The Lady of Loyalty House Part 23

"To my being a Puritan and to my being of your kin. When I was a boy I learned of that kinship, learned how her marriage with a Puritan had earned for a woman of your race the scorn, indeed the hatred of her family, or those who should most and best have loved her."

"You do not understand how strongly those who think as we think feel on such a matter," Brilliana urged, one-half of her spirit angry that she was speaking almost apologetically, the other half vexed that the first half was not more angry.

"Forgive me," said Evander, "but I do understand; I understand very well; I made it my business to understand. And, therefore, I resolved that so far as in me lay I would show those who scorned my people and my creed that a Puritan might compete with his enemies in all the arts and graces they held most dear, and not come off the worst in all encounters."

"That was a brave resolve!" Brilliana's eyes and voice applauded him. He flushed a little as he went on.

"It was a kind of oath of Hannibal. G.o.d was gracious in the gift of a strong will, and I stuck to my purpose. I mastered arts, acquired tongues, forced myself to dexterity in all manly exercises. I had a modest patrimony which allowed me to travel after I left Cambridge, and so gain that knowledge of the world which is so dear to English gentlemen. And always in my thoughts it was: some day I may meet some son of the house that cast us out and show him that a Puritan might fear G.o.d and yet ride a horse, fly a hawk, and use a sword with the best of his enemies."

"Instead of which," said Brilliana, as he paused, "you meet a daughter of the house and play your well-practised part to her." Her voice was stern now and her eyes shone fiercely as she leaned forward and continued in a low voice, "Was this the cause of your coming to Harby?"

"No," Evander answered. "I should never have come to Harby of my own accord. But news came to Cambridge of your flying the King's flag.

The example was dangerous; Harby was a good house for either side to hold. Colonel Cromwell commanded me to march with the volunteers I had raised at Cambridge to secure Harby in the name of the Parliament."

"And you were very glad to obey," Brilliana said, bitterly, and again Evander shook his head.

"I was very sorry to obey. But I had no choice. Colonel Cromwell was my father's friend; he knew the story of my people; he set it upon me as a special seal for righteousness that I should do this thing. 'Kin shall be set against kin in this strife,' he said, 'father against son, and brother against brother. Go forth in the name of the Lord and pluck the banner of Baal from the wall of Harby.' And I went."

Brilliana, lifting her head, looked over the green wall of yews to where, in the cool, gray-blue of the October sky, the royal standard fluttered its gaudy folds in the wind. She said nothing, but her smile spoke whole volumes of victories; the panegyrics of a thousand triumphs gleamed in her eyes. Evander read smile and gleam rightly.

"True, I failed," he admitted. "Yet I may not say that I am sorry, for if I had not failed I should have lost a friend."

He looked admiringly at her, but Brilliana drew herself up stiffly and regarded him coldly.

"You may be my kinsman without being my friend," she said, with a sourness which had the effect of making Evander laugh like a boy.

"Why, lady," he protested, "it is not ten minutes since that you proffered me your friendship."

"Did I so?" Brilliana asked, puckering her brows as if in doubt, though she had not the least doubt upon the matter.

"Indeed, madam," said Evander, very earnestly, "friends for a lifetime." Brilliana snapped contradiction.

"No, no; it was you who said that. I admit the friendship for three days."

"And I a.s.sert the friendship of a lifetime," Evander persisted. His voice and his eyes were very merry, but there came an unconquerable gnawing at his heart that, in spite of the fair place and the fair face and the sweet discourse, life for him meant no more than a s.p.a.ce of three days. Well, then, he would live his three days bravely, brightly. He lifted his eyes to the lady.

"Are you of Master Amiens' school?" he asked--

"'Most friendship is feigning, most love is mere folly.'"

She made no reply to his question, but its matter surprised her and prompted her to another.

"Do you go to Master Shakespeare's school?" she asked; and even as she spoke she leaned forward to look at the book he had laid down and to which, till that moment, she had paid no heed. She drew it towards her and saw what it was.

"Why, here are his plays. Can you affect him when 'tis known that the King loves him?"

"I would the King had no worse counsellors," Evander said, gravely.

Brilliana had lifted the big book onto her lap and was turning the pages tenderly, pausing here and there with loving murmurs.

"Had I been a man," she said, softly, "I should have turned player for the pleasure to speak such golden words."

Evander, watching her fair, lowered face under its crown of dark hair, thought of all that Imogen might mean, or Rosalind or Juliet, did each of these dear ones show on the stage like this lady. He gave the odd thought form in speech.

"It is strange," he said, almost to himself, "that a Cavalier world is content without women players."

Brilliana lifted her face from the book, and there was a look of astonishment and even of pain upon it.

"Oh, that is quite another matter," she said, quickly. "That could never come to pa.s.s."

Evander's Puritanism, recalled to recollection of itself, felt compelled to a.s.sent.

"I trust not," he said, gravely. He was looking at Brilliana with eyes that were honestly admiring. She rose from her seat.

"I must dismiss you now," she said, "for I have much to do ere dinner. You will dine with me, I pray."

Evander made her a not uncourtly bow.

"If I be not unwelcome," he suggested.

Brilliana shook her head very positively.

"We are pledged friends for the time, and friends love to break bread together."

There was no countering this argument. Evander took up the folio and made its owner another bow.

"I will attend you at the dinner-hour," he said. "This treasure I restore to its home."

As the Parliament man moved away across the gra.s.s, his image very dark against its green, Brilliana looked after him, nursing her chin in her palm and her elbow on her knee. As he entered the house with the big book under his arm she took out her pretty handkerchief, and with much deliberation tied a small knot in one corner of it.

"Master Puritan, Master Puritan," she murmured, "I must tie a knot in my handkerchief to remind me that you and I are enemies."

XXII

MASTER PAUL AND MASTER PETER

At the dinner-hour Halfman came for Evander, where he sat in the library, and told him that Lady Brilliana awaited him. The meal was served in the banqueting-hall, a splendid, panelled room with deep-embrasured windows, from which the defences had now been removed and through which the inmates could have n.o.ble views of the lawns and gardens beyond the moat. The little company of three seemed, as it were, lost in the vastness of the chamber as they sat at meat together at the oak table by the hearth at one end of the room, Brilliana at the head, with Halfman at her right and Evander at her left as the guest and stranger. It proved a vastly pleasant meal to Evander, for the talk was brisk and entertaining, and there was no allusion made to those civil and religious differences which in distracting the country had their curious effect, so unimportant to the country, so important to themselves, of bringing that oddly a.s.sorted trio together. Brilliana gave a gracious equality of attention to her companions; showed no keener interest in her new visitor than she had found in the conversation of her old acquaintance, and thus made both men very happily at their ease.

Indeed, Halfman was at his best that afternoon, playing the genial, ripe, mellow man of the world to perfection, so that Evander found him a most entertaining board-fellow.

They were at the fruit, and Halfman showing them tricks of carving faces in October apples, when Tiffany skipped into the room a-twitter with excitement.

"My lady," she cried, "here is come Master Paul and two of our people bearing a great box. And I can spy Master Peter and his party with another at the turn of the road."

Halfman laughed loudly; Brilliana laughed softly; Evander wondered what there was to laugh at.