The White Lady of Hazelwood Part 19

Amphillis sprang up, ran lightly with bare feet across the chamber, and drew back the curtain. The full harvest moon was s.h.i.+ning into the inner court, and she discerned eight black shadows, all mixed together in what was evidently a struggle of some kind, the only one distinguishable being that of Colle, who was as busy and excited as any of the group.

At length she saw one of the shadows get free from the others, and speed rapidly to the wall, pursued by the dog, which, however, could not prevent his escape over the wall. The other shadows had a further short scuffle, at the end of which two seemed to be driven into the outer yard by the five, and Amphillis lost sight of them. She told her mistress what she saw.

"Some drunken brawl amongst the retainers, most like," said the Countess. "Come back to thy bed, maid; 'tis no concern of thine."

Amphillis obeyed, and silence fell upon the house. The next thing of which she was conscious was Perrote's entrance in the morning.

"What caused yon bruit in the night?" asked the Countess, as Amphillis was dressing her hair.

"Dame," said Perrote, "it was an attack upon the house."

"An attack?" The Countess turned suddenly round, drawing her hair out of her tirewoman's hands. "After what fas.h.i.+on? thieves? robbers? foes?

Come, tell me all about it."

"I scantly know, Dame, how far I may lightly tell," said Perrote, uneasily. "It were better to await Sir G.o.dfrey's return, ere much be said thereanentis."

The Countess fixed her keen black eyes on her old attendant.

"The which means," said she, "that the matter has too much ado with me that I should be suffered to know the inwards thereof. Perrote, was it that man essayed once more to free me? Thou mayest well tell me, for I know it. The angels whispered it to me as I lay in my bed."

"My dear Lady, it was thus. Pray you, be not troubled: if so were, should you be any better off than now?"

"Mary, Mother!" With that wail of pain the Countess turned back to her toilet. "Who was it? and how? Tell me what thou wist."

Perrote considered a moment, and then answered the questions.

"Your Grace hath mind of the two pedlars that came hither a few days gone?"

"One of whom sold yon violet twist, the illest stuff that ever threaded needle? He had need be 'shamed of himself. Ay: well?"

"Dame, he was no pedlar at all, but Sir Roland de Pencouet, a knight of Bretagne."

"Ha! one of Oliver Clisson's following, or I err. Ay?"

A look of intense interest had driven out the usual weary listlessness in the black eyes.

"Which had thus disguised him in order to essay the freeing of your Grace."

"I am at peace with him, then, for his caitiff twist. Knights make ill tradesmen, I doubt not. Poor fool, to think he could do any such thing!

What befell him?"

"With him, Dame, were two other--Ivo filz Jehan, yon little Breton jeweller that was used to trade at Hennebon; I know not if your Grace have mind of him--"

"Ay, I remember him."

"And also a priest, named Father Eloy. The priest won clean away over the wall; only Mark saith that Colle hath a piece of his hose for a remembrance. Sir Roland and Ivo were taken, and be lodged in the dungeon."

"Poor fools!" said the Countess again. "O Perrote, Perrote, to be free!"

"Dear my Lady, should it be better with you than now?"

"What wist thou? To have the right to go right or left, as man would; to pluck the flowerets by the roadside at will; to throw man upon the gra.s.s, and breathe the free air; to speak with whom man would; to feel the heaving of the salt sea under man's boat, and to hear the clash of arms and see the chargers and the swords and the nodding plumes file out of the postern--O Perrote, Perrote!"

"Mine own dear mistress, would I might compa.s.s it for you!"

"I know thou dost. And thou canst not. But wherefore doth not G.o.d compa.s.s it? Can He not do what He will? Be wrong and cruelty and injustice what He would? Doth He hate me, that He leaveth me thus to live and die like a rat in a hole? And wherefore? What have I done? I am no worser sinner than thousands of other men and women. I never stole, nor murdered, nor sware falsely; I was true woman to G.o.d and to my lord, and true mother to the lad that they keep from me; ay, and true friend to Lord Edward the King, that cares not a bra.s.s nail whether I live or die--only that if I died he would be quit of a burden. Holy saints, but I would full willingly quit him of it! G.o.d! when I ask Thee for nought costlier than death, canst Thou not grant it to me?"

She looked like an inspired prophetess, that tall white-haired woman, lifting her face up to the morning sun, as if addressing through it the Eternal Light, and challenging the love and wisdom of His decrees.

Amphillis shrank back from her. Perrote came a little nearer.

"G.o.d is wiser than His creatures," she said.

"Words, words, Perrote! Only words. And I have heard them all aforetime, and many a time o'er. If I could but come at Him, I'd see if He could not tell me somewhat better."

"Ay," said Perrote, with a sigh; "if we could all but come at Him! Dear my Lady--"

"Cross thyself, old woman, and have done. When I lack an homily preacher, I'll send for a priest. My wimple, Phyllis. When comes Sir G.o.dfrey back?"

"Sat.u.r.day shall be a week, Dame."

