CHAPTER XV

THE EVE OF WAR

Service was being held in the Royal Chapel at Hampton Court.

There were not many people there: only the King, the officers of his household, and one or two others, including Mr. Prior, new come from The Hague.

William knelt alone in his pew while his chaplain delivered the final and beautiful prayers of the Anglican service; he was not listening to or repeating these prayers.

The old austerity of his stern religion had become softened with his vaster knowledge and experiences, nor could his firm conception of a wide tolerance maintain the narrow prejudices of sectarian belief; but the old teaching of the faith that had supported his youth and manhood through so much was still strong in him. It suited his nature and his circumstance; it was the creed of his beloved country, and had ever been under the especial protection of his family. The heart of the King was still as Calvinist as it had been when he learnt his grim theology from Pastor Trigland. Though he knelt in English churches and listened to Anglican services, it pleased him to close his eyes and imagine himself back in the bare whitewashed Groote Kerk, an eager grave boy, a silent anxious man, seated in the stiff pew watching the sunlight fall athwart the massive, tall pillars, and drawing stern comfort and noble inspiration from the pastor's thunderous declamation of the theology of Geneva.

This morning the picture came before him with a peculiar and painful vividness. He put his hand over his eyes and thought that he could hear the little stir of Mary's gown beside him, and that if he put out his hand he would touch hers, warm on her Prayer Book ...

Long after the prayers had ceased he continued kneeling, and when he at last rose there was a curious expression on his face.

When he left the Chapel his words were to know if Albemarle had yet arrived.

No, he was told, but my lord might be expected any hour, as the packet from Holland had got in last night.

The King had constantly shown a wistful impatience for the return of Albemarle, when he had parted from him with great pain; but my lord was the only person who knew his exact wishes in the matter of the disposal of the troops in the United Provinces and whom he could entrust with his minute instructions to M. Heinsius.

He now calculated that my lord, even riding all night, could scarcely be there before midday, and he ordered out his horse and said he would ride in the park awhile. It was a day in February, and mild and fine. Of late, too, he had been unexpectedly better in health, and had even hunted and spent hours on horseback.

As the little company left the Chapel, Mr. Prior fell behind to speak with Lord Buckhurst, son of my Lord Dorset, Mr. Prior's former patron.

"Everything is done, is it not?" he asked eagerly.

"Everything," said my young lord, with enthusiasm. "We--and the allies--will take the field this spring. God bless His Majesty!"

"Ay, he did it. I would I could have heard his speech to Parliament. They say, sir, it hath roused Europe like the trumpet-call to charge----"

"Europe, Mr. Prior, and the Commons of England. I think no nobler words were ever heard in Westminster--he raised them all above themselves--you have read the speech? It is in a dozen different tongues already. England might hold the balance of Europe, he said, if she would exert her ancient vigour and forget her unhappy internal animosities;--and she will, Mr. Prior, she will--thanks to His Majesty."

My Lord Buckhurst was only voicing the general sentiment of enthusiasm and loyalty that William had at last succeeded in rousing.

"Will the King take the campaign this year?" asked Matthew Prior, as they strolled out into the magnificent gardens.

"I do not think so--it is to be my Lord Marlborough."

"A man who was ever detested by the King."

"His Majesty saith he is the greatest general and statesman. Next year he might go himself--there seemeth hope that he might be recovered then."

They passed the yew hedges and fountains, the famous patterned flower-beds, and came out by King Charles's Long Canal, with the resplendent avenue of trees rising up lofty against the pale spring sky and fading into a fair, hazy distance. Coming now into the park where the fresh grass was pushing up through the dead damp leaves of last autumn, and the little groups of slender deer moved delicately through the open sloping glades, they perceived the King riding with two grooms, and holding his hat in his hand to catch the full strength of the faint sun on his face.

He drew up his horse as he saw the two gentlemen, and spoke to them kindly, telling them of the new fine entrance-gates he proposed to make from the Palace grounds to Bushey Park.

He looked more animated and cheerful than he had done for a long while. He was mounted on a splendid young sorrel horse, that he managed with all his old skill.

"A new fellow," he remarked. "The grooms warned me he was spirited, but I could scarcely be afraid of a horse--eh?" He faintly smiled and patted the great creature's glossy neck with his thin, white, ungloved hand.

