Transcribed from the 1912 Macmillan and Co. edition by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk

THE CAGED LION

PREFACE

When the venture has been made of dealing with historical events and characters, it always seems fair towards the reader to avow what liberties have been taken, and how much of the sketch is founded on history. In the present case, it is scarcely necessary to do more than refer to the almost unique relations that subsisted between Henry V. and his prisoner, James I. of Scotland; who lived with him throughout his reign on the terms of friend rather than of captive, and was absolutely sheltered by this imprisonment throughout his nonage and early youth from the frightful violence and presumption of the nobles of his kingdom.

James’s expedition to Scotland is wholly imaginary, though there appears to have been space for it during Henry’s progress to the North to pay his devotions at Beverley Minster. The hero of the story is likewise invention, though, as Froissart ascribes to King Robert II. ‘eleven sons who loved arms,’ Malcolm may well be supposed to be the son of one of those unaccounted for in the pedigrees of Stewart. The same may be said of Esclairmonde. There were plenty of Luxemburgs in the Low Countries, but the individual is not to be identified. Readers of Tyler’s ‘Henry V.,’ of Agnes Strickland’s ‘Queens,’ Tytler’s ‘Scotland,’ and Barante’s ‘Histoire de Bourgogne’ will be at no loss for the origin of all I have ventured to say of the really historical personages. Mr. Fox Bourne’s ‘English Merchants’ furnished the tradition respecting Whittington. I am afraid the knighthood was really conferred on Henry’s first return to England, after the battle of Agincourt; but human—or at least story-telling—nature could not resist an anachronism of a few years for such a story. The only other wilful alteration of a matter of time is with regard to the Duke of Burgundy’s interview with Henry. At the time of Henry’s last stay at Paris the Duke was attending the death-bed of his wife, Michelle of France, but he had been several times in the King’s camp at the siege of Meaux.

Another alteration of fact is that Ralf Percy, instead of being second son of Hotspur, should have been Henry Percy, son of Hotspur’s brother Ralf; but the name would have been so confusing that it was thought better to set Dugdale at defiance and consider the reader’s convenience. Alice Montagu, though her name sounds as if it came out of the most commonplace novelist’s repertory, was a veritable personage—the heiress of the brave line of Montacute, or Montagu; daughter to the Earl of Salisbury who was killed at the siege of Orleans; wife to the Earl of the same title (in her right) who won the battle of Blore Heath and was beheaded at Wakefield; and mother to Earl Warwick the King-maker, the Marquis of Montagu, and George Nevil, Archbishop of York. As nothing is known of her but her name, I have ventured to make use of the blank.

For Jaqueline of Hainault, and her pranks, they are to be found in Monstrelet of old, and now in Barante; though justice to her and Queen Isabeau compels me to state that the incident of the ring is wholly fictitious. Of the trial of Walter Stewart no record is preserved save that he was accused of ‘roborica.’ James Kennedy was the first great benefactor to learning in Scotland, and founder of her earliest University, having been himself educated at Paris.

The Abbey of Coldingham is described from a local compilation of the early part of the century, with an account of the history of that grand old foundation, and the struggle for appointments between the parent house at Durham and the Scottish Government. Priors Akefield and Drax are historical, and as the latter really did commission a body of moss-troopers to divert an instalment of King James’s ransom into his own private coffers, I do not think I can have done him much injustice. As the nunnery of St. Abbs has gone bodily into the sea, I have been the less constrained by the inconvenient action of fact upon fiction. And for the Hospital of St. Katharine’s-by-the-Tower, its history is to be found in Stowe’s ‘Survey of London,’ and likewise in the evidence before the Parliamentary Commission, which shows what it was intended by Queen Philippa to have been to the river-side population, and what it might have been had such intentions been understood and acted on—nay, what it may yet become, since the foundation remains intact, although the building has been removed.

C. M. YONGE.

November 24, 1869.

CHAPTER I: THE GUEST OF GLENUSKIE

A master hand has so often described the glens and ravines of Scotland, that it seems vain and presumptuous to meddle with them; and yet we must ask our readers to figure to themselves a sharp cleft sloping downwards to a brawling mountain stream, the sides scattered with gray rocks of every imaginable size, interspersed here and there with heather, gorse, or furze. Just in the widest part of the valley, a sort of platform of rock jutted out from the hill-side, and afforded a station for one of those tall, narrow, grim-looking fastnesses that were the strength of Scotland, as well as her bane.

Either by nature or art, the rock had been scarped away on three sides, so that the walls of the castle rose sheer from the steep descent, except where the platform was connected with the mountain side by, as it were, an isthmus joining the peninsula to the main rock; and even this isthmus, a narrow ridge of rock just wide enough for the passage of a single horse, had been cut through, no doubt with great labour, and rendered impassable, except by the lowering of a drawbridge. Glenuskie Castle was thus nearly impregnable, so long as it was supplied with water, and for this all possible provision had been made, by guiding a stream into the court.

The castle was necessarily narrow and confined; its massive walls took up much even of the narrow space that the rock afforded; but it had been so piled up that it seemed as though the builders wished to make height compensate for straitness. There was, too, an unusual amount of grace, both in the outline of the gateway with its mighty flanking towers, and of the lofty donjon tower, that shot up like a great finger above the Massy More, as the main building was commonly called by the inhabitants of Glenuskie.

Wondrous as were the walls, and deep-set as were the arches, they had all that peculiar slenderness of contour that Scottish taste seemed to have learnt from France; and a little more space was gained at the top, both of the gateway towers and the donjon, by a projecting cornice of beautifully vaulted arches supporting a battlement, that gave the building a crowned look. On the topmost tower was of course planted the ensign of the owner, and that ensign was no other than the regal ruddy Lion of Scotland, ramping on his gold field within his tressure fiery and counter flory, but surmounted by a label divided into twelve, and placed upon a pen-noncel, or triangular piece of silk. The eyes of the early fifteenth century easily deciphered such hieroglyphics as these, which to every one with the least tincture of ‘the noble science’ indicated that the owner of the castle was of royal Stewart blood, but of a younger branch, and not yet admitted to the rank of knighthood.

The early spring of the year 1421 was bleak and dreary in that wild lonely vale, and large was the fire burning on the hearth in the castle hall, in the full warmth of which there sat, with a light blue cloth cloak drawn tightly round him, a tall old man, of the giant mould of Scotland, and with a massive thoughtful brow, whose grand form was rendered visible by the absence of hair, only a few remnants of yellow locks mixed with silver floating from his temples to mingle with his magnificent white beard. A small blue bonnet, with a short eagle feather, fastened with a brooch of river pearl, was held in the hands that were clasped over his face, as, bending down in his chair, he murmured through his white beard, ‘Have mercy, good Lord, have mercy on the land. Have mercy on my son,—and guard him when he goes out and when he comes in. Have mercy on the children I have toiled for, and teach me to judge and act for them aright in these sore straits; and above all, have mercy on our King, break his fetters, and send him home to be the healer of his land, the avenger of her cruel wrongs.’

So absorbed was the old man that he never heard the step that came across the hall. It was a slightly unequal step, but was carefully hushed at entrance, as if supposing the old man asleep; and at a slow pace the new-comer crossed the hall to the chimney, where he stood by the fire, warming himself and looking wistfully at the old Knight.

He was wrapped in a plaid, black and white, which increased the gray appearance of the pale sallow face and sad expression of the wearer, a boy of about seventeen, with soft pensive dark eyes and a sickly complexion, with that peculiar wistful cast of countenance that is apt to accompany deformity, though there was no actual malformation apparent, unless such might be reckoned the slight halt in the gait, and the small stature of the lad, who was no taller than many boys of twelve or fourteen. But there was a depth of melancholy in those dark brown eyes, that went far into the heart of any one who had the power to be touched with their yearning, appealing, almost piteous gaze, as though their owner had come into a world that was much too hard for him, and were looking out in bewilderment and entreaty for some haven of peace.

He had stood for some minutes looking thoughtfully into the fire, and the sadness of his expression ever deepening, before the old man raised his face, and said, ‘You here, Malcolm? where are the others?’

‘Patie and Lily are still on the turret-top, fair Uncle,’ returned the boy. ‘It was so cold;’ and he shivered again, and seemed as though he would creep into the fire.

‘And the reek?’ asked the uncle.

‘There is another reek broken out farther west,’ replied Malcolm. ‘Patie is sure now that it is as you deemed, Uncle; that it is a cattle-lifting from Badenoch.’

‘Heaven help them!’ sighed the old man, again folding his hands in prayer. ‘How long, O Lord, how long?’

Malcolm took up the appeal of the Psalm, repeating it in Latin, but with none the less fervency; that Psalm that has ever since David’s time served as the agonized voice of hearts hot-burning at the sight of wrong.

‘Ah yes,’ he ended, ‘there is nothing else for it! Uncle, this was wherefore I came. It was to speak to you of my purpose.’

‘The old purpose, Malcolm? Nay, that hath been answered before.’

‘But listen, listen, dear Uncle. I have not spoken of it for a full year now. So that you cannot say it is the caresses of the good monks. No, nor the rude sayings of the Master of Albany,’ he added, colouring at a look of his uncle. ‘You bade me say no more till I be of full age; nor would I, save that I were safe lodged in an abbey; then might Patrick and Lily be wedded, and he not have to leave us and seek his fortune far away in France; and in Patie’s hands and leading, my vassals might be safe; but what could the doited helpless cripple do?’ he added, the colour rising hotly to his cheek with pain and shame. ‘Oh, Sir, let me but save my soul, and find peace in Coldingham!’

‘My poor bairn,’ said his uncle, laying a kind hand upon him, as in his eagerness he knelt on one knee beside the chair, ‘it must not be. It is true that the Regent and his sons would willingly see you in a cloister. Nay, that unmanly jeer of Walter Stewart’s was, I verily believe, meant to drive you thither. But were you there, then would poor Lilias become a prize worth having, and the only question would be, whether Walter of Albany, or Robert of Athole, or any of the rest of them, should tear her away to be the lady of their fierce ungodly households.’

‘You could give her to Patrick, Uncle.’

‘No, Malcolm, that were not consistent with mine honour, or oaths to the King and State. You living, and Laird of Glenuskie, Lilias is a mere younger sister, whom you may give in marriage as you will; but were you dead to the world, under a cowl, then the Lady of Glenuskie, a king’s grandchild, may not be disposed of, save by her royal kinsman, or by those who, woe worth the day! stand in his place. I were no better than yon Wolf of Badenoch or the Master of Albany, did I steal a march on the Regent, and give the poor lassie to my own son!’

‘And so Lilias must pine, and Patrick wander off to the weary French war,’ sighed Malcolm; ‘and I must be scorned by my cousins whenever the House of Stewart meets together; and must strive with these fierce cruel men, that will ever be too hard for me when Patie is gone.’ His eyes filled with tears as he continued, ‘Ah! that fair chapel, with the sweet chant of the choir, the green smooth-shaven quadrangle, the calm cloister walk; there, there alone is rest. There, one ceases to be a prey and a laughing-stock; there, one sees no more bloodshed and spulzie; there, one need not be forced to treachery or violence. Oh, Uncle! my very soul is sick for Coldingham. How many years will it be ere I can myself bestow my sister on Patie, and hide my head in peace!’

Before his uncle had done more than answer, ‘Nay, nay, Malcolm, these are no words for the oe of Bruce; you are born to dare as well as to suffer,’ there was an approach of footsteps, and two young people entered the hall; the first a girl, with a family likeness to Malcolm, but tall, upright, beautiful, and with the rich colouring of perfect health, her plaid still hanging in a loose swelling hood round her brilliant face and dark hair, snooded with a crimson ribbon and diamond clasp; the other, a knightly young man, of stately height and robust limbs, keen bright blue eyes and amber hair and beard, moving with the ease and grace that showed his training in the highest school of chivalry.

‘Good Uncle,’ cried the maiden in eager excitement, ‘there is a guest coming. He has just turned over the brae side, and can be coming nowhere but here.’

‘A guest!’ cried both Malcolm and the elder knight, ‘of what kind, Lily?’

‘A knight—a knight in bright steel, and with three attendants,’ said Lilias; ‘one of Patrick’s French comrades, say I, by the grace of his riding.’

‘Not a message from the Regent, I trust,’ sighed Malcolm. ‘Patie, oh do not lower the drawbridge, till we hear whether it be friend or foe.’

‘Nay, Malcolm, ’tis well none save friends heard that,’ said Patrick. ‘When shall we make a brave man of you?’

‘Nevertheless, Patie,’ said the old gentleman, ‘though I had rather the caution had come from the eldest rather than the youngest head among us, parley as much as may serve with honour and courtesy ere opening the gate to the stranger. Hark, there is his bugle.’

A certain look of nervous terror passed over young Malcolm’s face, while his sister watched full of animation and curiosity, as one to whom excitement of any kind could hardly come amiss, exclaiming, as she looked from the window, ‘Fear not, most prudent Malcolm; Father Ninian is with him: Father Ninian must have invited him.’

‘Strange,’ muttered Patrick, ‘that Father Ninian should be picking up and bringing home stray wandering land-loupers;’ and with an anxious glance at Lilias, he went forward unwillingly to perform those duties of hospitality which had become necessary, since the presence of the castle chaplain was a voucher for the guest. The drawbridge had already been lowered, and the new-comer was crossing it upon a powerful black steed, guided by Father Ninian upon his rough mountain pony, on which he had shortly before left the castle, to attend at a Church festival held at Coldingham.

The chaplain was a wise, prudent, and much-respected man; nevertheless, young Sir Patrick Drummond felt little esteem for his prudence in displaying one at least of the treasures of the castle to the knight on the black horse. The stranger was a very tall man, of robust and stalwart make, apparently aged about seven or eight and twenty years, clad in steel armour, enamelled so as to have a burnished blue appearance; but the vizor of the helmet was raised, and the face beneath it was a manly open face, thoroughly Scottish in its forms, but very handsome, and with short dark auburn hair, and eyes of the same peculiar tint, glancing with a light that once seen could never be forgotten; and the bearing was such, that Patrick at once growled to himself, ‘One of our haughty loons, brimful of outre cuidance; and yet how coolly he bears it off. If he looks to find us his humble servants, he will find himself mistaken, I trow.’

‘Sir Patrick,’ said Father Ninian, who was by this time close to him, ‘let me present to you Sir James Stewart, a captive knight who is come to collect his ransom. I fell in with him on the road, and as his road lay with mine, I made bold to assure him of a welcome from your honoured father and Lord Malcolm.’

Patrick’s face cleared. It was no grace or beauty that he feared in any stranger, but the sheer might and unright that their Regency enabled the House of Albany to exercise over the orphans of the royal family, whose head was absent; and a captive knight could be no mischievous person. Still this might be only a specious pretence to impose on the chaplain, and gain admittance to the castle; and Patrick was resolved to be well on his guard, though he replied courteously to the graceful bow with which the stranger greeted him, saying in a manly mellow voice and southern accent, ‘I have been bold enough to presume on the good father’s offer of hospitality, Sir.’

‘You are welcome, Sir,’ returned Patrick, taking the stranger’s bridle that he might dismount; ‘my father and my cousin will gladly further on his way a prisoner seeking freedom.’

‘A captive may well be welcome, for the sake of one prisoner,’ said his father, who had in the meantime come forward, and extended his hand to the knight, who took it, and uncovering his bright locks, respectfully said, ‘I am in the presence of the noble Tutor of Glenuskie.’

‘Even so, Sir,’ returned Sir David Drummond, who was, in fact, as his nephew’s guardian, usually known by this curious title; ‘and you here see my wards, the Lord Malcolm and Lady Lilias. Your knighthood will make allowances for the lad, he is but home-bred.’ For while Lilias with stately grace responded to Sir James Stewart’s courtly greeting, Malcolm bashfully made an awkward bow, and seemed ready to shrink within himself, as, indeed, the brutal jests of his rude cousins had made him dread and hate the eye of a stranger; and while the knight was led forward to the hall fire, he merely pressed up to the priest, and eagerly demanded under his breath, ‘Have you brought me the book?’ but Father Ninian had only time to nod, and sign that a volume was in his bosom, before old Sir David called out, ‘What now, Malcolm, forgetting that your part is to come and disarm the knight who does you the honour to be your guest?’ And Sir Patrick rather roughly pushed him forward, gruffly whispering, ‘Leave not Lily to supply your lack of courtesy.’

Malcolm shambled forward, bewildered, as the keen auburn eye fell on him, and the cheery kindly voice said, ‘Ha! a new book—a romance? Well may that drive out other thoughts.’

‘Had he ears to hear such a whisper?’ thought Malcolm, as he mumbled in the hoarse voice of bashful boyhood, ‘Not a romance, Sir, but whatever the good fathers at Coldingham would lend me.’

‘It is the “Itinerarium” of the blessed Adamnanus,’ replied Father Ninian, producing from his bosom a parcel, apparently done up in many wrappers, a seal-skin above all.

‘The “Itinerarium”!’ exclaimed Sir James, ‘methought I had heard of such a book. I have a friend in England who would give many a fair rose noble for a sight of it.’

‘A friend in England!’—the words had a sinister sound to the audience, and while Malcolm jealously gathered up the book into his arms, the priest made cold answer, that the book was the property of the Monastery at Coldingham, and had only been lent to Lord Malcolm Stewart by special favour. The guest could not help smiling, and saying he was glad books were thus prized in Scotland; but at that moment, as the sunny look shone on his face, and he stood before the fire in the close suit of chamois leather which he wore under his armour, old Sir David exclaimed, ‘Ha! never did I see such a likeness. Patie, you should be old enough to remember; do you not see it?’

‘What should I see? Who is he like?’ asked Patrick, surprised at his father’s manner.

‘Who?’ whispered Sir David in a lowered voice; ‘do you not see it? to the unhappy lad, the Duke of Rothsay.’

Patrick could not help smiling, for he had been scarcely seven years old at the time of the murder of the unfortunate Prince of Scotland; but a flush of colour rose into the face of the guest, and he shortly answered, ‘So I have been told;’ and then assuming a seat near Sir David, he entered into conversation with him upon the condition of Scotland at the period, inquiring into the state of many of the families and districts by name. Almost always there was but one answer—murder—harrying—foray; and when the question followed, ‘What had the Regent done?’ there was a shrug of the shoulders, and as often Sir James’s face flushed with a dark red fire, and his hand clenched at the hilt of the sword by his side.

‘And is there not a man in Scotland left to strike for the right?’ he demanded at last; ‘cannot nobles, clergy, and burghers, band themselves in parliament to put down Albany and his bloody house, and recall their true head?’

‘They love to have it so,’ returned Sir David sadly. ‘United, they might be strong enough; but each knows that his fellow, Douglas, Lennox, March, or Mar, would be ready to play the same game as Albany; and to raise a rival none will stir.’

‘And so,’ proceeded Sir James, bitterly, ‘the manhood of Scotland goes forth to waste itself in an empty foreign war, merely to keep France in as wretched a state of misrule as itself.’

‘Nay, nay, Sir,’ cried Patrick angrily, ‘it is to save an ancient ally from the tyranny of our foulest foe. It is the only place where a Scotsman can seek his fortune with honour, and without staining his soul with foul deeds. Bring our King home, and every sword shall be at his service.’

‘What, when they have all been lavished on the crazy Frenchman?’ said Sir James.

‘No, Sir,’ said Patrick, rising in his vehemence; ‘when they have been brightened there by honourable warfare, not tarnished by home barbarities.’

‘He speaks truly,’ said Sir David; ‘and though it will go to my heart to part with the lad, yet may I not say a word to detain him in a land where the contagion of violence can scarce be escaped by a brave man.’

Sir James gave a deep sigh as of pain, but as if to hinder its being remarked, promptly answered, ‘That may be; but what is to be the lot of a land whose honest men desert her cause as too evil for them, and seek out another, that when seen closer is scarce less evil?’

‘How, Sir!’ cried Patrick; ‘you a prisoner of England, yet speaking against our noble French allies, so foully trampled on?’

‘I have lived long enough in England,’ returned Sir James, ‘to think that land happiest where law is strong enough to enforce peace and order.’

‘The coward loons!’ muttered Patrick, chiefly out of the spirit of opposition.

‘You have been long in England, Sir?’ said Lilias, hoping to direct the conversation into a more peaceful current.

‘Many years, fair lady,’ he replied, turning courteously to her; ‘I was taken when I was a mere lad, but I have had gentle captors, and no over harsh prison.’

‘And has no one ransomed you?’ she asked pitifully, as one much moved by a certain patience on his brow, and in his sweet full voice.

‘No one, lady. My uncle was but too willing that the heir should be kept aloof; and it is only now he is dead, that I have obtained leave from my friendly captor to come in search of my ransom.’

Lilias would have liked to know the amount, but it was not manners to ask, since the rate of ransom was the personal value of the knight; and her uncle put in the question, who was his keeper.

‘The Earl of Somerset,’ rather hastily answered Sir James; and then at once Lilias exclaimed, ‘Ah, Uncle, is not the King, too, in his charge?’ And then questions crowded on. ‘What like is the King? How brooks he his durance? What freedom hath he? What hope is there of his return? Can he brook to hear of his people’s wretchedness?’

This was the first question at which Sir James attempted to unclose his hitherto smiling and amused lip. Then it quivered, and the dew glittered in his eyes as he answered, ‘Brook it! No indeed, lady. His heart burns within him at every cry that comes over the Border, and will well-nigh burst at what I have seen and heard! King Harry tells him that to send him home were but tossing him on the swords of the Albany. Better, better so, to die in one grapple for his country’s sake, than lie bound, hearing her bitter wails, and unable to stir for her redress!’ and as he dashed the indignant tear from his eyes, Patrick caught his hand.

‘Your heart is in the right place, friend,’ he said; ‘I look on you as an honest man and brother in arms from this moment.’

‘’Tis a bargain,’ said Sir James, the smile returning, and his eyes again glistening as he wrung Sir Patrick’s hand. ‘When the hour comes for the true rescue of Scotland, we will strike together.’

‘And you will tell the King,’ added Patrick, ‘that here are true hearts, and I could find many more, only longing to fence him from the Albany swords, about which King Harry is so good as to fash himself.’

‘But what like is the King?’ asked Lilias eagerly. ‘Oh, I would fain see him. Is it true that he was the tallest man at King Harry’s sacring? more shame that he were there!’

‘He and I are much of a height, lady,’ returned the knight. ‘Maybe I may give you the justest notion of him by saying that I am said to be his very marrow.’

‘That explains your likeness to the poor Duke,’ said Sir David, satisfied; ‘and you too count kindred with our royal house, methinks?’

‘I am sprung from Walter the Stewart, so much I know; my lands lie Carrick-wards,’ said Sir James lightly, ‘but I have been a prisoner so long, that the pedigree of my house was never taught me, and I can make no figure in describing my own descent.’ And as though to put an end to the inquiry, he walked to the window, where Malcolm so soon as they had begun to talk of the misrule of Scotland, had ensconced himself in the window-seat with his new book, making the most of the failing light, and asked him whether the Monk of Iona equalled his expectations.

Malcolm was not easy to draw out at first, but it presently appeared that he had been baffled by a tough bit of Latinity. The knight looked, and readily expounded the sentence, so that all became plain; and then, as it was already too dark to pursue the study with comfort, he stood over the boy, talking to him of books and of poems, while the usually pale, listless, uninterested countenance responded by looks of eager delight and flushing colour.

It seemed as though each were equally pleased with the other: Sir James, at finding so much knowledge and understanding in a Scottish castle; and Malcolm, at, for the first time, meeting anything but contempt for his tastes from aught but an ecclesiastic.

Their talk continued till they were summoned to supper, which had been somewhat delayed to provide for the new-comers. It was a simple enough meal, suited to Lent, and was merely of dried fish, with barley bread and kail brose; but there were few other places in Scotland where it would have been served with so much of the refinement that Sir David Drummond and his late wife had learnt in France. A tablecloth and napkins, separate trenchers, and water for hand cleansing, were not always to be found in the houses of the nobles; and in fact, there were those who charged Malcolm’s delicacy and timidity on the nisété or folly of his effeminate education; the having the rushes on the floor frequently changed, the preference of lamps for pine torches, and the not keeping falcons, dogs, swine, and all, pell mell in the great hall.

Lilias sat between her uncle and his guest, looking so fair and bright that Patrick felt fresh accesses of angry jealousy, while the visitor talked as one able to report to the natives from another world, and that world the hateful England, which as a Scotsman he was bound to abhor. Had it been France, it had been endurable, but praise of English habits was mere disloyalty; and yet, whenever Patrick tried to throw in a disparaging word, he found himself met with a quiet superiority such as he had believed no knight in Scotland could assume with him, and still it was neither brow-beating nor insolence, nothing that could give offence.

Malcolm begged to know whether there had not been a rare good poet in England, called Chaucer. Verily there had been, said the knight; and on a little solicitation, so soon as supper was over, he recited to the eager and delighted auditors the tale of patient Grisel, as rendered by Chaucer, calling forth eager comments from both Patrick and Lily, on the unknightliness of the Marquis. Malcolm, however, added, ‘Yet, after all, she was but a mere peasant wench.’

‘What makes that, young Sir?’ replied Sir James gravely. ‘I would have you to know that the husband’s rank is the wife’s, and the more unequal were their lot before, the more is he bound to respect her, and to make her be respected.’

‘That may be, after the deed is done,’ said Sir David, in a warning voice; ‘but it is not well that like should not match with like. Many an evil have I seen in my time, from unequal mating.’

‘And, Sir,’ eagerly exclaimed Patrick, ‘no doubt you can gainsay the slander, that our noble King has been caught in the toils of an artful Englishwoman, and been drawn in to promise her a share in his crown.’

A flush of crimson flamed forth on Sir James Stewart’s cheeks, and his tawny eye glanced with a fire like red lightning, but he seemed, as it were, to be holding himself in, and answered with a voice forcibly kept low and calm, and therefore the more terribly stern, ‘Young Sir, I warn you to honour your future queen.’

Sir David made a gesture with his hand, enforcing restraint upon his son, and turning to Sir James, said, ‘Our queen will we honour, when such she is, Sir; but if you are returning to the King, it were well that he should know that our hot Scottish bloods, here, could scarce brook an English alliance, and certainly not one beneath his birth.’

‘The King would answer, Sir,’ returned Sir James, haughtily, but with recovered command over himself, ‘that it is for him to judge whom his subjects shall brook as their queen. Moreover,’ he added, in a different and more conciliatory voice, ‘Scotsmen must be proud indeed who disdain the late King’s niece, the great-granddaughter of King Edward III., and as noble and queenly a demoiselle as ever was born in a palace.’

‘She is so very fair, then?’ said Lilies, who was of course on the side of true love. ‘You have seen her, gentle Sir? Oh, tell us what are her beauties?’

‘Fair damsel,’ said Sir James, in a much more gentle tone, ‘you forget that I am only a poor prisoner, who have only now and then viewed the lady Joan Beaufort with distant reverence, as destined to be my queen. All I can tell is, that her walk and bearing mark her out for a throne.’

‘And oh!’ cried Malcolm, ‘is it not true that the King hath composed songs and poems in her honour?’

‘Pah!’ muttered Patrick; ‘as though the King would be no better than a wandering minstrel rhymester!’

‘Or than King David!’ dryly said Sir James.

‘It is true, then, Sir,’ exclaimed Lilias. ‘He doth verily add minstrelsy to his other graces? Know you the lines, Sir? Can you sing them to us? Oh, I pray you.’

‘Nay, fair maid,’ returned Sir James, ‘methinks I might but add to the scorn wherewith Sir Patrick is but too much inclined to regard the captive King.’

‘A captive, a captive—ay, minstrelsy is the right solace for a captive,’ said Patrick; ‘at least, so they say and sing. Our king will have better work when he gains his freedom. Only there will come before me a subtilty I once saw in jelly and blanc-mange, at a banquet in France, where a lion fell in love with a hunter’s daughter, and let her, for love’s sake, draw his teeth and clip his claws, whereupon he found himself made a sport for her father’s hounds.’

‘I promise you, Sir Patrick,’ replied the guest, ‘that the Lady Joan is more hike to send her Lion forth from the hunter’s toils, with claws and teeth fresh-whetted by the desire of honour.

‘But the lay—the hay, Sir,’ entreated Lilias; ‘who knows that it may not win Patrick to be the Lady Joan’s devoted servant? Malcolm, your harp!’

Malcolm had already gone in quest of the harp he loved all the better for the discouragement thrown on his gentle tastes.

The knight leant back, with a pensive look softening his features as he said, after a little consideration, ‘Then, fair lady, I will sing you the song made by King James, when he had first seen the fair mistress of his heart, on the slopes of Windsor, looking from his chamber window. He feigns her to be a nightingale.’

‘And what is that, Sir?’ demanded Lilias. ‘I have heard the word in romances, and deemed it a kind of angel that sings by night.’

‘It is a bird, sister,’ replied Malcolm; ‘Philomel, that pierces her breast with a thorn, and sings sweetly even to her death.’

‘That’s mere minstrel leasing, Malcolm,’ said Patrick. ‘I have both seen and heard the bird in France—Rossignol, as we call it there; and were I a lady, I should deem it small compliment to be likened to a little russet-backed, homely fowl such as that.’

‘While I,’ replied the prisoner, ‘feel so much with your fair sister, that nightingales are a sort of angels that sing by night, that it pains me, when I think of winning my freedom, to remember that I shall never again hear their songs answering one another through the forest of Windsor.’

Patrick shrugged his shoulders, but Lilias was so anxious to hear the lay, that she entreated him to be silent; and Sir James, with a manly mellow voice, with an exceedingly sweet strain in it, and a skill, both of modulation and finger, such as showed admirable taste and instruction, poured forth that beautiful song of the nightingale at Windsor, which commences King James’s story of his love, in his poem of the King’s Quhair.

There was an eager pressing round to hear, and not only were Lilias and Malcolm, but old Sir David himself, much affected by the strain, which the latter said put him in mind of the days of King Robert III., which, sad as they were, now seemed like good old times, so much worse was the present state of affairs. Sir James, however, seemed anxious to prevent discussion of the verses he had sung, and applied to Malcolm to give a specimen of his powers: and thus, with music, ballad, and lay, the evening passed away, till the parting cup was sent round, and the Tutor of Glenuskie and Malcolm marshalled their guest to the apartment where he was to sleep, in a wainscoted box bedstead, and his two attendant squires, a great iron-gray Scot and a rosy honest-faced Englishman, on pallets on the floor.

In the morning he went on his journey, but not without an invitation to rest there again on his way back, whether with or without his ransom. He promised to come, saying that he should gladly bear to the King the last advices from one so honoured as the Tutor of Glenuskie; and, on their sides, Malcolm and Sir David resolved to do their best to have some gold pieces to contribute, rather than so ‘proper a knight’ should fail in raising his ransom; but gold was never plenty, and Patrick needed all that his uncle could supply, to bear him to those wars in France, where he looked for renown and fortune.

For these were, as may have been gathered, those evil days when James I. of Scotland was still a captive to England, and when the House of Albany exercised its cruel misrule upon Scotland; delaying to ransom the King, lest they should bring home a master.

Old Robert of Albany had been King Stork, his son Murdoch was King Log; and the misery was infinitely increased by the violence and lawlessness of Murdoch’s sons. King Robert II. had left Scotland the fearful legacy of, as Froissart says, ‘eleven sons who loved arms.’ Of these, Robert III. was the eldest, the Duke of Albany the second. These were both dead, and were represented, the one by the captive young King James, the other by the Regent, Duke Murdoch of Albany, and his brother John, Earl of Buchan, now about to head a Scottish force, among whom Patrick Drummond intended to sail, to assist the French.

Others of the eleven, Earls of Athol, Menteith, &c., survived; but the youngest of the brotherhood, by name Malcolm, who had married the heiress of Glenuskie, had been killed at Homildon Hill, when he had solemnly charged his Stewart nephews and brothers to leave his two orphan children to the sole charge of their mother’s cousin, Sir David Drummond, a good old man, who had been the best supporter and confidant of poor Robert III. in his unhappy reign, and in embassies to France had lost much of the rugged barbarism to which Scotland had retrograded during the wars with England.

CHAPTER II: THE RESCUE OF COLDINGHAM

It was a lonely tract of road, marked only by the bare space trodden by feet of man and horse, and yet, in truth, the highway between Berwick and Edinburgh, which descended from a heathery moorland into a somewhat spacious valley, with copsewood clothing one side, in the midst of which rose a high mound or knoll, probably once the site of a camp, for it still bore lines of circumvallation, although it was entirely deserted, except by the wandering shepherds of the neighbourhood, or occasionally by outlaws, who found an admirable ambush in the rear.

