk less and
come more speedily to bed.
CHAPTER XXII
THE WHITE QUEEN
Wessex after a while was ready enough to dismiss the unpleasant subject.
Perhaps he had no right to be censorious or to resent the Spaniard's
somewhat unusual attitude. In England, undoubtedly, a gentleman would
never--except under very special circumstances--allude to any passing
liaison he might have with a lady of his own rank. That was a strict
code of honour which had existed from time immemorial, even in the days
of King Harry's youth, when the virtue of high-born women had been but
little thought of.
Abroad, perhaps, it was different. Spaniards, just then, were noted for
the light way in which they regarded the favours of the fair sex, and
Don Miguel's code of honour had evidently prompted him to consult
Wessex' wishes in the matter of his own intrigue. Loyalty to their own
sex is perhaps, on the whole, more general in men than is their chivalry
towards women, and perhaps the Marquis' feelings would have revolted at
the thought of seeing a lady of such light virtue in the position of
Duchess of Wessex.
Be that as it may, His Grace had no wish to probe the matter further;
with a shrug of the shoulders he dismissed it from his thoughts, whilst
registering a vow to chastise the young blackguard if his impertinence
showed signs of recurrence.
He was on the point of yielding to his faithful Harry's canine appeals
by allowing him to lead the way towards his own distant lodgings, when
his ear suddenly caught the sound of a silk dress rustling somewhere,
not far from where he stood.
At the end of the room closest to him, a few steps led up to a gallery,
which ran along the wall, finally abutting at a door, which gave access
to the Duchess of Lincoln's and other ladies' lodgings. The rustle of a
silk skirt seemed to come from there.
Perhaps Wessex would not have taken notice of it, except that his every
thought was filled with a strange excitement since the rencontre of the
afternoon. At times now he felt as if his very senses ached with the
longing to see once more that entrancing, girlish figure, dressed all in
white and crowned with the halo of her exquisite golden hair, to hear
once more the sound of that fresh young voice, that merry, childlike
laugh, through which there vibrated the thrill of a newly awakened
passion.
Since he had met her he was conscious of a wonderful change in himself.
He did not even analyse his feelings: he knew that he loved her now:
that, in a sense, he had always loved her, for his poetic and romantic
temperament had ever been in search of that perfect type of womanhood,
which she seemed so completely to embody in herself.
He had only spoken to her for about half an hour, then had sat opposite
to her in a boat among the reeds, in the cool of the afternoon, with the
lazy river gently rocking the light skiff, and the water birds for sole
witnesses of his happiness. They had hardly exchanged a word then, for
he had enjoyed the delight--dear to every man who loves--of watching the
blushes come and go upon her cheek in response to his ardent gaze. What
did words matter? the music in their souls supplied all that they wished
to say.
And he--who had been deemed so fickle, who had made of love a pastime,
taking what joys women would give him with a grateful yet transient
smile, His Grace of Wessex, in fact, who had loved so often yet so
inconstantly--knew now that the stern little god, who will not for long
brook defiance of his laws, had wounded him for life or death at last.
And even now, when he heard the rustle of a kirtle, he paused
instinctively, vaguely, madly hoping that chance, and the great wild
longing which was in him, had indeed drawn her footsteps hither.
The door above, at the end of the gallery, was tentatively opened.
Wessex could see nothing, for those distant corners of the room were in
complete darkness, but he heard a voice, low and sweet, humming the
little ditty which she, his queen, had sung this afternoon.
"Disdaine me not that am your own,
Refuse me not that am so true,
Mistrust me not till all be knowen,
Forsake me not now for no new."
She walked slowly along the gallery, and paused not far from the top of
the short flight of oak steps. She seemed to be hesitating a little, as
if afraid to venture farther into the large, dimly lighted hall.
The flicker of the tall wax tapers now caught her dainty figure, casting
golden lights and deep, ruddy shadows on her fair young face and on the
whiteness of her gown. In her arms she held an enormous sheaf of pale
pink monthly roses, the spoils of the garden, lavish in its autumnal
glory.
Never had Wessex--fastidious, fickle, insouciant Wessex--seen anything
more radiant, more exquisite, more poetic than this apparition which
came towards him like the realization of all his maddest dreams.
For one moment more he lingered, his ardent, passionate soul was loath
to give up these heaven-born seconds spent in looking at her. Her eyes
shone darkly in the gleam of the candle light and had wondrous
reflections in them, which looked ruddy and hot; her delicately
chiselled features were suffused with a strange glow, which seemed to
come from within; and her lips were slightly parted, moist and red like
some ripe summer fruit. From her whole person there came an exhalation
of youth and womanhood, of purity and soul-stirring passion.
"Come down, sweet singer," said Wessex to her at last.
She gave a startled little cry, leant over the balustrade, and the sheaf
of flowers dropped from her arms, falling in a long cascade of leaves
and blossoms, rose-coloured and sweet-scented, at his feet.
"Ah, Your Grace frightened me!" she whispered, with just a touch of
feminine coquetry. "I . . . I . . . didn't know you were here."
"I swear you did not, sweet saint . . . but now . . . as I am here . . .
come down quickly ere I perish with longing for a nearer sight of your
dear eyes."
"But my flowers," she said, with a sudden access of timidity, brought
forth by the thrilling ardour of his voice. "I had picked them for Her
Majesty's oratory."
"Nay! let them all wither save one . . . which I will take from your
hand. Come down. . . ."
One of the roses had remained fixed in the stiff fold of her panier. She
took it between her fingers and sighed.
"Oh! I dare not," she said sadly. "Your Grace does not know,--cannot
guess, what dire disgrace would befall me if I did."
"Perish the thought of disgrace," rejoined Wessex gaily. "Marry! the
saints in Paradise must come down from heaven sometimes, else the world
would be consumed by its own wickedness. Come down," he added more
earnestly, seized with a mad, ungovernable desire to clasp her to his
heart, "come down, or I swear that I'll bring you down in my arms."
"No . . . no . . . no!" she protested, alarmed at his vehemence. "I'll
come down."
With a quaintly mischievous gesture she flung the rose at him; it hit
him in the face, then fell; he had perforce to stoop in order to pick it
up. When he once more straightened his tall figure she was standing
quite close to him.
There she was, just as he had always thought of her, even as a boy when
first he began to dream. She, the perfect woman whom one day he would
meet, and on that day would love wholly, passionately, humbly, and
proudly, his own and yet his queen; she the most perfect product of
Nature, with just that tone of gold in her hair, just those eyes, so
inscrutable, so full of colour, so infinite in their variety; not very
tall, but graceful and slender, with her dainty head on a level with his
shoulder, her fair young forehead on a level with his lips.
Now that she was so near, he was as if turned to stone. The wild longing
was still in him to clasp her in his arms, to hold her closely, tenderly
to his heart, yet he would not have touched her for a kingdom.
But as he looked at her he knew that she, herself, would come to him in
all her purity, her innocence . . . soon . . . to-day perhaps . . . but
certainly one day . . . and that she would come with every fibre in her
entire being vibrating in responsive passion to him.
She looked up at him shyly, tentatively. His very soul went out to her
as he returned her gaze. A great and glorious exultation thrilled every
fibre of her being. She knew that she had conquered, that the love which
in her girlish heart she had kept for him had borne fruit a
thousandfold. Her heart seemed to stop beating at the immensity of her
happiness.
But woman-like, she was more self-possessed than he was.
"I must not stay," she said gravely and with only an imperceptible
quiver in her voice. "I am in disgrace, you know . . . for that stroll
on the river . . . with you . . . this afternoon."
"Why? what happened?" he asked with a smile.
She held up her little hand and counted on her fingers.
"Number one, a frown and a colder shoulder from Her Majesty! Two, a
lecture from Her Grace of Lincoln! Twenty minutes! Three, four, and
five, pin-pricks from the ladies and a lonely supper in my room
to-night."
He loved her in this gayer mood which made her seem so young and
childlike.
"Could you not have contrived to let me know?"
"Why? . . . What would you have done?"
"Made it less lonely for you."
"You are doing that now. I thought I should be alone the rest of the
evening. Her Grace of Lincoln and the others are at prayers with Her
Majesty. I was confined to that room up there. How is it Your Grace
happened to be in this hall just when I came out?"
"A moth is always to be found where the light happens to be," he replied
gravely.
"But how did you know I should be here?"
"My eyes, since this afternoon, see you constantly where you are
not--how could they fail to see you where you are?"
"Then, as Your Grace has seen me . . ." she added with timid
nervousness, seeing that he now stood between her and the steps, "will
you allow me to go up again?"
"No."
"I entreat!" she pleaded.
"Impossible."
"Her Grace of Lincoln will be looking for me."
"Then stay here with me until she does."
"What to do?" she queried innocently.
"To make me happy."
"Happy?" she laughed merrily. "Ho! ho! ho! How can I, a humble
waiting-maid, manage to make His Grace of Wessex happy?"
"By letting me look at you."
With quaint and artless coquetry she picked up the folds of her heavy
brocaded paniers, right and left, with two delicate fingers, and
executed a dainty pirouette in front of him.
"There!" she said merrily, "'tis done. . . . And now?"
"By letting me whisper to you . . ." he murmured.
She drew back quickly, and said with mock severity--
"That which I must not hear."
"Why not?"
"Because Your Grace is not free," she rejoined archly. "Not free to
whisper anything in any woman's ear, save in that of Lady Ursula
Glynde."
