Grisly Grisell Or The Laidly Lady of Whitburn Part 22

"And he knighted you," said Grisell.

"True," with a sharp glance, as if he wondered how she was aware of the fact; "but only as my father's heir. My poor old house and tenants! I would I knew how they fare; but mine uncle sends me no letters, though he does supply me."

"Then you do not feel bound in honour to Lancaster?" said Grisell.

"Nay; I did not stir or strive to join the Queen when last she called up the Scots - the Scots indeed! - to aid her. I could not join them in a foray on England. I fear me she will move heaven and earth again when her son is of age to bear arms; but my spirit rises against allies among Scots or French, and I cannot think it well to bring back bloodshed and slaughter."

"I shall pray for peace," said Grisell. All this was happiness to her, as she felt that he was treating her with confidence. Would she ever be nearer to him?

He was a graver, more thoughtful man at seven and twenty than he had been at the time of his hurried marriage, and had conversed with men of real understanding of the welfare of their country. Such talks as these made Grisell feel that she could look up to him as most truly her lord and guide. But how was it with the fair Eleanor, and whither did his heart incline? An English merchant, who came for spices, had said that the Lord Audley had changed sides, and it was thus probable that the damsel was bestowed in marriage to a Yorkist; but there was no knowing, nor did Grisell dare to feel her way to discovering whether Leonard knew, or felt himself still bound to constancy, outwardly and in heart.

Every one was taken up with the funeral solemnities of Duke Philip; he was to be finally interred with his father and grandfather in the grand tombs at Dijon, but for the present the body was to be placed in the Church of St. Donatus at Bruges, at night.

Sir Leonard rode at a foot's pace in the troop of men-at-arms, all in full armour, which glanced in the light of the sixteen hundred torches which were borne before, behind, and in the midst of the procession, which escorted the bier. Outside the coffin, arrayed in ducal coronet and robes, with the Golden Fleece collar round the neck, lay the exact likeness of the aged Duke, and on shields around the pall, as well as on banners borne waving aloft, were the armorial bearings of all his honours, his four dukedoms, seven counties, lordships innumerable, besides the banners of all the guilds carried to do him honour.

More than twenty prelates were present, and shared in the ma.s.s, which began in the morning hour, and in the requiem. The heralds of all the domains broke their white staves and threw them on the bier, proclaiming that Philip, lord of all these lands, was deceased. Then, as in the case of royalty, Charles his son was proclaimed; and the organ led an acclamation of jubilee from all the a.s.sembly which filled the church, and a shout as of thunder arose, "Vivat Carolus."

Charles knelt meanwhile with hands clasped over his brow, silent, immovable. Was he crushed at thought of the whirlwinds of pa.s.sion that had raged between him and the father whom he had loved all the time? or was there on him the weight of a foreboding that he, though free from the grosser faults of his father, would never win and keep hearts in the same manner, and that a sad, tumultuous, troubled career and piteous, untimely end lay before him?

His mother, Grisell's d.u.c.h.ess, according to the rule of the Court, lay in bed for six weeks - at least she was bound to lie there whenever she was not in entire privacy. The room and bed were hung with black, but a white covering was over her, and she was fully dressed in the black and white weeds of royal widowhood. The light of day was excluded, and hosts of wax candles burnt around.

Grisell did not see her during this first period of stately mourning, but she heard that the good lady had spent her time in weeping and praying for her husband, all the more earnestly that she had little cause personally to mourn him.

CHAPTER XXVII - FORGET ME NOT

And added, of her wit, A border fantasy of branch and flower, And yellow-throated nestling in the nest.

TENNYSON, Elaine.

The d.u.c.h.ess Isabel sent for Grisell as soon as the rules of etiquette permitted, and her own mind was free, to attend to the suite of lace hangings, with which much progress had been made in the interval. She was in the palace now, greatly honoured, for her son loved her with devoted affection, and Grisell had to pa.s.s through tapestry-hung halls and chambers, one after another, with persons in mourning, all filled with men-at-arms first, then servants still in black dresses. Next pages and squires, knights of the lady, and lastly ladies in black velvet, who sat at their work, with a chaplain reading to them. One of these, the Countess of Poitiers, whom Grisell had known at the Grey Sisters' convent, rose, graciously received her obeisance, and conducted her into the great State bedroom, likewise very sombre, with black hangings worked and edged, however, with white, and the window was permitted to let in the light of day. The bed was raised on steps in an alcove, and was splendidly draped and covered with black embroidered with white, but the d.u.c.h.ess did not occupy it. A curtain was lifted, and she came forward in her deepest robes of widowhood, leading her little granddaughter Mary, a child of eight or nine years old. Grisell knelt to kiss the hands of each, and the d.u.c.h.ess said -

"Good Griselda, it is long since I have seen you. Have you finished the border?"

"Yes, your Highness; and I have begun the edging of the corporal."

The d.u.c.h.ess looked at the work with admiration, and bade the little Mary, the damsel of Burgundy, look on and see how the dainty web was woven, while she signed the maker to seat herself on a step of the alcove.

When the child's questions and interest were exhausted, and she began to be somewhat perilously curious about the carved weights of the bobbins, her grandmother sent her to play with the ladies in the ante-room, desiring Grisell to continue the work. After a few kindly words the d.u.c.h.ess said, "The poor child is to have a stepdame so soon as the year of mourning is pa.s.sed. May she be good to her! Hath the rumour thereof reached you in the city, Maid Griselda, that my son is in treaty with your English King, though he loves not the house of York? But princely alliances must be looked for in marriage."

