The Story of Francis Cludde

by Stanley John Weyman

"Well," said the Duchess, a smile again transforming her open features, "I will answer for that, Master Carey. Deeds are better than names, and as for being a new man, what with Pagets and Cavendishes and Spencers, we have nought but new men nowadays. So, cheer up!" she continued kindly. "And we will poke no questions at you, though I doubt whether you do not possess more birth and breeding than you would have us think. And if, when we return to England, as I trust we may before we are old men and women, we can advance your cause, then let us have your secret. No one can say that Katherine Willoughby ever forgot her friend."

"Or forgave her enemy over quickly," quoth her husband naïvely.

She rapped his knuckles with the back of her knife for that; and under cover of this small diversion I had time to regain my composure. But the matter left me sore at heart, and more than a little homesick. And I sought leave to retire early.

"You are right!" said the Duchess, rising graciously. "To-night, after being out in the air, you will sleep soundly, and to-morrow you will be a new man," with a faint smile. "Believe me, I am not ungrateful, Master Francis, and I will diligently seek occasion to repay both your gallant defense of the other day and your future service." She gave me her hand to kiss, and I bent over it. "Now," she continued, "do homage to my baby, and then I shall consider that you are really one of us, and pledged to our cause."

I kissed the tiny fist held out to me, a soft pink thing looking like some dainty sea-shell. Master Bertie cordially grasped my hand. And so under the oil-lamp in the neat cabin of that old Dutch boat, somewhere on the Waal between Gorcum and Nimuegen, we plighted our troth to one another, and in a sense I became one of them.

I went to my berth cheered and encouraged by their kindness. But the interview, satisfactory as it was, had set up no little excitement in my brain, and it was long before I slept. When I did I had a strange dream. I dreamed that I was sitting in the hall at Coton, and that Petronilla was standing on the dais looking fixedly at me with gentle, sorrowful eyes. I wanted to go to her, but I could not move; every dreamer knows the sensation. I tried to call to her, to ask her what was the matter, and why she so looked at me. But I could utter no sound. And still she continued to fix me with the same sad, reproachful eyes, in which I read a warning, yet could not ask its meaning.

I struggled so hard that at last the spell was in a degree broken. Following the direction of her eyes I looked down at myself, and saw fastened to the breast of my doublet the knot of blue velvet which she had made for my sword-hilt, and which I had ever since carried in my bosom. More, I saw, with a singular feeling of anger and sorrow, that a hand which came over my shoulder was tugging hard at the ribbon in the attempt to remove it.

This gave me horrible concern, yet at the moment I could not move nor do anything to prevent it. At last, making a stupendous effort, I awoke, my last experience, dreaming, being of the strange hand working at my breast. My first waking idea was the same, so that I threw out my arms, and cried aloud, and sat up. "Ugh!" I exclaimed, trembling in the intensity of my relief, as I looked about and welcomed the now familiar surroundings. "It was only a dream. It was----"

I stopped abruptly, my eyes falling on a form lurking in the doorway. I could see it only dimly by the light of a hanging lamp, which smoked and burned redly overhead. Yet I could see it. It was real, substantial--a waking figure; nevertheless, a faint touch of superstitious terror still clung to me. "Speak, please!" I asked. "Who is it?"

"It is only I," answered a soft voice, well known to me--Mistress Anne's. "I came in to see how you were," she continued, advancing a little, "and whether you were sleeping. I am afraid I awoke you. But you seemed," she added, "to be having such painful dreams that perhaps it was as well I did."