CHAPTER XL.
With shame and sorrow filled:
Shame for his folly; sorrow out of time
For plotting an unprofitable crime.--Dryden.
We must once more take our readers back, if it be but for the space of a couple of hours, and introduce them into the bedchamber of a king: a place, we believe, as yet sacred from the sacrilegious foot of any novelist.
In the castle of Guisnes, then, and in the sleeping-room of Henry the Eighth, King of England, stood, exactly opposite the window, a large square bed, covered with a rich coverlet of arras, which, hanging down on each side, swept the floor with its golden fringe. High overhead, attached to the wall, was a broad and curiously-wrought canopy, whereon the laborious needle of some British Penelope had traced, with threads of gold, the rare and curious history of that famous knight, Alexander the Great, who was there represented with lance in rest, dressed in a suit of Almaine rivet armour, overthrowing King Darius; who, for his part, being in a mighty fright, was whacking on his clumsy elephant with his sceptre, while the son of Philip, with more effect, appeared pricking him up under the ribs with the point of his spear.
In one corner of the chamber, ranged in fair and goodly order, were to be seen several golden lavers and ewers, together with fine diapers and other implements for washing; while hard by was an open closet filled with linen and plate of various kinds, with several Venice glasses, a mirror, and a bottle of scented waters. In addition to these pieces of furniture appeared four wooden settles of carved oak, which, with two large rich chairs of ivory and gold, made up, at that day, the furniture of a king's bed-chamber.
The square lattice window was half-open, letting in the sweet breath of the summer morning upon Henry himself, who, with his head half-covered with a black velvet nightcap, embroidered with gold, still lay in bed, supporting himself on his elbow, and listening to a long detail of grievances poured forth from the rotund mouth of honest Jekin Groby, who, by the king's command, encumbered with his weighty bulk one of the ivory chairs by the royal bedside.
Somewhat proud of having had a lord for the companion of his perils, the worthy clothier enlarged mightily upon the seizure of himself and Lord Darnley by Sir Payan Wileton, seasoning his discourse pretty thickly with "My lord did," and "My lord said," but omitting altogether to mention him by the name of Sir Osborne, thinking it would be a degradation to his high companionship so to do; though, had he done so but once, it would have saved many of the misfortunes that afterwards befel.
Henry heard him calmly, till he related the threats which Sir Payan held out to his prisoner, in that interview of which Jekin had been an unperceived witness; then starting up, "Mother of God!" cried the king, "what has become of the young gallant? Where is he? ha, man? Now, heaven defend us! the base traitor has not murdered him! ha?"
"Lord 'a mercy! you've kicked all the clothes off your grace's worship," cried Jekin: "let me kiver you up! you'll catch a malplexy, you will!"
"God's life! answer me, man!" cried Henry. "What has become of the young lord, Osborne Darnley?--ha?"
"Bless your grace! that's just what I cannot tell you," replied Jekin; "for I never saw him after we got out."
"Send for the traitor! have him brought instantly!" exclaimed the king. "See who knocks! Let no one in! Who dares knock so loud at my chamber-door?"
Proceeding round the king's bed, Jekin opened the door, against which some one had been thumping with very little ceremony; but in a moment the valiant clothier started back, exclaiming, "Lord 'a mercy! it's a great man with a drawn sword!"
"A drawn sword!" cried Henry, starting up, and snatching his own weapon, which lay beside him. But at that moment Francis ran in, and, holding his blade over the king, commanded him to surrender.
"I yield! I yield!" exclaimed Henry, delighted with the jest. "Now, by my life, my good brother of France, thou has shown me the best turn ever prince showed another. I yield me your prisoner; and, as sign of my faith, I beg you to accept this jewel." So saying, he took from his pillow, where it had been laid the night before, a rich bracelet of emeralds, and clasped it on the French king's arm.
"I receive it willingly," answered Francis; "but for my love and amity, and also as my prisoner, you must wear this chain;" and, unclasping a jewelled collar from his neck, he laid it down beside the English monarch.
Many were the civilities and reciprocations of friendly speeches that now ensued; and Henry, about to rise, would fain have called an attendant to assist him, but Francis took the office on himself. "Come, I will be your valet for this morning," said he; "no one but I shall give you your shirt; for I have come over alone to beg some boons of you."
