MICHEL DE LA FORÊTwas gone, a prisoner. From the dusk of the trees by the little chapel of Rozel, Angèle had watched his exit in charge of the governor’s men. She had not sought to show her presence; she had seen him—that was comfort to her heart; and she would not mar the memory of that last night’s farewell by another before these strangers. She saw with what quiet Michel bore his arrest, and she said to herself, as the last halberdier vanished:
“If the Queen do but speak with him, if she but look upon his face and hear his voice, she must needs deal kindly by him. My Michel—ah, it is a face for all men to trust and all women—”
But she sighed and averted her head as though before prying eyes.
The bell of Rozel chapel broke gently on the evening air; the sound, softened by the leaves and mellowed by the wood of the great elm-trees, billowed away till it was lost in faint reverberation in the sea beneath the cliffs of the Couperon, where a little craft was coming to anchor in the dead water.
At first the sound of the bell soothed her, softening the thought of the danger to Michel. She moved with it towards the sea, the tones of her grief chiming with it. Presently, as she went, a priest in cassock and robes and stole crossed the path in front of her, an acolyte before him swinging a censer, his voice chanting Latin verses from the service for the sick, in his hands the sacred elements of the communion for the dying. The priest was fat and heavy, his voice was lazy, his eyes expressionless, and his robes were dirty. The plaintive, peaceful sense which the sound of the vesper-bell had thrown over Angèle’s sad reflections passed away, and the thought smote her that, were it not for such as thisblack-toothed priest, Michel would not now be on his way to England, a prisoner. To her this vesper-bell was the symbol of tyranny and hate. It was fighting, it was martyrdom, it was exile, it was the Medici. All that she had borne, all that her father had borne, the thought of the home lost, the mother dead before her time, the name ruined, the heritage dispossessed, the red war of the Camisards, the rivulets of blood in the streets of Paris and of her loved Rouen, smote upon her mind and drove her to her knees in the forest glade, her hands upon her ears to shut out the sound of the bell. It came upon her that the bell had said “Peace! Peace!” to her mind when there should be no peace; that it had said “Be patient!” when she should be up and doing; that it had whispered “Stay!” when she should tread the path her lover trod, her feet following in his footsteps as his feet had trod in hers.
She pressed her hands tight upon her ears and prayed with a passion and a fervor she had never known before. A revelation seemedto come upon her, and, for the first time, she was a Huguenot to the core. Hitherto she had suffered for her religion because it was her mother’s broken life, her father’s faith, and because they had suffered and her lover had suffered. Her mind had been convinced, her loyalty had been unwavering, her words for the great cause had measured well with her deeds. But new senses were suddenly born in her, new eyes were given to her mind, new powers for endurance to her soul. She saw now as the martyrs of Meaux had seen; a passionate faith descended on her as it had descended on them; no longer only patient, she was fain for action. Tears rained from her eyes. Her heart burst itself in entreaty and confession.
“Thy light shall be my light, and Thy will my will, O Lord,” she cried at the last. “Teach me Thy way, create a right spirit within me. Give me boldness without rashness, and hope without vain thinking. Bear up my arms, O Lord, and save me when falling. A poor Samaritan am I. Give me the water that shall be a well of water springingup to everlasting life, that I thirst not in the fever of doing. Give me the manna of life to eat that I faint not nor cry out in plague, pestilence, or famine. Give me Thy grace, O God, as Thou has given it to Michel de la Forêt, and guide my feet as I follow him in life and in death, for Christ’s sake. Amen.”
As she rose from her knees she heard the evening gun from the Castle of Mont Orgueil, whither Michel was being borne by the Queen’s men. The vesper-bell had stopped. Through the wood came the salt savor of the sea on the cool sunset air. She threw back her head and walked swiftly towards it, her heart beating hard, her eyes shining with the light of purpose, her step elastic with the vigor of youth and health. A quarter-hour’s walking brought her to the cliff of the Couperon.
As she gazed out over the sea, however, a voice in the bay below caught her ear. She looked down. On the deck of the little craft which had entered the harbor when the vesper-bell was ringing stood a man who waved a hand up towards her, then gave a peculiarcall. She stared with amazement: it was Buonespoir the pirate. What did this mean? Had God sent this man to her, by his presence to suggest what she should do in this crisis in her life? For even as she ran down the shore towards him, it came to her mind that Buonespoir should take her in his craft to England.
What to do in England? Who could tell? She only knew that a voice called her to England to follow the footsteps of Michel de la Forêt, who even this night would be setting forth in the governor’s brigantine for London.
Buonespoir met her upon the shore, grinning like a boy.
“God save you, lady!” he said.
“What brings you hither, friend?” she asked.
If he had said that a voice had called him hither as one called her to England, it had not sounded strange; for she was not thinking that this was one who superstitiously swore by the little finger of St. Peter, but only that he was the man who had broughther Michel from France, who had been a faithful friend to her and to her father.
“What brings me hither?” Buonespoir laughed low in his chest. “Even to fetch to the Seigneur of Rozel, a friend of mine by every token of remembrance, a dozen flagons of golden muscadella.”
To Angèle no suggestion flashed that these flagons of muscadella had come from the cellar of the Seigneur of St. Ouen’s, where they had been reserved for a certain royal visit. Nothing was in her mind save the one thought—that she must follow Michel.
