The age of the King was thirty-eight, and he was one of the tallest men in his kingdom. The colour of his hair, whiskers, and small forked beard, was only one remove from black. Dark pencilled eyebrows, of that surprised shape which many persons admire, arched over keen liquid dark eyes. The general type of the features was Grecian; their regularity was perfect, but the nose was a trifle too prominent for pure Grecian. About the set of the lips, delicately as they were cut, there was a peculiarity which a physiognomist might have interpreted to mean that when their owner had once placed a particular end before him, no considerations of right on the one hand, or of friendship on the other, would be allowed to interfere with its attainment. This was a very clever man, a very sagacious, far-seeing man, a very handsome man, a very popular man; yet a man whom no human heart ever loved, and who never loved any human being—a man who could stand alone, and who did stand alone, to the hour when, "with all his imperfections on his head," he stood before the bar of God.

"The match is no serviceable one," said the Archbishop.

"Truth to tell," replied the King a little doubtfully, "I scarce do account my cousin herself an heretic:—yet I wis not—she may be. But she hath been rocked in the heresy in her cradle, and ever sithence hath been within earshot thereof. You wot well, holy Father, what her lord was; and his mother, with whom she hath dwelt these ten years or more, is worser than himself. Now it shall never serve to have Kent lost to the Church her cause. You set affiance on him, I know, and I the like: and if he be not misturned, methinks he may yet prove a good servant. But here is this alliance cast in our way! I know they be wed without my licence: yet what should it serve to fine or prison him? To prison her might be other matter; but we cannot touch her. So this done should not serve our turn. Father, is there any means that you can devise to break this marriage?"

"The priest that wed them is a Gospeller," returned the Archbishop with a peculiar smile.

"A priest in full orders," objected the King, "of good life and unblemished conversation. Even you, holy Father, so fertile in wise plans, shall scarce, methinks, be able to lay finger on him."

"Scantly; without he were excommunicate of heresy at the time this wedding were celebrate."

"Which he was not," answered the King rather impatiently. "Would to Saint Edmund he had so been! It were then no marriage."

The Archbishop made no reply in words, but drawing towards him a sheet of paper which lay upon the table, he slowly traced upon it a date some two months previous—the date of the Sunday before Constance's marriage. The King watched him in equal silence, with knitted brows and set lips. Then the two conspirators' eyes met.

"Could that be done?" asked the royal layman, under his breath.

"Is it not done, Sire?" calmly responded the priestly villain, pointing to the paper.

The King was silent for a minute; but, unprincipled as he was, his conscience was not quite so seared as that of Arundel.

"The end halloweth the means, trow?" he said inquiringly.

"All means be holy, Sire, where the end is the glory of God," replied Arundel, with a hypocritical assumption of piety. "And the glory of God is the service and avancement of holy Church."

Still Henry's mind misgave him. His conscience appears at times to have tortured him in his later years, and he shrank from burdening it yet further.

"Father, if sin be herein, you must bear this burden!"

"I have borne heavier," replied Arundel with a cynical smile.

And truly, to a man upon whose soul eleven murders lay lightly, an invalidated marriage was likely to be no oppressive weight.

"Yet even now," resumed the King, again knitting his brows uneasily, "methinks all hardships be scarce vanished. Our good cousin of Kent is he that should not be turned aside from his quarry [object of pursuit; a hunting phrase] by a brook in his way."

"Not if an eagle arose beyond the heron he pursued?" suggested Arundel, significantly.

"Ha!" said the King.

"He is marvellous taken with beauty," resumed his priestly counsellor. "And the Lady Custance is not the sole woman in the world."

"You have some further thought, Father," urged Henry.

"Methinks your Grace hath a good friend in the Lord Galeas, Duke of Milan?"

"Ay, of olden time," answered the King, with a sigh. Was it caused by the regretful thought that if he could bring back that olden time, when young Henry of Bolingbroke was learning Italian at Milan and Venice, he might be a happier man than now?

"He hath sisters, methinks, that bear high fame for fair and lovesome?"

"None higher in Christendom."

"And the youngest-born, the Lady Lucy, I take it, is yet unwed?"

"She is so."

"And cometh not behind her sisters for beauty?"

"She was but a little child when I was at Milan," said the King; "but I hear tell of her as fairest of all the fair Visconti."

"Were it impossible, Sire, that the lady, in company of her young brothers, should visit your Highness' Court?"

Henry readily owned that it was by no means impossible, if he were to ask it: but he reminded the Archbishop that the Duke of Milan was poor, though proud; and that while he would consider the Princess Lucia eternally disgraced by marrying beneath her, he probably would not scruple to sell her hand to the highest bidder of those illustrious persons who stood on the list of eligibles. And Kent, semi-royal though he were, was not a rich man, his family having suffered severely from repeated attainders.

"And what riches he hath goeth in velvet and ouches," [jewellery] said the Archbishop, with his cold, sarcastic smile. "Well—if the Duke's Grace would fain pick up ducats even in the mire, mayhap he shall find them as plenty in England as otherwhere. Your Highness can heald [pour forth] gold with any Prince in Italy. And when the lady is hither, 'twere easy to bid an hunting party, an' your Grace so list. My cousin of Kent loveth good hawking."

Again that keen, cruel smile parted the priestly lips.

"Moreover, Sire, she must be a Prince's daughter, or my cousin, who likewise loveth grandeur and high degree, may count the cost ere he swallow the bait. The Lady Custance is not lightly matched for blood."

"You desire this thing, holy Father?"

The eyes of the two evil counsellors met again.

"It were an holy and demeritous work, Sire," said the priest.

"Be it as you will," returned Henry hastily. "But mind you, holy Father! you bear what there may be of sin."

"I can carry it, Sire!"

The royal and reverend conspirators parted; and the Archbishop, mounting his richly-caparisoned mule (an animal used by priests out of affected humility, in imitation of the ass's colt on which Christ rode into Jerusalem), rode straight to Coldharbour, the town residence of his niece, Joan Duchess Dowager of York. He found her at work in the midst of her bower-women; but no sooner did she hear the announcement of her Most Reverend uncle, than she hurriedly commanded them all to leave the room.

"Well?" she said breathlessly, as soon as they were alone.

"Thy woman's wit hath triumphed, Joan. 'Twas a brave thought of thine, touching the Lady Lucy of Milan. The King fell in therewith, like a fowl into a net."

"Nay, the Lady Lucy was your thought, holy Father; I did but counsel to tempt him with some other. Then it shall be done?"

"It shall be done."

"Thanks be to All-Hallows!" cried the Duchess, with mirth which it would scarcely be too strong a term to call fiend-like. "Now shall the proud minx be brought to lower her lofty head! I hate her!"

"'Tis allowed to hate an heretic," said the Archbishop calmly. "And if the Lady Le Despenser be no heretic, she hath sorely abused her opportunities."

"She shall never be Nym's true wife!" cried the Duchess fierily. "I will not have it! I would sooner follow both her and him to the churchyard! I hate, I hate her!"

"Thou mayest yet do that following, Joan. But I must not tarry. Peace be with thee!"

Peace!—of what sort? We are told, indeed, of one who is like a strong man armed, and who keepeth his goods in peace. And the dead sleep peacefully enough—not only dead bodies, but dead souls.

The Earl and Countess of Kent had been about a week at Langley, when a letter arrived from the King, commanding the attendance of the Earl at Court, as feudal service for one of his estates held on that tenure. The Countess was not invited to accompany him. The Duke of York seized his opportunity, for his plot was fully ripe, and suggested that she should obtain the royal permission to pay a visit to Windsor, where the hapless heirs of March were imprisoned. Permission to do so was asked and granted, for the King never suspected his cousin of any sinister intention.

The Earl set out first for Westminster. Constance stood at her lattice, and waved a loving farewell to him as he rode away, turning several times to catch another glimpse of her, and to bend his graceful head in yet another farewell. He had not quite recovered from the glamour of his enchantment.

"Farewell!" said the Princess at last, though her husband was far beyond hearing. "Hark, Maude, to the Priory bells—dost hear them? What say they to thee? I hear them say—'He will come—he will come—safely back again!'" And she sang the words in the tone of the chime.

Maude was silent. A dark, sudden presentiment seemed to seize upon her of unknown coming evil, and to her ear also the bells had a voice. But they rang—"He will come—he will come—never any more!"

The bells told the truth—to one of them.

The Duke of York escorted his sister to Windsor. She was accompanied by Bertram and Maude, Eva, and several minor domestics. He left her full directions how to proceed, promising to meet her with a guard of men a few miles beyond Eton, and go with her overland as far as Hereford. The final destination of Constance and her recaptured charges was to be her own home at Cardiff, but a rather roundabout way was to be taken to baffle the probable pursuers. York promised to let Kent know of the escapade through one of his squires on the morning of their departure from Windsor, with orders to join them as quickly as possible by sea from Bideford. At Cardiff the final stand was to be made, in favour of Richard, if living—of March, if he were proved to be dead. The evening of a saint's day, about ten days later, was selected for the attempted rescue; in the hope that the sentinels, having honoured the saint by extra feasting and potations, might be the less disposed to extra vigilance.