"They are granted from this moment," replied Henry. "But do you say you came alone? Do you mean unattended?"
"With but one faithful friend," answered the French king; "one who not a week ago saved my life by the valour of his arm. 'Tis the best knight that ever charged a lance, and the noblest heart: he is your subject, too."
"Mine!" cried Henry, with some surprise. "How is he called? What is his name? Say, France, and we will love him for his service to you."
"First, hear how he did serve me," replied Francis; and, while the English monarch threaded the intricate mazes of the toilet, he narrated the whole of his adventure with Shoenvelt, which not a little interested Henry, the knight-errantry of whose disposition took fire at the vivid recital of the French king, and almost made him fancy himself on the spot.
"A gallant knight!" cried he at length, as the King of France detailed the exploits of Sir Osborne; "a most gallant knight, on my life! But say, my brother, what is his name? 'Slife, man! let us hear it. I long to know him."
"His name," replied Francis, with an indifferent tone, but at the same time fixing his eyes on Henry's face, to see what effect his answer would produce; "his name is Sir Osborne Maurice."
A cloud came over the countenance of the English king. "Ha!" said he, thoughtfully, jealous perhaps in some degree that the splendid chivalrous qualities of the young knight should be transferred to the court of France. "It is like him. It is very like him. For courage and for feats of arms, I, who have seen many good knights, have rarely seen his equal. Pity it is that he should be a traitor."
"Nay, nay, my good brother of England," answered Francis; "I will avouch him no traitor, but of unimpeachable loyalty. All I regret is, that his love for your noble person, and for the court of England, should make him wish to quit me. But to the point. My first boon regards him. He seeks not to return to your royal favour with honour stained and faith doubtful, but he claims your gracious permission to defy his enemies, and to prove their falsehood with his arm. If they be men, let them meet him in fair field; if they be women or churchmen, lame, or in any way incompetent according to the law of arms, let them have a champion, the best in France or England. To regain your favour and to prove his innocence, he will defy them be they who they may; and here at your feet I lay down his gage of battle, so confident in his faith and worth, that I myself will be his godfather in the fight. He waits here in the corridor to know your royal pleasure."
Henry thought for a moment. He was not at all willing that the court of Francis, already renowned for its chivalry, should possess still another knight of so much prowess and skill as he could not but admit in Sir Osborne. Yet the accusations that had been laid against him, and which nobody who considers them--the letter of the Duke of Buckingham, and the evidence of Wilson the bailiff--can deny were plausible, still rankled in the king's mind, notwithstanding the partial explanation which Lady Katrine Bulmer had afforded respecting the knight's influence with the Rochester rioters. Remembering, however, that the whole or greater part of the information which Wolsey had laid before him had been obtained, either directly or indirectly, from Sir Payan Wileton, he at length replied, "By my faith, I know not what to say: it is not wise to take the sword from the hand of the law, and trust to private valour to maintain public justice, more than we can avoid. But you, my royal brother, shall in the present case decide. The accusations against this Sir Osborne Maurice are many and heavy, but principally resting on the testimonies produced by a certain wealthy and powerful knight, one Sir Payan Wileton, who, though in other respects most assuredly a base and disloyal villain, can have no enmity against Sir Osborne, and no interest in seeking his ruin. Last night, by my order, this Sir Payan was brought hither from Calais, on the accusations of that good fool (pointing to Jekin Groby). You comprehend enough of our hard English tongue to hear him examined yourself, and thus you shall judge. If you find that there is cause to suspect Sir Payan and his witnesses, though it be but in having given the slightest colour of falsehood to their testimony, let Sir Osborne's arm decide his quarrel against the other knight; but if their evidence be clear and indubitable, you shall yield him to be judged by the English law. What say you? Is it not just?"
The King of France at once agreed to the proposal, and Henry turned to Jekin, who had stood by, listening with his mouth open, wonderfully edified at hearing the two kings converse, though he understood not a word of the language in which they spoke. "Fly to the page, man!" cried the king; "tell him to bid those who have Sir Payan Wileton in custody bring him hither instantly by the back-staircase; but first send to the reverend lord cardinal, requiring his counsel in the king's chamber. Haste! dally not, I say; I would have them here directly."