“Will you take me to England?” she asked, putting a hand quickly on his arm.
He had been laughing hard, picturing to himself what Lemprière of Rozel would say when he sniffed the flagon of St. Ouen’s best wine, and for an instant he did not take in the question; but he stared at her now as the laugh slowly subsided through notes of abstraction, and her words worked their way into his brain.
“Will you take me, Buonespoir?” she urged.
“Take you—?” he questioned.
“To England.”
“And myself to Tyburn?”
“Nay, to the Queen.”
“’Tis the same thing. Head of Abel! Elizabeth hath heard of me. The Seigneur of St. Ouen’s and others have writ me down a pirate to her. She would not pardon the muscadella,” he added, with another laugh, looking down where the flagons lay.
“She must pardon more than that,” exclaimed Angèle, and hastily she told him of what had happened to Michel de la Forêt and why she would go.
“Thy father, then?” he asked, scowling hard in his attempt to think it out.
“He must go with me—I will seek him now.”
“It must be at once, i’ faith, for how long, think you, can I stay here unharmed? I was sighted off St. Ouen’s shore a few hours agone.”
“To-night?” she asked.
“By twelve, when we shall have the moon and the tide,” he answered. “But hold!”he hastily added. “What, think you, could you and your father do alone in England? And with me it were worse than alone. These be dark times, when strangers have spies at their heels and all travellers be suspect.”
“We will trust in God,” she answered.
“Have you money?” he questioned—“for London, not for me,” he added, hastily.
“Enough,” she replied.
“The trust with the money is a weighty matter,” he added; “but they suffice not. You must have ’fending.”
“There is no one,” she answered, sadly, “no one save—”
“Save the Seigneur of Rozel!” Buonespoir finished the sentence. “Good. You to your father and I to the seigneur. If you can fetch your father by your pot-of-honey tongue, I’ll fetch the great Lemprière with muscadella. Is’t a bargain?”
“In which I gain all,” she answered, and again touched his arm with her finger-tips.
“You shall be aboard here at ten, and I will join you on the stroke of twelve,” he said, and gave a low whistle.
At the signal three men sprang up like magic out of the bowels of the boat beneath them, and scurried over the side; three as ripe knaves as ever cheated stocks and gallows, but simple knaves, unlike their master. Two of them had served with Francis Drake in that good ship of his lying even now not far from Elizabeth’s palace at Greenwich. The third was a rogue who had been banished from Jersey for an habitual drunkenness which only attacked him on land—at sea he was sacredly sober. His name was Jean Nicolle. The names of the other two were Hervé Robin and Rouge le Riche, but their master called them by other names.
“Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego,” said Buonespoir, in ceremony, and waved a hand of homage between them and Angèle. “Kiss dirt, and know where duty lies. The lady’s word on my ship is law till we anchor at the Queen’s Stairs at Greenwich. So, Heaven help you, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego!” said Buonespoir.
A wave of humor passed over Angèle’s grave face, for a stranger quartet neversailed high seas together: one blind of an eye, one game of a leg, one bald as a bottle and bereft of two front teeth; but Buonespoir was sound of wind and limb, his small face with the big eyes lost in the masses of his red hair, and a body like Hercules. It flashed through Angèle’s mind even as she answered the gurgling salutations of the triumvirate that they had been got together for no gentle summer sailing in the Channel. Her conscience smote her that she should use such churls; but she gave it comfort by the thought that while serving her they could do naught worse; and her cause was good. Yet they presented so bizarre an aspect, their ugliness was so varied and particular, that she almost laughed. Buonespoir understood her thoughts, for with a look of mocking innocence in his great blue eyes he waved a hand again towards the graceless trio, and said, “For deep-sea fishing,” then solemnly winked at the three.
A moment later Angèle was speeding along the shore towards her home on the fartherhill-side up the little glen; and within an hour Buonespoir rolled from the dusk of the trees by the manor-house of Rozel and knocked at the door. He carried on his head, as a fishwife carries a tray of ormers, a basket full of flagons of muscadella; and he did not lower the basket when he was shown into the room where the Seigneur of Rozel was sitting before a trencher of spiced veal and a great pot of ale. Lemprière roared a hearty greeting to the pirate, for he was in a sour humor because of the taking-off of Michel de la Forêt; and of all men this pirate-fellow, who had quips and cranks, and had played tricks on his cousin of St. Ouen’s, was most welcome.
“What’s that on your teacup of a head?” he roared again, as Buonespoir grinned pleasure at the greeting.
“Muscadella,” said Buonespoir, and lowered the basket to the table.
Lemprière seized a flagon, drew it forth, looked closely at it, then burst into laughter, and spluttered, “St. Ouen’s muscadella, by the hand of Rufus!”
Seizing Buonespoir by the shoulders, he forced him down upon a bench at the table, and pushed the trencher of spiced meat against his chest. “Eat, my noble lord of the sea and master of the cellar!” he gurgled out, and, tipping the flagon of muscadella, took a long draught. “God-a-mercy—but it has saved my life,” he gasped in satisfaction as he lay back in his great chair and put his feet on the bench whereon Buonespoir sat.
