So then Adhelmar left her. In the main hall he found the vicomte still sitting over his wine of Anjou.
"Cousin," said Adhelmar, "I must ride hence to-night."
Reinault stared at him: a mastering wonder woke in Reinault's face. "Ta, ta, ta!" he clicked his tongue, very softly. Afterward he sprang to his feet and clutched Adhelmar by both arms. "No, no!" Reinault cried. "No, Adhelmar, you must not try that! It is death, lad,—sure death! It means hanging, boy!" the vicomte pleaded, for, hard man that he was, he loved Adhelmar.
"That is likely enough," Adhelmar conceded.
"They will hang you,"' Reinault said again: "d'Andreghen and the CountDauphin of Vienna will hang you as blithely as they would Iscariot."
"That, too," said Adhelmar, "is likely enough, if I remain in France."
"Oy Dieus! will you flee to England, then?" the vicomte scoffed, bitterly. "Has King Edward not sworn to hang you these eight years past? Was it not you, then, cousin, who took Almerigo di Pavia, that Lombard knave whom he made governor of Calais,—was it not you, then, who delivered Edward's loved Almerigo to Geoffrey de Chargny, who had him broken on the wheel? Eh, holy Maclou! but you will get hearty welcome and a chaplain and a rope in England."
Adhelmar admitted that this was true. "Still," said he, "I must ride hence to-night."
"For her?" Reinault asked, and jerked his thumb upward.
"Yes," said Adhelmar,—"for her."
Reinault stared in his face for a while. "You are a fool, Adhelmar," said he, at last, "but you are a brave man, and you love as becomes a chevalier. It is a great pity that a flibbertigibbet wench with a tow-head should be the death of you. For my part, I am the King's vassal; I shall not break faith with him; but you are my guest and my kinsman. For that reason I am going to bed, and I shall sleep very soundly. It is likely I shall hear nothing of the night's doings,—ohimé, no! not if you murder d'Andreghen in the court-yard!" Reinault ended, and smiled, somewhat sadly.
Afterward he took Adhelmar's hand and said: "Farewell, lord Adhelmar! O true knight, sturdy and bold! terrible and merciless toward your enemies, gentle and simple toward your friends, farewell!"
He kissed Adhelmar on either cheek and left him. In those days men encountered death with very little ado.
Then Adhelmar rode off in the rain with thirty-four armed followers. Riding thus, he reflected upon the nature of women and upon his love for the Demoiselle de Puysange; and, to himself, he swore gloomily that if she had a mind to Hugues she must have Hugues, come what might. Having reached this conclusion, Adhelmar wheeled upon his men, and cursed them for tavern-idlers and laggards and flea-hearted snails, and bade them spur.
Mélite, at her window, heard them depart, and heard the noise of their going lapse into the bland monotony of the rain's noise. This dank night now divulged no more, and she turned back into the room. Adhelmar's glove, which he had forgotten in his haste, lay upon the floor, and Mélite lifted it and twisted it idly.
"I wonder—?" said she.
She lighted four wax candles and set them before a mirror that was in the room. Mélite stood among them and looked into the mirror. She seemed very tall and very slender, and her loosened hair hung heavily about her beautiful shallow face and fell like a cloak around her black-robed body, showing against the black gown like melting gold; and about her were the tall, white candles tipped with still flames of gold. Mélite laughed—her laughter was high and delicate, with the resonance of thin glass,—and raised her arms above her, head, stretching tensely like a cat before a fire, and laughed yet again.
"After all," said she, "I do not wonder."
Mélite sat before the mirror, and braided her hair, and sang to herself in a sweet, low voice, brooding with unfathomable eyes upon her image in the glass, while the October rain beat about Puysange, and Adhelmar rode forth to save Hugues that must else be hanged.
Sang Mélite:
"_Rustling leaves of the willow-treePeering downward at you and me,And no man else in the world to see,
"Only the birds, whose dusty coatsShow dark in the green,—whose throbbing throatsTurn joy to music and love to notes_.
"Lean your body against the tree,Lifting your red lips up to me,Mélite, and kiss, with no man to see!
"And let us laugh for a little:—Yea,Let love and laughter herald the dayWhen laughter and love will be put away.
"Then you will remember the willow-treeAnd this very hour, and remember me,Mélite,—whose face you will no more see!
"So swift, so swift the glad time goes,And Eld and Death with their countless woesDraw near, and the end thereof no man knows,
"Lean your body against the tree,Lifting your red lips up to me,Mélite, and kiss, with no man to see!"_
Mélite smiled as she sang; for this was a song that Adhelmar had made for her upon a May morning at Nointel, before he was a knight, when both were very young. So now she smiled to remember the making of the verses which she sang while the October rain was beating about Puysange.
5.Night-work
It was not long before they came upon d'Andreghen and his men camped about a great oak, with One-eyed Peire a-swing over their heads for a lamentable banner. A shrill sentinel, somewhere in the dark, demanded the newcomers' business, but without receiving any adequate answer, for at that moment Adhelmar gave the word to charge.
Then it was as if all the devils in Pandemonium had chosen Normandy for their playground; and what took place in the night no man saw for the darkness, so that I cannot tell you of it. Let it suffice that Adhelmar rode away before d'Andreghen had rubbed sleep well out of his eyes; and with Adhelmar were Hugues d'Arques and some half of Adhelmar's men. The rest were dead, and Adhelmar was badly hurt, for he had burst open his old wound and it was bleeding under his armor. Of this he said nothing.
"Hugues," said he, "do you and these fellows ride to the coast; thence take ship for England."
He would have none of Hugues' thanks; instead, he turned and left Hugues to whimper out his gratitude to the skies, which spat a warm, gusty rain at him. Adhelmar rode again to Puysange, and as he went he sang.
Sang Adhelmar:
"D'Andreghen in NormandyWent forth to slay mine enemy;But as he wentLord God for me wrought marvellously;
"Wherefore, I may call and cryThat am now about to die,'I am content!'
"Domine! Domine!Gratias accipe!Et meum animumRecipe in coelum_!"
6. They Kiss at Parting
When he had come to Puysange, Adhelmar climbed the stairs of the White Turret,—slowly, for he was growing very feeble now,—and so came again to Mélite crouching among the burned-out candles in the slate-colored twilight which heralded dawn.
"He is safe," said Adhelmar. He told Mélite how Hugues was rescued and shipped to England, and how, if she would, she might straightway follow him in a fishing-boat. "For there is likely to be ugly work at Puysange," Adhelmar said, "when the marshal comes. And he will come."
"But what will you do now, my cousin?" asked Mélite.
"Holy Ouen!" said Adhelmar; "since I needs must die, I will die inFrance, not in the cold land of England."
"Die!" cried Mélite. "Are you hurt so sorely, then?"
He grinned like a death's-head. "My injuries are not incurable," said he, "yet must I die very quickly, for all that. The English King will hang me if I go thither, as he has sworn to do these eight years, because of that matter of Almerigo di Pavia: and if I stay in France, I must hang because of this night's work."
Mélite wept. "O God! O God!" she quavered, two or three times, like one hurt in the throat. "And you have done this for me! Is there no way to save you, Adhelmar?" she pleaded, with wide, frightened eyes that were like a child's.