The spring had hung the hazels with tassels, bedecked the willows with golden downy tufts, and opened the primroses and celandines beneath them, when the solitary dale was disturbed by the hasty clatter of horses’ feet, and hard, heavy breathing as of those who had galloped headlong beyond their strength. Here, however, the foremost of the party, an old esquire, who grasped the bridle-rein of youth by his side, drew up his own horse, and that which he was dragging on with him, saying—

‘We may breathe here a moment; there is shelter in the wood. And you, Rab, get ye up to the top of Jill’s Knowe, and keep a good look-out.’

‘Let me go back, you false villain!’ sobbed the boy, with the first use of his recovered breath.

‘Do not be so daft, Lord Malcolm,’ replied the Squire, retaining his hold on the boy’s bridle; ‘what, rin your head into the wolf’s mouth again, when we’ve barely brought you off haill and sain?’

‘Haill and sain? Dastard and forlorn,’ cried Malcolm, with passionate weeping. ‘I—I to flee and leave my sister—my uncle! Oh, where are they? Halbert, let me go; I’ll never pardon thee.’

‘Hoot, my lord! would I let you gang, when the Tutor spak to me as plain as I hear you now? “Take off Lord Malcolm,” says he; “save him, and you save the rest. See him safe to the Earl of Mar.” Those were his words, my lord; and if you wilna heed them, I will.’

‘What, and leave my sister to the reivers? Oh, what may not they be doing to her? Let us go back and fall on them, Halbert; better die saving her than know her in Walter Stewart’s hands. Then were I the wretched craven he calls me.’

‘Look you, Lord Malcolm,’ said Halbert, laying his finger on his nose, with a knowing expression, ‘my young lady is safe from harm so long as you are out of the Master of Albany’s reach. Had you come by a canny thrust in the fray, as no doubt was his purpose, or were you in his hands to be mewed in a convent, then were your sister worth the wedding; but the Master will never wed her while you live and have friends to back you, and his father, the Regent, will see she has no ill-usage. You’ll do best for yourself and her too, as well as Sir David, if you make for Dunbar, and call ben your uncles of Athole and Strathern.—How now, Rab? are the loons making this way?’

‘Na, na!’ said Rab, descending; ‘’tis from the other gate; ’tis a knight in blue damasked steel: he, methinks, that harboured in our castle some weeks syne.’

‘Hm!’ said Halbert, considering; ‘he looked like a trusty cheild: maybe he’d guide my lord here to a wiser wit, and a good lance on the way to Dunbar is not to be scorned.’

In fact, there would have been no time for one party to conceal themselves from the other; for, hidden by the copsewood, and unheeded by the watchers who were gazing in the opposite direction, Sir James Stewart and his two attendants suddenly came round the foot of Jill’s Knowe upon the fugitives, who were profiting by the interval to loosen the girths of their horses, and water them at the pool under the thicket, whilst Halbert in vain tried to pacify and reason with the young master, who had thrown himself on the grass in an agony of grief and despair. Sir James, after the first momentary start, recognized the party in an instant, and at once leapt from his horse, exclaiming—

‘How now, my bonnie man—my kind host—what is it? what makes this grief?’

‘Do not speak to me, Sir,’ muttered the unhappy boy. ‘They have been reft—reft from me, and I have done nothing for them. Walter of Albany has them, and I am here.’

And he gave way to another paroxysm of grief, while Halbert explained to Sir James Stewart that when Sir Patrick Drummond had gone to embark for France, with the army led to the aid of Charles VI. by the Earl of Buchan, his father and cousins, with a large escort, had accompanied him to Eyemouth; whence, after taking leave of him, they had set out to spend Passion-tide and Easter at Coldingham Abbey, after the frequent fashion of the devoutly inclined among the Scottish nobility, in whose castles there was often little commodity for religious observances. Short, however, as was the distance, they had in the midst of it been suddenly assailed by a band of armed men, among whom might easily be recognized the giant form of young Walter Stewart, the Master of Albany, the Regent Duke Murdoch’s eldest son, who was well known for his lawless excesses and violence. His father’s silky sayings, and his own ruder speeches, had long made it known to the House of Glenuskie that the family policy was to cajole or to drive the sickly heir into a convent, and, rendering Lilias the possessor of the broad lands inherited from both parents, unite her and them to the Albany family.

The almost barbarous fierceness and wild licentiousness of Walter would have made the arrangement abhorrent to Lilias, even had not love passages already passed between her and her cousin, Patrick Drummond, and Sir David had hitherto protected her by keeping Malcolm in the secular life; but Walter, it seemed, had grown impatient, and had made this treacherous attack, evidently hoping to rid himself of the brother, and secure the sister. No sooner had the Tutor of Glenuskie perceived that his own party were overmatched, than he had bidden his faithful squire to secure the bairns—if not both, at least the boy; and Halbert, perceiving that Lilias had already been pounced upon by Sir Walter himself and several more, seized the bridle of the bewildered Malcolm, who was still trying to draw his sword, and had absolutely swept him away from the scene of action before he had well realized what was passing; and now that the poor lad understood the whole, his horror, grief, and shame were unspeakable.

Before Sir James had done more than hear the outline of Halbert’s tale, however, the watchers on the mound gave the signal that the reivers were coming that way—a matter hitherto doubtful, since no one could guess whether Walter Stewart would make for Edinburgh or for Doune. With the utmost agility Sir James sprang up the side of the mound, reconnoitred, and returned again just as Halbert was trying to stir his master from the ground, and Malcolm answering sullenly that he would not move—he would be taken and die with the rest.

‘You may save them instead, if you will attend to me,’ said Sir James; and at his words the boy suddenly started up with a look of hope.

‘How many fell upon you?’ demanded Sir James.

‘Full a hundred lances,’ replied Halbert (and a lance meant at least three men). ‘It wad be a fule’s wark to withstand them. Best bide fast in the covert, for our horses are sair forfaughten.’

‘If there are now more than twenty lances, I am greatly mistaken,’ returned Sir James. ‘They must have broken up after striking their blow, or have sent to secure Glenuskie; and we, falling on them from this thicket—’

‘I see, I see,’ cried Halbert. ‘Back, ye loons; back among the hazels. Hold every one his horse ready to mount.’

‘With your favour, Sir Squire, I say, bind each man his horse to a tree. The skene and broadsword, which I see you all wear, will be ten times as effective on foot.’

‘Do as the knight bids,’ said Malcolm, starting forth with colour on his cheek, light in his eye, that made him another being. ‘In him there is help.’

‘Ay, ay, Lord Malcolm,’ muttered Halbert; ‘you need not tell me that: I know my duty better than not to do the bidding of a belted knight, and pretty man too of his inches.’

The two attendants of Sir James were meantime apparently uttering some remonstrance, to which he lightly replied, ‘Tut, Nigel; it will do thine heart good to hew down a minion of Albany. What were I worth could I not strike a blow against so foul a wrong to my own orphan kindred? Brewster, I’ll answer it to thy master. These are his foes, as well as those of all honest men. Ha! thou art as glad to be at them as I myself.’

By this time he had exchanged his cap for a steel helmet, and was assuming the command as his natural right, as he placed the men in their ambush behind the knoll, received reports from those he had set to watch, and concerted the signal with Halbert and his own followers. Malcolm kept by him, shivering with intense excitement and eagerness; and thus they waited till the horses’ hoofs and clank of armour were distinctly audible. But even then Sir James, with outstretched hand, signed his followers back, and kept them in the leash, as it were, until the troop was fairly in the valley, those in front beginning to halt to give their horses water. They were, in effect, riding somewhat carelessly, and with the ease of men whose feat was performed, and who expected no more opposition. Full in the midst was Lilias, entirely muffled and pinioned by a large plaid drawn closely round her, and held upon the front of the saddle of a large tall horse, ridden by a slender, light-limbed, wiry groom, whom Malcolm knew as Christopher Hall, a retainer of the Duke of Albany; and beside him rode her captor, Sir Walter Stewart, a man little above twenty, but with a bronzed, hardened, reckless expression that made him look much older, and of huge height and giant build. Malcolm knew him well, and regarded him with unmitigated horror and dread, both from the knowledge of his ruffianly violence even towards his father, from fear of his intentions, and from the misery that his brutal jests, scoffs, and practical jokes had often personally inflicted: and the sight of his sister in the power of this wicked man was the realization of all his worst fears. But ere there was time for more than one strong pang of consternation and constitutional terror, Sir James’s shout of ‘St. Andrew for the right!’ was ringing out, echoed by all the fifteen in ambush with him, as simultaneously they leapt forward. Malcolm, among the first, darting with one spring, as it were, to the horse where his sister was carried, seized the bridle with his left hand, and flashing his sword upon the ruffian with the other, shouted, ‘Let go, villain; give me my sister!’ Hall’s first impulse was to push his horse forward so as to trample the boy down, but Malcolm’s hold rendered this impossible; besides, there was the shouting, the clang, the confusion of the outburst of an ambush all around and on every side, and before the man could free his hand to draw his weapon he necessarily loosed his grasp of Lilias, who, half springing, half falling, came to the ground, almost overthrowing her brother in her descent, but just saved by him from coming down prostrate. The horse, suddenly released, started forward with its rider and at the same moment Malcolm, recovering himself, stood with his sword in his hand, his arm round his sister’s waist, assuring her that she was safe, and himself glowing for the first time with manly exultation. Had he not saved and rescued her himself?

It was as well, however, that the rescue did not depend on his sole prowess. Indeed, by the time the brother and sister were clinging together and turning to look round, the first shock was over, and the retainers of Albany, probably fancying the attack made by a much larger troop, were either in full flight, or getting decidedly the worst in their encounters with their assailants.

Sir James Stewart had at the first onset sprung like a lion upon the Master of Albany, and without drawing his sword had grappled with him. ‘In the name of St. Andrew and the King, yield thy prey, thou dastard,’ were his words as he threw his arms round the body of Sir Walter, and exerted his full strength to drag him from his horse. The young giant writhed, struggled, cursed, raged; he had not space to draw sword or even dagger, but he struck furiously with his gauntleted hand, strove to drive his horse forward. The struggle like that of Hercules and Antæus, so desperate and mighty was the strength put forth on either side, but nothing could unclasp the iron grip of those sinewy arms, and almost as soon as Malcolm and Lilias had eyes to see what was passing, Walter Stewart was being dragged off his horse by that tremendous grapple, and the next moment his armour rung as he lay prostrate on his back upon the ground.

His conqueror set his mailed foot upon his neck lightly, but so as to prevent any attempt to rise, and after one moment’s pause to gather breath, said in a clear deep trumpet voice, ‘Walter Stewart of Albany, on one condition I grant thee thy life. It is that thou take the most solemn oath on the spot that no spulzie or private brawl shall henceforth stain that hand of thine while thy father holds the power in Scotland. Take that oath, thou livest: refuse it, and—’ He held up the deadly little dagger called the misericorde.

‘And who art thou, caitiff land-louper,’ muttered Walter, ‘to put to oath knights and princes?’

The knight raised the visor of his helmet. The evening sun shone resplendently on his damasked blue armour and the St. Andrew’s cross on his breast, and lighted up that red fire that lurked in his eyes, and withal the calm power and righteous indignation on his features might have befitted an avenging angel wielding the lightning.

‘Thou wilt know me when we meet again,’ was all he said; and for the very calmness of the voice the Master of Albany, who was but a mere commonplace insolent ruffian, quailed with awe and terror to the very backbone.

‘Loose me, and I will swear,’ he faintly murmured.

Sir James, before removing his foot, unclasped his gorget, and undoing a chain, held up a jewel shaped like a St. Andrew’s cross, with a diamond in the midst, covering a fragmentary relic. At the sight Walter Stewart’s eyes, large pale ones, dilated as if with increased consternation, the sweat started on his forehead, and his breath came in shorter gasps. Malcolm and Lilias, standing near, likewise felt a sense of strange awe, for they too had heard of this relic, a supposed fragment of St. Andrew’s own instrument of martyrdom, which had belonged to St. Margaret, and had been thought a palladium to the royal family and House of Stewart.

‘Rise on thy knees,’ said Sir James, now taking away his foot, ‘and swear upon this.’

Walter, completely cowed and overawed, rose to his knees at his victor’s command, laid his hand on the relic, and in a shaken, almost tremulous voice, repeated the words of the oath after his dictation: ‘I, Walter Stewart, Master of Albany, hereby swear to God and St. Andrew, to fight in no private brawl, to spoil no man nor woman, to oppress no poor man, clerk, widow, maid, or orphan, to abstain from all wrong or spulzie from this hour until the King shall come again in peace.’

He uttered the words, and kissed the jewel that was tendered to him; and then Sir James said, in the same cold and dignified tone, ‘Let thine oath be sacred, or beware. Now, mount and go thy way, but take heed how I meet thee again.’

Sir Walter’s horse was held for him by Brewster, the knight’s English attendant, and without another word he flung himself into the saddle, and rode away to join such of his followers as were waiting dispersed at a safe distance to mark his fate, but without attempting anything for his assistance.

‘Oh, Sir!’ burst forth Malcolm; but then, even as he was about to utter his thanks, his eye sought for the guardian who had ever been his mouthpiece, and, with a sudden shriek of dismay, he cried, ‘My uncle! where is he? where is Sir David?’

‘Alack! alack!’ cried Lilias. ‘Oh, brother, I saw him on the ground; he fell before my horse. I saw no more, for the Master held me, and muffled my face. Oh, let us back, he may yet live.’

‘Yea, let us back,’ said Sir James, ‘if we may yet save the good old man. Those villains will not dare to follow; or if they do, Nigel—Brewster, you understand guarding the rear.’

‘Sir,’ began Lilias, ‘how can we thank—’

‘Not at all, lady,’ replied Sir James, smiling; ‘you will do better to take your seat; I fear it must be en croupe, for we can scarce dismount one of your guards.’

‘She shall ride behind me,’ said Malcolm, in a more alert and confident voice than had ever been heard from him before.

‘Ay, right,’ said Sir James, placing a kind hand on his shoulder; ‘thou hast won her back by thine own exploit, and mayst well have the keeping of her. That rush on the caitiff groom was well and shrewdly done.’

And for all Malcolm’s anxiety for his uncle, his heart had never given such a leap as at finding himself suddenly raised from the depressed down-trodden coward into something like manhood and self-respect.

Lilias, who, like most damsels of her time, was hardy and active, saw no difficulties in the mode of conveyance, and, so soon as Malcolm had seated himself on horseback, she placed one foot upon his toe, and with a spring of her own, assisted by Sir James’s well-practised hand, was instantly perched on the crupper, clasping her brother round the waist with her arms, and laying her head on his shoulder in loving pride at his exploit, while for her further security Sir James threw round them both the long plaid that had so lately bound her.

‘Dear Malcolm’—and her whisper fell sweetly on his ear—‘it will be bonnie tidings for Patie that thou didst loose me all thyself. The false tyrant, to fall on us the very hour Patie was on the salt sea.’

But they were riding so fast that there was scant possibility for words; and, besides, Sir James kept too close to them for private whispers. In about an hour’s time they had crossed the bit of table-land that formed the moor, and descended into another little gorge, which was the place where the attack had been made upon the travellers.

This was where it was possible that they might find Sir David; but no trace was to be seen, except that the grass was trampled and stained with blood. Perhaps, both Lilias and old Halbert suggested, some of their people had returned and taken him to the Abbey of Coldingham, and as this was by far the safest lodging and refuge for her and her brother, the horses’ heads were at once turned thitherwards.

The grand old Priory of Coldingham, founded by King Edgar, son of Margaret the Saint, and of Malcolm Ceanmohr, in testimony of his gratitude for his recovery of his father’s throne from the usurper Donaldbane, was a Benedictine monastery under the dominion of the great central Abbey of Durham.

It had been a great favourite with the Scottish kings of that glorious dynasty which sprung from Margaret of Wessex, and had ample estates, which, when it was in good hands, enabled it to supply the manifold purposes of an ecclesiastical school, a model farm, a harbour for travellers, and a fortified castle. At this period, the Prior, John de Akecliff, or Oakcliff, was an excellent man, a great friend of Sir David Drummond, and much disliked and persecuted by the House of Albany, so that there was little doubt that this would be the first refuge thought of by Sir David’s followers.

Accordingly Malcolm and his companions rode up to the chief gateway, a grand circular archway, with all the noble though grotesque mouldings, zigzag and cable, dog-tooth and parrot-beak, visages human and diabolic, wherewith the Norman builders loved to surround their doorways. The doors were of solid oak, heavily guarded with iron, and from a little wicket in the midst peered out a cowled head, and instantly ensued the exclamation—

‘Benedicite! Welcome, my Lord Malcolm! Ah! but this will ease the heart of the Tutor of Glenuskie!’

‘Ah! then he is here?’ cried Malcolm.

‘Here, Sir, but in woful plight; borne in an hour syne by four carles who said you had been set upon by the Master of Albany, and sair harried, and they say the Tutor doth nought but wail for his bairns. How won ye out of his hands, my Lord?’

‘Thanks to this good knight,’ said Malcolm; and the gate was opened, and the new-comers dismounted to pass under the archway, which taught humility. A number of the brethren met them as they came forth into the first quadrangle, surrounded by a beautiful cloister, and containing what was called Edgar’s Walls, a house raised by the good founder, for his own lodging and that of visitors, within the monastery. It was a narrow building, about thirty feet from the church, was perfectly familiar to Malcolm, who bent his steps at once thither, among the congratulations of the monks; and Lilias was not prevented from accompanying him thus far within the convent, but all beyond the nave of the church was forbidden ground to her sex, though the original monastery destroyed by the Danes had been one of the double foundations for monks and nuns.

Entering the building, the brother and sister hastily crossed a sort of outer hall to a chamber where Sir David lay on his bed, attended by the Prior Akecliff and the Infirmarer. The glad tidings had already reached him, and he held out his hands, kissed and blessed his restored charges, and gave thanks with all his heart; but there was a strange wanness upon his face, and a spasm of severe pain crossed him more than once, though, as Lilias eagerly asked after his hurts, he called them nothing, since he had her safe again, and then bade Malcolm summon the captive knight that he might thank him.

Sir James Stewart had been left in the hall without, to the hospitality of the monks; he had laid aside his helmet, washed his face, and arranged his bright locks, and as he rose to follow Malcolm, his majestic stature and bearing seemed to befit the home of the old Scottish King.

As he entered the chamber, Sir David slightly raised himself on the pillow, and, with his eyes dilating into a bewildered gaze, exclaimed, ‘My liege, my dear master!’

‘He raves,’ sighed Lilias, clasping Malcolm’s hand in dire distress.

‘No,’ muttered the sick man, sinking back. ‘Good King Robert has been in his grave many a day; his sons, woe is me!—Sir,’ recovering himself, ‘pardon the error of an old dying man, who owes you more than he can express.’

‘Then, Sir,’ said James Stewart, ‘grant me the favour of a few moments’ private speech with you. I will not keep you long from him,’ he added to Malcolm and Lilias.

His manner was never one to be disputed, there was an atmosphere of obedience about the whole monastery, and the Prior added—

‘Yes, my children, it is but fitting that you should give thanks in the church for your unlooked-for deliverance.’

Malcolm was forced to lead Lilias away into the exquisite cross church, built in the loveliest Early English style, of which a few graceful remnants still exist. The two young things knelt together hand in hand in the lornness of their approaching desolation, neither of them having dared to utter the foreboding upon their hearts, but feeling it all the more surely; and while the sister’s spirit longed fervently after him whose protection had been only just removed, the brother looked up to the sheltering vaults, lost in the tranquil twilight, and felt that here alone was his haven of peace, the refuge for the feeble and the fatherless.

Their devotions performed, they ventured back to the outer hall, and on their return being notified, they were again admitted. Sir James, who had been seated on a stool by the sick man’s head, immediately rose and resigned his place to Lilias, but did not leave the room and Sir David thus spoke: ‘Bairns, God in His mercy hath raised you up the best of guardians in the stead of your ain poor Tutor. Malcolm, laddie, you will ride the morn with this gentleman to the true head of your name, your ain King, whom God for ever bless!’ His voice quivered. ‘And be it your study so to profit by his example and nurture, as to do your devoir by him for ever.’

‘Nay, father,’ cried Malcolm, ‘I cannot leave you and Lily.’

‘If you call me father, do my bidding,’ said Sir David. ‘Lily can be safely bestowed with the good Sisters of St. Abbs, nor while you are out of Albany’s reach is the poor lassie worth his molesting; but when I am gone, your uncles of Albany and Athole become your tutors, and the Prior has no power to save you. Only over the Border with the King is there safety from them, and your ruin is the ruin of your sister.’

‘And,’ added Sir James, ‘when the King is at liberty, or when you yourself are of age, you will return to resume the charge of your fair sister, unless some nearer protector be found. Meantime,’ he laid one hand on Malcolm’s head, and with the other took out the relic which had had so great an effect upon Walter Stewart, ‘I swear on this holy Rood of St. Andrew, that Malcolm Stewart of Glenuskie shall be my charge, not merely as my kinsman, but as my young brother.’

‘You hear, Malcolm,’ said Sir David. ‘You will strive to merit such goodness.’

‘Father,’ broke out the poor boy again, ‘you cannot mean to part us! Let us abide as we have been till I am of age to take my vows! I am not fit to serve the King.’

‘He is the best judge of that,’ returned Sir James.

‘And,’ added Sir David, ‘I tell you, lad, that I shall never be as I was before, and that were I a whole man and sain, riding back to Glenuskie the morn, I should still bless the saints and bid you gang.’

Rarely did the youth of the fifteenth century venture to question the authority of an elder, but Malcolm was only silenced for a moment, and though by no means understanding that his guardian believed his injuries mortal, he threw himself upon the advice of the Prior, whom he entreated to allow him to judge for himself, and to remain to protect his sister—he talked boldly of protecting her after this day’s exploit. But Prior Akecliff gave him no more encouragement than did his uncle. The Benedictine vows were out of the question till he should be eighteen, and the renunciation of the world they involved would be ruinous to Lilias, since she would become his heiress. Moreover, the Prior himself was almost in a state of siege, for the Regent was endeavouring to intrude on the convent one Brother William Drake, or Drax, by his own nomination, instead of the canonical appointment emanating from Durham, and as national feeling went with the Regent’s nominee, it was by no means certain that the present Prior would be able to maintain his position.

‘Oh, go! yes, go, dear brother,’ entreated Lilias. ‘I should be far happier to know you in safety. They cannot hurt me while you are safe.’

‘But you, Lily! What if this villain Drax have his way?’

‘He could not harm her in St. Ebba’s fold,’ returned the Prior. ‘The Abbess herself could not yield her; and, as you have so often been told, my young Lord, your absence is a far greater protection to your sister than your presence. Moreover, were the Tutor’s mind at rest, there would be far better hope of his recovery.’

There was no alternative, and Malcolm could not but submit. Lilias was to be conducted before daybreak to the monastery of St. Abbs, about six miles off, whence she could be summoned at any time to be with her uncle in Coldingham; and Malcolm was to set off at daybreak with the captive knight, whose return to England could no longer be delayed.

Poor children! while Sir James Stewart was in the Prior’s chamber, they sat silent and mournful by the bedside where their guardian lay dozing, even till the bell for Matins summoned them in common with all the other inmates of the convent; they knelt on the floor of the candle-lit church, and held each other’s hands as they prayed; Lilias still the stronger and more hopeful, while Malcolm, as he looked up at those dear familiar vaultings, felt as if he were a bird driven from its calm peaceful nest to battle with the tossing winds and storms of ocean, without one near him whom he had learnt to love.

It was still dark when the service had ended, and Prior Akecliff came towards them. ‘Daughter,’ he said to Lilias, ‘we deem it safer that you should ride to St. Abbs ere daylight. Your palfrey is ready, the Mother Abbess is warned, and I will myself conduct you thither.’

Priors were not people to be kept waiting, and as it was reported that the Tutor of Glenuskie was still asleep, Lilias had to depart without taking leave of him. With Malcolm the last words were spoken while crossing the court. ‘Fear not, Lily; my heart will only weary till the Church owns me, and Patie has you.’

‘Nay, my Malcolm; mayhap, as the Prior tells me, your strength and manhood will come in the south country.’

‘Let them,’ said Malcolm; ‘I will neither cheat the Church nor Patie.’

‘It were no cheat. There never was any compact. Patie is winning his fortune by his own sword; he would scorn—’

‘Hush, Lily! When the King sees what a weakling Sir James has brought him, he will be but too glad to exchange Patie for me, and leave me safe in these blessed walls.’

But here they were under the archway, and the convoy of armed men, whom the exigencies of the time forced the convent to maintain, were already mounted. Sir James stood ready to assist the lady to her saddle, and with one long earnest embrace the brother and sister were parted, and Lilias rode away with the Prior by her side, letting the tears flow quietly down her cheeks in the darkness, and but half hearing the long arguments by which good Father Akecliff was proving to her that the decision was the best for both Malcolm and herself.

By and by the dawn began to appear, the air of the March night became sharper, and in the distance the murmur and plash of the tide was heard. Then, standing heavy and dark against the clear pale eastern sky, there arose the dark mass of St. Ebba’s monastery, the parent of Coldingham, standing on the very verge of the cliff to which it has left the name of St. Abb’s Head, upon ground which has since been undermined by the waves, and has been devoured by them. The sea, far below, calmly brightened with the brightening sky, and reflected the morning stars in a lucid track of light, strong enough to make the lights glisten red in the convent windows. Lilias was expected, was a frequent guest, and had many friends there, and as the sweet sound of the Lauds came from the chapel, and while she dismounted in the court the concluding ‘Amen’ swelled and died away, she, though no convent bird, felt herself in a safe home and shelter under the wing of kind Abbess Annabel Drummond, and only mourned that Malcolm, so much tenderer and more shrinking than herself, should be driven into the unknown world that he dreaded so much more than she did.

CHAPTER III: HAL

The sun had not long been shining on the dark walls of St. Ebba’s monastery, before the low-browed gate of Coldingham Priory opened to let pass the guests of the previous night. Malcolm had been kissed and blessed by his guardian, and bidden to transfer his dutiful obedience to his new protector; and somewhat comforted by believing Sir David to be mending since last night, he had rent himself away, and was riding in the frosty morning air beside the kinsman who had so strangely taken charge of him, and accompanied by Sir James’s tall old Scottish squire, by the English groom, and by Malcolm’s own servant, Halbert.

For a long space there was perfect silence: and as Malcolm began to detach his thoughts from all that he had left behind, he could not help being struck with the expressions that flitted over his companion’s countenance. For a time he would seem lost in some deep mournful reverie, and his head drooped as if in sadness or perplexity; then a sudden gleam would light up his face, as if a brilliant project had occurred to him, his lips would part, his eyes flash, he would impel his horse forward as though leading a charge, or lift up his head with kindling looks, like one rehearsing a speech; but ever a check would come on him in the midst, his mouth closed in dejection, his brow drew together in an anguish of impatience, his eyelids drooped in weariness, and he would ride on in deep reflection, till roused perhaps by the flight of a moor-fowl, or the rush of a startled roe, he would hum some gay French hunting-song or plaintive Scottish ballad.

Scarcely a word had been uttered, until towards noon, on the borders of a little narrow valley, the merry sound of bells clashed up to their ears, and therewith sounds of music. ‘’Tis the toon of Christ’s Kirk on the Green,’ said the squire, as Sir James looked at him for information, ‘where we were to bait. Methought in Lent we had been spared this gallimawfrey.’

‘’Tis Midlent week, you pagan,’ replied Sir James. ‘These good folk have come a-mothering, and a share of their simnels we’ll have.’

‘Sir,’ entreated the squire, ‘were it not more prudent of you to tarry without, and let me fetch provisions?’

‘Hoot, man, a throng is our best friend! Besides, the horses must rest.’

So saying, Sir James rode eagerly forward; Malcolm following, not without wonder at not having been consulted, for though kept in strict discipline by his uncle, it had always been with every courtesy due to his rank as a king’s grandson; and the cousins, from whom he had suffered, were of the same rank with himself. Did this wandering landless knight, now he had him in his power, mean to disregard all that was his due? But when Sir James turned round his face sparkling with good-humour and amusement, and laughed as he said, ‘Now then for the humours of a Scottish fair!’ all his offended dignity was forgotten.

The greensward was surrounded by small huts and hovels; a little old stone church on one side, and a hostel near it, shadowed by a single tall elm, beneath which was the very centre of the village wake. Not only was it Midlent, but the day was the feast of a local saint, in whose honour Lenten requirements were relaxed. Monks and priests were there in plenty, and so were jugglers and maskers, Robin Hood and Marion, glee-men and harpers, merchants and hucksters, masterful beggars and sorners, shepherds in gray mauds with wise collies at their feet, shrewd old carlines with their winter’s spinning of yarn, lean wolf-like borderers peaceable for the nonce, merry lasses with tow-like locks floating from their snoods, all seen by the intensely glittering sun of a clear March day, dry and not too cold for these hardy northern folk.

Nigel, the squire, sighed in despondency; and Malcolm, who hated crowds, and knew himself a mark for the rude observations of a free-spoken populace, shrank up to him, when Sir James, nodding in time to the tones of a bagpipe that was playing at the hostel door, flung his bridle to Brewster the groom, laughed at his glum and contemptuous looks, merrily hailed the gudewife with her brown face and big silver ear-rings, seated himself on the bench at the long wooden table under the great garland of fir-boughs, willow catkins, and primroses, hung over the boughs of the tree, crossed himself, murmured his Benedictus benedicat, drew his dagger, carved a slice of the haunch of ox on the table, offered it to the reluctant Malcolm, then helping himself, entered into conversation with the lean friar on one side of him, and the stalwart man-at-arms opposite, apparently as indifferent as the rest of the company to the fact that the uncovered boards of the table were the only trenchers, and the salt and mustard were taken by the point of each man’s dagger from common receptacles dispersed along the board. Probably the only person really disgusted or amazed was the English Brewster, who, though too cautious to express a word of his feelings, preserved the most complete silence, and could scarcely persuade himself to taste the rude fare.

Nor when the meal was over was Sir James disposed to heed the wistful looks of his attendants, but wandered off to watch the contest in archery at the butts, where arrow after arrow flew wide of the clout, for the strength of Scotland did not lie in the long-bow, and Albany’s edict that shooting should be practised on Sundays and holidays had not produced as yet any great dexterity.

Sir James at first laughed merrily at the extraordinary screwings of visage and contortions of attitude, and the useless demonstration of effort with which the clowns aimed their shafts and drew their bow, sometimes to find the arrow on the grass at their feet, sometimes to see it producing consternation among the bystanders; but when he saw Brewster standing silently apart, viewing their efforts with a scorn visible enough in the dead stolidity of his countenance, he murmured a bitter interjection, and turned away with folded arms and frowning brow.

Nigel again urged their departure, but at that moment the sweet notes of a long narrative ballad began to sound to the accompaniment of a harp, and he stood motionless while the wild mournful ditty told of the cruelty of the Lady of Frendraught, and how

‘Morning sun ne’er shone upon
Lord John and Rothiemay.

Large tears were dropping from under the hand with he veiled his emotion; and when Nigel touched his cloak to remind him that the horses were ready, he pressed the old man’s hand, saying, with a sigh, ‘I heard that last at my father’s knee! It rung in my ears for many a year! Here, lad!’ and dropping a gold coin into the wooden bowl carried round by the blind minstrel’s attendant, he was turning away, when the glee-man, detecting perhaps the ring of the coin, broke forth in stirring tones—

“It fell about the Lammas tide,
When moormen win their hay,
The doughty Earl of Douglas rode
Into England to catch a prey.”

Again he stood transfixed, beating time with his hand, his eyes beaming, his hips moving as he followed the spirit-stirring ballad; and then, as Douglas falls, and is laid beneath the bracken bush, unseen by his men, and Montgomery forces Hotspur to yield, not to him, but

‘to the bracken bush
That grows upon the lily lea,’

he sobbed without disguise; and no sooner was the ballad ended than he sprang forward to the harper, crying, ‘Again, again; another gold crown to hear it again!’

‘Sir,’ entreated Nigel, ‘remember how much hangs on your speed.’

‘The ballad I must have,’ exclaimed Sir James, trying to shake him off. ‘It moves the heart more than aught I ever heard! How runs it?’

‘I know the ballad,’ said Malcolm, half in impatience, half in contempt. ‘I could sing every word of it. Every glee-man has it.’