They raised their flagons and toasted each other, and Lemprière burst forth into song, in the refrain of which Buonespoir joined boisterously:
“King Rufus he did hunt the deer,With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!It was the spring-time of the year,Hey ho, Dolly shut her eyes!King Rufus was a bully boy,He hunted all the day for joy,Sweet Dolly she was ever coy:And who would e’er be wiseThat looked in Dolly’s eyes?“King Rufus he did have his day,With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!So get ye forth where dun deer play—Hey ho, Dolly comes again!The greenwood is the place for me,For that is where the dun deer be,’Tis where my Dolly comes to me:And who would stay at home,That might with Dolly roam?Sing hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!”
“King Rufus he did hunt the deer,With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!It was the spring-time of the year,Hey ho, Dolly shut her eyes!King Rufus was a bully boy,He hunted all the day for joy,Sweet Dolly she was ever coy:And who would e’er be wiseThat looked in Dolly’s eyes?
“King Rufus he did hunt the deer,
With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!
It was the spring-time of the year,
Hey ho, Dolly shut her eyes!
King Rufus was a bully boy,
He hunted all the day for joy,
Sweet Dolly she was ever coy:
And who would e’er be wise
That looked in Dolly’s eyes?
“King Rufus he did have his day,With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!So get ye forth where dun deer play—Hey ho, Dolly comes again!The greenwood is the place for me,For that is where the dun deer be,’Tis where my Dolly comes to me:And who would stay at home,That might with Dolly roam?Sing hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!”
“King Rufus he did have his day,
With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!
So get ye forth where dun deer play—
Hey ho, Dolly comes again!
The greenwood is the place for me,
For that is where the dun deer be,
’Tis where my Dolly comes to me:
And who would stay at home,
That might with Dolly roam?
Sing hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!”
Lemprière, perspiring with the exertion, mopped his forehead, then lapsed into a plaintive mood.
“I’ve had naught but trouble of late,” he wheezed. “Trouble! trouble! trouble! like gnats on a filly’s flank!” and in spluttering words, twice bracketed in muscadella, he told of Michel de la Forêt’s arrest, and of his purpose to go to England if he could get a boat to take him.
“’Tis that same business brings me here,” said Buonespoir, and forthwith told of his meeting with Angèle and what was then agreed upon.
“You to go to England!” cried Lemprière, amazed. “They want you for Tyburn there.”
“They want me for the gallows here,”said Buonespoir. Rolling a piece of spiced meat in his hand, he stuffed it into his mouth and chewed till the grease came out of his eyes, and took eagerly from a servant a flagon of malmsey and a dish of ormers.
“Hush! chew thy tongue a minute,” said the seigneur, suddenly starting and laying a finger beside his nose. “Hush!” he said, again, and looked into the flicker of the candle by him with half-shut eyes.
“May I have no rushes for a bed, and die like a rat in a moat, if I don’t get thy pardon, too, of the Queen, and bring thee back to Jersey, a thorn in the side of De Carteret forever! He’ll look upon thee assoilzied by the Queen, spitting fire in his rage, and no canary or muscadella in his cellar.”
It came not to the mind of either that this expedition would be made at cost to themselves. They had not heard of Don Quixote, and their gifts were not imitative. They were of a day when men held their lives as lightly as many men hold their honor now, when championship was as the breath of life to men’s nostrils, and to adventure forwhat was worth having or doing in life the only road of reputation.
Buonespoir was as much a champion in his ways as Lemprière of Rozel. They were of like kidney, though so far apart in rank. Had Lemprière been born as low and as poor as Buonespoir, he would have been a pirate, too, no doubt; and had Buonespoir been born as high as the seigneur, he would have carried himself with the same rough sense of honor, with as ripe a vanity, have been as naïve, as sincere, as true to the real heart of man untaught in the dissimulation of modesty or reserve. When they shook hands across the trencher of spiced veal, it was as man shakes hand with man, not man with master.
They were about to start upon their journey when there came a knocking at the door. On its being opened the bald and toothless Abednego stumbled in with the word that immediately after Angèle and her father came aboard theHoneyflowersome fifty halberdiers suddenly appeared upon the Couperon. They had at once set sail, and gotaway even before the sailors had reached the shore. As they had rounded the point, where they were hid from view, Abednego dropped overboard and swam ashore on the rising tide, making his way to the manor to warn Buonespoir. On his way hither, stealing through the trees, he had passed a half-score of halberdiers making for the manor, and he had seen others going towards the shore.
Buonespoir looked to the priming of his pistols, and, buckling his belt tightly about him, turned to the seigneur and said: “I will take my chances with Abednego. Where does she lie—theHoneyflower, Abednego?”
“Off the point called Verclut,” answered the little man, who had travelled with Francis Drake.
“Good; we will make a run for it, flying dot-and-carry-one as we go.”
While they had been speaking the seigneur had been thinking; and now, even as several figures appeared at a little distance in the trees, making towards the manor, he said, with a loud laugh:
“BUONESPOIR LOOKED TO THE PRIMING OF HIS PISTOLS”
“BUONESPOIR LOOKED TO THE PRIMING OF HIS PISTOLS”
“No. ’Tis the way of a fool to put his head between the door and the jamb. ’Tis but a hundred yards to safety. Follow me—to the sea—Abednego last. This way, bullies!”