"None," said Adhelmar. He took both her hands in his, very tenderly. "Ah, my sweet," said he, "must I, whose grave is already digged, waste breath upon this idle talk of kingdoms and the squabbling men who rule them? I have but a brief while to live, and I wish to forget that there is aught else in the world save you, and that I love you. Do not weep, Mélite! In a little time you will forget me and be happy with this Hugues whom you love; and I?—ah, my sweet, I think that even in my grave I shall dream of you and of your great beauty and of the exceeding love that I bore you in the old days."
"Ah, no, I shall not ever forget, O true and faithful lover! And, indeed, indeed, Adhelmar, I would give my life right willingly that yours might be saved!"
She had almost forgotten Hugues. Her heart was sad as she thought of Adhelmar, who must die a shameful death for her sake, and of the love which she had cast away. Beside it, the Sieur d'Arques' affection showed somewhat tawdry, and Mélite began to reflect that, after all, she had liked Adhelmar almost as well.
"Sweet," said Adhelmar, "do I not know you to the marrow? You will forget me utterly, for your heart is very changeable. Ah, Mother of God!" Adhelmar cried, with a quick lift of speech; "I am afraid to die, for the harsh dust will shut out the glory of your face, and you will forget!"
"No; ah, no!" Mélite whispered, and drew near to him. Adhelmar smiled, a little wistfully, for he did not believe that she spoke the truth; but it was good to feel her body close to his, even though he was dying, and he was content.
But by this time the dawn had come completely, flooding the room with its first thin radiance, and Mélite saw the pallor of his face and so knew that he was wounded.
"Indeed, yes," said Adhelmar, when she had questioned him, "for my breast is quite cloven through." And when she disarmed him, Mélite found a great cut in his chest which had bled so much that it was apparent he must die, whether d'Andreghen and Edward of England would or no.
Mélite wept again, and cried, "Why had you not told me of this?"
"To have you heal me, perchance?" said Adhelmar. "Ah, love, is hanging, then, so sweet a death that I should choose it, rather than to die very peacefully in your arms? Indeed, I would not live if I might; for I have proven traitor to my King, and it is right that traitors should die; and, chief of all, I know that life can bring me naught more desirable than I have known this night. What need, then, have I to live?"
Mélite bent over him; for as he spoke he had lain back in a tall carven chair by the east window. She was past speech. But now, for a moment, her lips clung to his, and her warm tears fell upon his face. What better death for a lover? thought Adhelmar.
Yet he murmured somewhat. "Pity, always pity!" he said, wearily. "I shall never win aught else of you, Mélite. For before this you have kissed me, pitying me because you could not love me. And you have kissed me now, pitying me because I may not live."
But Mélite, clasping her arms about his neck, whispered into his ear the meaning of this last kiss, and at the honeyed sound of her whispering his strength came back for a moment, and he strove to rise. The level sunlight through the open window smote full upon his face, which was very glad. Mélite was conscious of her nobility in causing him such delight at the last.
"God, God!" cried Adhelmar, and he spread out his arms toward the dear, familiar world that was slowly taking form beneath them,—a world now infinitely dear to him; "all, my God, have pity and let me live a little longer!"
As Mélite, half frightened, drew back from him, he crept out of his chair and fell prone at her feet. Afterward his hands stretched forward toward her, clutching, and then trembled and were still.
Mélite stood looking downward, wondering vaguely when she would next know either joy or sorrow again. She was now conscious of no emotion whatever. It seemed to her she ought to be more greatly moved. So the new day found them.
* * * * *
"Jack, how agrees the devil and thee about thy soul, that thou soldest him for a cup of Madeira and a cold capon's leg?"
_In the chapel at Puysange you may still see the tomb of Adhelmar; but Mélite's bones lie otherwhere. "Her heart was changeable," as old Nicolas says, justly enough; and so in due time it was comforted.
For Hugues d'Arques—or Hugh Darke, as his name was Anglicized—presently stood high in the favor of King Edward. A fief was granted to Messire Darke, in Norfolk, where Hugues shortly built for himself a residence at Yaxham, and began to look about for a wife: it was not long before he found one.
This befell at Brétigny when, in 1360, the Great Peace was signed between France and England, and Hugues, as one of the English embassy, came face to face with Reinault and Mélite. History does not detail the meeting; but, inasmuch as the Sieur d'Arques and Mélite de Puysange were married at Rouen the following October, doubtless it passed off pleasantly enough.
The couple had sufficient in common to have qualified them for several decades of mutual toleration. But by ill luck, Mélite died in child-birth three years after her marriage. She had borne, in 1361, twin daughters, of whom Adelais died a spinster; the other daughter, Sylvia, circa 1378, figured in an unfortunate love-affair with one of Sir Thomas Mowbray's attendants, but subsequently married Robert Vernon of Winstead. Mélite left also a son, Hugh, born in 1363, who succeeded to his father's estate of Yaxham in 1387, in which year Hugues fell at the battle of Radcot Bridge, fighting in behalf of the ill-fated Richard of Bordeaux.
Now we turn to certain happenings in Eastcheap, at the Boar's HeadTavern._
The Episode Called Love-Letters of Falstaff
I. "That Gray Iniquity"
There was a sound of scuffling within as Sir John Falstaff—much broken since his loss of the King's favor, and now equally decayed in wit and health and reputation—stood fumbling at the door of the Angel room. He was particularly shaky this morning after a night of particularly hard drinking.
But he came into the apartment singing, and, whatever the scuffling had meant, found Bardolph in one corner employed in sorting garments from a clothes-chest, while at the extreme end of the room Mistress Quickly demurely stirred the fire; which winked at the old knight rather knowingly.
"Then came the bold Sir Caradoc," carolled Sir John. "Ah, mistress, what news?—And eke Sir Pellinore.—Did I rage last night, Bardolph? Was I a Bedlamite?"
"As mine own bruises can testify," Bardolph assented. "Had each one of them a tongue, they would raise a clamor beside which Babel were as an heir weeping for his rich uncle's death; their testimony would qualify you for any mad-house in England. And if their evidence go against the doctor's stomach, the watchman at the corner hath three teeth—or, rather, hath them no longer, since you knocked them out last night—that will, right willingly, aid him to digest it."
"Three, say you?" asked the knight, rather stiffly lowering his great body into his great chair set ready for him beside the fire. "I would have my valor in all men's mouths, but not in this fashion, for it is too biting a jest. Three, say you? Well, I am glad it was no worse; I have a tender conscience, and that mad fellow of the north, Hotspur, sits heavily upon it, so that thus this Percy, being slain by my valor, isper seavenged, a plague on him! Three, say you? I would to God my name were not so terrible to the enemy as it is; I would I had 'bated my natural inclination somewhat, and had slain less tall fellows by some threescore. I doubt Agamemnon slept not well o' nights. Three, say you? Give the fellow a crown apiece for his mouldy teeth, if thou hast them; if thou hast them not, bid him eschew this vice of drunkenness, whereby his misfortune hath befallen him, and thus win him heavenly crowns."