‘Nay—hear you, Sir—the lad can sing it,’ reiterated Nigel; and Sir James, throwing the promised guerdon to the minstrel, let himself be led away to the front of the inn; but there was a piper, playing to a group of dancers, and as if his feet could not resist the fascination, Sir James held out his hand to the first comely lass he saw disengaged, and in spite of the steel-guarded boots that he wore, answered foot for foot, spring for spring, to the deft manoeuvres of her shoeless feet, with equal agility and greater grace. Nigel frowned more than ever at this exhibition, and when the knight had led his panting partner to a seat, and called for a tankard of ale for her refreshment, he remonstrated more seriously still. ‘Sir, the gates of Berwick will be shut.’

‘The days lengthen, man.’

‘And who knows if some of yon land-loupers be not of Walter Stewart’s meiné? Granted that they ken not yourself, that lad is only too ken-speckle. Moreover, you ye made free enough with your siller to set the haill crew of moss-troopers on our track.’

‘Twenty mile to Berwick-gate,’ said Sir James, carelessly; ‘nor need you ever look behind you at jades like theirs. Nay, friend, I come, since you grudge me for once the sight of a little wholesome glee among my own people. My holiday is dropping from me like sands in an hour-glass!’

He mounted, however, and put his horse to as round a pace as could be maintained by the whole party with out distress; nor did he again break silence for many miles.

At the gates of Berwick, then in English hands, be gave a pass-word, and was admitted, he bade Nigel conduct Lord Malcolm to an inn, explaining that it was his duty to present himself to the governor; and, being detained to sup with him, was seen no more till they started the next morning. The governor rode out with them some ten miles, with a strong guard of spearmen; and after parting with him they pushed on to the south.

After the first day’s journey, Malcolm was amazed to see Sir James mount without any of his defensive armour, which was piled on the spare horse; his head was covered by a chaperon, or flat cap with a short curtain to it, and his sword was the only weapon he retained. Nigel was also nearly unarmed, and Sir James advised Malcolm himself to lay aside the light hawberk he wore; then, at his amazed look, said, ‘Poor lad! he never saw the day when he could ride abroad scathless. When will the breadth of Scotland be as safe as these English hills?’

He was very kind to his young companion, treating him in all things like a guest, pointing out what was worthy of note, and explaining what was new and surprising. Malcolm would have asked much concerning the King, to whom he was bound, but these questions were the only ones Sir James put aside, saying that his kinsman would one day learn that it ill beseemed those who were about a king’s person to speak of him freely.

One night was spent at Durham, the parent of Coldingham, and here Malcolm felt at home, far more grand as was that mighty cathedral institution. There it stood, with the Weir encircling it, on its own fair though mighty hill, with all the glory of its Norman mister and lovely Lady-chapel; yet it seemed to the boy more like a glorified Coldingham than like a strange region.

‘The peace of God rests on the place,’ he said, when Sir James asked his thoughts as he looked back at the grand mass of buildings. ‘These are the only spots where the holy and tender can grow, like the Palestine lilies sheltered from the blast in the Abbot’s garden at Coldingham.’

‘Nay, lad, it were an ill world did lilies only grow in abbots’ gardens.’

‘It is an ill world,’ said Malcolm.

‘Let us hear what you say in a month’s time,’ replied the knight, lightly: then dreaming over the words.

A few days more, and they were riding among the lovely rock and woodland scenery of Yorkshire, when suddenly there leaped from behind a bush three or four young men, with a loud shout of ‘Stand.’

‘Reivers!’ thought Malcolm, sick with dismay, as the foremost grasped Sir James’s bridle; but the latter merely laughed, saying, ‘How now, Hal! be these your old tricks?’

‘Ay, when such prizes are errant,’ said the assailant and Sir James, springing from his horse, embraced him and his companion with a cordiality that made Malcolm not a little uneasy. Could he have been kidnapped by a false Englishman into a den of robbers for the sake of his ransom?

‘You are strict to your time,’ said the chief robber. ‘I knew you would be. So, when Ned Marmion came to Beverley, and would have us to see his hunting at Tanfield, we came on thinking to meet you. Marmion here has a nooning spread in the forest; ere we go on to Thirsk, where I have a matter to settle between two wrong-headed churls. How has it been with you, Jamie? you have added to your meiné.’

‘Ah, Hal! never in all your cut-purse days did you fall on such an emprise as I have achieved.’

‘Let us hear,’ said Hal, linking his arm in Sir James’s, who turned for a moment to say, ‘Take care of the lad, John; he is a young kinsman of mine.’

‘Kinsman!’ thought Malcolm; ‘do all wandering Stewarts claim kin to the blood royal?’ but then, as he looked at Sir James’s stately head, he felt that no assumption could be unbecoming in one of such a presence, and so kind to himself; and, ashamed of the moment’s petulance, dismounted, and, as John said, ‘This is the way to our noon meat,’ he let himself be conducted through the trees to a glade, sheltered from the wind, where a Lenten though not unsavoury meal of bread, dried fish, and eggs was laid out on the grass, in a bright warm sunshine; and Hal, declaring himself to have a hunter’s appetite, and that he knew Jamie had been starved in Scotland, and was as lean as a greyhound, seated himself on the grass, and to Malcolm’s extreme surprise, not to say disgust, was served by Lord Marmion on the knee and with doffed cap.

While the meal was being eaten, Malcolm studied the strangers. Lord Marmion was a good-humoured, hearty-looking young Yorkshireman, but the other two attracted his attention far more. They were evidently brothers, one perhaps just above, the other just below, thirty; both of the most perfect mould of symmetry, activity, and strength, though perhaps more inclining to agility than robustness. Both were fair-complexioned, and wore no beard; but John was the paler, graver, and more sedate, and his aquiline profile had an older look than that borne by Hal’s perfectly regular features. It would have been hard to define what instantly showed the seniority of his brother, for the clearness of his colouring—bright red and white like a lady’s—his short, well-moulded chin, and the fresh earnestness and animation of his countenance, gave an air of perpetual youth in spite of the scar of an arrow on the cheek which told of at least one battle; but there were those manifestations of being used to be the first which are the evident tokens of elder sonship, and the lordly manner more and more impressed Malcolm. He was glad that his own Sir James was equal in dignity, as well as superior in height, and he thought the terrible red lightning of those auburn eyes would be impossible to the sparkling azure eyes of the Englishman, steadfast, keen, and brilliant unspeakably though they were; but so soon as Sir James seemed to have made his explanation, the look was most winningly turned on him, a hand held out, and he was thus greeted: ‘Welcome, my young Prince Malcolm; I am happy that your cousin thinks so well of our cheer, that he has brought you to partake it.’

‘His keeper, Somerset,’ thought Malcolm, as he bowed stiffly; ‘he seems to treat me coolly enough. I come to serve my King,’ he said, but he was scarcely heard; for as Hal unbuckled his sword before sitting down on the grass, he thrust into his bosom a small black volume, with which he seemed to have been beguiling the time; and John exclaimed—

‘There goes Godfrey de Bulloin. I tell you, Jamie, ’tis well you are come! Now have I some one to speak with. Ever since Harry borrowed my Lady of Westmoreland’s book of the Holy War, he has not had a word to fling at me.’

‘Ah!’ said Sir James, ‘I saw a book, indeed, of the Holy Land! It would tempt him too much to hear how near the Border it dwells! What was it named, Malcolm?’

‘The “Itinerarium of Adamnanus,”’ replied Malcolm, blushing at the sudden appeal.

‘Ha! I’ve heard of it,’ cried the English knight. ‘I sent to half the convent libraries to beg the loan when Gilbert de Lannoy set forth for the survey of Palestine. Does the Monk of Iona tell what commodity of landing there may be on the coast?’

Malcolm had the sea-port towns at his fingers’ ends, and having in the hard process of translation, and reading and re-reading one of the few books that came into his hands, nearly mastered the contents, he was able to reply with promptness and precision, although with much amazement, for

‘Much he marvelled a knight of pride
Like book-bosomed priest should ride;’

nor had he ever before found his accomplishments treated as aught but matters of scorn among the princes and nobles with whom he had occasionally been thrown.

‘Good! good!’ said Sir Harry at last. ‘Well read, and clearly called to mind. The stripling will do you credit, James. Where have you studied, fair cousin?’

Cousin! was it English fashion to make a cousin of everybody? But gentle, humble Malcolm had no resentment in him, and felt gratified at the friendly tone of so grand and manly-looking a knight. ‘At home,’ he answered, ‘with a travelling scholar who had studied at Padua and Paris.’

‘That is where you Scots love to haunt! But know you how they are served there? I have seen the gibbet where the Mayor of Paris hung two clerks’ sons for loving his daughters over well!’

‘The clerks’ twa sons of Owsenford that were foully slain!’ cried Malcolm, his face lighting up. ‘Oh, Sir, have you seen their gibbet?’

‘What? were they friends of yours?’ asked Hal, much amused, and shaking his head merrily at Sir James. ‘Ill company, I fear—’

‘Only in a ballad,’ said Malcolm, colouring, ‘that tells how at Yuletide the ghosts came to their mother with their hats made of the birk that grew at the gates of Paradise.’

‘A rare ballad must that be!’ exclaimed Hal. ‘Canst sing it? Or are you weary?—Marmion, prithee tell some of the fellows to bring my harp from the baggage.’

‘His own harp is with ours,’ said Sir James; ‘he will make a better figure therewith.’

At his sign, the attendant, Nigel, the only person besides Lord Marmion of Tanfield who had been present at the meal, besides the two Stewarts and the English brothers, rose and disappeared between the trees, beyond which a hum of voices, an occasional laugh, and the stamping of horses and jingling of bridles, betokened that a good many followers were in waiting. Malcolm’s harp was quickly brought, having been slung in its case to the saddle of Halbert’s horse; and as he had used it to beguile the last evening’s halt, it did not need much tuning. Surprised as his princely notions were at being commanded rather than requested to sing, the sweet encouraging smile and tone of kind authority banished all hesitation in complying, and he gave the ballad of the Clerks’ Twa Sons of Owsenford with much grace and sweetness, while the weakness of his voice was compensated by the manlier strains with which Sir James occasionally chimed in. Then, as Harry gave full meed of appreciative praise and thanks, Sir James said, ‘Lend me thine harp, Malcolm; I have learnt thy song now; and thou, Harry, must hear and own how far our Scottish minstrelsy exceeds thy boasted Chevy Chase.’

And forth rang in all the mellow beauty of his voice that most glorious of ballads, the Battle of Otterburn, as much more grand than it had been when he heard it from the glee-man or from Malcolm, as a magnificent voice, patriotic enthusiasm, and cultivation and refinement, could make it. He had lost himself and all around in the passion of the victory, the pathos of the death. But no such bright look of thanks recompensed him. Harry’s face grew dark, and he growled, ‘Douglas dead? Ay, he wins more fields so than alive! I wish you would keep my old Shrewsbury friend, Earl Tyneman, as you call him, at home.’

‘’Tis ill keeping the scholars in bounds when the master is away,’ returned Sir James.

‘Well, by this time Tom has taught them how to transgress—sent them home with the long scourge from robbing orchards in Anjou. He writes to me almost with his foot in the stirrup, about to give Douglas and Buchan a lesson. I shall make short halts and long stages south. This is too far off for tidings.’

‘True,’ said Sir John, with a satirical curl of the lip; ‘above all, when fair ladies brook not to ink their ivory fingers.’

‘There spake the envious fiend,’ laughed the elder brother. ‘John bears not the sight of what he will not or cannot get.’

‘I’ll never be chained to a lady’s litter, nor be forced to loiter till her wimple is pinned,’ retorted John. ‘Nor do I like dames with two husbands besides.’

‘One would have cancelled the other, as grammarians tell us,’ said Harry, ‘if thy charms, John, had cancelled thine hook nose! I would they had, ere her first marriage. Humfrey will burn his fingers there, and we must hasten back to look after that among other things.—My Lord Marmion,’ he added, starting hastily up, and calling to him as he stood at some distance conversing with the Scottish Nigel, ‘so please you, let us have the horses;’ and as the gentleman hastened to give the summons, he said, ‘We shall make good way now. We shall come on Watling Street. Ha, Jamie, when shall we prove ourselves better men than a pack of Pagan Romans, by having a set of roads fit for man or beast, of our own making instead of theirs half decayed? Look where I will, in England or France, their roads are the same in build—firm as the world itself, straight as arrows. An army is off one’s mind when once one gets on a Roman way. I’ll learn the trick, and have them from Edinburgh to Bordeaux ere ten years are out; and then, what with traffic and converse with the world, and ready justice, neither Highland men minor Gascons will have leisure or taste for robbery.’

‘Perhaps Gascons and Scots will have a voice in the matter,’ said James, a little stiffly; and the horses being by this time brought, Sir Harry mounted, and keeping his horse near that of young Malcolm, to whom he had evidently taken a fancy, he began to talk to him in so friendly and winning a manner, that he easily drew from the youth the whole history of his acquaintance with Sir James Stewart, of the rescue of his sister, and the promise to conduct him to the captive King of Scots, as the only means of saving him from his rapacious kindred.

‘Poor lad!’ said Harry, gravely.

‘Do you know King James, Sir?’ asked Malcolm, timidly.

‘Know him?’ said Harry, turning round to scan the boy with his merry blue eye. ‘I know him—yes; that as far as a poor Welsh knight can know his Grace of Scotland.’

‘And, Sir, will he be good lord to me?’

‘Eh! that’s as you may take him. I would not be one of yonder Scots under his hands!’

‘Has he learned to hate his own countrymen?’ asked Malcolm, in an awe-stricken voice.

‘Hate? I trow he has little to love them for. He is a good fellow enough, my young lord, when left to himself; but best beware. Lions in a cage have strange tempers.’

A courier rode up at the moment, and presented some letters, which Sir Harry at once opened and read, beckoning his brother and Sir James to his side, while Malcolm rode on in their wake, in a state of dismay and bewilderment. Nigel and Lord Marmion were together at so great an interval that he could not fall back on them, nor learn from them who these brothers were. And there was something in the ironical suppressed pity with which Harry had spoken of his prospects with the King of Scots, that terrified him all the more, because he knew that Sir James and Nigel would both hold it unworthy of him to have spoken freely of his own sovereign with an Englishman. Would James be another Walter? and, if so, would Sir James Stewart protect him? He had acquired much affection for, and strong reliance on, the knight; but there was something unexplained, and his heart sank.

The smooth line of Watling Street at length opened into the old town of Thirsk, and here bells were ringing, flags flying from the steeple, music sounded, a mayor and his corporation in their robes rode slowly forth, crowds lined the road-side, caps were flung up, and a tremendous shout arose, ‘God save King Harry!’

Malcolm gazed about more utterly discomfited. There was ‘Harry,’ upright on his horse, listening with a gracious smile, while the mayor rehearsed a speech about welcome and victories, and the hopeful queen, and, what was still more to the purpose, tendered a huge pair of gauntlets, each filled to the brim, one with gold, and the other with silver pieces.

‘Eh! Thanks, Master Mayor, but these gloves must be cleared, ere there is room for me to use them in battle!’

And handing the gold glove to his brother, he scattered the contents of the silver one far and wide among the populace, who shouted their blessings louder than ever, and thus he reached the market-place. There all was set forth as for the lists, a horseman in armour on either side.

‘Heigh now, Sirs,’ said Harry, ‘have we not wars enough toward without these mummings of vanity?’

‘This is no show, my Lord King,’ returned the mayor, abashed. ‘This is deadly earnest. These are two honourable gentlemen of Yorkshire, who are come hither to fight out their quarrel before your Grace.’

‘Two honourable foolsheads!’ muttered Harry; then, raising his voice, ‘Come hither, gentlemen, let us hear your quarrel.’

The two gentlemen were big Yorkshiremen, heavy-browed, and their native shrewdness packed far away behind a bumpkin stolidity and surliness that barely allowed them to show respect to the King.

‘So please you, Sir,’ growled the first in his throat, ‘here stands Christopher Kitson of Barrowbridge, ready to avouch himself a true man, and prove in yonder fellow’s teeth that it was not a broken-kneed beast that I sent up for a heriard to my Lord Archbishop when my father died; but that he of Easingwold is a black slanderer and backbiter.’

‘And here,’ shouted the other, ‘stands honest William Trenton of Easingwold, ready to thrust his lies down his throat, and prove on his body that the heriard he sent to my Lord Archbishop was a sorry jade.’

‘That were best proved by the beast’s body,’ interposed time King.

‘And,’ proceeded the doughty Kitson, as though repeating a lesson, ‘having vainly pleaded the matter these nine years, we are come to demand licence to fight it out, with lance, sword, and dagger, in your royal presence, to set the matter at rest for ever.’

‘Breaking a man’s head to prove the soundness of a horse!’ ejaculated Harry.

‘Your licence is given, Sir King?’ demanded Kitson.

‘My licence is given for a combat à l’outrance,’ said Henry; but, as they were about to flounder back on their big farm-horses, he raised his voice to a thundering sound: ‘Solely on this condition, that he who slays his neighbour, be he Trenton or Kitson, shall hang for the murder ere I leave Thirsk.’

There was a recoil, and the mayor himself ventured to observe something about the judgment of God, and ‘never so seen.’

‘And I say,’ thundered Henry, and his blue eyes seemed to flame with vehement indignation, ‘I say that the ordeal of battle is shamefully abused, and that it is a taking of God’s name—ay, and man’s life—in vain, to appeal thereto on every coxcomb’s quarrel, risking the life that was given him to serve God’s ends, not his own sullen fancy. I will have an end of such things!—And you, gentlemen, since the heriard is dead, or too old to settle the question, shake hands, and if you must let blood, come to France with me next month, and flesh your knives on French and Scots.’

‘So please you, Sir,’ grumbled Kitson, ‘there’s Mistress Agnes of Mineshull; she’s been in doubt between the two of us these five years, and she’d promised to wed whichever of us got the better.’

‘I’ll settle her mind for her! Whichever I find foremost among the French, I’ll send home to her a knight, and with better sense to boot than to squabble for nine years as to an old horse.’

He then dismounted, and was conducted into the town-hall, where a banquet was prepared, taking by the hand Sir James Stewart, and followed by his brother John, and by Malcolm, who felt as though his brain were turning, partly with amazement, partly with confusion at his own dulness, as he perceived that not only was the free-spoken Hal, Henry of Monmouth, King of England, but that his wandering benefactor, the captive knight, whose claim of kindred he had almost spurned, was his native sovereign, James the First of Scotland.

CHAPTER IV: THE TIDINGS OF BEAUGÉ

Malcolm understood it at last. In the great chamber where he was bidden to wait within ‘Nigel’ till ‘Sir James’ came from a private conference with ‘Harry,’ he had all explained to him, but within a curtness and brevity that must not be imitated in the present narrative.

The squire Nigel was in fact Sir Nigel Baird, Baron of Bairdsbrae, the gentleman to whom poor King Robert II. had committed the charge of his young son James, when at fourteen he had been sent to France, nominally for education, but in reality to secure him from the fate of his brother Rothsay.

Captured by English vessels on the way, the heir of Scotland had been too valuable a prize to be resigned by the politic Henry IV., who had lodged him at Windsor Castle, together with Edmund Mortimer, earl of March, and placed both under the nominal charge of the Prince of Wales, a youth of a few years older. Unjust as was the detention, it had been far from severe; the boys had as much liberty as their age and recreation required, and received the choicest training both in the arts of war and peace. They were bred up in close intercourse with the King’s own four sons, and were united with them by the warmest sympathy.

In fact, since usurpation had filled Henry of Lancaster’s mind with distrust and jealousy, his eldest son had been in no such enviable position as to be beyond the capacity of fellow-feeling for the royal prisoner.

Of a peculiarly frank, open, and affectionate nature, young Henry had so warmly loved the gentle and fascinating Richard II., that his trust in the father, of whom he had seen little in his boyhood, had received a severe shock through Richard’s fate. Under the influence of a new, suspicious, and avaricious wife, the King kept his son as much at a distance as possible, chiefly on the Welsh marches, learning the art of war under Hotspur and Oldcastle; and when the father and son were brought together again, the bold, free bearing and extraordinary ability of the Prince filled the suspicious mind of the King with alarm and jealousy. To keep him down, give him no money, and let him gain no influence, was the narrow policy of the King; and Henry, chafing, dreaming, feeling the injustice, and pining for occupation, shared his complaints within James, and in many a day-dream restored him freely to his throne, and together redressed the wrongs of the world. Meantime, James studied deep in preparation, and recreated himself with poetry, inspired by the charms of Joan Beaufort, the lovely daughter of the King’s legitimatized brother, the Earl of Somerset; while Henry persisted in a boy’s passionate love to King Richard’s maiden widow, Isabel of France. Entirely unrequited as his affection was, it had a beneficial effect. Next after his deep sense of religion, it kept his life pure and chivalrous. He was for ever faithful to his future wife, even when Isabel had been returned to France, and his romantic passion had fixed itself on her younger sister Catherine, whom he endowed in imagination with all he had seen or supposed in her.

Credited with every excess by the tongue of his stepmother, too active-minded not to indulge in freakish sports and experiments in life very astounding to commonplace minds, sometimes when in dire distress even helping himself to his unpaid allowance from his father’s mails, and always with buoyant high spirits and unfailing drollery that scandalized the grave seniors of the Court, there is full proof that Prince Hal ever kept free from the gross vices which a later age has fancied inseparably connected with his frolics; and though always in disgrace, the vexation of the Court, and a by-word for mirth, he was true to the grand ideal he was waiting to accomplish, and never dimmed the purity and loftiness of his aim. That little band of princely youths, who sported, studied, laughed, sang, and schemed in the glades of Windsor, were strangely brought together—the captive exiled King, the disinherited heir of the realm, and the sons of the monarch who held the one in durance and occupied the throne of the other; and yet their affection had all the frank delight of youthful friendship. The younger lads were in more favour with their father than was the elder. Thomas was sometimes preferred to him in a mortifying manner, John’s grave, quiet nature prevented him from ever incurring displeasure, and Humfrey was the spoilt pet of the family; but nothing could lessen Harry’s large-minded love of his brothers; and he was the idol and hero of the whole young party, who implicitly believed in his mighty destinies as a renovator of the world, the deliverer of Jerusalem, and restorer of the unity and purity of the Church.

‘Harry the Fifth was crowned,’ and with the full intention of carrying out his great dream. But his promise of releasing James became matter of question. The House of Albany, who held the chief power in Scotland, had bound Henry IV. over not to free their master; and it was plain that to send him home before his welcome was ensured would be but tossing him on their spears. In vain James pleaded that he was no boy, and was able to protect himself; and vowed that when the faithful should rally round his standard, he would be more than a match for his enemies; or that if not, he would rather die free than live in bondage. Henry would not listen, and insisted upon retaining him until he should himself be at leisure to bring him home with a high hand, utterly disregarding his assurance that this would only be rendering him in the eyes of his subjects another despised and hated Balliol.

Deeming himself a divinely-appointed redresser of wrongs, Henry was already beginning on his great work of purifying Europe in preparation for his mighty Crusade; and having won that splendid victory which laid distracted France at his feet, he only waited to complete the conquest as thoroughly and rapidly as might be; and, lest his grand purpose should be obstructed, this great practical visionary, though full of kindness and generosity, kept in thraldom a whole troop of royal and noble captives.

He had, however, been so far moved by James’s entreaties, as to consent that when he himself offered his devotions at the shrine of St. John of Beverley, the native saint who shared with the two cordwainers his gratitude for the glories of ‘Crispin Crispian’s day,’ his prisoner should, unknown to any save the few who shared the pilgrimage, push on to reconnoitre his own country, and judge for himself, having first sworn to reveal himself to no one, and to avoid all who could recognize him. James had visited Glenuskie within a special view to profiting by the wisdom of Sir David Drummond, and had then been at Stirling, Edinburgh, and Perth. On his way back, falling in with Malcolm in his distress, he had conceived the project of taking him to England; and finding himself already more than half recognized by Sir David, had obtained his most grateful and joyous consent. In truth, James’s heart had yearned to his young cousin, his own situation had become much more lonely of late; for Henry was no longer the comrade he had once been, since he had become a keeper instead of a fellow-sufferer. It was true that he did his best to forget this by lavishing indulgences on his captive, and insisting on being treated on terms of brotherly familiarity; but though his transcendent qualities commanded love, the intimacy could be but a semblance of the once equal friendship. Moreover, that conspiracy which cost the life of the Earl of Cambridge had taught James that cautious reserve was needed in dealing with even his old friends the princes, so easily might he be accused of plotting either with Henry’s immediate heir or with the Mortimers; and, in this guarded life, he had hailed with delight the opportunity of taking to himself the young orphan cousin of kindred blood, of congenial tastes, and home-like speech, whom he might treat at once as a younger brother and friend, and mould by and by into a trusty counsellor and assistant. That peculiar wistfulness and gentleness of Malcolm’s look and manner, together with the refinement and intellect apparent to all who conversed with him without alarming him, had won the King’s heart, and made him long to keep the boy with him. As to Malcolm’s longing for the cloister, he deemed it the result of the weakly health and refined nature which shrank from the barbarism of the outer world, and he thought it would pass away under shelter from the rude taunts of the fierce cousins, at a distance from the well-meaning exhortations of the monks, and at the spectacle of brave and active men who could also be pious, conscientious, and cultivated. In the renewed sojourn at Windsor which James apprehended, the training of such a youth as Malcolm of Glenuskie would be no small solace.

By the time Malcolm had learnt as much of all this as Sir Nigel Baird knew, or chose to communicate, the King entered the room. He flung himself on his knees, exclaiming, with warm gratitude, as he kissed the King’s hand, ‘My liege, I little kenned—’

‘I meant thee to ken little,’ said James, smiling. ‘Well, laddie, wilt thou share the prisoner’s cell?—Ay, Bairdsbrae, you were a true prophet. Harry will do all himself, and will not hear of losing me to deal with my own people at my own gate. No, no, he’ll have me back with Southron bows and bills, so soon as this small trifle of France lies quiet in his grasp! I had nearly flung back my parole in his face, and told him that no English sword should set me on the Bruce’s throne; but there is something in Harry of Monmouth that one must love, and there are moments when to see and hear him one would as soon doubt the commission of an angel with a flaming sword.’

‘A black angel!’ growled Sir Nigel.

‘Scoff and chafe, Baird, but look at his work. Look at Normandy, freed from misrule and exaction, in peace and order. Look at this land. Was ever king so loved? Or how durst he act as he did this day?’

‘Nay, an it were so at home,’ said Baird, ‘I had as lief stay here as where a man is not free to fight out his own feud. Even this sackless callant thought it shame to see two honest men baulked.’

‘Poor Scotland!’ sighed James. ‘Woe is the land where such thoughts come readiest to gray-haired men and innocent boys. I tell you, cousin, this precious right is the very cause that our poor country is so lawless and bloody, that yon poor silly sparrow would fain be caged for fear of the kites and carrion-crows.’

‘Alack, my Lord, let me but have my way. I cannot fight! Let Patrick Drummond have my sister and my lands, and your service will be far better done,’ said Malcolm.

‘I know all that,’ said the King, kindly. ‘There is time enough for settling that question; and meantime you will not be spoilt for monk or priest by cheering me awhile in my captivity. I need you, laddie,’ me added, laying his hand on the boy’s shoulder, with all the instinctive fascination of a Stewart. ‘I lack a comrade of my own blood, for I am all alone!’

‘Oh, Sir!’ and Malcolm, looking into his face, saw it full of tenderness.

‘Books and masters you shall have,’ continued James, ‘such as for church or state, cathedral, cloister, or camp, shall render you the meeter prince; and I pass you my royal word, that if at full age the cowl be your choice, I will not gainsay you. Meantime, abide with me, and be the young brother I have yearned for.’

The King threw his arms round Malcolm, who felt, and unconsciously manifested, a strange bliss in that embrace, even while fixed in his determination that nothing should make him swerve from his chosen path, nor render him false to his promise to Patrick and Lilias. It was a strange change, from being despised and down-trodden by fierce cousins, or only fondled, pitied, and treated with consideration by his own nearest and dearest friends, to be the chosen companion of a king, and such a king. Nor could it be a wile of Satan, thought Malcolm, since James still promised him liberty of choice. He would ask counsel of a priest next time he went to confession; and in the meantime, in the full tide of gratitude, admiration, and affection, he gave himself up to the enjoyment of his new situation, and of time King’s kindness and solicitude. This was indeed absolutely that of an elder brother; for, observing that Malcolm’s dress and equipments, the work of Glenuskie looms, supplemented by a few Edinburgh purchases, was uncouth enough to attract some scornful glances from the crowd who came out to welcome the royal entrance into York the next day, he instantly sent Brewster in search of the best tailor and lorimer in the city, and provided so handsomely for the appearance of young Glenuskie, his horse, and his attendants, that the whole floor of their quarters was strewn with doublets, boots, chaperons, and gloves, saddles, bridles, and spurs, when the Duke of Bedford loitered into the room, and began to banter James for thus (as he supposed) pranking himself out to meet the lady of his love; and then bemoaned the fripperies that had become the rage in their once bachelor court, vowing, between sport and earnest, that Hal was so enamoured of his fair bride, that anon the conquest of France would be left to himself and his brother, Tom of Clarence; while James retorted by thrusts at Bedford’s own rusticity of garb, and by endeavouring to force on him a pair of shoes with points like ram’s horns, as a special passport to the favour of Dame Jac—a lady who seemed to be the object of Duke John’s great distaste.

Suddenly a voice was heard in the gallery of the great old mansion where they were lodged. ‘John! John! Here!—Where is the Duke, I say?’ It was thick and husky, as with some terrible emotion; and the King and Duke had already started in dismay before the door was thrown open, and King Henry stood among them, his face of a burning red.

‘See here, John!’ he said, holding out a letter; and then, with an accent of wrathful anguish, and a terrible frown, he turned on James, exclaiming, ‘I would send you to the Tower, Sir, did I think you had a hand in this!’

Malcolm trembled, and sidled nearer his prince; while James, with an equally fierce look, replied, ‘Hold, Sir! Send me where you will, but dare not dishonour my name!’ Then changing, as he saw the exceeding grief on Henry’s brow, and heard John’s smothered cry of dismay, ‘For Heaven’s sake, Harry, what is it?’

‘This!’ said Henry, less loudly, less hotly, but still with an agony of indignation: ‘Thomas is dead—and by the hand of two of your traitor Scots!’

‘Murdered!’ cried James, aghast.

‘Murdered by all honest laws of war, but on the battlefield,’ said Henry. ‘Your cousin of Buchan and old Douglas fell on my brave fellows at Beaugé, when they were spent with travel to stop the robberies in Anjou. They closed in with their pikes on my brave fellows, took Somerset prisoner, and for Thomas, while he was dealing with a knight named Swinton in front, the villain Buchan comes behind and cleaves his head in twain; and that is what you Scots call fighting!’

‘It was worthy of a son of Albany!’ said James. ‘Would that vengeance were in my power!’

‘Ay, you loved him!’ said Henry, grasping James’s hand, his passion softened into a burst of tears, as he wrung his prisoner’s hand. ‘Nay, who did not love him, my brave, free-hearted brother? And that I—I should have dallied here and left him to bear the brunt, and be cut off by you felon Scots!’ And he hid his face, struggling within an agony of heart-rending grief, which seemed to sway his whole tall, powerful frame as he leant against the high back of a chair; while John, together with James, was imploring him not to accuse himself, for his presence had been needful at home; and, to turn the tenor of his thought, James inquired whether there were any further disaster.

‘Not as yet,’ said Henry; ‘there is not a man left in that heaven-abandoned crew who knows how to profit by what they have got! but I must back again ere the devil stir them up a man of wit!—And you, Sir, can you take order with these heady Scots?’

‘From Windsor? no,’ said James; ‘but set me in the saddle, let me learn war under such a captain as yourself, and maybe they will not take the field against me; or if they do, the slayer of Clarence shall rue it.’

‘Be it so,’ said Henry, wringing his hand. ‘You shall with me to France, Jamie, and see war. The Scots should flock to the Lion rampant, and without them the French are mo better than deer, under the fool and murderer they call Dauphin. Yet, alas! will any success give me back my brother—my brother, the brave and true?’ he added, weeping again within time abandon of an open nature and simple age. ‘It was for my sins, my forgetfulness of my great work, that this has come on me.—Ho, Marmion! carry these tidings from me to the Dean; pray him that the knell be tolled at the Minster, and a requiem sung for my brother and all who fell with him. We will be there ourselves, and the mayor must hold us excused from his banquet; these men are too loyal not to grieve for their King.’

And, with his arm round the neck of his brother John, Henry left the room; and before another word could be said, Sir Nigel was there, having only retired on the King’s entrance. The news was of course all over the house, and with an old attendant’s freedom he exclaimed, ‘So, Sir, the English have found tough cummers at last!’

‘Not too honourably,’ said James, sadly.

‘Hout, would not the puir loons be glad enow of any gate of coming by a clout at the man’s brother that keeps you captive!’