Without a word all three left the house and walked on in the order indicated, as De Carteret’s halberdiers ran forward threatening.
“Stand!” shouted the sergeant of the halberdiers. “Stand, or we fire!”
But the three walked straight on unheeding. When the sergeant of the men-at-arms recognized the seigneur he ordered down the blunderbusses.
“We come for Buonespoir the pirate,” said the sergeant.
“Whose warrant?” said the seigneur, fronting the halberdiers, Buonespoir and Abednego behind him.
“The Seigneur of St. Ouen’s,” was the reply.
“My compliments to the Seigneur of St. Ouen’s, and tell him that Buonespoir is my guest,” he bellowed, and strode on, the halberdiersfollowing. Suddenly the seigneur swerved towards the chapel and quickened his footsteps, the others but a step behind. The sergeant of the halberdiers was in a quandary. He longed to shoot, but dared not, and while he was making up his mind what to do the seigneur had reached the chapel door. Opening it, he quickly pushed Buonespoir and Abednego inside, whispering to them, then slammed the door and put his back against it.
There was another moment’s hesitation on the sergeant’s part, then a door at the other end of the chapel was heard to open and shut, and the seigneur laughed loudly. The halberdiers ran round the chapel. There stood Buonespoir and Abednego in a narrow road-way, motionless and unconcerned. The halberdiers rushed forward.
“Perquage! Perquage! Perquage!” shouted Buonespoir, and the bright moonlight showed him grinning.
For an instant there was deadly stillness, in which the approaching footsteps of the seigneur sounded loud.
“Perquage!” Buonespoir repeated.
“Perquage! Fall back!” said the seigneur, and waved off the pikes of the halberdiers. “He has sanctuary to the sea.”
This narrow road in which the pirates stood was the last of three in the Isle of Jersey, running from churches to the sea, in which a criminal was safe from arrest by virtue of an old statute. The otherperquageshad been taken away, but this one of Rozel remained, a concession made by Henry VIII. to the father of this Raoul Lemprière. The privilege had been used but once in the present seigneur’s day, because the criminal must be put upon the road from the chapel by the seigneur himself, and he had used his privilege modestly.
No man in Jersey but knew the sacredness of thisperquage, though it was ten years since it had been used; and no man, not even the governor himself, dare lift his hand to one upon that road.
So it was that Buonespoir and Abednego, two fugitives from justice, walked quietly to the sea down theperquage, halberdiers,balked of their prey, prowling on their steps and cursing the Seigneur of Rozel for his gift of sanctuary—for the Seigneur of St. Ouen’s and the royal court had promised each halberdier three shillings and all the ale he could drink at a sitting if Buonespoir was brought in alive or dead.
In peace and safety the three boarded theHoneyfloweroff the point called Verclut, and set sail for England, just seven hours after Michel de la Forêt had gone his way upon the Channel, a prisoner.
AFORTNIGHTlater, of a Sunday morning, the Lord Chamberlain of England was disturbed out of his usual equanimity. As he was treading the rushes in the presence-chamber of the royal palace at Greenwich, his eye busy in inspection—for the Queen would soon pass on her way to chapel—his head nodding right and left to archbishop, bishop, councillors of state, courtiers, and officers of the crown, he heard a rude noise at the door leading into the antechapel, where the Queen received petitions from the people. Hurrying thither in shocked anxiety, he found a curled gentleman of the guard, resplendent in red velvet and gold chains, in peevish argument with a boisterous seigneur of a bronzed, good-humored face,who urged his entrance to the presence-chamber.
The Lord Chamberlain swept down upon the pair like a flamingo with wings outspread. “God’s death! what means this turmoil? Her Majesty comes hither!” he cried, and scowled upon the intruder, who now stepped back a little, treading on the toes of a huge sailor with a small head and bushy red hair and beard.
“Because her Majesty comes I come also,” the seigneur interposed, grandly.
“What is your name and quality?”
“Yours first, and I shall know how to answer.”
“I am the Lord Chamberlain of England.”
“And I, my lord, am Lemprière, Seigneur of Rozel—and butler to the Queen.”
“Where is Rozel?” asked my Lord Chamberlain.
The face of the seigneur suddenly flushed, his mouth swelled, and then burst.
“Where is Rozel!” he cried, in a voice of rage. “Where is Rozel! Have you heard of Hugh Pawlett?” he asked, with a hugecontempt—“of Governor Hugh Pawlett?” The Lord Chamberlain nodded. “Then ask his Excellency when next you see him, Where is Rozel? But take good counsel and keep your ignorance from the Queen,” he added. “She has no love for stupids.”
“You say you are butler to the Queen? Whence came your commission?” said the Lord Chamberlain, smiling now; for Lemprière’s words and ways were of some simple world where odd folk lived, and his boyish vanity disarmed anger.
“By royal warrant and heritage. And of all of the Jersey Isle, I only may have dove-cotes, which is the everlasting thorn in the side of De Carteret of St. Ouen’s. Now will you let me in, my lord?” he said, all in a breath.
