CHAPTER XXV.
And knowing this, should I yet stay,
Like such as blow away their lives,
Enamoured of their golden gyves?--Ben Jonson.
Away! though parting be a fretful corrosive,
It is applied to a deathful wound.--Shakspere.
Who would be a king if he could help it? When Wolsey had left him, Henry once more raised the papers which lay upon the table, and read them through; then leant his head upon his hand, and passed some moments in deep and frowning meditation. "No!" said he, "no! I will not show them to him, lest he warn the traitor Buckingham. Ho, without! Tell Pace to come to me;" and again falling into thought, he remained musing over the papers with bent brows and an absent air, till the secretary had time to obey his summons. On his approach, the good but timid Pace almost trembled at the angry glow he saw upon the king's face; but he was relieved by Henry placing in his hands the papers which Wolsey had left, bidding him have good care thereof.
Pace took the papers in respectful silence, and waited an instant to see whether the king had further commands; but Henry waved his hand, crying, "Begone! leave me, and send the page."
The page lost not a moment in appearing; for the king's hasty mood was easily discernible in his aspect, and no one dared, even by an instant's delay, to add fuel to the fire which was clearly burning in his bosom; but still Henry allowed him to wait for several minutes. "Who waits in the ante-chamber?" demanded he, at length.
"Sir Charles Hammond, so please your grace," replied the page.
"And where is Denny?" asked the king. "Where is Sir Anthony Denny, ha?"
"He has been gone about an hour, your grace," replied the page.
"They hold me at nought!" cried Henry. "Strike his name from the list! By my life, I will teach him to wait! Go call Sir Osborne Maurice to my presence," and rising from his seat, he began again to pace the apartment.
The page, as he conducted the young knight to the hall in which Henry awaited him, took care to hint that he was in a terrific mood, with that sort of eagerness which all vulgar people have to spread evil tidings. The knight, however, asked no question and made no comment, and passing through the door which he had seen give admission to the priest about an hour before, he entered the ante-chamber, in which was seated Sir Charles Hammond, who saluted him with a silent bow. Proceeding onward, the page threw open the door of the privy-chamber, and Sir Osborne approached the king, in the knitting of whose brow, and in the curling of whose lip, might be plainly seen the inward irritation of his impetuous spirit. As he came near, Henry turned round, and fixed his eye upon him; and the knight, not knowing what might be the cause or what the consequence of his anger, bent his knee to the ground, and bowing his head, said, "God save your grace!"
"Marry, thou sayest well!" cried Henry. "We trust he will, and guard us ever against traitors! What say you?"
"If ever there be a man so much a traitor to himself," replied Sir Osborne, "as to nourish one thought against so good a king, oh, may his treason fall back upon his own head, and crush him with the weight!"
"Well prayed again," said Henry, more calmly. "Rise, rise, Sir Osborne; we must speak together. Give me your arm. We cannot sit and speak when the heart is so busy. We will walk. This hall has space enough," and with a hurried pace he took one or two turns in the chamber, fixing his eyes upon the ground, and biting his lip in silence. "Now, by our Lady!" cried he at length, "there are many men in this kingdom, Sir Osborne Maurice, who, seeing us here, holding your arm and walking by your side, would judge our life in peril."
Sir Osborne started, and gazed in Henry's face with a look of no small surprise.
"Did I but know of any one," said he, at length, "who could poison your royal ear with such a tale, were it other than a churchman or a woman, he should either confess his falsehood or die upon my sword. But your grace is noble, and believes them not. However," he continued, unbuckling his sword and laying it on the table as far away as possible, "on all accounts I will put that by. There lays the sword that was given me by an emperor, and here is the hand that saved a king's life; and here," he continued, kneeling at the king's feet, "is a heart as loyal as any in this realm, ready to shed its best blood if its king command it. But tell me, only tell me, how I have offended."
"Rise, sir knight," said the king. "On my life, I believe you so far, that if you have done wrong, you have been misled; and that your heart is loyal I am sure: yet listen. You came to this court a stranger; in you I found much of valour and of knightly worth. I loved you, and I favoured you; yet now I find that you have in much deceived me. Speak not, for I will not see in you any but the man who has saved my life; I will know you for none other. Say, then, Sir Osborne, is not life a good return for life? It is? ha?"