"Then you guessed what I would have whispered to you?"
"Perhaps."
"What was it?"
She veiled the glory of her eyes with their fringe of dark lashes.
"That you loved me . . ." she murmured, "for the moment. . . ."
How irresistible she was, with just that soupcon of coquetry to whet the
desire of this fastidious man of the world, and with it all so free from
artifice, so young and fresh and pure:--a madonna, yet made to tempt
mankind.
"Nay! if you would let me, sweet saint, I would whisper in your tiny ear
that I worship you!" he said in all sincerity and truth, and with the
ring of an ardent passion in every tone of his voice.
"Worship me? . . ." she queried in mock astonishment, "and Your Grace
does not even know who I am."
"Faith! but I do. You are the most beautiful woman on this earth."
"Oh! . . . but my name! . . ."
"Nay! as to that I care not . . . You shall tell it me anon, if you
like. . . . For the moment I love to think of you as I first beheld you
in the garden this afternoon--a fairy or sprite . . . I know not which
. . . an angel mayhap . . . in your robes of white, surrounded with
flowers and dark bosquets of hazelnut and of yew, with golden tints of
ruddy autumn around you, less glorious than your hair. Let me worship
blindly . . . fettered . . . your slave."
She sighed, a quaint little sigh, which had a tinge of melancholy in it.
"For how long?" she murmured.
"For my whole life," he replied earnestly. "Will you not try me?"
"How?"
"You love me, sweet saint?"
"I . . ." she began shyly.
"Let me look into your eyes. . . . I will find my answer."
Her arms dropped by her side, she looked up and met his eyes, ardent,
burning with passion, fixed longingly upon her. He came close to her,
quite close, his presence thrilled her; she closed her eyes in order to
shut out from her innermost soul everything from the outside world, save
the exquisite feeling of her newly awakened love.
"Now, see how perverse I am," he whispered passionately. "I do not want
you to tell me anything just now . . . open your eyes, dear saint . . .
for I but want to stand like this . . . and read in their blue depths
. . . enjoying every fraction of a second of this heavenly moment.
. . ."
She tried to speak, but instinctively he stopped her.
"No . . . no . . . do not speak. . . . And yet . . . 'tis from your
sweet lips I'd have my final answer."
He took her in his arms. She lay against him, unresisting, her sweet
face turned up to his, soul meeting soul at last in the ecstasy of a
first kiss. He held her to his heart. It seemed as if he could never let
her go from him again. Everything was forgotten, the world had ceased to
be. For him there was but one woman on this earth, and she was his own.
CHAPTER XXIII
CHECK TO THE QUEEN
How long they stood thus, heart to heart, they themselves could never
have said. The sound of many voices in the near distance roused them
from their dream. Ursula started in alarm.
"Holy Virgin!" she exclaimed under her breath, "if it should be the
Queen!"
But Wessex held her tightly, and she struggled in vain.
"Nay! then let the whole Court see that I hold my future wife in my
arms," he said proudly.
But with an agitated little cry she contrived to escape him. He seemed
much amused at her nervousness; what had she to fear? was she not his
own, to protect even from the semblance of ill? But Ursula, now fully
awakened to ordinary, everyday surroundings, was fearful lest her own
innocent little deception should be too crudely, too suddenly unmasked.
She had so earnestly looked forward to the moment when she would say to
him that she in sooth was none other than Lady Ursula Glynde, the woman
whom every conventionality had decreed that he should marry, and
whom--because of these conventionalities--he had secretly but certainly
disliked.
Her woman's heart had already given her a clear insight into the
character and the foibles of the man she loved. His passion for her now,
sincere and great though it was, was partly dependent on that atmosphere
of romance which his poetical temperament craved for, and which had
surrounded the half-mysterious personality of exquisite, irresistible
"Fanny."
Instinctively she dreaded the rough hand of commonplace, that ugly,
coarse destroyer of poetic idylls. A few hastily uttered words might
shatter in an hour the mystic shrine wherein Wessex had enthroned her.
She had meant to tell him soon, to-morrow perhaps, perhaps only after a
few days, but she wished to find her own time for this, when he knew her
inner soul better, and the delicate cobwebs of this great
love-at-first-sight had fallen away from his eyes.
She could not altogether have explained to herself why a sudden
disclosure of her identity at this moment would have been peculiarly
unpleasant to her. It was a weak, childish feeling no doubt. But such as
it was, it was real, and strong, and genuine.
Barely a minute had elapsed whilst these quick thoughts and fears went
wildly coursing through her mind. There was no time to tell him
everything now. The voices came from the next room, within the next few
seconds probably the great door would be open to admit a group of
people: the Duchess of Lincoln and the ladies mayhap, or the Queen on
her way to chapel. And His Grace of Wessex looked terribly determined.
"No! no! no!--not just this moment, sweet Grace," she entreated, "by
your love! not _just_ this moment. . . . The Queen would be so angry
. . . oh! not _just_ now!"
She looked so genuinely disturbed, and so tenderly appealing, that he
could not help but obey.
"But you cannot send me away like this," he urged. "Another word, sweet
saint. . . . Faith! I could not live without another kiss. . . ."
"No, no, no, I entreat Your Grace . . . not to-night," she protested
feebly.
He thought, however, that he detected a sign of yielding in her voice,
although she was already beginning to mount the steps ready for flight.
"Just one tiny word," he whispered hurriedly: "when the Queen has passed
through, linger up there for one brief minute only. I'll wait in there!"
And he pointed to a small door close behind him, which led to an inner
closet at right angles with the gallery. Before she had time to
protest--nay! perhaps she had no wish to refuse--he had disappeared
behind its heavy panels, quickly calling to his dog to follow him. But
in that one moment's hesitation, those few brief and delicious words
hastily exchanged, she had lost her opportunity for escape.
The next instant the door at the further end of the room was thrown
open, and the Queen entered followed by some of her ladies. She was
accompanied by the Duchess of Lincoln, and His Eminence the Cardinal de
Moreno was on her left.
As chance or ill-luck would have it, the first sight which greeted Her
Majesty's eyes was the figure of Lady Ursula, midway up the steps which
led to the gallery, some mysterious imp of mischief having contrived
that the light from the wax tapers should unaccountably and very vividly
fall upon the white-clad form of the young girl. An exclamation of stern
reproval from Her Grace of Lincoln brought Ursula to a standstill.
Flight now was no longer possible; she could but trust in her guardian
angel, or in any of those protective genii who have in their keeping the
special care of lovers in distress, and who happened to be hovering
nigh.
It was not seemly to be half-way up a flight of stairs when Her Majesty
was standing on the floor below. Ursula, with her cheeks aflame with
vexation, slowly descended, whilst encountering as boldly as she could
the artillery fire of half a dozen pairs of eyes fixed steadily upon
her.
Mary Tudor looked coldly severe, Her Grace of Lincoln horror-struck, His
Eminence ironical, and the ladies vastly amused.
"Ah, child!" said Her Majesty, in her iciest tone of voice, "all alone,
and in this part of the Palace?"
She looked the dainty young figure disdainfully up and down, then her
eye caught the sheaf of roses lying in a fragrant tangle close to the
foot of the stairs. There was a quick flash of anger in her face, then a
frown. Ursula wondered how much she guessed or what she suspected.
But the Queen, after that one quick wave of passionate wrath, made an
obvious effort to control herself. She turned composedly to the Duchess
of Lincoln.
"Your Grace is aware," she said drily, "that I deem it most indecorous
for my maids-of-honour to wander about the Palace alone."
The wrinkled old face of the kindly Duchess expressed the most heartfelt
sorrow.
"I crave Your Majesty's humble pardon . . ." she stammered in an agony
of misery at this public reproof. "I . . ."
"Nay, Duchess, I know the difficulty of your task," rejoined Mary Tudor
bitingly, "the other ladies are docile, and their behaviour is maidenly
and chaste. 'Tis not always so with the Lady Ursula Glynde."
Mary's voice had been so trenchant and hard that it seemed to Ursula's
sensitive ears as if its metallic tones must have penetrated to every
corner of the Palace. She gave a quick, terrified look towards the door,
longing with all her might for the gift to see through its massive
panels--to know what went on within that inner closet, where Wessex was
waiting and must have heard.
One pair of eyes, however, had caught that swift glance, and noted the
sudden obvious fright which accompanied it. His Eminence had not taken
his piercing eyes from off the young girl's face; he had seen every
movement of the delicate nostril, every quiver of the eyelid.
What Mary Tudor only half suspected, what the good old Duchess could not
even conjecture, that His Eminence had already more than guessed.
The delicate, rosy blush which suffused the young girl's cheeks, that
indescribable something which emanated from her entire personality, the
half-withered roses, all told their tale to this experienced
diplomatist, accustomed to read his fellow-creatures' thoughts. Then
that quick, apprehensive look towards the door had confirmed his every
surmise.
"She has seen His Grace. . . . He is closeted in there!" were his
immediate mental deductions. And whilst Ursula met Her Majesty's cold
glances with as much boldness as she could command, and Her Grace of
Lincoln lost herself in a maze of abject apologies, His Eminence,
seemingly unconcerned, edged up to the low door, keeping the lock and
handle thereof well in view.