The first point to be ascertained was the exact rooms in the Castle occupied by the youthful captives. This was easily found out by Bertram. He and Maude were the sole confidants of their mistress's secret. The second scene of the drama—which might turn either to comedy or tragedy—was to obtain a mould of the lock in wax. This also was done by Bertram, who further achieved the third point—that of procuring false keys from a smith. Constance, whose ideas of truth were elastic and accommodating, had instructed her messenger to say that the keys had been lost, and the new ones were wanted to replace them; but Bertram kept a conscience which declined to be burdened with this falsehood, and accordingly he merely reported that the person who had sent him required duplicates of the keys.

No idea of wrongfulness in aiding the plot ever occurred either to Bertram or Maude. In their eyes King Henry was no king at all, but a rebel, a usurper, and a murderer; and the true King, to whom alone their fealty was due, was (if Richard were dead) the boy unjustly confined in Windsor Castle. To work his freedom, therefore, was not a bad deed, but a good one; nor could it fairly be called treachery to circumvent a traitor.

The keys were safely secreted in Constance's jewel-box until the night appointed for the rescue came.

It proved to be fair, but cloudy, with a low damp mist filling the vale of the Thames. Bertram took no one into his confidence but his own squire, William Maydeston, whom he posted in the forest, at a sufficient distance from the Castle, in charge of the four horses necessary to mount the party.

The Princess went to bed as usual—about eight o'clock, for she kept late hours for her time—with Maude and Eva in attendance. Both were dismissed; and Eva at least went peacefully to sleep, in happy ignorance of the kind of awakening which was in store for her. At half-past ten, an hour then esteemed in the middle of the night, Maude, according to instructions previously received, softly opened the door of her lady's bedchamber. She found her not only risen, but already fully equipped for her journey, and in a state of feverish excitement. She came out at once, and they joined Bertram, who was waiting in the corridor outside. The little trio of plotters crept slowly down the stairs, and across the court-yard to the foot of the Beauchamp Tower, within which the children were confined. It was necessary to use the utmost caution, to avoid being heard by the sentinels. Bertram fitted the false key into the great iron lock of the outer door. The door opened, but with such a creak that Maude shuddered in terror lest the sentinels should hear it. She was reassured by a peal of laughter which came from beyond the wall. The sentinels were awake, but were making too much noise themselves to be easily roused to action. Then the party went silently up into the Beauchamp Tower, unlocked the door which they sought, and leaving Bertram outside it to give an alarm if necessary, Constance and Maude entered the first of the two rooms.

A white, frightened face was the first thing they saw. In the outer chamber, as the less valuable pair of prisoners, slept the sisters, Anne and Alianora Mortimer, whose ages were fifteen and eleven. Alianora, the younger, slept quietly; but Anne sat up, wide awake, and said in a tremulous voice which she tried in vain to render firm—

"What is it? Are you a spirit?"

Constance was by her side in a moment, and assured the girl at least of her humanity by taking Anne's face between her hands. She looked on it with deep interest; for this was the face that Dickon loved. A soft, gentle face it was, which would have been pretty if it had been less thin and wan with prison life, and less tired with suspense and care. To her—

"The future was all dark, And the past a troubled sea, And Memory sat in her heart, Wailing where Hope should be."

For Anne Mortimer was one of those hapless girls who are not motherless, but what is far worse, unmothered. Her father, who lay in his bloody grave in Ireland, she had loved dearly; but her mother was a mere stranger somewhere in the world, who had never cared for her at all. To the younger ones Anne herself had been the virtual mother; they had been tended by her fostering care, but who save God had ever tended her? Thus, from the time of her father's death, when she was eight years old, Anne's life had been a flowerless, up-hill road, with nothing to look forward to at the end. Was it any wonder that the face looked worn with care, though only fifteen years had passed over it?

The sole breaks to the monotony of this weary life occurred when the Court was at Windsor. Then the poor little prisoners were permitted to come out of durance, and—still under strict surveillance—to join the royal party. These times were delightful to the younger three, but they would have been periods of unmixed pain to Anne, if it had not been for the presence and uniform kindness of one person. She shuddered within herself when the King or his Mentor the Archbishop addressed her, shrinking from both with the instinctive aversion of a song-bird to a serpent; but Richard of Conisborough spoke as no one else spoke to her— so courteously, so gently, so kindly, that no room was left for fear. No one had ever spoken so to this girl since her father died. And thus, without the faintest suspicion of his feelings towards her, the lonely maiden's imagination wove its sweet fancies around this hero of her dreams, and she began unconsciously to look forward to the time when she should meet him again. Well for her that it was so! for she was a "pale meek blossom" unsuited for rough blasts, and the only ray of sunshine which was ever to fall across her life lay in the love of Richard of Conisborough.

"Who is it?" Anne repeated, in a rather less frightened tone.

"Hast thou forgot me, Nannette?" said Constance affectionately. "I am the Lady Le Despenser—thine aunt now, the wife of thine uncle of Kent."

"Oh!" responded Anne, with a long-drawn sigh of relief. The tone said, "How delightful!"

"I thought you were a ghost."

"Well, so I am, but within the body," whispered Constance with a little laugh.

"That makes all the difference," said Anne, whose response did not go beyond a faint smile. "Has your Ladyship then won allowance to visit us?"

Her voice expressed some surprise, for certainly the middle of the night was a singular time for a visitor to choose for a call.

"Nay, sweet heart. I come without allowance—hush!—to bear you all away hence. Wake thy sister, and arise both, and busk [dress] you quickly. Where be thy brothers?"

"In the inner cowche," [bedroom].

Constance desired Maude to hasten the girls in dressing, which must be done by the fitful moonlight, as best it could, and went herself into the inner chamber. Both the boys were asleep. They were Edmund, the young Earl, whose age was nearly thirteen, and his little brother Roger, who was not yet eight. Constance laid her hand lightly on the shoulder of the future King.

"Nym!" she said. "Hush! make no bruit."

The boy was sleeping too heavily to be roused at once; but his little brother Roger awoke, and looked up with two very bright, intelligent eyes.

"Are we to be killed?" he wanted to know; but his query was not put in the frightened tone of his sister.

"Not so, little one. Wake thy brother, and rise quickly."

"'Tis no light gear to wake Nym," said little Roger. "You must shake him."

Constance put the advice in practice, but Edmund only gave a grunt and turned over.

"Nym!" said his little brother in a loud whisper. "Nym! wake up."

Edmund growled an inarticulate request to be "let be."

"Then you must pinch him," said little Roger. "Nip him well—be not afeard."

Constance, extremely amused, acted on this recommendation also. Edmund gave another growl.

"Nay, then you must needs slap him!" was the third piece of advice given.

Constance laughingly suggested that the child should do it for her. Little Roger jumped up, boxed his brother's ears in a decided manner, and finally, burying his small hands in Edmund's light curly hair, gave him a dose of sensation which would have roused a dormouse.

"Is he in this wise every morrow?" asked Constance.

"Master Gaoler bringeth alway a wet mop," said little Roger confidentially. "Wake up, Nym! If thou fallest to sleep again, I must tweak thee by the nose!"

This terrible threat seemed to be nearly as effectual as the mop. Edmund stretched himself lazily, and in very sleepy accents desired to know what his brother could possibly mean by such wanton cruelty.

"Where is thy breeding, churl, to use such thewis [manners] with a lady?" demanded little Roger in a scandalised voice.

"Lady!—where is one?" murmured Edmund, whose eyes were still shut.

"Methinks thou art roused now, Nym," said Constance. "But when thou shalt be a knight, I pity thy squire. Haste, lad, rise and busk thee in silence, but make as good speed as ever thou canst Roger, see he turneth not back to sleep. I go to thy sisters."

"Nay, but he will, an' you pluck him not out of bed!" said little Roger, who evidently felt himself unfit to cope with the emergency.

"Thou canst wring him by the nose, then," said Constance, laughing. "Come, Nym! turn out—quick!" Edmund turned over on his face, buried it in the pillow, and tacitly intimated that to get up at the present moment was an impossibility.

"He'll have another nap!" said little Roger, in the mournful tone of a prophet who foresaw the speedy accomplishment of his tragical predictions.

"But he must not!" exclaimed Constance, returning. "Then you must pluck him out, and set him on the floor," repeated little Roger earnestly. "'Twill be all I can do to let him to [hinder him from] get in again then—without you clap his chaucers [slippers] about his ears," he added meditatively, as if this expedient might possibly answer.

Constance took the future master of England by his shoulders, and pulled him out of bed without any further quarter. The monarch elect grumbled exceedingly, but in so inarticulate a style that very little could be understood.

"Now, Nym!" said Constance warningly to her refractory and dilatory nephew, "if thou get into bed again, we will leave thee behind, and crown Roger, that is worth ten of thee. By my Lady Saint Mary! a pretty King thou wilt make!"

"Eh?" inquired Edmund, brightening up. "Let be. Go on and busk thee. Roger! if he is not speedy, come to the door and say it."

Constance went back to the girls. She found Anne nearly ready, but Alianora, who apparently shared the indolent disposition of her elder brother, was dressing in the most deliberate manner, though Maude and Anne were both hastening her as much as they could.

"Now, Nell!" said Constance, employing the weapon which had proved useful with Edmund, "if thou make not good speed, we will leave thee behind."

"Well, what if so?" demanded Alianora coolly, tying a string in the most leisurely style.

"If I have not as great a mind to leave you both behind!"—cried Constance in an annoyed tone. "I will bear away Nan and Roger, and wash mine hands of you!"