"Indeed, sir," began Bardolph, "I doubt—"
"Doubt not, sirrah!" cried Sir John, testily; and continued, in a virtuous manner: "Was not the apostle reproved for that same sin? Thou art a Didymus, Bardolph;—an incredulous paynim, a most unspeculative rogue! Have I carracks trading in the Indies? Have I robbed the exchequer of late? Have I the Golden Fleece for a cloak? Nay, it is paltry gimlet, and that augurs badly. Why, does this knavish watchman take me for a raven to feed him in the wilderness? Tell him there are no such ravens hereabout; else had I ravenously limed the house-tops and set springes in the gutters. Inform him that my purse is no better lined than his own broken skull: it is void as a beggar's protestations, or a butcher's stall in Lent; light as a famished gnat, or the sighing of a new-made widower; more empty than a last year's bird-nest, than a madman's eye, or, in fine, than the friendship of a king."
"But you have wealthy friends, Sir John," suggested the hostess of the Boar's Head Tavern, whose impatience had but very hardly waited for this opportunity to join in the talk. "Yes, I warrant you, Sir John. Sir John, you have a many wealthy friends; you cannot deny that, Sir John."
"Friends, dame?" asked the knight, and cowered closer to the fire, as though he were a little cold. "I have no friends since Hal is King. I had, I grant you, a few score of acquaintances whom I taught to play at dice; paltry young blades of the City, very unfledged juvenals! Setting my knighthood and my valor aside, if I did swear friendship with these, I did swear to a lie. But this is a censorious and muddy-minded world, so that, look you, even these sprouting aldermen, these foul bacon-fed rogues, have fled my friendship of late, and my reputation hath grown somewhat more murky than Erebus. No matter! I walk alone, as one that hath the pestilence. No matter! But I grow old; I am not in the vaward of my youth, mistress."
He nodded his head with extreme gravity; then reached for a cup of sack that Bardolph held at the knight's elbow.
"Indeed, I know not what your worship will do," said Mistress Quickly, rather sadly.
"Faith!" answered Sir John, finishing the sack and grinning in a somewhat ghastly fashion; "unless the Providence that watches over the fall of a sparrow hath an eye to the career of Sir John Falstaff, Knight, and so comes to my aid shortly, I must needs convert my last doublet into a mask, and turn highwayman in my shirt. I can take purses yet, ye Uzzite comforters, as gaily as I did at Gadshill, where that scurvy Poins, and he that is now King, and some twoscore other knaves did afterward assault me in the dark; yet I peppered some of them, I warrant you!"
"You must be rid of me, then, master," Bardolph interpolated. "I for one have no need of a hempen collar."
"Ah, well!" said the knight, stretching himself in his chair as the warmth of the liquor coursed through his inert blood; "I, too, would be loth to break the gallows' back! For fear of halters, we must alter our way of living; we must live close, Bardolph, till the wars make us Croesuses or food for crows. And if Hal but hold to his bias, there will be wars: I will eat a piece of my sword, if he have not need of it shortly. Ah, go thy ways, tall Jack; there live not three good men unhanged in England, and one of them is fat and grows old. We must live close, Bardolph; we must forswear drinking and wenching! But there is lime in this sack, you rogue; give me another cup."
The old knight drained this second cup, and unctuously sucked at and licked his lips. Thereafter,
"I pray you, hostess," he continued, "remember that Doll Tearsheet sups with me to-night; have a capon of the best, and be not sparing of the wine. I will repay you, upon honor, when we young fellows return from France, all laden with rings and brooches and such trumperies like your Norfolkshire pedlars at Christmas-tide. We will sack a town for you, and bring you back the Lord Mayor's beard to stuff you a cushion; the Dauphin shall be your tapster yet; we will walk on lilies, I warrant you, to the tune ofHey, then up go we!"
"Indeed, sir," said Mistress Quickly, in perfect earnest, "your worship is as welcome to my pantry as the mice—a pox on 'em!—think themselves; you are heartily welcome. Ah, well, old Puss is dead; I had her of Goodman Quickly these ten years since;—but I had thought you looked for the lady who was here but now;—she was a roaring lion among the mice."
"What lady?" cried Sir John, with great animation. "Was it Flint the mercer's wife, think you? Ah, she hath a liberal disposition, and will, without the aid of Prince Houssain's carpet or the horse of Cambuscan, transfer the golden shining pieces from her husband's coffers to mine."
"No mercer's wife, I think," Mistress Quickly answered, after consideration. "She came with two patched footmen, and smacked of gentility;—Master Dumbleton's father was a mercer; but he had red hair;—she is old;—and I could never abide red hair."
"No matter!" cried the knight. "I can love this lady, be she a very Witch of Endor. Observe, what a thing it is to be a proper man, Bardolph! She hath marked me;—in public, perhaps; on the street, it may be;—and then, I warrant you, made such eyes! and sighed such sighs! and lain awake o' nights, thinking of a pleasing portly gentleman, whom, were I not modesty's self, I might name;—and I, all this while, not knowing! Fetch me my Book of Riddles and my Sonnets, that I may speak smoothly. Why was my beard not combed this morning? No matter, it will serve. Have I no better cloak than this?" Sir John was in a tremendous bustle, all a-beam with pleasurable anticipation.
But Mistress Quickly, who had been looking out of the window, said,"Come, but your worship must begin with unwashed hands, for old MadamWish-for't and her two country louts are even now at the door."
"Avaunt, minions!" cried the knight. "Avaunt! Conduct the lady hither, hostess; Bardolph, another cup of sack. We will ruffle it, lad, and go to France all gold, like Midas! Are mine eyes too red? I must look sad, you know, and sigh very pitifully. Ah, we will ruffle it! Another cup of sack, Bardolph;—I am a rogue if I have drunk to-day. And avaunt! vanish! for the lady comes."
He threw himself into a gallant attitude, suggestive of one suddenly palsied, and with the mien of a turkey-cock strutted toward the door to greet his unknown visitor.
2."Then was Jack Falstaff, now Sir John, a Boy"
The woman who entered was not the jolly City dame one looked for: and, at first sight, you estimated her age as a trifle upon the staider side of sixty. But to this woman the years had shown unwonted kindliness, as though time touched her less with intent to mar than to caress; her form was still unbent, and her countenance, bloodless and deep-furrowed, bore the traces of great beauty; and, whatever the nature of her errand, the woman who stood in the doorway was unquestionably a person of breeding.
Sir John advanced toward her with as much elegance as he might muster; for gout when coupled with such excessive bulk does not beget an overpowering amount of grace.
"See, from the glowing East, Aurora comes," he chirped. "Madam, permit me to welcome you to my poor apartments; they are not worthy—"
"I would see Sir John Falstaff, sir," declared the lady, courteously, but with some reserve of manner, and looking him full in the face as she said this.
"Indeed, madam," suggested Sir John, "if those bright eyes—whose glances have already cut my poor heart into as many pieces as the man in the front of the almanac—will but desist for a moment from such butcher's work and do their proper duty, you will have little trouble in finding the bluff soldier you seek."
"Are you Sir John?" asked the lady, as though suspecting a jest. "The son of old Sir Edward Falstaff, of Norfolk?"
