Long Will Part 25

"And how alone will she be, that peasant maid that I have chose to make my lady," said Stephen. "Think, sire! a kingdom is no plaything.

Be sure Christ Jesus, of all men the Judge, will not let thee off of thy devoir to the least man or maid born in England,--when the last day cometh. And when thou and Calote stand face to face, and the great angel a-blowing his trump, and all the world rising up fearful out of its grave, wilt thou say to the Judge: 'Christ, King of Heaven, this was a maid that went out to do me service. My kingdom was full of a quarrel 'twixt peasant and n.o.blesse, 'twixt monk and friar, and merchant. There was no man but had a grievance against his brother.

And this maid said, I will bring love out of this hate, and truth out of this lying; the King and the peasant shall kiss the kiss of peace.'

And wilt thou say again, 'I had knights and n.o.bles in my court to guard me well and to do my will, O Christ! but I would not give one of all these to go follow the maid and shield her from peril in her lonely pilgrimage. I would not let go even a squire to be her body-guard. If she hath come to harm, it is by me, and in my cause.'"

"No, no, no!" whispered Richard very piteous; "I will not do so." He had ceased his weeping, but now and again a sob shook him. "Etienne, I will be a true King. Ah, who will learn me to be true when thou art gone!"

"The wisest men in the kingdom are at thy bidding, King Richard,"

Stephen answered him gravely.

"But they are too wise," the boy complained. "They weary me. I love thee best."

"Natheless, 't were scarce fitting that Master John Wyclif, or Lord Percy of Northumberland, be sent to follow Calote in my stead," quoth Stephen, half-mischievous.

The King laughed a tearful little laugh. But presently he said:--

"Calote flouteth thee. She will not let thee go with her."

"She shall not know," Stephen answered. "Will my lord hear what I purpose? 'T is no wonted adventure."

"Yea," Richard agreed. "But do thou first cover me in bed, and give me a tippet; I 'm cold. Is there any of the clarre left in the cup?"

Thereupon Stephen covered him and gave him the cup to drink, and after told him what he purposed to do,--a long tale.

"O Etienne, what a true lover art thou!" sighed Richard. "But I shall miss thee sore."

"And I 'll lodge in poor men's cots, and take them to be my friend, and learn if they be strong enough to overcome the n.o.bles."

"I 'd rather be thou than the King," Richard said wistfully. "Here 's a merry adventure, and 't is dull in the Palace at Westminster. Tell on!"

So they spoke peacefully together, and at the last the King fell fast asleep, and Stephen kissed his hand very soft, and left him.

CHAPTER V

The Adventure in Devon

Calote was in the south of England that winter, in Hampshire, and Wiltshire, and Somerset; resting, now a week, now a night only, in town or village or lonely hut. She travelled off the highway as much as she might, and slept in poor folks' cots. She bought bed and victual with a ballad or a gest, and because she could spin and bake as well as tell a tale, the goodwives of the countryside harboured her willingly, and sent her on her way with bread in her bag and milk in her bottle, and her head bret-full of messages to distant friends; as:--

"If thou 'lt take yon three fields as the crow flieth, then turn thee on thy left hand, through a wood and up a hill and down again, thou 'lt come, in a good ten mile, to a river and a white thatched house on t' other side; there be three yew trees behind. Do thou go in boldly and call for Cristina atte Ford; she 's my brother's second wife. I 've not seen her this six year and more, but she was a kindly soul at that time. Say 't was Cecily Ayr sent thee; and here 's a piece of new linen for the latest baby and six new-laid eggs. G.o.d and Saint Mary keep thee, wench! Yonder 's Roger Stokfisshe in his dung-cart a-going thy way; he 'll give thee a ride."

When she came into a village, she went and stood by the cross, or in the street before the tavern, and blew a blast on the King's horn; and when the people began to gather round, she sang a song of Robin Hood, or Earl Randle of Chester; and after, of Piers Ploughman; and she said as how she was Will Langland's daughter; and if there were but common folk, or a knight or two in the company, she told of the Brotherhood, and at the last of the young King.

Whiles they were sullen and afraid; whiles they scoffed and would believe but only that 't was a merry gest of a jongleuse; whiles they waited not to hear the end, but drifted away by twos and threes a-shaking their heads. Yet, more often, they stayed by, and crowded closer, and fingered the silver horn curiously. A-many had heard already something of this matter, as how the peasants should arise; and these questioned her of when and where. Others told their grievances loudly and said: "Will this be cured?"--"Will that be done away?" Ofttimes she might not know all that they would say, for that their speech was strange; and they on their part said: "What is 't?"--"What 's that to mean?" for Englishmen spoke a diverse language in that day. Nevertheless, because of the going to and fro of peddlers and merchants and minstrels, of pilgrims and friars, over the land, there began to be a scattering of words from one shire to another; and Calote, being quick of wit, had soon the jargon of the south country and the west at the tip of her tongue.

'T would seem there was a young peddler journeying in these parts about this same time; ever and anon Calote met him in tavern or marketplace. There was never a lonely stretch of road but she found him jogging on before, or looked behind to see him coming after. He spoke not overmuch, and then with a grievous stammer. He was not goodly to look upon, having no eyebrows and black hair very wild about his head; yet, in his company Calote ever found her heart light with a content and surety the which she was at a loss to understand. He wore a tawny tabard, and a bright blue flannel hood of the kind that is cape and hood in one, with a hole to thrust the face out. His hosen were of coa.r.s.e yarn, twixt white and gray, streaked. He carried a light pack, with pins and ribbons and trinkets in it, and a lute slung under his arm. Twice or thrice he had sat on the steps of a market cross and tw.a.n.ged his lute that Calote might the better sing her ballads, but if she thanked him, he would scowl.