"It is, my liege," replied Sir Osborne, believing his real name discovered. "Whatever I have done amiss has been but error of judgment, not of heart, and surely cannot be held as very deep offence in eyes so gracious as my noble king's."
"We find excuses for you, sir, which rigorous judges might not find," replied the monarch; "yet there are many who strive to make your faults far blacker than they are, and doubtless may urge much against you; but hitherto we stand between you and the law, giving you life for life. But see you use the time that is allowed you well, for to-morrow, at high noon, issues the warrant for your apprehension, and if you make not speed to leave this court and country, your fate upon your head, for you have warning."
Sir Osborne was struck dumb, and for a moment he gazed upon the king in silent astonishment. "I know not what to think," he cried, after a while; "I cannot believe that a king famous for his clemency, can see in my very worst crime aught but an error. Your grace has said that many strive to blacken me; still humbly at your feet let me beseech you to tell me of what they do accuse me."
"Of many rank offences, sir!" replied the king, somewhat impatiently; "offences of which you might find it hard to wash yourself so clear as not to leave enough to weigh you down. However, 'tis our will that you depart the court, without further sojourn; and if you are wise, you'll speed to leave a country where you may chance to find worse entertainment and a harder lodging if you stay. Go to the keeper of our private purse, who will give a thousand marks to clear your journey of all cost; and God befriend you for the time to come!"
"Nay, your grace," replied Sir Osborne, "poor as I came I'll go; but thus far richer, that for one short month I won a great king's love, and lost it without deserving; and if to this your grace will add the favour to let me once more kiss your royal hand, you'll send me grateful forth."
Henry held out his hand towards him. "By my faith," cried he, "I do believe him honest! But the proofs! the proofs! Go, go, Sir Osborne; I judge not harshly of you. You have been misled; but fly speedily, I command you; for your own sake, fly!"
Sir Osborne raised himself, took his sword from the table, and, with a low obeisance to the king, quitted the room, his heart far too full to speak with any measure what he felt.
His hopes all broken, his dream of happiness dispelled like a wreath of morning mist in the sunshine, the young knight sought his chamber, and casting himself in a seat, leant his head upon his hands, in an attitude of total despondency. He did not think; for the racking images of despair that hurried through his brain were very different from the defined shapes of the most busy thought. His bosom was a chaos of dark and gloomy feelings, and it was long before reason lent him any aid to arrange and disentangle his ideas. As it did so, however, the thought of whither he should fly presented itself, and his first resolution was to go to his father in Wales; but then, to be the bearer of such news! it was more than he could undertake. Besides, as he reflected, he saw that, use what speed he might, his course would be easily tracked in that direction, and that the facilities which the messengers of the government possessed of gaining fresh horses would soon enable them to overtake and arrest him if the warrant were issued the next day at noon, as the king had said, and followed up with any degree of alacrity. That it would be so he had no reason to doubt, attributing, as he did, the whole of his misfortune to the hatred and jealousy of Wolsey; whose haste to ruin him had been sufficiently evinced by his having begun and completed it within one day after his arrival from York. These thoughts brought on others; and not knowing the stinging impulse of a favourite's jealousy, he pondered over the malice of the cardinal, wondering whether in former days his father might have offered the then rising minister either offence or injury, and thus entailed his evil offices on himself and family. But still the question, whither he should fly, returned; and after much consideration he resolved that it should be to Flanders, once more to try the fortune of his sword; for though peace nominally subsisted between the French king and the new emperor, it was a peace which could be but of short duration, and it was even then interrupted by continual incursions upon each other's territories, and incessant violation of the frontier by the various garrisons of France and Burgundy. Once arrived, he would write, he thought, to his father, who would surely join him there, and they would raise their house and name in a foreign land. But Constance de Grey--could she ever be his? He knew not; but at her very name Hope relighted her torch, and he began to dream again.
As he thought thus, he raised his eyes, and perceived his faithful attendant Longpole watching him with a look of anxious expectation, waiting till his agitated reverie should end. "How! Longpole!" said he. "You here? I did not hear you come in."
"I have been here all the time, your worship," replied the yeoman. "And I've made some noise in the world, too, while you have been here, for I let all the armour fall in that closet."
