My Lady Rotha Part 10

'Sceptres are easy leading-staves,' my lady answered deftly. 'All these were kings, or the like.'

'Then take Don John at Lepanto. He, too, was twenty-five.'

'A king's son,' my lady replied quickly.

'Then I will give you one to whom you can make no objection,' he answered in a tone of triumph: 'Gaston de Foix, the Thunderbolt of Italy. He who conquered at Como, at Milan, at Ravenna. How old was he when he died, leaving a name never to be forgotten in arms?

Twenty-three, fair cousin. And I am twenty-three.'

'But then you are not Gaston de Foix,' my lady retorted, laughter bubbling to her lips; 'nor a king's nephew.'

'But I may be.'

'What? A king's nephew?' the Countess answered, laughing outright.

'Pray where is the king's niece?'

'King's niece?' he exclaimed reproachfully--and I doubt not with a kind look at her, and a movement as if he would have paid her for her sauciness. 'You know I want no king's niece. There is no king's niece in the world so sweet to my taste, so fair, or so gracious as the cousin I have been fortunate enough to serve during the last few days; and that I will maintain against the world.'

'So here is my glove!' my lady answered gaily, finishing the speech for him. 'Very prettily said, Rupert. I make you a thousand curtsies.

But a truce to compliments. Tell me more.'

He needed no second bidding; though I think that she would have listened without displeasure to another pretty speech, and an older man would certainly have made one. But he was full of the future and fame--and himself. He had never had such a listener before, and he poured forth his hopes and aspirations, as he strode up and down, so gallant of figure and frank of face that it was impossible not to feel with him. He was going to do this; he was going to do that. He would make the name of Rupert of Weimar stand with that of Bernard. Never was such a time for enterprise. Gustavus Adolphus, with Sweden and North Germany at his back, was at Munich; Bavaria, Franconia, and the Rhine Bishoprics were at his feet. The hereditary dominions of the Empire, Austria, Silesia, Moravia, with Bohemia, Hungary, and the Tyrol, must soon be his; their conquest was certain. Then would come the division of the spoil. The House of Weimar, which had suffered more in the Protestant cause than any other princely house of Germany, which had resigned for its sake the Electoral throne and the rights of primogeniture, must stand foremost for reward.

'And which kingdom shall you choose?' my lady asked, with a twinkle in her eye which belied her gravity. 'Bohemia or Hungary? or Bavaria?

Munich I am told is a pleasant capital.'

'You are laughing at me!' he said, a little hurt.

'Forgive me,' she said, changing her tone so prettily that he was appeased on the instant. 'But, speaking soberly, are you not curing the skin before the bear is dead? The great Wallenstein is said to be collecting an army in Bohemia, and if the latest rumour is to be believed, he has already driven out the Saxons and retaken Prague. The tide of conquest seems already to be turning.'

'We shall see,' the Waldgrave answered.

'Very well,' my lady replied. 'But, besides, is there not a proverb about the lion's share? Will the Lion of the North forego his?'

'We shall make him,' the young lord answered. 'He goes as far as we wish and no farther. Without German allies he could not maintain his footing for a month.'

'Germany should blush to need his help,' my lady said warmly.

'Never mind. Better times are coming,' he answered. 'And soon, I hope.'

With that they moved out of hearing, crossing to the other side of the court and beginning to walk up and down there; and I heard no more.

But I had heard enough to enable me to arrive at two or three conclusions. For one thing, I felt jealous no longer. My lady's tone when she spoke to the Waldgrave convinced me that whatever the future might bring forth, she regarded him in the present with liking, and some pride perhaps, but with no love worthy of the name. A woman, she took pleasure in his handsome looks and gallant bearing; she was fond of listening to his aspirations. But the former pleased her eye without touching her heart, and the latter never for a moment carried her away.

I was glad to be sure of this, because I discerned something lacking on his side also. It was 'Rotha,' 'sweet cousin,' 'fair cousin,' too soon with him. He felt no reverence, suffered no pangs, trembled under no misgivings, sank under no sense of unworthiness. He thought that all was to be had for pleasant words and the asking. Heritzburg seemed a rustic place to him, and my lady's life so dull and uneventful, my lady herself so little of a G.o.ddess, that he deemed himself above all risk of refusal. A little difficulty, a little doubt, the appearance of a rival, might awaken real love. But it was not in him now. He felt only a pa.s.sing fancy, the light offspring of propinquity and youth.

