Where England sets her feet: a romance

by Bernard Capes

Patience! To one on the rack! Brion read the missive through; and read it through again; and turned it up and down for any hint of more; then put it from him with a half whimsical sigh, and called himself a fool. He had no belief from that moment in any power to help him. The shock of disappointment had steadied his reason and brought him to himself again. Perhaps that was as well. Had it not been a poor fibreless love, he thought, that could engage a friend to contrive for it? Her champion! and he had insulted her rather through that weak commission. Never again. Henceforth his own sole resources should serve him, whether to win or fail.

He went thus resolved about his customary duties, expecting no further satisfaction from his friend, and receiving none. Alas! too instantly successful in negotiating his ‘pack of small accomplishments,’ it is to be feared that that brilliant soldier of fortune had already lost conceit with those minor obligations which involved even a small measure of self-sacrifice. He was too absorbed over his own affairs to bestow a thought on another’s. Only once again, after a long interval, did he write, and that once again, in almost the same words, though carrying even less conviction, make his assurance of unforgetfulness. And after that no further letter came from him: he was launched full-flood on that prosperous and tragic tide which was to convey him by darkening stages to Traitor’s Gate and the block. Brion heard of him once as gone, in Lord Deputy Gray’s company, to Ireland, where he made a fine name for himself, and was confirmed in his royal mistress’s favour, by helping to put down the Earl of Desmond’s rebellion. But long before the date of that event he had passed—save as a picturesque memory, not untenderly recalled for all his particular shortcoming—out of the young man’s mind, so that any renewal of their intimacy was the last thing in the world expected by the latter. And yet it was to come to happen, and on the Captain’s return from that very expedition which was to add so greatly to his fortune and renown.

In the meantime, Brion took up his life again as it had been before that feverish interlude had come to disturb and excite it. He recovered his philosophy, went resolutely about his business, and extracted what enjoyment he could from his always ambiguous position. That, because it kept him proudly aloof, both on his Uncle’s and his own account, from contact with his neighbours, was the source in him of an invincible self-reliance. As he matured in years, the spirit of independence strengthened in him, as his body, habituated to incessant physical exercise, toughened and grew compact. At twenty-three he was a fine-looking young fellow, attractive of face, shapely of limb, and as well-endowed mentally as he was skilful of his hands. He had a few friends, but he sought none. Those who wanted him must seek him; and a handful of kindred spirits did. But Clerivault remained always, and first and foremost, his comrade. They rode, and went fishing or hawking together—sometimes in young company—or made occasional expeditions far afield, penetrating to Exeter, Tavistock, Plymouth, or divers such places on the seabord as Brixham, Lyme and Bridport, where they made acquaintance with ships and shipping, and now and then chaffered with some local skipper for a run along the coast. At these times they would be away not infrequently for nights together, returning immensely pleased and instructed from their trips. Nor did the Uncle oppose any objection to this practice of enterprise and independence in his nephew. He was by now grown so submissive to the younger will as virtually to defer to its quiet dictation in most matters, even to the extent of moderating that particular self-indulgence which had been destroying him—moderating, would it could be said, to happy effect; but the evil was done. He had sown that in his brain which could not be uprooted, and, for all he was become more temperate, his grosser state was replaced in these days by an unquiet melancholy and fancifulness, which bid fair to complete the mental ruin the other had begun. Among their manifestations became ever a little and a little more pronounced one which caused Brion no small uneasiness; and that was a form of religious depression, in which he brooded on his misfortunes as the direct judgment of Heaven on him for his apostasy. It was no use arguing with him: the more one desired to save him, the more resolute he was to be damned. So the thing had to be humoured, and just left to its own possible cure.

Now, as to his relations with, or attitude towards, the other sex, a word calls to be spoken for Brion. It is not to be supposed that so sweet and débonnaire a youth could in all these years wholly escape the regard of admiring eyes, or fail to arouse in amorous bosoms sentiments to which the knowledge of a bar sinister might be counted a provocation rather than a hindrance. Not only in the breast of rustic Phillida, but in hers of the Hall or Manor, would sighs at times heave up and tender thoughts be born, children of a vision of young manliness not less caressingly encountered because some senseless ban of Orthodoxy professed to hold it forbidden. There might be dreams on pillows for Brion of which he never dreamed; there might be looks in chance meetings, swift offered and withdrawn, which had been eloquent to a forwarder spirit. Perhaps he read them better than appeared. He was no hypocrite to himself; and if he was a Joseph, it was from no self-righteous prudery, but because, summarising all women in one, he wished to hold the sex immaculate. It was not in the least that he was insensible to its inherent fascinations—to its beauty, its softness, and its lovableness; it was that truth was dearer to him than all things, and that he had taken his oath and meant to keep it. His will was stronger than his emotions: if it had been otherwise, he could have found plenty to invite him to surrender it, in a way much more unequivocal than might be expressed in blushes and covert glances. But he kept his heart high, and his shield stainless.