"I did not hear you," said the knight. "My thoughts were very busy. But, my good Heartley, I am afraid the time is come that we must part."
"By my faith, it must be a queer time, then, your worship!" answered Longpole; "for it is not every-day weather that will make me quit you, especially when I see you in such a way as you were just now."
"But, my good Longpole," answered the knight, "I am ruined. The king has discovered who I really am; Wolsey has whetted his anger against me, and he has banished me his court, bidding me fly instantly, lest I be to-morrow arrested, and perhaps committed to the Tower. I must therefore quit this country without loss of time, and take my way to Flanders, for my hopes here are all at an end. Wolsey is too powerful to be opposed."
"Well, then, my lord," said Longpole, "I will call you by your real name now; and so I'll go and saddle our horses, pack up as much as I can, and we'll be off in a minute."
"But, my good Longpole," said his master, "you do not think what you are doing. Indeed, you must not leave your country and your friends, and that poor girl Geraldine, to follow a man ruined in fortune and expectations, going to travel through strange lands, where he knows not whether he may find friends or enemies."
"More reason he should have a companion on the road," replied Longpole. "But, my lord, my determination is made. Where you go, there will I go too; and as to little Mistress Geraldine, why, when we've made a fortune, which I am sure we shall do, I'll make her trot over after me. But, as I suppose there is but little time to spare, I will go get everything into order as fast as possible. Carpe diem, as good Dr. Wilbraham used to say to me when I was lazy. There is your lordship's harness. If you can manage to pop on the breast and back pieces, I will be back directly."
"Nay," said the knight, "there is yet one person I must see. However, be not long, good fellow, for I shall not stay. Give me that wrapping cloak with the hood."
Longpole obeyed; and enveloping himself in a large mantle, which he had upon a former occasion used to cover his armour, in one of those fanciful justs where every one appeared disguised, the knight left his own apartments, and proceeded to those of Lady Constance de Grey. Many were the sounds of mirth and merriment which met his ears as he passed by the various ranges of apartments, jarring harshly with all his own sorrowful feelings, and in the despondency of his mind he marvelled that any but idiots or madmen could indulge in laughter in a world so full of care. Hurrying on to avoid such inharmonious tones, he approached the suite of rooms appropriated to Lady Constance, and was surprised at finding the door open. Entering, nothing but confusion seemed to reign in the ante-chamber, where her maids were usually found employed in various works. Here stood a frame for caul-work, there one for embroidery; here a cushion for Italian lace thrown upon the ground; there a chair overturned; while two of the maids stood looking out of the window (to make use of the homely term), crying their eyes out.
"Where is your mistress?" demanded Sir Osborne, as he entered; the agitation of his own feelings, and the alarm he conceived from the strange disarray of the apartment, making him stint his form of speech to the fewest words possible.
"We do not know, sir," replied one of the desolate damsels. "All that we know is, that she is gone."
"Gone!" cried Sir Osborne. "Gone! In the name of heaven, whither is she gone? Who is gone with her?"
"Jesu Maria, sir! don't look so wild," cried the woman, who thought herself quite pretty enough, even in her tears, to be a little familiar. "Dr. Wilbraham is with the Lady Constance, and so is Mistress Margaret, and therefore she is safe enough, surely."
"But cannot you say whither she is gone?" cried the knight. "When did she go? How?"
"She went but now, sir," replied the woman. "She was sent for about an hour or more ago to the little tapestry-hall, to speak with my lord cardinal; and after that she came back very grave and serious, and made Mistress Margaret pack up a great parcel of things, while she herself spoke with Dr. Wilbraham; and when that was done, they all three went away together; but before she went she gave each of us fifty marks a-piece, and said that she would give us news of her."
"Did she not drop any word in regard to her destination?" demanded Sir Osborne. "Anything that might lead you to imagine whither she was gone?"
"Mistress Margaret said they were going to London," said the other girl, turning round from the window, and speaking through her tears. "She said that they were going because such was my lord cardinal's will. But I don't believe it, for she said it like a lie; and I'm sure I shall never see my young lady again. I'm sure I shan't! So now, sir knight, go away and leave us, for we can tell you nothing more."