Jekin hurried to obey; and after he had delivered the order, returned to the king's chamber, where Henry, while he completed the adjustment of his apparel, related to Francis the nature of the accusation against Sir Osborne, and the proofs that had been adduced of it. The King of France, however, with a mind less susceptible of suspicion, would not believe a word of it, maintaining that the witnesses were suborned and that the letter was a forgery; and contended it would most certainly appear that Sir Payan had some deep interest in the ruin of the knight.
The sound of many steps in the ante-chamber soon announced that some one had arrived. "Quick!" cried Henry to Jekin Groby; "get behind the arras, good Jekin. After we have despatched this first business, I would ask the traitor some questions before he sees thee. Ensconce thee, man! ensconce thee quick!"
At the king's command, poor Jekin lifted up the corner of the arras by the side of the bed, and hid himself behind; but though a considerable space existed between the hangings and the wall, the worthy clothier having, as we have hinted, several very protuberant contours in his person, his figure was somewhat discernible still, swelling out the stomach of King Solomon and the hip of the Queen of Sheba, who were represented in the tapestry as if one was crooked and the other had the dropsy.
Scarcely was he concealed when the page threw open the door, and Cardinal Wolsey entered in haste, somewhat surprised at being called to the king's chamber at so early an hour; but the sight of the French king sufficiently explained the summons, and he advanced, bending low with a proud affectation of humility.
"God bless and shield your graces both!" said he. "I feared some evil by this early call; but now that I find the occasion was one of joy, I do not regret the haste that apprehension gave me."
"Still we have business, my good Wolsey," replied Henry, "and of some moment. My brother of France here espouses much the cause of the Sir Osborne Maurice who lately sojourned at the court, and won the good-will of all, both by his feats of arms and his high-born and noble demeanour; who, on the accusations given against him to you, lord cardinal, by Sir Payan Wileton, was banished from the court; nay, judged worthy of attachment for treason."
The king, in addressing Wolsey, instead of speaking in French, which had been the language used between him and Francis, had returned to his native tongue; and good Jekin Groby, hearing what passed concerning Sir Osborne Maurice, was seized with an intolerable desire to have his say too.
"Lord 'a mercy!" cried he, popping his head from behind the tapestry, "your grace's worship don't know----"
"Silence!" cried Henry, in a voice that made poor Jekin shrink into nothing: "said I not to stay there--ha?"
The worthy clothier drew back his head behind the arras, like a frightened tortoise retracting its noddle within the shelter of its shell; and Henry proceeded to explain to Wolsey, in French, what had passed between himself and Francis.
The cardinal was, at that moment, striving hard for the King of France's favour; nor was his resentment towards Sir Payan at all abated, though the arrangements of the first meeting between the kings had hitherto delayed its effects. Thus all at first seemed favourable to Sir Osborne, and the minister himself began to soften the evidence against him, when Sir Payan, escorted by a party of archers and a sergeant-at-arms, was conducted into the king's chamber. The guard drew up across the door of the anteroom; and the knight, with a pale but determined countenance, and a firm heavy step, advanced into the centre of the room, and made his obeisance to the kings. Henry, now dressed, drew forward one of the ivory chairs for Francis, and the sergeant hastened to place the other by its side for the British monarch; when, both being seated, with Wolsey by their side, the whole group would have formed as strange but powerful a picture as ever employed the pencil of an artist. The two magnificent monarchs in the pride of their youth and greatness, somewhat shadowed by the eastern wall of the room; the grand and dignified form of the cardinal, with his countenance full of thought and mind; the stern, determined aspect of Sir Payan, his whole figure possessing that sort of rigidity indicative of a violent and continued mental effort, with the full light streaming harshly through the open casement upon his pale cheek and haggard eye, and passing on to the king's bed, and the dressing-robe he had cast off upon it, showing the strange scene in which Henry's impetuosity had caused such a conclave to be held: these objects formed the foreground; while the sergeant-at-arms standing behind the prisoner, and the guard drawn up across the doorway, completed the picture; till, gliding in between the arches, the strange figure of Sir Cesar the astrologer, with his cheeks sunken and livid, and his eye lighted up by a kind of wild maniacal fire, entered the room, and, taking a place close on the right hand of Henry, added a new and curious feature to the already extraordinary scene.
