Buch lesen: «The Lady of Loyalty House: A Novel», Seite 4
IX
HOW THE SIEGE WAS RAISED
The man and the woman glared at each other, each in swift suspicion of treason. The Lady of Harby was the quickest to act upon impulse. She snatched up the pistol that lay upon the table and levelled it with a steady hand at Evander.
“Do you use your trust to betray us?” she shrilled. “It shall not save you.”
Even a less-experienced soldier could have seen from the sure way in which Brilliana handled her weapon that his life was in real peril, but he paid no more heed to her menace than if she was threatening him with her glove or her fan.
“Fighting outside!” he cried. Turning to the woman he asked, with a fierceness that contrasted with his previous calm, “Who is the traitor here?”
His sword was naked in his hand as he spoke and he made a rush for the door. But before he could reach it it was flung open in his face and Halfman rushed in, waving his drawn sword, and followed by Thoroughgood carrying a gun and Garlinge and Clupp armed with pikes.
Inevitably bewildered by the sudden turn in the tide of events, Evander Cloud gave ground for a moment before the onrush, while Halfman, staggering like a drunken man, reeled forward towards Brilliana, shrieking:
“There is fighting in the rebel lines. Help has come at last.”
Whatever joy the tidings gave to Brilliana, she wasted no words from the needs of the moment. Pointing to Evander where he stood, irresolute in surprise, she commanded, “Secure that man!”
Evander’s resolution returned to him with the sound of her voice, but he was one against too many. While he tried to engage the blade of Halfman, a swinging blow from the pike of Garlinge knocked his weapon out of his hand, and in another moment he was gripped in the grasp of the two young country giants, while Thoroughgood covered him with his musketoon.
“This is treachery,” he gasped; but no one paid any attention to his protest. Halfman, convinced that the Puritan was a sure prisoner, swaggered up to Brilliana with all the arrogance of a stage herald.
“Dear lord,” he shouted, “dear lady, a company of Cavaliers are galloping up the avenue, a-shouting like devils for the King.”
He was flushed and drunk with exhilaration; he could speak no more; the timely episode tickled his tired brain like wine; he caught at the table for support and muttered inarticulately. Thoroughgood, who had secured Evander’s fallen sword, interpolated a word of explanation.
“It is Sir Rufus, my lady – Sir Rufus and his friends.”
The interruption had been so sudden, the things that had chanced had passed so swiftly, that Brilliana still stood as she had stood when she gave the command to secure Evander. But now all her being seemed alive with a new life.
“I hear them; I hear them!” she cried, exultantly. And, indeed, the sounds came very clearly now of fierce young voices shouting for the King.
“The King! The King!” Brilliana cried, in an ecstasy, and as the loyal syllables died on her lips there came a trampling of near feet, and then through the yawning doorway rushed a covey of young gentlemen waving their drawn swords and yelling their cry, “The King! The King!” As they flooded into the room, bright foam on the wave of victorious loyalty, Brilliana knew them all. Sir Rufus Quaryll, her neighbor and hot lover; the Lord Fawley, who had vainly wooed her for wife; Sir John Radlett, who had the sense to love her and the sense to hold his tongue; Captain Bardon, the bold and bluff; and young Lord Richard Ingrow, with the delicate, girlish face that masked the amazing rake. She seemed to see them as in some golden dream, seemed to hear a-down the vistas of dreams the echoes of their gallant cries of “God save the King!” Then as the new-comers knelt before her she knew that all was true.
“God bless you, gentlemen!” she cried, from a full heart. “You are very well come.”
Rufus Quaryll, neighbor and wooer, was the first to speak, looking up at her with rapture in his eyes of reddish brown.
“Imperial lady, the siege of Harby is raised.”
Brilliana flung out her hands to him, and as he caught and kissed them she raised him to his feet.
“Your news is music,” she said, and her voice was as blithe as a song.
“We are heralds of victory,” Rufus said, as he stood and looked into her eyes.
My Lord Fawley rose from his knees with a whoop.
“We have pelted the rebels from Edgehill,” he shouted. Sir John Radlett caught him up. “We banged them finely,” he trumpeted. Young Ingrow, with a flush on his fine cheeks, sang out a shrill “Hurrah for Prince Rupert!” and bluff Bardon rubbed his hands as he chuckled, “He brushed them into dust.”