But how, it may be asked, was I so wise that, from a few sentences heard between sleeping and waking, I could gather all this, and draw as many inferences from a laugh as Fraulein Anna Max from a page of crabbed Latin? The question put to me then, as I sat day-dreaming over Heritzburg, might have posed me. I am clear enough about it now. I could answer it if I chose. But a nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse, and a horse with eyes needs neither one nor the other.

Presently I saw Fraulein Anna come out and go sliding along one side of the court to gain another door. She had a great book under her arm and blinked like an owl in the sunshine, and would have run against my lady if the Waldgrave had not called out good-humouredly. She shot away at that with a show of excessive haste, and was in the act of disappearing like a near-sighted rabbit, when my lady called to her pleasantly to come back.

She came slowly, hugging the great book, and with her lips pursed tightly. I fancy she had been sitting at a window watching my lady and her companion, and that every laugh which rose to her ears, every merry word, nay the very sunshine in which they walked, while she sat in the dull room with her unread book before her, wounded her.

'What have you been doing, Anna?' my lady asked kindly.

'I have been reading the "Praise of Folly,"' Fraulein Max answered primly. 'I am going to my Voetius now.'

'It is such a fine day,' my lady pleaded.

'I never miss my Voetius,' Fraulein answered.

The Waldgrave looked at her quizzically, with scarcely veiled contempt. 'Voetius?' he said. 'What is that? You excite my curiosity.'

Perhaps it was the contrast between them, between his strength and comeliness and her weak figure and pale frowning face, that moved me; but I know that as he said that, I felt a sudden pity for her. And she, I think, for herself. She reddened and looked down and seemed to go smaller. Scholarship is a fine thing; I have heard Fraulein Anna herself say that knowledge is power. But I never yet saw a bookworm that did not pale his fires before a soldier of fortune, nor a scholar that did not follow the courtier and the ruffler with eyes of envy.

Perhaps my lady felt as I did, for she came to the rescue. 'You are too bad,' she said. 'Anna is my friend, and I will not have her teased. As for Voetius, he is a writer of learning, and you would know more about many things, if you could read his works, sir.'

'Do you read them?' he asked.

'I do!' she answered.

'Good heavens!' he exclaimed, staring at her freely and affecting to be astonished. 'Well, all I can say is that you do not look like it!'

My lady fired up at that. I think she felt for her friend. 'I do not thank you,' she said sharply. 'A truce to such compliments, if you please. Anna,' she continued, 'have you been to see this poor girl from the town?'

'No,' Fraulein Max answered.

'She has come, has she not?'

'And gone--to the stables!' And Fraulein Anna laughed spitefully. 'She is used to camp life, I suppose, and prefers them.'

'But that is not right,' my lady said, with a look of annoyance.

She turned and called to me. 'Martin,' she said, 'come here. This girl--the papist from the town--why has she not been brought to the women's quarters in the house?'

I answered that I did not know; that she should have been.

'We will go and see,' my lady answered, nodding her head in a way that premised trouble should any one be found in fault. And without a moment's hesitation she led the way to the inner court, the Waldgrave walking beside her, and Fraulein Anna following a pace or two behind.

The latter still hugged her book, and her face wore a look of secret antic.i.p.ation. I took on myself to go too, and followed at a respectful distance, my mind in a ferment.

The stable court at Heritzburg is small. The rays of the sun even at noon scarcely warm it, and a shadow seemed to fall on our party as we entered. Two grooms, not on guard, were going about their ordinary duties. They started on seeing my lady, who seldom entered that part without notice; and hastened to do reverence to her.

'Where is the girl who was brought here from the town?' she said, in a peremptory tone.

The men looked at one another, scared by her presence, yet not knowing what was amiss. Then one said, 'Please your excellency, she is in the room over the granary.'

'She should be in the house, not here,' my lady answered harshly.

'Take me to her.'

The man stared, and the Waldgrave, seeing his look of astonishment, interposed, murmuring that perhaps the place was scarcely fit.

'For me?' my lady said, cutting him short, with a high look which reminded me of her uncle, Count Tilly. 'You forget, sir cousin, that I am not a woman only, but mistress here. Ignorance, which may be seemly in a woman, does not become me. Lead on, my man.'