Chapter Eight.
Thekla comes to the Rescue.
“It were a well-spent journey,
Though seven deaths lay between.”
A.R. Cousins.
“Lysken, didst thou ever love any one very much?”
Blanche spoke dreamily, as she stood leaning against the side of the window in the parsonage parlour, and with busy idleness tied knots in her gold chain, which at once untied themselves by their own weight.
“Most truly,” said Lysken, looking up with an expression of surprise. “I love all here—very much.”
“Ah! but—not here?”
“Certes. I loved Mayken Floriszoon, who died at Leyden, the day after help came. And I loved Aunt Jacobine; and Vrouw Van Vliet, who took care of me before I came hither. And I loved—O Blanche, how dearly!—my father and my mother.”
Blanche’s ideas were running in one grove, and Lysken’s in quite a different one.
“Ay, but I mean, Lysken—another sort of love.”
“Another sort!” said Lysken, looking up again from the stocking which she was darning. “Is there any sort but one?”
“Oh ay!” responded Blanche, feeling her experience immeasurably past that of Lysken.
“Thou art out of my depth, Blanche, methinks,” said Lysken, re-threading her needle in a practical unromantic way. “Love is love, for me. It differeth, of course, in degree; we love not all alike. But, methinks, even a man’s love for God, though it be needs deeper and higher far, must yet be the same manner of love that he hath for his father, or his childre, or his friends. I see not how it can be otherwise.”
Blanche was shocked at the business-like style in which Lysken darned while she talked. Had such a question been asked of herself, the stocking would have stood still till it was settled. She doubted whether to pursue the subject. What was the use of talking upon thrilling topics to a girl who could darn stockings while she calmly analysed love? Still, she wanted somebody’s opinion; and she had an instinctive suspicion that Clare would be no improvement upon her cousin.
“Well, but,” she said hesitatingly, “there is another fashion of love, Lysken. The sort that a woman hath toward her husband.”
“That is deeper, I guess, than she hath for her father and mother, else would she not leave them to go with him,” said Lysken quietly; “but I see not wherein it should be another sort.”
“’Tis plain thou didst never feel the same, Lysken,” returned Blanche sentimentally.
“How could I, when I never had an husband?” answered Lysken, darning away tranquilly.
“But didst thou never come across any that—that thou shouldst fain—”
“Shouldst fain—what?” said Lysken, as Blanche paused.
“Shouldst have liked to wed,” said Blanche, plunging into the matter.
“Gramercy, nay!” replied Lysken, turning the stocking to look at the other side. “And I should have thought shame if I had.”
Blanche felt this speech a reflection on herself.
“Lysken!” she cried pettishly.
Lysken put down the stocking, and looked at Blanche.
“What meanest thou?” she inquired, in a plain matter-of-fact style which was extremely aggravating to that young lady.
“Oh, ’tis to no good to tell thee,” returned Blanche loftily. “Thou wist nought at all thereabout.”
“What about?” demanded Lysken, to whom Blanche was unintelligible.
“About nought. Let be!”
“I cannot tell wherefore thou art vexed, Blanche,” said Lysken, resuming her darning, in that calm style which is eminently provoking to any one in a passion.
“Thou seest not every matter in the world,” retorted Blanche, with an air of superiority. “And touching this matter, ’tis plain thou wist nothing. Verily, thou hast gain therein; for he that hath bettered knowledge—as saith Solomon—hath but increased sorrow.”
“Blanche, I do not know whereof thou art talking! Did I put thee out by saying I had thought shame to have cared to wed with any, or what was it? Why, wouldst not thou?”
This final affront was as the last straw to the camel. Deigning no answer, which she felt would be an angry one, Blanche marched away like an offended queen, and sat down on a chair in the hall as if she were enthroning herself upon a pedestal. Mrs Tremayne was in the hall, and the door into the parlour being open, she had heard the conversation. She made no allusion to it at the time, but tried to turn the girl’s thoughts to another topic. Gathering from it, however, the tone of Blanche’s mind, she resolved to give her a lesson which should not eject her roughly from her imaginary pedestal—but make her come down from it of her own accord.
“Poor foolish child!” said Mrs Tremayne to herself. “She has mistaken a rushlight for the sun, and she thinks her horizon wider than that of any one else. She is despising Lysken, at this moment, as a shallow, prosaic character, who cannot enter into the depth of her feelings, and has not attained the height of her experience. And there are heights and depths in Lysken that Blanche will never reach.”