The knight turned away. "Oh, Constance! Constance!" thought he, as he paced back to his apartments; "will you ever be able to resist all the influence they may bring against you? When you hear, too, of your lover's disgrace! Well, God is good, and sometimes joy shines forth out of sorrow, like the sun that dispels the storm." As he thought thus, the prediction of Sir Cesar, that their misfortune should be but of short duration, came across his mind. "The evil part of his prophecy," thought he, "is already on my head. Why should I doubt the good? Come, I will be superstitious, and believe it fully; for hope is surely as much better than fear as joy is better than sorrow. Will Constance ever give her hand to another? Oh, no, no! And surely, surely, I shall win her yet."
Of all the bright gifts with which heaven has blessed our youth, there is none more excellent than that elasticity of spirit which rebounds strongly from the depressing load of a world's care, and after the heaviest weight of sorrow, or the severest stroke of disappointment, raises us lightly up, and gives us back to hope and to enjoyment. It is peculiar to youth, and it is peculiar to good conduct; for the reiterated burdens that years cast upon us as they fly gradually rob the spring of expectation of its flexibility, and vice feels within itself that it has not the same right to hope as virtue. Sir Osborne's spirit was all rebound; and though surrounded with doubts, with difficulties, and with dangers, it was not long before he was ready to try again the wide adventurous world, with unabated vigour of endeavour, though rebuffed in his first endeavours and disappointed in his brightest expectations.
On returning to his apartment he found his faithful attendant ready prepared; and there was a sort of easy, careless confidence in the honest yeoman's manner, that well seconded the efforts of reviving hope in his master's breast. It seemed as if he never thought for a moment that want of success was possible; and, besides, he was one of those over whom Fortune has little power. He himself had no extraneous wants or wishes. Happy by temperament, and independent by bodily vigour, he derived from nature all that neither Stoic nor Epicurean could obtain by art. He was a philosopher by frame; and more than a philosopher, as the word is generally used, for he had a warm heart and a generous spirit, and joined affection for others to carelessness about himself.
Such was the companion, of all others, fitted to cheer Sir Osborne on his way; far more so than if he had been one of equal rank or equal refinement, for he was always ready to assist, to serve, to amuse, or advise, without sufficient appreciation of finer feelings to encourage, even by understanding them, those thoughts upon which the knight might have dwelt painfully in conversation with any one else.
At the same time, Longpole was far above his class in every respect. He had some smattering of classical knowledge, which was all that rested with him of the laborious teaching which good Dr. Wilbraham had bestowed upon his youth; he not only could read and write, but had read all the books he could get at, while a prisoner in France, and had, on more than one occasion, contrived to turn a stanza, though neither the stuff nor the workmanship was very good; and he had, moreover, a strange turn for jesting, which he took care to keep in perpetual exercise. To these he joined all the thousand little serviceable qualifications of an old soldier, and an extraordinary fluency in speaking French, which had proved very useful to him in many instances. Thus equipped inwardly, he now stood before Sir Osborne, with his outward man armed in the plain harness of a custrel, or shield-bearer, with casque and corslet, cuissards, brassards, and gauntlets; and considering that he was nearly six feet three inches in height, he was the sort of man that a knight might not be sorry to see at his back in the mêlée or the skirmish.
"Longpole," said the knight, "give me my armour; I will put it on while you place what clothes you can in the large horsebags. But, my good custrel, we must put something over our harness: give me that surcoat. You have not barded my horse, I trust?"
"Indeed I have, my lord," replied he; "and depend on it you may have need thereof. Remember how dear the barding of a horse is: I speak of the steel, which is, in fact, the true bard, or bardo, as the Italians call it, for the cloth that covers it is not the bard; and if you carry the steel with you, you may as well have the silk too."
"But 'twill weary the horse," said Sir Osborne; "however, as 'tis on, let it stay: only it may attract attention, and give too good a track to any that follow; though, God knows, I can hardly determine which way to turn my rein."
"To London! to London, to be sure, your worship," cried Longpole; "that is the high road to every part on the earth, and off the earth, and under the earth. If a man want to go to heaven, he will there find guides; if he seek hell, he will find plenty going the same road; and if he love this world better, there shall he meet conveyance to every part of it. What would you think of just paying a visit to good Master William Hans, the merchant, to see if he cannot give us a cast over to Flanders? A thousand to one he has some vessel going, or knows some one that has."