"I crave Your Majesty's indulgence for the child," the Duchess of
Lincoln was muttering. "She meant no harm, I'll take my oath on that,
and she will, I know, return at once to her room, there to grieve over
Your Majesty's disapproval of her. She----"
"Nay, Duchess," interrupted the Queen sternly, "repentance is far from
Lady Ursula's thoughts, and her behaviour is not the thoughtlessness of
a moment."
"Your Majesty . . ." protested the Duchess, whilst Ursula threw her head
back in token of proud denial.
"The rumour has already reached us," continued Mary, "of a
maid-of-honour's strange wanderings at night and in disguise outside the
purlieus of the Palace, and that the maiden who so far forgot her rank
and her modesty was none other than the Lady Ursula Glynde."
Again that quick apprehensive glance directed towards the closet door at
mention of her name, a glance unseen by any one present save by His
Eminence's watchful eyes. To him it had revealed all that he wished to
know, whilst the Queen, blinded by her own jealousy, saw nothing but a
rival whom she desired to humiliate.
"Wessex is behind that door . . ." mused His Eminence. "She starts every
time her name is uttered . . . ergo, he made love to her without knowing
who she is."
It was natural and simple. The very logical sequence of a series of
co-ordinated thoughts, together with a shrewd knowledge of human nature.
How this little incident would affect his own immediate plans His
Eminence had not yet conjectured. That it would prove of vast
importance, he was never for a moment in doubt. Therefore, at a moment
when every one's eyes were fixed upon the Queen or Ursula, he quietly
turned the key in the lock of that closet door, and slipped the key in
his own pocket.
After that he rejoined the group of ladies, feeling that he could wait
in peace until the close of the dramatic little episode.
"The rumour, if rumour there was," Ursula had retorted defiantly, "is a
false one, Your Majesty."
"Indeed, child," said the Queen coldly, "did you not, then, some days
ago leave the Palace with no other companion save weak-willed Margaret
Cobham?"
"Verily, I . . ."
"In order to visit, in disguise, or masked, or cloaked--we know
not--some public entertainment, a country fair, methinks?"
"Of a truth, but . . ."
"You do not deny that, meseems."
"I do not deny it, Your Majesty. I meant no harm."
"No harm! hark at the girl! Was there no harm then in your meeting
certain gentlemen of our Court, under circumstances not altogether
creditable to the fair fame of our English maidens?"
"Has the Marquis de Suarez dared. . . ."
"Nay! We did not name the Marquis, girl. Of a truth a gentleman will
dare all, once a maid forgets her own dignity. But enough of this. I
spoke a word of warning in your own interests. The Marquis--saving His
Eminence's presence--has all the faults of his race. We warn you to
cease this intercourse, which doth no credit to your modesty."
"Your Majesty . . ." retorted Ursula, proud and rebellious at this
slight put upon her, and forgetting for the moment even the invisible
presence of the man she loved.
But Mary Tudor, though at times capable of noble and just impulses, was
far too blinded by her own passion to give up the joy of this victory
over the girl who had become her rival. At any rate, Fate had done one
great thing for her: she was the Queen, ruling as every Tudor had ruled,
by divine right, absolutely, unquestionably.
She would not let the girl speak, she would see her go, humiliated, with
head bent, forcibly swallowing her tears of shame. Mary only regretted
this: that Wessex could not be witness of this scene.
She threw back her head, drew herself up to her full height, and pointed
peremptorily up towards the gallery.
"Silence, wench!" she commanded. "Go!"
And Ursula could not help but obey.
Slowly she mounted the stairs, her heart burning with defiance. To have
angered Mary Tudor further by renewed rebellion would have been worse
than madness; it would inevitably have brought more ignominy and worse
perchance upon herself.
But the tears, which she tried in vain to suppress, were not caused by
the Queen's harsh words, but by the terrible doubts which assailed her
when she thought of Wessex.
Had he heard?
What would he think?
Would he understand the cause of her innocent deception, or would he
believe--as indeed he must if he heard them--the evil insinuations so
basely put forward by the Queen.
As she found her way along the gallery she heard Mary's voice once more.
"Duchess, I pray you see that in future more strict surveillance is kept
over the young maids under your charge. Lady Ursula's conduct has put me
verily to shame before the ambassadors of foreign Courts."
With a sob of impotent revolt Ursula disappeared within the upper room.
The Cardinal watched her until the door closed upon her and he was quite
sure that she was well out of hearing. Then he approached the Queen and
said in his most suave manner--
"Nay! Your Majesty, methinks, takes this trifling matter too much _au
serieux_. You deigned to mention the Marquis de Suarez just now. Believe
me, he is far too proud of the favours bestowed upon him by Lady Ursula
to look on England with any reproach."
The Duchess of Lincoln would have spoken, if she dared. Her loyal old
soul rebelled against this insinuation, which she knew to be utterly
false. But to tax His Eminence with the uttering of unfounded gossip and
in the presence of the Queen of England--that task was quite beyond the
worthy Duchess's powers.
But in her motherly heart she registered the resolution to take
Ursula's part as hotly as she dared whenever Her Majesty would give her
leave to speak, and in any case she would not allow the Cardinal's
imputation to rest long upon the innocent young girl.
The Queen, on the other hand, had visibly brightened up when His
Eminence himself mentioned the name of the young Spaniard in such close
connection with that of Ursula. She seemed to drink in with delight the
poisoned cup of thinly veiled slander which His Eminence held so
temptingly before her.
She wanted to think of Ursula as base and wanton and had, until now,
never quite dared to believe the many strange rumours which certainly
had reached her ears.
With all her faults, Mary was a just woman and above all a proud one;
she would never have allowed her rival to suffer long and seriously
under a false calumny. The name of the Marquis de Suarez, when she
uttered it, had been but a shaft hurled at random.
But since His Eminence so palpably hinted a confirmation of her hopes,
she was more than ready to give his insinuations the fullest credence.
So pleased was she that she gave him quite a pleasant smile, the first
he had had from her since the afternoon.
"As Your Eminence justly remarks," she said graciously, "the matter is
perhaps not of grave moment. But our interest in the young maidens who
form our Court is a genuine one nevertheless. I pray you let it
pass--Duchess, we'll speak of it all on the morrow. My lord Cardinal, we
will wish you good night."
She was about to finally pass him and to leave the room when her
curiosity got the better of her usual dignified reserve.
"Is it the last night Your Eminence will spend at our Court?" she asked
pointedly.
"I think not, Your Majesty," replied the Cardinal blandly. "'Tis many
days yet which I shall hope to spend in Your Majesty's company."
"Yet the skein is still entangled, my lord."
"'Twill be unravelled, Your Majesty."
"When?"
"_Quien sabe?_" he replied. "Perhaps to-night."
"To-night?"
She had allowed herself to be led away by the eagerness of her desire to
know what was happening. Shrewd enough where her own wishes and plans
were concerned, she could not help but notice the air of contentment,
even of triumph, which the Cardinal had worn throughout the evening. He
certainly did not look like a man about to be sent back discomfited, to
an irate master, there to explain that he had failed in the task
allotted to him.
Mary's curiosity was very much on the alert, but His Eminence's
monosyllabic answers were not intended to satisfy her, and perforce she
had to desist from further questioning him. Obviously he did not mean to
tell her anything just yet. She bade him good night with more
graciousness than he could have anticipated, and his bow to her was full
of the most profound respect.
A moment later she had passed out of the room, followed by Her Grace of
Lincoln and her maids-of-honour.
CHAPTER XXIV
CHECK TO THE KING
The colloquy between Mary Tudor and Ursula Glynde had probably not
lasted more than a few minutes.
To Wessex it seemed as if years had elapsed since he had closed the door
of the small inner room behind him, shutting out from his sight the
beautiful vision which had filled his soul with gladness.
Years! during which he had learnt chapter by chapter, the history of
woman's frailty and deceit. Now, he suddenly felt old, all the buoyancy
had gone out of his life, and he was left worn and weary, with a
millstone of shattered illusions hung around his neck.
It had come about so strangely.
She was not exquisite "Fanny," mysterious, elusive, after all. She was
Lady Ursula Glynde.
Well! what mattered that?
The name first pronounced by the Queen's trenchant voice had grated
harshly on his ear. Why?
At first he could not remember.
Fanny or Ursula? Why not? The woman whom conventionality had in some
sense ordained that he should marry. Why not?
Surely 'twas for him to thank conventionality for this kind decree.
But the Lady Ursula Glynde!
When did he last hear that name? Surely it was on that Spaniard's lips
half an hour ago, accompanied by a thinly veiled, coarse jest and an
impudent laugh.
But his "Fanny!"--that white-clad, poetic embodiment of his most exalted
dreams! Those guileless blue eyes--or were they black?--that childlike
little head so fitly crowned with gold!
No! no! _that_ was his "Fanny," not the other woman, whom the Queen was
even now upbraiding for immodest conduct.
Now she was speaking . . . stammering . . . denying nothing. . . . Where
was that Ursula Glynde? . . . the other woman . . . she who was false
and wanton. . . . "Fanny" was pure and sweet and girlish. . . . Ursula
alone was to blame. Where was she?
"Has the Marquis de Suarez dared . . ."
It was her voice. Why did she name that man?
She knew him then? . . . had met him at East Molesey Fair? . . . she did
not deny it . . . she only asked if he had dared . . . whilst the
Spaniard had said, with a flippant shrug of the shoulders, that the
acquaintanceship had ripened into . . . friendship.