"Please, I'm ready!" announced little Roger in a whisper through the crack of the door, in an incredibly short space of time.

"Why wert thou not the firstborn?" exclaimed the Princess. "I would thou hadst been! What is Nym about?"

"Combing his hair," said Roger, glancing back at him, "and hath been this never so long."

Constance dashed back into the room with one of her quick, impulsive movements, snatched the comb from his dilatory young Majesty, smoothed his hair in a second, ordered him to wash his hands, and to put on his gown and tunic, and stood over him while he did it.

"The saints have mercy on thee, Nym, and send thee a wise council!" said she, half in earnest and half in jest. "The whole realm will go to sleep else."

"Well, they might do worser," responded Edmund calmly.

The two sluggards were ready at last, but not before Constance had lost her temper, and had noticed the unruffled endurance of Anne.

"Why, Nan, thou hast patience enough!" she said.

"I have had need these seven years," answered the maiden quietly.

"Now, Maude, take thou Lord Roger by the hand; and Nan, take thy sister. Nym, thou comest with me. Lead on, Sir Bertram; and mind all of you— no bruit, not enough to wake a mouse!"

"It would not wake Nym, then!" said little Roger.

They crept down the stairs of the Beauchamp Tower as slowly and cautiously as they had come. Down to the little postern gate, left unguarded by the careless sentinel, who was carousing with his fellows on another side of the Castle; out and away to the still glade in Windsor Forest, where Maydeston stood waiting with the horses, all fitted with pillion and saddle.

"Here come we, Maydeston!" exclaimed Bertram. "Now, Madam, an' it like your Grace to mount with help of Master Maydeston, will it list you that I ride afore?"

For it was little short of absolute necessity that the gentleman should be seated on his saddle before the lady mounted the pillion.

"Nay—the King that shall be, the first!" said Constance.

Bertram bowed and apologised. He was always in the habit of giving precedence to his mistress, and he really had forgotten for a moment that the somnolent Nym was to be regarded as his Sovereign. So his future Majesty, with Bertram's assistance, mounted the bay charger, and his sister Alianora was placed on the pillion behind him.

The next horse was mounted by Constance, with Bertram before her; the third by little Roger, very proud of his position, with Maude set on the pillion in charge of her small cavalier, and the bridle firmly tied to Bertram's saddle. Last came Maydeston and Anne. They were just ready to start when Constance broke into a peal of merry laughter.

"I do but laugh to think of Eva's face, when she shall find neither thee nor me," she said to Maude, "and likewise his Highness' gaolers, waking up to an empty cage where the little birds should be."

Maude's heart was too heavy and anxious about the issue of the adventure to enable her to reply lightly.

Through the most unfrequented bridle-paths they crept slowly on, till first Windsor, and then Eton, was left behind. They were about two miles beyond Eton, when a hand was suddenly laid on Constance's bridle, and the summons to "Stand and deliver!" jestingly uttered in a familiar and most welcome voice.

"Ha, Dickon! right glad am I to hear thee!" cried his sister.

"Is all well, Custance?"

"Sweet as Spanish must [new wine]. But where is Ned?"

"Within earshot, fair Sister," said Edward's equally well-known and deeper tones. "Methinks a somewhat other settlement should serve better for quick riding, though thine were well enough to creep withal. Sir Bertram, I pray you alight—you shall ride with your dame, and I with the Lady Countess. Can you set the Lord Roger afore? Good! then so do. Lord Sele! I pray you to squire the Lady Alianora's Grace. His Highness will ride single, as shall be more to his pleasure. Now, Dickon, I am right sorry to trouble thee, but mefeareth I must needs set thee to squire the Lady Anne."

Semi-sarcastic speeches of this kind were usually Edward's nearest approach to fun. The fresh arrangement was made as he suggested; and though little Roger would not have acknowledged it publicly on any consideration, yet privately he felt the change in his position a relief. Lord Richard of Conisborough was the last of the illustrious persons to mount, and his squire helped Anne Mortimer to spring to her place behind him. The only notice which Richard outwardly took of her was to say, as he glanced behind him—

"We ride now at quick gallop; clasp me close, Lady Anne."

They were off as soon as he had spoken—at such a gallop as Anne had never ridden in all her life. But she felt no fear, for the one person in the world whom she trusted implicitly was he who sat before her.

During part of the way, they followed the same route which Le Despenser and Bertram had taken five years before; and Bertram found a painful interest in pointing out to Maude the different spots where the incidents of the journey had happened. Meanwhile a dialogue was passing between Edward and Constance which the former had expected, and had made his arrangements for the journey with the special view that her queries on that topic should be answered by no one but himself.

"Ned, hast seen my Lord?"

"But once sithence I saw thee."

"How is it with him?"

"Passing well, for aught I know."

"Thou didst him to wit of all this matter?"

"Said I not that I so would?"

"But didst thou?" she repeated, noting the evasion.

"I did so."

In saying which, Edward told a deliberate falsehood.

"And when will he be at Cardiff?"

"When the wind bloweth him thither," said the Duke drily.

"Now, Ned!"

"Nay, Custance—what know I more than thou? The winds be no squires of mine."

"But he will come with speed?"

"No doubt."

"Sent he no word unto me?"

"Oh, ay—an hogshead full!"

"Ned, thou caitiff! [miserable wretch]—what were they?"

"Stuff and folly."

"Thou unassoiled villain, tell me them this minute, or—"

"Thou wilt drop from the pillion? By all means, an' it so like thee. I shall but be left where I am."

"Ned! I will nip thee like a pasty, an' thou torment me thus."

"Forsooth, Custance, I charged no memory of mine with such drastis," [dross, rubbish].

"Drastis!"

"I cry thee mercy—cates [delicates, good things] and honey, if thou wilt have it so. 'Twas all froth and thistle-down."

"I have done, Ned. I will not speak to thee again this month."

"And wilt keep that resolve—ten minutes? By 'r Lady, I am no squire of dames, Custance. Prithee, burden not me with an heap of fond glose," [foolish flattery].

"By Saint Mary her hosen, but I would my Lord had chosen a better messenger!"

Constance was really vexed. Edward himself was in a little difficulty, for he had only been amusing himself with his sister's anxieties. In reality, he was charged with no message, and he did not want the trouble of devising one suitable to Kent's character.

"By Saint Mary her galoches," [loose over-shoes], he said jocularly, "what wouldst have of me, Custance? I cannot carry love-letters in mine head."

"But canst not tell me one word?"

Edward would have given a manor if she would have been quiet, or would have passed to some other topic. But he said—

"Lo' you, Custance! I cannot gallop and talk."

"Hast found that out but now?" was the ironical response.

"Well, if thou must needs have a word," replied he testily, "he said he loved thee better than all the world. Will that do?"

"Ay, that shall serve," said Constance in a low voice.

So it might have done—had it been true.

There was silence for half an hour; when Edward said in his gravest tone—

"Custance! I would fain have thee hearken me."

"For a flyting?" demanded his sister in a tone which was not at all grave. "Thy voice hath sound solemn enough for a justiciary."

"Ninerias [nonsense], Custance! I speak in sober earnest."

"Say on, my Lord Judge!"

"When I have seen thee in safety, I look to turn back to the Court."

"Sweet welcome thou shalt find there!"

"Maybe—if I scale yet again the walls of Eltham Palace, where the King now abideth—as I sought in vain to do this last Christmas."

"Scale the walls!—What to do, Ned?"

"What thinkest, Custance?"

"Ned! surely thou meanest not to take the King's life? caitiff though he be!"

"Nay," said Edward slowly; "scantly that, Custance—without I were forced thereto. It might be enough to seize him and lock him up, as he did to our Lord, King Richard."

"I will have no hand in murder, caitiff!"

Constance spoke too sternly to be disregarded. And it was in her nature to have turned back to Windsor that moment, had she been left without reassurance that all would go right.

"Softly, fair Sister!—who spake of so horrid a thing? Most assuredly I mean no such, nor have any intent thereto."

"Scale walls at thy pleasure," she said in a calmer tone, "and lock Harry of Bolingbroke under forty keys if thou list: I will not let thee. But no blood, Ned, or I leave thee and thy gear this minute."

"Fair sister Custance, never had I no such intent, by All Hallows!"

"Have a care!" she said warningly.

After that they galloped in silence.

The journey went on till the Welsh Marches were reached, of which the Earl of March was lord. Edmund began to hold his head higher, for he knew that the Welsh loyalists were ready to welcome him as King. Little Roger innocently asked if he would be Prince of Wales when his brother was King of England; because in that case, he would pull down some of the big hills which it took so long to climb. At last only one day's march lay between them and the Principality.

And on that morning Edward left them. Constance could not understand why he did not go with them to Cardiff. He was determined not to do so; and to the disappointment of every one, he induced his brother to accompany him. Richard would rather have stayed; but he had been too long accustomed to obey the stronger will of his brother to begin the assertion of his own. The yielding character which he had inherited from his father prevailed; and however unwillingly, he followed Edward.

On the morning of that last day's march, they had to traverse a narrow rocky pass. The path, though rough and stony, was tolerably level; and feeling themselves almost safe, they slackened their pace. They had just been laughing at some remark of little Roger's, and they were all in more or less good spirits, feeling so near the end of their perilous journey; when all at once, in a turn of the pass, the leading horse came to a sudden halt.

