The Story of Francis Cludde

by Stanley John Weyman

  CHAPTER XVI.

  IN THE DUKE'S NAME.

  They took me back to the room in the tower, it being now nearly teno'clock. Master Lindstrom would fain have stayed with me constantly tothe end, but having the matter I have mentioned much in my mind, Ibegged him to go and get me writing materials. When he returned VanTree was with him. With a particularity very curious at that moment, Iremarked that the latter was carrying something.

  "Where did you get that?" I said sharply and at once.

  "It is your haversack," he answered, setting it down quietly. "I foundthe man who had taken possession of your horse, and got it from him. Ithought there might be something in it you might like."

  "It is my haversack," I assented. "But it was not on my horse. I havenot seen it since I left it in Master Lindstrom's house by the river.I left it on the pallet in my room there, and it was forgotten. Isearched for it at Emmerich, you remember."

  "I only know," he replied, "that I discovered it behind the saddle ofthe horse you were riding yesterday."

  He thought that I had become confused and was a little wrong-headedfrom excitement. Master Lindstrom also felt troubled, as he told meafterward, at seeing me taken up with a trifle at such a time.

  But there was nothing wrong with my wits, as I promptly showed them.

  "The horse I was riding yesterday?" I continued. "Ah! then, Iunderstand. I was riding the horse which I took from the Spanishtrooper. The Spaniard must have annexed the haversack when he and hiscompanions searched the house after our departure."

  "That is it, no doubt," Master Lindstrom said. "And in the hurry ofyesterday's ride you failed to notice it."

  It was a strange way of recovering one's property--strange that theenemy should have helped one to it. But there are times--and this tome was one--when the strange seems the ordinary and commonplace. Itook the sack and slipped my hand through a well-known slit in thelining. Yes, the letter I had left there was there still--the letterto Mistress Clarence. I drew it out. The corners of the little packetwere frayed, and the parchment was stained and discolored, no doubt bythe damp which had penetrated to it. But the seal was whole. I placedit, as it was, in Master Lindstrom's hands.

  "Give it," I said, "to the Duchess afterward. It concerns her. Youhave heard us talk about it. Bid her make what use she pleases of it."

  I turned away then and sat down, feeling a little flurried andexcited, as one about to start upon a journey might feel; not afraidnor exceedingly depressed, but braced up to make a brave show and hidewhat sadness I did feel by the knowledge that many eyes were upon me,and that more would be watching me presently. At the far end of theroom a number of people had now gathered, and were conversingtogether. Among them were not only my jailers of the night, but two orthree officers, a priest who had come to offer me his services, andsome inquisitive gazers who had obtained admission. Their curiosity,however, did not distress me. On the contrary, I was glad to hear thestir and murmur of life about me to the last.

  I will not set down the letter I wrote to the Duchess, though it wereeasy for me to do so, seeing that her son has it now. It contains somethings very proper to be said by a dying man, of which I am notashamed--God forbid! but which it would not be meet for me to repeathere. Enough that I told her in a few words who I was, and entreatedher, in the name of whatever services I had rendered her, to letPetronilla and Sir Anthony know how I had died. And I added somethingwhich would, I thought, comfort her and her husband--namely, that Iwas not afraid, or in any suffering of mind or body.

  The writing of this shook my composure a little. But as I laid downthe pen and looked up and found that the time was come, I took couragein a marvelous manner. The captain of the guard--I think that out of acompassionate desire not to interrupt me they had allowed me someminutes of grace--came to me, leaving the group at the other end, andtold me gravely that I was waited for. I rose at once and gave theletter to Master Lindstrom with some messages in which Dymphna andAnne were not forgotten. And then, with a smile--for I felt under allthose eyes as if I were going into battle--I said: "Gentlemen, I amready if you are. It is a fine day to die. You know," I added gayly,"in England we have a proverb, 'The better the day, the better thedeed!' So it is well to have a good day to have a good death, SirCaptain."

  "A soldier's death, sir, is a good death;" he answered gravely,speaking in Spanish and bowing.

  Then he pointed to the door.

  As I walked toward it, I paused momentarily by the window, and lookedout on the crowd below. It filled the sunlit street--save where alittle raised platform strewn with rushes protruded itself--with headsfrom wall to wall, with faces all turned one way--toward me. It was asilent crowd standing in hushed awe and expectation, the consciousnessof which for an instant sent a sudden chill to my heart, blanching mycheek, and making my blood run slow for a moment. The next I moved onto the door, and bowing to the spectators as they stood aside, beganto descend the narrow staircase.

  There were guards going down before me, and behind me were MasterLindstrom and more guards. The Dutchman reached forward in the gloom,and clasped my hand, holding it, as we went down, in a firm, stronggrip.

  "Never fear," I said to him cheerily, looking back. "It is all right."

  He answered in words which I will not write here; not wishing, as Ihave said, to make certain things common.

  I suppose the doorway at the bottom was accidentally blocked, for afew steps short of it we came to a standstill; and almost at the samemoment I started, despite myself, on hearing a sudden clamor and aroar of many voices outside.

  "What is it?" I asked the Dutchman.

  "It is the Duke of Cleves arriving, I expect," he whispered. "He comesin by the other gate."

