The Lady of Loyalty House Part 12

Rufus did not deny her.

"I am a very earnest lover, a very desperate lover."

Brilliana made a gesture of protest.

"Fie, this is no love-talk time, when the King is fighting. Ride, gallant Rufus, come back with loyal laurels and the flags of canting rebels, and see how I shall welcome you."

Rufus caught her hands.

"Must I be content with this?" he asked, hotly.

"You must be content with this," Brilliana replied, coolly. "Here come your brothers-in-arms."

The doors of the banqueting-hall opened, and Fawley, Radlett, Bardon, Ingrow, and Halfman came in, all brighter for wine and food.

"'Tis boot and saddle, Rufus," Fawley cried.

"I am yours," Rufus answered. He bowed over Brilliana's fingers.

"Farewell, lady."

One and all they turned and left her, and as they tramped into the air the chorus of the Cavalier song came back to her happy ears.

"And we will sing, boys, G.o.d bless the King, boys, Cast up your hats, and cry Vive le Roy."

XIII

A GILDED CAGE

Evander awoke in a strange world steeped in lavender. It was long since he had lain so soft, long since he had drifted out of dreams to breathe lavender. His pleased senses, less alert for very ease and pleasure, denied him immediate knowledge of his whereabouts. He saw a fair room, well appointed; he welcomed the morning sunlight through delicate, unfamiliar curtains; he questioned the insisting deliciousness of lavender. Where was he? What was this chamber of calm panelled in pale oak? It was not Leyden, it was not Cambridge; then in a flash he knew. It was the west room at Harby--Harby where he lay a prisoner on parole, Harby which he had tried to take and which had ended by taking him. He leaped from his bed instantly, well awake, well alive, and gaining the window peeped through the parted curtains. He looked out across the moat on the terrace to the rear of Harby, beyond which lay the s.p.a.cious gardens for which Harby was held famous. His men had held that terrace twenty-four hours earlier; now they had vanished as if they had never been, save for the testimony of the trampled gra.s.s. In their place a solitary figure sat on a bal.u.s.ter drinking smoke contemplatively from a pipe of clay. Evander knew him for Halfman--knew, too, that Halfman watched there for him, for the moment the curtains parted the sitter rose and, advancing towards the edge of the moat, waved and voiced salutation to Evander.

"Give you good-morning, gallant capitano," he called. "Jocund day stands on the top of yon high eastern hill. Will it please your worthiness to be stirring?"

"Very willingly," Evander called back. "Have I overslept?"

Halfman made a gesture of protestation.

"Nay, nay," he answered. "Your time is your own nag here, to amble, pad, or gallop as you choose. Have I your permission to wait upon you in your apartment?"

On Evander's a.s.surances that nothing would afford him greater pleasure, Halfman favored him with a military salute, and, crossing the moat by the now restored bridge, disappeared inside the house.

Evander hastened to clothe himself, a task which he had but partially accomplished when the drumming of a pair of hands upon the door informed him that his custodian waited at the threshold. He opened the door, and Halfman walked in wearing for the occasion a manner in which good-fellowship and condescension, with the consideration of a n.o.ble victor for a n.o.ble vanquished, were artfully blended and emphatically interpreted. He held out his hand for Evander's and gave to it a martial pressure.

"A soldier should ever be abroad betimes," he a.s.serted. "Wherefore I applaud your rising."

Evander inquired again, somewhat anxiously, if he had been expected to appear before, which again Halfman denied.

"Since you have pa.s.sed your parole," he affirmed, "Harby Hall is Liberty Hall for you as far as to the park limits. I would have battered at your door ere this, but I respected your first sleep in a strange bed, wherein often a bad night makes a late matins. Can you break your fast?"

Evander answering that he could, Halfman called upon him to follow, and led the way into an adjoining room, which was, so he a.s.sured Evander, set at his disposal during the period of his stay. The room, like the bedchamber, was panelled of oak, was handsomely furnished, and its long windows, which occupied almost the entirety of one wall, afforded the same view of terrace and garden that Evander had already seen. Much had been newly done, so Evander could see, to brighten and cheer the place. A bowl of royal roses stood on the buffet, and Evander smiled at the delicate defiance. In the alcove of the window-seat a number of books were piled, books that had patently been newly dusted, and Evander, glancing at these, found that they were all theological, an attention which made him smile. A table decked with lily-white linen and silver furniture bore preparations for a meal.

"Here, sir," said Halfman, cheerfully, "for some few hours of flying time, you are, in a word, king of the castle. These rooms are yours to eat in, read in, pray in, sleep in--what you please. None shall disturb your privacy without your leave."

Evander guessed that his hostess had found this way of treating him well and yet keeping her from his presence. There was bitterness in the thought that she must needs hate him so deeply. It may be that something of the bitterness of the thought a.s.serted itself on Evander's face, and that Halfman misread it thinking he read the prisoner's thoughts clearly.

"Do not think," he proceeded, "that you are cabined and cribbed to these walls. All Harby Park is your pleasant paradise when you are pleased to walk abroad, and after you have broken your fast I shall be pleased to guide you through its glories. And now, will you that I eat with you? I have kept myself fasting, or wellnigh fasting, till now, but if you would rather break your bread in solitude say, without offence given, what I shall hear without offence taken."