"Stand, in the King's name!"

Before them was a small, compact body of cavalry; and at their head, resplendent in official ermine, Sir William Hankeford, Judge of the King's Bench.

Resistance and flight were equally impossible. Constance addressed herself to the old man whom she had cheated five years before, and who, having subsequently discovered her craftiness, had by no means forgotten it.

"Sir William, you will do your commission; but I pray you remember that here be five of the King your master's cousins, and we claim to be used as such."

The old Judge's eyes twinkled as he surveyed the royal lady.

"So, Madam! Your Ladyship hath the right: my commission I shall do, and set the King my master's cousins in safe keeping—with a chimney-board clapped to the louvre," [chimney].

Constance fairly laughed.

"Come, Sir, I should scantly play the same trick on you twice."

"No, Madam, I will have a care you no do."

"And for what look we, Sir William? May we know?"

"Madam," said Hankeford drily, "you may look for what you shall find, and you may know so much as you be told."

"We may bid farewell, trow?"

"So it lie not over too much time."

"Well! needs must, Nym," said Constance, turning to the boy who had so nearly worn the crown of England. "And after all, belike, it shall be worser for me than thee."

"Nym won't care," spoke up little Roger boldly, "if my master yonder will let him lie till seven of the clock of a morrow."

"Till nine, if it like him," said Sir William.

"Then he'll be as happy as a king!" added little Roger.

"Nay, you be all too young to care overmuch—save Nan," responded Constance, looking at Anne's white troubled face. "Poor maid! 'tis hard for thee."

"I can bear what God sendeth, Madam," said Anne in a low voice.

"Well said, brave heart!" answered Constance, only half understanding her. "The blessed saints aid thee so to do!—Now, Sir William, dispose of us."

Hankeford obeyed the intimation by separating them into two bands. Constance, Bertram, and Maude, he placed in the care of Elmingo Leget, an old servant of the Crown, with orders to conduct them direct to London, where Constance guessed that she at least was to undergo trial. The four young Mortimers he took into his own charge, but declined to say what he was going to do with them. The three officers of the Duke of York were desired to return to their master, the old Judge cynically adding that they could please themselves whether they told him of the recapture or not; while Maydeston was as cynically informed that Sir William saw no sufficient reason wherefore the King's Grace should be at the charges of his journey home, but that he might ride in the company if he listed to pay for the lodgings of his beast and his carcase. To which most elegant intimation Maydeston replied that he was ready to pay his own expenses without troubling his Majesty, and that he did prefer to keep his master company.

So the little group of friends were parted, and Constance began her return journey to London as a prisoner of state.

But what was happening at Cardiff? And where was the Earl of Kent?

We shall see both in the next chapter.



CHAPTER TEN.

HOW THE ROSE WAS GRAFTED.

"To drive the deer with hound and horne Earl Percy took his way; The child may rue that is unborne The hunting of that day."

Ballad of Chevy Chase.

"Willemina!" said the old Lady Le Despenser to her bower-maiden, "what horn was that I heard but now without?"

"Shall I certify your Ladyship?" asked Willemina, rising and gathering together the embroidered quilt on which she was working.

"Ay, child," said the Dowager; "so do." But when Willemina came back, she looked very important.

"Madam, 'tis a sumner from my Lord's Grace of Canterbury, that beareth letter for Sir Ademar. Counteth your Ladyship that he shall be made bishop or the like?"

"With Harry of Bolingbroke in the throne, and Thomas de Arundel bearing the mitre?" responded the old lady with a laugh. "Marry, my maid, that were a new thing."

"Were it so, Madam?" asked Willemina innocently. "Truly, Sir Ademar is well defamed [has a good reputation] of all around here."

"This is not the world, child!" said the Dowager.

"'Tis more like—Well, Sir Ademar? Hath my Lord's Grace—Jesu, pour ta pite!"

Ademar had walked quietly into the room, and placed a paper in the hands of the Dowager. It was a solemn writ of excommunication against Ademar de Milford, clerk in orders, and it was dated on the Sunday which had intervened between the marriage of Maude and that of Constance. All official acts of Ademar since that day were invalidated. Maude's marriage, therefore, was not affected, but Constance was no longer Countess of Kent.

"Sir Ademar, this is dread!" exclaimed the old lady in trembling accents. "What can my Lord's Grace have against you? This—this toucheth right nearly the Lady, our daughter—Christ aid her of His mercy!"

"Maybe, Madam, it were so intended," said Ademar shrewdly. "For me, truly I wis little what my Lord hath against me—saving that I see not in all matters by his most reverend eyes. I know better what the Lord hath against me—yet what need I note it, seeing it is cancelled in the blood of His Son?—But for our Lady—ah me!"

"Sir Ademar!"—and the dark sunken eyes of the Dowager looked very keenly into his—"arede me your thought—is my Lord of Kent he that should repair this wrong, or no?"

Ademar's voice was silent; but his eyes said,—"No!"

"God comfort her!" murmured the old lady, turning away. "For, ill as she should brook the loss of him, yet methinks, if I know her well, she might bear even that lighter than the witting that her name was made a name of scorn for ever."

"Lady," said Ademar, quietly, "even God can only comfort them that lack comforting."

She looked at him in silence. Ademar pointed out of the window to two little children who were dancing merrily on the shore, and laughing till they could scarcely dance.

"How would you comfort them, Madam?"

"They need it not," she murmured, absently.

"In verity," said Ademar; "neither wasteth our Lord His comfort on them that dance, nor His pitifulness on them that be at ease. And I have seen ere now, Madam, that while He holdeth wide the door of His fold for all His sheep to enter in, yet there be some that will not come in till they be driven. Yea, and some lack a sharp rap of the shepherd's rod ere they will quit the wayside herbage."

"And you think she feedeth thereby?"

"I think that an' she be of the sheep, she must be fetched within; and maybe not one nor two strokes shall be spent in so doing."

"Amen, even if so! But this rap hath fallen on the tenderest side."

"The Shepherd knoweth the tender side, Madam; and lo' you, that so doing, He witteth not only where to smite with the rod, but where to lay the plaister."

"And you, Sir Ademar—lack you no plaister?"

"Madam, I have but received a gift. 'For it is ghouun [given] to you for Christ, that not oonli ghe [ye] bileuen in him, but also that ghe suffren for him.'"

"Can you so take it, it is well." And the old lady turned aside with a sigh.

"Ay," said the Lollard priest, "it was well with the Shunammite gentlewoman. And after all, it is but a little while ere our Lord is coming. 'Tis light gear to watch for the full day, when you see the sun gilding the crests of the mountains."

"Yet when you see not the sun—?"

"Then, Lady, you long the more for his coming."

————————————————————————————————————

There was no slight stir that morning on Berkhamsted Green. The whole Court was gathered there, fringed on its outskirts by a respectful and admiring crowd of sight-seers. Under a spreading tree sat the King, on a fine black charger, a hooded hawk borne upon his wrist. Close beside him was a little white palfrey, bearing a lady, and on her wrist also was a hooded hawk. They were apparently waiting for somebody. In front, the Prince of Wales, being of an active turn of mind, was amusing himself by making his horse prance and curvet all about the green, and levelling invisible lances at imperceptible foes—to the intense interest of the outside crowd.

"Late, late, my Lord of Kent!" he cried lightly, as a bay charger shot past him, its rider doffing his plumed cap.

Kent merely bowed again in answer, and rode rapidly up to the King.

"Better late than never, fair Cousin!" was Henry's greeting. "We will forth at once. Will you ride by our fair guest?—The Lady Lucy of Milan!"

The lady who sat on the white palfrey turned her face towards the Earl of Kent, and, slightly blushing and smiling, spoke a few words of courteous French, indicating her acceptance of his society for the day.

She was the most beautiful woman whom Kent had ever seen. Her figure was very slight, and her carriage easy and graceful; her age was about twenty. Glossy, luxuriant hair, of the deepest black, shaded a delicate face, in shape midway between round and oval, the features of which, though very regular, could not strictly be termed either Roman or Grecian, for the nose was too straight for the former, while the forehead was too prominent and too fully developed for the latter. Her eyes were usually cast down, so that they were rarely seen; but when she raised them, they showed themselves large, lustrous, and clear, of a rich, deep, gleaming brown. Her complexion was formed neither of lilies nor roses; it was that pure, perfect cream-colour, which one William Shakspere knew was beautiful, though some of his commentators have rashly differed from him. Add to this description a low, musical voice, strangely clear for her nationality, and a smile of singular fascination,—and it will not seem strange that Kent fell into the snare laid for him, and had no eyes thenceforward but for Lucia Visconti.

The King kept all day near his decoy and his victim. He never interfered with their conversation, but when it languished he was always at hand to supply some fresh topic. They spoke French, which was understood and employed fluently by all three; but Kent knew no Italian, and Lucia no English. The King spoke Lucia's language well—a fact which greatly assisted an occasional "aside." But Lucia was only half aware of the state of affairs, and it would not have suited Henry's purpose to inform her too fully. She knew that she was expected to make herself agreeable to the Earl of Kent, and that he was a cousin and favourite of the King—so far as a man of Henry's stamp can be said to have had any favourites. But of the plot for which she was made the innocent decoy, she had not the faintest idea.

The shades of evening began to fall at last, and the royal bugle-horn was sounded to call the stragglers home.

