"Rupert has many faults, but he is a man of honour. My marriage to Cymlin will be a barrier sacred to both of us. Our friendship can hold itself above endearments. You need not fear for Cymlin; Matilda de Wick will honour her husband, whether she obeys him or not. Cymlin is formed for power and splendour, and he will stand near the throne."
"If there be a throne."
"Of that, who now doubts? Cromwell is falling sick, and you may feel 'God save the King' in the air. If you had married Stephen, he would have been alive to join in the cry. I could weep at your obstinacy, Jane."
"Let it pass, dear. I was suckled on Puritan milk. Stephen and I never could have been one. My fate was to go to the New World. When I was a little child I dreamed of it, saw it in visions before I knew that it existed. Stephen has escaped this sorrowful world and——"
"Oh, then, I would he were here! This sorrowful world with Stephen in it was a better world than it is without him. Jane, Jane, how he loved you!"
"And I loved him, as a companion, friend, brother, if you will. When you lay his body in de Wick, cast a tear and a flower on his coffin for me. God give him peace!"
At length their "farewell" came. Jane dreaded it; she was sure Matilda would wear emotion to shreds and exhaustion. But it was not so. She wept, but she was solemnly silent; and the last words between them were soft and whispered, and only those sad, loving monosyllables which are more eloquent than the most fervid protestations. And so they parted, forever in this life,—and if this life were all, Death would indeed be the Conqueror. But it is not all; even through the death struggle, the Soul carries high her cup of Love, unspilled.
The next afternoon Jane and Cluny rode through London streets for the last time. They were full of busy, happy people, and mingling with them all the bravery and splendid show of the great company of courtiers that were in the train of Mazarin's two nephews, the Duke of Crequin and Monsieur Mancini; Ambassadors from the King of France to congratulate Cromwell—"the most invincible of sovereigns, the greatest and happiest of princes—" on the surrender of Dunkirk.
And Jane on the previous day had heard this "most invincible of sovereigns, the greatest and happiest of princes," declare that "he was weak and weary; that all the waves and billows of a sea of troubles had gone over him," and with tears and outstretched hands entreat his God to "give him rest from his sorrow and from his fear, and from the hard bondage wherein he had been called to serve."
On the ship they found Jane's father, Doctor Verity and Sir Thomas Jevery. There were no tears at this parting, nor any signs of sorrow; every one seemed resolved to regard it as a happy and hopeful event. For, though not spoken of, there was a firm belief and promise of a meeting again in the future not very far off. Israel held his little daughter to his heart, and then laid her hand in Cluny's without a word; the charge was understood. The young husband kissed the hand, and clasped it within his own, and his eyes answered the loving father in a language beyond deception. When the last few minutes came, and the men were trooping to the anchor, Doctor Verity raised his hands, and the three or four in the dim, small cabin knelt around him; and so their farewell was a prayer, and their parting a blessing.