My Lady Rotha Part 21

We found quarters prepared for us, not in the general's house, the large one by the cannon, but in a house of four rooms, a little farther down the street. It was convenient, it had been cleaned for us, and we found a meal awaiting us; and so far I was bound to confess that we had no ground for complaint. The general accompanied my lady to the door, and there left her with many bows, requesting permission to wait on her next day, and begging her in the mean time to send to him for anything that was lacking to her comfort.

When he was gone, and my lady had surveyed the place, she let her satisfaction be seen. The main room had been made habitable enough.

She stood in her redingote, tapping the table with her whip.

'Well, Martin, this is better than the forest,' she said.

'Yes, your excellency,' I answered reluctantly.

'I think we have done very well,' she continued; and she smiled to herself.

'We are safe from the rain, at any rate,' I said bluntly. My tongue itched to tell her Von Werder's warning, but Fraulein Anna and Marie Wort were in the room, and I did not think it safe to speak.

I could not stay and not tell, however, and I jumped at the first excuse for retiring. There was a kind of wooden platform in front of the houses, and running their whole length; a walk, raised out of the mud of the street and sheltered overhead by the low, wide eaves. A woman and some children had climbed on to it, and begging with their palms through the windows almost deafened us. I ran out and drove them off, and set a man in front to keep the place free. But the wretched creatures' entreaties haunted me, and when I returned I was in a worse temper than before.

The Waldgrave met me at the door, and to my surprise laid his hand on my shoulder. 'This way, Martin,' he said in a low voice. 'I want a word with you.'

I went with him across the road, and leaned against the fallen trunk of a tree, which was just visible in the darkness. Through the unglazed windows of the house we could see the lighted rooms, the Countess and her attendants moving about, Fraulein Anna sitting with her feet tucked up in a corner, the servants bringing in the meal. All in a frame of blackness, with the hoa.r.s.e sounds of the camp in our ears, and the pitiful wailing of the beggars dying away in the distance. It was a dark night, and still.

The Waldgrave laughed. 'Dilly, dilly, dilly! Come and be killed,' he muttered. 'Two thousand soldiers? Two thousand cut-throats, Martin.

Pappenheim's black riders were gentlemen beside these fellows!'

'Things may look more cheerful by daylight,' I said.

'Or worse!' he answered.

I told him frankly that I thought the sooner we were out of the camp the better.

'If we can get out! Of course, it is better for the mouse when it is out of the trap!' he answered with a sneer. 'But there is the rub.'

'He would not dare to detain us,' I said. I did not believe my words, however.

'He will dare one of two things,' the Waldgrave answered firmly, 'you may be sure of that: either he will march your lady back to Heritzburg, and take possession in her name, with this tail at his heels--in which case, Heaven help her and the town. Or he will keep her here.'

I tried to think that he was prejudiced in the matter, and that his jealousy of General Tzerclas led him to see evil where none was meant.

But his fears agreed so exactly with my own, that I found it difficult to treat his suggestions lightly. What the camp was, I had seen; how helpless we were in the midst of it, I knew; what advantage might be taken of us, I could imagine.

Presently I found an argument. 'You forget one thing, my lord,' I said. 'General Tzerclas is on his way to the south. In a week we shall be with the main army at Nuremberg, and able to appeal to the King of Sweden or the Landgrave or a hundred friends, ready and willing to help us.'

The Waldgrave laid his hand on my arm. 'He does not intend to go south,' he said.

I could not believe that; and I was about to state my objections when the noisy march of a body of men approaching along the road disturbed us. The Waldgrave raised his hand and listened.

'Another time!' he muttered--already we began to fear and be secret--'Go now!'

In a trice he disappeared in the darkness, while I went more slowly into the house, where I found my lady inquiring anxiously after him. I thought that the young lord would follow me in, and I said I had seen him. But he did not come, and presently wild strains of music, rising on the air outside, took us all by surprise and effectually diverted my lady's thoughts.

The players proved to be the general's band, sent to serenade us.

As the weird, strange sweetness of the air, with its southern turns and melancholy cadences, stole into the room and held the women entranced--while moths fluttered round the lights and the servants pressed to the door to listen, and now and then a harsh scream or a distant oath betrayed the surrounding savagery--I felt my eyes drawn to my lady's face. She sat listening with a rapt expression. Her eyes were downcast, her lashes drooped and veiled them; but some pleasant thought, some playful remembrance curved her full lips and dimpled her chin. What was the thought, I wondered? was it gratification, pleasure, complacency, or only amus.e.m.e.nt? I longed to know.

On one point I was resolved. My lady should not sleep that night until she had heard the warning I had received from Von Werder. To that end I did all I could to catch her alone, but in the result I had to content myself with an occasion when only Fraulein Anna was with her.

Time pressed, and perhaps the Dutch girl's presence confused me, or the delicacy of the position occurred to me _in mediis rebus_, as I think the Fraulein called it. At any rate, I blurted out the story a little too roughly, and found myself called sharply to order.

'Stay!' my lady said, and I saw too late that her colour was high.

'Not so fast, man! I think, Martin, that since we left Heritzburg you have lost some of your manners! See to it, you recover them. Who told you this tale?'

'Herr von Werder,' I answered with humility; and I was going on with my story. But she raised her hand.

'Herr von Werder!' she said haughtily. 'Who is he?'

'The gentleman who supped with us last night,' I reminded her.

She stamped the floor impatiently. 'Fool!' she cried, 'I know that!

But who is he? Who is he? He should be some great man to prate of my affairs so lightly.'

I stuttered and stammered, and felt my cheek redden with shame. _I did not know_. And the man was not here, and I could not reproduce for her the air of authority, the tone and look which had imposed on me: which had given weight to words I might otherwise have slighted, and importance to a warning that I now remembered was a stranger's. I stood, looking foolish.

My lady saw her advantage. 'Well,' she said harshly, 'who is he? Out with it, man! Do not keep us waiting.'

I muttered that I knew no more of him than his name.

'Perhaps not that,' she retorted scornfully.

I admitted that it might be so.

My lady's eyes sparkled and her cheeks flamed. 'Before Heaven, you are a fool!' she cried. 'How dare you come to me with such a story? How dare you traduce a man without proof or warranty! And my cousin! Why, it pa.s.ses belief. On the word of a nameless wanderer admitted to our table on sufferance you accuse an honourable gentleman, our kinsman and our host, of--Heaven knows of what, I don't! I tell you, you shame me!' she continued vehemently. 'You abuse my kindness. You abuse the shelter given to us. You must be mad, stark mad, to think such things.

Or----'

She stopped on a sudden and looked down frowning. When she looked up again her face was changed. 'Tell me,' she said in a constrained voice, 'did any one--did the Waldgrave Rupert suggest this to you?'

'G.o.d forbid!' I said.

The answer seemed to embarra.s.s her. 'Where is he?' she asked, looking at me suspiciously.

I told her that I did not know.

'Why did he not come to supper?' she persisted.

Again I said I did not know.

'You are a fool!' she replied sharply. But I saw that her anger had died down, and I was not surprised when she continued in a changed tone, 'Tell me; what has General Tzerclas done to you that you dislike him so? What is your grudge against him, Martin?'

'I have no grudge against him, your excellency,' I answered.

'You dislike him?'

I looked down and kept silence.

'I see you do,' my lady continued. 'Why? Tell me why, Martin.'