Grisly Grisell Or The Laidly Lady of Whitburn Part 21

The kind couple of Groots were exceedingly solicitous about Grisell's appearance before the d.u.c.h.ess, and much concerned that she could not be induced to wear the head-gear a foot or more in height, with veils depending from the peak, which was the fashion of the Netherlands. Her black robe and hood, permitted but not enjoined in the external or third Order of St. Francis, were, as usual, her dress, and under it might be seen a face, with something peculiar on one side, but still full of sweetness and intelligence; and the years of comfort and quiet had, in spite of anxiety, done much to obliterate the likeness to a cankered oak gall. Lambert wanted to drench her with perfumes, but she only submitted to have a little essence in the pouncet box given her long ago by Lady Margaret at their parting at Amesbury. Master Groot himself chose to conduct her on this first great occasion, and they made their way to the old gateway, sculptured above with figures that still remain, into the great cloistered court, with its chapel, chapter-house, and splendid great airy hall, in which the Hospital Sisters received their patients.

They were seen flitting about, giving a general effect of gray, whence they were known as Surs Grises, though, in fact, their dress was white, with a black hood and mantle. The d.u.c.h.ess, however, lived in a set of chambers on one side of the court, which she had built and fitted for herself.

A lay sister became Grisell's guide, and just then, coming down from the d.u.c.h.ess's apartments, with a board with a chalk sketch in his hand, appeared a young man, whom Groot greeted as Master Hans Memling, and who had been receiving orders, and showing designs to the d.u.c.h.ess for the ornamentation of the convent, which in later years he so splendidly carried out. With him Lambert remained.

There was a broad stone stair, leading to a large apartment hung with stamped Spanish leather, representing the history of King David, and with a window, glazed as usual below with circles and lozenges, but the upper part glowing with coloured gla.s.s. At the farther end was a dais with a sort of throne, like the tester and canopy of a four-post bed, with curtains looped up at each side. Here the d.u.c.h.ess sat, surrounded by her ladies, all in the sober dress suitable with monastic life.

Grisell knew her duty too well not to kneel down when admitted. A dark-complexioned lady came to lead her forward, and directed her to kneel twice on her way to the d.u.c.h.ess. She obeyed, and in that indescribable manner which betrayed something of her breeding, so that after her second obeisance, the manner of the lady altered visibly from what it had been at first as to a burgher maiden. The wealth and luxury of the citizen world of the Low Countries caused the proud and jealous n.o.bility to treat them with the greater distance of manner. And, as Grisell afterwards learnt, this was Isabel de Souza, Countess of Poitiers, a Portuguese lady who had come over with her Infanta; and whose daughter produced Les Honneurs de la Cour, the most wonderful of all descriptions of the formalities of the Court.

Grisell remained kneeling on the steps of the dais, while the d.u.c.h.ess addressed her in much more imperfect Flemish than she could by this time speak herself.

"You are the lace weaver, maiden. Can you speak French?"

"Oui, si madame, son Altese le veut," replied Grisell, for her tongue had likewise become accustomed to French in this city of many tongues.

"This is English make," said the d.u.c.h.ess, not with a very good French accent either, looking at the specimens handed by her lady. "Are you English?"

"So please your Highness, I am."

"An exile?" the Princess added kindly.

"Yes, madame. All my family perished in our wars, and I owe shelter to the good Apothecary, Master Lambert."

"Purveyor of drugs to the sisters. Yes, I have heard of him;" and she then proceeded with her orders, desiring to see the first piece Grisell should produce in the pattern she wished, which was to be of roses in honour of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, whom the Peninsular Isabels reckoned as their namesake and patroness.

It was a pattern which would require fresh p.r.i.c.king out, and much skill; but Grisell thought she could accomplish it, and took her leave, kissing the d.u.c.h.ess's hand - a great favour to be granted to her - curtseying three times, and walking backwards, after the old training that seemed to come back to her with the atmosphere.

Master Lambert was overjoyed when he heard all. "Now you will find your way back to your proper station and rank," he said.

"It may do more than that," said Grisell. "If I could plead his cause."

Lambert only sighed. "I would fain your way was not won by a base, mechanical art," he said.

"Out on you, my master. The needle and the bobbin are unworthy of none; and as to the honour of the matter, what did Sir Leonard tell us but that the Countess of Oxford, as now she is, was maintaining her husband by her needle?" and Grisell ended with a sigh at thought of the happy woman whose husband knew of, and was grateful for, her toils.

The pattern needed much care, and Lambert induced Hans Memling himself, who drew it so that it could be p.r.i.c.ked out for the cushion. In after times it might have been held a greater honour to work from his pattern than for the d.u.c.h.ess, who sent to inquire after it more than once, and finally desired that Mistress Grisell should bring her cushion and show her progress.

She was received with all the same ceremonies as before, and even the small fragment that was finished delighted the Princess, who begged to see her at work. As it could not well be done kneeling, a footstool, covered in tapestry with the many Burgundian quarterings, was brought, and here Grisell was seated, the d.u.c.h.ess bending over her, and asking questions as her fingers flew, at first about the work, but afterwards, "Where did you learn this art, maiden?"