‘They have taken away one of those I loved best!’ said James.

‘I’m no speaking ill of the lad Clarence himself,’ said Nigel; ‘he was a braw youth, leal and bold, and he has died in his helm and spurs, as a good knight should. I’d wish none of these princes a waur ending. Moreover, could Swinton have had the wit to keep him living, he’d have been a bonnie barter for you, my Lord; but ony way the fight was a gallant one, and the very squire that brought the tidings cannot deny that our Scots fought like lions.’

‘Would Douglas but so fight in any good quarrel!’ sighed the King. ‘But what are you longing to ask, Malcolm? Is it for your kinsman Patrick? I fear me that there is little chance of your hearing by name of him.’

‘I wot not,’ said Sir Nigel; ‘I did but ask for that hare-brained young cousin of mine, Davie Baird, that must needs be off on this journey to France; and the squire tells me he was no herald, to be answerable for the rogues that fought on the other side.’

‘We shall soon see for ourselves,’ said James; ‘I am to make this campaign.’

‘You! you, my liege! Against your own ally, and under the standard of England! Woe’s me, how could ye be so lost!’

James argued on his own conviction that the true France was with poor Charles VI., and that it was doing the country no service to prolong the resistance of the Armagnacs and the Dauphin, who then appeared mere partisans instead of patriots. As to fighting under the English banner, no subjection was involved in an adventurer king so doing: had not the King of Bohemia thus fought at Crecy? and was not the King of Sicily with the French army? Moreover, James himself felt the necessity of gaining some experience in the art of war. Theoretically he had studied it with all his might, from Cæsar, Quintus Curtius, and that favourite modern authority, the learned ecclesiastic, Jean Pavé, who was the Vauban of the fifteenth century; and he had likewise obtained greedily all the information he could from Henry himself and his warriors; but all this had convinced him that if war was to be more than a mere raid, conducted by mere spirit and instinct, some actual apprenticeship was necessary. Even for such a dash, Henry himself had told him that he would find his book-knowledge an absolute impediment without some practice, and would probably fail for that very reason when opposed to tough old seasoned warriors. And, prudence apart, James, at five-and-twenty, absolutely glowed with shame at the thought that every one of his companions had borne arms for at least ten years past, while his arrows had no mark but the target, his lances had all been broken in the tilt-yard. It was this argument that above all served to pacify old Bairdsbrae; though he confessed himself very uneasy as to the prejudice it would create in Scotland, and so evidently loathed the expedition, that James urged on him to return to Scotland, instead of continuing his attendance. There was no fear but that his ransom would be accepted, and he had been absent twelve years from his home.

‘No, no, my Lord; I sware to your father that I’d never quit you till I brought you safe home again, and, God willing, I’ll keep my oath. But what’s this puir callant to do, that you were set upon rearing upon your books at Windsor?’

‘He shall choose,’ said James. ‘Either he shall study at the learned university at Oxford or at Paris, or he shall ride with me, and see how cities and battles are won. Speak not yet, cousin; it takes many months to shake out the royal banner, and you shall look about you ere deciding. Now give me yonder black cloak; they are assembling for the requiem.’

Malcolm, as he followed his king, was not a little amazed to see that Henry, the magnificent victor, was wrapped in a plain black serge garment, his short dark hair uncovered, his feet bare; and that on arriving at the Minster he threw himself on his knees, almost on his face, before the choir steps, there remaining while the De profundis and the like solemn and mournful strains floated through the dark vaultings above him, perhaps soothing while giving expression to the agony of his affliction, and self-accusation, not for the devastation of the turbulent country of an insane sovereign, but for his having relaxed in the mighty work of renovation that he had imposed on himself.

Even when the service was ended, the King would not leave the Minster. He lifted himself up to bid Bedford and his companions return; but for himself, he intended to remain and confess, in preparation for being ‘houselled’ at the Mass for the dead early the next morning, before hastening on the southern journey.

Was this, thought the bewildered Malcolm as he fell asleep, the godless atmosphere he had been used to think all that was not Glenuskie or Coldingham—England above all?

Indeed, in the frosty twilight of the spring morning, though Henry was now clad in his usual garb, sleeplessness, sorrow, and fasting made him as wan and haggard as any ascetic monk; his eyes were sunken, and his closed lips bore a stern fixed expression, which scarcely softened even when the sacrificial rite struck the notes of praise; and though a light came into his eye, it was rather the devotion of one who had offered himself, than the gleam of hopeful exultation. The horses stood saddled at the west door, for Henry was feverishly eager to reach Pontefract, where he had left his queen, and wished to avoid the delay of breaking his fast at York, but only to snatch a meal at some country hostel on his way.

Round the horses, however, a crowd of the citizens were collected to gaze; and two or three women with children in their arms made piteous entreaties for the King’s healing touch for their little ones. The kind Henry waited, ungloved his hand, asked his treasurer for the gold pieces that were a much-esteemed part of the cure, and signed to his attendant chaplain to say the Collect appointed for the rite.

Fervent blessings were meantime murmured through the crowd, which broke out into loud shouts of ‘God save King Harry!’ as he at length leapt into the saddle; but at that moment, a feeble, withered old man, leaning on a staff, and wearing a bedesman’s gown, peered up, and muttered to a comrade—

‘Fair-faced, quotha—fair, maybe, but not long for this world! One is gone already, and the rest will not be long after; the holy man’s words will have their way—the death mark is on him.’

The words caught James’s ear, and he angrily turned round: ‘Foul-mouthed raven, peace with thy traitor croak!’ but Bedford caught his arm, crying—

‘Hush! ’tis a mere bedesman;’ and bending forward to pour a handful of silver into the beggar’s cap, he said, ‘Pray, Gaffer, pray—pray for the dead and living, both.’

‘So,’ said James, as both mounted, ‘there’s a fee for a boding traitor.’

‘I knew his face,’ said Bedford, with a shudder; ‘he belonged to Archbishop Scrope.’

‘A traitor, too,’ said James.

‘Nay, there was too much cause for his words. Never shall I forget the day when Scrope was put to death on this very moor on which we are entering. There sat my father on his horse, with us four boys around him, when the old man passed in front of us, and looked at him with a face pitiful and terrible. “Harry of Bolingbroke,” he said, “because thou hast done these things, therefore shall thy foes be of thine own household; the sword shall never depart therefrom, but all the increase of thy house shall die in the flower of their age, and in the fourth generation shall their name be clean cut off.” The commons will have it that at that moment my father was struck with leprosy; and struck to the heart assuredly he was, nor was he ever the same man again. I always believed that those words made him harder upon every prank of poor Hal’s, till any son save Hal would have become his foe! And see now, the old bedesman may be in the right; poor pretty Blanche has long been in her grave, Thomas is with her now, and Jamie,’—he lowered his voice,—‘when men say that Harry hath more of Alexander in him than there is in other men, it strikes to my heart to think of the ring lying on the empty throne.’

‘Now,’ said James, ‘what strikes me is, what doleful bodings can come into a brave man’s head on a chill morning before he has broken his fast. A tankard of hot ale will chase away omens, whether of bishop or bedesman.’

‘It may chase them from the mind, but will not make away with them,’ said John. ‘But I might have known better than to speak to you of such things—you who are well-nigh a Lollard in disbelief of all beyond nature.’

‘No Lollard am I,’ said James. ‘What Holy Church tells me, I believe devoutly; but not in that which she bids me loathe as either craft of devils or of men.’

‘Ay, of which? There lies the question,’ said John.

‘Of men,’ said the Scottish king; ‘of men who have wit enough to lay hold of the weaker side even of a sober youth such as Lord John of Lancaster! Your proneness to believe in sayings and prophecies, in sorceries and magic, is the weakest point of all of you.’

‘And it is the weakest point in you, James, that you will not credit upon proof, such proof as was the fulfilment of the prophecy of the place of my father’s death.’

‘One such saying as that, fulfilled to the ear, though not in truth, is made the plea for all this heart-sinking—ay, and what is worse, for the durance of your father’s widow as a witch, and of her brave young son, because forsooth his name is Arthur of Richemont, and some old Welsh rhymester hath whispered to Harry that Richmond shall come out of Brittany, and be king of England.’

‘Arthur is no worse off than any other captive of Agincourt,’ said Bedford; ‘and I tell you, James, the day may come when you will rue your want of heed to timely warnings.’

‘Better rue once than pine under them all my life, and far better than let them betray me into deeming some grewsome crime an act of justice, as you may yet let them do,’ said James.

Such converse passed between the two princes, while King Henry rode in advance, for the most part silent, and only desirous of reaching Pontefract Castle, where he had left the young wife whose presence he longed for the more in his trouble. The afternoon set in with heavy rain, but he would not halt, although he gave free permission to any of his suite to do so; and James recommended Malcolm to remain, and come on the next day with Brewster. The boy, however, disclaimed all weariness, partly because bashfulness made him unwilling to venture from under his royal kinsman’s wing, and partly because he could not bear to let the English suppose that a Scotsman and a Stewart could be afraid of weather. As the rain became harder with the evening twilight, silence sank upon the whole troop, and they went splashing on through the deep lanes, in mud and mire, until the lights of Pontefract Castle shimmered on high from its hill. The gates were opened, the horses clattered in, torches came forth, flickering and hissing in the darkness. The travellers went through what seemed to Malcolm an interminable number of courts and gateways, and at length flung themselves off their horses, when Henry, striding on, mounted the steps, entered the building, and, turning the corner of a great carved screen, he and his brother, with James and Malcolm, found themselves in the midst of a blaze of cressets and tapers, which lighted up the wainscoted part of the hall.

The whole scene was dazzling to eyes coming in from the dark, and only after a moment or two could Malcolm perceive that, close to the great fire, sat a party of four, playing at what he supposed to be that French game with painted cards of which Patrick Drummond had told him, and that the rest seemed to be in attendance upon them.

Dark eyed and haired, with a creamy ivory skin, and faultless form and feature, the fair Catherine would have been unmistakable, save that as Henry hurried forward, the lights glancing on his jaded face, matted hair, and soaked dress, the first to spring forward to meet him was a handsome young man, who wrung his hand, crying, ‘Ah, Harry, Harry, then ’tis too true!’ while the lady made scarcely a step forwards: no shade of colour tinged her delicate cheek; and though she did not resist his fervent embrace, it was with a sort of recoil, and all she was heard to say was, ‘Eh, Messire, vos bottes sont crottées!’

‘You know all, Kate?’ he asked, still holding her hand, and looking afraid of inflicting a blow.

‘The battle? Is it then so great a disaster?’ and, seeing his amazed glance, ‘The poor Messire de Clarence! it was pity of him; he was a handsome prince.’

‘Ah, sweet, he held thee dear,’ said Henry, catching at the crumb of sympathy.

‘But yes,’ said Catherine, evidently perplexed by the strength of his feeling, and repeating, ‘He was a beau sieur courtois. But surely it will not give the Armagnacs the advantage?’

‘With Heaven’s aid, no! But how fares it with poor Madge—his wife, I mean?’

‘She is away to her estates. She went this morn, and wished to have taken with her the Demoiselle de Beaufort; but I forbade that—I could not be left without one lady of the blood.’

‘Alack, Joan—’ and Henry was turning, but Catherine interrupted him. ‘You have not spoken to Madame of Hainault, nor to the Duke of Orleans. Nay, you are in no guise to speak to any one,’ she added, looking with repugnance at the splashes of mud that reached even to his waist.

‘I will don a fresh doublet, sweetheart,’ said Henry, more rebuked than seemed fitting, ‘and be ready to sup anon.’

‘Supper! We supped long ago.’

‘That may be; but we have ridden long since we snatched our meal, that I might be with thee the sooner, my Kate.’

‘That was not well in you, my Lord, to come in thus dishevelled, steaming with wet—not like a king. You will be sick, my Lord.’

The little word of solicitude recalled his sweet tender smile of gratitude. No fear, ma belle; sickness dares not touch me.’

‘Then,’ said the Queen, ‘you will be served in your chamber, and we will finish our game.’

Henry turned submissively away; but Bedford tarried an instant to say, ‘Fair sister, he is sore distressed. It would comfort him to have you with him. He has longed for you.’

Catherine opened her beautiful brown eyes in a stare of surprise and reproof at the infraction of the rules of ceremony which she had brought with her. John of Bedford had never seemed to her either beau or courtois, and she looked unutterable things, to which he replied by an elevation of his marked eyebrows.

She sat down to her game, utterly ignoring the other princes in their weather-beaten condition; and they were forced to follow the King, and make their way to their several chambers, for Queen Catherine’s will was law in matters of etiquette.

‘The proud peat! She is jealous of every word Harry speaks—even to his cousin,’ muttered James, as he reached his own room. ‘You saw her, though,—you saw her!’ he added, smiling, as he laid his hand on Malcolm’s shoulder.

The boy coloured like a poppy, and answered awkwardly enough, ‘The Lady Joan, Sir?’

‘Who but the Lady Joan, thou silly lad? How say’st thou? Will not Scotland forget in the sight of that fair face all those fule phantasies—the only folly I heard at Glenuskie?’

‘Methinks,’ said Malcolm, looking down in sheer awkwardness, ‘it were easier to bow to her than to King Harry’s dame. She hath more of stateliness.’

‘Humph!’ said James, ‘dost so serve thy courtly ‘prenticeship? Nay, but in a sort I see thy meaning. The royal blood of England shows itself to one who hath an eye for princeliness of nature.’

‘Nay,’ said Malcolm, gratified, ‘those dark eyes and swart locks—’

‘Dark eyes—swart locks!’ interrupted the King. ‘His wits have gone wool-gathering.’

‘Indeed, Sir!’ exclaimed Malcolm, ‘I thought you meant the lady who stood by the Queen’s table, with the grand turn of the neck and the white wimple and veil.’

‘Pshaw!’ said James; ‘the foolish callant! he hath taken that great brown Luxemburg nun of Dame Jac’s for the Rose of Somerset.’

However, James, seeing how confounded the boy was by this momentary displeasure, explained to him who the other persons he had seen were—Jaqueline, the runaway Countess of Hainault in her own right, and Duchess of Brabant by marriage; Humfrey, duke of Gloucester, the King’s young, brilliant brother; the grave, melancholy Duke of Orleans, who had been taken captive at Agincourt, and was at present quartered at Pontefract; the handsome, but stout and heavy-looking Earl of March; brave Lord Warwick; Sir Lewis Robsart, the old knight to whose charge the Queen had been specially committed from the moment of her betrothal; and a young, bold, gay-looking lad, of Malcolm’s own age, but far taller and stouter, and with a merry, half-defiant, half-insouciant air, who had greatly taken his fancy, was, he was told, Ralf Percy, the second son of Sir Harry Percy.

‘Of him they called Hotspur?—who was taken captive at Otterburn, who died a rebel!’ exclaimed Malcolm.

‘Ay,’ said James; ‘but King Harry had learnt the art of war as a boy, first under Hotspur, in Wales; nor doth he love that northern fashion of ours of keeping up feud from generation to generation. So hath he restored the eldest son to his barony, and set him to watch our Borders; and the younger, Ralf, he is training in his own school of chivalry.’

More wonders for Malcolm Stewart, who had learnt to believe it mere dishonour and tameness to forgive the son for his father’s deeds. A cloistered priest could hardly do so: pardon to a hostile family came only with the last mortal throe; and here was this warlike king forgiving as a mere matter of course!

‘But,’ added James, ‘you had best not speak of your bent conventwards in the Court here. I should not like to have you called the monkling!’

Malcolm crimsoned, with the resolution never to betray himself.

CHAPTER V: WHITTINGTON S FEAST

The next day the royal train set forth from Pontefract, and ere mounting, James presented his young kinsman to the true Joan Beaufort—fair-haired, soft-featured, blue-eyed, and with a lovely air of graciousness, as she greeted him with a sweet, blushing, sunny smile, half that of the queen in anticipation, half that of the kindly maiden wishing to set a stranger at ease. So beautiful was she, that Malcolm felt annihilated at the thought of his blunder of last night.

As they rode on, James was entirely occupied with the lady, and Malcolm was a good deal left to himself; for, though the party was numerous, he knew no one except the Duke of Bedford, who was riding with the King and Lord Warwick, in deep consultation, while Sir Nigel Baird, Lord Marmion, and the rest were in the rear. He fell into a mood of depression such as had not come upon him since he passed the border, thinking himself despised by all for being ill-favoured and ill-dressed, and chafing, above all, at the gay contempt he fancied in young Ralf Percy’s eye. He became constantly more discontented with this noisy turmoil, and more resolved to insist on returning to the peaceful cloister where alone he could hide his head and be at rest.

The troop halted for what they called their noon meat at the abode of a hospitable Yorkshire knight; but King Henry, in order that the good gentleman’s means should not be overtasked, had given directions that only the ladies and the princes should enter the house, while the rest of the suite should take their meal at the village inn.

King James, in attending to Joan, had entirely forgotten his cousin; and Malcolm, doubtful and diffident, was looking hesitatingly at the gateway, when Ralf Percy called out, ‘Ha! you there, this is our way. That is only for the royal folk; but there’s good sack and better sport down here! I’ll show you the way,’ he added, good-naturedly, softened, as most were, by the startled, wistful, timid look.

Malcolm, ashamed to say he was royal, but surprised at the patronage, was gratefully following, when old Bairdsbrae indignantly laid his hand on the rein. ‘Not so, Sir; this is no place for you!’

‘Let me alone!’ entreated Malcolm, as he saw Percy’s amazed look and whistle of scorn. ‘They don’t want me.’

‘You will never have your place if you do not take it,’ said the old gentleman; and leading the trembling, shrinking boy up to the door, he continued, ‘For the honour of Scotland, Sir!’ and then announcing Malcolm by his rank and title, he almost thrust him in.

Fancying he detected a laugh on Ralf Percy’s face, and a sneer on that of the stout English porter, Malcolm felt doubly wretched as he was ushered into the hall and the buzz of talk and the confusion made by the attendance of the worthy knight and his many sons, one of whom, waiting with better will than skill, had nearly run down the shy limping Scotsman, who looked wildly for refuge at some table. In his height of distress, a kindly gesture of invitation beckoned to him, and he found himself seated and addressed, first in French, and then in careful foreign English, by the same lady whom he had yesterday taken for Joan of Somerset, namely, Esclairmonde de Luxemburg.

He was too much confused to look up till the piece of pasty and the wine with which the lady had caused him to be supplied were almost consumed, and it was not till she had made some observations on the journey that he became at ease enough to hazard any sort of answer, and then it was in his sweet low Scottish voice, with that irresistibly attractive look of shy wistful gratitude in his great soft brown eyes, while his un-English accent caused her to say, ‘I am a stranger here, like yourself, my Lord;’ and at the same moment he first raised his eyes to behold what seemed to him perfect beauty and dignity, an oval face, richly-tinted olive complexion, dark pensive eyes, a sweet grave mouth smiling with encouraging kindness, and a lofty brow that gave the whole face a magnificent air, not so much stately as above and beyond this world. It might have befitted St. Barbara or St. Katherine, the great intellectual virgin visions of purity and holiness of the middle ages; but the kindness of the smile went to Malcolm’s heart, and emboldened him to answer in his best French, ‘You are from Holland, lady?’

‘Not from the fens,’ she answered. ‘My home lies in the borders of the forest of Ardennes.’

And then they found that they understood each other best when she spoke French, and Malcolm English, or rather Scotch; and their acquaintance made so much progress, that when the signal was again given to mount, the Lady Esclairmonde permitted Malcolm to assist her to her saddle; and as he rode beside her he felt pleased with himself, and as if Ralf Percy were welcome to look at him now.

On Esclairmonde’s other hand there rode a small, slight girl, whom Malcolm took for quite a child, and paid no attention to; but presently old Sir Lewis Robsart rode back with a message that my Lady of Westmoreland wished to know where the Lady Alice Montagu was. A gentle, timid voice answered, ‘O Sir, I am well here with Lady Esclairmonde. Pray tell my good lady so.’

And therewith Sir Lewis smiled, and said, ‘You could scarcely be in better hands, fair damsel,’ and rode back again; while Alice was still entreating, ‘May I stay with you, dear lady? It is all so strange and new!’

Esclairmonde smiled, and said, ‘You make me at home here, Mademoiselle. It is I who am the stranger!’

‘Ah! but you have been in Courts before. I never lived anywhere but at Middleham Castle till they fetched me away to meet the Queen.’

For the gentle little maiden, a slender, fair-haired, childish-faced creature, in her sixteenth year, was the motherless child and heiress of the stout Earl of Salisbury, the last of the Montacutes, or Montagues, who was at present fighting the King’s battles in France, but had sent his commands that she should be brought to Court, in preparation for fulfilling the long-arranged contract between her and Sir Richard Nevil, one of the twenty-two children of the Earl of Westmoreland.

She was under the charge of the Countess—a stately dame, with all the Beaufort pride; and much afraid of her she was, as everything that was shy or forlorn seemed to turn towards the maiden whose countenance not only promised kindness but protection.

Presently the cavalcade passed a gray building in the midst of green fields and orchards, where, under the trees, some black-veiled figures sat spinning.

‘A nunnery!’ quoth Esclairmonde, looking eagerly after it as she rode past.

‘A nunnery!’ said Malcolm, encouraged into the simple confidingness of a young boy. ‘How unlike the one where my sister is! Not a tree is near it; it is perched upon a wild crag overhanging the angry sea, and the winds roar, and the gulls and eagles scream, and the waves thunder round it!’

‘Yet it is not the less a haven of peace,’ replied Esclairmonde.

‘Verily,’ said Malcolm, ‘one knows what peace is under that cloister, where all is calm while the winds rave without.’

‘You know how to love a cloister,’ said the lady, as she heard his soft, sad tones.

‘I had promised myself to make my home in one,’ said Malcolm; ‘but my King will have me make trial of the world first. And so please you,’ he added, recollecting himself, ‘he forbade me to make my purpose known; so pray, lady, be so good as to forget what I have said.’

‘I will be silent,’ said Esclairmonde; ‘but I will not forget, for I look on you as one like myself, my young lord. I too am dedicated, and only longing to reach my cloistered haven.’

She spoke it out with the ease of those days when the monastic was as recognized a profession as any other calling, and yet with something of the desire to make it evident on what ground she stood.

Lady Alice uttered an exclamation of surprise.

‘Yes,’ said Esclairmonde, ‘I was dedicated his my infancy, and promised myself in the nunnery at Dijon when I was seven years old.’

Then, as if to turn the conversation from herself, she asked of Malcolm if he too had made any vow.

‘Only to myself,’ said Malcolm. ‘Neither my Tutor nor the Prior of Coldingham would hear my vows.’ And he was soon drawn into telling his whole story, to which the ladies both listened with great interest and kindness, Esclairmonde commending his resolution to leave the care of his lands and vassals to one whom he represented as so much better fitted to bear them as Patrick Drummond, and only regretting the silence King James had enjoined, saying she felt that there was safety and protection in being avowed as a destined religious.

‘And you are one,’ said Lady Alice, looking at her in wonder. ‘And yet you are with that lady—’ And the girl’s innocent face expressed a certain wonder and disgust that no one could marvel at who had heard the Flemish Countess talk in the loudest, broadest, most hoydenish style.

‘She has been my very good lady,’ said Esclairmonde; ‘she has, under the saints, saved me from much.’

‘Oh, I entreat you, tell us, dear lady!’ entreated Alice. It was not a reticent age. Malcolm Stewart had already avowed himself in his own estimation pledged to a monastic life, and Esclairmonde of Luxemburg had reasons for wishing her position and intentions to be distinctly understood by all with whom she came in contact; moreover, there was a certain congeniality in both her companions, their innocence and simplicity, that drew out confidence, and impelled her to defend her lady.

‘My poor Countess,’ she said, ‘she has been sorely used, and has suffered much. It is a piteous thing when our little imperial fiefs go to the spindle side!’

‘What are her lands?’ asked Malcolm.

‘Hainault, Holland, and Zealand,’ replied the lady. ‘Her father was Count of Hainault, her mother the sister of the last Duke of Burgundy—him that was slain on the bridge of Montereau. She was married as a mere babe to the Duke of Touraine, who was for a brief time Dauphin, but he died ere she was sixteen, and her father died at the same time. Some say they both were poisoned. The saints forfend it should be true; but thus it was my poor Countess was left desolate, and her uncle, the Bishop of Liége—Jean Sans Pitié, as they call him—claimed her inheritance. You should have seen how undaunted she was!’

‘Were you with her then?’ asked Alice Montagu.

‘Yes. I had been taken from our convent at Dijon, when my dear brothers, to whom Heaven be merciful! died at Azincourt. My oncles à la mode de Bretagne—how call you it in English?’

‘Welsh uncles,’ said Alice.

‘They are the Count de St. Pol and the Bishop of Thérouenne. They came to Dijon. In another month I should have been seventeen, and been admitted as a novice; but, alack! there were all the lands that came through my grandmother, in Holland and in Flanders, all falling to me, and Monseigneur of Thérouenne, like almost all secular clergy, cannot endure the religious orders, and would not hear of my becoming a Sister. They took me away, and the Bishop declared my dedication null, and they would have bestowed me in marriage at once, I believe, if Heaven had not aided me, and they could not agree on the person. And then my dear Countess promised me that she would never let me be given without my free will.’

‘Then,’ said Alice, ‘the Bishop did cancel your dedication?’

‘Yes,’ said Esclairmonde; ‘but none can cancel the dedication of my heart. So said the holy man at Zwoll.’

‘How, lady?’ anxiously inquired Malcolm; ‘has not a bishop power to bind and unloose?’

‘Yea,’ said Esclairmonde, ‘such power that if my childish promise had been made without purpose or conscience thereof, or indeed if my will were not with it, it would bind me no more, there were no sin in wedlock for me, no broken vow. But my own conscience of my vow, and my sense that I belong to my Heavenly Spouse, proved, he said, that it was not my duty to give myself to another, and that whereas none have a parent’s right over me, if I have indeed chosen the better part, He to whom I have promised myself will not let it be taken from me, though I might have to bear much for His sake. And when I said in presumption that such would lie light on me, he bade me speak less and pray more, for I knew not the cost.’

‘He must have been a very holy man,’ said Alice, ‘and strict withal. Who was he?’

‘One Father Thomas, a Canon Regular of the chapter of St. Agnes, a very saint, who spends his life in copying and illuminating the Holy Scripture, and in writing holy thoughts that verily seem to have been breathed into him by special inspiration of God. It was a sermon of his in Lent, upon chastening and perplexity, that I heard when first I was snatched from Dijon, that made me never rest till I had obtained his ghostly counsel. If I never meet him again, I shall thank Heaven for those months at Zwoll all my life—ere the Duke of Burgundy made my Countess resign Holland for twelve years to her uncle, and we left the place. Then, well-nigh against her will, they forced her into a marriage with the Duke of Brabant, though he be her first cousin, her godson, and a mere rude boy. I cannot tell you how evil were the days we often had then. If he had been left to himself, Madame might have guided him; but ill men came about him; they maddened him with wine and beer; they excited him to show that he feared her not; he struck her, and more than once almost put her in danger of her life. Then, too, his mother married the Bishop of Liége, her enemy—

‘The Bishop!’

‘He had never been consecrated, and had a dispensation. That marriage deprived my poor lady of even her mother’s help. All were against her then; and for me too it went ill, for the Duke of Burgundy insisted on my being given to a half-brother of his, one they call Sir Boëmond of Burgundy—a hard man of blood and revelry. The Duke of Brabant was all for him, and so was the Duchess-mother; and though my uncles would not have chosen him, yet they durst not withstand the Duke of Burgundy. I tried to appeal to the Emperor Sigismund, the head of our house, but I know not if he ever heard of my petition. I was in an exceeding strait, and had only one trust, namely, that Father Thomas had told me that the more I threw myself upon God, the more He would save me from man. But oh! they seemed all closing in on me, and I knew that Sir Boëmond had sworn that I should pay heavily for my resistance. Then one night my Countess came to me. She showed me the bruises her lord had left on her arms, and told me that he was about to banish all of us, her ladies, into Holland, and to keep her alone to bear his fury, and she was resolved to escape, and would I come with her? It seemed to me the message of deliverance. Her nurse brought us peasant dresses, high stiff caps, black boddices, petticoats of many colours, and therein we dressed ourselves, and stole out, ere dawn, to a church, where we knelt till the Sieur d’Escaillon—the gentleman who attends Madame still—drove up in a farmer’s garb, with a market cart, and so forth from Bruges we drove. We cause to Valenciennes, to her mother; but we found that she, by persuasion of the Duke, would give us both up; so the Sieur d’Escaillon got together sixty lances, and therewith we rode to Calais, where never were weary travellers more courteously received than we by Lord Northumberland, the captain of Calais.’

‘Oh, I am glad you came to us English!’ cried Alice. ‘Only I would it had been my father who welcomed you. And now?’

‘Now I remain with my lady, as the only demoiselle she has from her country; and, moreover, I am waiting in the trust that my kinsmen will give up their purpose of bestowing me in marriage, now that I am beyond their reach; and in time I hope to obtain sufficient of my own goods for a dowry for whatever convent I may enter.’

‘Oh, let it be an English one!’ cried Alice.

‘I have learnt to breathe freer since I have been on English soil,’ said Esclairmonde, smiling; ‘but where I may rest at last, Heaven only knows!’

‘This is a strange country,’ said Malcolm. ‘No one seems afraid of violence and wrong here.’

‘Is that so strange?’ asked Alice, amazed. ‘Why, men would be hanged if they did violence!’

‘I would we were as sure of justice at my home,’ sighed Esclairmonde. ‘King Henry will bring about a better rule.’

‘Never doubt,’ cried Salisbury’s daughter. ‘When France is once subdued, there will be no more trouble, he will make your kinsmen do you right, dear demoiselle, and oh! will you not found a beauteous convent?’

‘King Henry has not conquered France yet,’ was all Esclairmonde said.

‘Ha!’ cried the buxom Countess Jaqueline, as the ladies dismounted, ‘never speak to me more, our solemn sister. When have I done worse than lure a young cavalier, and chain him all day with my tongue?’

‘He is a gentle boy!’ said Esclairmonde, smiling.

‘Truly he looked like a calf turned loose among strange cattle! How gat he into the hall?’

‘He is of royal Scottish blood,’ said Esclairmonde ‘cousin-german to King James.’

‘And our grave nun has a fancy to tame the wild Scots, like a second St. Margaret! A king’s grandson! fie, fie! what, become ambitious, Clairette? Eh? you were so occupied, that I should have been left to no one but Monseigneur of Gloucester, but that I was discreet, and rode with my Lord Bishop of Winchester. How he chafed! but I know better than to have tête-à-têtes with young sprigs of the blood royal!’

Esclairmonde laughed good-humouredly, partly in courtesy to her hoyden mistress, but partly at the burning, blushing indignation she beheld in the artless face of Alice Montagu.

The girl was as shy as a fawn, frightened at every word from knight or lady, and much in awe of her future mother-in-law, a stiff and stately dame, with all the Beaufort haughtiness; so that Lady Westmoreland gladly and graciously consented to the offer of the Demoiselle de Luxemburg to attend to the little maiden, and let her share her chamber and her bed. And indeed Alice Montagu, bred up in strictness and in both piety and learning, as was sometimes the case with the daughters of the nobility, had in all her simplicity and bashfulness a purity and depth that made her a congenial spirit with the grave votaress, whom she regarded on her side with a young girl’s enthusiastic admiration for a grown woman, although in point of fact the years between them were few.

The other ladies of the Court were a little in awe of the Demoiselle de Luxemburg, and did not seek her when they wished to indulge in the gossip whose malice and coarseness she kept in check; but if they were anxious, or in trouble, they always came to her as their natural consoler; and the Countess Jaqueline, bold and hoydenish as she was, kept the license of her tongue and manners under some shadow of restraint before her, and though sometimes bantering her, often neglecting her counsel, evidently felt her attendance a sort of safeguard and protection.

The gentlemen were mostly of the opinion of the Duke of Gloucester, who said that the Lady Esclairmonde was so like Deborah, come out of a Mystery, that it seemed to be always Passion-tide where she was; and she, moreover, was always guarded in her manner towards them, keeping her vocation in the recollection of all by her gravely and coldly courteous demeanour, and the sober hues and fashion of her dress; but being aware of Malcolm’s destination, perceiving his loneliness, and really attracted by his pensive gentleness, she admitted him to far more friendly intercourse than any other young noble, while he revered and clung to her much as Lady Alice did, as protector and friend.

King James was indeed so much absorbed in his own lady-love as to have little attention to bestow on his young cousin, and he knew, moreover, that to be left to such womanly training as ladies were bound to bestow on young squires and pages was the best treatment for the youth, who was really thriving and growing happier every day, as he lost his awkwardness and acquired a freedom and self-confidence such as he could never have imagined possible in his original brow-beaten state, though without losing the gentle modesty and refinement that gave him such a charm.