"His wife hath frequently assured me so," Sir John protested, very gravely; "and to confirm her evidence I have about me a certain villainous thirst that did plague Sir Edward sorely in his lifetime, and came to me with his other chattels. The property I have expended long since; but no Jew will advance me a maravedi on the Falstaff thirst. It is a priceless commodity, not to be bought or sold; you might as soon quench it."
"I would not have known you," said the lady, wonderingly; "but," she added, "I have not seen you these forty years."
"Faith, madam," grinned the knight, "the great pilferer Time hath since then taken away a little from my hair, and added somewhat (saving your presence) to my belly; and my face hath not been improved by being the grindstone for some hundred swords. But I do not know you."
"I am Sylvia Vernon," said the lady. "And once, a long while ago, I wasSylvia Darke."
"I remember," said the knight. His voice was altered. Bardolph would hardly have known it; nor, perhaps, would he have recognized his master's manner as he handed Dame Sylvia to the best chair.
"A long while ago," she repeated, sadly, after a pause during which the crackling of the fire was very audible. "Time hath dealt harshly with us both, John;—the name hath a sweet savor. I am an old woman now. And you—"
"I would not have known you," said Sir John; then asked, almost resentfully, "What do you here?"
"My son goes to the wars," she answered, "and I am come to bid him farewell; yet I should not tarry in London, for my lord is feeble and hath constant need of me. But I, an old woman, am yet vain enough to steal these few moments from him who needs me, to see for the last time, mayhap, him who was once my very dear friend."
"I was never your friend, Sylvia," said Sir John.
"Ah, the old wrangle!" said the lady, and smiled a little wistfully. "My dear and very honored lover, then; and I am come to see him here."
"Ay!" interrupted Sir John, rather hastily; and he proceeded, glowing with benevolence: "A quiet, orderly place, where I bestow my patronage; the woman of the house had once a husband in my company. God rest his soul! he bore a good pike. He retired in his old age and 'stablished this tavern, where he passed his declining years, till death called him gently away from this naughty world. God rest his soul, say I!"
This was a somewhat euphemistic version of the taking-off of Goodman Quickly, who had been knocked over the head with a joint-stool while rifling the pockets of a drunken guest; but perhaps Sir John wished to speak well of the dead, even at the price of conferring upon the present home of Sir John an idyllic atmosphere denied it by the London constabulary.
"And you for old memories' sake yet aid his widow?" the lady murmured."That is like you, John."
There was another silence, and the fire crackled more loudly than ever.
"And are you sorry that I come again, in a worse body, John, strange and time-ruined?"
"Sorry?" echoed Sir John; and, ungallant as it was, he hesitated a moment before replying: "No, faith! But there are some ghosts that will not easily bear raising, and you have raised one."
"We have summoned up no very fearful spectre, I think," replied the lady; "at most, no worse than a pallid, gentle spirit that speaks—to me, at least—of a boy and a girl who loved each other and were very happy a great while ago."
"Are you come hither to seek that boy?" asked the knight, and chuckled, though not merrily. "The boy that went mad and rhymed of you in those far-off dusty years? He is quite dead, my lady; he was drowned, mayhap, in a cup of wine. Or he was slain, perchance, by a few light women. I know not how he died. But he is quite dead, my lady, and I had not been haunted by his ghost until to-day."
He stared at the floor as he ended; then choked, and broke into a fit of coughing which unromantic chance brought on just now, of all times.
"He was a dear boy," she said, presently; "a boy who loved a young maid very truly; a boy that found the maid's father too strong and shrewd for desperate young lovers—Eh, how long ago it seems, and what a flood of tears the poor maid shed at being parted from that dear boy!"
"Faith!" admitted Sir John, "the rogue had his good points."
"Ah, John, you have not forgotten, I know," the lady said, looking up into his face, "and, you will believe me that I am very heartily sorry for the pain I brought into your life?"
"My wounds heal easily," said Sir John.
"For though my dear dead father was too wise for us, and knew it was for the best that I should not accept your love, believe me, John, I always knew the value of that love, and have held it an honor that any woman must prize."
"Dear lady," the knight suggested, with a slight grimace, "the world is not altogether of your opinion."
"I know not of the world," she said; "for we live away from it. But we have heard of you ever and anon; I have your life quite letter-perfect for these forty years or more."
"You have heard of me?" asked Sir John; and, for a seasoned knave, he looked rather uncomfortable.
"As a gallant and brave soldier," she answered; "of how you fought at sea with Mowbray that was afterward Duke of Norfolk; of your knighthood by King Richard; of how you slew the Percy at Shrewsbury; and captured Coleville o' late in Yorkshire; and how the Prince, that now is King, did love you above all men; and, in fine, of many splendid doings in the great world."
Sir John raised a protesting hand. He said, with commendable modesty: "I have fought somewhat. But we are not Bevis of Southampton; we have slain no giants. Heard you naught else?"
"Little else of note," replied the lady; and went on, very quietly: "But we are proud of you at home in Norfolk. And such tales as I have heard I have woven together in one story; and I have told it many times to my children as we sat on the old Chapel steps at evening, and the shadows lengthened across the lawn, and I bid them emulate this, the most perfect knight and gallant gentleman that I have known. And they love you, I think, though but by repute."
Once more silence fell between them; and the fire grinned wickedly at the mimic fire reflected by the old chest, as though it knew of a most entertaining secret.
"Do you yet live at Winstead?" asked Sir John, half idly.
"Yes," she answered; "in the old house. It is little changed, but there are many changes about."
"Is Moll yet with you that did once carry our letters?"
"Married to Hodge, the tanner," the lady said; "and dead long since."
"And all our merry company?" Sir John demanded. "Marian? And Tom and little Osric? And Phyllis? And Adelais? Zounds, it is like a breath of country air to speak their names once more."
"All dead," she answered, in a hushed voice, "save Adelais, and even to me poor Adelais seems old and strange. Walter was slain in the French wars, and she hath never married."
"All dead," Sir John informed the fire, as if confidentially; then he laughed, though his bloodshot eyes were not merry. "This same Death hath a wide maw! It is not long before you and I, my lady, will be at supper with the worms. But you, at least, have had a happy life."
"I have been content enough," she said, "but all that seems run by; for, John, I think that at our age we are not any longer very happy nor very miserable."
"Faith!" agreed Sir John, "we are both old; and I had not known it, my lady, until to-day."
Again there was silence; and again the fire leapt with delight at the jest.
Sylvia Vernon arose suddenly and cried, "I would I had not come!"
Then said Sir John: "Nay, this is but a feeble grieving you have wakened. For, madam—you whom I loved once!—you are in the right. Our blood runs thinner than of yore; and we may no longer, I think, either sorrow or rejoice very deeply."
"It is true," she said; "but I must go; and, indeed, I would to God I had not come!"
Sir John was silent; he bowed his head, in acquiescence perhaps, in meditation it may have been; but he stayed silent.
"Yet," said she, "there is something here which I must keep no longer: for here are all the letters you ever writ me."
Whereupon she handed Sir John a little packet of very old and very faded papers. He turned them awkwardly in his hand once or twice; then stared at them; then at the lady.
"You have kept them—always?" he cried.
"Yes," she responded, wistfully; "but I must not be guilty of continuing such follies. It is a villainous example to my grandchildren," Dame Sylvia told him, and smiled. "Farewell."
