The Bow of Orange Ribbon Part 18

"And this afternoon comes here Neil Semple. Scarcely he believed me that Katherine was out. Joris, what wilt thou do about the young man?"

"His fair chance he is to have, Lysbet. That to the elder is promised."

"The case now is altered. Neil Semple I like not. Little he thought of our child's good name. With his sword he wounded her most. No patience have I with the man. And his dark look thou should have seen when I said, 'Katherine is not at home.' Plainly his eyes said to me, 'Thou art lying.'"

"Well, then, what thought hast thou?"

"This: one lover must push away the other. The young dominie that is now with the Rev. Lambertus de Ronde, he is handsome and a great hero. From Surinam has he come, a man who for the cross has braved savage men and savage beasts and deadly fever. No one but he is now to be talked of in the kirk; and I would ask him to the house. Often I have seen the gown and bands put the sword and epaulets behind them."

"Well, then, at the wedding of Batavius he will be asked; and if before there is a good time, I will say, 'Come into my house, and eat and drink with us.'"

So the loving, anxious parents, in their ignorance, planned. Even then, accustomed in all their ways to move with caution, they saw no urgent need of interference with the regular and appointed events of life. A few weeks hence, when Joanna was married, if there was in the meantime no special opportunity, the dominie could be offered as an antidote to the soldier; and, in the interim, Neil Semple was to honourably have such "chance" as his ungovernable temper had left him.

The next afternoon he called again on Katherine. His arm was still useless; his pallor and weakness so great as to win, even from Lysbet, that womanly pity which is often irrespective of desert. She brought him wine, she made him rest upon the sofa, and by her quiet air of sympathy bespoke for him a like indulgence from her daughter. Katherine sat by her small wheel, unplaiting some flax; and Neil thought her the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. He kept angrily asking himself why he had not perceived this rare loveliness before; why he had not made sure his claim ere rivals had disputed it with him. He did not understand that it was love which had called this softer, more exquisite beauty into existence. The tender light in the eyes; the flush upon the cheek; the lips, conscious of sweet words and sweeter kisses; the heart, beating to pure and loving thoughts,--in short, the loveliness of the soul, transfiguring the meaner loveliness of flesh and blood, Neil had perceived and wondered at; but he had not that kind of love experience which divines the cause from the result.

On the contrary, had Hyde been watching Katherine, he would have been certain that she was musing on her lover. He would have understood that bewitching languor, that dreaming silence, that tender air and light and colour which was the physical atmosphere of a soul communing with its beloved; a soul touching things present only with its intelligence, but reaching out to the absent with intensity of every loving emotion.

For some time the conversation was general. The meeting of the delegates, and the hospitalities offered them; the offensive and tyrannical Stamp Act; the new organization of patriots who called themselves "Sons of Liberty;" and the loss of Miss Mary Blankaart's purse,--furnished topics of mild dispute. But no one's interest was in their words, and presently Madam Van Heemskirk rose and left the room.

Her husband had said, "Neil was to have some opportunities;" and the words of Joris were a law of love to Lysbet.

Neil was not slow to improve the favour. "Katherine, I wish to speak to you. I am weak and ill. Will you come here beside me?"

She rose slowly, and stood beside him; but, when he tried to take her hands, she clasped them behind her back.

"So?" he asked; and the blood surged over his white face in a crimson tide that made him for a moment or two speechless. "Why not?"

"Blood-stained are your hands. I will not take them."

The answer gave him a little comfort. It was, then, only a moral qualm.

He had even no objection to such a keen sense of purity in her; and sooner or later she would forgive his action, or be made to see it with the eyes of the world in which he moved.

"Katherine, I am very sorry I had to guard my honour with my sword; and it was your love I was fighting for."

"My honour you cared not for, and with the sword I could not guard it.

Of me cruel and false words have been said by every one. On the streets I was ashamed to go. Even the dominie thought it right to come and give me admonition. Batavius never since has liked or trusted me. He says Joanna's good name also I have injured. And my love,--is it a thing to be fought for? You have guarded your honour, but what of mine?"

"Your honour is my honour. They that speak ill of you, sweet Katherine, speak ill of me. Your life is my life. O my precious one, my wife!"

"Such words I will not listen to. Plainly now I tell you, your wife I will never be,--never, never, never!"

"I will love you, Katherine, beyond your dream of love. I will die rather than see you the wife of another man. For your bow of ribbon, only see what I have suffered."

"And, also, what have you made another to suffer?"

"Oh, I wish that I had slain him!"

"Not your fault is it that you did not murder him."

"An affair of honour is not murder, Katherine."

"Honour!--Name not the word. From a dozen wounds your enemy was bleeding; to go on fighting a dying man was murder, not honour. Brave some call you: in my heart I say, 'Neil Semple was a savage and a coward.'"

"Katherine, I will not be angry with you."

"I wish that you should be angry with me."

"Because some day you will be very sorry for these foolish words, my dear love."

"Your dear love I am not."

"My dear love, give me a drink of wine, I am faint."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "I am faint"]

His faint whispered words and deathlike countenance moved her to human pity. She rose for the wine, and, as she did so, called her mother; but Neil had at least the satisfaction of feeling that she had ministered to his weakness, and held the wine to his lips. From this time, he visited her constantly, unmindful of her frowns, deaf to all her unkind words, patient under the most pointed slights and neglect. And as most men rate an object according to the difficulty experienced in attaining it, Katherine became every day more precious and desirable in Neil's eyes.