My Lord Buckhurst looked at the frail figure of the King and the great power of the animal, and indeed wondered that he could manage him. He secretly agreed with the grooms that William was perhaps relying too much on his exquisite horsemanship in mounting such an untried brute.

"I hope," said William, "that I shall find my Lord Albemarle when I return."

He touched up the horse and galloped away out of sight down the long avenue, the grooms after him.

Lord Buckhurst and Mr. Prior lingered a little in the pleasant dim sun and shade, talking over this great prospect opening out over Europe, and the part the nations of the world would play in the coming struggle--which could not fail to establish for ever the Protestant faith and the liberty of peoples.

Presently the sun clouded over, and they were for returning to the Palace, when the distant sound of hoofs on the grass caused them to look round, thinking this might be the King returning.

What they saw was a riderless horse--a monstrous sorrel horse--galloping across the glade, with the stirrups flying loose.

"The King--his horse!" exclaimed Mr. Prior breathlessly. Lord Buckhurst said nothing; he turned and ran swiftly towards where the animal had come from. Cumbered as he was with sword, full extravagant vesture, and a wide-bottomed peruke, youth brought him easily over the ground, and in a few minutes he came to the spot he made for--a little clearing beyond the great trees of the avenue, with Mr. Prior breathless at his heels.

They saw there what they had been dreading to see: the King lying on the ground, and the two frightened grooms coming up, one dismounted and in an embarrassment to know what to do with his horse, the other giving doleful exclamations and cries for help.

William had raised himself on one elbow, and was holding a handkerchief to his mouth.

Buckhurst and Prior rushed up to him.

"Are you hurt, sire?" cried my lord.

The King removed the handkerchief from his lips; it was scarlet with blood.

"No," he answered. "The brute threw me over that molehill--the first time, my lord, I have been thrown----"

He put his hand to the shoulder on which he had fallen.

"Something broken, I think," he said, in a fainter voice. "They were right--I overestimated my skill--I have not the seat--I--once--had."

My lord endeavoured to raise him, tenderly enough; but at the attempt to move the King's face went of an ashy colour, and he fainted with pain.

"This is the end," murmured my lord. "Take him up, Mr. Prior--dear God, I think this is the end."

With the aid of the two servants, who had now left their horses, they carried him back, by easy degrees, into the Palace, and his own apartments.

Before the doctor could be called he came to his senses and asked for Albemarle. On being told he had arrived, he bid him rest a little before he delivered his news, and, having sent the message, called M. Zulestein to bring him his yet unfinished letter to M. Heinsius.

When it was brought, and quill and ink, he sat up in his great chair with arms, and added painfully these words: "God be praised, all difficulties are overcome," and his name.

He bid them, in a broken whisper, send off this letter immediately, and fell back again in his chair, very white and frowning.

The alarmed gentlemen were for his seeing the doctor immediately, but he desired to give Albemarle his audience first.

My lord came on the instant, spurred and dusty, and all in a reek from travel.

He entered, with a breathless air of dread, the throne-room, where they had brought the King.

William was seated in a great low chair of red velvet, in front of the blue dais and throne, which bore in silver the Royal arms and the motto of Nassau: "Je Maintaindrai." He still wore his buff hunting-coat with the gold galloon on the wide skirt and the tight doeskin boots with the gilt spurs; his waistcoat was open on his laced shirt, and he held his right hand over his heart.

Lord Albemarle fell on his knees and passionately kissed the King's free hand.

William looked down at him affectionately, and said, between quick little gasps--

"How go matters in Holland?"

"Well, sire, well--everything is in readiness. The States are willing to everything that Your Majesty wisheth; all the preparations are complete for an early campaign--but you, Your Majesty----"

"Tell me of Holland," interrupted William faintly.

Albemarle looked round the company, and hesitated; but at a sign from M. Zulestein obeyed the King, and spoke of the affairs of the Republic, and of their response to the King's call to arms.

William of Orange listened to these words, that told him his lifework was at last accomplished, with such calm that it seemed indifference, or as if he was giving no attention to the matter of the discourse; he never changed his attitude or raised his downcast eyes. It seemed as if even this could not rouse him now.

When Albemarle paused at last and waited, half fearfully, William spoke, but so faintly that my lord, kneeling close as he was, could hardly catch the words.

"I have often wished to die," he murmured; "but now I might wish to live and see this prospect fulfilled; but I draw near my end--the end--the end----"

He said the word three times with so many little sighs, and then fainted, dropping his hand from his heart.