Sir John drew close to her and took her hands in his. He looked into her eyes for an instant, holding himself very erect,—and it was a rare event when Sir John looked any one squarely in the eyes,—and he said, wonderingly, "How I loved you!"
"I know," she murmured. Sylvia Vernon gazed up into his bloated old face with a proud tenderness that was half-regretful. A quavering came into her gentle voice. "And I thank you for your gift, my lover,—O brave true lover, whose love I was not ever ashamed to own! Farewell, my dear; yet a little while, and I go to seek the boy and girl we know of."
"I shall not be long, madam," said Sir John. "Speak a kind word for me inHeaven; for I shall have sore need of it."
She had reached the door by this. "You are not sorry that I came?"
Sir John answered, very sadly: "There are many wrinkles now in your dear face, my lady; the great eyes are a little dimmed, and the sweet laughter is a little cracked; but I am not sorry to have seen you thus. For I have loved no woman truly save you alone; and I am not sorry. Farewell." And for a moment he bowed his unreverend gray head over her shrivelled fingers.
3. "This Pitch, as Ancient Writers do Report, doth Defile"
"Lord, Lord, how subject we old men are to the vice of lying!" chuckled Sir John, and leaned back rheumatically in his chair and mumbled over the jest.
"Yet it was not all a lie," he confided, as if in perplexity, to the fire; "but what a coil over a youthful green-sickness 'twixt a lad and a wench more than forty years syne!
"I might have had money of her for the asking," he presently went on; "yet I am glad I did not; which is a parlous sign and smacks of dotage."
He nodded very gravely over this new and alarming phase of his character.
"Were it not a quaint conceit, a merry tickle-brain of Fate," he asked of the leaping flames, after a still longer pause, "that this mountain of malmsey were once a delicate stripling with apple cheeks and a clean breath, smelling of civet, and as mad for love, I warrant you, as any Amadis of them all? For, if a man were to speak truly, I did love her.
"I had the special marks of the pestilence," he assured a particularly incredulous—and obstinate-looking coal,—a grim, black fellow that, lurking in a corner, scowled forbiddingly and seemed to defy both the flames and Sir John. "Not all the flagons and apples in the universe might have comforted me; I was wont to sigh like a leaky bellows; to weep like a wench that hath lost her grandam; to lard my speech with the fag-ends of ballads like a man milliner; and did, indeed, indite sonnets, canzonets, and what not of mine own elaboration.
"And Moll did carry them," he continued; "plump brown-eyed Moll, that hath married Hodge the tanner, and reared her tannerkins, and died long since."
But the coal remained incredulous, and the flames crackled merrily.
"Lord, Lord, what did I not write?" said Sir John, drawing out a paper from the packet, and deciphering by the firelight the faded writing.
Read Sir John:
"_Have pity, Sylvia? Cringing at thy doorEntreats with dolorous cry and clamoring,That mendicant who quits thee nevermore;Now winter chills the world, and no birds singIn any woods, yet as in wanton SpringHe follows thee; and never will have done,Though nakedly he die, from followingWhither thou leadest.
"Canst thou look uponHis woes, and laugh to see a goddess' sonOf wide dominion, and in strategy
"More strong than Jove, more wise than Solomon,Inept to combat thy severity?Have pity, Sylvia! And let Love be oneAmong the folk that bear thee company_."
"Is it not the very puling speech of your true lover?" he chuckled; and the flames spluttered assent. "Among the folk that bear thee company," he repeated, and afterward looked about him with a smack of gravity. "Faith, Adam Cupid hath forsworn my fellowship long since; he hath no score chalked up against him at the Boar's Head Tavern; or, if he have, I doubt not the next street-beggar might discharge it."
"And she hath commended me to her children as a very gallant gentleman and a true knight," Sir John went on, reflectively. He cast his eyes toward the ceiling, and grinned at invisible deities. "Jove that sees all hath a goodly commodity of mirth; I doubt not his sides ache at times, as if they had conceived another wine-god."
"Yet, by my honor," he insisted to the fire; then added, apologetically,—"if I had any, which, to speak plain, I have not,—I am glad; it is a brave jest; and I did love her once."
Then the time-battered, bloat rogue picked out another paper, and read:
"'My dear lady,—That I am not with thee to-night is, indeed, no fault of mine; for Sir Thomas Mowbray hath need of me, he saith. Yet the service that I have rendered him thus far is but to cool my heels in his antechamber and dream of two great eyes and of that net of golden hair wherewith Lord Love hath lately snared my poor heart. For it comforts me—' And so on, and so on, the pen trailing most juvenal sugar, like a fly newly crept out of the honey-pot. And ending with a posy, filched, I warrant you, from some ring.
"I remember when I did write her this," he explained to the fire. "Lord, Lord, if the fire of grace were not quite out of me, now should I be moved. For I did write it; and it was sent with a sonnet, all of Hell, and Heaven, and your pagan gods, and other tricks of speech. It should be somewhere."
He fumbled with uncertain fingers among the papers. "Ah, here it is," he said at last, and he again began to read aloud.
Read Sir John:
"Cupid invaded Hell, and boldly droveBefore him all the hosts of Erebus,Till he had conquered: and grim CerberusSang madrigals, the Furies rhymed of love,Old Charon sighed, and sonnets rang aboveThe gloomy Styx; and even as TantalusWas Proserpine discrowned in Tartarus,And Cupid regnant in the place thereof.
"Thus Love is monarch throughout Hell to-day;In Heaven we know his power was always great;And Earth acclaimed Love's mastery straightwayWhen Sylvia came to gladden Earth's estate:—Thus Hell and Heaven and Earth his rule obey,And Sylvia's heart alone is obdurate.
"Well, well," sighed Sir John, "it was a goodly rogue that writ it, though the verse runs but lamely! A goodly rogue!
"He might," Sir John suggested, tentatively, "have lived cleanly, and forsworn sack; he might have been a gallant gentleman, and begotten grandchildren, and had a quiet nook at the ingleside to rest his old bones: but he is dead long since. He might have writ himselfarmigeroin many a bill, or obligation, or quittance, or what not; he might have left something behind him save unpaid tavern bills; he might have heard cases, harried poachers, and quoted old saws; and slept in his own family chapel through sermons yet unwrit, beneath his presentment, done in stone, and a comforting bit of Latin: but he is dead long since."
Sir John sat meditating for a while; it had grown quite dark in the room as he muttered to himself. He rose now, rather cumbrously and uncertainly, but with a fine rousing snort of indignation.
"Zooks!" he said, "I prate like a death's-head. A thing done hath an end,God have mercy on us all! And I will read no more of the rubbish."
He cast the packet into the heart of the fire; the yellow papers curled at the edges, rustled a little, and blazed; he watched them burn to the last spark.
"A cup of sack to purge the brain!" cried Sir John, and filled one to the brim. "And I will go sup with Doll Tearsheet."
* * * * *
"Anoon her herte hath pitee of his wo, And with that pitee, love com in also; Thus is this quene in pleasaunce and in loye."