Wessex' whole soul rebelled at this suggestion. He had but one desire,
to see her, to ask her--she would tell him the truth, and he would
believe whatever she told him with those dear red lips of hers, which he
had kissed.
He felt quite calm, still, firm in his faith, and sustained by his great
love. He went to the door and found it locked.
A trifling matter surely, but why was it locked?
She had been upset, confused, ere the Queen had come. She would not
allow him the great joy of proclaiming to all who were there to hear,
that he had wooed and won her. Once more there came that torturing
question: Why?
So averse was she to his appearing before the Queen, that she had locked
the door for fear that the exuberant happiness which was in him, should
cause him to precipitate a climax which she obviously dreaded.
Why? Why? Why?
But he would respect her wishes, and though his very sinews ached with
the longing to break down that door, to see her then and there, not to
endure for another second this maddening agony which made his temples
throb and his brain reel, he made no attempt to touch the bolts again.
Just then there came the Queen's final words to her:
"The Marquis de Suarez has all the faults of his race. We warn you to
cease this intercourse which doth no credit to your modesty."
And she--his love, his cherished dream--had said nothing in reply.
Wessex strained his every sense to hear, but there came nothing save--
"Your Majesty . . ."
And then the peremptory--
"Silence, wench!" from irate Mary Tudor.
And then nothing more.
She had gone evidently, bearing her humiliation, leaving him in doubt
and fear, to endure a torture of the soul which well-nigh unmanned him.
She must have known that he had heard, and yet she said nothing.
To the Duke of Wessex, the most favoured man in England, the grand
seigneur with one foot on the throne, the idea of suffering a false
accusation in silence was a thing absolutely beyond
comprehension--weakness which must have its origin in guilt.
Human nature is so constituted that man is bound to measure his
fellow-creatures by his own standard; else why doth charity think no
evil? The goodness and purity which comes from the soul is always
mirrored in the soul of others. Evil sees evil everywhere. Pride does
not understand humility.
Thus in Wessex' heart!
Had his sovereign liege--that sovereign being a man--dared to put forth
a base insinuation against him, he would have forgotten the kingship
and struck the man, who impeached his honour, fearlessly in the face.
Nothing but conscious guilt would have stayed his avenging hand, or
silenced the indignant words on his lips.
Of course he could not see what was actually passing: he could but
surmise, and a fevered, tortured brain is an uncertain counsellor.
He could not understand Ursula's attitude. The girlish weakness, the
submission to the highest authority in the land born of centuries of
tradition, the maidenly bashfulness at the monstrosity of the
accusation, were so many little feminine traits which at this moment
appeared to him as so many admissions of guilt.
He would have loved them at other times: loved them in _her_ especially,
because they were so characteristic of her simple nature, bred in the
country, half woman and wholly child. Just now they were repellent to
his pride, incomprehensible to his manhood, and for the first time his
faith began to waver.
Pity him, my masters! for he suffered intensely.
Pity him, mistress, for he loved her with his whole soul.
Nay! do not sneer. Love-at-first-sight is a great and wonderful thing,
and, more than that, it is real--genuinely, absolutely, completely real.
But it is not immutable. It is the basis, the solid foundation of what
will become the lasting passion. In itself it has one great
weakness--the absence of knowledge.
Wessex loved with his soul, but not yet with his reason. How could he?
Reason is always the last to fall into line with the other slaves of
passion. At present he worshipped in her that which he had conceived her
to be, and the very sublimity of this whole-hearted love was a bar to
the existence of perfect trust and faith.
There had been a long silence whilst Ursula mounted the stairs and
finally disappeared, but the rustle of her silk skirt did not penetrate
through the solid panels of the closet door. Wessex did not know whether
she had gone, or had been ordered to wait until Her Majesty had quitted
the room. He wondered now how soon he would meet her, how she would look
when she finally released him from this torture-chamber. He knew that he
would not upbraid her, and feared but one awful eventuality, his own
weakness if she were guilty.
Love such as his oft makes cowards of men.
To the Cardinal's poisoned shaft he paid but little heed. The weary soul
had come to the end of its tether. It could not suffer more.
Beyond that lay madness or crime.
Silence became oppressive.
Then it seemed as if the key was being gently turned in the lock.
CHAPTER XXV
THE CARDINAL'S MOVE
His Eminence had been left all alone in the room after the passage of
Her Majesty to her own apartments.
"And now, what is the next move in this game of chess?" he mused, as he
took the key of the closet door from his pocket and thoughtfully
contemplated this tiny engine of his far-reaching and elaborate schemes.
"For the moment my guess was a shrewd one. His Grace of Wessex is in
there, and had I not locked that door he would have precipitated a
climax, which had sent Queen Mary into a fever of jealous rage, and the
Spanish ambassador and myself back to Spain to-morrow."
He listened intently for a second or so; no sound came from the inner
room. Then he glanced up towards the gallery.
There was, of course, no sign of Lady Ursula. Even if she intended anon
to rejoin His Grace, she would certainly wait a little while ere she
once more ventured to sally forth.
The Cardinal very softly put the key back into the lock, and waited.
Very soon the door was vigorously shaken. His Eminence retired to the
further end of the room and called loudly--
"Who goes there?"
"By Our Lady!" came in strong accents from the other side of the locked
door, "whoever you may be, an you don't open this door, it shall fall
in splinters atop of you."
Time to once more recross the room, and turn a small key, and a second
later the Cardinal stood face to face with the Duke of Wessex.
"His Grace of Wessex!" he murmured, with an expression of boundless
astonishment.
"Himself in person, my lord," rejoined Wessex, trying with all his might
to appear unconcerned before this man, whom he knew to be his deadliest
enemy. "Marry!" he added, with well-acted gaiety, "the next moment, an
Your Eminence had not released me, I might have lost my temper."
"A precious trifle Your Grace would no doubt have quickly found again,"
said His Eminence with marked suavity. "Ah! I well recollect in my young
days being locked in . . . just like Your Grace . . . by a lady who was
no less fair."
Had he entertained the slightest doubt as to whether the little dramatic
episode just enacted had borne its bitter fruit, he would have seen it
summarily dispelled with the first glance which he had cast at Wessex.
The Duke's grave face was deadly pale, and the violent effort which he
made to contain himself was apparent in the heavily swollen veins of his
temples and the almost imperceptible tremor of his hands. But his voice
was quite steady as he said lightly--
"Nay! why should Your Eminence speak of a lady in this case?"
"What have I said?" quoth the Cardinal, throwing up his be-ringed hands
in mock alarm. "Nay! Your Grace need have no fear. Discretion is an
integral portion of my calling. I was merely indulging in reminiscences.
My purple robes do not, as you know, conceal a priest. Though a prince
of the Church, I am an ecclesiastic only in name, and therefore may
remember, without a blush, that I was twenty once and very hot-tempered.
The lady in my case put me under lock and key whilst she went to another
gallant."
"Again you speak of a lady, my lord," said the Duke, with the same light
indifference. "May I ask----"
"Nay, nay! I pray you ask me nothing . . . I saw nothing, believe me
. . ."
He paused a moment. Wessex had turned to his dog, who, yawning and
stretching, after the manner of his kind, and not the least upset by his
recent incarceration, had just appeared in the doorway of the inner
room.
"I saw nothing," continued the Cardinal, with a voice full of gentle,
good-natured indulgence, "save a charming lady standing here alone,
close to that door, when I entered with Her Majesty. What Queen Mary
guessed or feared, alas! I cannot tell. The charming lady had just
turned the key in the lock . . . and this set me thinking of my own
youth and follies. . . . But Your Grace must pardon an old man who has
but one affection left in life. Don Miguel is as a son to me----"
"I pray you, my lord," here interrupted Wessex haughtily, "what has the
Marquis de Suarez' name to do with me?"
"Only this, my son," rejoined the Cardinal with truly paternal
benevolence, "Don Miguel is a stranger in England . . . I had almost
hoped that hospitality would prevent Your Grace from flying your hawk
after his birds. . . .
"Don Miguel would be hard hit," he added quickly, seeing that Wessex, at
the end of his patience, was about to make an angry retort, "for we all
know that where His Grace of Wessex desires to conquer, other vows and
other lovers are very soon forgotten . . . But the Marquis is young
. . . I would like to plead his cause. . . ."
His keen eyes had never for a moment strayed from the proud face of the
Duke. He was shrewd enough to know that in speaking thus, he was
reaching the outermost limits of His Grace's forbearance. His robes and
his age rendered him to a certain extent immune from an actual quarrel
with a man of Wessex' physique, nor did fear for his own personal safety
ever enter into the far-seeing calculations of this astute diplomatist.
Whatever his weaknesses might be, cowardice was not one of them, and he
pursued his own aims boldly and relentlessly.
But he had had to endure a great deal through the personality and the
presence of the Duke of Wessex: the humiliation put upon him this very
afternoon by Mary Tudor still rankled deeply in his mind, and the vein
of cruelty, almost inseparable from his nationality, rendered the
present situation peculiarly pleasing to this dissector of human hearts.
Until this moment he had perhaps not quite realized that His Grace of
Wessex had been hard hit. Having wilfully put away from his own life
every tender sentiment, he did not understand the quick rise of a great
and whole-souled passion. The Duke had been ever noted for his
gallantry, his chivalry, and his numerous and light amourettes, and the
Cardinal never imagined that in the daring game which he had planned,
and which with the help of the wench Mirrab he was about to play, he
would have to reckon with something more serious than a passing
flirtation.