For all his fond intimacy with Clerivault, he had never thought fit to confide to that good friend a hint of his secret. It would have been loyally kept, he knew, yet in some way cheapened in the sharing. Nor, for any reason or none, had he ever spoken to him of that discovery of his in the old well-house. Perhaps his reticence was due to that past expressed determination of his to treat as closed and sealed the wound, with all its details of pain and loneliness, caused by the other’s desertion of him. In any case he kept his knowledge to himself. But once in all this time had he descended again into the secret chamber; and that was shortly after Master Grenville’s revelations had set him thinking and wondering about the reputed hidden treasure. He had had no fear of being watched or detected in his visit: there was no one but himself in the house would have gone near the place: it was shunned by all alike; and about the ilex thicket which enclosed it Nol, in clearing the garden, had left a neutral zone of waste ground, which none would have crossed though the fiend were behind to urge him. But he discovered nothing new to reward his curiosity. It was just the bare dank little chamber of his knowledge, all lined with obdurate stone, and giving off when sounded no hint of anything but impenetrable solidity. So he abandoned the search, and henceforth thought no more upon the matter; nor did he visit the place again until years had passed, and then on an errand very different from that comprised in a hunt for buried gold.

* * * * * *

It was in the late Autumn of ’81 that Raleigh appeared again. He came riding by the London to Plymouth road, in company with his servant Nic Wright and a small body of retainers, and turned apart from his way for the express purpose of revisiting, and renewing his acquaintance with, his young country friend, and perhaps, who knows, of impressing him with a sight of his magnificence. He was become a great man in these days, and in high report with the Queen, who had taken his side in a dispute he had had with the Lord Deputy, following his recent return from Ireland, and seemed disposed to admit him to her extremest favour. No doubt her Majesty had ample reason for this condescension to a soldier who had rendered her such fine and masterful service; yet no question was but that good looks and a flattering tongue had their part in the honours and emoluments which from this date came to be lavished on the fortunate favourite. And indeed the man was built for valiant success. He was of a bold and masterful disposition, imaginative, and even chivalrous for an age in which romanticism, no longer the purely spiritual force of earlier days, survived but as a sort of working Utopianism, full of great visions of the unknown, but regarding that in the light of material rather than of moral possession. Then his intellect was as boundless as his ambition, and as ready to take the whole world for its province; he had a silver tongue for verse, when rhymers were as many and sweet as blackberries; he was as full of curious inventiveness as was his near forerunner, the Italian da Vinci, and not less in the graver articles of chemistry and science than in those of gallantry; and most of all he was a fierce patriot—one of those mighty Elizabethan Captains from whose loins sprang that greater Britain which was offspring of their passionate love for their country. ‘His naeve was,’ says old Aubrey, ‘that he was damnable proud.’ Well, he might be, being great among the great, and he clothed his pride in splendour. The same Chronicler is not wholly complimentary to his appearance, though he admits he was a tall and handsome man. But he wrote from hearsay, and one may feel assured that she, to whom masculine beauty was ever a first recommendation to favour, saw something to admire in her new-found votary besides character. At any rate Brion was aware of no ‘sour eie-lidded’ deformity in this face, which, with its intellectuality and vivacity, was always to him as attractive a face as any he was acquainted with; and, as to that high-handed arrogance which was reputed to bring the Captain into dislike with some, he only knew that his manner to him was ever frank and courteous, while, as to the man’s own servants, they loved their master to devotion.

He happened to be in the Courtyard when the little cavalcade rode up and in, and advanced to meet his friend, with his eyes shining welcome and a strange stirring at his heart. It was full four years since they had parted, and each showed in his mien and manner the ripening touch of Time. Where had been shyness was self-possession, and where had been self-possession was authority. Raleigh dismounted, while Brion held his stirrup, and, being on the ground, impulsively embraced that courtly young esquire. He was all in meek gray, but bedizened like an argus pheasant with eyes of jewelled enamel. The strap which carried his sword was crusted with emeralds thick as dewdrops on grass, and he wore a sapphire worth a county’s ransom in his cap.

‘’Fore God,’ he said, with fervour, holding the youngster from him by the shoulders; ‘a proper man! ’Tis good to see the fruit where hung the flower. How many years ago, dear lad?’

‘Four,’ answered Brion, with a smile. He bore this oblivious correspondent no grudge. He had not, nor ever had, any real claim upon him.