All the Cavaliers spoke rapidly and eagerly, flinging their phrases each on top of the other. Rufus summed up all in a single splendid sentence.
“The road lies plain to London.”
“Heaven be praised,” Brilliana ejaculated, and then, wonder treading on the heels of thankfulness, she questioned, “How came you here so timely?”
My Lord Fawley broke into a boisterous laugh which seemed to rattle among the rafters.
“Oh, Lord, the best jest in the world,” he bellowed. Bardon clapped a hand on lad Ingrow’s shoulder.
“Our Ingrow writes a clerky hand,” he asserted. Ingrow, stabbing at Bardon’s stout ribs with slender fingers, riposted:
“And our Bardon has a merry invention.”
Brilliana looked commands and entreaties at the row of jolly, laughing faces.
“Do not play the sphinx with me,” she pleaded. Rufus immediately made himself interpreter of the mirth.
“Why, between us we forged a letter from my lord high damnable traitor Essex to your enemy here, advising him of reinforcements, assuring him of the King’s defeat.”
“Yes,” chirruped the Lord Fawley, “and the gull-gaby swallowed the bait.”
“When we rode up but now,” Radlett interposed, “his rascals received us with open arms.”
Rufus smiled sardonically as he completed the story of the entrapment.
“They took us for Essex men because of our orange-tawny scarves, but they found out when too late that we were right-tight Cavalier lads and no crop-eared curmudgeons. Why, we were in the thick of them with sword and pistol before they had stayed from snuffling their psalms of welcome.”
Brilliana held out her hand again for her cousin’s hand and clasped it manfully.
“How rich is the ring of victory in your loyal voice,” she sighed. “My last public news was of the King’s stay at Shrewsbury. Then these curmudgeons raced hot-foot from Cambridge to pull down my flag. But ‘This is Loyalty House,’ says I, and ‘Go to the devil,’ says I – forgive me, sirs, if I raged unmaidenly – and I slammed the door in their sour faces. Then came such a tintamar, rebels firing on us, we firing on rebels, and so in such noise and thunder we have been eclipsed out of the world these weary days.”
“Never were such days better lived through since the world began,” said Rufus. “You do well to call this Loyalty House which has held out so well against the King’s enemies.”
Brilliana now turned to where Halfman stood apart, his hands resting on the hilt of his sword, and the shadow of a frown on his forehead as he eyed the babbling gallants.
“That Loyalty House should hold out so long as it could was from the first my purpose,” she said. “But that it was able to hold out so long as it did was greatly due to the courage and the counsels of this brave gentleman.”
As she spoke she pointed to Halfman, whose dark face flushed with pleasure as he gave back the stares of the astonished Cavaliers who up to now had left him unnoticed.
“Gentles,” she went on, “this is Captain Halfman, who warned me of my danger, who helped me in my peril with his soldier’s knowledge and his soldier’s sword, and who was of my own mind rather to die than to surrender Harby.”
Halfman strode forward with a studied grace. He felt like Faulconbridge; he felt like Harry at Agincourt; he felt like Coriolanus; he felt exceedingly happy.
“Gallants,” he said, with a magnificent salutation, “to have served this lady makes a man know how it had seemed to serve Alexander or Cæsar. Wherefore, a soldier of good-fortune salutes you.”
Rufus, who had watched him with something of a sullen eye from the moment of Brilliana’s introduction, now answered him with a clearer countenance.
“We greet you, sir,” he said, gravely, “with great gratitude and great envy, for, indeed, there is none among us who would not have given his life to be lieutenant to this lady.” He accorded the beaming Halfman a military salute, and then, turning to Brilliana, continued:
“Bright Brilliana, your servants and swains yearned to ride to your help when we heard of your peril, but we could not leave the King in the beginning of his enterprise. He gave us glad leave after the victory. ‘Tell the brave lady,’ he said, ‘she shall be our viceroy in Oxfordshire.’”
Brilliana’s cheeks blazed with pleasure. “Oh, the dear man,” she cried, with clasped hands of rapture. But there was more to come.
“I think,” continued Rufus, “it is more than likely that his Majesty will visit Harby – I should say Loyalty House – ere he rides to London.”
Brilliana thrilled with pride – with pleasure. The air about her seemed to swoon with music, to be sweet as roses, to be spangled with golden motes.