To his feline disposition, his callous estimate of human nature, his
real hatred for this political rival, there was now a delicious
satisfaction in dealing a really mortal wound to the man for whose sake
he had oft been humiliated.
He felt a thrill of real and cruel delight in seeing this haughty
Englishman half broken under the strain of this mental torture, which
his slanderous words helped to aggravate. With half-closed eyes His
Eminence was watching the quiver of the proud lip, ever ready with
laughter and jest, the tremor of the slender hands, that peculiar
stiffening of the whole figure which denotes a fierce struggle 'twixt
raging passion and iron self-control. Was it not a joy to watch this
gaping wound, into which he himself was pouring a deadly poison with a
steady and unerring hand?
The game had become doubly interesting now, and so much more important.
The Duke, obviously deeply in love with Lady Ursula, would certainly
never turn to another woman again. If the intrigue contrived by His
Eminence and the Marquis de Suarez succeeded in accordance with their
expectations, then not only would His Grace be parted from the lady in
accordance with Queen Mary's ultimatum, but he would probably bury his
disillusionment and sorrow on some remote estate of his, far from Court
and political strife.
Chance had indeed been kind to the envoys of the King of Spain.
Chance, and the natural sequence of events, skilfully guided by the
Cardinal's gentle hands.
But His Eminence was clever enough to know exactly how far he might dare
venture. For the moment he certainly had said enough. The Duke seemed
partly dazed and had altogether forgotten his presence.
Without a sound the Cardinal glided out of the room.
The closing of the door roused Wessex from the torpor into which he had
fallen. The hall looked sombre and dreary, the wax tapers flickered
feebly in their sockets, whilst strange shadows seemed to jeer at him
from the dark corners around. He would not look up at the gallery, the
steps whereon she stood, for it seemed to him as if some mocking witch
wearing her face and her golden hair would look down at him from there,
and laugh and sneer, until she finally faded from his sight in the arms
of the Marquis de Suarez.
"Other vows and other lovers," he mused, whilst trying to shut away from
his eyes the hellish visions which tortured him. "So my beautiful Fanny
is not mine at all . . . but the Spaniard's . . . or another's . . .
what matter whose? Not true and proud, but a frisky wench, ready for
intrigue, of whom these foreigners speak with a coarse laugh and a shrug
of the shoulders."
"Harry Plantagenet, my friend," he added, as the dog, seeming to feel
the presence of sorrow, gave his master's hand a gentle lick, "His Grace
of Wessex has been made a fool of by a woman. . . . Ah, fortune! fickle
fortune! one or two turns of your relentless wheel and a host of
illusions . . . the last I fear me . . . have been scattered to the
winds. . . . Shall we go, old Harry? Meseems you are the only honest
person in this poison-infected Court. We'll not stay in it, friend, I
promise you. . . . I am thirsting for the pure air of our Devon moors.
. . . Come, now . . . we must to bed . . . and sleep. . . . Not dream,
old Harry! . . . whatever else we do . . . for God's sake, let us not
dream. . . ."
CHAPTER XXVI
THE PROVOCATION
When Ursula finally succeeded in escaping from her room, where she had
been forcibly confined--almost a prisoner--in the charge of two
waiting-women, she returned to the hall, vaguely hoping that Wessex
would still be there. She found no one. The closet door was open; taking
one of the wax tapers in her hand she peeped into the inner room and saw
that it was empty.
On the fur rug, on the floor, was still the impress of Harry
Plantagenet's body, as he had curled himself up patiently to wait and
sleep.
A sudden draught extinguished the taper and left the small room in total
darkness; to her overwrought nerves it seemed cold and lonely, like a
newly opened grave. Wessex had gone because he had heard that she had
deceived him. The slanders uttered against her had found credence in his
heart. Thus she mused, guessing at the truth, perhaps not even realizing
how much he had suffered.
She would not go back to her room just yet. She knew that she could not
rest. Though the room was empty there seemed something of him still in
it, even in its cold and deserted aspect.
She lingered here, sitting in the chair where he had sat and heard. She
could not cry, she would not give way, for she wished to think.
Therefore she lingered.
Thus fate worked its will in this strange history of that night.
Wessex did not know that she had returned. After the Cardinal had left
him he waited awhile, but he never guessed that she would come back. Had
he not heard that her kindest favours had been the Spaniard's, ere his
noble Grace had come across her path? With that almost morbid humility
which is such a peculiar and inalienable characteristic of a great love,
he thought it quite natural that she should love Don Miguel, or any
other man, rather than him, and now he was only too willing to suppose
that she had gone to her favoured gallant, leaving him in the ridiculous
and painful position in which she had wantonly placed him.
He had waited in a desultory fashion, not really hoping that she would
come. Then, as silence began to fall more and more upon the Palace, and
the clock in the great tower boomed the midnight hour, he had finally
turned his steps towards his own apartments.
To reach them he had to go along the cloisters, and traverse the great
audience chamber, which lay between his suite of rooms and that occupied
by the Cardinal de Moreno and Don Miguel de Suarez.
As he entered the vast room he was unpleasantly surprised to see the
young Spaniard standing beside the distant window.
The lights had been put out, but the two enormous bays were open,
letting in a flood of brilliant moonlight. The night was peculiarly
balmy and sweet, and through the window could be seen the exquisite
panorama of the gardens and terraces of Hampton Court, with the river
beyond bathed in silvery light.
Wessex had paused at the door, his eyes riveted on that distant picture,
which recalled so vividly to his aching senses the poetic idyll of this
afternoon.
It was strange that Don Miguel should be standing just where he was,
between him and that vision so full of memories now.
Wessex turned his eyes on the Marquis, who had not moved when he
entered, and seemed absorbed in thought.
"And there is the man who before me has looked in Ursula's eyes," mused
the Duke. "To think that I have a fancy for killing that young
reprobate, because he happens to be more attractive than myself . . . or
because . . ."
He suddenly tried to check his thoughts. They were beginning to riot in
his brain. Until this very moment, when he saw the Spaniard standing
before him, he had not realized how much he hated him. All that is
primitive, passionate, semi-savage in man rose in him at the sight of
his rival. A wild desire seized him to grip that weakling by the throat,
to make him quake and suffer, if only one thousandth part of the agony
which had tortured him this past hour.
He deliberately crossed the room, then opened the door which led to his
own apartments.
"Harry, old friend," he called to his dog, "go, wait for me within. I
have no need for thy company just now."
The beautiful creature, with that peculiar unerring instinct of the
faithful beast, seemed quite reluctant to obey. He stopped short, wagged
his tail, indulged in all the tricks which he knew usually appealed to
his master, begging in silent and pathetic language to be allowed to
remain. But Wessex was quite inexorable, and Harry Plantagenet had
perforce to go.
The door closed upon the Duke's most devoted friend. In the meanwhile
Don Miguel had evidently perceived His Grace, and now when Wessex turned
towards him he exclaimed half in surprise, half in tones of thinly
veiled vexation--
"Ah! His Grace of Wessex? Still astir, my lord, at this hour?"
"At your service, Marquis," rejoined the Duke coldly. "Has His Eminence
gone to his apartments? . . . Can I do aught for you?"
"Nay, I thank Your Grace . . . I thought you too had retired," stammered
the young man, now in visible embarrassment. "I must confess I did not
think to see you here."
"Whom did you expect to see, then?" queried Wessex curtly.
"Nay! methought Your Grace had said that questions could not be
indiscreet."
"Well?"
"Marry! . . . your question this time, my lord . . ."
"Was indiscreet?"
"Oh!" said the Spaniard deprecatingly.
"Which means that you expect a lady."
"Has Your Grace any objection to that?" queried Don Miguel with thinly
veiled sarcasm.
"None at all," replied Wessex, who felt his patience and self-control
oozing away from him bit by bit. "I am not your guardian; yet, methinks,
it ill becomes a guest of your rank to indulge in low amours beneath the
roof of the Queen of England."
"Why should you call them low?" rejoined the Marquis, whose manner
became more and more calm and bland, as Wessex seemed to wax more
violent. "You, of all men, my lord, should know that we, at Court, seek
for pleasure where we are most like to find it."
"Aye! and in finding the pleasure oft lose our honour."
"Your Grace is severe."
"If my words offend you, sir, I am at your service."
"Is this a quarrel?"
"As you please."
"Your Grace . . ."
"Pardi, my lord Marquis," interrupted Wessex haughtily and in tones of
withering contempt, "I did not know that there were any cowards among
the grandees of Spain."
"By Our Lady, Your Grace is going too far," retorted the Spaniard.
And with a quick gesture he unsheathed his sword.
Wessex' eyes lighted up with the fire of satisfied desire. He knew now
that this was what he had longed for ever since the young man's insolent
laugh had first grated unpleasantly on his ear. For the moment all that
was tender and poetic and noble in him was relegated to the very
background of his soul. He was only a human creature who suffered and
wished to be revenged, an animal who was wounded and was seeking to
kill. He would have blushed to own that what he longed for now, above
everything on earth, was the sight of that man's blood.
"Nay, my lord!" he said quietly, "are we children to give one another a
pin-prick or so?"
And having drawn his sword, he unsheathed his long Italian dagger, and
holding it in his left hand he quickly wrapped his cloak around that
arm.
