Patricia at the inn

by J. C. Snaith

Again the King’s face had been too much for his mad purposes. Before his lips could form the words of betrayal, the resolve died stillborn in his heart. With the King gazing upon him, it was useless to attempt to utter them. He must lie there passively, and acquiesce in the deceit that had for its object the sparing of the King’s life and the sacrifice of his own.

Nay, he must do more than acquiesce in it. He must assist it; he must promote it by every means in his power. For was not this hateful man his King? Was he not the representative of all that three generations of his family had recklessly spent their possessions and their blood upon? Was he not the symbol—he, the dirty-faced man in the mean clothes—upon which the gold, the tears, and the very lives of hundreds of the noblest and proudest in the land had been lavished? And yet he, a mere youth, was prepared to forego the first duty taught him by his father, the father who had yielded up his life that he might teach it with the better authority, that of fidelity to the King, simply because his Majesty, overcome by the beauty of his wife, had gloried in the fact.

He was perfectly sane now. The fever of his insanity had lasted less than a minute. The man was his King; and where his sacred Majesty was concerned, no man had a right to think of himself. As suddenly as he had given way to his furious hate, he now became intoxicated by the King’s divinity. As long as a breath remained faithful to his body, so must he remain faithful to his sovereign. He must thank his God upon his knees, humbly, that it was given to him to render even the smallest service to his King.

He must aid his wife in her strange, mad, heroic efforts. The spirit to conceive, to act, and to accomplish thrilled through his weak frame. His lips grew articulate; his voice took a new tone, one wholly strange to himself and even to those who were familiar with it.

“Madam,” he said, “be calm, I pray you. We must bow to the inevitable.”

Very gently he unclasped the arms of his wife from about his neck. He then turned to the eagerly-listening soldiers with a grave, sad smile, which yet had a delicate courtesy in it that insensibly disarmed them with its charm.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “I pray you be a little patient with us. We are even now but recovering from a memorial we bore upon our person of the melancholy Third. Be a little patient, I pray you, gentlemen, and we will hope to rise from our couch when we have recovered of ourselves a little, and greet you more formally.”

Captain Culpeper bowed humbly. Few men can look upon a King unmoved; and a monarch in his last extremity may receive even the consideration of his enemies.

“I beg you, Sire,” said the soldier, in a broken voice, “that you will not submit your person to the least inconvenience. We find you so weak and stricken, Sire, that we earnestly pray that to-night you will not attempt to discompose yourself on our account.”

“You are more than kind, sir,” said the man in the bed; “a courteous enemy, indeed. But we will rise and endeavour to extend a little courtesy unto you and these gentlemen, as is your merit.”