In the meantime, without being watched, Katherine felt herself to be under a certain amount of restraint. If she proposed a walk into the city, Joanna or madam was sure to have the same desire. She was not forbidden to visit Mrs. Gordon, but events were so arranged as to make the visit almost impossible; and only once, during the month after her marriage, had she an interview with her husband. For even Hyde's impatience had recognized the absolute necessity of circ.u.mspection. The landlord's suspicions had been awakened, and not very certainly allayed.

"There must be no scandal about my house, Captain," he said. "I merit something better from you;" and, after this injunction, it was very likely that Mrs. Gordon's companions would be closely scrutinized. True, the "King's Arms" was the great rendezvous of the military and government officials, and the landlord himself subserviently loyal; but, also, Joris Van Heemskirk was not a man with whom any good citizen would like to quarrel. Personally he was much beloved, and socially he stood as representative of a cla.s.s which held in their hands commercial and political power no one cared to oppose or offend.

The marriage license had been obtained from the governor, but extraordinary influence had been used to procure it. Katherine was under age, and yet subject to her father's authority. In spite of book and priest and ring, he could retain his child for at least three years; and three years, Hyde--in talking with his aunt--called "an eternity of doubt and despair." These facts, Hyde, in his letters, had fully explained to Katherine; and she understood clearly how important the preservation of her secret was, and how much toward allaying suspicion depended upon her own behaviour. Fortunately Joanna's wedding day was drawing near, and it absorbed what attention the general public had for the Van Heemskirk family. For it was a certain thing, developing into feasting and dancing; and it quite put out of consideration suspicions which resulted in nothing, when people examined them in the clear atmosphere of Katherine's home.

At the feast of St. Nicholas the marriage was to take place. Early in November the preparations for it began. No such great event could happen without an extraordinary housecleaning; and from garret to cellar the housemaid's pail and brush were in demand. Spotless was every inch of paint, shining every bit of polished wood and gla.s.s; not a thimbleful of dust in the whole house. Toward the end of the month, Anna and Cornelia arrived, with their troops of rosy boys and girls, and their slow, substantial husbands. Batavius felt himself to be a very great man. The weight of his affairs made him solemn and preoccupied. He was not one of those light, foolish ones, who can become a husband and a householder without being sensible of the responsibilities they a.s.sume.

In the midst of all this household excitement Katherine found some opportunities of seeing Mrs. Gordon; and in the joy of receiving letters from, and sending letters to, her husband, she recovered a gayety of disposition which effectually repressed all urgent suspicions. Besides, as the eventful day drew near, there was so much to attend to. Joanna's personal goods, her dresses and household linen, her china, and wedding gifts, had to be packed; the house was decorated; and there was a most amazing quant.i.ty of delicacies to be prepared for the table.

In the middle of the afternoon of the day before the marriage, there was the loud rat-tat-tat of the bra.s.s knocker, announcing a visitor. But visitors had been constant since the arrival of Cornelia and Anna, and Katherine did not much trouble herself as to whom it might be. She was standing upon a ladder, pinning among the evergreens and scarlet berries rosettes and bows of ribbon of the splendid national colour, and singing with a delightsome cheeriness,--

"But the maid of Holland, For her own true love, Ties the splendid orange, Orange still above!

_O oranje boven!_ Orange still above!"

"Orange still above! Oh, my dear, don't trouble yourself to come down! I can pa.s.s the time tolerably well, watching you."

It was Mrs. Gordon, and she nodded and laughed in a triumphant way that very quickly brought Katherine to her side. "My dear, I kiss you. You are the top beauty of my whole acquaintance." Then, in a whisper, "_Richard sends his devotion. And put your hand in my m.u.f.f: there is a letter._ And pray give me joy: I have just secured an invitation. I asked the councillor and madam point blank for it. Faith, I think I am a little of a favourite with them! Every one is talking of the bridegroom, and the bridegroom is talking to every one. Surely, my dear, he imagines himself to be the only man that will ever again commit matrimony.

_Oranje boven_, everywhere!" Then, with a little exultant laugh, "_Above the Tartan_, at any rate. How is the young Bruce? My dear, if you don't make him suffer, I shall never forgive you. Alternate doses of hope and despair, that would be my prescription."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Don't trouble yourself to come down"]

Katherine shook her head.

"Take notice, in particular, that I don't understand nods and shakes and sighs and signs. What is your opinion, frankly?"

"On my wedding day, as I left Richard, this he said to me: 'My honour, Katherine, is now in your keeping.' By the lifting of one eyelash, I will not stain it."

"My dear, you are perfectly charming. You always convince me that I am a better woman than I imagine myself. I shall go straight to d.i.c.k, and tell him how exactly proper you are. Really, you have more perfections than any one woman has a right to."

"To-morrow, if I have a letter ready, you will take it?"

"I will run the risk, child. But really, if you could see the way mine host of the 'King's Arms' looks at me, you would be sensible of my courage. I am persuaded he thinks I carry you under my new wadded cloak.

Now, adieu. Return to your evergreens and ribbons.