At a stir behind him the Lord Chamberlain turned, and with a horrified exclamation hurried away, for the procession from the Queen’s apartments had already entered the presence-chamber: gentlemen, barons, earls, knights of the garter, in brave attire, with bare heads and sumptuous calves. The LordChamberlain had scarce got to his place when the Chancellor, bearing the seals in a red silk purse, entered, flanked by two gorgeous folk with the royal sceptre and the sword of state in a red scabbard, all flourished with fleurs-de-lis. Moving in and out among them all was the Queen’s fool, who jested and shook his bells under the noses of the highest.
It was an event of which the Seigneur of Rozel told to his dying day: that he entered the presence-chamber of the royal palace of Greenwich at the same instant as the Queen—“Rozel at one end, Elizabeth at the other, and all the world at gaze,” he was wont to say, with loud guffaws. But what he spoke of afterwards with preposterous ease and pride was neither pride nor ease at the moment; for the Queen’s eyes fell on him as he shoved past the gentlemen who kept the door. For an instant she stood still, regarding him intently, then turned quickly to the Lord Chamberlain in inquiry, and with a sharp reproof, too, in her look. The Lord Chamberlain fell on his knee, and with low, uncertain voice explained the incident.
Elizabeth again cast her eyes towards Lemprière, and the court, following her example, scrutinized the seigneur in varied styles of insolence or curiosity. Lemprière drew himself up with a slashing attempt at composure, but ended by flaming from head to foot, his face shining like a cock’s comb, the perspiration standing out like beads upon his forehead, his eyes gone blind with confusion. That was but for a moment, however, and then, Elizabeth’s look being slowly withdrawn from him, a curious smile came to her lips, and she said to the Lord Chamberlain, “Let the gentleman remain.”
The Queen’s fool tripped forward and tapped the Lord Chamberlain on the shoulder. “Let the gentleman remain, gossip, and see you that remaining he goeth not like a fly with his feet in the porridge.” With a flippant step before the seigneur, he shook his bells at him. “Thou shalt stay, Nuncio, and, staying, speak the truth. So doing, you shall be as noted as a comet with three tails. You shall prove that man was made in God’s image. So lift thy head and sneeze—sneezingis the fashion here; but see that thou sneeze not thy head off as they do in Tartary. ’Tis worth remembrance.”
Rozel’s self-importance and pride had returned. The blood came back to his heart, and he threw out his chest grandly; he even turned to Buonespoir, whose great figure might be seen beyond the door, and winked at him. For a moment he had time to note the doings of the Queen and her courtiers with wide-eyed curiosity. He saw the Earl of Leicester, exquisite, haughty, gallant, fall upon his knee, and Elizabeth slowly pull off her glove and with a none too gracious look give him her hand to kiss, the only favor of the kind granted that day. He saw Cecil, her minister, introduce a foreign noble, who presented his letters. He heard the Queen speak in a half-dozen different languages, to people of various lands, and was smitten with due amazement.
But as Elizabeth came slowly down the hall, her white silk gown fronted with great pearls flashing back the light, a marchioness bearing the train, the crown on her head glitteringas she turned from right to left, her wonderful collar of jewels sparkling on her uncovered bosom, suddenly the mantle of black, silver-shotted silk upon her shoulders became to Lemprière’s heated senses a judge’s robe, and Elizabeth the august judge of the world. His eyes blinded again, for it was as if she were bearing down upon him. Certainly she was looking at him now, scarce heeding the courtiers who fell to their knees on either side as she came on. The red doublets of the fifty Gentlemen Pensioners—all men of noble families proud to do this humble yet distinguished service—with battle-axes, on either side of her, seemed to Lemprière on the instant like an army with banners threatening him. From the antechapel behind him came the cry of the faithful subjects who, as the gentlemen-at-arms fell back from the doorway, had but just caught a glimpse of her Majesty—“Long live Elizabeth!”
It seemed to Lemprière that the Gentlemen Pensioners must beat him down as they passed, yet he stood riveted to the spot.And, indeed, it was true that he was almost in the path of her Majesty. He was aware that two gentlemen touched him on the shoulder and bade him retire; but the Queen motioned to them to desist. So, with the eyes of the whole court on him again, and Elizabeth’s calm, curious gaze fixed, as it were, on his forehead, he stood still till the flaming Gentlemen Pensioners were within a few feet of him and the battle-axes were almost over his head.
The great braggart was no better now than a wisp of grass in the wind, and it was more than homage that bent him to his knees as the Queen looked him full in the eyes. There was a moment’s absolute silence, and then she said, with cold condescension:
“By what privilege do you seek our presence?”
“I am Raoul Lemprière, Seigneur of Rozel, your high Majesty,” said the choking voice of the Jerseyman.
The Queen raised her eyebrows. “The man seems French. You come from France?”
Lemprière flushed to his hair—the Queendid not know him, then! “From Jersey Isle, your sacred Majesty.”
“Jersey Isle is dear to us. And what is your warrant here?”
“I am butler to your Majesty, by your gracious Majesty’s patent, and I alone may have dove-cotes in the isle; and I only may have the perquage—on your Majesty’s patent. It is not even held by De Carteret of St. Ouen’s.”