Evander a.s.sured his companion that he desired his company of all things. Indeed, had Halfman been other than he was, Evander would have preferred any companionship that kept him from his melancholy thoughts. And already Halfman attracted him, or at least interested him. His fantastical manner, his fluent speech, his a.s.surance, and that note of something foreign, odd, as characteristic, as conclusive, as the scorch of foreign suns upon his face, appealed to the curiosity in Evander which ever made men books for him. Halfman's manner grew more expansive at Evander's ready acceptance of his offer. He was now the magnificent host, soldier still, but soldier at his ease, and he played at Lord of Harby with enthusiasm.

"You are in the right," he said. "It is ill for man to sit alone at meat, for it encourages whimsical humors and the mounting of crudities to the brain. A flagon is twice a flagon that is shared by camerados, and who can praise a pasty to himself with only dumb walls to echo his plaudits? And here in good time come flagon and pasty, both."

The door had opened as he spoke, and Mistress Satch.e.l.l came into the room, followed by a brace of serving-men who bore on trays the materials for an ample repast. Halfman eyed the viands with approval, while Evander returned gravely Mrs. Satch.e.l.l's florid bobs and greetings.

"I saw to it last night," he went on, "that Harby was revictualled.

You pinched us, sir, you pared us; our larder was as lean as a stork's leg, but to-day we can eat our fill."

And, indeed, the table now being spread by Mrs. Satch.e.l.l's directions bore out the a.s.sertion of Halfman. Jolly, white loaves, a grinning boar's head, a pasty with a golden dome, a ham the color of a pink flower, and a dish of cold game tempted hunger where flagons of white wine and red wine tempted thirst. Halfman dismissed Mrs. Satch.e.l.l and her satellites affably.

"We can wait upon ourselves," he averred. "We shall be more private so," and he motioned Evander to a seat and took his own place opposite. "Yes," he said, resuming the thread of his thought, as he piled a plate for Evander, "you did your best to starve us; we must not do the like by you."

Evander smiled as he stayed the generosity of his host's hands and accepted from his reluctance a plate less lavishly charged with viands than Halfman had proposed to offer him.

"Yet," he said, "I think I heard, no later ago than yesterday, much clatter of dishes and much rattling of cups and all the sounds of plenty."

Halfman hurriedly bolted a goodly slice of ham lest it should choke him while he laughed, which he now did heartily, lolling back in his chair. He was honestly amused, and yet it seemed to Evander as if there were something in his strange friend's mirth which was carefully calculated to produce its effect. Indeed, Halfman, as he laughed, was thinking of Sir John Falstaff's full-bodied thunders over some ticklish misdoings of Bardolph or Nym. When he had enough of his own performance, he allowed the laughter to die as suddenly as it had dawned, and gave tongue.

"That was the best jest in the world," he chuckled. "Clatter of dishes, say you, and rattle of cups. Once, when I was in Aleppo, I heard an old fellow in an Abraham beard telling a tale to a crowd of Moors. I had not enough of their lingo to know why they laughed, but one who was with me that had more Moorish told me the tale. It was of one who invited a poor man to his house and pretended to feed him n.o.bly, naming this fair dish and that fine wine, and pressing meat and drink upon him, while all the while, in very mockery, there was neither bite in any platter nor sup in any bottle. Well, excellent sir, our table of yesterday was in some such case."

Evander nodded. "I guessed as much," he commented. "But, indeed, it was bravely done."

"It was bravely devised," Halfman a.s.serted. "It was my lady's thought. She would never let a rascally Roundhead--I crave your pardon, she would never let an enemy--dream that we were in lack of aught at Harby that could help us to serve the King."

"Your lady is a very brave lady," Evander said, quietly. Halfman caught at his words with a kind of cheer in his voice.

"Hippolyta was not more valiant, nor Parthian Candace, nor French Joan. She is the rose of the world, the fairest fair, the valiantest valor. There is no wine in the world that is worthy to pledge her, but we must do our best with what we have."

He filled himself a s.p.a.cious tankard as he spoke and drained it at a draught. Evander listened to his ebullient praises in silence. He did not think that the Lady of Harby should be so spoken of and by such an one. Over-eating and especially over-drinking were ever distasteful to him, and he took it that Halfman was on the high-road to becoming drunk. But in this he was wrong. When Halfman set down his vessel he was as sober as when he had lifted it, but of a sudden a shade graver, as if Evander's silence had shadowed his boisterous gayety. He pushed the beaker from him with a sigh, and then, seeing that Evander's plate was empty, offered to ply him with more food. On Evander's refusal he pushed back his chair. "Well," he said, "if your stomach is stayed, are you for a stroll in the gardens--will you see lawns and parks of fairyland?"

Evander willingly acquiesced, and the strangely a.s.sorted pair rose and quitted the chamber. They met Mistress Satch.e.l.l on the threshold, and Tiffany hiding slyly behind her highness. Evander smilingly complimented Mistress Satch.e.l.l on the excellence of her table, to the good dame's great gratification. But much to Tiffany's indignation he paid little heed to her pretty face.

XIV

A Pa.s.sAGE AT ARMS