_Meanwhile had old Dome Sylvia returned contentedly to the helpmate whom she had accepted under compulsion, and who had made her a fair husband, as husbands go. It is duly recorded, indeed, on their shared tomb, that their forty years of married life were of continuous felicity, and set a pattern to all Norfolk. The more prosaic verbal tradition is that Lady Vernon retained Sir Robert well in hand by pointing out, at judicious intervals, that she had only herself to blame for having married such a selfish person in preference to a hero of the age and an ornament of the loftiest circles.
I find, on consultation of the Allonby records, that Sylvia Vernon died of a quinsy, in 1419, surviving Sir Robert by some three months. She had borne him four sons and four daughters: of these there remained at Winstead in 1422 only Sir Hugh Vernon, the oldest son, knighted by Henry V at Agincourt, where Vernon had fought with distinction; and Adelais Vernon, the youngest daughter, with whom the following has to do._
The Episode Called "Sweet Adelais"
1.Gruntings at Aeaea
It was on a clear September day that the Marquis of Falmouth set out for France. John of Bedford had summoned him posthaste when Henry V was stricken at Senlis with what bid fair to prove a mortal distemper; for the marquis was Bedford's comrade-in-arms, veteran of Shrewsbury, Agincourt and other martial disputations, and the Duke-Regent suspected that, to hold France in case of the King's death, he would presently need all the help he could muster.
"And I, too, look for warm work," the marquis conceded to Mistress Adelais Vernon, at parting. "But, God willing, my sweet, we shall be wed at Christmas for all that. The Channel is not very wide. At a pinch I might swim it, I think, to come to you."
He kissed her and rode away with his men. Adelais stared after them, striving to picture her betrothed rivalling Leander in this fashion, and subsequently laughed. The marquis was a great lord and a brave captain, but long past his first youth; his actions went somewhat too deliberately ever to be roused to the high lunacies of the Sestian amorist. So Adelais laughed, but a moment later, recollecting the man's cold desire of her, his iron fervors, Adelais shuddered.
This was in the court-yard at Winstead. Roger Darke of Yaxham, the girl's cousin, standing beside her, noted the gesture, and snarled.
"Think twice of it, Adelais," said he.
Whereupon Mistress Vernon flushed like a peony. "I honor him," she said, with some irrelevance, "and he loves me."
Roger scoffed. "Love, love! O you piece of ice! You gray-stone saint! What do you know of love?" Master Darke caught both her hands in his. "Now, by Almighty God, our Saviour and Redeemer, Jesus Christ!" he said, between his teeth, his eyes flaming; "I, Roger Darke, have offered you undefiled love and you have mocked at it. Ha, Tears of Mary! how I love you! And you mean to marry this man for his title! Do you not believe that I love you, Adelais?" he whimpered.
Gently she disengaged herself. This was of a pattern with Roger's behavior any time during the past two years. "I suppose you do," Adelais conceded, with the tiniest possible shrug. "Perhaps that is why I find you so insufferable."
Afterward Mistress Vernon turned on her heel and left Master Darke. In his fluent invocation of Mahound and Termagaunt and other overseers of the damned he presently touched upon eloquence.
2.Comes One with Moly
Adelais came into the walled garden of Winstead, aflame now with autumnal scarlet and gold. She seated herself upon a semicircular marble bench, and laughed for no apparent reason, and contentedly waited what Dame Luck might send.
She was a comely maid, past argument or (as her lovers habitually complained) any adequate description. Circe, Colchian Medea, Viviane du Lac, were their favorite analogues; and what old romancers had fabled concerning these ladies they took to be the shadow of which Adelais Vernon was the substance. At times these rhapsodists might have supported their contention with a certain speciousness, such as was apparent to-day, for example, when against the garden's hurly-burly of color, the prodigal blazes of scarlet and saffron and wine-yellow, the girl's green gown glowed like an emerald, and her eyes, too, seemed emeralds, vivid, inscrutable, of a clear verdancy that was quite untinged with either blue or gray. Very black lashes shaded them. The long oval of her face (you might have objected), was of an absolute pallor, rarely quickening to a flush; but her petulant lips burned crimson, and her hair mimicked the dwindling radiance of the autumn sunlight and shamed it. All in all, the aspect of Adelais Vernon was, beyond any questioning, spiced with a sorcerous tang; say, the look of a young witch shrewd at love-potions, but ignorant of their flavor; yet before this the girl's comeliness had stirred men's hearts to madness, and the county boasted of it.
Presently Adelais lifted her small imperious head, and then again she smiled, for out of the depths of the garden, with an embellishment of divers trills and roulades, came a man's voice that carolled blithely.
Sang the voice:
_"Had you lived when earth was newWhat had bards of old to doSave to sing in praise of you?
"Had you lived in ancient days,Adelais, sweet Adelais,You had all the ancients' praise,—You whose beauty would have wonCanticles of Solomon,Had the sage Judean kingGazed upon this goodliest thingEarth of Heaven's grace hath got.
"Had you gladdened Greece, were notAll the nymphs of Greece forgot?
"Had you trod Sicilian ways,Adelais, sweet Adelais_,
"You had pilfered all their praise:Bion and TheocritusHad transmitted unto usHoneyed harmonies to tellOf your beauty's miracle,Delicate, desirable,And their singing skill were bentYou-ward tenderly,—content,While the world slipped by, to gazeOn the grace of you, and praiseSweet Adelais_."
Here the song ended, and a man, wheeling about the hedge, paused to regard her with adoring eyes. Adelais looked up at him, incredibly surprised by his coming.
This was the young Sieur d'Arnaye, Hugh Vernon's prisoner, taken at Agincourt seven years earlier and held since then, by the King's command, without ransom; for it was Henry's policy to release none of the important French prisoners. Even on his death-bed he found time to admonish his brother, John of Bedford, that four of these,—Charles d'Orleans and Jehan de Bourbon and Arthur de Rougemont and Fulke d'Arnaye,—should never be set at liberty. "Lest," as the King said, with a savor of prophecy, "more fire be kindled in one day than all your endeavors can quench in three."
Presently the Sieur d'Arnaye sighed, rather ostentatiously; and Adelais laughed, and demanded the cause of his grief.
"Mademoiselle," he said,—his English had but a trace of accent,—"I am afflicted with a very grave malady."
"What is the name of this malady?" said she.
"They call it love, mademoiselle."
Adelais laughed yet again and doubted if the disease were incurable. But Fulke d'Arnaye seated himself beside her and demonstrated that, in his case, it might not ever be healed.
"For it is true," he observed, "that the ancient Scythians, who lived before the moon was made, were wont to cure this distemper by blood-letting under the ears; but your brother, mademoiselle, denies me access to all knives. And the leech Aelian avers that it may be cured by the herb agnea; but your brother, mademoiselle, will not permit that I go into the fields in search of this herb. And in Greece—he, mademoiselle, I might easily be healed of my malady in Greece! For in Greece is the rock, Leucata Petra, from which a lover may leap and be cured; and the well of the Cyziceni, from which a lover may drink and be cured; and the river Selemnus, in which a lover may bathe and be cured: but your brother will not permit that I go to Greece. You have a very cruel brother, mademoiselle; seven long years, no less, he has penned me here like a starling in a cage."
And Fulke d'Arnaye shook his head at her reproachfully.