The Queen smiled as she had not smiled since she entered the presence-chamber. “God preserve us,” she said, “that I should not have recognized you! It is, of course, our faithful Lemprière of Rozel.”
The blood came back to the seigneur’s heart, but he did not dare look up yet, and he did not see that Elizabeth was in rare mirth at his words; and though she had no ken or memory of him, she read his nature and was mindful to humor him. Beckoning Leicester to her side, she said a few words in an undertone, to which he replied with a smile more sour than sweet.
“Rise, Monsieur of Rozel,” she said.
The seigneur stood up, and met her gaze faintly.
“And so, proud seigneur, you must needs flout e’en our Lord Chamberlain, in the name of our butler with three dove-cotes and the perquage. In sooth thy office must not be set at naught lightly—not when it is flanked by the perquage. By my father’s doublet, but that frieze jerkin is well cut; it suits thy figure well—I would that my Lord Leicester here had such a tailor. But this perquage—I doubt not there are those here at court who are most ignorant of its force and moment. My Lord Chamberlain, my Lord Leicester, Cecil here—confusion sits in their faces. The perquage, which my father’s patent approved, has served us well, I doubt not, is a comfort to our realm and a dignity befitting the wearer of that frieze jerkin. Speak to their better understanding, Monsieur of Rozel.”
“Speak, Nuncio, and you shall have comforts, and be given in marriage, multiple or singular, even as I,” said the fool, and touched him on the breast with his bells.
Lemprière had recovered his heart, andnow was set full sail in the course he had charted for himself in Jersey. In large words and larger manner he explained most innocently the sacred privilege ofperquage.
“And how often have you used the right, friend?” asked Elizabeth.
“But once in ten years, your noble Majesty.”
“When last?”
“But yesterday a week, your universal Majesty.”
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows. “Who was the criminal, what the occasion?”
“The criminal was one Buonespoir, the occasion our coming hither to wait upon the Queen of England and our Lady of Normandy, for such is your well-born Majesty to your loyal Jersiais.” And thereupon he plunged into an impeachment of De Carteret of St. Ouen’s, and stumbled through a blunt, broken story of the wrongs and the sorrows of Michel and Angèle and the doings of Buonespoir in their behalf.
Elizabeth frowned and interrupted him. “I have heard of this Buonespoir, monsieur,through others than the Seigneur of St. Ouen’s. He is an unlikely squire of dames. There’s a hill in my kingdom has long bided his coming. Where waits the rascal now?”
“In the antechapel, your Majesty.”
“By the rood!” said Elizabeth, in sudden amazement. “In my antechapel, forsooth!”
She looked beyond the doorway and saw the great, red-topped figure of Buonespoir, his good-natured, fearless face, his shock of hair, his clear blue eye—he was not thirty feet away.
“He comes to crave pardon for his rank offences, your benignant Majesty,” said Lemprière.
The humor of the thing rushed upon the Queen. Never before were two such naïve folk at court. There was not a hair of duplicity in the heads of the two, and she judged them well in her mind.
“I will see you stand together—you and your henchman,” she said to Rozel, and moved on to the antechapel, the court following. Standing still just inside the doorway, she motioned Buonespoir to come near.The pirate, unconfused, undismayed, with his wide, blue, asking eyes, came forward and dropped upon his knees. Elizabeth motioned Lemprière to stand a little apart.
Thereupon she set a few questions to Buonespoir, whose replies, truthfully given, showed that he had no real estimate of his crimes, and was indifferent to what might be their penalties. He had no moral sense on the one hand, on the other, no fear.
Suddenly she turned to Lemprière again. “You came, then, to speak for this Michel de la Forêt, the exile—?”
“And for the demoiselle Angèle Aubert, who loves him, your Majesty.”
“I sent for this gentleman exile a fortnight ago—” She turned towards Leicester inquiringly.
“I have the papers here, your Majesty,” said Leicester, and gave a packet over.
“And where have you De la Forêt?” said Elizabeth.
“In durance, your Majesty.”
“When came he hither?”
“Three days gone,” answered Leicester, alittle gloomily, for there was acerbity in Elizabeth’s voice.
Elizabeth seemed about to speak, then dropped her eyes upon the papers and glanced hastily at their contents.
“You will have this Michel de la Forêt brought to my presence as fast as horse can bring him, my lord,” she said to Leicester. “This rascal of the sea—Buonespoir—you will have safe bestowed till I recall his existence again,” she said to a captain of men-at-arms; “and you, Monsieur of Rozel, since you are my butler, will get you to my diningroom and do your duty—the office is not all perquisites,” she added, smoothly. She was about to move on when a thought seemed to strike her, and she added, “This mademoiselle and her father whom you brought hither—where are they?”
“They are even within the palace grounds, your imperial Majesty,” answered Lemprière.
“You will summon them when I bid you,” she said to the seigneur; “and you shall see that they have comforts and housing as befitstheir station,” she added to the Lord Chamberlain.
So did Elizabeth, out of a whimsical humor, set the highest in the land to attend upon unknown, unconsidered exiles.
FIVEminutes later Lemprière of Rozel, as butler to the Queen, saw a sight of which he told to his dying day. When, after varied troubles hereafter set down, he went back to Jersey, he made a speech before the royal court, in which he told what chanced while Elizabeth was at chapel.