X
PRISONER OF WAR
“I rejoice,” she answered, in a voice unsteady with happiness – such might have been the voice of Semele at the coming of her god – “I rejoice that Loyalty House boasts a roof to shelter his Majesty. For I was minded to blow the place to pieces rather than yield it to this gentleman who would so speciously persuade me to surrender.”
As she spoke she glanced disdainfully in the direction of Evander Cloud, who now for the first time since the irruption of the Cavaliers became in any sense an object of public interest. None of the new-comers had paid any heed to the sombre-habited prisoner; Halfman had forgotten his captive in his jealous study of the men who had raised the siege; Thoroughgood, with the Puritan’s sword resting idly on his left arm, was as absorbed in the converse of Sir Rufus and his comrades as were his subordinates Garlinge and Clupp, who, though they gripped their prisoner tightly, were as indifferent to his existence as if he had been the turbaned dummy of a quintain. But now on the instant every glance was turned on Evander, and Sir Rufus, eying him with much disfavor, asked of Brilliana, “Who is your prisoner?”
Evander made a step forward unrestrained by his guards, and answered for himself composedly.
“I am Captain Cloud, of the parliamentary army, snared under a flag of truce.”
He was so well restrained in his speech and carriage, so quiet a contrast to the heated gentlemen who glared at him, that to an uninformed observer he might very well have seemed the judge rather than the one on trial. Rufus snapped at him like an angry dog.
“Well, you tub-thumper, you see that the gentlemen of England are more than a match for pestilent pennyweight rebels.”
Evander surveyed his truculent opponent with a tranquil contempt which had its effect in increasing the irritation of the Cavalier.
“You play the valiant braggart to a captive,” he commented, quietly. Then he turned to Brilliana as one who had no further desire for treaty with a fellow of this kind.
“Let me remind you, lady, that I came here under a flag of truce.”
Brilliana had forgotten Evander in the exhilaration of her relief. But now that he had come into her mind again, so with his image had flooded in again all the prejudices he provoked, the scorn, the hatred.
“That plea cannot release you,” she answered, hotly. “Your time was up, your sword was drawn; I am very sure you would have joined your men.”
Evander, whose arms were now released from bondage by Garlinge and Clupp, made a gesture of absolute acquiescence.
“I am very sure I should have joined my men,” he answered, calmly. Brilliana rounded on him triumphant.
“Then you are a prisoner of war, fairly taken. Let me have no more words.”
As indifferent to her words as to the angry carriage of the Cavaliers, Evander stepped tranquilly back to his place between his warders.
“I have no more words to waste,” he said, with a scorn in his voice that stung Brilliana’s cheeks to crimson. She turned hurriedly to the little knot of Cavaliers, who chafed at having to witness what they held to be the presumption of a Puritan in daring to bandy words with a lady of quality.
“Gallants,” she said, “this merry meeting calls for its baptism of wine.” As she spoke she struck upon the bell, shrewdly confident that her wishes would be met. “Wine,” she added, “the more precious that it is wellnigh the last in our cellars.”
As the Cavaliers came about her applauding with word and look, the doors of the banqueting-room parted and Mrs. Satchell entered, full of pomp and apple-red with pleasure, followed by Shard bearing a tray of glasses, and by pretty, dimpling Tiffany bearing a goodly flagon of wine and observing with demure approbation the covey of King’s gentlemen.
Mistress Satchell swam like a gall on towards the Cavaliers, her great, red, spoon-shaped face damp with satisfaction. Playing at heroine behind bombarded walls was all very well, but greeting of timely gentry who had set heroines free was infinitely better.
“Heaven bless you, merry gentlemen,” she chirruped. “Here is a cup of comfort for you.”
“Heaven bless you, merry matron,” Bardon answered, as soberly as he could, for indeed the sight of Mistress Satchell in her Sunday best and in her most coming-on humor was not of a nature to strengthen sobriety. Lord Fawley gasped as the virago swaggered towards his companions, and young Ingrow popped his handkerchief into his mouth and bit at it while he stared with eyes of nursery wonder at the dame. Radlett winked as if dazzled by the whimsical apparition, and Sir Rufus, familiar with Mrs. Satchell and her vagaries, was the only member of his party who kept his countenance unchanged on her entrance.
