Grief for the loss of Imogen had for a moment caused the death of Cloten to be forgotten; but Belarius reminded the young Princes that, after all, he was a Queen’s son, and though they had killed him as a foe, they must bury him as a Prince. Fetching the dead body, therefore, they placed it not far from the bier where Imogen lay, and strewed both with flowers.
Soon after the mourners had retired, Imogen woke from the sleep into which the drug had thrown her. As she recovered her dazed senses, she presently became aware that near at hand lay a dead man, and recognising the garments of Leonatus, she at once took for granted that it was indeed her husband who had been thus cruelly slain. Struck to the heart by this new sorrow, she flung herself half fainting on the body, and there soon afterwards she was found by the Roman General, Lucius. Pitying her desolate condition, for he thought this lad in his page’s dress was weeping over his dead master, Lucius took Imogen into his own service.
On hearing of Cymbeline’s refusal to pay tribute, the Roman Emperor lost no time in sending over an army to enforce his demand. The rival forces met near Milford Haven, not far from the cave of Belarius. Hearing the noise of warfare, Belarius first suggested flight to the upper mountains for better security, but the noble spirit of the two young Princes scorned such cowardly counsel, and they boldly determined to throw in their lot with the British in fighting the enemy of their country.
Leonatus also at this crisis had returned from Rome, and, disguised as a poor soldier, he fought in the ranks of the British. Meeting Iachimo, who was commanding the Roman troops, Leonatus fought with him on the battle-field and vanquished him. The proud Roman was deeply mortified that a noble knight like himself should be overcome and disarmed by one whom he imagined to be a low churl. Repentance for the base way in which he had behaved to Imogen stirred in his heart; he thought it was the guilt and heaviness of his own soul that in this combat had unnerved his manhood and enfeebled his arm. As for Leonatus, he fought in reckless despair, his grief for Imogen’s murder, which he believed Pisanio to have carried out, making him long for the death which seemed to shun him.
The valour of Guiderius and Arviragus had soon an opportunity of displaying itself. The British, sorely bested, were in act of flight, and Cymbeline had been captured by the Romans, when Belarius and the two Princes went to his assistance, and with the aid of Leonatus succeeded in rescuing the King. By their desperate courage they drove back the flying Britons, and forced them to rally and resist the foe, and finally achieve a brilliant victory.
After the skirmish, some British soldiers coming across Leonatus, took him for a fugitive from the Romans, and put him into prison. Leonatus was ready to welcome bondage, for it was a way, as he looked at it, to liberty. Death was the key that would unbar those locks; his conscience was more heavily fettered than his limbs. It was not enough to be sorry; he longed to die. For Imogen’s dear life, which he had stolen from her, he would gladly yield up his own.
When, therefore, the gaolers came the following morning to lead him forth to death, Leonatus told them he was more than ready—he was merrier to die than they to live. Another messenger arriving with an order that his fetters were to be knocked off, and that he was to be conducted to the King. Leonatus followed him willingly, believing that at last the moment for death had come.
Cymbeline was seated in his tent, and at his side stood his three preservers—the aged warrior, with white flowing beard, and the two gallant striplings. A fourth was missing, and Cymbeline lamented for him—a poor soldier, he said, who fought so nobly that his rags shamed gilded arms. Anyone who found him should receive the highest favour from the King. No one could give tidings of this hero, but Cymbeline proceeded to confer the honour of knighthood on the three other champions, and to appoint them companions to his own person, with dignities becoming their estate.
At this moment there came an interruption,—Cornelius, the physician, entered; he brought the news that the wicked Queen’s life was ended, and that before her death she had confessed all her villainy—her duplicity towards Imogen, and her intention of poisoning both her and Cymbeline, in order to secure the crown for her own son. The strange disappearance of Cloten, for whose sake she had wrought so much evil, and the consequent failure of all her schemes, made her grow desperate, and so in despair she died. Cymbeline could not but be moved by the account of this unsuspected treachery on the part of his wife, for she was as beautiful in person as she was wicked in mind, and he had been quite deceived by her. His thoughts now began to turn with tenderness to the innocent daughter whom he had treated with such unjust severity.
Lucius, the Roman General, was next led as prisoner before the King. He was ready to accept with manly dignity the doom of death which he presumed would be meted out to him, but he petitioned as a last favour that the life of his little page might be spared.