Afterward he laughed. Always this Frenchman found something at which to laugh; Adelais could not remember in all the seven years a time when she had seen him downcast. But while his lips jested of his imprisonment, his eyes stared at her mirthlessly, like a dog at his master, and her gaze fell before the candor of the passion she saw in them.
"My lord," said Adelais, "why will you not give your parole? Then you would be free to come and go as you elected." A little she bent toward him, a covert red showing in her cheeks. "To-night at Halvergate the Earl of Brudenel holds the feast of Saint Michael. Give your parole, my lord, and come with us. There will be in our company fair ladies who may perhaps heal your malady."
But the Sieur d'Arnaye only laughed. "I cannot give my parole," he said, "since I mean to escape for all your brother's care." Then he fell to pacing up and down before her. "Now, by Monseigneur Saint Médard and the Eagle that sheltered him!" he cried, in half-humorous self-mockery; "however thickly troubles rain upon me, I think that I shall never give up hoping!" After a pause, "Listen, mademoiselle," he went on, more gravely, and gave a nervous gesture toward the east, "yonder is France, sacked, pillaged, ruinous, prostrate, naked to her enemy. But at Vincennes, men say, the butcher of Agincourt is dying. With him dies the English power in France. Can his son hold that dear realm? Are those tiny hands with which this child may not yet feed himself capable to wield a sceptre? Can he who is yet beholden to nurses for milk distribute sustenance to the law and justice of a nation? He, I think not, mademoiselle! France will have need of me shortly. Therefore, I cannot give my parole."
"Then must my brother still lose his sleep, lord, for always your safe-keeping is in his mind. To-day at cock-crow he set out for the coast to examine those Frenchmen who landed yesterday."
At this he wheeled about. "Frenchmen!"
"Only Norman fishermen, lord, whom the storm drove to seek shelter inEngland. But he feared they had come to rescue you."
Fulke d'Arnaye shrugged his shoulders. "That was my thought, too," he admitted, with a laugh. "Always I dream of escape, mademoiselle. Have a care of me, sweet enemy! I shall escape yet, it may be."
"But I will not have you escape," said Adelais. She tossed her glittering little head. "Winstead would not be Winstead without you. Why, I was but a child, my lord, when you came. Have you forgotten, then, the lank, awkward child who used to stare at you so gravely?"
"Mademoiselle," he returned, and now his voice trembled and still the hunger in his eyes grew more great, "I think that in all these years I have forgotten nothing—not even the most trivial happening, mademoiselle,—wherein you had a part. You were a very beautiful child. Look you, I remember as if it were yesterday that you never wept when your good lady mother—whose soul may Christ have in his keeping!—was forced to punish you for some little misdeed. No, you never wept; but your eyes would grow wistful, and you would come to me here in the garden, and sit with me for a long time in silence. 'Fulke,' you would say, quite suddenly, 'I love you better than my mother.' And I told you that it was wrong to make such observations, did I not, mademoiselle? My faith, yes! but I may confess now that I liked it," Fulke d'Arnaye ended, with a faint chuckle.
Adelais sat motionless. Certainly it was strange, she thought, how the sound of this man's voice had power to move her. Certainly, too, this man was very foolish.
"And now the child is a woman,—a woman who will presently be Marchioness of Falmouth. Look you, when I get free of my prison—and I shall get free, never fear, mademoiselle,—I shall often think of that great lady. For only God can curb a man's dreams, and God is compassionate. So I hope to dream nightly of a gracious lady whose hair is gold and whose eyes are colored like the summer sea and whose voice is clear and low and very wonderfully sweet. Nightly, I think, the vision of that dear enemy will hearten me to fight for France by day. In effect, mademoiselle, your traitor beauty will yet aid me to destroy your country."
The Sieur d'Arnaye laughed, somewhat cheerlessly, as he lifted her hand to his lips.
And certainly also (she concluded her reflections) it was absurd how this man's touch seemed an alarm to her pulses. Adelais drew away from him.
"No!" she said: "remember, lord, I, too, am not free."
"Indeed, we tread on dangerous ground," the Frenchman assented, with a sad little smile. "Pardon me, mademoiselle. Even were you free of your trothplight—even were I free of my prison, most beautiful lady, I have naught to offer you yonder in that fair land of France. They tell me that the owl and the wolf hunt undisturbed where Arnaye once stood. My château is carpeted with furze and roofed with God's Heaven. That gives me a large estate—does it not?—but I may not reasonably ask a woman to share it. So I pray you pardon me for my nonsense, mademoiselle, and I pray that the Marchioness of Falmouth may be very happy."
And with that he vanished into the autumn-fired recesses of the garden, singing, his head borne stiff. Oh, the brave man who esteemed misfortune so slightly! thought Adelais. She remembered that the Marquis of Falmouth rarely smiled; and once only—at a bull-baiting—had she heard him laugh. It needed bloodshed, then, to amuse him, Adelais deduced, with that self-certainty in logic which is proper to youth; and the girl shuddered.
But through the scarlet coppices of the garden, growing fainter and yet more faint, rang the singing of Fulke d'Arnaye.
Sang the Frenchman:
"Had you lived in Roman timesNo Catullus in his rhymesHad lamented Lesbia's sparrow:He had praised your forehead, narrowAs the newly-crescent moon,White as apple-trees in June;He had made some amorous tuneOf the laughing light ErosSnared as Psyche-ward he goesBy your beauty,—by your slim,White, perfect beauty.
"After himHorace, finding in your eyesHorace limned in lustrous wise,Would have made you melodiesFittingly to hymn your praise,Sweet Adelais."
3. Roger is Explicit
Into the midst of the Michaelmas festivities at Halvergate that night, burst a mud-splattered fellow in search of Sir Hugh Vernon. Roger Darke brought him to the knight. The fellow then related that he came from Simeon de Beck, the master of Castle Rising, with tidings that a strange boat, French-rigged, was hovering about the north coast. Let Sir Hugh have a care of his prisoner.
Vernon swore roundly. "I must look into this," he said. "But what shall I do with Adelais?"
"Will you not trust her to me?" Roger asked. "If so, cousin, I will very gladly be her escort to Winstead. Let the girl dance her fill while she may, Hugh. She will have little heart for dancing after a month or so of Falmouth's company."
"That is true," Vernon assented; "but the match is a good one, and she is bent upon it."
So presently he rode with his men to the north coast. An hour later RogerDarke and Adelais set out for Winstead, in spite of all Lady Brudenel'sprotestations that Mistress Vernon had best lie with her that night atHalvergate.
It was a clear night of restless winds, neither warm nor chill, but fine September weather. About them the air was heavy with the damp odors of decaying leaves, for the road they followed was shut in by the autumn woods, that now arched the way with sere foliage, rustling and whirring and thinly complaining overhead, and now left it open to broad splashes of moonlight, where fallen leaves scuttled about in the wind vortices. Adelais, elate with dancing, chattered of this and that as her gray mare ambled homeward, but Roger was moody.
Past Upton the road branched in three directions; here Master Darke caught the gray mare's bridle and turned both horses to the left.
"Why, of whatever are you thinking!" the girl derided him. "Roger, this is not the road to Winstead!"
He grinned evilly over his shoulder. "It is the road to Yaxham, Adelais, where my chaplain expects us."