Brilliana was sympathetically swift to explain her astonishing handwoman.
“Gentles,” she said, “this is Mistress Satchell, who queens it in times of peace over my kitchen, but who has proved herself my very valiant adjutant during the siege.”
The dame bridled with pride.
“I can handle a pike, my lords, I promise ye,” she asserted; and then, turning to Halfman for confirmation, “Can I not, Master Halfman?”
Halfman slapped his thigh approvingly and answered to the Cavalier with grave voice and smiling eyes.
“Never was pike so handled before, I promise ye.”
The tone of his voice mimicked Mrs. Satchell’s manner even as the words of it aped her matter, but the dame was too pleased with herself and the world to heed what it was that set the gentlemen laughing.
“So, so,” Radlett hummed approval. “Mrs. Satchell, will you ride with me to the King?”
Mrs. Satchell dipped him a swimming reverence, but she shook her head decisively.
“Your honor means well, but I cannot leave my lady. The Roundheads might come again.”
The Lord Fawley had by this seen his glass filled by Tiffany and was staring boldly into her pretty face, much to the exasperation of honest Thoroughgood, chafing in the background.
“Do you handle a pike, prettikins?” Fawley asked. Prettikins dropped him a courtesy and shook her curls.
“No, my lord,” she whispered, “I am not very soldierly.”
It was now Ingrow’s turn to have his glass filled and to stare admiration at the pretty serving-woman.
“If you have a mind to enlist,” he said, temptingly, “you shall be ensign in my troop and we’ll carry your kirtle for a flag.”
Whether Mrs. Satchell considered that Tiffany was like to be embarrassed by the attentions of the gentry, or whether she considered that those attentions diverted too much notice from herself as the heroine of the servants’ hall, she certainly came to the rescue, edging her bulk between the girl and Ingrow.
“She is too green for your grace,” she insisted. “You need a fine woman like me for your flag-bearer.”
Even Ingrow’s readiness found him something at a loss for an answer. He looked as if he feared lest dame Satchell might take him in an embrace. Brilliana, now that all the glasses were charged, decided that the company had tasted enough of Mrs. Satchell’s humors.
“I thank you, Mistress Satchell,” she said, quietly, and Mrs. Satchell, rightly reading in the tones of her mistress’s voice permission to retire, withdrew in good order, beaming and bobbing to all the gentlemen and followed by Shard and Tiffany, who, with lids demurely lowered, avoided recognition of the admiring glances of Fawley and Ingrow.
Brilliana turned to her company and lifted her glass.
“Drink, gentles,” she summoned. “Drink ‘The King!’”
All the Cavaliers shouted the loyal toast so that the words “The King!” seemed to ring in every nook of the great hall; then every Cavalier drained his glass.
“Ah,” sighed Lord Fawley, as he set down his empty vessel, “I could drink the King’s health forever.”
“I swear it would sweeten sour ale,” Bardon declared.
Young Ingrow took him up. “When it floats on such noble tipple I am a god-swilling nectar.” Halfman slapped his chest.
“Come, lads!” he cried; “when Cavaliers drink the King’s health they should sing the King’s song,” and in another moment his mellow voice was setting his friends a sturdy example. “Gallants of England,” he warbled:
“Gallants of England, shall not the King land
Safely in town to knock Parliament down?
Shall we not ever strive to endeavor
Glory to win for our King and our crown?
Shall not the Roundhead soon be confounded?
Sa, sa, sa, sa, boys, ha, ha, ha, ha, boys,
Then we’ll return home in triumph and joy.
Then we’ll be merry, drink sack and sherry,
And we will sing, boys, God save the King, boys,
Cast up our hats, and sing Vive le Roy.”
XI
AT BAY
Brilliana and the Cavaliers, stirred by the enthusiasm of Halfman’s stanza, caught up the cry commanded and sent it rolling through the hall.
“Vive le Roy! God bless the King!” they shouted, with the loyal tears in their eyes. Brilliana gave Halfman a grateful smile.
“Well sung, well done,” she approved. Halfman glowed. Sir Rufus frowned a little. Turning hurriedly to his companions, he said:
“Friends, I have another toast for you. I give you the King’s sweet warrior, Oxfordshire’s blithe viceroy, ‘The Lady of Loyalty House.’”