"Sir Payan Wileton," said Henry, "many and grievous are the crimes laid to your charge, and of which your own conscience must accuse you as loudly as the living voices of your fellow-subjects; at least, so by the evidence brought forward against you, it appears to us at this moment. Most of these charges we shall leave to be investigated by the common course of law; but there are some points touching which, as they involve our own personal conduct and direction, we shall question you ourself: to which questions we charge you, on your allegiance, to answer truly and without concealment."
"To your grace's questions," replied Sir Payan, boldly, "I will answer for your pleasure, though I recognise here no established court of law; but first, I will say that the crimes charged against me ought to be heavier than I, in my innocence believe them, to justify the rigour with which I have been treated."
An ominous frown gathered on the king's brow. "Ha!" cried he, forgetting the calm dignity with which he had at first addressed the knight. "No established court of law! Thou sayest well: we have not the power to question thee! Ha! who then is the king? Who is the head of all magistrates? Who holds in his hand the power of all the law? By our crown! we have a mind to assemble such a court of law as within this half-hour shall have thy head struck off upon the green!"
Sir Payan was silent, and Wolsey replied to the latter part of what he had said with somewhat more calmness than Henry had done to the former. "You have been treated, sir," said he, "with not more rigour than you merited; nor with more than is justified by the usual current of the law. It is on affidavit before me, as chancellor of this kingdom, that you both instigated and aided the Lady Constance de Grey, a ward of court, to fly from the protection and government of the law; and, therefore, attachment issued against your person, and you stand committed for contempt. You had better, sir, sue for grace and pardon than aggravate your offence by such unbecoming demeanour."
"Thou hast said well and wisely, my good Wolsey," joined in the king, whose heat had somewhat subsided. "Standing thus reproved, Sir Payan Wileton, answer touching the charges you have brought against one Sir Osborne Maurice; and if you speak truly, to our satisfaction, you shall have favour and lenity at our hands. Say, sir, do you still hold to that accusation?"
"All I have to reply to your grace," answered the knight, resolved, even if he fell himself, to work out his hatred against Sir Osborne, with that vindictive rancour that the injurer always feels towards the injured; "all that I have to reply is, that what I said was true; and that if I had stated all that I suspected, as well as what I knew, I should have made his treason look much blacker than it does even now."
"Do you understand, France?" demanded Henry, turning to Francis: "shall I translate his answers, to show you his true meaning?"
The King of France, however, signified that he comprehended perfectly; and Sir Payan, after a moment's thought, proceeded.
"I should suppose your grace could have no doubt left upon that traitor's guilt; for the charge against him rests, not on my testimony, but upon the witness of various indifferent persons, and upon papers in the handwriting of his friends and abettors."
"Villain!" muttered Sir Cesar, between his teeth; "hypocritical, snake-like villain!" Both the king and Sir Payan heard him; but Henry merely raised his hand, as if commanding silence, while the eyes of the traitorous knight flashed a momentary fire, as they met the glance of the old man, and he proceeded. "I had no interest, your grace, in disclosing the plot I did; though, had I done wisely, I would have held my peace, for it will make many my enemies, even many more than I dreamed of then. I have since discovered that I then only knew one half of those that are implicated. I know them all now," he continued, fixing his eye on Sir Cesar; "but as I find what reward follows honesty, I shall bury the whole within my own breast."
"On these points, sir, we will leave our law to deal with you," replied Henry: "there are punishments for those that conceal treason; and, by my halidame, no favour shall you find in us, unless you make a free and full confession! Then our grace may touch you, but not else. But to the present question, my bold sir. Did you ever see Sir Osborne Maurice before the day that he was arrested by your order, on the charge of having excited the Cornishmen to revolt? And, before God, we enjoin you--say, are you excited against him by feelings of interest, hatred, or revenge?"
"On my life," replied Sir Payan, boldly, "I never saw him but on that one day; and as I hope for salvation in heaven"--and here he made a hypocritical grimace of piety--"I have no one reason, but pure honesty, to accuse him of these crimes."
A low groan burst from behind the tapestry at this reply, and Henry gave an angry glance towards the worthy clothier's place of concealment; but Francis, calling back his attention, begged him to ask the knight in English whether he had ever known Sir Osborne Maurice by any other name, or in any other character.