"You are mad," protested Don Miguel with a frown, for a sword and dagger
fight meant death to one man at least, and a mortal combat with one so
desperate as Wessex had not formed part of the programme so carefully
arranged by the Cardinal de Moreno.
"By the Mass, man," was the Duke's calm answer, "art waiting to feel my
glove on thy cheek?"
"As you will, then," retorted Don Miguel, reluctantly drawing his own
dagger, "but I swear that this quarrel is none of my making."
"No! 'tis of mine! _en garde_!"
Don Miguel was pale to the lips. Not that he was a coward; he had fought
more than one serious duel before now, and risked his life often enough
for mere pastime or sport. But there was such a weird glitter in the
eyes of this man, whom he and his chief had so wantonly wronged for the
sake of their own political advancement, such a cold determination to
kill, that, much against his will, the Spaniard felt an icy shiver
running down his spine.
The room too! half in darkness, with only the strange, almost unreal
brilliancy of the moon shedding a pallid light over one portion of the
floor, that portion where one man was to die.
The Marquis de Suarez had been provoked; his was therefore the right of
selecting his own position for the combat. In the case of such a
peculiar illumination this was a great initial advantage.
The Spaniard, with his back towards the great open bay, had his
antagonist before him in full light, whilst his own figure appeared only
as a dark silhouette, elusive and intensely deceptive. Wessex, however,
seemed totally unconscious of the disadvantage of his own position. He
was still dressed in the rich white satin doublet in which he had
appeared at the banquet a few hours ago. The broad ribbon of the Garter,
the delicate lace at the throat, the jewels which he wore, all would
help in the brilliant light to guide his enemy's dagger towards his
breast.
But he seemed only impatient to begin; the issue, one way or the other,
mattered to him not at all. The Spaniard's death or his own was all that
he desired:--perhaps his own now--for choice. He felt less bitter, less
humiliated since he held his sword in his hand, and only vaguely
recollected that Spaniards made a boast these days of carrying poisoned
daggers in their belts.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE FIGHT
Whilst Don Miguel was preparing for the fight, a slight sound suddenly
caused him to turn towards that side of the room, from whence a tall
oaken door led to his own and the Cardinal's apartments. His eyes,
rendered peculiarly keen by the imminence of his own danger, quickly
perceived a thin fillet of artificial light running upwards from the
floor, which at once suggested to him that the door was slightly ajar.
It had certainly been closed when Wessex first entered the room. Behind
it, as Don Miguel well knew, the Cardinal de Moreno had been watching;
he was the great stage-manager of the drama which he had contrived
should be enacted this night before His Grace. The young Marquis was
only one of the chief actors; the principal actress being the wench
Mirrab, who, surfeited with wine, impatient and violent, had been kept a
close prisoner by His Eminence these last six hours past.
That little glimmer of light dispelled Don Miguel's strange obsession.
The Cardinal, with the slight opening of that door, had plainly meant to
indicate that he was on the alert, and that this unrehearsed scene of
the drama would not be enacted without his interference. The Duke, who
had his back to that portion of the room, had evidently seen and heard
nothing, and the whole little episode had occurred in less than three
seconds.
Now Don Miguel was ready, and the next moment the swords clashed
against one another. Eye to eye these two enemies seemed to gauge one
another's strength. For a moment their daggers, held in the left hand,
only acted as weapons of defence, the cloaks wrapped round their arms
were still efficient sheaths.
Very soon the Spaniard realized that his original fears had not been
exaggerated. Wessex was a formidable opponent, absolutely calm, a
skilful fencer, and with a wrist which seemed made of steel. His attack
was quick and vigorous; step by step, slowly but unerringly, he forced
the Marquis away from the stronghold of his position. Try how he might,
parry how he could, the young Spaniard gradually found himself thrust
more and more into full light, whilst his antagonist was equally
steadily working his way round towards the more advantageous post.
No sound came from the Cardinal's apartments, and Don Miguel dared not
even glance towards the door, for the swiftest look would have proved
his undoing.
Wessex' face was like a mask, quite impassive, almost stony in its rigid
expression of perfect determination. The Spaniard was still steadily
losing ground, another few minutes and he would be in full light, whilst
the Duke's figure would become the deceptive silhouette. Under those
conditions, and against such a perfect swordsman, the Marquis knew that
his doom was sealed. An icy sweat broke out from his forehead, he would
have bartered half his fortune to know what was going on behind the
door.
For one awful moment the thought crossed his mind that His Eminence
perhaps had decreed his death at the hands of Wessex. Who knows? the
ways of diplomacy are oft tortuous and ever cruel; none knew that better
than Don Miguel de Suarez himself. How oft had he callously exercised
the right given him by virtue of some important mission entrusted to
him, in order to sweep ruthlessly aside the lesser pawns which stood in
the way of his success?
Had he become the lesser pawn now in this gigantic game of chess, in
which the hand of a Queen was the final prize for the victor? Was his
death, at the hand of this man, of more importance to the success of the
Cardinal's intrigues than his life would be? If so, Heaven alone could
help him, for His Eminence would not hesitate to sacrifice him
mercilessly.
The horror of these thoughts gave the young man the strength of despair.
But he might just as well have tried to pierce a stone wall, as to break
the _garde_ of this impassive and deadly opponent. His own wrist was
beginning to tire; the combat had lasted nigh on a quarter of an hour,
and the next few minutes would inevitably see its fatal issue. The
Duke's attacks became more swift and violent; once or twice already Don
Miguel had all but felt His Grace's dagger at his throat.
Suddenly a piercing woman's shriek seemed to rend the air, the swift
sound of running footsteps, the grating of a heavy door on its hinges,
and then there came another cry, more definite this time--
"Wessex, have a care!"
Both the men had paused, of course. Even in this supreme moment when one
life hung in the balance, how could they help turning towards the
distant corner of the room whence had come that piercing shriek.
The door leading to the Marquis' apartments was wide open now; a flood
of light came from the room beyond, and against this sudden glare, which
seemed doubly brilliant to the dazed eyes of the combatants, there
appeared a woman's figure, dressed in long flowing robes of clinging
white, her golden hair hanging in a wild tangle over her shoulders. A
quaint and weird figure! at first only a silhouette against a glowing
background, but anon it came forward, disappeared completely for a
while in the dense shadow of an angle of the room, but the next moment
emerged again in the full light of the moon, ghostlike and fantastic; a
girlish form, her white draperies half falling from her shoulders,
revealing a white throat and one naked breast; on her hair a few green
leaves, bacchante-like entwined and drooping, half hidden in the tangle
of ruddy gold.
Wessex gazed on her, his sword dropped from his hand.
It was she! She, as a hellish vision had shown her to him half an hour
ago, in the great room wherein he had first kissed her: a weird and
witchlike creature, with eyes half veiled, and coarsened, sensuous lips.
It was but a vision even now, for he could not see her very distinctly,
his eyes were dazed with the play of the moonlight upon his sword, and
she, after her second cry, had drawn back into the shadow.
Don Miguel on the other hand had not seemed very surprised at her
apparition, only somewhat vexed, as he exclaimed--
"Lady Ursula, I pray you . . ."
He placed his hand on her shoulder. It was the gesture of a master, and
the tone in which he spoke to her was one of command.
"I pray you go within," he added curtly; "this is no place for women."
Wessex' whole soul writhed at the words, the touch, the attitude of the
man towards her; an hour ago, when he stood beside her, he would have
bartered a kingdom for the joy of taking her hand.
She seemed dazed, and her form swayed strangely to and fro; suddenly she
appeared to be conscious of her garments, for with a certain shamed
movement of tardy modesty she pulled a part of her draperies over her
breast.
"I wish to speak with him," she whispered under her breath to Don
Miguel.
But the Spaniard had no intention of prolonging this scene a second
longer than was necessary. It had from the first been agreed between him
and the Cardinal that the Duke should not obtain more than a glimpse at
the wench. At any moment, after the first shock of surprise, Wessex
might look more calmly, more steadily at the girl. She might begin to
speak, and her voice--the hoarse voice of a gutter-bred girl--would
betray the deception more quickly than anything else. The one brief
vision had been all-sufficient: Don Miguel was satisfied. It had been
admirably staged so far by the eminent manager who still remained out of
sight, it was for the young man now to play his role skilfully to the
end.
"Come!" he said peremptorily.
He seized the girl's wrist, whispered a few words in her ear which never
reached her dull brain, and half led, half dragged her towards the door.
Wessex broke into a long, forced laugh, which expressed all the
bitterness and anguish of his heart.
Oh! the humiliation of it all! Wessex suddenly felt that all his anger
had vanished. The whole thing was so contemptible, the banality of the
episode so low and degrading, that hatred fell away from him like a
mantle, leaving in his soul a sense of unutterable disgust and even of
abject ridicule. His pride alone was left to suffer. He who had always
held himself disdainfully aloof from all the low intrigues inseparable
from Court life, who had kept within his heart a reverent feeling of
chivalry and veneration for all women, whether queen or peasant,
constant or fickle, for him to have sunk to this! one of a trio of
vulgar mountebanks, one of two aspirants for the favours of a wanton.
Of trickery, of deception, he had not one thought. How could he have?
The events of the past hours had prepared him for this scene, and he had
had only a brief vision in semi-darkness, whilst everything had been
carefully prepared to blind him completely by this dastardly trick.