A great sorrow awaited him, however, at Leicester, where Easter was to be spent. A messenger came from Durham, bringing letters from Coldingham to announce the death of good Sir David Drummond, which had taken place two days after Malcolm had left him, all but the youth himself having well known that his state was hopeless.

In his grief, Malcolm found his chief comforter in Esclairmonde, who kindly listened when he talked of the happy old times at Glenuskie, and of the kindness and piety of his guardian; while she lifted his mind to dwell on the company of the saints; and when he knew that her thoughts went, like his, to his fatherly friend in the solemn services connected with the departed, he was no longer desolate, and there was almost a sweetness in the grief of which his fair saint had taken up a part. She showed him likewise some vellum pages on which her ghostly father, the Canon of St. Agnes, had written certain dialogues between the Divine Master and His disciple, which seemed indeed to have been whispered by heavenly inspiration, and which soothed and hallowed his mourning for the guide and protector of his youth. He loved to dwell on her very name, Esclairmonde—‘light of the world.’ The taste of the day hung many a pun and conceit upon names, and to Malcolm this—which had, in fact, been culled out of romance—seemed meetly to express the pure radiance of consolation and encouragement that seemed to him to shine from her, and brighten the life that had hitherto been dull and gloomy—nay, even to give him light and joy in the midst of his grief.

At that period Courts were not much burdened with etiquette. No feudal monarch was more than the first gentleman, and there was no rigid line of separation of ranks, especially where, as among the kings of the Red Rose, the boundaries were so faint between the princes and the nobility; and as Catherine of Valois was fond of company, and indolently heedless of all that did not affect her own dignity or ease, the whole Court, including some of the princely captives, lived as one large family, meeting at morning Mass in church or chapel, taking their meals in common, riding, hunting, hawking, playing at bowls, tennis, or stool-ball, or any other pastime, in such parties as suited their inclinations; and spending the evening in the great hall, in conversation varied by chess, dice, and cards, recitals of romance, and music, sometimes performed by the choristers of the Royal chapel, or sometimes by the company themselves, and often by one or other of the two kings, who were both proficients as well with the voice as with the lute and organ.

Thus Malcolm had many opportunities of being with the Demoiselle of Luxemburg: and almost a right was established, that when she sat in the deep embrasure of a window with her spinning, he should be on the cushioned step beneath; when she mounted, he held the stirrup; and when the church bells were ringing, he led her by her fair fingers to her place in the nave, and back again to the hall; and when the manchet and rere supper were brought into the hall, he mixed her wine and water, and held the silver basin and napkin to her on bended knee, and had become her recognized cavalier. He was really thriving. Even the high-spirited son of Hotspur could not help loving and protecting him.

‘Have a care,’ said Ralf to a lad of ruder mould; ‘I’ll no more see that lame young Scot maltreated than a girl.’

‘He is no better than a girl,’ growled his comrade; ‘my little brother Dick would be more than a match for him!’

‘I wot not that,’ said Percy; ‘there’s a drop of life and spirit at the bottom; and for the rest, when he looks up with those eyes of his, and smiles his smile, it is somehow as if it were beneath a man to vex him wilfully. And he sees so much meaning in everything, too, that it is a dozen times better sport to hear him talk than one of you fellows, who have only wit enough to know a hawk from a heron-schaw.’

After a grave Easter-tide spent at Leicester, the Court moved to Westminster, where Henry had to meet his parliament, and obtain supplies for the campaign which was to revenge the death of Clarence.

There was no great increase of gaiety even here, for Henry was extremely occupied, both with regulating matters for government during his absence, and in training the troops who began to flock to his standard; so that the Queen complained that his presence in England was of little service to her, since he never had any leisure, and there were no pastimes.

‘Well, Dame,’ said Henry, gaily, ‘there is one revel for you. I have promised to knight the Lord Mayor, honest Whittington, and I hear he is preparing a notable banquet in the Guild Hall.’

‘A city mayor!’ exclaimed Queen Catherine, with ineffable disgust. ‘My brothers would sooner cut off his roturier head than dub him knight!’

‘Belike,’ said Henry, dryly; ‘but what kind of friends have thy brothers found at Paris? Moreover, this Whittington may content thee as to blood. Rougedragon hath been unfolding to me his lineage of a good house in Gloucestershire.’

‘More shame that he should soil his hands with trade!’ said the Queen.

‘See what you say when he has cased those fair hands in Spanish gloves. You ladies should know better than to fall out with a mercer.’

‘Ah!’ said Duke Humfrey, ‘they never saw the silks and samites wherewith he fitted out my sister Philippa for the Swedes! Lucky the bride whose wardrobe is purveyed by honest Dick!’

‘Is it not honour enough for the mechanical hinds that we wear their stuffs,’ said Countess Jaqueline, ‘without demeaning ourselves to eat at their boards? The outrecuidance of the rogues in the Netherlands would be surpassing, did we feed it in that sort.’

‘’Tis you that will be fed, Dame Jac,’ laughed Henry. ‘I can tell you, their sack and their pasties, their march-pane and blanc-manger, far exceed aught that a poor soldier can set before you.’

‘Moreover,’ observed Humfrey, ‘the ladies ought to see the romaunt of the Cat complete.’

‘How!’ cried Jaqueline, ‘is it, then, true that this Vittentone is the miller’s son whose cat wore boots and made his fortune?’

‘I have heard my aunt of Orleans divert my father with that story,’ murmured Catherine. ‘How went the tale? I thought it folly, and marked it not. What became of the cat?’

‘The cat desired to test his master’s gratitude, so tells Straparola,’ said the Duke of Orleans, in his dry satirical tone; ‘and whereas he had been wont to promise his benefactor a golden coffin and state funeral, Puss feigned death, and thereby heard the lady inform her husband that the old cat was dead. “A la bonne heure!” said the Marquis. “Take him by the tail, and fling him on the muck-heap beneath the window!”’

‘Thereof I acquit Whittington, who never was thankless to man or brute,’ said King Henry. ‘Moreover, his cat, or her grandchildren, must be now in high preferment at the King of Barbary’s Court.’

‘A marvellous beast is that cat,’ said James. ‘When I was a child in Scotland, we used to tell the story of her exchange for a freight of gold and spices, only the ship sailed from Denmark,’

‘Maybe,’ said Henry; ‘but I would maintain the truth of Whittington’s cat with my lance, and would gladly have no worse cause! You’ll see his cat painted beside him in the Guild Hall, and may hear the tale from him, as I loved to hear him when I was a lad.

“Turn again, Whittington,
Thrice Lord Mayor of London town!”

I told my good old friend I must have come over from France on purpose to keep his third mayoralty. So I am for the City on Thursday; and whoever loves good wine, good sturgeon, good gold, or good men, had best come with me.’

Such inducements were not to be neglected, and though Queen Catherine minced and bridled, and apologized to Duchess Jaqueline for her husband’s taste for low company, neither princess wished to forego the chance of amusement; and a brilliant cavalcade set forth in full order of precedence. The King and Queen were first; then, to his great disgust, the King of Scots, with Duchess Jaqueline; Bedford, with Lady Somerset; Gloucester, with the Countess of March; the Duke of Orleans, with the Countess of Exeter; and Malcolm of Glenuskie found himself paired off with his sovereign’s lady-love, Joan Beaufort, and a good deal overawed by the tall horned tower that crowned her flaxen locks, as well as by knowing that her uncle, the Bishop of Winchester, the stateliest, stiffest, and most unapproachable person in all the Court, was riding just behind him, beside the Demoiselle de Luxemburg.

Temple Bar was closed, and there was a flourish of trumpets and a parley ere the gate was flung open to admit the royal guests; but Malcolm, in his place, could not see the aldermen on horseback, in their robes of scarlet and white, drawn up to receive the King. All that way up Holborn, every house was hung with tapestry, and the citizens formed a gorgeously-apparelled lane, shouting in unison, their greetings attuned to bursts of music from trumpets and nakers.

Beautiful old St. Paul’s, with the exquisite cross for open-air preaching in front, rose on their view; and before the lofty west door the princely guests dismounted, each gentleman leading his lady up the nave to the seat prepared in such manner that he might be opposite to her. The clergy lined the stalls, and a magnificent mass was sung, and was concluded by the advance of the King to the altar step, followed by a fine old man in scarlet robes bordered with white fur, the collar of SS. round his neck, and his silvery hair and lofty brow crowning a face as sagacious as it was dignified and benevolent.

It seemed a reversal of the ordinary ceremonial when the slender agile young man took in hand the sword, and laid the honour of knighthood on the gray-headed substantial senior, whom he bade to arise Sir Richard Whittington. Jaqueline of Hainault had the bad taste to glance across to Humfrey and titter, but the Duke valued popularity among the citizens, and would not catch her eye; and in the line behind the royal ladies there was a sweet elderly face, beautiful, though time-worn, with blue eyes misty with proud glad tears, and a mouth trembling with tender exultation.

After the ceremony was concluded, King Henry offered his hand to the Lady Mayoress, Dame Alice Whittington, making her bright tears drop in glad confusion at his frank, hearty congratulation and warm praise of her husband; and though the fair Catherine could have shuddered when Sir Richard advanced to lead her, she was too royal to compromise her dignity by visible scorn, and she soon found that the merchant could speak much better French than most of the nobles.

Malcolm felt as averse as did the French princesses to burgher wealth and splendour, and his mind had not opened to understand burgher worth and weight; and when he saw the princes John and Humfrey, and even his own king, seeking out city dames and accosting them with friendly looks, it seemed to him a degrading truckling to riches, from which he was anxious to save his future queen; but when he would have offered his arm to Lady Joan, he saw her already being led away by an alderman measuring at least a yard across the shoulders; and the good-natured Earl of March, seeing him at a loss, presented him to a round merry wife in a scarlet petticoat and black boddice, its plump curves wreathed with geld chains, who began pitying him for having been sent to the wars so young, being, as usual, charmed into pity by his soft appealing eyes and unconscious grace; would not believe his assertions that he was neither a captive nor a Frenchman;—‘don’t tell her, when he spoke like a stranger, and halted from a wound.’

Colouring to the ears, he explained that he had never walked otherwise; whereupon her pity redoubled, and she by turns advised him to consult Master Doctor Caius, and to obtain a recipe from Mistress—she meant Dame—Alice Whittington, the kindest soul living, and, Lady Mayoress as she was, with no more pride than the meanest scullion. Pity she had no child—yet scarce pity either, since she and the good Lord Mayor were father and mother to all orphans and destitute—nay, to all who had any care on their minds.

Malcolm was in extreme alarm lest he should be walked up to the Lady Mayoress for inspection before all the world when they entered the Guild Hall, a building of grand proportions, which, as good Mistress Bolt informed him, had lately been paved and glazed at Sir Richard Whittington’s own expense. The bright new red and yellow tiles, and the stained glass of the tall windows high up, as well as the panels of the wainscot, were embellished with trade-marks and the armorial bearings of the guilds; and the long tables, hung with snowy napery, groaned with gold and silver plate, such as, the Duke of Orleans observed to Catherine, no citizens would dare exhibit in France to any prince or noble, at peril of being mulcted of all, with or without excuse.

On an open hearth beneath the louvre, or opening for smoke, burnt a fire diffusing all around an incense-like fragrance, from the logs, composed of cinnamon and other choice woods and spices, that fed the flame. The odour and the warmth on a bleak day of May were alike delicious; and King Henry, after heading Dame Alice up to it, stood warming his hands and extolling the choice scent, adding: ‘You spoil us, Sir Richard. How are we to go back to the smoke of wood and peat, and fires puffed with our own mouths, after such pampering as this—the costliest fire I have seen in the two realms?’

‘It shall be choicer yet, Sir,’ said Sir Richard Whittington, who had just handed the Queen to her seat.

‘Scarce possible,’ replied Henry, ‘unless I threw in my crown, and that I cannot afford. I shall be pawning it ere long.’

Instead of answering, the Lord Mayor quietly put his hand into his furred pouch, and drawing out a bundle of parchments tied with a ribbon, held them towards the King, with a grave smile.

‘Lo you now, Sir Richard,’ said Henry, with a playful face of disgust; ‘this is to save your dainty meats, by spoiling my appetite by that unwelcome sight. What, man! have you bought up all the bonds I gave in my need to a whole synagogue of Jews and bench of Loin-bards? I shall have to send for my crown before you let me go; though verily,’ he added, with frank, open face, ‘I’m better off with a good friend like you for my creditor—only I’m sorry for you, Sir Richard. I fear it will be long ere you see your good gold in the stead of your dirty paper, even though I gave you an order on the tolls. How now! What, man, Dick Whittington! Art raving? Here, the tongs!’

For Sir Richard, gently smiling, had placed the bundle of bonds on the glowing bed of embers.

Henry, even while calling for the tongs, was raking them out with his sword, and would have grasped them in his hand in a moment, but the Lord Mayor caught his arm.

‘Pardon, my lord, and grant your new knight’s boon.’

‘When he is not moon-struck!’ said Henry, still guarding the documents. ‘Why, my Lady Mayoress, know you what is here?’

‘Sixty thousand, my liege,’ composedly answered Dame Alice. ‘My husband hath his whims, and I pray your Grace not to hinder what he hath so long been preparing.’

‘Yea, Sir,’ added Whittington, earnestly. ‘You wot that God hath prospered us richly. We have no child, and our nephews are well endowed. How, then, can our goods belong to any save God, our king, and the poor?’

Henry drew one hand over his eyes, and with the other wrung that of Whittington. ‘Had ever king such a subject?’ he murmured.

‘Had ever subject such a king?’ was Whittington’s return.

‘Thou hast conquered, Whittington,’ said the King, presently looking up with a sunny smile. ‘To send me over the seas a free man, beholden to you in heart though not by purse, is, as I well believe, worth all that sum to thy loyal heart. Thou art setting me far on my way to Jerusalem, my dear friend! Thank him, Kate—he hath done much for thine husband!’

Catherine looked amiable, and held out a white hand to be kissed, aware that the King was pleased, though hardly understanding why he should be glad that an odour of singed parchment should overpower the gums and cinnamon. This was soon remedied by the fresh handful of spices that were cast into the flame, and the banquet began, magnificent with peacocks, cranes, and swans in full plumage; the tusky bear crunched his apple, deer’s antlers adorned the haunch, the royal sturgeon floated in wine, fountains of perfumed waters sprang up from shells, towers of pastry and of jelly presented the endless allegorical devices of mediæval fancy, and, pre-eminent over all, a figure of the cat, with emerald eyes, fulfilled, as Henry said, the proverb, ‘A cat might look at a king;’ and truly the cat and her master had earned the right; therefore his first toast was, ‘To the Cat!’

Each guest found at his or her place a beautiful fragrant pair of gloves, in Spanish leather, on the back of which was once more embroidered, in all her tabby charms, the cat’s face. Therewith began a lengthy meal; and Malcolm Stewart rejoiced at finding himself seated next to the Lady Esclairmonde, but he grudged her attention to her companion, a slender, dark, thoughtful representative of the Goldsmiths’ Company, to whom she talked with courtesy such as Malcolm had scorned to show his city dame.

‘Who,’ said Esclairmonde, presently, ‘was a dame in a religious garb whom I marked near the door here? She hooked like one of the Béguines of my own country.’

‘We have no such order here, lady,’ said the goldsmiths, puzzled.

‘Hey, Master Price,’ cried Mistress Bolt, speaking across Malcolm, ‘I can tell the lady who it was. ’Twas good Sister Avice Rodney, to whom the Lady Mayoress promised some of these curious cooling drinks for the poor shipwright who hath well-nigh cloven off his own foot with his axe.’

‘Yea, truly,’ returned the goldsmith; ‘it must have been one of the bedeswomen of St. Katharine’s whom the lady has seen.’

‘What order may that be?’ asked Esclairmonde. ‘I have seen nothing so like my own country since I came hither.’

‘That may well be, madam,’ said Mistress Belt, ‘seeing that these bedeswomen were first instituted by a countrywoman of your own—Queen Philippa, of blessed memory.’

‘By your leave, Mistress Bolt,’ interposed Master Price, ‘the hospital of St. Katharine by the Tower is of far older foundation.’

‘By your leave, sir, I know what I say. The hospital was founded I know not when, but these bedeswomen were especially added by the good Queen, by the same token that mine aunt Cis, who was tirewoman to the blessed Lady Joan, was one of the first.’

‘How was it? What is their office?’ eagerly inquired Esclairmonde. And Mistress Bolt arranged herself for a long discourse.

‘Well, fair sirs and sweet lady, though you be younger than I, you have surely heard of the Black Death. Well named was it, for never was pestilence more dire; and the venom was so strong, that the very lips and eyelids grew livid black, and then there was no hope. Little thought of such disease was there, I trow, in kings’ houses, and all the fair young lords and ladies, the children of King Edward, as then was, were full of sport and gamesomeness as you see these dukes be now. And never a one was blither than the Lady Joan—she they called Joan of the Tower, being a true Londoner born—bless her! My aunt Cis would talk by the hour of her pretty ways and kindly mirth. But ’twas even as the children have the game in the streets—

“There come three knights all out of Spain,
Are come to fetch your daughter Jane.”

’Twas for the King of Castille, that same Peter for whom the Black Prince of Wales fought, and of whom such grewsome tales were told. The pretty princess might almost have had a boding what sort of husband they had for her, for she begged and prayed, even on her knees, that her father would leave her; but her sisters were all espoused, and there was no help for it. But, as one comfort to her, my aunt Cis, who had been about her from her cradle, was to go with her; and oft she would tell of the long journey in litters through France, and how welcome were the English tongues they heard again at Bordeaux, and how when poor Lady Joan saw her brother, the Prince, she clung about his neck and sobbed, and how he soothed her, and said she would soon laugh at her own unwillingness to go to her husband. But even then the Black Death was in Bordeaux, and being low and mournful at heart, the sweet maid contracted it, and lay down to die ere she had made two days’ journey, and her last words were, “My God hath shown me more pity than father or brother;” and so she died like a lamb, and mine aunt was sent by the Prince to bear home the tidings to the good Queen, who was a woeful woman. And therewith, here was the pestilence in London, raging among the poor creatures that lived in the wharves and on the river bank, in damp and filth, so that whole households lay dead at once, and the contagion, gathering force, spread into the city, and even to the nobles and their ladies. Then my good aunt, having some knowledge of the sickness already, and being without fear, went among the sick, and by her care, and the food, wine, and clothing she brought, saved a many lives. And from whom should the bounties come, save from the good Queen, who ever had a great pity for those touched like her own fair child? Moreover, when she heard from my aunt how the poor things lived in uncleanness and filth, and how, what with many being strangers coming by sea, and others being serfs fled from home, they were a nameless, masterless sort, who knew not where to seek a parish priest, and whom the friars shunned for their poverty, she devised a fresh foundation to be added to the hospital of St. Katharine’s in the Docks, providing for a chapter of ten bedeswomen, gentle and well-nurtured, who should both sing in choir, and likewise go forth constantly among the poor, to seek out the children, see that they learn their Credo, Ave, and Pater Noster, bring the more toward to be further taught in St. Katharine’s school, and likewise to stir poor folk up to go to mass and lead a godly life; to visit the sick, feed and tend them, and so instruct them, that they may desire the Sacraments of the Church.’

‘Ah! good Flemish Queen!’ cried Esclairmonde. ‘She learnt that of our Béguines!’

‘If your ladyship will have it so,’ said Mrs. Bolt; ‘but my aunt Cicely began!’

‘Who nominates these bedeswomen?’ asked Esclairmonde.

‘That does the Queen,’ said Mistress Bolt. ‘Not this young Queen, as yet, for Queen Joan, the late King’s widow, holds the hospital till her death, unless it should be taken from her for her sorceries, from which Heaven defend us!’

‘Can it be visited?’ said Esclairmonde. ‘I feel much drawn thither, as I ever did to the Béguines.’

‘Ay, marry may it!’ cried delighted Mrs. Bolt. ‘I have more than one gossip there, foreby Sister Avice, who was godchild to Aunt Cis; and if the good lady would wish to see the hospital, I would bear her company with all my heart.’

To Malcolm’s disgust, Esclairmonde caught at the proposal, which the Scottish haughtiness that lay under all his gentleness held somewhat degrading to the cousin of the Emperor. He fell into a state of gloom, which lasted till the loving-cup had gone round and been partaken of in pairs.

After hands had been washed in rose-water, the royal party took their seats in barges to return to Westminster by the broad and beautiful highway of the Thames.

Here at once Alice Montagu nestled to Esclairmonde’s side, delighted with her cat gloves, and further delighted with an old captain of trained bands, to whose lot she had fallen, and who, on finding that she was the daughter of the Earl of Salisbury, under whom he had served, had launched forth by the hour into the praises of that brave nobleman, both for his courage and his kindness to his troops.

‘No wonder King Henry loves his citizens so well!’ cried Esclairmonde. ‘Would that our Netherlandish princes and burghers could take pride and pleasure in one another’s wealth and prowess, instead of grudging and fearing thereat!’

‘To my mind,’ said Malcolm, ‘they were a forward generation. That city dame will burst with pride, if you, lady, go with her to see those bedeswomen.’

‘I trust not,’ laughed Esclairmonde, ‘for I mean to try.’

‘Nay, but,’ said Malcolm, ‘what should a mere matter of old rockers and worn-out tirewomen concern a demoiselle of birth?’

‘I honour them for doing their Master’s work,’ said Esclairmonde, ‘and would fain be worthy to follow in their steps.’

‘Surely,’ said Malcolm, ‘there are houses fit for persons of high and princely birth to live apart from gross contact with the world.’

‘There are,’ said Esclairmonde; ‘but I trust I may be pardoned for saying that such often seem to me to play at humility when they stickle for birth and dower with the haughtiest. I never honoured any nuns so much as the humble Sisters of St. Begga, who never ask for sixteen quarterings, but only for a tender hand, soft step, pure life, and pious heart.’

‘I deemed,’ said Malcolm, ‘that heavenly contemplation was the purpose of convents.’

‘Even so, for such as can contemplate like the holy man I have told you of,’ said Esclairmonde; ‘but labour hath been greatly laid aside in convents of late, and I doubt me if it be well, or if their prayers be the better for it.’

‘And so,’ said Alice, ‘I heard my Lord of Winchester saying how it were well to suppress the alien priories, and give their wealth to found colleges like that founded by Bishop Wykeham.’

For in truths the spirit of the age was beginning to set against monasticism. It was the period when perhaps there was more of license and less of saintliness than at any other, and when the long continuance of the Great Schism had so injured Church discipline that the clergy and ecclesiastics were in the worst state of all, especially the monastic orders, who owned no superior but the Pope, and between the two rivals could avoid supervision altogether. Such men as Thomas à Kempis, or the great Jean Gerson, were rare indeed; and the monasteries had let themselves lose their missionary character, and become mere large farms, inhabited by celibate gentlemen and their attendants, or by the superfluous daughters of the nobles and gentry. Such devotion as led Esclairmonde to the pure atmosphere of prayer and self-sacrifice had well-nigh died out, and almost every other lady of the time would have regarded her release from the vows made for her its her babyhood a happy escape.

Still less, at a time when no active order of Sisters, save that of the Béguines in Holland, had been invented, and when no nun ever dreamt of carrying her charity beyond the quadrangle of her own convent, could any one be expected to enter into Esclairmonde’s admiration and longing for out-of-door works; but the person whom she had chiefly made her friend was the King’s almoner and chaplain, sometimes called Sir Martin Bennet, at others Dr. Bennet, a great Oxford scholar, bred up among William of Wykeham’s original seventy at Winchester and New College, and now much trusted and favoured by the King, whom he everywhere accompanied. That Sir Martin was a pluralist must be confessed, but he was most conscientious in providing substitutes, and was a man of much thought and of great piety, in whom the fair pupil of the Canon of St. Agnes found a congenial spirit.

CHAPTER VI: MALCOLM’S SUIT

‘That is a gentle and gracious slip of the Stewart. What shall you do with him?’ asked King Henry of James, as they stood together at one end of the tilt-yard at Westminster, watching Malcolm Stewart and Ralf Percy, who were playing at closhey, the early form of nine-pins.

‘I know what I should like to do,’ said James.

‘What may that be?’

‘To marry him to the Lady Esclairmonde de Luxemburg.’

Henry gave a long whistle.

‘Have you other views for her?’

‘Not I! Am I to have designs on every poor dove who flies into my tent from the hawk? Besides, are not they both of them vowed to a religious life?’

‘Neither vow is valid,’ replied James.

‘To meddle with such things is what I should not dare,’ said Henry.

‘Monks and friars are no such holy beings, that I should greatly concern me about keeping an innocent had out of their company,’ said James.

‘Nor do I say they are,’ said Henry; ‘but it is ill to cross a vow of devotion, and to bring a man back to the world is apt to render him not worth the having. You may perchance get him down lower than you intended.’

‘This boy never had any real vocation at all,’ said James; ‘it was only the timidity born of ill-health, and the longing for food for the mind.’

‘Maybe so,’ replied the English king, ‘and you may be in the right; but why fix on that grand Luxemburg wench, who ought to be a Lady Abbess of Fontainebleau at least, or a very St. Hilda, to rule monks and nuns alike?’

‘Because they have fixed on each other. Malcolm needs a woman like her to make a man of him; and with her spirit and fervent charity, we should have them working a mighty change in Scotland.’

‘If you get her there!’

‘Have I your consent, Harry?’

‘Mine? It’s no affair of mine! You must settle it with Madame of Hainault; but you had best take care. You are more like to make your tame lambkin into a ravening wolf, than to get that Deborah the prophetess to herd him.’

James in sooth viewed this warning as another touch of Lancastrian superstition, and only considered how to broach the question. Malcolm, meantime, was balancing between the now approaching decision between Oxford and France. He certainly felt something of his old horror of warlike scenes; but even this was lessening; he was aware that battles were not every-day occurrences, and that often there was no danger at all. He would not willingly be separated from his king; and if the female part of the Court were to accompany the campaign, it would be losing sight of all he cared for, if he were left among a set of stranger shavelings at Oxford. Yet he was reluctant to break with the old habits that had hitherto been part of his nature; he felt, after every word of Esclairmonde—nay, after every glance towards her—as though it were a blessed thing to have, like her, chosen the better part; he knew she would approve his resort to the home of piety and learning; he was aware that when with Ralf Percy and the other youths of the Court he was ashamed of his own scrupulousness, and tempted to neglect observances that they might call monkish and unmanly; and he was not at all sure that in face of the enemy a panic might not seize him and disgrace him for ever! In effect he did not know what he wished, even when he found that the Queen had decided against going across the sea, and that therefore all the ladies would remain with her at Shene or Windsor.

He should probably never again see Esclairmonde, the guiding star of his recent life, the embodiment of all that he had imagined when conning the quaint old English poems that told the Legend of Seynct Katharine; and as he leant musingly against a lattice, feeling as if the brightness of his life was going out, King James merrily addressed him:—

‘Eh! the fit is on you too, boy!’

‘What fit, Sir?’ Malcolm opened his eyes.

‘The pleasing madness.’

Malcolm uttered a cry like horror, and reddened crimson. ‘Sir! Sir! Sir!’ he stammered.

‘A well-known token of the disease is raving.’

‘Sir, Sir! I implore you to speak of nothing so profane.’

‘I am not given to profanity,’ said James, endeavouring to look severe, but with laughter in his voice. ‘Methought you were not yet so sacred a personage.’

‘Myself! No; but that I—I should dare to have such thoughts of—oh, Sir!’ and Malcolm covered his face with his hands. ‘Oh, that you should have so mistaken me!’

‘I have not mistaken you,’ said James, fixing his keen eyes on him.

‘Oh, Sir!’ cried Malcolm, like one freshly stung, ‘you have! Never, never dreamt I of aught but worshipping as a living saint, as I would entreat St. Margaret or—’

There was still the King’s steady look and the suppressed smile. Malcolm broke off, and with a sudden agony wrung his hands together. The King still smiled. ‘Ay, Malcolm, it will not do; you are man, not monk.’

‘But why be so cruel as to make me vile in my own eyes?’ almost sobbed Malcolm.

‘Because,’ said the King, ‘she is not a saint in heaven, nor a nun in a convent, but a free woman, to be won by the youth she has marked out.’

‘Marked! Oh, Sir, she only condescended because she knew my destination.’

‘That is well,’ said King James. ‘Thus sparks kindle at unawares.’

Malcolm’s groan and murmur of ‘Never!’ made James almost laugh at the evidence that on one side at least the touch-wood was ready.

‘Oh, Sir,’ he sighed, ‘why put the thought before me, to make me wretched! Even were she for the world, she would never be for me. I—doited—hirpling—’

‘Peace, silly lad; all that is past and gone. You are quite another now, and a year or two of Harry’s school of chivalry will send you home a gallant knight and minstrel, such as no maiden will despise.’

The King went, and Malcolm fell into a silent state of musing. He was entirely overpowered, both by the consciousness awakened within himself, by the doubt whether it were not a great sin, and by the strangeness that the King, hitherto his oracle, should infuse such a hope. What King James deemed possible could never be so incredible, or even sacrilegious, as he deemed it. Restless, ashamed, rent by a thousand conflicting feelings, Malcolm roamed up and down his chamber, writhed, tried to sit and think, then, finding his thoughts in a whirl, renewed his frantic pacings. And when dire necessity brought him again into the ladies’ chamber, he was silent, blushing, ungainly, abstracted, and retreated into the farthest possible corner from the unconscious Esclairmonde.

Then, when again alone with the King, he began with the assertion, ‘It is utterly impossible, Sir;’ and James smiled to see his poison working. Not that he viewed it as poison. Monasticism was at a discount, and the ranks of the religious orders were chiefly filled, the old Benedictine and Augustinian foundations by gentlemen of good family who wanted the easy life of a sort of bachelor squire, and the friaries were recruited by the sort of men who would in modern times be dissenting teachers of the lower stamp. James was persuaded that Malcolm was fit for better things than were usually to be seen in a convent, and that it was a real kindness not to let him merely retire thither out of faintness of heart, mistaken for devotion; and he also felt as if he should be doing good service, not only to Malcolm, but to Scotland, if he could obtain for him a wife of the grand character of Esclairmonde de Luxemburg.

He even risked the mention of the project to the Countess of Hainault, without whose consent nothing could be effected. Jaqueline laughed long and loud at the notion of her stately Esclairmonde being the lady-love of King James’s little white-visaged cousin; but if he could bring it about she had no objection, she should be very glad that the demoiselle should come down from the height and be like other people; but she would wager the King of Scots her emerald carcanet against his heron’s plume, that Esclairmonde would never marry unless her hands were held for her. Was she not at that very moment visiting some foundation of bedeswomen—that was all she heard of at yonder feast of cats!

In fact, under Dr. Bennet’s escort, Esclairmonde and Alice were in a barge dropping down the Thames to the neighbourhood of the frowning fortress of the Tower—as yet unstained; and at the steps leading to the Hospitium of St. Katharine the ladies were met, not only by their friend Mrs. Bolt, but by Sir Richard Whittington, his kindly dame, and by ‘Master William Kedbesby,’ a grave and gentle-looking old man, who had been Master of St. Katharine’s ever since the first year of King Richard II., and delighted to tell of the visits ‘Good Queen Anne’ of Bohemia had made to her hospital, and the kind words she had said to the old alms-folk and the children of the schools; and when he heard that the Lady Esclairmonde was of the same princely house of Luxemburg, he seemed to think no honour sufficient for her. They visited the two houses, one for old men, the other for old women, each with a common apartment, with a fire, and a dining-table in the midst, and sleeping cells screened off round it, and with a paved terrace walk overhanging the river, where the old people could sit and sun themselves, and be amused by the gay barges and the swans that expatiated there. The bedeswomen, ten in number, had a house arranged like an ordinary nunnery, except that they were not in seclusion, had no grating, and shared the quadrangle with the alms-folk and children. They were gentle and well-nurtured women, chiefly belonging to the city and country families that furnished servants to the queens; and they applied themselves to various offices of charity, going forth into the city to tend the poor, and to teach the women and children. The appointments of alms-folk and admissions to the school were chiefly made at their recommendation; and though a master taught all the book-learning in the busy hive of scholars—eighty in number—one or more of them instructed the little girls in spinning and in stitchery, to say nothing of gentle and modest demeanour. There was a great look of happiness and good order about all; and the church, fair and graceful, seemed well to complete and rule the institution. Esclairmonde could but sigh with a sort of regret as she left it, and let herself be conducted by Sir Richard Whittington to a refection at his beautiful house in Crutched Friars, built round a square, combining warehouse and manor-house; richly-carved shields, with the arms of the companies of London, supporting the tier of first-floor windows, and another row of brackets above supporting another overhanging story. A fountain was in the centre of a beautiful greensward, with beds of roses, pansies, pinks, stars of Bethlehem, and other good old flowers, among which a monkey was chained to a tree, while a cat roamed about at a safe distance from him.