Sir G.o.dfrey came back in a bad temper. He had been overcome at the tournament, which in itself was not pacifying; and he was extremely angry to hear of the unsuccessful attempt to set his prisoner free. He scolded everybody impartially all round, but especially Matthew and Father Jordan, the latter of whom was very little to blame, since he was not only rather deaf, but he slept on the other side of the house, and had never heard the noise at all. Matthew growled that if he had calmly marched the conspirators up to the prisoner's chamber, and delivered her to them, his father could scarcely have treated him worse; whereas he had safely secured two out of the three, and the prisoner had never been in any danger.

Kate had been captured as well as the conspirators, and instead of receiving the promised crespine, she was bitterly rueing her folly, locked in a small turret room whose only furniture was a bundle of straw and a rug, with the pleasing prospect of worse usage when her mistress should return. The morning after their arrival at home, Lady Foljambe marched up to the turret, armed with a formidable cane, wherewith she inflicted on poor Kate a sound discipline. Pleading, sobs, and even screams fell on her ears with as little impression as would have been caused by the buzzing of a fly. Having finished her proceeding, she administered to the suffering culprit a short, sharp lecture, and then locked her up again to think it over, with bread and water as the only relief to meditation.

The King was expected to come North after Parliament rose--somewhere about the following February; and Sir G.o.dfrey wrathfully averred that he should deal with the conspirators himself. The length of time that a prisoner was kept awaiting trial was a matter of supremely little consequence in the Middle Ages. His Majesty reached Derby, on his way to York, in the early days of March, and slept for one night at Hazelwood Manor, disposing of the prisoners the next morning, before he resumed his journey.

n.o.body at Hazelwood wished to live that week over again. The King brought a suite of fourteen gentlemen, beside his guard; and they all had to be lodged somehow. Perrote, Amphillis, Lady Foljambe, and Mrs Margaret slept in the Countess's chamber.

"The more the merrier," said the prisoner, sarcastically. "Prithee, Avena, see that the King quit not this house without he hath a word with me. I have a truth or twain to tell him."

But the King declined the interview. Perhaps it was on account of an uneasy suspicion concerning that truth or twain which might be told him.

For fifty years Edward the Third swayed the sceptre of England, and his rule, upon the whole, was just and gentle. Two sore sins lie at his door--the murder of his brother, in a sudden outburst of most righteous indignation; and the long, dreary captivity of the prisoner of Tickhill and Hazelwood, who had done nothing to deserve it. Considering what a mother he had, perhaps the cause for wonder is that in the main he did so well, rather than that on some occasions he acted very wrongly. The frequent wars of this King were all foreign ones, and under his government England was at rest. That long, quiet reign was now drawing near its close. The King had not yet sunk into the sad state of senile dementia, wherein he ended his life; but he was an infirm, tired old man, bereft of his other self, his bright and loving wife, who had left him and the world about four years earlier. He exerted himself a little at supper to make himself agreeable to the ladies, as was then held to be the bounden duty of a good knight; but after supper he enjoyed a peaceful slumber, with a handkerchief over his face to keep away the flies. The two prisoners were speedily disposed of, by being sent in chains to the Duke of Bretagne, to be dealt with as he should think fit.

The King seemed rather amused than angered by Kate's share in the matter: he had the terrified girl up before him, talked to her in a fatherly fas.h.i.+on, and ended by giving her a crown-piece with his own hand, and bidding her in the future be a good and loyal maid, and not suffer herself to be beguiled by the wiles of evil men. Poor Kate sobbed, promised, and louted confusedly; and in due course of time, when King Edward had been long in his grave, and Kate was a staid grandmother, the crown-piece held the place of honour on her son's chest of drawers as a prized family heirloom.

The next event of any note, a few weeks afterwards, was Marabel's marriage. In those days, young girls of good family, instead of being sent to school, were placed with some married lady as bower-women or chamberers, to be first educated and then married. The mistress was expected to make the one her care as much as the other; and it was not considered any concern of the girl's except to obey. The husband was provided by the mistress, along with the wedding-dress and the wedding-dinner; and the bride meekly accepted all three with becoming thankfulness--or at least was expected to do so.

The new chamberer, who came in Marabel's place, was named Ricarda; the girls were told this one evening at supper-time, and informed that she would arrive on the morrow. Her place at table was next below Amphillis, who was greatly astonished to be asked, as she sat down to supper--

"Well, Phyllis, what hast thou to say to me?"

Amphillis turned and gazed at the speaker.

"Well?" repeated the latter. "Thou hast seen me before."

"Ricarda! How ever chanceth it?"

The astonishment of Amphillis was intense. The rules of etiquette at that time were chains indeed; and the daughter of a tradesman was not in a position to be bower-woman to a lady of t.i.tle. How had her cousin come there?

"What sayest, then," asked Ricarda, with a triumphant smile, "to know that my Lady Foljambe sent to covenant with me by reason that she was so full fain of thee that she desired another of thy kin?"