At Salisbury, in the spring, she came upon Wat Tyler a-walking the High Street, and 't would be hard to tell which had more joy of other.

He caught her up and kissed her heartily; and she, laughing, with the tears on her cheeks, had well-nigh choked him with her arms around his neck.

He told her as how her father was very silent, and ever busy with the Vision. And her mother said: "If so be thou find Calote,"--for they knew she was in that part of England where she was,--"here is a pair of warm shoes for her feet."

He told her also how 't was rumoured that a poll tax was toward; because, forsooth, some fool averred that "the wealth of the kingdom is in the hands of the workmen and labourers." Wat smacked his own empty hands together loudly and laughed so that men turned in the street to look on him.

He lingered around and about Salisbury a month and more, and Calote stayed with him, singing her songs in Wilton and Bemerton, and in the taverns and at the poultry cross. That elfish peddler likewise rested in the town, and ever he was at Wat's elbow, questioning of when the people should rise; and how many shires were already awake to these matters. But when May was come in, Wat set Calote on the road to Exeter and himself turned his face to Londonward. And all that month of May she was a-wandering over the moors of Devon, she and the peddler, for he had never been in these parts and he lost his way.

"I know a man of Devon," quoth Calote; "he lives by the sea. If we could come at him, he 'd succour us and set us in the right road."

They went in a circle ofttimes, and twice at nightfall they came back to the same farm-house. Then the peddler bruised his foot, and they stayed three nights under the open sky, in the heather. The silence of the moors wrapped them round, and also the peddler's stammer was a burden to his speech. The third evening a shepherd came upon them, and gave them beans to eat.

It was June the day they came out upon a great red foreland above the sea. The chief colour of the water was a flashing blue, but at the edges it changed to clear green, fringed white with foam; there were cloud shadows of purple lying on that blue, and here and there a wondrous rosy patch, as it might be apple blossoms were melted there.

They followed along the cliffs after this, a dizzy way, and once Calote was fain to lie down and cling to the short gra.s.s and cry.

"G-get up," quoth the peddler; "f-for sh-sh-shame to cry. I-I-I-- G-give me th-th-thy hand!"

And so twixt coaxing and comforting he got her to her feet again, and they went on, he walking on the side of the sea as much as he might.

Ever and anon they came upon a handful of fishermen's cottages in a wooded coombe, and at one of these hamlets they heard that Calote's friend Peter dwelt some three miles farther on, inland about a mile.

So when they were come to Peter's cot, which was wreathed all about with a riot of honeysuckle and wild rose, the peddler gave Calote good-day, and she leapt the dry ditch and went into the yard through the gate; and there was Peter a-sitting on the doorstone, mending a hoe.

"O mistress!" he cried, and she laughed and shook him by the shoulders and kissed him. And Peter's son, that was now a parson, came out of the house with a book in his hand.

When the peddler saw this parson in the doorway, and how young he was, he half turned as he would go back; but then he thought better of it, and went on till he came to the church of the parish. In the churchyard he sat down to rest under an old yew tree, and here the parson found him after vespers, and took him in to lodge in his own house.

Meanwhile, in Peter's cot, Calote went to bed supperless.

"We ate our bread at noon," said Peter. "The morrow morn I 'll make shift to sell our black c.o.c.k to the steward of the manor-house. 'T is an ancient bird, but I have heard tell the cook is wonderly skilful to disguise tough meat."

"Nay, not for my sake shalt thou sell it!" cried Calote.

But Peter answered her: "We also must eat, mistress. I am in arrears to Bailiff for that my plough broke in the furrow three days past; I could not beg no wood to mend it, but Forester found me in the park with mine axe. Wherefore I sat yesterday in the stocks."

Peter had no shoes, and there were raw rings about his ankles where the stocks had galled him, also his neck was bruised. He was very ragged, his tabard full of holes. Nevertheless, he was not the only one in that village went bare.

So soon as all the people heard that this was Long Will's daughter, who was Peter's friend in London, they came eagerly to see her. They were a big and kindly and simple folk, slow and obstinate. They heard Calote's tales in silence, stolidly; yet they came again and again to hear. Now it was before the door of Peter's cot that they gathered; now it was at the foot of the cliffs when the tide was out; now it was in the churchyard of a Sunday after Ma.s.s, the parson sitting by a-copying her words; for his own book of the Vision was a tattered thing, never complete, that he had bought at a Devon fair.

Meanwhile, the parson and the peddler were close comrades. The peddler had to answer many questions; as, how did John Wyclif appear? And was he so learned a man as John Ball? And did William Courtney, Devon's son, still bear him arrogant, now he was Bishop of London? And was it true, what the friars in these parts said, that John Wyclif was a sorcerer and in the Devil's pay? And had the peddler been in Oxford?--this with a lingering sigh. But ever the questioning came round at the last to love, for concerning this matter the parson was very curious; not that love Long Will sang in the Vision, but the more common kind; and throughout whole days of June, as they walked together over the wide rose-blossoming country on the top of the cliffs, the parson to carry comfort to the sick or the aged, the peddler to sell his wares, they discoursed of lovers and loving; and it was the peddler who learned the parson the Romaunt of the Rose.

"And didst thou ever suffer this malady of love, to know it?" the parson queried one day.

"Ay, a-and do suffer," the peddler answered. "B-b-but she 'll n-none of me."

"A foolish maid, to judge by the outside," said the parson; himself was a big, broad, yellow-headed man, might have had any maid in Devon to keep his house for him an he had chose; but of this he was not aware.

"Didst ever essay to curl thy hair?" he continued; "'t would soften thy countenance."