“Never a better toast in the world,” Halfman shouted. “Drink, gallants, drink.”
Brilliana crossed her fingers before her face. Through the living lattice her eyes peeped brightly.
“I protest you make too much of me,” she pleaded, while Halfman and the Cavaliers quickly filled their glasses again and lifted them high in air. A chorus of “The Lady of Loyalty House!” rang out, and again the toast was honored.
“I thank you with all my heart,” Brilliana panted, blushing and excited at the tumult and the praise. There was a moment’s silence. Everything worth saying seemed to have been said, everything worth doing to have been done. Suddenly, in that silence, Bardon caught sight of Evander where he stood apart, disdainful, between his guards, and the sight pricked his wits. Turning to his mates, he thumbed at the prisoner over his shoulder.
“Should we not make the crop-ear yonder pledge the Lady of Loyalty House?” he questioned. Radlett rubbed approving hands.
“Well thought. Let him honor his conqueror,” he began. The Lord Fawley tripped him up with a new proposal.
“Stop, stop; not so fast,” he protested. “The fellow has not pledged the King yet. Let him drink the King’s health first and be damned to him.”
The others applauded, but Ingrow, noting a certain sterner tightening of Evander’s mouth, interrupted.
“I’ll wager he will not drink,” he said, looking maliciously from the flushed faces of the Cavaliers to the pale face of the Puritan. Rufus’s temper blazed instantly.
“Will not drink, say you!” he cried. “This mewcant shall pledge at our pleasure or taste our displeasure.”
He strode to the table, filled a cup of wine, and set it down on the corner nearest to Evander.
“Come, you Roundpoll,” he continued – “come, you Geneva mumbler, here is a cup for you to wash down the dust of your dry thoughts. Drink, I give you ‘The King.’”
Evander gazed steadfastly at the irate gentleman and made no motion to take the wine. Brilliana, from where she stood, watching him curiously, wrestled with a reluctant admiration of his carriage. Ingrow commented, smoothly, maliciously:
“You see, the gentleman does not drink.”
Ingrow’s words fanned the Cavalier fire.
“Damn him for a disloyal rat!” Radlett shouted. Halfman elbowed his way past him and addressed Rufus.
“Sweet Sir Rufus,” he said, “I have lived in places where a little persuasion has often led folk to act much against their personal inclinations and desires. Out swords and force the toast.”
As he spoke he drew his sword with his best Mercutio manner, and the suggestion and the naked steel carried contagion. Every gentleman unsheathed his sword; all advanced upon Evander, a line of shining points.
“Bait him, bait him!” Bardon shouted.
Ingrow shrilled, “Tickle him, prick him, pink him till he drinks!”
Though Evander surveyed his enemies as composedly as if they had been children threatening him with pins, Brilliana knew that the spirit of mischief was alive and that the Cavaliers would not boggle at cruelty, six to one, for the sport of making a Parliament man honor the King against his will. She hated the man, but she would not have him so handled. Instantly she stepped between Evander and the Cavaliers, who fell back with lowered points before their hostess.
“Wait, sirs,” she ordered, “let me see if my entreaties will not make the bear more gracious.”
She took up the cup where Rufus had set it down, and, coming close to Evander, held the vessel to him with her sweetest smile, the smile which, she had been assured a thousand times, would tame a savage and shatter adamant. “Will you not pledge the best gentleman in England?” she asked, with a voice all honey.
Very courteously Evander took the proffered cup from her fingers and gave her back her smile. Brilliana’s heart thrilled with pleasure at this new proof of beauty’s victory.
“I will drink at your wish,” he said, looking at her with a quiet smile and speaking as if he and she were alone together in the great hall. “I will drink at your wish, but with my own wit.” Still looking into the gratified eyes of Brilliana, he lifted the cup.
“I drink,” he cried, loud and clear, “to the best man in England. I drink to Colonel Cromwell.”
He drained the glass and sent it crashing into the fireplace. Then he folded his arms and faced his antagonists.
Brilliana’s heart seemed for a second to stand still. So beauty had not triumphed, after all. Dimly, as one in a dream, she could hear the fury of the Cavaliers find words.
“You black Jack, I will clip your ears,” Rufus promised.
“Blood him. Blood him,” bawled Fawley.
“Slit his nose,” Radlett suggested.
“Duck him in the horse-pond,” suggested Bardon.