Alice Montagu raised a laugh by asking if it were the cat; to which her city namesake replied that ‘her master’ never could abide to be without a cat in memory of his first friend, and marshalled them into the beautiful hall, with wainscot lining below, surmounted by an arcade containing statues, and above a beautiful carved ceiling. Here a meal was served to them, and the Lady talked with Whittington of the grand town-halls and other buildings of the merchants of the Low Countries, with whom he was a trader for their rich stuffs; and the visit passed off with no small satisfaction to both parties.

Esclairmonde sat in the barge on her return, looking out on the gray clear water, and on the bright gardens that sloped down to it, gay with roses and fruitful with mulberries, apples, and strawberries, and the mansions and churches that were never quite out of sight, though there were some open fields and wild country ere coming to Westminster, all as if she did not see them, but was wrapped in deep contemplation.

Alice at last, weary of silence, stole her arm round her waist, and peeped up into her face. ‘May I guess thy thoughts, sweet Clairette? Thou wilt found such a hospice thyself?’

‘Say not I will, child,’ said Esclairmonde, with a crystal drop starting in each dark eye. ‘I would strive and hope, but—’

‘Ah! thou wilt, thou wilt,’ cried Alice; ‘and since there are Béguines enough for their own Netherlands, thou wilt come to England and be our foundress here.’

‘Nay, little one; here are the bedeswomen of St. Katharine’s in London.’

‘Ah! but we have other cities. Good Father, have we not? Hull—Southampton—oh! so many, where poor strangers come that need ghostly tendance as well as bodily. Esclairmonde—Light of the World—oh! it was not for nothing that they gave thee that goodly name. The hospice shall bear it!’

‘Hush, hush! sweet pyet; mine own name is what they must not bear.’

‘Ah! but the people will give it; and our Holy Father the Pope, he will put thee into the canon of saints. Only pity that I cannot live to hear of Ste. Esclairmonde—nay, but then I must overlive thee, mind I should not love that.’

‘Oh, silence, silence, child; these are no thoughts to begin a work with. Little flatterer, it may be well for me that our lives must needs lie so far apart that I shall not oft hear that fond silly tongue.’

‘Nay,’ said Alice, in the luxury, not of castle-building but of convent-building; ‘it may be that when that knight over there sees me so small and ill-favoured he will none of me, and then I’ll thank him so, and pray my father to let him have all my lands and houses except just enough to dower me to follow thee with, dear Lady Prioress.’

But here Alice was summarily silenced. Such talk, both priest and votaress told her, was not meet for dutiful daughter or betrothed maiden. Her lot was fixed, and she must do her duty therein as the good wife and lady of the castle, the noble English matron; and as she looked half disposed to pout, Esclairmonde drew such a picture of the beneficent influence of the good baronial dame, ruling her castle, bringing up her children and the daughters of her vassals in good and pious nurture, making ‘the heart of her husband safely trust in her,’ benefiting the poor, and fostering holy men, wayfarers, and pilgrims, that the girl’s eyes filled within tears as she looked up and said, ‘Ah! lady, this is the life fitted for thee, who can paint it so well. Why have I not a brother, that you might be Countess of Salisbury, and I a poor little sister in a nunnery?’

Esclairmonde shook her head. ‘Silly child, petite nïaise, our lots were fixed by other hands than ours. We will strive each to serve our God, in the coif or in the veil, in samite or in serge, and He will only ask which of us has been most faithful, not whether we have lived in castle or in cloister.’

Little had Esclairmonde expected to hear the greeting with which the Countess received her, breaking out into peals of merriment as she told her of the choice destiny in store for her, to be wedded to the little lame Scot, pretending to read her a grave lecture on the consequences of the advances she had made to him.

Esclairmonde was not put out of countenance; in fact, she did not think the Countess in earnest, and merely replied with a smile that at least there was less harm in Lord Malcolm than in the suitors at home.

Jaqueline clapped her hands and cried, ‘Good tidings, Clairette. I’ll never forgive you if you make me lose my emerald carcanet! So the arrow was winged, after all. She prefers him—her heart is touched by the dainty step.’

‘Madame!’ entreated Esclairmonde, with agitation; ‘at least, infirmity should be spared.’

‘It touches her deeply!’ exclaimed the Duchess. ‘Ah! to see her in the mountains teaching the wild men to say their Aye, and to wear culottes, the little prince interpreting for her, as King James told us in his story of the saint his ancestor.’

Raillery about Malcolm had been attempted before, but never so pertinaciously; and Esclairmonde heeded it not at all, till James himself sought her out, and, within all his own persuasive grace, told her that he was rejoiced to hear from Madame of Hainault that she had spoken kindly of his youthful kinsman, for whose improvement he was sure he had in great measure to thank her.

Esclairmonde replied composedly, but as one on her guard, that the Sieur de Glenuskie was a gentle and a holy youth, of a good and toward wit.

‘As I saw from the first,’ said James, ‘when I brought him away from being crushed among our rude cousins; but, lady, I knew not how the task of training the boy would be taken out of my hands by your kindness; and now, pardon me, lady, only one thing is wanting to complete your work, and that is hope.’

‘Hope is always before a holy man, Sir.’

‘O, madame! but we peer earthly beings require an earthly hope, nearer home, to brace our hearts, and nerve our arms.’

‘I thought the Sieur de Glenuskie was destined to a religious life.’

‘Never by any save his enemies, lady. The Regent Albany and his fierce sons have striven to scare Malcolm into a cloister, that his sister and his lands may be their prey; and they would have succeeded had not I come to Scotland in time. The lad never had any true vocation.’

‘That may be,’ said Esclairmonde, somewhat sorrowfully.

‘Still,’ added James, ‘he is of a thoughtful and somewhat tender mould, and the rudeness of life will try him sorely unless he have some cheering star, some light of love, to bear him up and guide him on his way.’

‘If so, may he find a worthy one.’

‘Lady, it is too late to talk of what he may find. The brightness that has done so much for him already will hinder him from turning his eyes elsewhere.’

‘You are a minstrel, Sir King, and therefore these words of light romance fall from your lips.’

‘Nay, lady, hitherto my romance has been earnest. It rests with you to make Malcolm’s the same.’

‘Not so, Sir. That has long been out of my hands.’

‘Madame, you might well shrink from what it was as insult to you to propose; but have you never thought of the blessings you might confer in the secular life, with one who would be no hindrance, but a help?’

‘No, Sir, for no blessings, but curses, would follow a breach of dedication.’

‘Lady, I will not press you with what divines have decided respecting such dedication. Any scruples could be removed by the Holy Father at Rome, and, though I will speak no further, I will trust to your considering the matter. You have never viewed it in any light save that of a refuge from wedlock with one to whom I trust you would prefer my gentle cousin.’

‘It were a poor compliment to Lord Malcolm to name him in the same day with Sir Boëmond of Burgundy,’ said Esclairmonde; ‘but, as I said, it is not the person that withholds me, but the fact that I am not free.’

‘I do not ask you to love or accept the poor boy as yet,’ said James; ‘I leave that for the time when I shall bring him back to you, with the qualities grown which you have awakened. At least, I can bear him the tidings that it is not your feelings, but your scruples that are against him.’

‘Sir King,’ said Esclairmonde, gravely, ‘I question not your judgment in turning your kinsman and subject to the secular life; but if you lead him by false hopes, of which I am the object, I tell you plainly that you are deluding him; and if any evil come thereof, be it on your own head.’

She moved away, with a bend of her graceful neck, and James stood with a slight smile curving his lip. ‘By my troth,’ he said to himself, ‘a lordly lady! She knows her own vocation. She is one to command scores of holy maids, and have all the abbots and priors round at her beck, instead of one poor man. Rather Malcolm than I! But he is the very stuff that loves to have such a woman to rule him; and if she wed at all, he is the very man for her! I’ll not give it up! Love is the way to make a man of him, whether successful or not, and she may change her mind, since she is not yet on the roll of saints. If I could get a word with her father confessor, and show him how much it would be for the interest of the Church in Scotland to get such a woman there, it would be the surest way of coming at her. Were she once in Scotland, my pretty one would have a stay and helper! But all must rest till after the campaign.’

James therefore told Malcolm so much as that he had spoken to his lady-love for him, and that she had avowed that it was not himself, but her own vows, that was the obstacle.

Malcolm crimsoned with joy as well as confusion; and the King proceeded: ‘For the vows’—he shrugged his shoulders—‘we knew there is a remedy! Meantime, Malcolm, be you a man, win your spurs, and show yourself worth overcoming something for!’

Malcolm smiled and brightened, holding his head high and joyously, and handling his sword. Then came the misgiving—‘But Lilias, Sir, and Patrick Drummond.’

‘We will provide for them, boy. You know Drummond is bent on carving his own fortune rather than taking yours, and that your sister only longs to see you a gallant knight.’

It was true, but Malcolm sighed.

‘You have not spoken to the lady yourself?’ asked the King.

‘No, Sir. Oh, how can I?’ faltered Malcolm, shamefaced and frightened.

James laughed. ‘Let that be as the mood takes you, or occasion serves,’ he said, wondering whether the lad’s almost abject awkwardness and shame would be likely to create the pity akin to love or to contempt, and deciding that it must be left to chance.

Nor did Malcolm find boldness enough to do more than haunt Esclairmonde’s steps, trembling if she glanced towards him, and almost shrinking from her gaze. He had now no doubts about going on the campaign, and was in full course of being prepared with equipments, horses, armour, and attendants, as became a young prince attending on his sovereign as an adventurer in the camp. It was not even worth while to name such scruples to the English friar who shrived him on the last day before the departure, and who knew nothing of his past history. He knew all priests would say the same things, and as he had never made a binding vow, he saw no need of consulting any one on the subject; it would only vex him again, and fill him with doubts. The suspicion that Dr. Bennet was aware of his previous intention made him shrink from him. So the last day had come, and all was farewell. King Henry had persuaded the Queen to seclude herself for one evening from Madame of Hainault, for his sake. King James was pacing the gardens on the Thames banks, with Joan Beaufort’s hand for once allowed to repose in his; many a noble gentleman was exchanging last words with his wife—many a young squire whispering what he had never ventured to say before—many a silver mark was cloven—many a bright tress was exchanged. Even Ralf Percy was in the midst of something very like a romp with the handsome Bessie Nevil for a knot of ribbon to carry to the wars.

Malcolm felt a certain exaltation in being enough like other people to have a lady-love, but there was not much comfort otherwise; indeed, he could so little have addressed Esclairmonde that it was almost a satisfaction that she was the centre of a group of maidens whose lovers or brothers either had been sent off beforehand, or who saw their attentions paid elsewhere, and who all alike gravitated towards the Demoiselle de Luxemburg for sympathy. He could but hover on the outskirts, conscious that he must cut a ridiculous figure, but unable to detach himself from the neighbourhood of the magnet. As he looked back on the happy weeks of unconstrained intercourse, when he came to her as freely as did these young girls with all his troubles, he felt as if the King had destroyed all his joy and peace, and yet that these flutterings of heart and agonies of shame and fits of despair were worth all that childish calm.

He durst say nothing, only now and then to gaze on her with his great brown wistful eyes, which he dropped whenever she looked towards him; until at last, when the summer evening was closing in, and the last signal was given for the break-up of the party, Malcolm ventured on one faltering murmur, ‘Lady, lady, you are not offended with me?’

‘Nay,’ said Esclairmonde, kindly; ‘nothing has passed between us that should offend me.’

His eye lighted. ‘May I still be remembered in your prayers, lady?’

‘As I shall remember all who have been my friends here,’ she said.

‘And oh, lady, if I should—should win honour, may I lay it at your feet?’

‘Whatever you achieve as a good man and true will gladden me,’ said Esclairmonde, ‘as it will all others that wish you well. Both you and your sister in her loneliness shall have my best prayers. Farewell, Lord Malcolm; may the Saints bless and guard you, whether in the world or the Church.’

Malcolm knew why she spoke of his sister, and felt as if there were no hope for him. Esclairmonde’s grave kindness was a far worse sign than would have been any attempt to evade him; but at any rate she had spoken with him, and his heart could not but be cheered. What might he not do in the glorious future? As the foremost champion of a crusading king, bearing St. Andrew’s cross through the very gates of Jerusalem, what maiden, however saintly, could refuse him his guerdon?

And he knew that, for the present, Esclairmonde was safe from retiring into any convent, since her high birth and great possessions would make any such establishment expect a large dower with her as a right, and few abbesses would have ventured to receive a runaway foreigner, especially as one of her guardians was the Bishop of Thérouenne.

CHAPTER VII: THE SIEGE OF MEAUX

Wintry winds and rains were sweeping over the English tents on the banks of the Marne, where Henry V. was besieging Meaux, then the stronghold of one of those terrible freebooters who were always the offspring of a lengthened war. Jean de Gast, usually known as the Bastard de Vaurus, nominally was of the Armagnac or patriotic party, but, in fact, pillaged indiscriminately, especially capturing travellers on their way to Paris, and setting on their heads a heavy price, failing which he hung them upon the great elm-tree in the market-place. The very suburbs of Paris were infested by the forays of this desperate routier, as such highway robbers were called; the supplies of previsions were cut off, and the citizens had petitioned King Henry that he would relieve them from so intolerable an enemy.

The King intended to spend the winter months with his queen in England, and at once attacked the place in October, hoping to carry it by a coup de main. He took the lower city, containing the market-place and several large convents, with no great difficulty; but the upper city, on a rising ground above the river, was strongly fortified, well victualled, and bravely defended, and he found himself forced to invest it, and make a regular siege, though at the expense of severe toil and much sickness and suffering. Both his own prestige in France and the welfare of the capital depended on his success, and he had therefore fixed himself before Meaux to take it at whatever cost.

The greater part of the army were here encamped, together with the chief nobles, March, Somerset, Salisbury, Warwick, and likewise the King of Scots. James had for a time had the command of the army which besieged and took Dreux while Henry was elsewhere engaged, but in general he acted as a sort of volunteer aide-de-camp to his brother king, and Malcolm Stewart of Glenuskie was always with him as his squire. A great change had come over Malcolm in these last few months. His feeble, sickly boyhood seemed to have been entirely cast off, and the warm genial summer sun of France to have strengthened his frame and developed his powers. He had shot up suddenly to a fair height, had almost lost his lameness, and gained much more appearance of health and power of enduring fatigue. His nerves had become less painfully sensitive, and when after his first skirmish, during which he had kept close to King James, far too much terrified to stir an inch from him, he had not only found himself perfectly safe, but had been much praised for his valour, he had been so much pleased with himself that he quite wished for another occasion of displaying his bravery; and, what with use, and what with the increasing spirit of pugnacity, he was as sincere as Ralf Percy in abusing the French for never coming to a pitched battle. Perhaps, indeed, Malcolm spoke even more eagerly than Ralf, in his own surprise and gratification at finding himself no coward, and his fear lest Percy should detect that he ever had been supposed to be such.

So far the King of Scots had succeeded in awakening martial fire in the boy, but he found him less the companion in other matters than he had intended. When at Paris, James would have taken him to explore the learned hoards of the already venerable University of Paris, where young James Kennedy—son to Sir James Kennedy of Dunure, and to Mary, an elder sister of the King—was studying with exceeding zeal. Both James and Dr. Bennet were greatly interested in this famous abode of hearing—the King, indeed, was already sketching out designs in his own mind for a similar institution in Scotland, designs that were destined to be carried out after his death by Kennedy; and Malcolm perforce heard many inquiries and replies, but he held aloof from friendship with his clerkly cousin Kennedy, and closed his ears as much as might be, hanging back as if afraid of returning to his books. There was in this some real dread of Ralf Percy’s mockery of his clerkliness, but there was more real distaste for all that appertained to the past days that he now despised.

The tide of vitality and physical vigour, so long deficient, had, whom it had fairly set in, carried him away with it: and in the activity of body newly acquired, mental activity had well-nigh ceased. And therewith went much of the tenderness of conscience and devout habits of old. They dropped from him, sometimes for lack of time, sometimes from false shame, and by and by from very weariness and distaste. He was soldier now, and not monk—ay, and even the observances that such soldiers as Henry and James never failed in, and always enforced, were becoming a burthen to him. They wakened misgivings that he did not like, and that must wait till his next general shrift.

And Esclairmonde? Out of her sight, Malcolm dreamt a good deal about her, but more as the woman, less as the saint; and the hopes, so low in her presence, burnt brighter in her absence as Malcolm grew in self-confidence and in knowledge of the world. He knew that when he parted with her he had been a miserable little wretch whom any woman would despise, yet she had shown him a sort of preference; how would it be when he returned to her, perhaps a knight, certainly a brave man like other men!

Of Patrick Drummond he had as yet heard nothing, and only believed him to be among the Scots who fought on the French side under the Earls of Buchan and Douglas. Indeed, James especially avoided places where he knew these Scots to be engaged, as Henry persisted in regarding them as rebels against him, and in hanging all who were made prisoners; nor had Malcolm, during the courtesies that always pass between the outposts of civilized armies, made much attempt to have any communication with his cousin, for though his own abnegation of his rights had never been permitted by his guardian, or reckoned on by his sister or her lover, still he had been so much in earnest about it himself, as, while regarding it as a childish folly, to feel ill at ease in the remembrance, and, though defiant, willing to avoid all that could recall it.

Meantime he, with his king, was lodged in a large old convent, as part of the immediate following of King Henry. Others of the princes and nobles were quartered in the market hall and lower town, but great part of thine troops were in tents, and in a state of much discomfort, owing to the overflowings of the Marne. Fighting was the least of their dangers, though their skirmishes were often fought ankle-deep in mud and mire; fever and ague were among them, and many a sick man was sent away to recover or die at Paris. The long dark evenings were a new trial to men used to summer campaigning, and nothing but Henry’s wonderful personal influence and perpetual vigilance kept up discipline. At any hour of the day or night, at any place in the camp, the King might be at hand, with a cheery word of sympathy or encouragement, or with the most unflinching sternness towards any disobedience or debauchery—ever a presence to be either loved or dreaded. An engineer in advance of his time, he was persuaded that much of the discomfort might be remedied by trenching the ground around the camp; but this measure proved wonderfully distasteful to the soldiery. How hard they laboured in the direct siege operations they cared not, but to be set to drain French fields seemed to them absurd and unreasonable, and the work would not have proceeded at all without constant superintendence from one of the chiefs of the army, since the ordinary knights and squires were as obstinately prejudiced as were the men.

Thus it was that, on a cold sleety December day, James of Scotland rode along the meadows, splashing through thin ice into muddy water, and attended by his small personal suite, excepting Sir Nigel Baird, who was gone on a special commission to Paris. Both he and Malcolm were plainly and lightly armed, and wore long blue cloaks with the St. Andrew’s cross on the shoulder, steel caps without visors, and the King’s merely distinguished by a thread-hike circlet of gold. They had breastplates, swords, and daggers, but they were not going to a quarter where fighting was to be expected, and bright armour was not to be exposed to rust without need. A visit of inspection to the delvers was not a congenial occupation, for though the men-at-arms had obeyed James fairly well when he was in sole command at Dreux, yet whenever he was obliged to enforce anything unpopular, the national dislike to the Scot was apt to show itself, and the whole army was at present in a depressed condition which made such manifestations the more probable.

But King Henry was not half recovered from a heavy feverish cold, which he had not confessed or attended to, and he had also of late been troubled with a swelling of the neck. This morning, too, much to his inconvenience and dismay, he had missed his signet-ring. The private seal on such a ring was of more importance than the autograph at that time, and it would never have left the King’s hand; but no doubt, in consequence of his indisposition, his finger, always small-boned, had become thin enough to allow the signet to escape unawares, he was unwilling to publish the loss, as it might cast doubt on the papers he despatched, and he, with his chamberlain Fitzhugh, King James, Malcolm, Percy, and a few more, had spent half the morning in the vain search, ending by the King sending his chamberlain, Lord Fitzhugh, to carry to Paris a seal already bearing his shield, but lacking the small private mark that authenticated it as his signet. Fitzhugh would stand over the lapidary and see this added, and bring it back. Ralf Percy had meantime been sent to bring a report of the diggers, but he was long in returning; and when Henry became uneasy, James had volunteered to go himself, and Henry had consented, not because the air was full of sleety rain or snow, but because his hands were full of letters needing to be despatched to all quarters.

The air was so thick that it was not easy to see where were the sullen group of diggers presided over by the quondam duellists of Thirsk, Kitson and Trenton, now the most inseparable and impracticable of men; but James and his companions had ridden about two miles from the market-place, when Ralf Percy came out of the mist, exclaiming, ‘Is it you, Sir King? Maybe you can do something with those rascals! I’ve talked myself blue with cold to make them slope the sides of their dyke, but the owl Kitson says no Yorkshireman ditcher ever went but by one fashion, and none ever shall; and when I lifted my riding-rod at the most insolent of the rogues, what must Trenton do but tell me the lot were free yeomen, and I’d best look out, or they’d roll me in the mire if I meddled with a soul of them.’

‘You didn’t threaten to strike Trenton?’

‘No, no; the sullen cur is a gentleman. ’Twas one of those lubberly men-at-arms! I told them they should hear what King Harry would say to their mood. I would it were he!’

‘So would I,’ said James. ‘Little chance that they will hearken to a Scot when you have put them in such a mood. Hold, Ralf, do not go for the King; he has letters for the Emperor mattering more than this dyke.’

He rode on, and did his best by leaping into the ditch, taking the spade, and showing the superior security of the angle of inclination traced by the King, but all in vain; both Trenton and Kitson silently but obstinately scouted the notion that any king should know more about ditches than themselves.

‘See,’ cried Percy, starting up, ‘here’s other work! The fellows, whence came they?’

Favoured by the fog and the soft soil of the meadows, a considerable body of the enemy were stealing on the delvers with the manifest purpose of cutting them off from the camp. They were all mounted, but the only horses in the English party were those of James, Percy, Malcolm, and the half-dozen men of his escort. James, assuming the command at once, bade these to be all released; they would be sure to find their way to the camp, and that would bring succour. Meantime he drew the whole of the men, about thirty in number, into a compact body. They were, properly, archers, but their bows had been left behind, and they had only their pikes and bills, which were, however, very formidable weapons against cavalry as long as they continued in an unbroken rank; and though the bogs, pools, sunken hedges, and submerged stumps made it difficult to keep close together as they made their way slowly with one flank to the river, these obstacles were no small protection against a charge of horsemen.

For a quarter of a mile these tactics kept them unharmed, but at length they reached a wide smooth meadow, and the enemy seemed preparing to charge. James gave orders to close up and stand firm, pikes outwards. Malcolm’s heart beat fast; it was the most real peril he had yet seen; and yet he was cheered by the King’s ringing voice, ‘Stand firm, ye merry men. They must soon be with us from the camp.’

Suddenly a voice shouted, ‘The Scots! the Scots! ’Tis the Scots! Treachery! we are betrayed. Come, Sir’ (to Percy), ‘they’ll be on you. Treason!’

‘An’ it were, you fool, would a Percy turn his back?’ cried Ralf, striking at the man; but the panic had seized the whole body; all were shouting that the false Scots king had brought his countrymen down on them; they scattered hither and thither, and would have fallen an easy prey if they had been pursued. But this did not seem to be the purpose of the enemy, who merely extended themselves so as to form a hedge around the few who stood, sword in hand, disdaining to fly. These were, James, somewhat in advance, with his head high, and a lion look on his brow; Malcolm, white with dismay; Ralf, restless with fury; Kitson and Trenton, apparently as unmoved as ever; Brewster, equally steady: and Malcolm’s follower, Halbert, in a glow of hopeful excitement.

‘Never fear, friends,’ said James, kindly; ‘to you this can only be matter of ransom.’

‘I fear nothing,’ sharply answered Ralf.

‘We’ll stand by you, Sir,’ said Kitson to Ralf; ‘but if ever there were foul treason—’

‘Pshaw! you ass,’ were all Percy’s thanks; for at that moment a horseman came forward from among the enemy, a gigantic form on a tall white horse, altogether a ‘dark gray man,’ the open visor revealing an elderly face, hard-featured and grim, and the shield on his arm so dinted, faded, and battered, as scarce to show the blue chief and the bleeding crowned heart; but it was no unfamiliar sight to Malcolm’s eyes, and with a slight shudder he bent his head in answer to the fierce whisper, ‘Old Douglas himself!’ with which Hotspur’s son certified himself that he had the foe of his house before him. King James, resting the point of his sword on his mailed foot, stood erect and gravely expectant; and the Scot, springing to the ground, advanced with the words, ‘We greet you well, my liege, and hereby—’ he was bending his knee as he spoke, and removing his gauntlet in preparation for the act of homage.

‘Hold, Earl Douglas,’ said James, ‘homage is vain to a captive.’

‘You are captive no longer, Sir King,’ said Earl Archibald. ‘We have long awaited this occasion, and will at once return to Scotland with you, with the arms and treasure we have gained here, and will bear down the craven Albany.’

Kitson and Trenton looked at one another and grasped their swords, as though doubting whether they ought not to cut down their king’s prisoner rather than let him be rescued; and meanwhile the cry, ‘Save King James!’ broke out on all sides, knights leapt down to tender their homage, and among the foremost Malcolm knew Sir Patrick Drummond, crying aloud, ‘My lord, my lord, we have waited long for you. Be a free king in free Scotland! Trust us, my liege.’

‘Trust you, my friends!’ said James, deeply touched; ‘I trust you with all my heart; but how could you trust me if I began with a breach of faith to the King of England?’

Ralf Percy held up his finger and nodded his head to the Yorkshire squires, who stood open-mouthed, still believing that a Scot must be false. There was an angry murmur among the Scots, but James gazed at them undauntedly, as though to look it down.

‘Yes, to King Harry!’ he said, in his trumpet voice. ‘I belong to him, and he has trusted me as never prisoner was trusted before, nor will I betray that trust.’

‘The foul fiend take such niceties,’ muttered old Douglas; but, checking himself, he said, ‘Then, Sir, give me your sword, and we’ll have you home as my prisoner, to save this your honour!’

‘Yea,’ said James, ‘that is mine own, though my body be yours, and till England put me to ransom you would have but a useless captive.’

‘Sir,’ said Sir John Swinton, pressing forward, ‘if my Lord of Douglas be plain-spoken, bethink you that it is no cause for casting aside this one hope of freedom that we have sought so long. If you have the heart to strike for Scotland, this is the time.’

‘It is not the time,’ said James, ‘nor will I do Scotland the wrong of striking for her with a dishonoured hand.’

‘That will we see when we have him at Hermitage Castle,’ quoth Douglas to his followers. ‘Now, Sir King, best give your sword without more grimace. Living or dead you are ours.’

‘I yield not,’ said James. ‘Dead you may take me—alive, never.’ Then turning his eyes to the faces that gazed on him so earnestly in disappointment, in affection, or in scorn, he spoke: ‘Brave friends, who may perchance love me the better that I have been a captive half my life and all my reign, you can believe how sair my heart burns for my bonnie land’s sake, and how little I’d reck of my life for her weal. But broken oaths are ill beginnings. For me, so notably trusted by King Henry, to break my bonds, would shame both Scots and kings; and it were yet more paltry to feign to yield to my Lord of Douglas. Rescue or no rescue, I am England’s captive. Gentles, kindly brother Scots, in one way alone can you free me. Give up this wretched land of France, whose troubles are but lengthened by your valour. Let me gang to King Harry and tell him your swords are at his service, so soon as I am free. Then am I your King indeed; we return together, staunch hearts and strong hands, and the key shall keep the castle, and the bracken bush keep the cow, though I lead the life of a dog to bring it about.’

His tawny eye flashed with falcon light; and as he stood towering above all the tall men around, there were few who did not in heart own him indeed their king. But his picture of royal power accorded ill with the notions of a Black Douglas, in the most masterful days of that family; and Earl Archibald, who had come to regard kings as beings meant to be hectored by Douglases, resentfully exclaimed, ‘Hear him, comrades; he has avouched himself a Southron at heart. Has he reckoned how little it would cost to give a thrust to the caitiff who has lost heart in his prison, and clear the way for Albany, who is at least a true Scot?’

‘Do so, Lord Earl,’ said James, ‘and end a long captivity. But let these go scatheless.’

With one voice, Percy, Kitson, Trenton, and Brewster, shouted their resolve to defend him to the last; and Malcolm, flinging himself on Patrick Drummond, adjured him to save the King.

‘Thou here, laddie!’ said Patrick, amazed; and while several more knights exclaimed, ‘Sir, Sir, we’ll see no hand laid on you!’ he thrust forward, ‘Take my horse, Sir, ride on, and I’ll see no scathe befall you.’

‘Thanks,’ said James; ‘but my feet will serve me best; we will keep together.’

The Scottish force seemed dividing into two: Douglas and his friends and retainers, mounted and holding together, as though still undecided whether to grapple with the King and his half-dozen companions; while Drummond and about ten more lances were disposed to guard him at all risks.

‘Now,’ said James to his English friends; and therewith, sword in hand, he moved with a steady but swift stride towards the camp, nor did Douglas attempt pursuit; some of the other horsemen hovered between, and Patrick Drummond, with a puzzled face, kept near on foot. So they proceeded till they reached a bank and willow hedge, through which horses could hardly have pursued them.

On the other side of this, James turned round and said, ‘Thanks, Sir Knight; I suppose I may not hope that you will become a follower of the knight adventurer.’

‘I cannot fight under the English banner, my liege. Elsewhere I would fellow you to the death.’

‘This is no time to show your error,’ said James; ‘and I therefore counsel you to come no farther. The English will be pricking forth in search of us: so I will but thank you for your loyal aid.’

‘I entreat you, Sir,’ cried Patrick, ‘not to believe that we meant this matter to go as it has done! It had long been our desire—of all of us, that is, save my Lord Buchan’s retainers—to find you and release you; but never did we deem that Lord Douglas would have dared to conduct matters thus.’

‘You would be little the better for me did Lord Douglas bring me back on his own terms,’ said James, smiling. ‘No, no; when I go home, it shall be as a free king, able to do justice to all alike; and for that I am content to bide my time, and trust to such as you to back me when it comes.’

‘And with all my heart, Sir,’ said Patrick. ‘Would that you were where I could do so now. Ah! laddie,’ to Malcolm; ‘ye’re in good hands. My certie, I kenned ye but by your voice! Ye’re verily grown into a goodly ship after all, and ye stood as brave as the rest. My poor father would have been fain to see this day!’

Malcolm flushed to the ears; somehow Patrick’s praise was not as pleasant to him as he would have expected, and he only faltered, ‘You know—’

‘I ken but what Johnnie Swinton brought me in a letter frae the Abbot of Coldingham, that my father—the saints be with him!—had been set on and slain by yon accursed Master of Albany—would that his thrapple were in my grip!—that he had sent you southwards to the King, and that your sister was in St. Abbs. Is it so?’

Malcolm had barely time to make a sign of affirmation, when the King hurried him on. ‘I grieve to balk you of your family tidings, but delay will be ill for one or other of us; so fare thee well, Sir Patrick, till better times.’

He shook the knight’s hand as he spoke, cut short his protestations, and leapt down the bank, saying in a low voice, as he stretched out his hand and helped Malcolm down after him, ‘He would have known me again for your guest if we had stood many moments longer; he looked hard at me as it was; and neither in England nor Scotland may that journey of mine be blazed abroad.’

Malcolm was on the whole rather relieved; he could not help feeling guilty towards Patrick, and unless he could have full time for explanation, he preferred not falling in with him.

And at the same moment Kitson stepped towards the King. ‘Sir, you are an honest man, and we crave your pardon if we said aught that seemed in doubt thereof.’

James laughed, shaking each honest hand, and saying, ‘At least, good sirs, do not always think Scot and traitor the same word; and thank you for backing me so gallantly.’

‘I’d wish no better than to back such as you, Sir,’ said Kitson heartily; and James then turned to Ralf Percy, and asked him what he thought of the Douglas face to face.

‘A dour old block!’ said Ralf. ‘If those runaways had but stayed within us, the hoary ruffian should have had his lesson from a Percy.’

James smiled, for the grim giant was still a good deal more than a match for the slim, rosy-faced stripling of the house of Percy, who nevertheless simply deemed his nation and family made him invincible by either Scot or Frenchman.