"Madge!" exclaimed Grisell; then colouring, "I should say the Lady Margaret of York."

"You knew her?"

"Oh! I knew her. We loved each other well in the Lord of Salisbury's house! There never was a maid whom I knew or loved like her!"

"In the Count of Salisbury's house," repeated the d.u.c.h.ess. "Were you there as the Lady Margaret's fellow-pupil?" she said, as though perceiving that her lace maker must be of higher quality than she had supposed.

"It was while my father was alive, madame, and before her father had fixed his eyes on the throne, your Highness."

"And your father was, you said, the knight De - De - D'Acor."

"So please you, madame," said Grisell kneeling, "not to mention my poor name to the lady."

"We are a good way from speech of her," said the d.u.c.h.ess smiling. "Our year of doole must pa.s.s, and mayhap the treaty will not hold in the meantime. The King of France would fain hinder it. But if the Demoiselle loved you of old would she not give you preferment in her train if she knew?"

"Oh! madame, I pray you name me not till she be here! There is much that hangs on it, more than I can tell at present, without doing harm; but I have a pet.i.tion to prefer to her."

"An affair of true love," said the d.u.c.h.ess smiling.

"I know not. Oh! ask me not, madame!"

When Grisell was dismissed, she began designing a pattern, in which in spray after spray of rich point, she displayed in the pure frostwork-like web, the Daisy of Margaret, the Rose of York, and moreover, combined therewith, the saltire of Nevil and the three scallops of Dacre, and each connected with ramifications of the forget-me-not flower shaped like the turquoises of her pouncet box, and with the letter G to be traced by ingenious eyes, though the uninitiated might observe nothing.

She had plenty of time, though the treaty soon made it as much of a certainty as royal betrothals ever were, but it was not till July came round again that Bruges was in a crisis of the fever of preparation to receive the bride. Sculptors, painters, carvers were desperately at work at the Duke's palace. Weavers, tapestry-workers, embroiderers, sempstresses were toiling day and night, armourers and jewellers had no rest, and the bright July sunshine lay glittering on the ca.n.a.ls, graceful skiffs, and gorgeous barges, and bringing out in full detail the glories of the architecture above, the tapestry-hung windows in the midst, the gaily-clad Vrows beneath, while the bells rang out their merriest carillons from every steeple, whence fluttered the banners of the guilds.

The bride, escorted by Sir Antony Wydville, was to land at Sluys, and d.u.c.h.ess Isabel, with little Mary, went to receive her.

"Will you go with me as one of my maids, or as a tirewoman perchance?" asked the d.u.c.h.ess kindly.

Grisell fell on her knee and thanked her, but begged to be permitted to remain where she was until the bride should have some leisure. And indeed her doubts and suspense grew more overwhelming. As she freshly trimmed and broidered Leonard's surcoat and sword-belt, she heard one of the many gossips who delighted to recount the members of the English suite as picked up from the subordinates of the heralds and pursuivants who had to marshal the procession and order the banquet. "Fair ladies too," he said, "from England. There is the Lord Audley's daughter with her father. They say she is the very pearl of beauties. We shall see whether our fair dames do not surpa.s.s her."

"The Lord Audley's daughter did you say?" asked Grisell.

"His daughter, yea; but she is a widow, bearing in her lozenge, per pale with Audley, gules three herrings haurient argent, for Heringham. She is one of the d.u.c.h.ess Margaret's dames-of-honour."

To Grisell it sounded like her doom on one side, the crisis of her self-sacrifice, and the opening of Leonard's happiness on the other.

CHAPTER XXVIII - THE PAGEANT

When I may read of tilts in days of old, And tourneys graced by chieftains of renown, Fair dames, grave citoyens, and warriors bold - If fancy would pourtray some stately town, Which for such pomp fit theatre would be, Fair Bruges, I shall then remember thee.

SOUTHEY, Pilgrimage to Waterloo.

Leonard Copeland was in close attendance on the Duke, and could not give a moment to visit his friends at the Green Serpent, so that there was no knowing how the presence of the Lady of Heringham affected him. Duke Charles rode out to meet his bride at the little town of Damme, and here the more important portions of the betrothal ceremony took place, after which he rode back alone to the Cour des Princes, leaving to the bride all the splendour of the entrance.

The monastic orders were to be represented in the procession. The Grey Sisters thought they had an especial claim, and devised the presenting a crown of white roses at the gates, and with great pleasure Grisell contributed the best of Master Lambert's lovely white Provence roses to complete the garland, which was carried by the youngest novice, a fair white rosebud herself.

Every one all along the line of the tall old houses was hanging from window to window rich tapestries of many dyes, often with gold and silver thread. The trades and guilds had renewed their signs, banners and pennons hung from every abode ent.i.tled to their use, garlands of bright flowers stretched here and there and everywhere. All had been in a frenzy of preparation for many days past, and the final touches began with the first hours of light in the long, summer morning. To Grisell's great delight, Cuthbert Ridley plodded in at the hospitable door of the Green Serpent the night before. "Ah! my ladybird," said he, "in good health as ever."

"All the better for seeing you, mine old friend," she cried. "I thought you were far away at Compostella."