Kent and Lucia were riding together. They had reached a fork in the road, where the right-hand path branched off to Berkhamsted, and the left to Langley. And all at once there arose before Kent's soul a haunting memory—a memory which was to haunt him for many a day thereafter; and between his eyes and the fair face of the Italian Princess came another face, shaded with soft light hair, and lighted by sapphire eyes, which, he thought, were probably watching even now from the oriel window at Langley. He checked his horse, and wavered irresolutely for an instant.

He did not know that Constance was no longer at Langley. He did not know that at the very moment when he paused at the cross-roads, she was passing the threshold of the Tower as a prisoner of state. For that one moment Kent's better angel strove with his weak nature. But the phase of "beaucoup" was over, and "point du tout" was beginning.

Lucia saw the momentary irresolution. She touched her palfrey lightly with the whip, and turned her splendid eyes on her votary.

"This way, Monseigneur—come!" The struggle was over. Kent spurred on his charger, and followed his enchantress.

There was another scene enacting at the same time, and not far away. The Duke of York and Lord Richard of Conisborough were riding home to Langley. The brothers were very silent; Richard because he was sad and anxious, Edward because he was vexed and sullen. They had just heard of their sister's arrest.

The portcullis at Langley was visible, when Edward smote his hand on the pommel of his saddle—a much more elaborate structure than gentlemen's saddles now—with a few words of proverbial Spanish.

"Patience, and shuffle the cards! I may yet go to Rome, and come back Saint Peter."

Richard lifted his mournful eyes to his brother's face.

"Ned!" he said in a low voice, "it were better to abide a forest hind, methinks, than to come back Jude the Iscariot."

"What meanest, Dickon?"

"Take no heed what I meant, so it come not true."

"So what come not true?" Edward's voice, at any rate, expressed surprise and perplexity.

"If thou wist not, Ned, I am thereof, fain."

"Save thee All Hallows, Dickon! I can no more arede thy speech than the man in the moon."

"So better, brother mine."

They rode on for a little while without further words. Just before they came within earshot of the porters, Richard added quietly—

"I marvel at times, Ned, if it shall not seem strange one day that we ever set heart overmuch on anything, save only to have 'washen our stolis in the blood of the Lamb, that the power of us be in the tree of life, and enter by the gates into the city.'"

"When art thou shorn priest?" asked Edward cynically.

"I will do thee to wit in time to see it," said Richard more lightly, as they rode across the drawbridge at Langley.

How far did Edward play the traitor in this matter of the attempted rescue of the Mortimers? It cannot be said distinctly that he did at all; but he had played the traitor on so many previous occasions—he had assisted in hatching so many conspiracies for the mere object of denouncing his associates—that the suspicion of his having done so in this instance is difficult to avoid. And the strangest point of all is, that to the last hour of his life this man played with Lollardism. He used it like a cloak, throwing it on or off as circumstances demanded. He spent his life in deceiving and betraying every friend in turn, and at last told the truth in dying, when he styled himself "of all sinners the most wicked."

Three days after that evening, the House of Lords sat in "Parliament robes," in Westminster Hall. But the King was not present: and there were several peers absent, in attendance on His Majesty; among them the Duke of York, the Earl of Cambridge, and the Earl of Kent. The House had met to try a prisoner: and the prisoner was solemnly summoned by a herald's voice to the bar.

"Custance of Langley, Baroness of Cardiff!"

Forward she came, with firm step and erect head, clad in velvet and ermine, as beseemed a Princess of England: and with a most princess-like bend of her stately head, she awaited the reading of the charge against her.

The charge was high treason. The prisoner's answer was a simple point-blank denial of its truth.

"What mean you?" demanded the Lords. "No did you, by means of false keys, gain entrance into the privy chambers of our Lord the King in the Castle of Windsor?"

"I did so."

"How gat you those false keys?"

"From a blacksmith, as you can well guess."

"From what smith?"

"I cannot tell you; for I know not."

"Through whom gat you them?"

"I gat them, and I used them: that is enough."

"Through whom gat you them?"

"Fair Lords, you get no more of me."

"Through whom gat you them?" was repeated the third time.

The answer was dead silence. The question was repeated a fourth time.

"My Lords, an' ye ask me four hundred times, I will say what I say now: ye get no more of me."

"We have means to make men speak!" said one of the peers, threateningly.

"That may be; but not women."

"They can talk fast enough, as I know to my cost!" observed the lord of a very loquacious lady.

"Ay, and hold their peace likewise, as I will show you!" said Constance.

"Is it not true," enquired the Chancellor further, "that you stale away out of the Castle of Windsor the four childre of Roger Mortimer, sometime Earl of March?"

"It is very true."

"And wherefore did you so?"

"Because I chose it!" she said, lifting her head royally.

"Madam, you well wot you be a subject."

"I better wot you be," returned the unabashed Princess.

"And who aided and counselled you thereto?" asked the Chancellor—who was the prisoner's own cousin, Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Lincoln, and brother of the King.

"I can aid myself, and counsel myself," answered the prisoner.

"My question is not answered, Dame."

"Ay so, Sir. And 'tis like to abide thus a while longer."

"I must know who were your counsellors. Name but one man."

"Very well. I will name one an' you press me so to do."

"So do."

"Sir Henry de Beaufort, Chancellor of England."

A peal of laughter rang through the House.

"What mean you, Madam?" sternly demanded the affronted Chancellor.

"Marry, my Lord, you pressed me to name a man—and I have named a man."

The merriment of the august assembly was not decreased by the fact that the Chancellor was rather unpopular.

"Are you of ability, Madam, to declare unto us right-wisely that neither of my Lords your brothers did aid you in this matter?"

"I have passed no word, Sir, touching either of my brothers."

"The which I do now desire of you, Dame."

"Do you so, my Lord? I fear your Lordship may weary of waiting."

"I will wait no longer!" cried Beaufort, angrily and impatiently. "I—"

"Say you so, Sir?" responded the Princess in her coolest manner. "Then I bid your Lordship a merry morrow.—I am ready, Master Gaoler."

"I said not we were ready, Madam!" exclaimed Beaufort.

"No did, Sir? Then I cry your Lordship mercy that I misconceived you."

"Dame, I demand of you whether your brothers gave unto you no aid in this matter?"

Constance was in a sore strait. She did not much care to what conclusion the House came as concerned Edward: he was the prime mover in the affair, and richly deserved any thing he might get, irrespective of this proceeding altogether. But that any harm should come to Richard was a thought not to be borne. She was at her wits' end what to answer, and was on the point of denying that either had assisted her, when the Chancellor's next remark gave her a clue.

"If ne my Lord of York ne my Lord of Cambridge did aid you, how cometh it to pass that three servants of the Duke's Grace were with you in your journey?"

"Ask at their master, not me," said Constance coolly.

"'Tis plain, Madam, that his Grace of York did give you aid, methinks."

"You be full welcome, Sir Keeper, to draw your own conclusions."

"Lo' you, my Lords, the prisoner denieth it not!—And my Lord of Cambridge—what part took he. Lady?"

"Never a whit, Sir," answered Constance audaciously.

"May I crede you, mewondereth?"

"You did but this moment, my Lord. If my word be worth aught in the one matter, let it weigh in the other."

The Chancellor meditated a minute, but he could not deny the justice of the plea.

"Moreover, Lady, we heard,"—how had they heard it?—"that some trial were to be made of scaling the walls of the King's Grace's Palace of Eltham."

Constance grew paler. If they had heard this of Edward, what might they have heard of Richard's presence in the journey to Hereford?

"Have you so, Sir?" she answered, losing none of her apparent coolness.

"We have so, Madam!" replied Beaufort sternly; "and moreover of conspiration to steal away his Highness' person, and prison him—if not worser matter than this."

"Not of my doing," said Constance.

"How far you were privy thereto or no, that I leave. But can you deny that it were of my Lord of York his doing?"

"I was not there," she quickly rejoined. "How then wis I?"

"Can you deny that my Lord of Cambridge was therein concerned?"

"I can!" cried Constance in an agony—too hastily.

"Oh, you can so?" retorted Beaufort, seeing and instantly pressing his advantage. "Then you do wis thereof something?"

She was silent.

"My Lord of York—he was there, trow?"

No answer.

"He was there?"

"Sir Keeper, I was not there. What more can I say?"

"Who was there, Dame?—for I am assured you know."

"Who was where?" retorted the Princess satirically. "If no man scaled the Palace walls, how ask you such questions?"

"Nay, ask that at your Ladyship's own conscience; for it was not I, but you, that said first you were not there."

She was becoming entangled in the meshes.

"Lock you up whom your Lordship will!" she exclaimed. "The truth of all I have said can be proven, and thereto I do offer Master Will Maydeston mine esquire, which shall prove my truth with his body against such, as do accuse me [by duel; a resource then permitted by law]. And further will I say nought."

"But you must needs have had further aid, Lady."

"Ay so, Sir?"

"Most surely. Who were it, I demand of you?"

"I have said my saying."

"And you do deny, Madam, to further justice?"