"By Our Lady," he said at last, with that same bitter, heartrending
laugh, "the interruption was most opportune, and we must thank the Lady
Ursula for her timely intervention. What! you and I, my lord, crossing
swords for that?" and he pointed with a gesture of unutterable scorn
towards the swaying figure of the woman. "A farce, my lord, a farce! Not
a tragedy!"
He threw his dagger on to the floor and sheathed his sword, just as Don
Miguel had succeeded in pushing the girl out of the room and closing the
door on her.
The Spaniard began to stammer an apology.
"I pray you speak no more of it, my lord," said the Duke coldly, "'tis I
owe you an apology for interfering in what doth not concern me. As His
Eminence very pertinently remarked just now, hospitality should forbid
me to fly my hawk after your lordship's birds. My congratulations, my
lord Marquis!" he added with a sneer. "Your taste, I perceive, is
unerring. Good night and pleasant dreams."
He bowed lightly and turned to go.
Don Miguel watched him until his tall figure had disappeared behind the
door. Then he sighed a deep sigh of satisfaction.
"An admirably enacted comedy," he mused; "a thousand congratulations to
His Eminence. Carramba! this is the best night's work we have
accomplished since we trod this land of fogs."
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE SEQUEL OF THE COMEDY
Mirrab, during that very brief drama in which she herself had played the
chief role, had vainly tried to collect her scattered wits. For the last
few hours two noble gentlemen, one of whom wore gorgeous purple robes,
had been plying her with wine and with promises that she should see the
Duke of Wessex if she agreed to answer to the name of "Lady Ursula,"
seeing that His Grace never spoke to any one under the rank of a lady.
A clever and simple trick, which readily deceived this uneducated,
half-crazy wench, whose life had been spent in gipsy booths, and whose
intellect had long been quashed by the constant struggle for existence,
which mostly consisted of senseless and fantastic exhibitions designed
for the delectation of ignorant yokels.
She liked the idea of being called "my lady" even when it was done in
mockery, and was delighted at the thought of appearing in this new guise
before the Duke of Wessex, for whom she had entertained a curious and
passionate adoration ever since the dramatic episode of Molesey Fair.
She liked still more the voluptuous garments which she was bidden to
don, and was ready enough to concede to the young foreigner who thus
embellished her, any favours which he chose to demand.
That had been her training, poor soul! her calling in life--a vulgar
trickster by day, a wanton by night. Do not be too hard in your
judgment, mistress! she knew nothing of home, very little of kindred;
born in the gutter, her ambition did not soar beyond good food and a
little money to spend.
The Duke of Wessex had saved her life; she was proud of that, and since
that day she had had a burning ambition to see him again. She had hoped
that a warning from the stars would prove a certain passport to his
presence, but His Eminence the Cardinal and the other young gentleman
had assured her that a noble name would alone lead her to him.
Thus she had been content to wait a few hours: the wine was good and the
foreigner not too exacting. After awhile she had dropped to sleep like
some tired animal, curled up on a rug on the floor. The clash of arms
had roused her, and finding that every door yielded to her touch, she
ran out, in eager curiosity to see whence came the sound. Her first cry,
on seeing that strange moonlit combat, was one of sheer terror; then she
recognized Wessex, and gave him a cry of warning.
But the wine which she had drunk had made her head heavy. She would have
liked to go to the Duke, but the room seemed to be whirling unpleasantly
around her. Ere she had time to utter another word the young foreigner
had roughly seized her wrist and dragged her away. She was too weak to
resist him, and was reluctantly compelled to follow his lead. The next
moment he had closed the door on her, and she knew nothing more.
Excitement had somewhat dazed her, but a moment or two later she
partially recovered and collected her scattered senses. She put her ear
to the door and tried to listen, but she could hear nothing. Behind her
was the corridor, out of which opened several doors, one of these being
the one which gave into the room wherein she had been confined the whole
evening. Not a sound came from there either. There was not a sign of my
lord Cardinal.
Once more she tried the handle of the big door in front of her: it
yielded, and she found herself back in the room where the fight had just
taken place. The moonlight still streamed in through the open window.
She could not see into the corners of the great hall, but straight in
front of her was another massive door, exactly similar to the one in
which she stood.
The room itself seemed empty. Wessex had gone, and she had not spoken to
him. That was the one great thought which detached itself from the
turmoil which was going on in her brain. The door opposite fascinated
her. Perhaps he had gone through there. Nay! surely so, for it almost
seemed to her as if she could hear that strange, bitter laugh of his
still echoing in the distance.
She ran across the room, fearful lest he should disappear altogether ere
she could get to him. But even before she reached the door she felt her
arm seized, her body dragged violently back. By the light of the moon,
which fell full on him, she recognized the young foreign lord.
He had summarily placed himself before her, and he held her wrist in a
tight grip.
"Let me go!" she murmured hoarsely.
"No!"
"I _will_ go to him!"
"You cannot!"
He spoke from between his teeth, as if in a fury of rage or fear, she
could not tell which, but as she, poor soul, had never inspired terror
in any one she quaked before his rage.
Just then she heard, as if in the room beyond, a few footsteps, then a
call: "Come, Harry!" and after that the opening and shutting of a
distant door. It was the Duke of Wessex going again, somewhere where
perhaps she could not find him again, and here was this man standing
between her and the object of her adoration.
With a vigorous jerk she freed herself from Don Miguel's grasp.
"Have a care, man, have a care," she said in a low, trembling voice, in
which a suppressed passion seemed suddenly to vibrate. "Let me pass, or
. . ."
"Silence, wench!" commanded Don Miguel. "Another word and I call the
guard and have thee whipped as a disturber of the peace."
She started as if stung with the very lash with which he so callously
threatened her. The fumes of wine and of excitement were being slowly
expelled from her dull brain. A vague sense of bitter wrong crept into
her heart; her own native shrewdness--the shrewdness of the country
wench--made her dimly realize that she had been fooled: how and for what
purpose she could not yet comprehend.
She pushed the tangled hair from her forehead, mechanically readjusting
her cumbersome garments, then she stepped close up to the young
Spaniard; she crossed her arms over her breast and looked him boldly in
the eyes.
"Soho! my fine lord!" she said, speaking with a strange and pathetic
effort at calmness, "that's it, is it? . . . and do ye take me for a
fool, that I do not see through your tricks? . . . You and that
purple-robed hypocrite there wanted to make use of me . . . you cajoled
me with soft words . . . promises . . . what? . . . Bah! you tricked me,
I say, do you hear?" she added with ever-increasing vehemence, "tricked
me that you might trick him. . . . With all your talks of Ursula and
Lady . . . the devil alone knows what ye wanted. . . . Well! you've had
your way . . . he looked on me as he would on a plague-stricken cur
. . . mangy and dirty. . . . Was that what ye wanted? . . . You've had
your will . . . are ye satisfied . . . what more do ye want of me?"
Don Miguel, much astonished at this unexpected outburst of passion,
gazed at her with a sneer, then he shrugged his shoulders and said
coldly--
"Nothing, wench! His Grace of Wessex does not desire thy company, and I
cannot allow thee to molest him. If thou'lt depart in peace, there'll be
a well-filled purse for thee . . . if not . . . the whip, my girl . . .
the whip . . . understand!"
"I will not go!" she repeated with dogged obstinacy. "I'll not . . .
I'll not . . . I'll see him just once . . . he was good to me. . . . I
love his beautiful face and his kind, white hands; I want to kiss them.
. . . I'll not go . . . I'll not . . . till I've kissed them. . . . So
do not stand in my way, fine sir . . . but let me get to him. . . ."
The obstinate desire, half a mania now, had grown upon her with this
wanton thwarting of her wishes. A wholly unfettered passion seethed in
her, half made up of hatred against this man who had fooled her and
caused her to be spurned with unutterable contempt by Wessex.
"I'll give thee three minutes in which to get sober, my wench!" remarked
Don Miguel placidly. "After that, take heed. . . ."
He laughed a long, cruel laugh, and looked at her with an evil leer, up
and down.
"After that thou'lt go," he said slowly and significantly, "but not in
peace. The Palace watch have a heavy hand . . . three men to give thee
ten lashes each . . . till thy shoulders bleed, wench . . . aye! I'll
have thee whipped till thou die under it . . . so go now or . . ."
He looked so evil, so threatening, so full of baffled rage, that
instinctively she drew back a few steps away from him, into the gloom.
. . . As she did so her foot knocked against something on the floor,
whilst the sharp point of some instrument of steel penetrated through
the thin soles of her shoes.
She had enough presence of mind, enough determination, enough deadly
hatred of him, not to give forth one sound; but when he, almost overcome
with his own furious passion, had paused awhile and turned from her, she
stooped very quickly and picked up that thing which had struck her foot.
It was an unsheathed dagger.
Silently, surreptitiously, she hid it within the folds of her gown,
whilst keeping a tight grip on its handle with her clenched right hand.
Now she felt safe, and sure of herself and of ultimate success.
Don Miguel, seeing how quiet she had become, heaved a sigh of relief.
For one moment he had had the fear that she meant to create a scandal,
attract the guard with her screams, bring spectators upon the scene, and
thus expose the whole despicable intrigue which had just been so
successfully carried through.
But now she was standing quite rigid and mute, half hidden by the gloom,
evidently terrorized by the cruel threats hurled against her.
"Well, which is it to be, wench," said the young man more calmly, "the
purse of gold or the whipping-post?"
