VI
Mark established his young wife in the ingle-nook of the tapperij in the highly-respectable tavern of the "Merry Beggars," opposite the Cloth Hall.
He enjoined the host and hostess to take every care of the noble lady, and then he went off himself in search of a farrier.
Fortunately at this hour--it was just three o'clock in the afternoon--the tapperij was practically deserted. In one corner by the window, two middle-aged burghers were playing hazard, in another a soldier was fast asleep. Mine host was passing kind; he brought a roomy armchair up to the hearth for the pretty lady, threw a fresh log upon the fire, kicked it into a blaze and placed a footstool at Lenora's feet. His wife--a buxom though sad-eyed Flemish vrouw--brought her some warm milk and a piece of wheaten bread. Lenora ate and drank with relish for she was both hungry and tired, and when she had finished eating, she leaned back in the big armchair and soon fell comfortably asleep. She had had practically no rest the night before: her nerves were overstrung, and her eyes hot with weeping. There was also a heavy load on her heart--a load chiefly weighted by the packet which was destined for her father and which she still carried carefully hidden in the bosom of her gown.
So strange are the contradictions of the human heart--of a woman's heart above all--that ofttimes to-day as her horse ambled slowly along beside Mark's she had caught herself wishing--hoping--that something unforeseen would occur which would make it impossible for her to go to Brussels--something which would force her to go back to Ghent with the contents of that packet still a close secret within her heart. In the morning she had watched the skies anxiously, hardly aware that within her innermost soul she was hoping that the continuous rains had made the roads impassable--broken down a bridge--that some sign in fact would come to her from God that she was absolved from that awful oath, the fulfilment of which seemed indeed an impossible task.
Then would come a terrible revulsion of feeling: she would remember that the Prince of Orange was even now in Ghent, with two thousand men who were to be armed by him so that they might fight against their King and threaten the life of the Lieutenant-Governor, the King's own chosen representative. And she would hate and despise herself for her cowardly irresolution--her very prayer to God appeared like blasphemy--and she wanted to urge the horses forward, she fretted at every delay, for delay might mean the murder of the Duke of Alva, and the standard of rebellion hoisted up in triumph above the Town House of Ghent.
Women will understand and pity her--those at least who once in their life have been torn 'twixt duty and sentiment. Lenora was not one of the strong-minded of her sex: she was very young--a mere girl reared in the tranquillity of convent life, and then suddenly thrown into the vortex of political intrigue, of cruel reprisals and bitter revolt; and heart and mind within her fought a terrible battle which threatened to ruin her entire life.
But in the meanwhile she was sorely in need of rest. The tapperij was so quiet and the ingle-nook was rendered quite private by a tall screen between it and the rest of the room. The soldier in the corner was snoring with insistent monotony, a big blue-bottle droned against the window, and a pleasing glow and cheerful crackling came from the fire in the hearth.
Lenora slept peacefully.
CHAPTER X