My lady of Cleeve

by Percy John Hartley

As I approached nearer I scanned the persons before me more closely. With some at least I was already acquainted. There was Mistress Grace, who eyed me, I thought, with a glance that bespoke more of pity for my forlorn condition than of triumph at the successful issue of their enterprise. Near to her was my late adversary, the young Sir Rupert Courtenay, and three or four of the neighbouring gentry, all of whom I knew to be of the Jacobite persuasion; while at the head of the steps, with a grim smile upon his face, stood the stalwart figure of Sampson Dare. But it was with more curiosity that I gazed upon the two men with whom my lady herself was conversing. They were seated at a small table, a bottle and glasses before them, and a more villainous pair of rogues it has seldom been my lot to set eyes upon. He who seemed to be the spokesman was dressed in a voluminous skirted coat of blue, adorned here and there with tarnished bold braid. Beneath this was a faded silken vest, and I caught a glimpse of a brace of pistols garnishing the broad belt at his waist. His legs, like those of his companion, were encased in high sea-boots that reached all but to his thigh, and upon his head was an old-fashioned three-cornered hat. In years he might have been anything from forty to sixty, but his brown mahogany face was so scarred and wrinkled that it gave no clear indication as to his age. That he was a seaman I saw at a glance, and my mind instantly reverted to the vessel I had seen in the bay. His companion was a tall, gaunt man, dressed in a coarse blue jerkin and with a red cotton cap upon his head. For the rest, both these worthies wore heavy gold earrings and carried long swords at their sides. Master and mate I took them to be, and as it subsequently proved, my surmise was correct.

At length I came to a halt, I caught the words which he of the blue coat was addressing to my lady. “No, no,” he was saying in a harsh voice that was well in keeping with his whole appearance, “have no fear on that score, mistress. They shall be treated like gentlemen. Curse me! like gentlemen. No more humane a man than I am ever set sail from Bristol port, as Silas Ball here will tell you.”

Here he looked across at the mate, who grinned broadly, as at some excellent jest—a jest which at the time I failed to comprehend, though afterwards I came to experience more of the former gentleman’s humanity.

“Given a fair wind, in two days’ time they will be—— Is this the man?” he added abruptly, setting down his half-emptied glass and bending his brows upon me.

Up till now my lady had been standing with her back to me, but at these words she turned, and we were face to face. For it may be twenty seconds we stood thus, my lady proud and cold, I with a tumult of conflicting emotions in my breast, in which a rapidly rising rage against her treachery was the more predominant. At once the clamour around us was stilled into the silence of a great expectancy.

“This is the man, Captain Barclay,” my lady said quietly. Then, with her eyes still upon mine, she added: “I trust, sir, that your wound is on a fair way towards recovery?”

“Madam,” I answered bitterly, striving to control the passion in my voice, “awhile ago you accused me of hypocrisy in that I pitied you. I think that the accusation might well be reversed. You have openly rebelled against the government, you have defied the royal authority, and, for all that I am aware, have slain the troopers under my command, and, lastly, you have deprived me, a king’s officer, of my liberty by such base trickery as only the heart of a woman could conceive. You should have been an actress, madam, had fate not willed you to be born a lady. I congratulate you. Satan himself might take lessons from you in deceit!” For a moment she did not speak, and I saw the colour deepen in her face.

“I fought you with a woman’s weapons,” she answered coldly—“your manly wit against my woman’s beauty. If I succeeded, you have but yourself to blame.”

“You say true, madam,” I cried hotly. “For falsehood, flattery and guile—those are, indeed, a woman’s weapons—not a gentleman’s!”

“Then by your own words, sir,” she replied icily, “you do but prove the truth of my assertion.”