A Ladder of Swords Part 1

A Ladder of Swords.

by Gilbert Parker.

I

If you go to Southampton and search the register of the Walloon church there, you will find that in the summer of 157- "_Madame Vefue de Montgomery with all her family and servants were admitted to the Communion_"--"_Tous ceux ci furent Recus la a Cene du 157-, comme pa.s.sans, sans avoir Rendu Raison de la foi, mes sur la tesmognage de Mons. Forest, Ministre de Madame, qui certifia qui ne cognoisoit Rien en tout ceux la po quoy Il ne leur deust administre la Cene s'il estoit en lieu po la ferre._"

There is another striking record, which says that in August of the same year Demoiselle Angele Claude Aubert, daughter of Monsieur de la Haie Aubert, Councillor of the Parliament of Rouen, was married to Michel de la Foret, of the most n.o.ble Flemish family of that name.

When I first saw these records, now grown dim with time, I fell to wondering what was the real life-history of these two people.

Forthwith, in imagination, I began to make their story piece by piece; and I had reached a romantic _denoment_ satisfactory to myself and in sympathy with fact, when the Angel of Accident stepped forward with some "human doc.u.ments." Then I found that my tale, woven back from the two obscure records I have given, was the true story of two most unhappy yet most happy people. From the note struck in my mind, when my finger touched that sorrowful page in the register of the Church of the Refugees at Southampton, had spread out the whole melody and the very book of the song.

One of the later-discovered records was a letter, tear-stained, faded, beautifully written in old French, from Demoiselle Angele Claude Aubert to Michel de la Foret at Anvers in March of the year 157-. The letter lies beside me as I write, and I can scarcely believe that three and a quarter centuries have pa.s.sed since it was written, and that she who wrote it was but eighteen years old at the time. I translate it into English, though it is impossible adequately to carry over either the flavor or the idiom of the language:

"_Written on this May Day of the year 157-, at the place hight Rozel in the Minor called of the same of Jersey Isle, to Michel de la Foret, at Anvers in Flanders._

"MICHEL,--Thy good letter by safe carriage cometh to my hand, bringing to my heart a lightness it hath not known since that day when I was hastily carried to the port of St. Malo, and thou towards the King his prison. In what great fear have I lived, having no news of thee and fearing all manner of mischance! But our G.o.d hath benignly saved thee from death, and me He hath set safely here in this isle of the sea.

"Thou hast ever been a brave soldier, enduring and not fearing; thou shalt find enow to keep thy blood stirring in these days of trial and peril to us who are so opprobriously called Les Huguenots. If thou wouldst know more of my mind thereupon, come hither. Safety is here, and work for thee--smugglers and pirates do abound on these coasts, and Popish wolves do harry the flock even in this island province of England. Michel, I plead for the cause which thou hast n.o.bly espoused, but--alas! my selfish heart, where thou art lie work and fighting, and the same high cause, and sadly, I confess, it is for my own happiness that I ask thee to come. I wot well that escape from France hath peril, that the way hither from that point upon yonder coast called Carteret is hazardous, but yet--but yet all ways to happiness are set with hazard.

"If thou dost come to Carteret thou wilt see two lights turning this-wards: one upon a headland called Tour de Rozel, and one upon the great rock called of the Ecrehos. These will be in line with thy sight by the sands of Hatainville. Near by the Tour de Rozel shall I be watching and awaiting thee. By day and night doth my prayer ascend for thee.

"The messenger who bears this to thee (a piratical knave with a most kind heart, having, I am told, a wife in every port of France and of England the south, a most heinous sin!) will wait for thy answer, or will bring thee hither, which is still better. He is worthy of trust if thou makest him swear by the little finger of St. Peter. By all other swearings he doth deceive freely.

"The Lord make thee true, Michel. If thou art faithful to me, I shall know how faithful thou art in all; for thy vows to me were most frequent and p.r.o.nounced, with a full savor that might warrant short seasoning. Yet, because thou mayst still be given to such dear fantasies of truth as were on thy lips in those dark days wherein thy sword saved my life 'twixt Paris and Rouen, I tell thee now that I do love thee, and shall so love when, as my heart inspires me, the cloud shall fall that will hide us from each other forever.

"ANGeLE

"_An Afterword_:

"I doubt not we shall come to the heights where there is peace, though we climb thereto by a ladder of swords.

A."