Mrs Tremayne found her opportunity the next evening. She was alone with Blanche in the parlour; and knowing pretty well what every one was doing, she anticipated a quiet half-hour.
Of all the persons to whom Blanche was known, there was not one so well fitted to deal with her in this crisis as the friend in whose hands she had been placed for safety. Thirty years before, Thekla Tremayne had experienced a very dark trial,—had become miserably familiar with the heart-sickness of hope deferred,—during four years when the best beloved of Robin Tremayne had known no certainty whether he was living or dead, but had every reason rather to fear the latter. Compared with a deep, long-tried love like hers, this sentimental fancy over which Blanche was making herself cross and unhappy was almost trivial. But Mrs Tremayne knew that trouble is trouble, if it be based on folly; she thought that she recognised in Blanche, silly though she was in some points, a nobler nature than that of the vain, selfish, indolent mother from whom the daughter derived many of the surface features of her character: and she longed to see that nobler nature rouse itself to work, and sweep away the outward vanity and giddiness. It might be that even this would show her the real hollowness of the gilded world; that this one hour’s journey over the weary land would help to drive her for shelter to the shadow of the great Rock.
Blanche sat on a low stool at Mrs Tremayne’s feet, gazing earnestly into the fire. Neither had spoken for some time, during which the only sounds were the slight movements of Mrs Tremayne as she sat at work, and now and then a heavy sigh from Blanche. When the fifth of these was drawn, the lady gently laid her hand on the girl’s head.
“Apothecaries say, Blanche, that sighing shorteneth life.”
Blanche looked up. “I reckon you count me but a fool, Mistress Tremayne, as do all other.”
“Blanche,” said her friend, “I will tell thee a story, and after that thou shall judge for thyself what account I make of thee.”
Blanche looked interested, and altered her position so as to watch Mrs Tremayne’s face while she was speaking.
“Once upon a time, Blanche,—in the days of Queen Mary,—there was a priest that had a daughter of thine own age—sixteen years. In those days, as I cast no doubt thou hast heard, all wedded priests were laid under ban, and at the last a day was set whereon all they must needs part from their wives. Though my story take root ere this, yet I pray thee bear it in mind, for we shall come thereto anon. Well, this damsel, with assent of her father, was troth-plight unto a young man whom she loved very dearly; but seeing her youth, their wedding was yet some way off. In good sooth, her father had given assent under bond that they should not wed for three years; and the three years should be run out in June, 1553.”
“Three years!” said Blanche, under her breath.
“This young man was endeavouring himself for the priesthood. During the time of King Edward, thou wist, there was no displeasure taken at married priests; and so far as all they might see when the three years began to run, all was like to go smooth enough. But when they were run out, all England was trembling with fear, and men took much thought (felt much anxiety) for the future. King Edward lay on his dying bed; and there was good reason—ah! more reason than any man then knew!—to fear that the fair estate of such as loved the Gospel should die with him. For a maid then to wed a priest, or for a wedded man to receive orders, was like to a man casting him among wild beasts: there was but a chance that he might not be devoured. So it stood, that if this young man would save his life, he must give up one of two things,—either the service which for many months back he had in his own heart offered to God, or the maiden whom, for a time well-nigh as long, he had hoped should be his wife. What, thinkest thou, should he have done, Blanche?”
“I wis not, in very deed, Mistress Tremayne,” said Blanche, shaking her head. “I guess he should have given up rather her,—but I know not. Methinks it had been sore hard to give up either. And they were troth-plight.”
“Well,—I will tell thee what they did. They did appoint a set time, at the end whereof, should he not then have received orders (it being not possible, all the Protestant Bishops being prisoners), he should then resign the hope thereof, and they twain be wed. The three years, thou wist, were then gone. They fixed the time two years more beyond,—to run out in August, 1555—which should make five years’ waiting in all.”
“And were they wed then?” said Blanche, drawing a long breath.
“When the two further years were run out, Blanche—”
Blanche was a little startled to hear how Mrs Tremayne’s voice trembled. She was evidently telling “an owre true tale.”
“The maid’s father, and he that should have been her husband, were taken in one day. When those two years were run out, her father lay hidden away, having ’scaped from prison, until he might safely be holpen out of the country over seas: and the young man was a captive in Exeter Castle, and in daily expectation of death.”
“Good lack!”