The difficulties of their progress, however, entirely occupied them. Having diverged from the regular track, they had to make their way through the inundated meadows; sometimes among deep pools, sometimes in quagmires, or ever hedges; while the water that drenched them was fast freezing, and darkness came down on them. All stumbled or were bogged at different times; and Malcolm, shorter and weaker than the rest, and his lameness becoming more felt than usual, could not help impeding their progress, and at last was so spent that but for the King’s strong arm he would have spent the night in a bog-hole.

At last the lights were near, the outskirts were gained, the pass-word given to the watch, and the rough but welcome greeting was heard—‘That’s well! More of you come in! How got you off?’

‘The rogues got back, then?’ said Kitson.

‘Some score of them,’ was the answer; ‘but ’tis thought most are drowned or stuck by the French. The King is in a proper rage, as well he may be; but what else could come of a false Scot in the camp?’

‘Have a care, you foul tongue!’ Percy was the first to cry; and as torches were now brought out and cast their light on the well-known faces, the soldiers stood abashed; but James tarried not for their excuses; his heart was hot at the words which implied that Henry suspected him, and he strode hastily on to the convent, where the quadrangle was full of horses and men, and the windows shone with lights. At the door of the refectory stood a figure whose armour flashed with light, and his voice sounded through the closed visor—‘I tell you, March, I cannot rest till I knew what his hap has been. If he have done this thing—’

‘What then?’ answered James out of the darkness, in a voice deep with wrath; but Henry started.

‘You there! you safe! Speak again! Come here that I may see. Where is he?’

‘Here, Sir King,’ said James, gravely.

‘Now the saints be thanked!’ cried Henry, joyously. ‘Where be the caitiffs that brought me their false tale? They shall hang for it at once.’

‘It was the less wonder,’ said James, still coldly, ‘that they should have thought themselves betrayed, since their king believed it of me.’

‘Nay, ’twas but for a hot moment—ay, and the bitterest I ever spent. What could I do when the villains swore that there were signals and I know not what devices passing? I hoped yet ’twas but a plea for their own cowardice, and was mounting to come and see for you. Come, I should have known you better; I’d rather the whole world deceived me than have distrusted you, Jamie.’

There was that in his tone which ended all resentment, and James’s hand was at once clasped in his, while Henry added, ‘Ho, Provost-marshal! to the gallows with these knaves!’

‘Nay, Harry,’ said James, ‘let me plead for them. There was more than ordinary to dismay them.’

‘Dismay! ay, the more cause they should have stood like honest men. If a rogue be not to hang for deserting his captain and then maligning him, soon would knavery be master of all.’

‘Hear me first, Hal.’

‘I’ll hear when I return and you are dried. Why, man, thou art an icicle errant; change thy garments while I go round the posts, or I shall hear nought for the chattering of thy teeth.’

‘Nor I for your cough, if you go, Harry. Surely, ’tis Salisbury’s night!’

‘The more cause that I be on the alert! Could I be everywhere, mayhap a few winter blasts would not have chilled and frozen all the manhood out of the host.’

He spoke very sharply as he threw him on his horse, and wrapped his cloak about him—a poor defence, spite of the ermine lining, against the frost of the December night for a man whose mother, the fair and wise Mary de Bohun, had died in early youth from disease of the lungs.

James and the two young partners of his adventure had long been clad in their gowns of peace, and seated by the fire in the refectory, James with his harp in his hand, from time to time dreamily calling forth a few plaintive notes, such as he said always rang in his ears after hearing a Scottish voice, when they again heard Henry’s voice in hot displeasure with the provost-marshal for having deferred the execution of the runaways till after the hearing of the story of the King of Scots.

‘His commands were not to be transgressed for the king of anything,’ and he only reprieved the wretches till morning that their fate might be more signal. He spoke with the peremptory fierceness that had of late almost obscured his natural good-humour and kindliness; and when he entered the refectory and threw himself into a chair by the fire, he looked wearied out in body and mind, shivered and coughed, and said with unwonted depression that the sullen fellows would make a quagmire of their camp after all, since a French reinforcement had come up, and the vigilance that would be needed would occupy the whole army. At supper he ate little and spoke less; and when James would have related his encounter within the Scots, he cut him short, saying, ‘Let that rest till morning; I am sick of hearing of it! An air upon thy harp would be more to the purpose.’

Nor would James have been unwilling to be silent on old Douglas’s conduct if he had not been anxious to plead for the panic-stricken archers, as well as to extol the conduct of the two youths, and of the Yorkshire squires; but, as he divined that the young Hotspur would regard praise from him as an insult, he deferred the subject for his absence, and launched into a plaintive narrative ballad, to which Henry listened, leaning back in his chair, often dozing, but without relaxation of the anxiety that sat on his pale face, and ever and anon wakening within a heavy sigh, as though his buoyant spirits were giving way under the weight of care he had brought on himself.

James was just singing of one of the many knightly orphans of romance, exposed in woods to the nurture of bears, his father slain, his mother dead of grief—a ditty he had perhaps chosen for its soporific powers—when a gay bugle blast rang through the court of the convent.

‘The French would scarce send to parley thus late,’ exclaimed James; but the next moment a joyful clamour arose without, and Henry, springing to his feet, spoke not, but stood awaiting the tidings with the colour burning on cheek and brow in suppressed excitement.

An esquire, splashed to the ears, hurried into the room, and falling on his knees, cried aloud, ‘God save King Harry! News, news, my lord! The Queen has safely borne you a fair son at Windsor Castle, five days since.’

Henry did not speak, but took the messenger’s hand, wrung it, and left a costly ring there. Then, taking off his cap, he put his hands over his face, uttering a few words of fervent thanksgiving almost within himself, and then turning to the esquire, made further inquiries after his wife’s welfare, took from him the letter that Archbishop Chicheley had sent, poured out a cup of wine for him, bade the lords around make him good cheer, but craved license for himself to retire.

It was so unlike his usual hilarious manner that all looked at one another in anxiety, and spoke of his unusual susceptibility to fatigue and care; while the squire, looking at the rich jewel in his hand, declared within disappointment in his tone, that he would rather have had a mere flint stone so he had heard King Harry’s own cheery voice.

James was not the least anxious of them, but long ere light the next morning Henry stood at his bedside, saying, ‘I must go round the posts before mass, Jamie. Will you face the matin frost?’

‘I am fitter to face it than thou,’ said James, rising. ‘Is there need for this?’

‘Great need,’ said Henry. ‘Here are these fresh forces all aglow within their first zeal, and unless they are worse captains than I suppose them, they will attempt some mischief ere long—nor is any time so slack as cock-crow.’

James was speedily ready, and, within some suppressed sighs, so was Malcolm, who knew himself in duty bound to attend his master, and was kept on the alert by seeing Ralf Percy also on foot. But it was a great relief to him that the young gentleman murmured in no measured terms against the intolerable activity of their kings. No other attendants went within them, since Henry was wont to patrol his camp with as little demonstration as possible.

‘I would scarcely ask a dog to come out with me this wintry morn,’ said he, as he waved back his sleepy chamberlain, Fitzhugh, and took his brother king’s arm; ‘but I could not but crave a turn with thee, Jamie, ere the hue and cry of rejoicing begins.’

‘That is poor welcome for your heir,’ said James.

‘Poor child!’ said Henry; then, after they had walked some space in silence, he added, ‘You’ll mock me, but I would that this had not befallen at Windsor. I had laid my plans that it should be otherwise; but ladies are ill to guide.’

‘And wherefore should it not have been at fair Windsor? If I can love it as a prison, sure your son may well love it as a cradle.’

‘No dishonour to Windsor,’ said Henry; ‘but, sleeping or waking, this whole night hath this adage rung in my ears—

“Harry, born at Monmouth, shall short time live and all get;
Harry, born at Windsor, shall long time live and lose all.”’

‘A most choice piece of royal poesy and prophecy,’ laughed James.

‘Nay, do not charge me with it, thou dainty minstrel. It was sung to me by mime old Herefordshire nurse, when Windsor seemed as little within my reach as Meaux, and I never thought of it again till I looked to have a son.’

‘Then balk the prophecy,’ said James; ‘Edward born at Windsor got enough, and lived long enough to boot!’

‘Too late!’ was the answer. ‘The Archbishop christened the poor child Harry in the very hour of his birth.’

‘Poor child!’ echoed James, rather sarcastically.

‘Nay, ’tis not solely the rhyme,’ said Henry; ‘but this has been a wakeful night, and not without misgivings whether I am one who ought to look for joy in his children.’

‘What is past was not such that you alone should cry mea culpa,’ said James.

‘I never thought so till now,’ said Henry. ‘Yet who knows? My father was a winsome young man ere his exile, full of tenderness to us all, at the rare times he was with us. Who knows what cares may make of me ere my boy learns to knew me?’

‘You will not hold him aloof, and give him no chance of loving you?’

‘I trow not! I’ll have him with me in the camp, and he and my brave men shall be one another’s pride. Which Roman emperor is it that hears the nickname his father’s soldiers gave him as a child? Nay—Caligula was it? Omens are against me this morning.’

‘Then laughs them to scorn, and be yourself,’ said James. ‘Bless God for the goodly child, who is born to two kingdoms, won by his father’s and his grandsire’s swords.’

‘Ah!’ said Henry, depressed by failing health, a sleepless night, and hungry morning, ‘maybe it were better for him, soul and body both, did I stand here Duke of Lancaster, and good Edmund of March yonder were head of realm and army.’

‘Never would he be head of this army,’ said James. ‘He would be snoring at Shene; that is, if he could sleep for the trouble the Duke of Lancaster would be giving him.’

Henry laughed at last. ‘Good King Edmund, he would assuredly never try to set the world right on its hinges. Honest fellow, soon he will be as hearty in his congratulations as though he did not lie under a great wrong. Heigh-ho! such as he may be in the right on’t. I’ve marvelled of late, whether any priest or hermit could bring back my old assurance, that all this is my work on earth, or tell me if it be all one grand error. Men there have been like Cæsar, Alexander, or Charlemagne, who thought my thoughts and worked them out; and surely Church and nations cry aloud for purifying. Jerusalem, and a general council—I saw them once clear and bright before me; but now a mist seems to rise up from Richard’s blood, and hide them from me; and there comes from it my father’s voice when he asked on his deathbed what right I had to the crown. What would it be if I had to leave this work half done?’

He was interrupted by the sight of a young knight stealing into the camp, after a furtive expedition to Paris. It was enough to rouse him from his despondent state; and the severity of his wrath was in full proportion to the offence. Nor did he again utter his misgivings, but was full of his usual alacrity and life, as though daylight had restored his buoyancy.

James, on the way back to the thanksgiving mass, interceded for last night’s offenders, as an act of grace suitable to the occasion; but Henry was inexorable.

‘Had they stood to die like Englishmen, they had not lied like dogs! ‘he said; ‘and as dogs they shall hang!’

In fact, in the critical state of his army, he knew that the only safety lay in the promptest and sternest justice; and therefore the three foremost in accusing King James of treachery were hung long before noon.

However, he called for the two Yorkshiremen, and thus addressed them: ‘Well done, my masters! Thanks for showing Scots and Frenchmen what stuff Englishmen are made of! I keep my word, good fellows. Kneel down, and I’ll dub each a knight. How now! what are you blundering and whispering for?’

‘So please you, Sir,’ said Kitson, ‘this is no matter to win one’s spurs for—mere standing still without a blow.’

‘I would all had that same gift of standing still,’ returned Henry. ‘What is it sticks in your gizzard, friend? If ’tis the fees, I take them on myself.’

‘No, Sir,’ hoarsely cried both.

And Kitson explained: ‘Sir, you said you’d knight the one of us that was foremost. Now, the two being dubbed, we shall be but where we were before as to Mistress Agnes of Mineshull, unless of your good-will you would be pleased to let us fight out the wager of the heriard in all peace and amity.’

Henry burst out laughing, with all his old merriment, as he said, ‘For no Mistress Agnes living can I have honest men’s lives wasted, specially of such as have that gift of standing still. If she does not knew her own mind, one of you must get himself killed by the Frenchmen, not by one another. So kneel down, and we’ll make your knighthood’s feast fall in with that of my son.’

Thus Sir Christopher Kitson and Sir William Trenton rose up knights; and bore their honours with a certain bluntness that made them butts, even while they were the heroes of the day; and Henry, who had resumed his gay temper, made much diversion out of their mingled shrewdness and gruffness.

‘So,’ muttered Malcolm to Ralf Percy, ‘we are passed over in the self-same matter for which these fellows are knighted.’

‘Tush!’ answered Percy; ‘I’d scorn to be confounded with a couple of clowns like them! Moreover,’ he added, with better reason, ‘their valour was more exercised than ours, inasmuch as they thought there was treachery, and we did not. No, no; when my spurs are won, it shall be for some prowess, better than standing stock-still.’

Malcolm held his tongue, unwilling that Percy should see that he did feel this an achievement; but he was vexed at the lack of reward, fancying that knighthood would be no small step in the favour of that imaginary Esclairmonde whom he had made for himself.

‘Light of the world’ he loved to call her still, but it was in the commonplace romance of his time, the mere light of beauty and grace illuminating the world of chivalry.

CHAPTER VIII: THE CAPTURE

The seven months’ siege ended at last, but it was not until the brightness of May was on the fields outside, and the deadly blight of famine on all within, that a haggard, wasted-looking deputation came down from the upper city to treat with the King.

Henry was never severe with the inhabitants of French cities, and exacted no harsh terms, save that he insisted that Vaurus, the robber captain, and his two chief lieutenants, should be given up to him to suffer condign punishment. The warriors who had shut themselves up to hold out the place by honourable warfare for the Dauphin must be put to ransom as prisoners of war; but the burghers were to be unmolested, on condition of their swearing allegiance to Henry as regent for, and heir of, Charles VI.

To this the deputies consented, and the next day was fixed for the surrender. The difficulty was, as Henry had found at Harfleur, Rouen, and many other places, to enforce forbearance on his soldiery, who regarded plunder as their lawful prey, the enemy as their natural game, and the trouble a city had given them as a cause for unmercifulness. The more time changed his army from the feudal gathering of English country gentlemen and yeomen to mercenary bands of men-at-arms, the mere greedy, rapacious, and insubordinate became their temper. Well knowing the greatness of the peril, and that the very best of his captains had scarcely the will, if they had the power, to restrain the license that soon became barbarity unimaginable, he spoke sadly overnight of his dread of the day of surrender, when it might prove impossible to prevent deeds that would be not merely a blot on his scutcheon, but a shame to human nature; looking back to the exultation with which he had entered Harfleur as a mere effect of boyish ignorance and thoughtlessness.

Having taken all possible precautions, he stood in his full armour, with the fox’s brush in his helmet, under the great elm in the market-place, received the keys, accepted the sword of the captain commissioned by Charles with royal courtesy, gave his hand to be kissed by the mayor; and then, with grave inexorable air, like a statue of steel, watched as the freebooter Vaurus and his two chief companions were led down with their hands tied, halters round their necks, and priests at their sides, preparing them to be hung on that very tree. They were proud hard men, and uttered no entreaty for grace. They had hung too many travellers upon these same branches not to expect their own turn, and they were no cravens to abase themselves.

That act of justice ended, Henry mounted his warhorse and rode in at the gates. His wont was to go straight to the principal church, and there attend a solemn mass of thanksgiving; but experience had taught him that his devotions were the very opportunity of his men’s rapine: he had therefore arranged that as soon as he should have arrived in the choir of the cathedral, James should take his place, and he slip out by a side door, so as to return to the scene of action.

In full procession he and his suite reached the chief door, and there dismounted in an immense crowd, which thronged in at the doors.

‘Come, Glenuskie,’ said Ralf Percy, as the two youths were pushed chose together in the press; ‘if you have a fancy for being smothered in the minster, I have none. We shall never be missed. ’Twill be sport to walk round and see how these hardy rogues contrived to hold out.’

Malcolm willingly turned aside with him, and looked down the sloping street, which was swarming with comers and goers. The whole place was in an inflammable state. Soldiers were demanding quarters, which the citizens unwillingly gave. A refusal or expostulation against a rough entry led to violence; and ever as the two youths walked farther from the cathedral, there was more of excitement, more rude oaths of soldiers, more shrieking of women, often crying out even before any harm was done to them or their houses.

At last, before a tall overhanging house, there was an immense press, and a frightful din of shouts and imprecations, filling both the new-comers with infectious eagerness.

‘How now? how now?’ called Percy. ‘Keep the peace, good fellows.’

‘Sir,’ cried a number of voices, passionately, ‘the French villains have barred their door. There’s a lot of cowardly Armagnacs hid there with their gold, trying to balk honest men of their ransom.’

Such was the cry resounding on all sides. ‘Have at them! There’s the rogue at the windows. Out on the fellows! Burn down the door! ’Tis Vaurus himself and all his gold. Treason! treason!’

The clamour was convincing to the spirit, if not to the senses. The two lads believed in the concealed Armagnacs, or perhaps more truly were carried away by the vehemence around them; and with something of the spirit of the chase, threw themselves headlong into the affair.

‘Open! open!’ shouted Ralf. ‘Open, in the name of King Henry!’

An old man’s face peeped through a little wicket in the door, and at sight of the two youths, evidently of high rank, said in a trembling voice, ‘Alas! alas! Sir, bid these cruel men go away. I have nothing here—no one—only my sick daughter.’

‘You hear,’ said Malcolm, turning round; ‘only his sick daughter.’

‘Sick daughter!—old liar! Here’s an honest tinker makes oath he has hoards of gold laid up for Vaurus, and ten Armagnacs hidden in his house. Have at him! Bring fire!’

Blows hailed thick on the door; a flaming torch was handed over the heads of the throng; horrible growls and roars pervaded them. Malcolm and Ralf, furious at the cheat, stood among the foremost, making so much noise themselves between thundering and reviling, and calling out, ‘Where are the Armagnacs? Down with the traitors!’ that they were not aware of a sudden hush behind them, till a buffet from a heavy hand fell on Malcolm’s shoulder, and a mighty voice cried ‘Shame! shame! What, you too!’

‘There are traitors hid here, Sir,’ said Percy, in angry self-justification.

‘And what an if there are? Back, every one of you! rogues that you be!—Here, Fitzhugh, see those villains back to the camp. Let their arms be given up to the Provost-marshal.—Kites and crows as you are! Away, out with you!’

Henry pointed to the broken door, and the cowed and abashed soldiers slunk away from the terrible light of his eyes. No man could stand before the face of the King.

There was a stillness. He stood leaning on his sword, his chest heaving with his panting breaths. He was naturally as fleet as the swift-footed Achilles, but the winter had told upon him, and the haste with which he had rushed to the rescue left him breathless and speechless, while he seemed as it were to nail the two lads to the spot by his steady gaze of mingled distress and displeasure.

Neither could brook his eye: Percy hung his head like a boy in a scrape; Malcolm quailed with terror, but at the same time felt a keen sense of injury in being thus treated as a plunderer, and the blow under which his shoulder ached seemed an indignity to his royal blood.

‘Boys,’ said Henry, still low and breathlesly, but all the more impressively, ‘what is to become of honour and mercy if such as you must needs become ravening wolves at scent of booty?’

‘It was not booty, Sir; they said traitors were hid here,’ said Percy, sulkily.

‘Tush! the old story! Ever the plea for rapine and bloodthirstiness. After the warnings of last night you should have known better; but you are all alike in frenzy for a sack. You have both put off your knighthood till you have learnt not to become a shame thereto.’

‘I take not knighthood at your hands, Sir,’ burst out Malcolm, goaded with hot resentment, but startled the next moment at the sound of his own words.

‘I cry you mercy,’ said King Henry, in a cold, short tone.

Malcolm turned on his heel and walked away, without waiting to see how the poor old man in the house threw himself at the King’s feet with a piteous history of his sick daughter and her starving children, nor how Ralf hurried off headlong to the lower town to send them immediate relief in bread, wine, and doctors. The gay, good-natured, thoughtless lad no mere harboured malice for the chastisement than if his tutor had caught him idling; but things went deeper with Malcolm. True, he had undergone many a brutal jest and cruel practical joke from his cousins; but that was all in the family, not like a blow from an alien king, and one not apologized for, but followed up by a rebuke that seemed to him unjust, lowering him in his own eyes and those of Esclairmonde, and making him ready to gnaw himself with moody vexation.

‘You here, Malcolm!’ said King James, entering his quarters; ‘did you miss me in the throng? I have not seen you all day.’

‘I have been insulted, Sir,’ said Malcolm. ‘I pray your license to depart and carry my sword to my kinsmen in the French camp.’

‘How now! Is it the way to treat an insult to run away from it?’

‘Not when the world judges men to be on equal terms, my lord.’

‘What! Who has done you wrong, you silly loon?’

‘King Henry, Sir; he struck me with his fist, and rated me like his hound; and I will not eat another morsel of his bread unless he would answer it to me in single combat.’

‘Little enough bread you’d eat after that same answer!’ ejaculated James. ‘Oh! I understand now. You were with young Hotspur and the rest that set on the poor townsmen, and Harry made small distinction of persons! Nay, Malcolm, it was ill in you, that talked of so loathing spulzie!’

‘I wanted no spulzie. There were Armagnacs hid in the house, and the King would not hear us.’

‘He knew that story too well. Were you asleep or idling last night, when he warned all, on no plea whatever, to break into a house, but, if the old tale of treachery came up, to set a guard, and call one of the captains? Did you hear him—eh?’

‘I can take chiding from you, Sir, but neither words nor blows from any other king in Christendom, still less when he threatens me that I have deferred my knighthood! As if I would have it from him!’

‘From me you will not have it until he have pardoned Ralf Percy,’ said James, dryly. ‘Malcolm, I had not thought you such a fule body! Under a captain’s banner, what can be done but submit to his rule? I should do so myself, were Salisbury or March in command.’

‘Then, Sir,’ said Malcolm, much hurt that the King did not take his part, ‘I shall carry my service elsewhere.’

‘So,’ said James, much vexed, ‘this is the meek lad that wanted to hide in a convent from an ill world, flying off from his king and kinsman that he may break down honest men’s doors at his will.’

‘That I may be free from insult, Sir.’

‘You think John of Buchan like to cosset you! You found the Black Douglas so courtly to me the other day as to expect him to be tender to this nicety of yours! Malcolm, as your prince and guardian, I forbid this folly, and command you to lay aside this fit of malice and do your devoir. What! sobbing, silly lad—where’s your manhood?’

‘Sir, Sir, what will they think of me—the Lady Esclairmonde and all—if they hear I have sat down tamely with a blow?’

‘She will never think about you at all but as a sullen malapert ne’er-do-weel, if you go off to that camp of routiers, trying to prop a bad cause because you cannot take correction, nor observe discipline.’

A sudden suspicion came over Malcolm that the King would not thus make light of the offence, if it had really been the inexpiable insult he had supposed it, and the thought was an absolute relief; for in effect the parting from James, and joining the party opposed to Esclairmonde’s friends, would have been so tremendous a step, that he could hardly have contemplated it in his sober senses, and he murmured, ‘My honour, Sir,’ in a tone that James understood.

‘Oh, for your honour—you need not fear for that! Any knight in the army could have done as much without prejudice to your honour. Why, you silly loon, d’ye think I would not have been as angered as yourself, if your honour had been injured?’

Malcolm’s heart felt easier, but he still growled. ‘Then, Sir, if you assure me that I can do so without detriment to my honour, I will not quit you.’

James laughed. ‘It might have been more graciously spoken, my good cousin, but I am beholden to you.’

Malcolm, ashamed and vexed at the sarcastic tone, held his tongue for a little while, but presently exclaimed, ‘Will the Bishop of Thérouenne hear of it?’

James laughed. ‘Belike not; or, if he should, it would only seem to him the reasonable training of a young squire.’

The King did not say what crossed his own mind, that the Bishop of Thérouenne was more likely to think Henry over-strict in discipline, and absurdly rigorous.

The prelate, Charles de Luxemburg, brother to the Count de St. Pol, had made several visits to the English camp. He was one of these princely younger sons, who, like Beaufort at home, took ecclesiastical preferments as their natural provision, and as a footing whence they might become statesmen. He was a great admirer of Henry’s genius, and, as the chief French prelate who was heartily on the English side, enjoyed a much greater prominence than he could have done at either the French or Burgundian Court. He and his brother of St. Pol were Esclairmonde’s nearest kinsmen—‘oncles à la mode de Bretagne,’ as they call the relationship which is here sometimes termed Welsh uncle, or first cousins once removed—and from him James had obtained much more complete information about Esclairmonde than he could ever get from the flighty Duchess.

Her mother, a beautiful Walloon, had been heiress to wide domains in Hainault, her father to great estates in Flanders, all which were at present managed by the politic Bishop. Like most of the statesman-secular-clergy, the Bishop hated nothing so much as the monastic orders, and had made no small haste to remove his fair niece from the convent at Dijon, where she had been educated, lest the Cistercians should become possessed of her lands. He had one scheme for her marriage; but his brother, the Count, had wished to give her to his own second son, who was almost an infant; and the Duke of Burgundy had designs on her for his half-brother Boëmond; and among these various disputants, Esclairmonde had never failed to find support against whichever proposal was forced upon her, until the coalition between the Dukes of Burgundy and Brabant becoming too strong, she had availed herself of Countess Jaqueline’s discontent to evade them both.

The family had, of course, been much angered, and had fully expected that her estates would go to some great English abbey, or to some English lord whose haughty reserve and insularity would be insupportable. It was therefore a relief to Monseigneur de Thérouenne to hear James’s designs; and when the King further added, that he would be willing to let the claims on the Hainault part of her estates be purchased by the Count de St. Pol, and those in Flanders by the Duke of Burgundy, the Bishop was delighted, and declared that, rather than such a negotiation should fail, he would himself advance the sum to his brother; but that the Duke of Burgundy’s consent was more doubtful, only could they not do without it?

And he honoured Malcolm with a few words of passing notice from time to time, as if he almost regarded him as a relation. No doubt it would have been absurd to fly from such chances as these to Patrick Drummond and the opposite camp; and yet there were times when Malcolm felt as if he should get rid of a load on his heart if he were to break with all his present life, hurry to Patrick, confess the whole to him, and then—hide his head in some hermitage, leaving his pledge unforfeited!

That, however, could not be. He was bound to the King, and might not desert him, and it was not unpleasant to brood over the sacrifice of his own displeasure.

‘See,’ said Henry, in the evening, as he came into the refectory and walked up to James, ‘I have found my signet. It was left in the finger of my Spanish glove, which I had not worn since the beginning of winter. Thanks to all who took vain pains to look for it.’

But Malcolm did not respond with his pleased look to the thanks. He was not in charity with Henry, and crept out of hearing of him, while James was saying, ‘You had best destroy one or the other, or they will make mischief. Here, I’ll crush it with the pommel of my sword.’

‘Ay,’ said Henry, laughing, ‘you’d like to shew off one of your sledge-hammer blows—Sir Bras de Fer! But, Master Scot, you shall not smash the English shield so easily. This one hangs too loose to be safe; I shall keep it to serve me when we have fattened up at Paris, after the leanness of our siege.’

‘Hal,’ said James, seeing his gay temper restored, ‘you have grievously hurt that springald of mine. His northern blood cannot away with the taste he got of your fist.’

‘Pretty well for your godly young monk, to expect to rob unchecked!’ laughed Henry.

‘He will do well at last,’ said James. ‘Manhood has come on him with a rush, and borne him off his feet; nor would I have him over-tame.’

‘There spake the Scot!’ said Henry. ‘By my faith, Jamie, we should have had you the worst robber of all had we not caught you young! Well, what am I do for this sprig of royalty? Say I struck unawares? Nay, had I known him, I’d have struck with as much of a will as his slight bones would bear.’

‘An you love me, Hal, do something to cool his ill blood, and remove the sense of shame that sinks a lad in his own eyes.’

‘Methought,’ said Henry, ‘there was more shame in the deed than in the buffet.’

Nevertheless the good-natured King took an occasion of saying: ‘My Lord of Glenuskie, I smote without knowing you. It was no place for a prince—nay, for any honest man; otherwise no hand should have been laid on my guest or my brother’s near kinsman. And whereas I hear that both you and my fiery hot Percy verily credited the cry that prisoners were hid in that house, let me warn you that never was place yielded on composition but some villain got up the shout, and hundreds of fools followed it, till they learnt villainy in their turn. Therefore I ever chastise transgression of my command to touch neither dwelling nor inhabitant. You have both learnt your lesson, and the lion rampant and he of the straight tail will both be reined up better another time.’

Malcolm had no choice but to bend his head, mutter something, and let the King grasp his hand, though to him the apology seemed none at all, but rather to increase the offence, since the blame was by no means taken back again, while the condescension was such as could not be rejected, and thus speciously took away his excuse for brooding over his wrath. His hand lay so unwillingly in that strong hearty clasp that the King dropped it, frowned, shrugged his shoulders, and muttered to himself, ‘Sullen young dog! No Scot can let bygones be bygones!’ and then he turned away and cast the trifle from his memory.

James was amazed not to see the moody face clear up, and asked of Malcolm whether he were not gratified with this ample satisfaction.

‘I trow I must be, Sir,’ said Malcolm.

‘I tell thee, boy,’ said James, ‘not one king—nay, not one man—in a thousand would have offered thee the frank amends King Harry hath done this day: nay, I doubt whether even he could so have done, were it not that the hope of his wife’s coming hath made him overflow with joy and charity to all the world.’

Malcolm did not make much reply, and James regarded him with some disappointment. The youth was certainly warmly attached to him, but these tokens of superiority to the faults of his time and country which had caused the King to seek him for a companion seemed to have vanished with his feebleness and timidity. The manhood that had been awakened was not the chivalrous, generous, and gentle strength of Henry and his brothers, but the punctilious pride and sullenness, and almost something of the license, of the Scot. The camp had not proved the school of chivalry that James, in his inexperience, had imagined it must be under Henry, and the tedium and wretchedness of the siege had greatly added to its necessary evils by promoting a reckless temper and willingness to snatch at any enjoyment without heed to consequences. Close attendance on the kings had indeed prevented either Malcolm or Percy from even having the temptation of running into any such lengths as those gentry who had plundered the shrine of St. Fiacre at Breuil, or were continually galloping off for an interval of dissipation at Paris; but they were both on the outlook for any snatch of stolen diversion, for in ceasing from monastic habits Malcolm seemed to have laid aside the scruples of a religious or conscientious youth, and specially avoided Dr. Bennet, the King’s almoner.

James feared he had been mistaken, and looked to the influence of Esclairmonde to repair the evil, if perchance she should follow the Queen to France. And this it was almost certain she must do, since she was entirely dependent upon the Countess of Hainault, and could not obtain admission to a nunnery without recovering a portion of her estates.

CHAPTER IX: THE DANCE OF DEATH

The Queen was coming! No sooner had the first note of surrender been sounded from the towers of Meaux, than Henry had sent intelligence to England that the way was open for the safe arrival of his much-loved wife; and at length, on a sunny day in May, tidings were received that she had landed in France, under the escort of the Duke of Bedford.

Vincennes, in the midst of its noble forest, was the place fixed for the meeting of the royal pair; and never did a happier or more brilliant cavalcade traverse those woodlands than that with which Henry rode to the appointed spot.

All the winter, the King had heeded appearances as little as of old when roughing it with Hotspur in Wales; but now his dress was of the most royal. On his head was a small green velvet cap, encircled by a crown in embroidery; his robe was of scarlet silk, and over it was thrown a mantle of dark green samite, thickly powdered with tiny embroidered white antelopes; the Garter was on his knee, the George on his neck. It was a kingly garb, and well became the tall slight person and fair noble features. During these tedious months he had looked wan, haggard, and careworn; but the lines of anxiety were all effaced, his lustrous blue eyes shone and danced like Easter suns, his complexion rivalled the fresh delicate tints of the blossoms in the orchards; and when, with a shyness for which he laughed at himself, he halted to brush away any trace of dust that might offend the eye of his ‘dainty Kate,’ and gaily asked his brother king if he were sufficiently pranked out for a lady’s bower, James, thinking he had never seen him so handsome, replied:

‘Like a young bridegroom—nay, more like a young suitor.’

‘You’re jealous, Jamie—afraid of being outshone. ’Tis is your own fault, man; none can ever tell whether you be in festal trim or not.’

For King James’s taste was for sober, well-blending hues; and as he never lapsed into Henry’s carelessness, his state apparel was not very apparently dissimilar from his ordinary dress, being generally of dark rich crimson, blue, or russet, with the St. Andrew’s cross in white silk on his breast, or else the ruddy lion, but never conspicuously; and the sombre hues always seemed particularly well to suit his auburn colouring.