She did not reply at once, and a strange, almost awesome silence fell
upon the scene. Not a sound from any portion of the Palace, even from
the gardens and terraces, beyond the night watchman's call had ceased to
echo, only from far, very far away beyond the river and the distant
meadows the melancholy hooting of an owl broke the intense stillness of
the place.
Then the woman began to speak, slowly at first, very calmly, and in a
voice deep and low, like the sound of muffled thunder, growing louder
and louder, more violent, more passionate as she worked herself up into
a very whirlwind of fury.
"Powers of Hell!" she said, "grant me patience! Man, listen. Ye don't
understand me. . . . I am not one of your fine Court ladies, who simpers
and trips along arrayed in silken kirtle. . . . I am called Mirrab, a
witch, d'ye hear? . . . a witch who knows naught about the law, and the
guard, nor about queens and richly dressed lords. The Duke of Wessex
saved my life . . . and I want to go to him. . . . Do ye let me go.
. . . What is it to ye if I see him? . . . Do ye let me go. . . ."
Her voice broke into a sob of agonized entreaty and baffled desire.
"Shall I call the guard?" rejoined Don Miguel coldly.
She was now quite close to him, he, still between her and the door which
she wished to reach, was half turned away from her, in obvious
impatience, and looking at her over his shoulder with a sneer and a
cruel frown.
"Do ye let me go!" she entreated once more.
For sole answer he made pretence at calling the guard.
"What ho there! the guard! What ho!"
But the last sound broke in a death rattle. Even as he spoke Mirrab had
thrust the dagger with all her might between his shoulders. He fell
forward on the floor, whilst with one last gasp of agony he called upon
the man whom he had so deeply wronged.
"A moi! . . . Wessex! . . . I die! . . . A moi! . . ."
And the silvery moon, who had just gazed on so placidly whilst human
passions ran riot in this vast audience chamber, who had shed her poetic
light on hatred, revenge, and lust, suddenly veiled her brilliant face:
the room was plunged in total darkness as the Marquis de Suarez breathed
his last.
CHAPTER XXIX
CHECK-MATE
For some time already there had been a certain amount of commotion in
the Palace. Mirrab's shouts when first she saw the combat, then her
high-voiced altercation with Don Miguel, had roused the attention of
some of the guard who were stationed in the cloister green court close
by. Some of the gentlemen too were astir.
Wessex himself soon after he had reached his own apartments heard the
sound of angry voices proceeding from the room which he had just
quitted. He could hear nothing distinctly, but it seemed to him as if a
woman and a man were quarrelling violently. He tried to shut his ears to
the sound. He would hear nothing, know nothing more of the wanton who
had fooled and mocked him.
But there are certain instincts in every chivalrous man, which will not
be gainsaid; among these is the impulse to go at once to the assistance
of a woman if she be in trouble or difficulty.
It was that impulse and nothing more which caused Wessex to retrace his
footsteps. He had some difficulty in finding his way, now that there was
no moonlight to guide him, but as soon as he re-entered the last room,
which was next to the audience chamber, he heard the ominous "A moi!" of
his dying opponent. Also all round him the obvious commotion of a number
of footsteps all tending towards the same direction.
An icy horror suddenly gripped his heart. Not daring to imagine what had
occurred, he hurried on. By instinct, for he could see nothing, he
contrived to find and open the door, and still going forward he
presently stumbled against something which lay heavy and inert at his
feet.
In a moment he was on his knees, touching the prostrate body with a
gentle hand; realizing that the unfortunate young man had fallen on his
face, he tried with infinite care to lift and turn him as tenderly as he
could.
Then suddenly he became conscious of another presence in the room.
Nothing more than a ghostlike form of white, almost as rigid as the
murdered man himself, whilst from the corridors close by the sound of
approaching footsteps, still hesitating which way to go, became more and
more distinct. A murmur of distant voices too gradually took on a
definite sound.
"This way."
"No, that."
"In the court . . ."
"No! the audience chamber!"
The ghostly white-clad figure appeared as if turned to stone.
"Through the window," whispered Wessex with sudden vehemence, "it is not
high!--quick! fly, in the name of God! while there's yet time!"
That was his only instinct now. He could not think of her as the woman
he had loved, he understood nothing, knew nothing; but in the intense
gloom which surrounded him he had lost sight of the witchlike and
horrible vision which had dealt a death-blow to his love, he seemed only
to see the green bosquets of the park, the pond, the marguerites, and
another white-clad figure, a girlish face crowned with the golden halo
of purity and innocence.
The wild passion which he had felt for her changed to an agonizing
horror, not only of her deed, but at the thought of seeing her
surrounded, rough-handled by the guard, shamed and treated as a mad and
drunken wanton.
He despised himself for his own weakness, but at this awful and supreme
moment, when he realized that the idol which he had set up and
worshipped was nothing but defiled mud, he felt for her only tenderness
and pity.
Love had touched him once, and he knew now that nothing would ever tear
her image completely from out his heart. Love, great, ardent, immutable,
was dead; but death is oft more powerful than life, and his dead love
pleaded for his chivalry, for his protection, with all the power of
sweet memories, and aided by the agonizing grip of cold, stiff hands
clinging to his heartstrings.
He pointed once more to the open window.
"Quick! in God's name!"
The girl moved towards him.
"Ah no, no, for pity's sake. Go!"
There was not a second to be lost. Mirrab, realizing her danger, was
sobered and alert. The next moment she was clinging to the window-sill
and measuring its height from the terrace below. It was but a few feet.
As agile as a cat she flung herself over, and disappeared into the gloom
just as the door leading into the audience chamber was thrown violently
open, and a group of people--gentlemen, guard, servitors--bearing
torches came rushing into the room.
"Water! . . . a leech!--quick, some of you!" commanded Wessex, who held
Don Miguel's head propped against his knee.
"What is it? . . ." queried every one with unanimous breath.
Some pressed forward, snatching the flaming torches from the hands of
the servitors. In a moment Wessex and the dead Marquis were surrounded,
and the room flooded with weird, flickering light.
From the door of the apartments on the left a suave and urbane voice had
sounded softly--
"What is it?"
"The Spanish Marquis," murmured the foremost man in the crowd.
"Wounded?" queried another.
"Nay! I fear me dead," said Wessex quietly.
Then the groups parted instinctively, for the same urbane voice had
repeated its query in tones of the gravest anxiety.
"I was at prayers, and heard this noise. . . . What is it?"
The Cardinal de Moreno now stood beside the dead body of his friend.
"Your Grace! and? . . ."
"Alas, Your Eminence!" replied Wessex, "Don Miguel de Suarez is dead."
[Illustration: "Alas, Your Eminence! Don Miguel de Suarez is dead."]
The Cardinal made no comment, and the next moment was seen to stoop and
pick up something from the ground.
"But how?" queried one of the gentlemen.
"A duel?" added another.
"No, not a duel, seemingly," said His Eminence softly. "Don Miguel's
sword and dagger are both sheathed."
He turned to the captain of the guard, who was standing close beside
him.
"Will this dagger explain the mystery, think you, my son?" he asked,
handing a small weapon to the soldier. "I picked it up just now."
The guard--he was but a young man--took the dagger from His Eminence's
hand, and looked at it attentively. Those who were nearest to him
noticed that he suddenly started, and that the hand which held the
narrow pointed blade trembled visibly.
"Your Grace's dagger!" he said at last, handing the weapon to Wessex.
"It has Your Grace's arms upon the hilt."
Dead silence followed these simple words. The Duke seemed half dazed,
and mechanically took the dagger from the captain's hand; the blade
still bore on it the marks of Don Miguel's blood.
"Yes! it is my dagger," he murmured mechanically.
"But no doubt Your Grace can explain . . ." suggested His Eminence
indulgently.
Wessex was about to reply when one of the guard suddenly interposed.
"I seemed to see a woman flying through the gardens just now, captain,"
he said, addressing his officer.
"A woman?" asked His Eminence. "What woman?"
"Nay, my lord, I couldn't see distinctly," replied the soldier, "but she
was dressed all in white, and ran very quickly along the terrace not far
from this window."
"Then Your Grace will perhaps be able to tell us . . ." suggested the
Cardinal with utmost benevolence.
"I can tell Your Eminence nothing," replied Wessex coldly. "I was in
this room all the time and saw no woman near."
"Your Grace was here?" said His Eminence in gentle tones of profound
astonishment, "alone with Don Miguel de Suarez? . . . The woman . . ."
"There was no woman here," rejoined the Duke of Wessex firmly, "and I
was alone with Don Miguel de Suarez."
There was dead silence now, the moon, pale, inquisitive, brilliant,
peeped in through the window to see what was amiss. She saw a number of
men recoiling, awestruck, from a small group composed of a dead man and
of the first gentleman in the land self-confessed as a murderer. No one
dared to speak, the moment was too solemn, too terrible, for any speech
save a half-smothered sigh of horror.
The captain of the guard was the first to recollect his duty.
"Your Grace's sword . . ." he began, somewhat shamefacedly.
"Ah yes! I had forgot," said Wessex quietly, as he rose to his feet. He
drew his sword from its sheath, and with one quick, sudden wrench, broke
the blade across his knee. Then he threw the pieces of steel on the
ground.
"I am ready to follow you, friend captain," he said, with all the
hauteur, all the light, easy graciousness so peculiar to himself.
The groups parted silently, almost respectfully, as His Grace of Wessex
passed out of the room--a prisoner.
PART IV
HIS GRACE OF WESSEX