“And two years thereafter, the young man was had away from Exeter unto Woburn, and there set in the dread prison called Little Ease, shaped like to a funnel, wherein a man might neither stand, nor sit, nor lie, nor kneel.”
“O Mistress Tremayne! Heard any ever the like! And what came of the maiden, poor soul?”
The needlework in Mrs Tremayne’s hand was still now; and if any one had been present who had known her thirty years before, he would have said that a shadow of her old look at that terrible time had come back to her deep sweet eyes.
“My child, God allowed her to be brought very low. At the first, she was upheld mightily by His consolations: and they that saw her said how well she bare it. But ’tis not alway the first blush of a sorrow that trieth the heart most sorely. And there came after this a time—when it was an old tale to them that knew her, and their comforting was given over,—a day came when all failed her. Nay, I should have said rather, all seemed to fail her. God failed her not; but her eyes were holden, and she saw Him not beside her. It was darkness, an horror of great darkness, that fell upon her. The Devil came close enough; he was very busy with her. Was there any hope? quoth he. Nay, none, or but very little. Then of what worth were God’s promises to hear and deliver? He had passed His word, and He kept it not. Was God able to help?—was He true to His promise?—go to, was there any God in Heaven at all? And so, Blanche, she was tossed to and fro on the swelling billows, now up, seeing a faint ray of light, now down, in the depth of the darkness: yet, through all, with an half-palsied grasp, so to speak, upon the hem of Christ’s garment, a groping after Him with numb hands that scarce felt whether they held or no. O Blanche, it was like the plague in the land of Egypt—it was darkness that might be felt!”
Blanche listened in awed interest.
“Dear heart, the Lord hath passed word to help His people in their need; but He saith not any where that He will alway help them right as they would have it. We be prone to think there is but one fashion of help, and that if we be not holpen after our own manner, we be not holpen at all. Yet, if thou take a penny from a poor beggar, and give him in the stead thereof an angel (half-sovereign), thou hast given him alms, though he have lost the penny. Alas, for us poor beggars! we fall to weeping o’er our penny till our eyes be too dim with tears to see the gold of God’s alms. Dear Blanche, I would not have thee miss the gold.”
“I scantly conceive your meaning, dear Mistress.”
“We will come back to that anon. I will first tell thee what befel her of whom I spake.”
“Ay, I would fain hear the rest.”
“Well, there were nigh four years of that fearful darkness. She well-nigh forgat that God might have some better thing in store for her, to the which He was leading her all the time, along this weary road. She thought He dealt hardly with her. At times, when the darkness was at the thickest, she fancied that all might be a delusion: that there was no God at all, or none that had any compassion upon men. But it was not His meaning, to leave one of His own in that black pit of despair. He lifted one end of the dark veil. When the four years were over,—that is, when Queen Elizabeth, that now is, happily succeeded to her evil sister,—God gave the maiden back her father safe.”
Blanche uttered a glad “Oh!”
“And He gave her more than that, Blanche. He sent her therewith a message direct from Himself. Thou lookest on me somewhat doubtfully, dear heart, as though thou shouldst say, Angels bring no wolds from Heaven now o’ days. Well, in very sooth, I wis not whether they do or no. We see them not: can we speak more boldly than to say this? Yet one thing I know, Blanche: God can send messages to His childre in their hearts, howso they may come. And what was this word? say thine eyes. Well, sweeting, it was the softest of all the chidings that we hear Him to have laid on His disciples,—‘O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?’ As though He should say,—‘Thou mightest have doubted of the fulfilling of thy special hope; yet wherefore doubt Me? Would I have taken pleasure in bereaving thee of aught that was not hurtful? Could I not have given thee much more than this? Because I made thine heart void, that I might fill it with Myself,—child, did I love thee less, or more?’”
Mrs Tremayne paused so long, that Blanche asked timidly—“And did he come again at last, or no?”
A slight, sudden movement of her friend’s head showed that her thoughts were far away, and that she came back to the present with something like an effort.
“Methinks, dear heart,” Mrs Tremayne said lovingly, “there was a special point whereto God did desire to bring this maiden;—a point whereat He oft-times aimeth in the training of His childre. It is, to be satisfied with His will. Not only to submit thereto. Thou mayest submit unto all outward seeming, and yet be sore dissatisfied.”
Was not this Blanche’s position at that moment?