“Set him in the stocks,” Ingrow advised.
Halfman, seeing how Brilliana leaned against the table, her face pale as her smock, raged at her daring denier. He stretched out his sword as if to marshal and restrain the passions of the Cavaliers.
“Would it not be properer sport, sirs,” he asked, “to tie him in a chair, like Guido Fawkes on November day, and take him through the village that loyal lads may pelt a traitor?”
Once again Halfman’s pleasant invention pleased the fancy of his allies.
“Well said,” assented Rufus. “Fetch a rope, some one.”
Brilliana, hearing, moved a little forward. She had failed and felt shamed. Yet this thing must not happen. She could not leave her enemy thus to the mercy of his enemies. But what she would have said was stayed by a sudden diversion.
Interest in all the events that had so swiftly passed before them had gravely relaxed the vigilance of Evander’s guardians. Garlinge and Clupp – a strong Gyas and a strong Cloanthes – open-eyed and open-mouthed, were open-handed also and clawed no clutch upon their prisoner’s shoulder. Thoroughgood, confused between jealous thoughts of Tiffany and envious admiration of the manner in which Halfman handled the gentry, was as heedless as his inferiors, and was therefore taken too much by surprise to offer the slightest resistance when Evander, suddenly springing from between his guards, snatched from his supine arms the captured sword that had been intrusted to his keeping. Before he or any other of the astonished spectators could take any action Evander had leaped lightly into the alcove of the window, and, dragging by main force the heavy table in front of him, so as to blockade his corner, showed himself snugly intrenched behind a rampart which his single sword might well hope to hold at least for some time against the swords of half a dozen assailants.
“You will find me a spoil sport,” he cried, cheerily, as he stood on guard behind the massive bulk of oak. “Dogs, here is a hart at bay; beware his antlers.”
“Bravely done, rebel,” Brilliana cried, aloud, as if in spite of herself, as she beheld the reckless deed, and “Bravely done, rebel,” Halfman echoed, in his reluctant turn, as he heard his lady’s words and saw the light of praise on his lady’s face. Though he hated the Puritan as cordially as if he had been a King’s man all his days, he could not deny his courage, and his scene of effective action made him wish himself in Evander’s place, taking the stage so skilfully and dominating the situation. But above all this, if Brilliana applauded the rebel’s act, then the rebel’s life was of some value, and until he received his lady’s orders the rebel’s life should be sacred to Halfman. So he struck up with his sword the pikes that Garlinge and Clupp levelled, clumsily enough, and were preparing to thrust at Evander over the interposing barrier. At the same moment Rufus, for a very different reason, restrained the action of his comrade Cavaliers, who were making ready for a combined rush, sword in hand, upon their enemy. Rufus saw instantly how well intrenched their enemy lay; it would be hard for any sword to reach him across that width of oak, and even push of pike, when delivered by such loutish fingers as now governed those weapons, might easily be parried by a swordsman so skilful as he guessed Evander to be. But there was no generosity towards a brave adversary in Rufus’s action. In his hot ferocity he merely wished to make sure of his quarry as quickly as possible.
“You shall be no hart-royal,” he answered, fiercely, taking up the hunter’s challenge. “You shall not escape. We shall sound the mort of the deer in a moment. Give me your gun, fellow.”
This last command was addressed to Thoroughgood, who had brought his musketoon to the ready and was waiting irresolute for command. Sir Rufus snatched the weapon from him and was about to aim at Evander when, to his rage, Brilliana stepped between him and his mark.
“Stay your hand, Sir Rufus,” she commanded, with a frown on the fair face to which the color had now returned. “It is for me, and for me only, to give orders here. This is my prisoner, and were he ten times a Roundpoll he should have honest handling.”
Sir Rufus would fain have protested, would fain have carried his point, but he saw that in the face of her whom it was his heart’s desire to please which reduced him to sullen obedience. He shrugged his shoulders. “As you please,” he muttered, as he returned the gun to Thoroughgood and, turning on his heel to hide his vexation, joined his comrades, who seemed all to share, discomfited, in his rebuke, and to deprecate the anger of Brilliana. Brilliana went up to the table, and, poising herself against it by pressing the palms of her hands on its surface, looked with gracious entreaty into the grave eyes of Evander, who lowered his sword in respectful greeting.