Sir Cesar's eyes sparkled, and Sir Payan's cheek turned pale, as Henry put the question; but he boldly replied, "Never, so help me heaven! I never saw him, or heard of him, or knew him, by any other name than Osborne Maurice."
"Oh, you villanous great liar! Oh, you hypocritical thief!" shouted Jekin Groby, darting out from behind the tapestry, unable to contain himself any longer. "I don't care, I don't care a groat for any one; but I won't hear you tell his grace's worship such a string of lies, all as fat and as well tacked together as Christmas sausages. Lord 'a mercy! I'll tell your graces, both of you, how it was; for you don't know, that's clear. This here Sir Osborne Maurice, that you are asking about, is neither more nor less than that Lord Darnley that I was telling your grace of this morning. Lord! now, didn't I hear him tell that sweet young lady, Mistress Constance de Grey, all about it; how he could not bear to live any longer abroad in these foreign parts, and how he had come back under the name of Sir Osborne Maurice, all for to get your grace's love as an adventurous knight? And then didn't that Sir Payan--yes, you great thief! you did, for I heard you--didn't he come and crow over him, and say that now he had got him in his power? And then didn't he offer to let him go if he would sign some papers? And then, when he would not, didn't he swear a great oath that he would murther him, saying, 'he would make his tenure good by the extinction of the race of Darnley?' You did, you great rogue! you know you did! And, Lord 'a mercy! to think of your going about to tell his grace such lies! your own king, too, who should never hear anything but the truth! God forgive you, for you're a great sinner, and the devils will never keep company with you when you go to purgatory, but will kick you out into the other place, which is worse still, folks say. And now, I humbly beg your grace's pardon, and will go back again, if you like, behind the hangings; but I couldn't abear to hear him cheat you like that."
The sudden appearance of Jekin Groby, and the light he cast upon the subject, threw the whole party into momentary confusion. Sir Payan's resolution abandoned him; his knees shook, and his very lips grew pale. Sir Cesar gazed upon him with triumphant eyes, exclaiming, "Die, die! what hast thou left but to die?" At the same time Wolsey questioned Jekin Groby, who told the same straightforward tale; and Henry explained the whole to Francis, whose comprehension of the English tongue did not quite comprise the jargon of the worthy clothier.
Sir Payan Wileton, however, resolved to make one last despairing effort both to save himself and to ruin his enemies; for the diabolical spirit of revenge was as deeply implanted in his bosom as that of self-preservation. He thought then for a moment, glanced rapidly over his situation, and cast himself on his knee before the king. "Great and noble monarch!" said he, in a slow, impressive voice, "I own my fault--I acknowledge my crime; but it is not such as you think it. Hear me but out, and you yourself shall judge whether you will grant me mercy or show me rigour. I confess, then, that I had entered as deeply as others into the treasonable plot I have betrayed against your throne and life; nay, more--that I would never have divulged it, had I not found that the Lord Darnley had, under the name of Sir Osborne Maurice, become the Duke of Buckingham's chief agent, and was to be rewarded by the restitution of Chilham Castle, for which some vague indemnity was proposed to me hereafter. On bearing it, I dissembled my resentment; and pretending to enter more heartily than ever into the scheme, I found that the ambitious duke reckoned as his chief hope, in case of war, on the skill and chivalry of this Lord Darnley, who promised by his hand to seat him on the throne. I learned, moreover, the names of all the conspirators, amongst whom that old man is one;" and he pointed to Sir Cesar, who gazed upon him with a smile of contempt and scorn, whose intensity had something of sublime. "Thirsting for revenge," proceeded Sir Payan, "and with my heart full of rage, I commanded four of my servants to stop the private courier of the duke, when I knew he was charged with letters concerning this Sir Osborne Maurice, and thus I obtained those papers I placed in the hands of my lord cardinal----"
"But how shall we know they are not forgeries?" cried Henry. "Your honour, sir, is so gone, and your testimony so suspicious, that we may well suppose those letters cunning imitations of the good duke's hand. We have heard of such things--ay, marry have we."