Some years before Angele's letter was written, Michel de la Foret had become an officer in the army of Comte Gabriel de Montgomery, and fought with him until what time the great chief was besieged in the castle of Domfront in Normandy. When the siege grew desperate, Montgomery besought the intrepid young Huguenot soldier to escort Madame de Montgomery to England, to be safe from the oppression and misery sure to follow any mishap to this n.o.ble leader of the Camisards.

At the very moment of departure of the refugees from Domfront with the Comtesse, Angele's messenger--the "piratical knave with a most kind heart"--presented himself, delivered her letter to De la Foret, and proceeded with the party to the coast of Normandy by St. Brieuc.

Embarking there in a lugger which Buonespoir the pirate secured for them, they made for England.

Having come but half-way of the Channel, the lugger was stopped by an English frigate. After much persuasion the captain of the frigate agreed to land Madame de Montgomery upon the island of Jersey, but forced De la Foret to return to the coast of France; and Buonespoir elected to return with him.

II

Meanwhile Angele had gone through many phases of alternate hope and despair. She knew that Montgomery the Camisard was dead, and a rumor, carried by refugees, reached her that De la Foret had been with him to the end. To this was presently added the word that De la Foret had been beheaded. But one day she learned that the Comtesse de Montgomery was sheltered by the governor, Sir Hugh Pawlett, her kinsman, at Mont Orgueil Castle. Thither she went in fear from her refuge at Rozel, and was admitted to the Comtesse. There she learned the joyful truth that De la Foret had not been slain, and was in hiding on the coast of Normandy.

The long waiting was a sore trial, yet laughter was often upon her lips henceforth. The peasants, the farmers and fishermen of Jersey, at first--as they have ever been--little inclined towards strangers, learned at last to look for her in the fields and upon the sh.o.r.e, and laughed in response, they knew not why, to the quick smiling of her eyes. She even learned to speak their unmusical but friendly Norman-Jersey French. There were at least a half-dozen fishermen who, for her, would have gone at night straight to the Witches' Rock in St. Clement's Bay--and this was bravery unmatched.

It came to be known along the coast that "ma'm'selle" was waiting for a lover fleeing from the French coast. This gave her fresh interest in the eyes of the serfs and sailors and their women folk, who at first were not inclined towards the Huguenot maiden, partly because she was French, and partly because she was not a Catholic. But even these, when they saw that she never talked religiously, that she was fast learning to speak their own homely patois, and that in the sickness of their children she was untiring in her kindness, forgave the austerity of the gloomy-browed old man her father, who spoke to them distantly, or never spoke at all; and her position was secure.

Then, upon the other hand, the gentry of the manors, seeing the friendship grow between her and the Comtesse de Montgomery at Mont Orgueil Castle, made courteous advances towards her father, and towards herself through him.

She could scarce have counted the number of times she climbed the great hill like a fortress at the lift of the little Bay of Rozel, and from the Nez du Guet scanned the sea for a sail and the sky for fair weather. When her eyes were not thus busy, they were searching the lee of the hill-side round for yellow lilies, and the valley below for the campion, the daffodil, and the thousand pretty ferns growing in profusion there. Every night she looked out to see that her signal-fire was lit upon the Nez du Guet, and she never went to bed without taking one last look over the sea, in the restless, inveterate hope which at once sustained her and devoured her.

But the longest waiting must end. It came on the evening of the very day that the Seigneur of Rozel went to Angele's father and bluntly told him he was ready to forego all Norman-Jersey prejudice against the French and the Huguenot religion, and take Angele to wife without penny or estate.

In reply to the seigneur, Monsieur Aubert said that he was conscious of an honor, and referred monsieur to his daughter, who must answer for herself; but he must tell Monsieur of Rozel that monsieur's religion would, in his own sight, be a high bar to the union. To that the seigneur said that no religion that he had could be a bar to anything at all, and so long as the young lady could manage her household, drive a good bargain with the craftsmen and hucksters, and have the handsomest face and manners in the Channel Islands, he'd ask no more; and she might pray for him and his salvation without let or hindrance.

The seigneur found the young lady in a little retreat among the rocks, called by the natives _La Chaire_. Here she sat sewing upon some coa.r.s.e linen for a poor fisherwoman's babe when the seigneur came near. She heard the scrunch of his heels upon the gravel, the clank of his sword upon the rocks, and looked up with a flush, her needle poised; for none should know of her presence in this place save her father. When she saw who was her visitor, she rose. After greeting and compliment, none too finely put, but more generous than fitted with Jersey parsimony, the gentleman of Rozel came at once to the point.

