Before the door wore standing soldiers with shouldered arms. There stood also the lieutenant of the Tower, and two servants behind him with lighted candles. Geraldine gave a scream, and with anxious haste rearranged the thick veil that had slipped from her head.
Henry Howard also had uttered a cry, but not on account of the soldiers and the frustrated flight.
His eyes, stretched wide open, stared at this figure at his side, now so closely veiled.
It seemed to him as though like a spectre a strange face had risen up close by him—as though it were not the beloved head of the queen that rested there on his shoulder. He had seen this face only as a vision, as the fantasy of a dream; but he knew with perfect certainty that it was not her countenance, not the countenance of his Geraldine.
The lieutenant of the Tower motioned to his servants, and they carried the lighted candles into the earl’s cell.
Then he gave Henry Howard his hand and silently led him back into the prison.
Henry Howard exhibited no reluctance to follow him; but his hand had seized Geraldine’s arm, and he drew her along with him; his eye rested on her with a penetrating expression, and seemed to threaten her.
They were now again in the room which they had before left with such blessed hopes.
The lieutenant of the Tower motioned to the servants to retire, then turned with solemn earnestness to Earl Surrey.
“My lord,” said he, “it is at the king’s command that I bring you these lights. His majesty knows all that has happened here this night. He knew that a plot was formed to rescue you; and while they believed they were deceiving him, the plotters themselves were deceived. They had succeeded under various artful false pretences in influencing the king to give his signet-ring to one of his lords. But his majesty was already warned, and he already knew that it was not a man, as they wanted to make him believe, but a woman, who came, not to take leave of you, but to deliver you from prison.—My lady, the jailer whom you imagined that you had bribed was a faithful servant of the king. He betrayed your plot to me; and it was I who ordered him to make a show of favoring your deed. You will not be able to release Earl Surrey; but if such is your command, I will myself see you to the ship that lies in the harbor for you ready to sail. No one will hinder you, my lady, from embarking on it; Earl Surrey is not permitted to accompany you!—My lord, soon the night is at an end, and you know that it will be your last night. The king has ordered that I am not to prevent this lady, if she wishes to spend this night with you in your room. But she is allowed to do so only on the condition that the lights in your room remain burning. That is the king’s express will, and these are his own words: ‘Tell Earl Surrey that I allow him to love his Geraldine, but that he is to open his eyes to see her! That he may see, you will give him a light; and I command him not to extinguish it so long as Geraldine is with him. Otherwise he may confound her with another woman; for in the dark one cannot distinguish even a harlequin from a queen!’—You have now to decide, my lord, whether this lady remains with you, or whether she goes, and the light shall be put out!”