"Right surely, without justice were of my side." What was to be done with such a prisoner? Beaufort at last gave up in despair the attempt to make her criminate her accomplices any further, though he could hardly avoid guessing that Bertram and Maude had helped her more or less. The sentence pronounced was a remarkably light one, so far as Constance was concerned. In fact, the poor smith, who was the most innocent of the group, suffered the most. How he was found can but be guessed; but his life paid the forfeit of his forgery. The Princess was condemned to close imprisonment in Kenilworth Castle during the King's pleasure. Maude was sentenced to share her mistress's durance; and Bertram's penalty was even easier, for he was allowed free passage within the walls, as a prisoner on parole.

It was in the beginning of March that the captive trio, in charge of Elmingo Leget, arrived at Kenilworth. Two rooms were allotted for the use of Constance and Maude. The innermost was the bedchamber, from which projected a little oratory with an oriel window; the outer, the "withdrawing chamber," which opened only into a guardroom always occupied by soldiers. Bertram was permitted access to the Princess's drawing-room at her pleasure, and her pleasure was to admit him very frequently. She found her prison-life insufferably wearisome, and even the scraps of extremely local news, brought in by Bertram from the courtyard, were a relief to the monotony of having nothing at all to do. She grew absolutely interested in such infinitesimal facts as the arrival of a barrel of salt sprats, the sprained ankle of Mark Milksop [a genuine surname of the time] of the garrison, the Governor's new crimson damask gown, and the solitary cowslip which his shy little girl offered to Bertram "for the Lady."

But having nothing to do, by no means implied having nothing to think about. On the contrary, of that there was a great deal. The last items which Constance knew concerning her friends were, that Kent had been told of her flight from Windsor (if York's word could be trusted); that her children were left at Langley; and that her admissions on her trial had placed York in serious peril, for liberty if not life. As to the children, they were probably safe, either at Langley or Cardiff; yet there remained the possibility that they might have shared the fate of the Mortimers, and be closely confined in some stronghold. It was not in Isabel's nature to fret much over any thing; but Richard was a gentle, playful, affectionate child, to whom the absence of all familiar faces would be a serious trouble. Then what would become of Edward, whom she had tacitly criminated? What would become of Richard, the darling brother, whom not to criminate she had sacrificed truth, and would have sacrificed life? And, last and worst of all, what had become of Kent? If he had set out to join her, the gravest suspicion would instantly fall on him. If he had not, and were ignorant what had befallen her, Constance—who did not yet know his real character— pictured him as tortured with apprehension on her account.

"O Maude!" she said one evening, "if I could know what is befallen my Lord, methinks I might the lighter bear this grievance!"

Would it have been any relief if she could have known—if the curtain had been lifted, and had revealed the cushion-dance which was in full progress in the Lady Blanche's chamber at Westminster, where the Earl of Kent, resplendent in violet and gold, was dropping the embroidered cushion at the feet of the Princess Lucia?

"Dear my Lady," said Maude in answer, "our Lord wot what is befallen him."

"What reck I, the while I wis it not?"

And Maude remembered that the thought which was a comfort to her would be none to Constance. The reflection that God knows is re-assuring only to those who know God. What could she say which would be consoling to one who knew Him not?

"Maude," resumed her mistress, "'tis my very thought that King Harry, my cousin, doth this spite and ire against me, to some count [extent], because he maketh account of me as a Lollard."

Maude looked up quickly; but dropped her eyes again in silence.

"Thou wist I have dwelt with them all my life," proceeded Constance. "My Lord that was, and my Lady his mother, and my Lady my mother—all they were Lollards. My fair Castle of Llantrissan to a shoe-latchet, but he reckoneth the like of me!"

"Would it were true!" said Maude under her breath.

"'Would it were true!'" repeated Constance, laughing. "Nay, by the head of Saint John Baptist, but this Maude would have me an heretic! Prithee, turn thy wit to better use, woman. I may be taken for a Gospeller, yet not be one."

"But, sweet Lady," said Maude, earnestly, "wherefore will ye take the disgrace, and deny yourself of the blessing?"

"When I can see the blessing, Maude, I will do thee to wit," replied Constance, laughingly.

"Methinks it is scarce seen," returned Maude, thoughtfully. "Madam, you never yet saw happiness, but ye have felt it, and ye wit such a thing to be. And I have felt the blessing of our Lord's love and pity, though ye no have."

"Fantasies, child!" said Constance.

"If so be, Dame, how come so many to know it?"

"By reason the world is full of fantastical fools," answered Constance, lightly. "We be all nigh fools, sweeting—big fools and little fools— that is all."

Maude gave up the attempt to make her understand. She only said, "Would your Grace that I read unto you a season?" privately intending, if her offer were accepted, to read from the gospel of Saint Luke, which she had with her. But Constance laughingly declined the offer; and Maude felt that nothing more could be done, except to pray for her.

Time rolled away wearily enough till the summer was drawing to its close. And then a new interest awoke for both Maude and her lady. For the leaves were just beginning to droop on the trees around Kenilworth Castle, when the disinherited heiress of Kent, a prisoner from her birth, opened her eyes upon the world which had prepared for her such cold and cruel welcome.

There was plenty to do and to talk about after this. Constance was perplexed what name to give her baby. She had never consulted any will but her own before, for she had not cared about pleasing Le Despenser. But she wanted to please Kent, and she did not know what name would gratify him. At length she decided on Alianora, a name borne by two of his sisters, of whom the eldest, the Countess of March, she believed to be his favourite sister.

A few weeks after the birth of Alianora, on a close, warm autumn afternoon, Constance was lying on her bed to rest, feeling languid and tired with the heat; and Maude sat by the window near her, singing softly to the baby in her arms. Hearing a gentle call from Bertram outside, Maude laid the child down and opened the door. Bertram was there, in the drawing-room, and with him were two sisters of Saint Clare, robed in the habit of their order.

"These holy sisters would have speech of the Lady," explained Bertram. "May the same be?"

Certainly it might, so far as Constance was concerned. She was so weary of her isolation that she would have welcomed even the Duchess Joan. She bade the immediate admission of the nuns, who were evidently provided with permission from the authorities. They were both tall women, but with that item the likeness began and ended. One was a fair-complexioned woman of forty years,—stern-looking, spare, haggard-faced,—in whose cold blue eyes there might be intelligence, but there was no warmth of human kindness. The other was a comfortable-looking girl of eighteen, rosy-cheeked, with dark eyes and hair.

"Christ save you, holy sisters!" said Constance as they approached her. "Ye be of these parts, trow?"

"Nay," answered the younger nun, "we be of the House of Minoresses beyond Aldgate; and though thine eyes have not told thee so much, Custance, I am Isabel of Pleshy."

"Lady Isabel of Pleshy! Be right welcome, fair cousin mine!"

Isabel was the youngest daughter of that Duke of Gloucester who had been for so many years the evil angel of King and realm. Constance had not seen her since childhood, so that it was no wonder that she failed to recognise her. Meanwhile Maude had turned courteously to the elder nun.

"Pray you, take the pain to sit in the window."

"I never sit," replied the nun in a harsh, rasping voice.

"Truly, that is more than I could say," observed Maude with a smile. "Shall it like you to drink a draught of small ale?"

"I never drink ale."

This assertion would not sound strange to us, but it was astounding to Maude.

"Would you ipocras and spice rather?"

"I never eat spice."

"Will you eat a marchpane?"

"I never eat marchpane."

Maude wondered what this impracticable being did condescend to do.

"Then a shive of bread and tryacle?"

"Bread, an' you will: I am no babe, that I should lack sugar and tryacle."

Maude procured refreshments, and the elder nun, first making the sign of the cross over her dry bread, began to eat; while Lady Isabel, who evidently had not reached an equal height of monastic sanctity, did not refuse any of the good things offered. But when Maude attempted further conversation, the ascetic and acetic lady, intimating that it was prayer-time, and she could talk no more, pulled forth a huge rosary of wooden beads, from which the paint was nearly worn away, and began muttering Ave Marys in apparently interminable succession. "Now, Isabel," said Constance, "prithee do me to wit of divers matters I would fain know. Mind thou, I have been shut up from all manner of tidings, good or ill, sithence this last March, and I have a sumpter-mule's load of questions to ask at thee. But, first of all, how earnest thou hither?"

"Maybe thou shalt find so much in the answers to thy questions," replied Isabel—a smile parting her lips which had in it more keenness than mirth.

"Well, then, to fall to:—Where is my Lord?"

"In Tewkesbury Abbey, as methought."

"A truce to thy fooling, child! Thou wist well enough that I would say my Lord of Kent."

"How lookest I should wit, Custance? We sisters of Saint Clare be no news-mongers.—Well, so far as I knowledge, my Lord of Kent is with the Court. I saw him at Westminster a month gone."

"Is it well with him?"

"Very well, I would say, from what I saw." Constance's mind was too much engrossed with her own thoughts to put the right interpretation on that cold, mocking smile which kept flitting across her cousin's lips.

"And wist where be my little Dickon, and Nib?" [Isabel].

"At Langley, in care of Philippa, our fair cousin," [then synonymous with relative].

"Good. And Dickon my brother?"

"I scantly wis—marry, methinks with the Court, at this present."

"And my brother Ned?"

"In Pevensey Castle."

"What, governor thereof?"

But Constance guessed her cousin's answer.

"Nay,—prisoner."

"For this matter?"

"Ay, for the like gear thyself art hither."

"Truly, I am sorry. And what came of our cousins of March?"

"What had come aforetime."

"They be had back to their durance at Windsor?"

"Ay."