“But to be satisfied with His ordering—to receive it as the best thing, dearer unto thee than thine own will and way; as the one thing which thou wouldst have done, at the cost, if need be, of all other:—ah, Blanche, ’tis no light nor easy thing, this! And unto this God led her of whom I have been telling thee. He led her, till she could look up to Him, and say, with a true, honest heart—‘Father, lead where Thou wilt. If in the dark, well: so Thou hold me, I am content I am Thine, body, and soul, and spirit: it shall be well and blessed for me, if but Thy will be done.’ And then, Blanche,—when she could look up and say this in sincerity—then He laid down His rod, and gave all back into her bosom.”
Blanche drew a deep sigh,—partly of relief, but not altogether.
“You knew this maiden your own self, Mrs Tremayne?”
“Wouldst thou fain know whom the maid were, Blanche? Her name was—Thekla Rose.”
“Mistress Tremayne!—yourself?”
“Myself, dear heart. And I should not have gone back over this story now, but that I thought it might serve thee to hear it. I love not to look back to that time, though it were to mine own good. ’Tis like an ill wound which is healed, and thou hast no further suffering thereof: yet the scar is there for evermore. And yet, dear Blanche, if it were given me to choose, now, whether I would have that dark and weary time part of my life, or no—reckoning what I should have lost without it—I would say once again, Ay. They that know the sweetness of close walking with God will rather grope, step by step, at His side through the darkness, than walk smoothly in the full glare of the sun without Him: and very street was my walk, when I had won back the felt holding of His hand.”
“But is He not with them in the sunlight?” asked Blanche shyly.
“He is alway with them, dear heart: but we see his light clearest when other lights are out. And we be so prone to walk further off in the daylight!—we see so many things beside Him. We would fain be running off after birds and butterflies; fain be filling our hands with bright flowers by the way: and we picture not rightly to ourselves that these things are but to cheer us on as we step bravely forward, for there will be flowers enough when we reach Home.”
Blanche looked earnestly into the red embers, and was silent.
“Seest thou now, Blanche, what I meant in saying, I would not have thee miss the gold?”
“I reckon you mean that God hath somewhat to give, better than what He taketh away.”
“Right, dear heart. Ah, how much better! Yet misconceive me not, my child. We do not buy Heaven with afflictions; never think that, Blanche. There be many that have made that blunder. Nay! the beggar buyeth not thy gold with his penny piece. Christ hath bought Heaven for His chosen: it is the purchase of His blood; and nothing else in all the world could have paid for it. But they that shall see His glory yonder, must be fitted for it here below; and oft-times God employeth sorrows and cares to this end.—And now, Blanche, canst answer thine own question, and tell me what I think of thee?”
Blanche blushed scarlet.
“I am afeared,” she said, hanging down her head, “you must think me but a right silly child.”
Mrs Tremayne stroked Blanche’s hair, with a little laugh.
“I think nothing very ill of thee, dear child. But I do think thou hast made a blunder or twain.”
“What be they?” Blanche wished to know, more humbly than she would have done that morning.
“Well, dear Blanche—firstly, I think thou hast mistaken fancy for love. There be many that so do. Many think they love another, when in truth all they do love is themselves and their own pleasures, or the flattering of their own vain conceits. Ask thine own heart what thou lovest in thy lover: is it him, or his liking for thyself? If it be but the latter, that is not love, Blanche. ’Tis but fancy, which is to love as the waxen image to the living man. Love would have him it loveth bettered at her own cost: it would fain see him higher and nobler—I mean not higher in men’s eyes, but nearer Heaven and God—whatever were the price to herself. True love will go with us into Heaven, Blanche: it can never die, nor be forgotten. Remember the word of John the Apostle, that ‘he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.’ And wouldst thou dare to apply that holy and heavenly name unto some vain fancy that shall be as though it had never been six months thereafter? My child, we men and women be verily guilty concerning this matter. We take the name of that which is the very essence of God, and set it lightly on a thing of earth and time, the which shall perish in the using. Well, and there is another mistake, sweet, which I fear thou mayest have made. It may be thou art thinking wrongfully of thine earthly father, as I did of my heavenly One. He dealeth with thee hardly, countest thou? Well, it may be so; yet it is to save thee from that which should be much harder. Think no ill of the father who loveth thee and would fain save thee. And, O Blanche! howsoever He may deal with thee, never, never do thou think hardly of that heavenly Father, who loveth thee far dearer than he, and would save thee from far bitterer woe.”