"At Wilton, so please your Highness. The nunnery of St. Edith, near to Salisbury."

"St. Edith! I think my mother, whom the Saints rest, spoke of her; but I have not heard of her in Portugal nor here. Where did she suffer?"

"She was not martyred, madame, but she has a fair legend."

And on encouragement Grisell related the legend of St. Edith and the christening.

"You speak well, maiden," said the d.u.c.h.ess. "It is easy to perceive that you are convent trained. Have the wars in England hindered your being professed?"

"Nay, madame; it was the Proctor of the Italian Abbess."

Therewith the inquiries of the d.u.c.h.ess elicited all Grisell's early story, with the exception of her name and whose was the iron that caused the explosion, and likewise of her marriage, and the accusation of sorcery. That male heirs of the opposite party should have expelled the orphan heiress was only too natural an occurrence. Nor did Grisell conceal her home; but Whitburn was an impossible word to Portuguese lips, and Dacre they p.r.o.nounced after its crusading derivation De Acor.

CHAPTER XXVI - THE DUKE'S DEATH

Wither one Rose, and let the other flourish; If you contend, a thousand lives must wither.

SHAKESPEARE, King Henry VI., Part III.

So time went on, and the rule of the House of York in England seemed established, while the exiles had settled down in Burgundy, Grisell to her lace pillow, Leonard to the suite of the Count de Charolais. Indeed there was reason to think that he had come to acquiesce in the change of dynasty, or at any rate to think it unwise and cruel to bring on another desperate civil war. In fact, many of the Red Rose party were making their peace with Edward IV. Meanwhile the d.u.c.h.ess Isabel became extremely fond of Grisell, and often summoned her to come and work by her side, and talk to her; and thus came on the summer of 1467, when Duke Philip returned from the sack of unhappy Dinant in a weakened state, and soon after was taken fatally ill. All the city of Bruges watched in anxiety for tidings, for the kindly Duke was really loved where his hand did not press. One evening during the suspense when Master Lambert was gone out to gather tidings, there was the step with clank of spurs which had grown familiar, and Leonard Copeland strode in hot and dusty, greeting Vrow Clemence as usual with a touch of the hand and inclination of the head, and Grisell with hand and courteous voice, as he threw himself on the settle, heated and weary, and began with tired fingers to unfasten his heavy steel cap.

Grisell hastened to help him, Clemence to fetch a cup of cooling Rhine wine. "There, thanks, mistress. We have ridden all day from Ghent, in the heat and dust, and after all the Count got before us."

"To the Duke?"

"Ay! He was like one demented at tidings of his father's sickness. Say what they will of hot words and fierce pa.s.sages between them, that father and son have hearts loving one another truly."

"It is well they should agree at the last," said Grisell, "or the Count will carry with him the sorest of memories."

And indeed Charles the Bold was on his knees beside the bed of his speechless father in an agony of grief.

Presently all the bells in Bruges began to clash out their warning that a soul was pa.s.sing to the unseen land, and Grisell made signs to Clemence, while Leonard lifted himself upright, and all breathed the same for the mighty Prince as for the poorest beggar, the intercession for the dying. Then the solemn note became a knell, and their prayer changed to the De Profundis, "Out of the depths."

Presently Lambert Groot came in, grave and saddened, with the intelligence that Philip the Good had departed in peace, with his wife and son on either side of him, and his little granddaughter kneeling beside the d.u.c.h.ess.

There was bitter weeping all over Bruges, and soon all over Flanders and the other domains united under the Dukedom of Burgundy, for though Philip had often deeply erred, he had been a fair ruler, balancing discordant interests justly, and maintaining peace, while all that was splendid or luxurious prospered and throve under him. There was a certain dread of the future under his successor.

"A better man at heart," said Leonard, who had learnt to love the Count de Charolais. "He loathes the vices and revelry that have stained the Court."

"That is true," said Lambert. "Yet he is a man of violence, and with none of the skill and dexterity with which Duke Philip steered his course."

"A plague on such skill," muttered Leonard. "Caring solely for his own gain, not for the right!"

"Yet your Count has a heavy hand," said Lambert. "Witness Dinant! unhappy Dinant."

"The rogues insulted his mother," said Leonard. "He offered them terms which they would not have in their stubborn pride! But speak not of that! I never saw the like in England. There we strike at the great, not at the small. Ah well, with all our wars and troubles England was the better place to live in. Shall we ever see it more?"

There was something delightful to Grisell in that "we," but she made answer, "So far as I hear, there has been quiet there for the last two years under King Edward."

"Ay, and after all he has the right of blood," said Leonard. "Our King Henry is a saint, and Queen Margaret a peerless dame of romance, but since I have come to years of understanding I have seen that they neither had true claim of inheritance nor power to rule a realm."

"Then would you make your peace with the White Rose?"

"The rose en soleil that wrought us so much evil at Mortimer's Cross? Methinks I would. I never swore allegiance to King Henry. My father was still living when last I saw that sweet and gracious countenance which I must defend for love and reverence' sake."