"And what did my Lord when thou sawest him? Arede me all things touching him. What ware he?—and what said he?—and how looked he? Knew he thou shouldst see me?—and sent he me no word by thee?"

"Six questions in a breath, Custance!"

"Go to—one after other. What ware he?"

"By my mistress Saint Clare! how should I wit? An hundred yards of golden baudekyn, and fifty of pink velvet; and pennes [plumes] of ostriches enough to set up a peltier [furrier] in trade."

"And how looked he?"

"As his wont is—right goodly, and preux [brave] and courteous."

"Ay so!" said Constance tenderly. "And knew he thou shouldst see me?"

"I am not well assured, but methinks rather ay than nay."

"And what word sent he by thee?"

"None."

"What, not one word?"

"Nay."

Constance's voice sank to a less animated tone.

"And what did he?"

"They were about going in the hall to supper."

"Handed he thee?"

"Nay, my cousin the King's Grace handed me."

"Then who was with my Lord?"

"The Lady Lucy of Milan."

"Lucy of Milan!—is she not rarely beauteous?"

"I wis nought about beauty. If it lie in great staring black eyes, and a soft, debonere [amiable, pleasant] manner, like a black cat, belike so."

For the first time, Constance fairly noticed Isabel's peculiar smile. She sat up in her bed, with contracted brow.

"Isabel, there is worser behind."

"There is more behind, Custance," said Isabel coolly.

"Speak, and quickly!"

"Well, mayhap better so. Wit thou then, fair Cousin, that thy wedding with my Lord of Kent is found not good, sith—"

"Not good!" Constance said, or rather shrieked. "God in Heaven have mercy!—not good!"

"Not good, fair Cousin mine," resumed Isabel's even tones, "seeing that the priest which wedded you was ere that day excommunicate of heresy, nor could lawfully marry any."

Maude's face grew as white as her lady's, though she gave no audible sign of her terrible apprehension that her marriage was invalid also. Isabel, who seemed to notice nothing, yet saw everything, turned quietly to her. And though the sisters of Saint Clare might be no news-mongers, the royal nun had evidently received full information on that subject.

"There is no cause for your travail [trouble, vexation], Dame Lyngern," she said calmly. "The writ bare date but on Sunday, and you were wed the even afore; so you be no wise touched.—Marry, Custance, thou seest that so being, my Lord of Kent—and thou likewise—be left free to wed; wherefore it pleased the King's Grace, of his rare goodness, to commend him unto the Lady Lucy of Milan by way of marriage. They shall be wed this next January."

Isabel spoke as quietly as people generally do who are not personally concerned in the calamity they proclaim. But perhaps she hardly anticipated what followed. Her eyes were scarcely ready for the sight of that white livid face, quivering in every nerve with human agony, nor her ears for the fierce cry which broke from the parched bloodless lips.

"Thou liest!"

Isabel shrank back with a look of uneasy apprehension in her round rosy face.

"Nay, burden not me withal, Custance! 'Tis no work of mine. I am but a messenger."

"Poor fool! I shall not harm thee! But whose messenger art?"

"The King's Grace himself bade me to see thee."

"And tell me that?"

"He bade me do thee to wit so much."

"'So much'—how much? What I have heard hath killed me. Hast yet ill news left to bury me withal?"

"Only this, Custance," replied her cousin in a deprecating tone, "that sithence, though it were not good by law of holy Church, yet there was some matter of marriage betwixt thee and my Lord of Kent; and men's tongues, thou wist, will roll and rumble unseemlily,—it seemed good unto his Highness that it should be fully exhibit to the world how little true import were therein; and accordingly he would have thee to put thine hand to a paper, wherein thou shalt knowledge that the marriage had betwixt you two was against the law of holy Church, and is therefore null and void. If thou wilt do the same, I am bid to tell thee, thou shalt have free liberty to come forth hence, and all lands of thy dower restored."

"Art at an end?"

"Ay; therewith closeth my commission."

"Then have back at thy leisure, and tell Harry of Bolingbroke from me that I defy him and Satan his master alike. I will set mine hand to no such lie, as there is a Heaven above me, and beneath him an Hell!"

"Custance!" remonstrated her cousin in a scandalised tone.

But Constance lifted her head, and flung up her hands towards heaven.

"O God of Paradise!" she cried, "holy and true, just in Thy judgments, look upon us two—this King and me—and betwixt us judge this day! Look upon us, Lady of Pity, Lily of Christendom, and say whether of us two is the sinner! O all ye Angels, all ye Saints in Heaven! that sin not, but plead for us sinners,—plead ye this day with God that He will render to each of us two his due, as he hath demerited! Before you, before holy Church, before God in Heaven, I denounce this man Harry of Bolingbroke! Render unto him, O Lord! render unto him his desert!"

"Custance, thou mayest better take this matter more meekly," observed Isabel with quiet propriety, very different from her cousin's tone and mien of frenzied passion. "I have told thee truth, and no lie. What should it serve? The priest is excommunicate, and my Lord of Kent shall wed the Lady Lucy, and the King will have thine hand thereto, ere thou come forth."

"Not if I die here a thousand times!"

"I do thee to wit, Custance, that there is grave doubt cast of thy truth and fealty—"

"To Harry of Bolingbroke?" she asked contemptuously. "When lent I him any?"

"Custance!—Of thy truth and fealty unto holy Church our mother. Nor, maybe, shall she be over ready to lift up out of the mire one whom all the holy doctors do esteem an heretic."

"What, I?"

"Thou."

"I never was an heretic yet, Isabel, but I do thee to wit thou goest the way to make me so. As to holy Church, she never was my mother. I can breathe without her frankincense, belike, and maybe all the freer."

"Alas, Custance! Me feareth sore thou art gone a long way on that ill road, else hadst thou never spoken such unseemly words."

"Be it so!" said Constance, with the recklessness of overwhelming misery. "An heretic's daughter, and an heretic's widow—what less might ye look for? If thou hast mangled mine heart enough to serve thee, Isabel, I would thou wert out of my sight!"

"Fair Cousin, I do ensure thee mine own lieth bleeding for thy pain."

"Ay, forsooth! I see the drops a-dripping!" said Constance in bitter mockery. "Marry, get thee hence—'tis the sole mercy thou canst do me."

"So will I; but, Custance, I ensure thee, I am bidden to abide hither the setting of thine hand to that paper."

"Then haste and bid measure be taken for a coffin, for one shall lack either for thee or me ere thou depart!"

"Alack, alack!"

But Isabel rose and withdrew, signing to her companion to follow. The elder nun, who had not yet finished her rosary, stopped in the middle of a Paternoster, and obeyed.

"Leave me likewise, thou, Maude," said Constance, in a voice in which anguish and languor strove for the predominance.

"Dear my Lady, could I not—?" Maude began pityingly.

"Nay, my good Maude, nought canst thou do. Unless it were true that God would hearken prayer, and then, perchance—"

"Trust me for that, Lady mine!—Take I the babe withal?"

"Poor little maid!—Ay,—take her to thee."

Maude followed the nuns into the drawing-room. She found the beads-woman still busy, on her knees in the window, and Isabel seated in the one chair sacred to royalty.

"'Tis a soft morrow, Dame Lyngern," complacently remarked the lady whose heart lay bleeding. "Be that your little maid?"

Maude's tone was just a little stiff.

"The Lady Alianora de Holand, Madam."

"Ah! our fair cousin her babe?—Poor heart!"

Maude was silent.

"Verily, had I wist the pain it should take us to come hither," pursued Isabel, apparently quite careless about interrupting the spiritual labours of her sister nun, "methinks I had prayed my Lord the King to choose another messenger. By the rainfall of late, divers streams have so bisched [overflowed] their banks, that me verily counted my mule had been swept away, not once ne twice. It waked my laughter to see how our steward, that rade with us, strave and struggled with his beast."

Maude's heart was too heavy to answer; but Isabel went on chattering lightly, to a murmured under-current of "Ora pro nobis" as bead after bead, in the hands of the kneeling nun, pursued its fellow down the string of the rosary. Maude sat on the settle, with the sleeping child in her arms, listening as if she heard not, and feeling as though she had lost all power of reply. At last the rosary came to its final bead, and, crossing herself, the elder nun arose.

"Sister, I pray you of your Paternoster, sith you be terminate," said Isabel, holding out her hand. "Mine brake, fording the river astont [near], and half the beads were gone ere I could gather the same. 'Tis pity, for they were good cornelian."

The rosary changed hands, and Isabel began to say her prayers, neither leaving her chair nor stopping her conversation.

"'Twas when we reached the diversory [inn] last afore Stafford, Dame Lyngern—Janua Coeli, ora pro nobis!—we were aware of a jolly debonere pardoner [Note 1],—Stella Matutina, ora pro nobis!—that rade afore, on a fat mule, as well-liking as he—Refugium Peccatorum, ora pro nobis!—and coming anigh us, quoth he to me, that first rade—Regina Angelorum, ora pro nobis!—'Sister,' quoth my master the pardoner—."

"Sister Isabel, you have dropped a bead!" snapped the elder nun.

"Thanks, Sister Avice.—By my Lady Saint Mary! where was I? Oh ay!—Regina Patriarcharum, ora pro nobis!—Well, Dame Lyngern, I will do you to wit what befell."

But Maude's eyes and attention were riveted.

"Be there two Avices in the Priory at Aldgate?—crying your Ladyship mercy."