Malcolm, in scarlet and gold, was a far gayer figure, and quite conscious of the change in his own appearance—how much taller, ruddier, and browner he had become; how much better he held himself both in riding and walking; and how much awkwardness and embarrassment he had lost. No wonder Esclairmonde had despised the sickly, timid, monkish school-boy; and if she had then shown him any sort of grace or preference, what would she think of the princely young squire he could new show her, who had seen service, had proved his valour, and was only not a knight because of King Henry’s unkindness and King James’s punctilio?—at any rate, no child to be brow-beaten and silenced with folly about cloistral dedication, but a youth who had taken his place in the world, and could allege that his inspiration had come through her bright eyes.

Would she be there? That was the chief anxiety: for it was not certain that either she or her mistress would risk themselves on the Continent; and Catherine had given no intimation as to who would be in her suite—so that, as Henry had merrily observed, he was the only one in the whole party who was not in suspense, except indeed Salisbury, who had sent his commands to his little daughter to come out with the Queen.

‘She is come!’ cried Henry. ‘Beforehand with us, after all;’ and he spurred his horse on as he saw the banner raised, and the escort around the gate; and in a few seconds more he and his companions had hurried through the court, where the ladies had scarcely dismounted, and hastened into the hall, breaking into the seneschal’s solemn reception of the Queen.

‘My Kate, my fairest! Mine eyes have been hungry for a sight of thee.’

And Catherine, in her horned head-gear and flutter of spangled veil, was almost swallowed up in his hearty embrace; and the fervency of his great love so far warmed her, that she clung to him, and tenderly said, ‘My lord, it is long since I saw you.’

‘Thou wert before me! Ah! forgive thy tardy knight,’ he continued, gazing at her really enhanced beauty as if he had eyes for no one else, even while with lip and hand, kiss, grasp, and word, he greeted her companions, of whom Jaqueline of Hainault and John of Bedford were the most prominent.

‘And the babe! where is he?’ then cried he. ‘Let me have him to hold up to my brave fellows in the court!’

‘The Prince of Wales?’ said Catherine. ‘You never spake of my bringing him.’

‘If I spake not, it was because I doubted not for a moment that you would keep him with you. Nay, verily it is not in sooth that you left him. You are merely sporting with use.’

‘Truly, Sir,’ said Catherine, ‘I never guessed that you would clog yourself with a babe in the cradle, and I deemed him more safely nursed at Windsor.’

‘If it be for his safety! Yet a soldier’s boy should thrive among soldiers,’ said the King, evidently much disappointed, and proceeding to eager inquiries as to the appearance and progress of his child; to which the Queen replied with a certain languor, as though she had no very intimate personal knowledge of her little son.

Other eyes were meanwhile eagerly scanning the bright confusion of veils and wimples; and Malcolm had just made out the tall head and dark locks under a long almost shrouding white veil far away in the background behind the Countess of Hainault, when the Duke of Bedford came up with a frown of consternation on his always anxious face, and drawing King James into a window, said, ‘What have you been doing to him?’—to which James, without hearing the question, replied, ‘Where is she?’

‘Joan? At home. It was the Queen’s will. Of that another time. But what means this?’ and he signed towards his brother. ‘Never saw I man so changed.’

‘Had you seen him at Christmas you might have said so,’ replied James; ‘but now I see naught amiss; I had been thinking I had never seen him so fair and comely.’

‘I tell you, James,’ said Bedford, contracting his brows till they almost met ever his arched nose, ‘I tell you, his look brings back to me my mother’s, the last time she greeted my father!’

‘To your fantasy, not your memory, John! You were a mere babe at her death.’

‘Of five years,’ said Bedford. ‘That face—that cough—have brought all back—ay, the yearning look when my father was absent, and the pure rosy fairness that Harry and Tom cited so fiercely against one who would have told them how sick to death she was. I mind me too, that when our grandame of Hereford made us motherless children over to our grandsire of Lancaster, it was with a warning that Harry had the tender lungs of the Bohuns, and needed care. One deadly sickness he had at Kenilworth, when my father was ridden for post-haste. My mind misgave me throughout this weary siege; but his service held me fast at home, and I trusted that you would watch over him.’

‘A man like him is ill to guide,’ said James; ‘but he is more himself now than he has been for months, and a few weeks’ quiet with his wife will restore him. But what is this?’ he proceeded in his turn; ‘why is the Lady Joan not here?’

‘How can I tell? It was no fault of mine. I even got a prim warning that it became me not to meddle about her ladies, and I doubted what slanders you might hear if I were seen asking your Nightingale for a token.’

‘Have you none! Good John, I know you have.’

John smiled his ironical smile, produced from the pouch at his girdle a small packet bound with rose-coloured silk, and said: ‘The Nightingale hath a plume, you see, and saith, moreover, that her knight hath done his devoir passably, but that she yet looks to see him send some captive giant to her feet. So, Sir Knight, I hope your poor dwarf hath acquitted him well in your chivalrous jargon.’

James smiled and coloured with pleasure; the fantastic message was not devoid of reality in the days when young imaginative spirits tried to hide the prose of war and policy in a bright mist of romantic fancy; nor was he ashamed to bend his manly head in reverence to, and even press to his lips, his lady’s first love-letter, in the very sight of the satirical though sympathizing Bedford, of whom he eagerly asked of the fair Joan’s health and welfare, and whether she were flouted by Queen Catherine.

‘No more than is the meed of her beauty,’ said Bedford. ‘Sister Kate likes not worship at any shrine save one. Look at our suite: our knights—yea, our very grooms are picked for their comeliness; to wit that great feather-pated oaf of a Welshman, Owen Tudor there; while dames and demoiselles, tire-women and all, are as near akin as may be to Sir Gawain’s loathly lady.’

‘Not at least the fair Luxemburg. Did not I see her stately mien?’

‘She is none of the Queen’s, and moreover she stands aloof, so that the women forgive her gifts! There is that cough of Harry’s again! He is the shadow of the man he was; I would I knew if this were the step-dame’s doing.’

‘Nay, John, when you talk to me of Harry’s cough, and of night-watches and flooded camps, I hearken; but when your wits run wool-gathering after that poor woman, making waxen images stuck full—’

‘You are in the right on’t, James,’ said Henry, who had come up to them while he was speaking. ‘John will never get sorceries out of his head. I have thought it over, and will not be led into oppressing my father’s widow any more. I cannot spend this Pentecost cheerily till I know she is set free and restored to her manors; and I shall write to Humfrey and the Council to that effect.’

And as John shrugged his shoulders, Henry gaily added: ‘Thou seest what comes of a winter spent with this unbeliever Jamie; and truly, I found the thought of unright to my father’s widow was a worse pin in my heart than ever she is like to thrust there.’

Thus then it was, that in the overflowing joy and good-will of his heart, and mayhap with the presentiment which rendered him willing to be at peace with all his kindred, Henry forgave and released his step-mother, Joan of Navarre, whom common rumour termed the Witch Queen, and whom he had certainly little reason to love, whether it were true or not that she had attempted to weave spells against him. In fact, there were few of the new-comers from England who did not, like Bedford, impute the transparency of Henry’s hands, and the hollowness of his brightly-tinted cheek, to some form of sorcery.

Meantime, Esclairmonde de Luxemburg, more beautiful than ever under a still simpler dress, had greeted Malcolm with her wonted kindness; adding, with a smile, that he was so much grown and embrowned that she should not have known him but for the sweet Scottish voice which he, like his king, possessed.

‘You do me too much grace in commending aught that is mine, madame,’ said Malcolm, with an attempt at the assurance he believed himself to have acquired; but he could only finish by faltering and blushing. There was a power of repression about Esclairmonde that annihilated all his designs, and drove him back into his bashful self whenever he came into contact with her, and felt how unlike the grave serene loftiness of her presence was to the mere queen of romance, that in her absence her shadow had become.

Alice Montagu, returning to her side, relieved while disconcerting him. Sweet little Alice had been in a continual flutter ever since commands had come from Meaux that she was to come out to meet the father whom she had not seen since what seemed like half her childish lifetime, and the betrothed whom she had never seen at all; and Lady Westmoreland had added to her awe by the lengthened admonition with which she took leave of her. And on this day, when Esclairmonde herself had arrayed the fair child in the daintiest of rose-pink boddices edged with swan’s-down, the whitest of kirtles, and softest of rosy veils, the flush of anxiety on the pale little face made it so fair to look upon, that as the maiden wistfully asked, ‘Think you he will flout me?’ it was impossible not to laugh at the very notion. ‘Ah! but I would be glad if he did, for then I might bide with you.’

When, in the general greeting, Alice had been sought out by a tall, dark-browed, grizzled warrior, Esclairmonde had, cruelly, as the maiden thought, kept her station behind the Countess, and never stirred for all those wistful backward glances, but left her alone to drop on her knee to seek the blessing of the mighty old soldier.

And now she was holding his great hand, almost as tough as his gauntlets, and leading him up to her friend, while he louted low, and spoke with a grand fatherly courtesy:

‘Fair demoiselle, this silly wench of mine tells me that you have been good friend to her, and I thank you for the same with all mine heart.’

‘Silly’ was a fond term of love then, and had all the affection of a proud father in it, as the Earl of Salisbury patted the small soft fingers in his grasp.

‘Truly, my lord,’ responded Esclairmonde, ‘the Lady Alice hath been my sweetest companion, friend, and sister, for these many months.’

‘Nay, child, art worthy to be called friend by such a lady as this? If so, I shall deem my little Alice grown a woman indeed, as it is time she were—Diccon Nevil is bent on the wedding before we go to the wars again.’

Alice coloured like a damask rose, and hid her face behind her friend.

‘Hast seen him, sweet?’ asked Esclairmonde, when Salisbury had been called away. ‘Is he here?’

‘Yes; out there—he with the white bull on his surcoat,’ said Alice, dreading to look that way.

‘And hast spoken with him?’ asked the lady next, feeling as if the stout, commonplace, hardy-looking soldier she saw was scarce what she would have chosen for her little wild rose of an Alice, comely and brave though he were.

‘He hath kissed mine hand,’ faltered Alice, but it was quite credible that not a word had passed. The marriage was a business contract between the houses of Wark and Raby, and a grand speculation for Sir Richard Nevil, that was all; but gentle Alice had no reluctance beyond mere maidenly shyness, and unwillingness to enter on an unknown future under a new lord. She even whispered to her dear Clairette that she was glad Sir Richard never tormented her by talking to her, and that he was grave, and so old.

‘So old? why, little one, he can scarce be seven-and-twenty!’

‘And is not that old? oh, so old!’ said Alice. ‘Able to take care of me. I would not have a youth like that young Lord of Glenuskie. Oh no—never!’

‘That is well,’ said Esclairmonde, smiling; ‘but wherefore put such disdain in thy voice, Alice? He used to be our playfellow, and he hath grown older and more manly in this year.’

‘His boyhood was better than such manhood,’ said Alice; ‘he was more to my taste when he was meek, than now that he seems to say, “I would be saucy if I durst.” And he hath not the stuff to dare any way.’

‘Fie! fie! Alice, you are growing slanderous.’

‘Nay, now, Clairette, own verily—you feel the like!’

‘Hush, silly one, what skills it? Youths must pass through temptation; and if his king hindered his vocation, maybe the poor lad may rue it sorely, but methinks he will come to the right at last. It were better to say a prayer for his faults than to speak evil of them, Alice.’

Poor Malcolm! He was at that very moment planning with an embroiderer a robe wherein to appear, covered with flashes of lightning transfixing the world, and mottoes around—‘Esclairé mais Embrasé’

Every moment that he was absent from Esclairmonde was spent in composing chivalrous discourses in which to lay himself at her feet, but the mere sight of her steady dark eyes scattered them instantly from his memory; and save for very shame he would have entreated King James again to break the ice for him, since the lady evidently supposed that she had last year entirely quashed his suit. And in this mood Malcolm mounted and took his place to ride into Paris, where the King wished to arrive in the evening, and with little preparation, so as to avoid the weary length of a state reception, with all its speeches and pageants.

In the glow of a May evening the cavalcade passed the gates, and entered the city, where the streets were so narrow that it was often impossible to ride otherwise than two and two. The foremost had emerged into an open space before a church and churchyard, when there was a sudden pause, a shock of surprise. All across the space, blocking up the way, was an enormous line of figures, looking shadowy in the evening light, and bearing the insignia of every rank and dignity that earth presented. Popes were there, with triple crown and keys, and fanned by peacock tails; scarlet-matted and caped cardinals, mitred and crosiered bishops, crowned and sceptred kings, ermined dukes, steel-clad knights, gowned lawyers, square-capped priests, cowled monks, and friars of every degree—nay, the mechanic with his tools, the peasant with his spade, even the beggar within his dish; old men, and children of every age; and women too of all grades—the tower-crowned queen, the beplumed dame, the lofty abbess, the veiled nun, the bourgeoise, the peasant, the beggar;—all were there, moving in a strange shadowy wild dance, sometimes slow, sometimes swift and mad with gaiety, to the music of an unseen band of clashing kettle-drums, cymbals, and other instruments, that played fast and furiously; while above all a knell in the church tower rang forth at intervals a slow, deep, lugubrious note; and all the time there glided in and out through the ring a grisly being—skull-headed, skeleton-boned, scythe in hand—Death himself; and ever and anon, when the dance was swiftest, would he dart into the midst, pounce on one or other, holding an hour-glass to the face, unheeding rank, sex, or age, and bear his victim to the charnel-house beside the church. It was a sight as though some terrible sermon had taken life, as though the unseen had become visible, the veil were taken away; and the implicit unresisting obedience of the victims added to the sense of awful reality and fatality.

The advance of the victorious King Henry made no difference to the continuousness of the frightful dance; nay, it was plain that he was but in the presence of a monarch yet more victorious than himself, and the mazes wound on, the performers being evidently no phantoms, but as substantial as those who beheld them; nay, the grisly ring began to absorb the royal suite within itself, and an awe-stricken silence prevailed—at least, where Malcolm Stewart and Ralf Percy were riding together.

Neither lad durst ask the other what it meant. They thought they knew too well. Percy ceased not for one moment to cross himself, and mutter invocations to the saints; Malcolm’s memory and tongue alike seemed inert and paralyzed with horror—his brain was giddy, his eyes stretched open; and when Death suddenly turned and darted in his direction, one horrible gush of thought—‘Fallen, fallen! Lost, lost! No confession!’—came over him; he would have sobbed out an entreaty for mercy and for a priest, but it became a helpless shriek; and while Percy’s sword flashed before his eyes, he felt himself falling, death-stricken, to the earth, and knew no more.

‘There—he moved,’ said a voice above him.

‘How now, Glenuskie?’ cried Ralf Percy. ‘Look up; I verily thought you were sped by Death in bodily shape; but ’twas all an abominable grisly pageant got up by some dismal caitiffs.’

‘It was the Danse Macabre,’ added the sweet tone that did indeed unclose Malcolm’s eyes, to see Esclairmonde bending over him, and holding wine to his lips. Ralf raised him that he might swallow it, and looking round, he saw that he was in a small wainscoted chamber, with an old burgher woman, Ralf Percy, and Esclairmonde; certainly not in the other world. He strove to ask ‘what it meant,’ and Esclairmonde spoke again:

‘It is the Danse Macabre; I have seen it in Holland. It was invented as a warning to those of sinful life, and this good woman tells me it has become the custom to enact it every evening at this churchyard of the Holy Innocents.’

‘A custom I devoutly hope King Harry will break!’ exclaimed Ralf. ‘If not, I’ll some day find the way between those painted ribs of Monseigneur de la Mort, I can tell him! I had nearly given him a taste of my sword as it was, only some Gascon rogue caught my arm, and he was off ere I could get free. So I jumped off, that your poor corpse should not be trodden by French heels; and I hardly know how it was, but the Lady Esclairmonde was by my side as I dragged you out, and caused these good folks to let me bring you in behind their shop.’

‘Lady, lady, I am for ever beholden,’ cried Malcolm, gathering himself up as if to fall at her feet, and his heart bounding high with joy, for this was from death to life indeed.

‘I saw there was some one hurt,’ said Esclairmonde in her repressive manner. ‘Drink some more wine, eat this bread, and you will be able to ride to the Hôtel de St. Pol.’

‘Oh, lady, let me speak of my bliss!’ and he snatched at her hand, but was still so dizzy that he sank back, becoming aware that he was stiff and bruised from his fall. Almost at the same moment a new step and voice were heard in the little open booth where the cutler displayed his wares, and King James was at once admitted.

‘How goes it, laddie?’ he asked. ‘They told me grim Death had clutched you and borne you off to his charnel-house; but at least I see an angel has charge of you.’

Esclairmonde slightly coloured as she made answer:

‘I saw some one fall, and came to offer my poor skill, Sir; but as the Sieur de Glenuskie is fast recovering, if you will permit Sir Nigel Baird to attend me, Sir, I will at once return.’

‘I am ready—I am not hurt. Oh, let us go together!’ panted Malcolm, leaping up.

‘Eh, gentlemen!’ exclaimed the hospitable cutler’s wife; ‘you will not away so fast! This gallant knight will permit you to remain. And the fair lady, she will do me the honour to drink a cup of wine to the recovery of her betrothed.’

‘Not so, good woman,’ said Esclairmonde, a little apart, ‘I am the betrothed of Heaven. I only assisted because I feared the youth’s fall was more serious than it proves.’

The bourgeoise begged pardon, and made a curtsey; there was nothing unusual in the avowal the lady had made, when the convent was a thoroughly recognized profession; but Esclairmonde could not carry out her purpose of departing separately with old Sir Nigel Baird; Malcolm was on his feet, quite ready to mount, and there was no avoiding the being assisted to her saddle by any but the King, who was in truth quite as objectionable a companion, as far as appearances went, for a young solitary maiden, as was Malcolm himself. Esclairmonde felt that her benevolence might have led her into a scrape. When she had seen the fall, knowing that to the unprepared the ghastly pageant must seem reality, she had obeyed the impulse to hurry to the rescue, to console and aid in case of injury, and she had not even perceived that her female companions did not attempt to accompany her. However, the mischance could best be counteracted by simplicity and unconsciousness; so, as she found herself obliged to ride by the King, she unconcernedly observed that these fantastic dances might perhaps arouse sinners, but that they were a horrible sight for the unprepared.

‘Very like a dream becoming flesh and blood,’ said James. ‘We in advance were slow to perceive what it was, and then the King merely thought whether it would alarm the Queen.’

‘I trow it did not.’

‘No; the thing has not been found that will stir her placid face. She merely said it was very lugubrious, and an ill turn in the Parisians thus to greet her, but they were always senseless bêtes; and he, being relieved of care for her, looked with all his eyes, with a strange mixture of drollery at the antics and the masques, yet of grave musing at the likeness to this present life.’

‘I think,’ said Esclairmonde, ‘that King Henry is one of the few men to whom the spectacle is a sermon. He laughs even while he lays a thing to heart.’

These few sentences had brought them to the concourse around the gateway of the great Hôtel de St. Pol, in whose crowded courtyard Esclairmonde had to dismount; and, after being handed through the hall by King James, to make her way to the ladies’ apartments, and there find out, what she was most anxious about, how Alice, who had been riding at some distance from her with her father, had fared under the alarm.

Alice ran up to her eagerly. ‘Ah, dear Clairette, and was he greatly hurt?’

‘Not much; he had only swooned for fright.’

‘Swooned! to be a prince, and not have the heart of a midge!’

‘And how was it with you, you very wyvern for courage?’

‘With me? Oh, I was somewhat appalled at first, when my father took hold of my rein, and bade me never fear; for I saw his face grow amazed. Sir Richard Nevil rode up on the other side, and said the hobgoblins should eat out his heart ere they hurt me; and I looked into his face as he said that, and liked it more than ever I thought to like any but yours, Clairette. I think my father was going to leave me to him and see whether the King needed some one to back him; but up came a French lord, and said ’twas all a mere show, and my father said he was glad I was a stout-hearted wench that had never cried out for fear; and then I was so pleased, that I never heeded the ugly sight any more. Ay, and when Sir Richard lifted me off my horse, he kissed my hand of his own accord.’

‘This is all he has ever said to you?’ said Esclairmonde, smiling. ‘It is like an Englishman—to the purpose.’

‘Yea, is it not? Oh! is it not better than all the fine speeches and compliments that Joan Beaufort gets from her Scottish king?’

‘They have truths in them too, child.’

‘Ay; but too fine-spun, too minstrel-like, for a plain English maid. The hobgoblins should eat out his heart ere they touched me!’ she repeated to herself, as though the saying were the most poetical concert sung on minstrel lover’s lute.

Death’s Dance had certainly brought this affianced pair to a better understanding than all the gayest festivities of the Court.

Esclairmonde would have been happy if no one had noticed her benevolence to the young Scot save Alice Montagu; but she had to endure countless railleries from every lady, from Countess Jaqueline downwards, on the unmistakable evidence that her heart had spoken; and her grave dignity had less effect in silencing them than usual, so diverting was the alleged triumph over her propriety, well as they knew that she would have done the same for the youngest horse-boy, or the oldest man-at-arms.

CHAPTER X: THE WHITSUNTIDE FESTIVAL

‘Lady, fairest lady! Ah, suffer your slave to fall at your feet with his thanks!’

‘No thanks are due, Sir. I knew not who had fallen.’

‘Cruel coyness! Take not away the joy that has fed a hungry heart.’

‘Lord Glenuskie’s heart was wont to hunger for better joys.’

‘Lady, I have ceased to be a foolish boy.’

‘Such foolishness was better than some men’s wisdom.’

‘Listen, belle demoiselle. I have been forth into the world, and have learnt to see that monasteries have become mere haunts for the sluggard, who will not face the world; and that honour, glory, and all that is worth living for, lie beyond. Ah, lady! those eyes first taught me what life could give.’

‘Hush, Sir!’ said Esclairmonde. ‘I can believe that as a child you mistook your vocation, and the secular life may be blest to you; but with me it can never be so; and if any friendship were shown to you on my part, it was when I deemed that we were brother and sister in our vows. If I unwittingly inspired any false hopes, I must do penance for the evil.’

‘Call it not evil, lady,’ entreated Malcolm. ‘It cannot be evil to have wakened me to life and hope and glory.’

‘What should you call it in him who should endeavour to render Lady Joan Beaufort faithless to your king, Lord Malcolm? What then must it be to tempt another to break troth-plight to the King of Heaven?’

‘Nay, madame,’ faltered Malcolm; ‘but if such troth were forbidden and impossible?’

‘None has the right or power to cancel mine,’ replied the lady.

‘Yet,’ he still entreated, ‘your kindred are mighty.’

‘But my Bridegroom is mightier,’ she said.

‘O lady, yet—Say, at least,’ cried Malcolm, eagerly, ‘that were you free in your own mind to wed, at least you would less turn from me than from the others proposed to you.’

‘That were saying little for you,’ said Esclairmonde, half smiling. ‘But, Sir,’ she added gravely, ‘you have no right to put the question; and I will say nothing on which you can presume.’

‘You were kinder to me in England,’ sighed Malcolm, with tears in his eyes.

‘Then you seemed as one like-minded,’ she answered.

‘And,’ he cried, gathering fresh ardour, ‘I would be like-minded again. You would render me so, sweetest lady. I would kiss your every step, pray with you, bestow alms with you, found churches, endow your Béguines, and render our change from our childish purpose a blessing to the whole world; become your very slave, to do your slightest bidding. O lady, could I but give you my eyes to see what it might be!’

‘It could not be, if we began with a burthened conscience,’ said Esclairmonde. ‘We have had enough of this, Sieur de Glenuskie. You know that with me it is no matter of likes or dislikes, but that I am under a vow, which I will never break! Make way, Sir.’

He could but obey: she was far too majestic and authoritative to be gainsaid. And Malcolm, in an access of misery, stood lost to all the world, kneeling in the window-seat, where she had left him resting his head against the glass, when suddenly a white plump hand was laid on his shoulder, and a gay voice cried:

‘All à la mort, my young damoiseau! What, has our saint been unpropitious? Never mind, you shall have her yet. We will see her like the rest of the world, ere we have done within her!’

And Malcolm found himself face to face with the free-spoken Jaqueline of Hainault.

‘You are very good, madame,’ he stammered.

‘You shall think me very good yet! I have no notion of being opposed by a little vassal of mine; and we’ll succeed, if it were but for the fun of the thing! Monseigneur de Thérouenne is on your side, or would be, if he were sure of the Duke of Burgundy. You see, these prelates hate nothing so much as the religious orders; and all the pride of the Luxemburgs is in arms against Clairette’s fancy for those beggarly nursing Sisters; so it drives him mad to hear her say she only succoured you for charity. He thinks it a family disgrace, that can only be wiped off by marrying her to you; and he would do it bon gré, mal gré, but that he waits to hear what Burgundy will say. You have only to hold out, and she shall be yours, if I hold her finger while you put on the ring. Only let us be sure of Burgundy.’

This was not a very flattering way of obtaining a bride; but Malcolm was convinced that when once married to Esclairmonde, his devotion would atone to her for all that was unpleasant in obtaining her. At least, she loved no one else; she had even allowed that she had once thought him like-minded; she had formerly distinguished him; and nothing lay between them but her scruples; and when they were overcome, by whatever means, his idol would be his, to adore, to propitiate, to win by the most intense devotion. All now must, however, turn upon the Duke of Burgundy, without whose sanction Madame of Hainault would be afraid to act openly.

The Duke was expected at Paris for the Whitsuntide festival, which was to be held with great state. The custom was for the Kings of France to feast absolutely with all Paris, with interminable banquet tables, open to the whole world without question. And to this Henry had conformed on his first visit to the city; but he had learnt that the costly and lavish feast had been of very little benefit to the really distressed, who had been thrust aside by loud-voiced miscreants and sturdy beggars, such as had no shame in driving the feeble back with blows, and receiving their own share again and again.

By the advice of Dr. Bennet, his almoner, he was resolved that this should not happen again; that the feast should be limited to the official guests, and that the cost of the promiscuous banquet should be distributed to those who really needed it, and who should be reached through their parish priests and the friars known to be most charitable.

Dr. Bennet, as almoner, with the other chaplains, was to arrange the matter; and horrible was the distress that he discovered in the city, that had for five-and-twenty years been devastated by civil fury, as well as by foreign wars; and famines, pestilences, murders, and tyrannies had held sway, so as to form an absolute succession of reigns of terror. The poor perished like flies in a frost; the homeless orphans of the parents murdered by either faction roamed the streets, and herded in the corners like the vagrant dogs of Eastern cities; and meantime, the nobles and their partisans revelled in wasteful pomp.

Scholar as he was, Dr. Bennet was not familiar enough with Parisian ways not to be very grateful for aid from Esclairmonde in some of his conferences, and for her explanations of the different tastes and needs of French and English poor.

What she saw and heard, on the other hand, gave form and purpose to her aspirations. The Dutch Sisters of St. Bega, the English Bedeswomen of St. Katharine, were sorely needed at Paris. They would gather up the sufferers, collect the outcast children, feed the hungry, follow with balm wherever a wound had been. To found a Béguinage at Paris seemed to her the most befitting mode of devoting her wealth; and her little admirer, Alice, gave up her longing desire that the foundation should be in England, when she learned that, as the wife of Nevil, her abode was likely to be in France as long as that country required English garrisons.

To the young heiress of Salisbury, her own marriage, though close at hand, seemed a mere ordinary matter compared with Esclairmonde’s Béguinage, to her the real romance. Never did she see a beggar crouching at the church door, without a whisper to herself that there was a subject for the Béguines; and, tender-hearted as she was, she looked quite gratified at any lamentable tale which told the need.

If Esclairmonde had a climax to her visions of her brown-robed messengers of mercy, it was that the holy Canon of St. Agnes should be induced to come and act the part of master to her bedeswomen, as did Master Kedbesby at home.

She had even dared to murmur her design to Dr. Bennet; and when he, under strict seal of secrecy, had sounded King Henry, the present real master of Paris, he reported that the tears had stood in the King’s eyes for a moment, as he said, ‘Blessings on the maiden! Should she be able to do this for this city, I shall know that Heaven hath indeed sent a blessing by my arms!’

For one brief week, Esclairmonde and Alice were very happy in this secret hope; but at the end of that time the Bishop of Thérouenne appeared. Esclairmonde had ventured to hope that the King’s influence, and likewise the fact that her intention was not to enrich one of the regular monastic orders, might lead him to lend a favourable ear to her scheme; but she was by no means prepared to find him already informed of the affair of the Dance of Death, and putting his own construction on it.

‘So, my fair cousin, this is the end of your waywardness. The tokens were certainly somewhat strong; but the young gentleman’s birth being equal to yours, after the spectacle you have presented, your uncle of St. Pol, and I myself, must do our utmost to obtain the consent of the Duke of Burgundy.’

‘Monseigneur is mistaken,’ said Esclairmonde.

‘Child, we will have no more folly. You have flown after this young Scot in a manner fitted only for the foolish name your father culled for you out of his books of chivalry. You have given a lesson to the whole Court and city on the consequences of a damsel judging for herself, and running a mad course over the world, instead of submitting to her guardians.’

‘The Court understands my purpose as well as you do, Monseigneur.’

‘Silence, Mademoiselle. Your convent obstinacy is ended for ever now, since to send you to one would be to appear to hide a scandal.’

‘I do not wish to enter a convent,’ said Esclairmonde. ‘My desire is to dedicate my labour and my substance to the foundation of a house here at Paris, such as are the Béguinages of our Netherlands,’

The Bishop held up his hands. He had never heard of such lunacy and it angered him, as such purposes are wont to anger worldly-hearted men. That a lady of Luxemburg should have such vulgar tastes as to wish to be a Beguine was bad enough; but that Netherlandish wealth should be devoted to support the factious poor of Paris was preposterous. Neither the Duke of Burgundy, nor her uncle of St. Pol, would allow a sou to pass out of their grasp for so absurd a purpose; the Pope would give no license—above all to a vain girl, who had helped a wife to run away from her husband—for new religious houses; and, unless Esclairmonde was prepared to be landless, penniless, and the scorn of every one, for her wild behaviour, she must submit, bon gré, mal gré, to become the wife of the Scottish prince.

‘Landless and penniless then will I be, Monseigneur,’ said Esclairmonde. ‘Was not poverty the bride of St. Francis?’

The Bishop made a growl of contempt; but recollecting himself, and his respect for the saint, began to argue that what was possible for a man, a mere merchant’s son, an inspired saint besides, was not possible to a damsel of high degree, and that it was mere presumption, vanity, and obstinacy in her to appeal to such a precedent.

There was something in this that struck Esclairmonde, for she was conscious of a certain satisfaction in her plan of being the first to introduce a Béguinage at Paris, and that she was to a certain degree proud of her years of constancy to her high purpose; and she looked just so far abashed that the uncle saw his advantage, and discoursed on the danger of attempting to be better than other people, and of trying to vapour in spiritual heights, to all of which she attempted no reply; till at last he broke up the interview by saying, ‘There, then, child; all will be well. I see you are coming to a better mind.’

‘I hope I am, Monseigneur,’ she replied, with lofty meekness; ‘but scarcely such as you mean.’

Alice Montagu’s indignation knew no bounds. What! was this noble votaress to be forced, not only to resign the glory of being the foundress of a new order of beneficence, but to be married, just like everybody else, and to that wretched little coward? Boëmond of Burgundy was better than that, for he at least was a man!

‘No, no, Alice,’ said Esclairmonde, with a shudder; ‘any one rather than the Burgundian! It is shame even to compare the Scot!’

‘He may not be so evil in himself,’ said Alice; ‘but with a brave man you have only his own sins, while a coward has all those other people may frighten him into.’

‘He bore himself manfully in battle,’ said the fair Fleming in reproof.

But Alice answered with the scorn that sits so quaintly on the gentle daughter of a bold race: ‘Ay, where he would have been more afraid to run than to stand.’

‘You are hard on the Scot,’ said Esclairmonde. ‘Maybe it is because the Nevils of Raby are Borderers,’ she added, smiling; and, as Alice likewise smiled and blushed, ‘Now, if it were not for this madness, I could like the youth. I would fain have had him for a brother that I could take care of.’

‘But what will you do, Esclairmonde?’

‘Trust,’ said she, sighing. ‘Maybe, my pride ought to be broken; and I may have to lay aside all my hopes and plans, and become a mere serving sister, to learn true humility. Anyhow, I verily trust to my Heavenly Spouse to guard me for himself. If the Duke of Burgundy still maintains Boëmond’s suit, then in the dissension I see an escape.

‘And my father will defend you; and so will Sir Richard,’ said Alice, with complacent certainty in their full efficiency. ‘And King Harry will interfere; and we will have your hospital; ay, we will. How can you talk so lightly of abandoning it?’

‘I only would know what is human pride, and what God’s will,’ sighed Esclairmonde.