"Herein, happily, your grace can satisfy yourself and prove my truth," replied Sir Payan; "send for the servants whose names I will give, examine them, put them to the torture if 'you will; and if you wring not from them that, on the twenty-ninth of March, they stopped, by my command, the courier of the Duke of Buckingham, and took from him his bag of letters, condemn me to the stake. But mark me, King of England! I kneel before you pleading for life; grant it to me, with but my own hereditary property, and Buckingham, with all the many traitors that are now aiming at your life and striving for your crown, shall fall into your hand, and you shall have full evidence against them. I will instantly disclose all their names, and give you proof against their chief, that to-morrow you can reward his treason with the axe, nor fear to be called unjust. But if you refuse me your royal promise, sacredly given here before your brother king--to yield me life, and liberty, and lands, as soon as I have fulfilled my word--I will go to my death in silence, like the wolf, and never will you be able to prove anything against them; for that letter is nothing without my testimony to point it aright."
"You are bold!" said Henry; "you are very bold! but our subjects' good and the peace of our country may weigh with us. What think you, Wolsey?" And for a moment or two he consulted in a low tone with the cardinal and the King of France. "I believe, my liege," said Wolsey, whose hatred towards Buckingham was of the blindest virulence; "I believe that your grace will never be able to prove his treasons on the duke without this man's help. Perhaps you had better promise."
Francis bit his lip and was silent; but Henry, turning to Sir Payan, replied, "The tranquillity of our realm and the happiness of our people overcome our hatred of your crimes; and therefore we promise, that if by your evidence treason worthy of death be proved upon Edward Duke of Buckingham, you shall be free in life, in person, and in lands."
"Never!" cried the voice of Sir Cesar, mounting into a tone of thunder; "never!" And springing forward, he caught Sir Payan by the throat, grappled with him but for an instant, with a maniacal vigour, and drawing the small dagger he always carried, plunged it into the heart of the knight, with such force that one might have heard the blow of the hilt against his ribs. The whole was done in a moment, before any one was aware; and the red blood and the dark spirit rushing forth together, with a loud groan the traitor fell prone upon the ground; while Sir Cesar, without a moment's pause, turned the dagger against his own bosom, and drove it in up to the very haft.
Wolsey drew back in horror and affright. Francis and Henry started up, laying their hands upon their swords; Jekin Groby crept behind the arras; and the guards rushed in to seize the slayer; but Sir Cesar waved them back with the proud and dignified air of one who feels that earthly power has over him no further sway. "What fear ye?" said he, turning to the kings, and still holding the poniard tight against his bosom, as if to restrain the spirit from breathing forth through the wound. "There is no offence in the dead or in the dying. Hear me, King of England! and hear the truth, which thou wouldst never have heard from that false caitiff. Yet I have little time; the last moments of existence speed with fast wings towards another shore: give me a seat, for I am faint."
They instantly placed for him one of the settles; and after gazing around for a moment with that sort of painful vacancy of eye that speaks how the brain reels, he made an effort, and went on, though less coherently. "All he has said is false. I am on the brink of another world, and I say it is false as the hell to which he is gone. Osborne Darnley, the good, the noble, and the true--the son of my best and oldest friend--knew of no plot, heard of no treason. He was in England but two days when he fell into that traitor's hands. He never saw Buckingham but once. The Osborne Maurice named in the duke's letter is not he; one far less worthy."
"Who then is he?" cried the king impatiently. "Give me to know him, if you would have me believe. Never did I hear of such a name but in years long past, an abettor of Perkyn Warbeck. Who then is this Sir Osborne Maurice--ha? Mother of God! name him!"
"I--I--I--King of England!" cried the old man. "I, who, had he been guided by me, would have taught Richard King of England, whom you style Perkyn Warbeck, to wrench the sceptre from the hand of your usurping father; I, whose child was murdered by that dead traitor, in cold blood, after the rout at Taunton; I--I it was who predicted to Edward Bohun that his head should be highest in the realm of England: I it is who predict it still!" As he spoke the last words, the old man suddenly drew forth the blade of the dagger from his breast, upon which a full stream of blood instantly gushed forth and deluged the ground. Still struggling with the departing spirit, he started on his feet--put his hand to his brow. "I come! I come!" cried he--reeled--shuddered--and fell dead beside his enemy.