"Well bethought," answered Sir Osborne, slowly buckling on his armour. "It will soon grow dusk, and then our arms will call no attention. My hands refuse to help me on with my harness: I am very slow. Nay, good Longpole, if you have already finished, take a hundred marks out of that bag, which will nearly empty it, and seek the three men the Duke of Buckingham gave me. Divide it between them for their service; and, good Longpole, when you have done that, make inquiries about the palace as to what road was taken by Lady Constance de Grey and Dr. Wilbraham. Do not mention the lady; name only Dr. Wilbraham, as if I sought to speak with him."
Longpole obeyed, and after about half-an-hour's absence returned, tolerably successful in his inquiries; but, much to his surprise and disappointment, he found his young lord very nearly in the same situation in which he had left him, sitting in his chair, half armed, with his casque upon his knee, his fine head bare, and his eye fixed upon the fading gleams of the evening sky, where some faint clouds just above the distant trees seemed as if lingering in the beams of the sun's bright eye, like man still tenacious of the last ray of hope.
"Well, Longpole," cried he, waking from his reverie, "what news? Have you heard anything of Lady Constance?" and, as if ashamed of his delay, he busied himself to finish the arrangement of his armour.
"Let me aid you, my lord," said Longpole, kneeling down, and soon completing, piece by piece, what his master had left unfinished, replying at the same time to his question. "I have spoken with the man who carried the baggage down to the boat, my lord; and he says that Dr. Wilbraham, Lady Constance, and one of her women, took water about half-an-hour after the lord cardinal, and seemed to follow his barge."
Sir Osborne fell into another reverie, from which, at last, he roused himself with a sigh. "Well, I can do nothing," said he; "like an angry child I might rage and struggle, but I could do no more. Were I to stay, 'twould but be committing me to the Tower, and then I must be still perforce----"
Longpole heard all this with an air of great edification; but when he thought that his master had indulged himself enough, he ventured to interrupt him by saying, "The sun, sir, has gone to bed; had not we better take advantage of his absence, and make our way to London? Remember, sir, he is an early riser at this time of year, and will be up looking after us tomorrow before we are well aware."
"Ay, Longpole, ay!" replied the knight; "I will linger no longer, for it is unavailing. The trumpet must have sounded to supper by this time; has it not? So we shall have no idlers to gaze at our departure."
"The trumpet sounded as I went down but now," said Longpole, "and I met the sewer carrying in a brawn's head so like his own, that I could not help thinking he had killed and cooked his brother: they must be hard at his grace's liege capons even now."
"Well, I am ready," said the knight; "give me the surcoat of tawny velvet. Now; no more feathers!" he continued, plucking from his casque the long plume that, issuing from the crest in graceful sweeps, fell back almost to his girdle, taking care, however, at the same time, to leave behind a small white glove wrought with gold, that had surrounded the insertion of the feather, and which he secured in its place with particular attention. "Some one will have rare pillage of this apartment," he added, looking round. "That suit of black armour is worth five hundred marks; but it matters not to think of it: we cannot carry them with us. The long sword and baldrick, Longpole, and the gold spurs: I will go as a knight, at least. Now, take the bags. I follow. Farewell, King Henry! you have lost a faithful subject!"
Thus saying, he proceeded down the stairs after Longpole, and following a corridor, passed by one of the small doors of the great hall, through the partial opening of which were to be heard the rattle and the clatter of plates, of dishes, and of knives, and the buzz of many busy jaws. A feeling of disgust came over Sir Osborne as he heard it, he scarce knew why, and stayed not to inquire, but striding on, came speedily to the stable-yard, and was crossing towards the building in which his horses stood, when he observed a man loitering near the door of the stable, whom he soon discovered to be one of the yeomen given him by the Duke of Buckingham.
"On, Longpole!" cried the knight; "on, and send him upon some errand, for I am in no fit mood to speak with him now." While Sir Osborne drew back into the doorway, Longpole advanced, and in a moment after the man was seen traversing the court in another direction. The knight then proceeded, the horses were brought forth, and springing into the saddle, Sir Osborne, with a sigh given to the recollection of lost hopes, touched his charger with the spur, and rode out of the gates. Longpole followed, and in a few minutes they were on the high road to London.