“There stood I, butler to the Queen,” he said, with a large gesture, “but what knew I of butler’s duties at Greenwich Palace! Her Majesty had given me an office where all the work was done for me. Odd’s life! but when I saw the Gentleman of the Rod and his fellow get down on their knees to lay the cloth upon the table, as though it was an altar at Jerusalem, I thought it timeto say my prayers. There was naught but kneeling and retiring. Now it was the saltcellar, the plate, and the bread; then it was a Duke’s Daughter—a noble soul as ever lived—with a tasting-knife, as beautiful as a rose; then another lady enters who glares at me, and gets to her knees as does the other. Three times up and down, and then one rubs the plate with bread and salt, as solemn as St. Ouen’s when he says prayers in the royal court. Gentles, that was a day for Jersey. For there stood I as master of all, the Queen’s butler, and the greatest ladies of the land doing my will—though it was all Persian mystery to me, save when the kettle-drums began to beat and the trumpet to blow, and in walked bareheaded the yeomen of the guard, all scarlet, with a golden rose on their backs, bringing in a course of twenty-four gold dishes, and I, as Queen’s butler, receiving them.
“Then it was I opened my mouth, amazed at the endless dishes filled with niceties of earth, and the Duke’s Daughter pops onto my tongue a mouthful of the first dishbrought, and then does the same to every yeoman of the guard that carried a dish—that her notorious Majesty be safe against the hand of poisoners. There was I, fed by a Duke’s Daughter; and thus was Jersey honored; and the Duke’s Daughter whispers to me, as a dozen other unmarried ladies enter, ‘The Queen liked not the cut of your frieze jerkin better than do I, seigneur.’ With that she joins the others, and they all kneel down and rise up again, and, lifting the meat from the table, bear it into the Queen’s private chamber.
“When they return, and the yeomen of the guard go forth, I am left alone with these ladies, and there I stand with twelve pairs of eyes upon me, little knowing what to do. There was laughter in the faces of some, and looks less taking in the eyes of others; for my Lord Leicester was to have done the duty I was set to do that day, and he the greatest gallant of the kingdom, as all the world knows. What they said among themselves I know not, but I heard Leicester’s name, and I guessed that they were mostlyin the pay of his soft words. But the Duke’s Daughter was on my side, as was proved betimes when Leicester made trouble for us who went from Jersey to plead the cause of injured folk. Of the earl’s enmity to me—a foolish spite of a great nobleman against a Norman-Jersey gentleman—and of how it injured others for the moment, you all know; but we had him by the heels before the end of it, great earl and favorite as he was.”
In the same speech Lemprière told of his audience with the Queen, even as she sat at dinner, and of what she said to him; but since his words give but a partial picture of events, the relation must not be his.
When the Queen returned from chapel to her apartments, Lemprière was called by an attendant, and he stood behind the Queen’s chair until she summoned him to face her. Then, having finished her meal and dipped her fingers in a bowl of rose-water, she took up the papers Leicester had given her—the Duke’s Daughter had read them aloud as she ate—and said:
“Now, my good Seigneur of Rozel, answerme these few questions: First, what concern is it of yours whether this Michel de la Forêt be sent back to France or die here in England?”
“I helped to save his life at sea—one good turn deserves another, your high-born Majesty.”
The Queen looked sharply at him, then burst out laughing.
“God’s life, but here’s a bull making epigrams!” she said. Then her humor changed. “See you, my butler of Rozel, you shall speak the truth, or I’ll have you where that jerkin will fit you not so well a month hence. Plain answers I will have to plain questions, or De Carteret of St. Ouen’s shall have his will of you and your precious pirate. So bear yourself as you would save your head and your honors.”
Lemprière of Rozel never had a better moment than when he met the Queen of England’s threats with faultless intrepidity. “I am concerned about my head, but more about my honors, and most about my honor,” he replied. “My head is my own, myhonors are my family’s, for which I would give my head when needed, and my honor defends both until both are naught—and all are in the service of my Queen.”
Smiling, Elizabeth suddenly leaned forward, and, with a glance of satisfaction towards the Duke’s Daughter, who was present, said:
“I had not thought to find so much logic behind your rampant skull,” she said. “You’ve spoken well, Rozel, and you shall speak by the book to the end, if you will save your friends. What concern is it of yours whether Michel de la Forêt live or die?”
“It is a concern of one whom I’ve sworn to befriend, and that is my concern, your ineffable Majesty.”
“Who the friend?”
“Mademoiselle Aubert.”
“The betrothed of this Michel de la Forêt?”
“Even so, your exalted Majesty. But I made sure De la Forêt was dead when I asked her to be my wife.”
“Lord! Lord! Lord! hear this vast infant, this hulking baby of a seigneur, thisprimeval innocence! Listen to him, cousin,” said the Queen, turning again to the Duke’s Daughter. “Was ever the like of it in any kingdom of this earth? He chooses a penniless exile—he, a butler to the Queen, with three dove-cotes and the perquage—and a Huguenot withal. He is refused; then comes the absent lover oversea, to shipwreck; and our seigneur rescues him, ‘fends him; and when yon master exile is in peril, defies his Queen’s commands”—she tapped the papers lying beside her on the table—“then comes to England with the lady to plead the case before his outraged sovereign, with an outlawed buccaneer for comrade and lieutenant. There is the case, is’t not?”