"My name is none too bad," said he--"Raoul Lempriere, of the Lemprieres that have been here since Rollo ruled in Normandy. My estate is none worse than any in the whole islands; I have more horses and dogs than any gentleman of my acres; and I am more in favor at court than De Carteret of St. Ouen's. I am the Queen's butler, and I am the first that royal favor granted to set up three dove-cotes, one by St. Aubin's, one by St. Helier's, and one at Rozel; and--and," he added, with a lumbering attempt at humor--"and, on my oath, I'll set up another dove-cote without my sovereign's favor, with your leave alone. By Our Lady, I do love that color in yon cheek! Just such a color had my mother when she s.n.a.t.c.hed from the head of my cousin of Carteret's milkmaid-wife the bonnet of a lady of quality and bade her get to her heifers. G.o.d's beauty! but 'tis a color of red primroses in thy cheeks and blue campions in thine eyes.

Come, I warrant I can deepen that color"--he bowed low--"Madame of Rozel, if it be not too soon!"

The girl listened to this cheerful and loquacious proposal and courtship all in one, ending with the premature bestowal of a t.i.tle, in mingled anger, amus.e.m.e.nt, disdain, and apprehension. Her heart fluttered, then stood still, then flew up in her throat, then grew terribly hot and hurt her, so that she pressed her hand to her bosom as though that might ease it. By the time he had finished, drawn himself up, and struck his foot upon the ground in burly emphasis of his devoted statements, the girl had sufficiently recovered to answer him composedly, and with a little glint of demure humor in her eyes. She loved another man; she did not care so much as a spark for this happy, swearing, swashbuckling gentleman; yet she saw he had meant to do her honor. He had treated her as courteously as was in him to do; he chose her out from all the ladies of his acquaintance to make her an honest offer of his hand--he had said nothing about his heart; he would, should she marry him, throw her sc.r.a.ps of good-humor, bearish tenderness, drink to her health among his fellows, and respect and admire her--even exalt her almost to the rank of a man in his own eyes; and he had the tolerance of the open-hearted and open-handed man. All these things were as much a compliment to her as though she were not a despised Huguenot, an exiled lady of no fortune. She looked at him a moment with an almost solemn intensity, so that he shifted his ground uneasily, but at once smiled encouragingly, to relieve her embarra.s.sment at the unexpected honor done her. She had remained standing; now, as he made a step towards her, she sank down upon the seat and waved him back courteously.

"A moment, Monsieur of Rozel," she ventured. "Did my father send you to me?"

He inclined his head and smiled again.

"Did you say to him what you have said to me?" she asked, not quite without a touch of malice.

"I left out about the color in the cheek," he answered, with a smirk at what he took to be the quickness of his wit.

"You kept your paint-pot for me," she replied, softly.

"And the dove-cote, too," he rejoined, bowing finely, and almost carried off his feet by his own brilliance.

She became serious at once--so quickly that he was ill prepared for it, and could do little but stare and pluck at the ta.s.sel of his sword, embarra.s.sed before this maiden, who changed as quickly as the currents change under the brow of the Couperon Cliff, behind which lay his manor-house of Rozel.

"I have visited at your manor, Monsieur of Rozel. I have seen the state in which you live, your retainers, your men-at-arms, your farming-folk, and your sailor-men. I know how your Queen receives you; how your honor is as stable as your fief."

He drew himself up again proudly. He could understand this speech.

"Your horses and your hounds I have seen," she added, "your men-servants and your maid-servants, your fields of corn, your orchards, and your larder. I have sometimes broken the commandment and coveted them and envied you."

"Break the commandment again for the last time," he cried, delighted and boisterous. "Let us not waste words, lady. Let's kiss and have it over."

Her eyes flashed. "I coveted them and envied you; but, then, I am but a vain girl at times, and vanity is easier to me than humbleness."

"Blood of man, but I cannot understand so various a creature!" he broke in, again puzzled.

"There is a little chapel in the dell beside your manor, monsieur. If you will go there, and get upon your knees, and pray till the candles no more burn and the Popish images crumble in their places, you will yet never understand myself or any woman."