In a flash she saw it all as her eyes swept these desolate woods. "You will not dare!"
"Will I not?" said Roger. "Faith, for my part, I think you have mocked me for the last time, Adelais, since it is the wife's duty, as Paul very justly says, to obey."
Swiftly she slipped from the mare. But he followed her. "Oh, infamy!" the girl cried. "You have planned this, you coward!"
"Yes, I planned it," said Roger Darke. "Yet I take no great credit therefor, for it was simple enough. I had but to send a feigned message to your block-head brother. Ha, yes, I planned it, Adelais, and I planned it well. But I deal honorably. To-morrow you will be Mistress Darke, never fear."
He grasped at her cloak as she shrank from him. The garment fell, leaving the girl momentarily free, her festival jewels shimmering in the moonlight, her bared shoulders glistening like silver. Darke, staring at her, giggled horribly. An instant later Adelais fell upon her knees.
"Sweet Christ, have pity upon Thy handmaiden! Do not forsake me, sweet Christ, in my extremity! Save me from this man!" she prayed, with entire faith.
"My lady wife," said Darke, and his hot, wet hand sank heavily upon her shoulder, "you had best finish your prayer before my chaplain, I think, since by ordinary Holy Church is skilled to comfort the sorrowing."
"A miracle, dear lord Christ!" the girl wailed. "O sweet Christ, a miracle!"
"Faith of God!" said Roger, in a flattish tone; "what was that?"
For faintly there came the sound of one singing.
Sang the distant voice:
_"Had your father's household beenGuelfic-born or Ghibelline,Beatrice were unknownOn her star-encompassed throne.
"For, had Dante viewed your grace,Adelais, sweet Adelais,You had reigned in Bice's place,—Had for candles, Hyades,Rastaben, and Betelguese,—And had heard ZacharielChaunt of you, and, chaunting, tellAll the grace of you, and praiseSweet Adelais."_
4.Honor Brings a Padlock
Adelais sprang to her feet. "A miracle!" she cried, her voice shaking."Fulke, Fulke! to me, Fulke!"
Master Darke hurried her struggling toward his horse. Darke was muttering curses, for there was now a beat of hoofs in the road yonder that led to Winstead. "Fulke, Fulke!" the girl shrieked.
Then presently, as Roger put foot to stirrup, two horsemen wheeled about the bend in the road, and one of them leapt to the ground.
"Mademoiselle," said Fulke d'Arnaye, "am I, indeed, so fortunate as to be of any service to you?"
"Ho!" cried Roger, with a gulp of relief, "it is only the French dancing-master taking French leave of poor cousin Hugh! Man, but you startled me!"
Now Adelais ran to the Frenchman, clinging to him the while that she told of Roger's tricks. And d'Arnaye's face set mask-like.
"Monsieur," he said, when she had ended, "you have wronged a sweet and innocent lady. As God lives, you shall answer to me for this."
"Look you," Roger pointed out, "this is none of your affair, Monsieur Jackanapes. You are bound for the coast, I take it. Very well,—ka me, and I ka thee. Do you go your way in peace, and let us do the same."
Fulke d'Arnaye put the girl aside and spoke rapidly in French to his companion. Then with mincing agility he stepped toward Master Darke.
Roger blustered. "You hop-toad! you jumping-jack!" said he, "what do you mean?"
"Chastisement!" said the Frenchman, and struck him in the face.
"Very well!" said Master Darke, strangely quiet. And with that they both drew.
The Frenchman laughed, high and shrill, as they closed, and afterward he began to pour forth a voluble flow of discourse. Battle was wine to the man.
"Not since Agincourt, Master Coward—he, no!—have I held sword in hand. It is a good sword, this,—a sharp sword, is it not? Ah, the poor arm—but see, your blood is quite black-looking in this moonlight, and I had thought cowards yielded a paler blood than brave men possess. We live and learn, is it not? Observe, I play with you like a child,—as I played with your tall King at Agincourt when I cut away the coronet from his helmet. I did not kill him—no!—but I wounded him, you conceive? Presently, I shall wound you, too. My compliments—you have grazed my hand. But I shall not kill you, because you are the kinsman of the fairest lady earth may boast, and I would not willingly shed the least drop of any blood that is partly hers. Ohé, no! Yet since I needs must do this ungallant thing—why, see, monsieur, how easy it is!"
Thereupon he cut Roger down at a blow and composedly set to wiping his sword on the grass. The Englishman lay like a log where he had fallen.
"Lord," Adelais quavered, "lord, have you killed him?"
Fulke d'Arnaye sighed. "Hélas, no!" said he, "since I knew that you did not wish it. See, mademoiselle,—I have but made a healthful and blood-letting small hole in him here. He will return himself to survive to it long time—Fie, but my English fails me, after these so many years—"
D'Arnaye stood for a moment as if in thought, concluding his meditations with a grimace. After that he began again to speak in French to his companion. The debate seemed vital. The stranger gesticulated, pleaded, swore, implored, summoned all inventions between the starry spheres and the mud of Cocytus to judge of the affair; but Fulke d'Arnaye was resolute.
"Behold, mademoiselle," he said, at length, "how my poor Olivier excites himself over a little matter. Olivier is my brother, most beautiful lady, but he speaks no English, so that I cannot present him to you. He came to rescue me, this poor Olivier, you conceive. Those Norman fishermen of whom you spoke to-day—but you English are blinded, I think, by the fogs of your cold island. Eight of the bravest gentlemen in France, mademoiselle, were those same fishermen, come to bribe my gaoler,—the incorruptible Tompkins, no less. Hé, yes, they came to tell me that Henry of Monmouth, by the wrath of God King of France, is dead at Vincennes yonder, mademoiselle, and that France will soon be free of you English. France rises in her might—" His nostrils dilated, he seemed taller; then he shrugged. "And poor Olivier grieves that I may not strike a blow for her,—grieves that I must go back to Winstead."
D'Arnaye laughed as he caught the bridle of the gray mare and turned her so that Adelais might mount. But the girl, with a faint, wondering cry, drew away from him.
"You will go back! You have escaped, lord, and you will go back!"
"Why, look you," said the Frenchman, "what else may I conceivably do? We are some miles from your home, most beautiful lady,—can you ride those four long miles alone? in this night so dangerous? Can I leave you here alone in this so tall forest? Hé, surely not. I am desolated, mademoiselle, but I needs must burden you with my company homeward."
Adelais drew a choking breath. He had fretted out seven years of captivity. Now he was free; and lest she be harmed or her name be smutched, however faintly, he would go back to his prison, jesting. "No, no!" she cried aloud.
But he raised a deprecating hand. "You cannot go alone. Olivier here would go with you gladly. Not one of those brave gentlemen who await me at the coast yonder but would go with you very, very gladly, for they love France, these brave gentlemen, and they think that I can serve her better than most other men. That is very flattering, is it not? But all the world conspires to flatter me, mademoiselle. Your good brother, by example, prizes my company so highly that he would infallibly hang the gentleman who rode back with you. So, you conceive, I cannot avail myself of their services. But with me it is different, hein? Ah, yes, Sir Hugh will merely lock me up again and for the future guard me more vigilantly. Will you not mount, mademoiselle?"