“I swore to be her friend,” answered Lemprière, stubbornly, “and I have done according to my word.”
“There’s not another nobleman in my kingdom who would not have thought twice about the matter, with the lady aboard his ship on the high seas—’tis a miraculous chivalry, cousin,” she added to the Duke’s Daughter, who bowed, settled herself againon her velvet cushion, and looked out of the corner of her eyes at Lemprière.
“You opposed Sir Hugh Pawlett’s officers who went to arrest this De la Forêt,” continued Elizabeth. “Call you that serving your Queen? Pawlett had our commands.”
“I opposed them but in form, that the matter might the more surely be brought to your Majesty’s knowledge.”
“It might easily have brought you to the Tower, man.”
“I had faith that your Majesty would do right in this, as in all else. So I came hither to tell the whole story to your judicial Majesty.”
“Our thanks for your certificate of character,” said the Queen, with amused irony. “What is your wish? Make your words few and plain.”
“I desire before all that Michel de la Forêt shall not be returned to the Medici, most radiant Majesty.”
“That’s plain. But there are weighty matters ’twixt France and England, and Dela Forêt may turn the scale one way or another. What follows, beggar of Rozel?”
“That Mademoiselle Aubert and her father may live without let or hindrance in Jersey.”
“That you may eat sour grapes ad eternam? Next?”
“That Buonespoir be pardoned all offences and let live in Jersey on pledge that he sin no more, not even to raid St. Ouen’s cellars of the muscadella reserved for your generous Majesty.”
There was such humor in Lemprière’s look as he spoke of the muscadella that the Queen questioned him closely upon Buonespoir’s raid; and so infectious was his mirth as he told the tale that Elizabeth, though she stamped her foot in assumed impatience, smiled also.
“You shall have your Buonespoir, seigneur,” she said; “but for his future you shall answer as well as he.”
“For what he does in Jersey Isle, your commiserate Majesty?”
“For crime elsewhere, if he be caught, heshall march to Tyburn, friend,” she answered. Then she hurriedly added: “Straightway go and bring mademoiselle and her father hither. Orders are given for their disposal. And to-morrow at this hour you shall wait upon me in their company. I thank you for your services as butler this day, Monsieur of Rozel. You do your office rarely.”
As the seigneur left Elizabeth’s apartments he met the Earl of Leicester hurrying thither, preceded by the Queen’s messenger. Leicester stopped and said, with a slow, malicious smile, “Farming is good, then—you have fine crops this year on your holding?”
The point escaped Lemprière at first, for the favorite’s look was all innocence, and he replied: “You are mistook, my lord. You will remember I was in the presence-chamber an hour ago, my lord. I am Lemprière, Seigneur of Rozel, butler to her Majesty.”
“But are you, then? I thought you were a farmer and raised cabbages.” And, smiling, Leicester passed on.
For a moment the seigneur stood ponderingthe earl’s words and angrily wondering at his obtuseness. Then suddenly he knew he had been mocked, and he turned and ran after his enemy; but Leicester had vanished into the Queen’s apartments.
The Queen’s fool was standing near, seemingly engaged in the light occupation of catching imaginary flies, buzzing with his motions. As Leicester disappeared he looked from under his arm at Lemprière. “If a bird will not stop for the salt to its tail, then the salt is damned, Nuncio; and you must cryDavid!and get thee to the quarry.”
Lemprière stared at him swelling with rage; but the quaint smiling of the fool conquered him, and, instead of turning on his heel, he spread himself like a Colossus and looked down in grandeur. “And wherefore cryDavid!and get quarrying?” he asked. “Come, what sense is there in thy words when I am wroth with yonder nobleman?”
“Oh, Nuncio, Nuncio, thou art a child of innocence and without history. The salt held not the bird for the net of thy anger,Nuncio; so it is meet that other ways be found. David the ancient put a stone in a sling, and Goliath laid him down like an egg in a nest—therefore, Nuncio, get thee to the quarry. Obligato, which is to say Leicester yonder, hath no tail—the devil cut it off and wears it himself. So let salt be damned, and go sling thy stone!”
Lemprière was good-humored again. He fumbled in his purse and brought forth a gold-piece. “Fool, thou hast spoken like a man born sensible and infinite. I understand thee like a book. Thou hast not folly, and thou shall not be answered as if thou wast a fool. But in terms of gold shalt thou have reply.” He put the gold-piece in the fool’s hand and slapped him on the shoulder.
“Why now, Nuncio,” answered the other, “it is clear that there is a fool at court, for is it not written that a fool and his money are soon parted? And this gold-piece is still hot with running ‘tween thee and me.”
Lemprière roared. “Why, then, for thy hit thou shalt have another gold-piece, gossip. But see”—his voice lowered—“knowyou where is my friend, Buonespoir the pirate? Know you where he is in durance?”
“As I know marrow in a bone I know where he hides, Nuncio; so come with me,” answered the fool.
“If De Carteret had but thy sense we could live at peace in Jersey,” rejoined Lemprière, and strode ponderously after the light-footed fool, who capered forth, singing: