Part 9

“Indeed, my lord,” said Mistress Alicia, with as much disapproval as she dared to show to the head of the house, “here is no matter for laughing. ’Tis an excellent thing, my lord, that you should forbid Harry from marrying the Widow Harcourt. And truly, as you say, he’s not fit to wed for some four or five years to come. And, of a certainty, she’s scarce the woman to manage a household like this, brother; not such as I should care to trust with the keys. And I think you’ll not refuse me the credit to say, brother, that I have become them well these five years. Since, with his Majesty’s most happy Restoration, your lordship also has come to your own again, and placed me at the head of your house—I trust, I say, I have become the charge.”

“Indeed, none better,” said Rockhurst, absently.

The lady glanced at him sidelong. Her comely face took an air of indecision, almost of timidity, foreign to the massive severity of its lines. Something she had on her mind, that yet she feared to utter. But lack of courage could never be the failing of a Rockhurst.

“And, indeed, my lord, so long as you keep the lad mewed up here, as if he were a girl, ’tis not to be expected that he should get rid of such like maggots in his head. Why, the town’s the place for a gallant young gentleman like Harry. Your only son, my lord, your heir! Think on it. Why, Court’s the place for him, and you so rarely in his Majesty’s favour! He’d sing another song there, I warrant you.”

Once again the father’s face grew dark.

“’Tis my bird, sister; I’ll have him sing the song I choose.”

“But surely, brother,” argued the doughty lady, scarlet in the face, “with you to watch over him, with your example—”

“With my example!” He turned suddenly and fiercely on his sister: “No, by the Lord, not even with such valuable aid as that, will I trust my fine lad into that sink—that charnel-house—that pit! Ah, you think yourself so wise, and prate of what you know not—poor innocent old country virgin. I tell thee, woman, the taint is in the very air. Eyes, ears, nay, every pore, are channels for the poison—”

“Brother!” ejaculated Mistress Rockhurst, huffed and startled.

But Rockhurst proceeded, his eyes fixed more as if talking to himself than to her:—

“There, shame grows dearer than merit—vice becomes as a cloak, warm and soft, in which a man takes comfort. At the mere thought of cold virtue, of stern duty, of naked purity, ugh! we shiver and hug ourselves—”

His sister gave a faint, shocked cry, and flung out her hand:—

“But not you, not you, my lord! Surely these are strange words.”

“Harry shall be a man of better stuff,” the father cried. “He’s wholesome now, body and soul, and by the Lord, I say, I’ll keep him so! How now, Alicia, shall I not have pure-blooded, pure-hearted grandchildren, an I have the mind?”

For some unknown reason the excellent lady took deep umbrage at this last remark.

“Surely, surely!” she repeated, tossing her head, so that her grey curls danced.

“So let it be, then,” bade her brother. Then, in a changed voice he exclaimed:—

“Hush, now, here comes the country widow. Faith, the lad hath taste.”

But here he fell suddenly silent and sprang up. Mistress Rockhurst, surveying him in some anxiety, marked the extraordinary change that came over his countenance.

“As I am a sinful woman” (she afterward told her special gossip), “his lordship turned whey-white. And I do assure you, madam, his eyes blazed in his head—the like of which I have never seen before. ’Twas almost as if he and she had known each other and had never dreamed to meet again. And as for my fine young madam, she came along with her eyes on the ground—nay, the most bashful thing between this and York City. But when she looks up and sees my lord, as white as he went, she goes rosy, and, please you, gives a kind of cry with both her hands outstretched. That may have been artfulness. And if so, my lord met it even as I could have wished; for he but made her a deep bow, and, says he presently, in his very grand way, ‘It gives me pleasure, madam, to make your acquaintance.’ At which you should have seen how was taken aback the widow! ‘Make your acquaintance’ (mark me), says he, which shows he could not have known her before, after all.”

Harry, who had brought his lady in such pride beneath his father’s glance, stood somewhat dashed in the silence that followed Lord Rockhurst’s ceremonious greeting. By nature the most unsuspicious of youths, in his simple existence he had never felt the necessity of studying inner motives in those around him. He knew the tricks of bird and beast, but the secrets of his fellow-creatures he guessed not at. And so all the tokens that his aunt’s shrewd eye had noted were lost upon him. His father had been a trifle over-ceremonious toward a fair neighbour, let alone the mistress of his son’s heart. And she, his dear love, had blushed and grown pale, as was but natural.

“Well, sir,” he cried at last, anxiously, “now that you have seen Mistress Harcourt, do you not give me some reason?”

His father turned a singular glance upon him.

“Reason enough, lad,” he said, under his breath, “reason enough for any folly!”

Diana’s clear cheek had now resumed its usual pretty tint; but as her young lover spoke, it deepened; and at Rockhurst’s words, faded again slightly.

“Nay, my lord,” said she, speaking for the first time—her voice was low and troubled—“I know not what Master Harry hath been saying of me. It is his kindness that he will think so well of me, and—nay, I must say it, Harry—’tis his foolishness that he will not understand that he is over-kind.”

Rockhurst took Diana’s hand from his son’s hold, where it still rested unconsciously. Many thoughts were in his mind, as strangely conflicting as the forces in his nature. His keen knowledge of women and their ways told him that no woman who loved a man would have let her fingers lie so listlessly in his grasp. “My poor lad—she has no heart for him,” cried the father in him. But the man in him, as yet unsubdued by years or sorrow, rejoiced. Here was one who, nameless to him, had yet shone like a star in his troubled sky this many a month, for the sake of one hour, snatched, sweet, pure, sacred, out of an unworthily spent life. With all that was best in him, he had wished to keep her unknown, unattainable; and here she was, brought back by fate into his path!

No one could have guessed at the storm seething within him after his moment of self-betrayal. His usual polished composure governed face, voice, and gesture.

“My son has told me much about you, madam, truly,” he was saying; “and yet I see how little he has been able to tell me.”

’Twas the merest idle compliment. The words were as artificial as the tone. Diana courtesied in silence. Not thus did she remember her grave, chivalrous protector in an hour of doubt and peril. Nay, then, that memory had best be effaced from her mind, since it was his pleasure to deny it. Perchance (and the thought was more galling to her pride!) though she had so fondly kept his image in the deep recesses of her soul, hers had already faded from his thoughts.

“Indeed, my lord,” she began, rallying her spirits, “I too—” but she paused, for her brother and Lionel Ratcliffe were approaching, the latter with his cool air of indifference, the other all agape with curiosity.

Harry instantly took the younger man by the arm to present him to his father.

“One moment,” rebuked Rockhurst; “the lady is speaking. Pray, madam?”

“Oh, my lord,” said she, with formal grace, “the poor sentence was, certes, never worth such courteous attention. I was but about to say that I, too, have heard of your lordship often.”

“Aye? From what source?” he asked, and a shadow fell on his face.

But she was smiling.

“From this source,” she answered him, waving her roses toward Harry.

“Ah,” cried Rockhurst, laughing upon a sigh, “no doubt the rogue has full wearied you with the subject.”

“Alas,” she responded quickly, “must I not take this reproach to myself?”

Lionel Ratcliffe pulled young Rockhurst by the sleeve.

“What, all agaze and bewildered, Harry? Never fear, these are but Court wits in a friendly bout. Clink, clink, the sparks fly. But, hark to you, beware an unfoiled weapon.”

The boy withdrew from his touch with disfavour, and Rockhurst turned upon the whisperer a haughty look of enquiry.

“Well met again, my lord,” cried Ratcliffe, swaggering a step forward and saluting with a cavalier sweep of his hat.

Rockhurst returned the courtesy with a ceremonious inclination.

“Have we met before, sir?” he enquired.

No whit abashed, Ratcliffe replaced his felt with the very latest twist of the wrist.

“Does your lordship make it a practice, then, of not taking your memory out of town? To be sure, memory is a mighty inconvenient chattel at times. Natheless, ’tis a fact your lordship and my humble self have met at the same board. Did I not share with your lordship, last winter, the privilege of being the guest of the pretty Mantes?”

“Enough—I remember you, sir,” said his lordship.

“Egad,” laughed Ratcliffe, with elaborate geniality, “I, sure, did take special note of your lordship, that night, seeing you with the nymph, our hostess, whom, I mind me, you had but just whisked from under the very nose of Jove. Nay, not the first time (if report spoke truly) that Old Rowley has been cut out by the Rake—”

The words were arrested on his lips by a look as sharp as a sword:—

“You have too long a memory, sir. Shorten it.—My son,” added the speaker, turning his shoulder upon Ratcliffe, “you were about to introduce the young gentleman to me.”

“My brother, Sir Edward Hare, my lord,” said Diana, forestalling her lover.

The interlude with Ratcliffe had perturbed the group; and with gracious instinct she sought to cover her cousin’s insolence and young Rockhurst’s rising anger at insinuations incomprehensible to country dwellers, yet the hostile intent of which was but too transparent. Sir Edward, however, was far from assisting her purpose.

“Nay, brother, brother,” she whispered, as the bumpkin nodded sulkily. “Doff thy hat.”

“I tell thee, Di,” murmured the injured youth, “’tis he owes me two bows and a scrape. Ecod: ‘the lady’s speaking,’ quotha! And I with my best leg already drawn out for him!”

“Your lordship must excuse our rustic manners,” said Diana, with a pretty glance, half humorous, half pleading.

Rockhurst looked at her a second musingly.—Yes, grace, youth, sweetness, all were hers! And fate had so worked that it was she who was to embody his son’s young love dream! Dear lad … small blame to him! He gave an unconscious sigh. To his countenance came back that air of kindness which Harry had missed in it so singularly since the meeting with Diana.

“Of your leave, my son,” said he, then, “I will have a few minutes’ converse with Mistress Harcourt apart.”

Harry pressed his father’s hand in delighted response. He leant back against the sunny wall and watched his mistress go in grace beside the stately figure of the great Lord Rockhurst. Lionel took place beside him, and from narrowed lids looked smilingly at the young man’s happy countenance.

Mistress Rockhurst, who, solemnly seated at the end of her bench, had been a silent yet mightily observant witness of the whole scene, now, suddenly struck by the discontented expression of Edward Hare’s visage, addressed the youth:—

“What ails ye, Sir Edward?”

“I’m sick at stomach,” growled the candid baronet. “I hate a peacock.”

“Yet peacock is light fare,” said the lady, with a twinkle in her shrewd blue eye. “Sick at stomach, say you? There’s nothing better than a cup of marjoram water.”

Sir Edward flung the suggestion from him:—

“Water? Ugh!”

“When I say water,” amended she, “’tis strong water, aqua vitæ.”

“Aye,” quoth he, then, “that’s another matter. I’m not saying but a tass of it would warm the innards.”

She despised him heartily for a monstrous poor scion of a noble family; yet the housewife was too strong in her to resist the pleasure of ministering out of her store, even to an unworthy guest. She rose, chuckling, jingling her keys:—

“Oh, surely, surely,” she exclaimed, “this small comfort shall not be denied you here, Sir Edward. Come but with me.”

III

THE NEW FRENCH PASS

Rockhurst and Diana, at the extreme end of the terrace, stood alone in the sunshine, with the June roses about them.—How much more apart now than on that night in the snow between the black fir trees and the waste heath! She flung a sudden, eager look at him; but before the smooth courtesy with which he turned to her, drew back into herself, once more checked and puzzled. It was to be as if they had only met in a dream? So be it! Then the thought that he must now regard her as his son’s choice broke upon her in a flash of revelation—and anger. Why had she dallied with such folly? With an involuntary movement she loosened her grasp on Harry’s roses and they fell round her feet.

“Why, madam,” said Rockhurst, with a forced smile and a perfunctory solicitude, “your posy, madam, all in the dust! Nay, permit me to cull another for you.”

The man of the world had superseded all else. To place his years in rivalry with his son’s youth, the King’s Lord Constable against the country lad? Preposterous!

Lionel Ratcliffe stood attentively watching his kinswoman from afar. Beside him, Harry sat, dreaming, his young eyes fixed on God knows what golden vision. All at once the elder man tapped his companion stealthily on the arm.

“What is it?” cried Harry, starting from his muse and glancing round none too pleasantly. “What is it now?” quoth he, frowning.

“Look, look yonder, Master Rockhurst. Your roses.”

Harry’s glance followed the direction of the pointing finger. He saw Diana stand, a radiant vision in the amber light, with empty hands outstretched toward the flower that Rockhurst was in the act of gathering, a deep crimson rose that glowed like a ruby in the sun-rays. And about her feet the pale, sweet blossoms chosen for her with such love, but an hour ago! The red rose was carried to Diana’s cheek; and then she fastened it in her bosom. His flowers had not been so honoured. He could not think or reason; he could only look and suffer.

Again Lionel tapped him on the shoulder. He was smiling. Harry came back to his senses at sight of that odious smile.

“Well, sir, and what of it?” he cried, measuring Ratcliffe with a defiant look.

“What of it? More than you think.—What were you about, young man,” his voice sunk to a whisper, “when you invited Rakehell Rockhurst to come and view your lady?”

“Rakehell Rockhurst…!” echoed Harry in utter amazement. Then, fury leaping to his voice and eye, he wheeled fiercely upon Ratcliffe: “Of whom, sir, are you speaking?”

The latter proceeded, unmoved save for a trifle more of emphasis in his silky tone:—

“Did you not know that a single breath of his lips is enough to tarnish the virtue of the purest woman in England?”

The younger man fell back a step, and measured the speaker:—

“Of whom are you talking, I have asked you.”

There was more self-control in his demeanour, but more danger. It was tense with menace, like a bent bow. A second Ratcliffe paused. He had not given the lad credit for so much real manliness. The more reason for him to precipitate the crisis for which he was working; the crisis which might rid him of two rivals at once—for the courtly Rockhurst was indeed a rival to be reckoned with. And there was no affectation in the passion with which he now broke out:—

“Of whom, good lad? Of whom?——”

* * * * *

(Edward Hare, strolling out of the dim coolness of the buttery into the sunshine again, heard the sound of loud voices rising from the terrace below. Grinning, he advanced on tiptoe and bent over the parapet to listen. Cousin Ratcliffe and young Harry were at it at last! Even to his dull wits it had been evident that the quarrel that had long been smouldering between them was bound to break into open flame. Better than a wench or a bottle, better even than cockpit or bear-bait, Sir Edward loved the sight of a fight between his fellow-men. He chuckled as he hearkened.)

* * * * *

“Of whom, good lad, of whom—but the most noble Viscount, in town the incomparable libertine, his Majesty’s merry friend, known by Whitehall as Rakehell Rockhurst—in the country, thy sainted father! Aye, but, town or country, let Rockhurst get to windward of a pretty woman, and the devil will soon show his—”

Harry had stood a moment petrified, but before the last words were out he had struck Lionel on the lips:—

“Liar!”

Lionel staggered back; a narrow streak of blood was running down his chin. In a second he had whipped out the light riding sword that hung by his hip, and without a word made a deadly rush. Harry, however, strong country lad, trained by all the sudden accidents of sport and chase, had his wits about him. He stepped aside from the onslaught, caught up the cloak which lay on the balustrade, and flung it across the blade.

“Now, if you please,” said he, shaking his father’s sword free of the scabbard, whilst Ratcliffe, almost foaming at the mouth, struggled with the encumbering folds as if it had been his enemy himself, “let us continue the argument.”

* * * * *

It was a prettier fight than ever it had been Edward Hare’s luck to behold at feast or fair. In an ecstasy he hung over the parapet, jumping from one foot to the other.

“Sh! Sh!” he shouted, “at it, good dogs! Ecod, I would not have missed this for forty crowns! Ha, well pushed, cousin!”

Young Harry staggered, waved his sword aimlessly, then dropped it, pivoted on himself, and fell. He lay, face downward, and after a moment a coil of blood, like a slender serpent, began to move sinuously into the grey of the gravel.

The peacock, from his perch, peered down on the scene with stupid eyes, cocking its tufted head inanely from side to side.

The approving smile was petrified on Edward Hare’s face. He clapped his hand over his mouth like a frightened child.

“Dead, ecod!” he whispered to himself. Then, hanging further over the wall, he hailed Ratcliffe in a quavering shout:—

“Hist, coz—hast never killed him?”

The victor, leaning on his weapon, gazing in sombre abstraction at the prostrate form, started and looked up. He smiled hideously with his swollen lip.

“Be it mortal?” mouthed Edward again.

Ratcliffe answered stonily:—

“Mortal? I trust so. The affront was mortal.”

Then he slowly wiped his blade upon the cloak, sheathed it with care, and walked steadily away, along the path that led to the valley.

Hare watched him go, till the dark laurel bushes received and hid him. Then he looked over again at the motionless figure, and in a panic, sent loud calls ringing into the air: “Help here! Hoy—Hello! Master Rockhurst hurt, ill,—dead! Help!”

* * * * *

Rockhurst was the first to hear the cry. In a trice he was back in the Peacock Walk, kneeling by the bench. Hare was at his heels, gabbling his tale. Half his words went unheeded, but some found their mark in the father’s heart:—

“And Lionel says: ‘Rakehell Rockhurst’ (he, he!). ‘A devil with the women!’ says he. And Harry hits him across the mouth. ‘Liar!’ says Harry. Oh, ’twas a pretty quarrel. ’Twas a cracking slap!—”

As Rockhurst lifted his boy and supported him in his arms, light came back to the eyes so dark in the white face, and, stretching himself, Harry returned to consciousness and smiled up at his father like a waking child. Rockhurst tore the stained clothing apart with fierce hands, then drew a deep sigh of relief. His experience in such matters took stock of the wound—an ugly tear in truth, long, laying bare the ribs, but not deep.

“’Tis not vital—thank God! Go, call for help, man!” cried he sharply, looking up at the staring Edward. And off trotted the lout. Now came Diana, hastening, bewildered.

Lovers have quick ears: through the dimness of his returning consciousness Harry caught the sound of her steps. He tried to raise himself in his father’s embrace. There was a sudden shame upon him that he had done so womanish a thing as to swoon, this day when, of all days, he had so much reason to play the man.

“’Tis a mere scratch, my lord,” he murmured. Then, with an anxious glance on his father’s face, he added, stammering: “Master Lionel was showing me a new French pass, and I—I slipped—” He broke off; never before had he seen tears in his father’s eyes.

With a flutter like that of a settling bird, Diana sank on her knees beside them. With a soft cry, full of ruth, she took her boy lover’s hand. As he had passed her, running on Lord Rockhurst’s errand, her brother had bellowed his tidings:—

“A pretty quarrel! About you, sister! Ecod—there was talk about your virtue—and Master Harry’s slap, and Coz Lionel out with his tuck—”

As with the sting of arrows the words drove her forward. Ah, she needed no further telling to conjure up the scene: her kinsman had spoken lightly of her and her young lover had struck back the insult. Her boy lover! His youth, that had been his disability in her eyes, now became eloquent to plead for him. To see him lie there, pale and blood-stained, a mere lad.—After the way of women, on the moment her heart melted all to him.

“Harry, Harry! …” she cried, and the words were tender as a caress.

Harry turned his languid head.

“And now I cannot ride with you to-morrow—not even did my lord so permit! Father…!” Faintness was creeping over him again, but he made an effort. His voice rang out: “Father, will you escort her? My Diana!”

It was at once a supreme declaration of confidence and a solemn charge. The father bowed his head.

“Your Diana, lad, so be it—I accept the trust.”

Over the poor wounded body the eyes of Rakehell Rockhurst met those of Diana. There was a steady sweetness of renunciation in his, that she had seen there once before. Hers were quickly veiled again, lest they betray the singular, sharp pain that filled her heart.

At her swiftest gait, important, yet showing no alarm, Mistress Rockhurst advanced, followed by a couple of wenches, bearing varied paraphernalia. She had lived through the wars—it were a parlous wound indeed she could not cope with. In her own hands she carried a flask of renowned cordial. None too soon, it seemed, for the colour on the pretty boyish head lying between Rockhurst and Diana was fading fast again.

THE KING’S CUP

THE KING’S CUP

I

LITTLE SATAN

A swift thunder-storm had rushed down the Thames valley, passed over sultry London with clamour and hail scourge, and was gone—as sudden and wholesome as a good man’s passion. The town lay, a little dazed, it seemed, gasping as one astonished, yet mightily refreshed.

In the gardens of the Temple every leaf dripped and shone the brighter; the dry earth drank and sent up a fragrance to mingle with the scent from the historic rose-bushes of the inner pleasance, the glory of which now lay scattered, white and red, on the turf, each petal with the tears in its heart glinting under that sky of incomparable blue that reveals itself after the squall.

Down the steep slope from King’s Bench Walk, mimic mountain torrents rushed in haste, seeking the river which rolled, heaving still, a troubled yellow, in angry ebb toward the east, where the clouds still lowered in their flight.