Rory was accordingly carried straight to Otterbourne Castle, whither the gallant Mortimer Sang accompanied Katherine. Their parting at the gate was tender—but he could wring nothing from her that could elucidate the mystery of her present conduct.
CHAPTER LXII.
Withdrawal of the Scots Army—Obsequies of the Gallant Dead—The Mystery solved.
Although the morning sun rose bright and cheerful upon Otterbourne, yet were its rays incapable of giving gladness to those in the Scottish camp. The little army of heroes had gained a great and glorious victory, but they had dearly paid for it in the single death of Douglas. There was, therefore, more of condolence than of exultation among them, as they gave each other good morrow. They broke up their encampment with silence and sorrow, and marched off towards Scotland, under the united command of the Earls of Moray and Dunbar, with the solemn pace and fixed eyes of men who followed some funeral pageant; indeed, it was so in fact; for at the head of the main body of the army was the car that carried the coffin of the Douglas. Before it was borne his banner, that “Jamais Arriere” which, in the hands of Sir Patrick Hepborne the younger, had so happily turned the fate of the battle; and, in compliment to the gallant young knight, it was his esquire, Mortimer Sang, to whom the honour of carrying it was assigned. Behind it came the fatal pennon of Piersie, which had been the cause of so much waste of human life, and around the machine were clustered all those brave knights who had lately looked up to the hero for the direction of their every movement—at whose least nod or sign they would have spurred to achieve the most difficult and dangerous undertakings, and whose applause was ever considered by them as their highest reward. The life and soul of the army seemed now to have departed. They hung their heads, and marched on, rarely breaking the silence that prevailed, except to utter some sad remark calculated to heighten the very sorrow that gave rise to it. [[472]]
The last of their columns disappeared from the ground, and when Katherine Spears and the lady on whom she attended cast their eyes over it from the window of the tower in the Castle of Otterbourne, it was again as much a scene of peace as if no such fierce warfare had ever disturbed it. Huge heaps, and long lines, indeed, marked the places under which hundreds of those who had merrily marched thither now reposed, Scot and Englishman, in amity together. The ruined huts and broken-down entrenchments too were still visible; but the daisies and the other little flowers that enamelled the field, refreshed by the morning dew, had again raised their crushed heads, and the timid flocks and herds which had been scared by the din of arms, had again ventured forth from the covert whither they had been driven, and were innocently pasturing on the very spot where heroes had been so lately contending in the mortal strife. The lady, however, suffered her attention to be occupied with these objects for a brief space only ere she returned to perform her melancholy task of watching by those beloved remains she had so piously rescued from the promiscuous heaps of slaughter that covered the battle-field. She again sought the Chapel of the Castle, where lay the brave old knight Sir Walter de Selby, for it was he who, having met with some less merciful foe than Sir Patrick Hepborne, had been cut down in the melée. The mortal wound now gaped wide on his venerable head, and the beauty of his silver hair was disfigured with clotted gore. The tears of her who now seated herself by his bier fell fast and silently, as she bent over that benignant countenance now no longer animated by its generous spirit. Now it was she recalled all that affection so largely exhibited towards her from her very childhood. His faults had at this moment disappeared from her memory, and as the more remarkable instances of his kindness arose in succession, she gave way to that feeling natural to sensitive minds on such occasions, and bitterly accused herself of having but ill requited them.
The body of Sir Walter remained in the Castle of Otterbourne for several days, until proper preparations were made there and at Norham for doing it the honours due to the remains of so gallant a knight, and one who had enjoyed so important a command. After the escort was ready, the lady parted with much sorrow from Katherine Spears, whose father was yet unable to bear the motion of a journey. She commended both to the especial protection of the Captain of the Castle, and then hastily seating herself in her horse-litter to hide her grief from observation, the funeral procession moved away. [[473]]
It was long after the sunset of the second day, that the troops of the garrison of Norham, under the Lieutenant Oglethorpe, marched out in sad array to meet the corpse of their late governor. Clad in all the insignia of woe, and each soldier bearing a torch in his hand, they halted on the high ground over the village, and rested in mute and sorrowful expectation of the approach of the funeral train. Lights appeared slowly advancing from a distance, and the dull chanting of voices and the heavy measured tread of men were heard. The coffin had already been removed from the car in which it had hitherto been carried, and four priests who had gone to meet it, one of them bearing a crucifix aloft, now appeared walking bareheaded before it, and chanting a hymn. The coffin itself was sustained on the shoulders of a band of men-at-arms, who accompanied it from Otterbourne; and after it came the horse litter of the lady, attended by a train of horsemen who rode with their lances reversed. Among these, alas! no man belonging to the deceased was to be seen, for all had perished with him in the field.
When the procession had reached the spot where the troops from Norham were drawn up to receive it, those who formed it halted, and the bearers, resigning their burden to the chief officers of the garrison, fell back to join their fellows. One-half of the soldiers of the Castle then moved on before the body, whilst the other half filed in behind the lady’s litter, and the men of Otterbourne were left to close up the rear of the pageant.
As they descended the hill, the inhabitants of the village turned out to gaze on the imposing spectacle; and after it had passed by, they followed to witness the last obsequies of one whose military pomp had often delighted their eyes, and the hardy deeds of whose prime were even now in every man’s mouth.