"Nay,—but one," said Isabel. "Wherefore, Dame?"

"But—this is not my Avice!" faltered Maude.

"I am Saint Clare's Avice, and none other," said the nun stonily.

"But—Avice de Narbonne?"

"Avice de Narbonne I was; and thou wert Maude Gerard."

"Christ's mercy on thee!"

"What signifiest?" responded Avice, sternly. "I am an holy sister, and as Sister Isabel shall certify unto thee, am defamed for holiest of all our house."

"Ay so," admitted Isabel.

"I am sorry for thee, Cousin!" whispered Maude, her eyes full of tears.

"Sorry!" said Isabel.

"Sorry!" repeated Avice. "When I have ensured mine own salvation, and won mine husband's soul from Purgatory, and heaped up great store of merit belike!—Woman, I live but of bread and water, with here and there a lettuce leaf; a draught of milk of Sundays, but meat never saving holydays. I sleep never beyond three hours of a night, and of a Friday night not at all. I creep round our chapel on my bare knees every Friday morrow and Saturday even, and do lick a cross in the dust at every shrine. I tell our Lady's litany morrow and even. Sorry! When every sister of our house doth reckon me a very saint!"

A vision rose before Maude's eyes, of a man clad in blue fringes and phylacteries, who stood, head upright, in the Holy Place, and thanked God that he was not as other men. But she only said—

"O Avice!—what doth God reckon thee?"

Isabel stared at her.

"The like, of force!" said Avice, with a sneer.

"Avice, I deemed thee once not far from the kingdom of God. But I find thee further off than of old time."

"Thou art bereft of thy wits, sure!" said Avice, contemptuously.

"By the Holy Coat of Treves, but this passeth!" [surpasses expectation or reason] exclaimed Isabel, looking decidedly astonished.

"This world is no garden of pleasance, woman!" resumed Avice, harshly. "We must needs buy Heaven, and with heavy coin."

"Buy thou it, an' thou canst," said Maude, rocking the child to and fro, while one or two tears fell upon its little frock. "For me, I thank our Lord that He hath paid down the price."

She rose, for the child was beginning to cry, and walked to the window to try and engage its attention.

"A Gospeller, by my troth!" whispered Isabel, with a shrug of her shoulders.

"Maude was alway given unto Romaunts and the like fooling!" responded Avice as scornfully as before.

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Note 1. An officer of the Bishop's Court, whose business was to carry to their destination written absolutions and indulgences.



CHAPTER ELEVEN.

THE ROUGH NIGHT WIND.

"Whan cockle-shells ha'e siller bells, And mussels grow on every tree— Whan frost and snaw shall warm us a'— Then shall my luve prove true to me!"

Old Ballad.

It was the evening of the third day succeeding Isabel's visit, and while she and Avice were seated in the banquet-hall with the Governor and his family, the scene lit up by blazing pine torches, a single earthen lamp threw a dull and unsteady light over the silent bedchamber of the royal prisoner. The little Alianora was asleep in her cradle, and on the bed lay her mother, not asleep, but as still and silent as though she were. Near the cradle, on a settle, sat Maude Lyngern, trying with rather doubtful success to read by the flickering light.

Custance had not quitted her bed during all that time. She never spoke but to express a want or reply to a question. When Maude brought her food, she submitted to be fed like an infant. Of what thoughts were passing in her mind, she gave no indication.

At last Maude came to the conclusion that the spell of silence ought to be broken. The passionate utterances which Isabel's news had evoked at first were better than this dead level of silent suffering. But she determined to break it by no arguments or consolations of her own, but by the inspired words of God. She felt doubtful what to select; so she chose a passage which, half knowing it by heart, would be the easier to make out in the uncertain light.

"'And oon of the Farisees preiede [prayed] Jhesus that he schulde ete with him; and he entride into the hous of the Farisee, and sat at the mete. And lo, a synful woman that was in the cytee, as sche knewe that Jhesus sat at the mete in the hous of the Farisee, she broughte an alabastre box of oynement, and sche stood bihynde bisidis hise feet, and bigan to moiste hise feet with teeris, and wypide with the heeris of hir heed, and kiste hise feet, and anoyntide with oynement. And the Farisee seyng [seeing] that had clepide him seide within himsilf, seiyinge, if this were a profete, he schulde wete who and what maner womman it were that touchide him, for sche is a synful womman. And Jhesus answerde and seide to him, Symount, I han sum thing to seye to thee. And he seide, Maistir, seye thou. And he answerde, Tweye dettouris weren to oo lener [one lender]; and oon oughte fyve hundrid pens [pence] and the tother fifty. But whanne thei hadden not wherof thei schulen yelde, [yield, pay] he forgaf to bothe. Who thanne loueth him more? Symount answerde and seide, I gesse that he to whom he forgaf more. And he answeride to him, Thou hast demed [doomed, judged] rightly. And he turnide to the womman, and seyde to Symount, Seest thou this womman? I entride into thin hous, thou gaf no watir to my feet; but this hath moistid my feet with teeris, and wipide with her heeris. Thou hast not gouen to me a cosse [kiss]; but this, sithen sche entride, ceeside not to kisse my feet. Thou anointidst not myn heed with oyle; but this anointide my feet with oynement. For the which thing I seye to thee, manye synnes ben forgiuen to hir, for sche hath loued myche; and to whom is lesse forgyuen to hir, he loueth lesse. And Jhesus seyde to hir, Thi synnes ben forgiuen to thee. And thei that saten togider at the mete bigunnen to seye withinne hemsilf, [themselves], Who is this that forgyveth synnes? But he seide to the womman, Thei feith hath maad thee saaf; go thou in pees.'"

Maude added no words of her own. She closed the book, and relapsed into silence. But Custance's solemn stillness was broken at last.

"'He seide to the womman!'—Wherefore no, having so spoken to the Pharisee, have left?" [concluded].

"Nay, dear my Lady," answered Maude, "it were not enough. So dear loveth our good and gentle Lord, that He will not have so much as one of His children to feel any the least unsurety touching His mercy. Wherefore He were not aseeth [contented] to say it only unto the Pharisee; but on her face, bowed down as she knelt behind Him, He looked, and bade her to be of good cheer, for that she was forgiven. O Lady mine! 'tis great and blessed matter when a man hath God to his friend!"

"Thy words sound well," said the low voice from the bed. "Very well, like the sound of sweet waters far away."

"Far away, dear my Lady?"

"Ay, far away, Maude,—without [outside] my life and me."

"Sweet Lady, if ye will but lift the portcullis, our Lord is ready and willing to come within. And whereinsoever He entereth, He bringeth withal rest and peace."

"Rest! Peace!—Ay so. I guess there be such like gear some whither— for some folks."

"They dwell whereso Christ dwelleth, Lady mine."

"In Paradise, then! I told thee it were far hence."

"Is Paradise far hence, Lady? I once heard say Father Ademar that it were not over three hours' journey at the most; for the thief on the cross went there in one day, and it were high noon ere he set out."

Maude stopped sooner than she intended, suddenly checked by a moan of pain from Custance. The mere mention of Ademar's name seemed to evoke her overwhelming distress, as if it brought back the memory of all the miserable events over which she had been brooding for three days past. She rocked herself from side to side, as though her suffering were almost unendurable.

"If he could come back! O Maude, Maude!—if only he could come back!"

"Sweet Lady, an' he were hither, methinks Father Ademar—"

"No, no—not Father Ademar. Oh, if I could rend the grave open!—if I could tear asunder the blue veil of Heaven! I set no store by it all then; but now! He would forgive me: he would not scorn me! He would not count me too vile for his mercy. O my Lord, mine own dear Lord! you would never have served me thus!"

And down rained the blessed tears, and relieved the dry, parched soil of the agonised heart. She lay quieter after that torrent of pain and passion. The terrible spell of dark silence was broken; and Maude knew at last, that through this bitterest trial she had ever yet experienced, the wandering heart was coming home—at least to Le Despenser.

Was it needful that she should pass through yet deeper waters, before she would come home to God?

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The leaves were carpeting the ground around Kenilworth, when Custance granted a second interview to her cousin Isabel. There was more news for her by that time. Edward had been once more pardoned, and was again in his usual place at Court. How this inscrutable man procured his pardon, and what sum he paid for it, in cash or service, is among the mysteries of the medieval "back-stairs." He had to be forgiven for more than Custance knew. Among his other political speculations, he had been making love to the Queen; a fact which, though there can be little doubt that it was a mere piece of policy on his part, was unlikely to be acceptable to the King. But the one item which most closely concerned his sister was indicated in plain terms by his pardon—that she need look for no help at her brother's hands until she too "put herself in the King's mercy."

The King's mercy! What that meant depended on the King. In the reign of Richard of Bordeaux, that prisoner must be heavily-charged to whom it did not mean at least a smile of pardon—not unfrequently a grant of lands, or sometimes a coronet. But in the reign of Henry of Bolingbroke, it meant rigid justice, as he understood justice. And his mercy, to any Lollard, convicted or suspected, usually meant solitary confinement in a prison cell. What inducement was there for Custance to throw herself on such mercy as that? Nor was she further encouraged by hearing of another outbreak on behalf of King Richard or the Earl of March, headed by Archbishop Scrope and Lord Mowbray, and the heads of the ringleaders had fallen on the scaffold.