Blanche had looked very awe-struck when Mrs Tremayne spoke so solemnly of the real nature of love; and now she raised tearful eyes to her friend’s face.
“I thought none ill of my father, Mistress Tremayne. I wis well he loveth me.”
“That is well, dear heart. I am fain it should be so.”
And there the subject dropped rather abruptly, as first Clare, and then Arthur, came into the room.
Don Juan did not appear to: miss Blanche, after the first day. When he found that she and her father and sister were absent from the supper-table, he looked round with some surprise and a little perplexity; but he asked no question, and no one volunteered an explanation. He very soon found a new diversion, in the shape of Lucrece, to whom he proceeded to address his flowery language with even less sincerity than he had done to Blanche. But no sooner did Sir Thomas perceive this turn of affairs than he took the earliest opportunity of sternly demanding of his troublesome prisoner “what he meant?”
Don Juan professed entire ignorance of the purport of this question. Sir Thomas angrily explained.
“Nay, Señor, what would you?” inquired the young Spaniard, with an air of injured innocence. “An Andalusian gentleman, wheresoever he may be, and in what conditions, must always show respect to the ladies.”
“Respect!” cried the enraged squire. “Do Spanish gentlemen call such manner of talk showing respect? Thank Heaven that I was born in England! Sir, when an English gentleman carries himself toward a young maiden as you have done, he either designs to win her in honourable wedlock, or he is a villain. Which are you?”
“If we were in Spain, Señor,” answered Don Juan, fire flashing from his dark eyes, “you would answer those words with your sword. But since I am your prisoner, and have no such remedy, I must be content with a reply in speech. The customs of your land are different from ours. I will even condescend to say that I am, and for divers years have so been, affianced to a lady of mine own country. Towards the señoritas your daughters, I have shown but common courtesy, as it is understood in Spain.”
In saying which, Don Juan stated what was delicately termed by Swift’s Houynhnms, “the thing which is not.” Of what consequence was it in his eyes, when the Council of Constance had definitively decreed that “no faith was to be kept with heretics”?
Sir Thomas Enville was less given to the use of profane language than most gentlemen of his day, but in answer to this speech he swore roundly, and—though a staunch Protestant—thanked all the saints and angels that he never was in Spain, and, the Queen’s Highness’ commands excepted, never would be. As to his daughters, he would prefer turning them all into Nebuchadnezzar’s fiery furnace to allowing one of them to set foot on the soil of that highly objectionable country. These sentiments were couched in the most peppery language of which the Squire’s lips were well capable; and having thus delivered himself, he turned on his heel and left Don Juan to his own meditations.
That caballero speedily discovered that he had addressed his last compliment to any of the young ladies at Enville Court. Henceforward he only saw them at meals, and then he found himself, much to his discomfiture, placed between Jack and Mistress Rachel. To pay delicate attentions to the latter was sheer waste of frankincense: yet it was so much in his nature, when speaking to a woman, that he began to tell her that she talked like an angel. Mistress Rachel looked him full in the face.
“Don John,” said she, in the most unmoved manner, “if I believed you true, I should call on my brother to put you forth of the hall. As I believe you false, I do it not.”
After that day, Don Juan directed all his conversation to Jack.
He was not very sorry to leave Enville Court, which had become no longer an amusing, but an uncomfortable place. In his eyes, it was perfectly monstrous that any man should object to his daughters being honoured by the condescending notice of an Andalusian gentleman, who would one day be a grandee of the first class; utterly preposterous! But since this unreasonable man was so absurd as to object to the distinction, conferred upon his house, it was as well that an Andalusian gentleman should be out of his sphere. So Don Juan went willingly to London. Friends of his parents made suit for him, and Elizabeth herself remembered his mother, as one who had done her several little kindnesses, such as a Lady-in-Waiting on the Queen could do for a Princess under a cloud; and Don Juan received a free pardon, and leave to return home when and as he would. He only broke one more heart while he remained in England; and that was beneath any regret on his part, being only a poor, insignificant grocer’s daughter. And then he sailed for Spain; and then he married Doña Lisarda; and then he became a Lord-in-Waiting; and then he lived a wealthy, gorgeous, prosperous life; and then all men spoke well of him, seeing how much good he had done to himself; and then he grew old,—a highly respected, highly self-satisfied man.
And then his soul was required of him. Did God say to him,—“Thou fool”?