  A moment later we moved on and passed out into the light, the soldiersbefore me stepping on either side to give me place. The sunshine foran instant dazzled me, and I lowered my eyes. As I gradually raisedthem again I saw before me a short lane formed by two rows ofspectators kept back by guards; and at the end of this, two or threerough wooden steps leading to a platform on which were standing anumber of people. And above and beyond all only the bright blue sky,the roofs and gables of the nearer houses showing dark against it.

  I advanced steadily along the path left for me, and would haveascended the steps. But at the foot of them I came to a standstill,and looked round for guidance. The persons on the scaffold all hadtheir backs turned to me, and did not make way, while the shouting anduproar hindered them from hearing that we had come out. Then it struckme, seeing that the people at the windows were also gazing away, andtaking no heed of me, that the Duke was passing the farther end of thestreet, and a sharp pang of angry pain shot through me. I had come outto die, but that which was all to me was so little to these peoplethat they turned away to see a fellow-mortal ride by!

  Presently, as we stood there, in a pit, as it were, getting no view, Ifelt Master Lindstrom's hand, which still clasped mine, begin toshake; and turning to him, I found that his face had changed to a deepred, and that his eyes were protruding with a kind of convulsiveeagerness which instantly infected me.

  "What is it?" I stammered. I began to tremble also. The air rang, itseemed to me, with one word, which a thousand tongues took up andreiterated. But it was a German word, and I did not understand it.

  "Wait! wait!" Master Lindstrom exclaimed. "Pray God it be true!"

  He seized my other hand and held it as though he would protect me fromsomething. At the same moment Van Tree pushed past me, and, boundingup the steps, thrust his way through the officials on the scaffold,causing more than one fur-robed citizen near the edge to lose hisbalance and come down as best he could on the shoulders of the guards.

  "What is it?" I cried. "What is it?" I cried in impatient wonder.

  "Oh! my lad, my lad!" Master Lindstrom answered, his face close tomine, and the tears running down his cheeks. "It is cruel if it be nottrue! Cruel! They cry a pardon!"

  "A
pardon?" I echoed.

  "Ay, lad, a pardon. But it may not be true," he said, putting his armabout my shoulder. "Do not make too sure of it. It is only the mob cryit out."

  My heart made a great bound, and seemed to stand still. There was aloud surging in my brain, and a mist rose before my eyes and hideverything. The clamor and shouting of the street passed away, andsounded vague and distant. The next instant, it is true, I was myselfagain, but my knees were trembling under me, and I stood flaccid andunnerved, leaning on my friend.

  "Well?" I said faintly.

  "Patience! patience a while, lad!" he answered.

  But, thank Heaven! I had not long to wait. The words were scarcely offhis tongue, when another hand sought mine and shook it wildly; and Isaw Van Tree before me, his face radiant with joy, while a man whom hehad knocked down in his hasty leap from the scaffold was rising besideme with a good-natured smile. As if at a signal, every face now turnedtoward me. A dozen friendly hands passed me up the steps amid a freshoutburst of cheering. The throng on the scaffold opened somehow, and Ifound myself in a second, as it seemed, face to face with thepresident of the court. He smiled on me gravely and kindly--whatsmiles there seemed to be on all those faces--and held out a paper.

  "In the name of the Duke!" he said, speaking in Spanish, in a clear,loud voice. "A pardon!"

  I muttered something, I know not what; nor did it matter, for it waslost in a burst of cheering. When this was over and silence obtained,the magistrate continued, "You are required, however, to attend theDuke at the courthouse. Whither we had better proceed at once."

  "I am ready, sir," I muttered.

  A road was made for us to descend, and, walking in a kind of beautifuldream, I passed slowly up the street by the side of the magistrate,the crowd everywhere willingly standing aside for us. I do not knowwhether all those thousands of faces really looked joyfully and kindlyon me as I passed, or whether the deep thankfulness which choked me,and brought the tears continually to my eyes, transfigured them andgave them a generous charm not their own. But this I do know: that thesunshine seemed brighter and the air softer than ever before; that theclouds trailing across the blue expanse were things of beauty such asI had never met before; that to draw breath was a joy, and to move,delight; and that only when the dark valley was left behind did Icomprehend its full gloom--by Heaven's mercy. So may it be with all!

  At the door of the court-house, whither numbers of the people hadalready run, the press was so great that we came to a standstill, andwere much buffeted about, though in all good humor, before, even withthe aid of the soldiers, we could be got through the throng. When I atlast emerged I found myself again before the table, and saw--but onlydimly, for the light now fell through the stained window directly onmy head--a commanding figure standing behind it. Then a strange thinghappened. A woman passed swiftly round the table, and came to me andflung her arms round my neck and kissed me. It was the Duchess, andfor a moment she hung upon me, weeping before them all.

  "Madam," I said softly, "then it is you who have done this!"

  "Ah!" she exclaimed, holding me off from her and looking at me witheyes which glowed through her tears, "and it was you who did that!"

  She drew back from me then, and took me by the hand, and turnedimpetuously to the Duke of Cleves, who stood behind smiling at her infrank amusement. "This," she said, "is the man who gave his life formy husband, and to whom your highness has given it back."

  "Let him tell his tale," the Duke answered gravely. "And do you, mycousin, sit here beside me."

  She left me and walked round the table, and he came forward and placedher in his own chair amid a great hush of wonder, for she was stillmeanly clad, and showed in a hundred places the marks and stains oftravel. Then he stood by her with his hand on the back of the seat. Hewas a tall, burly man, with bold, quick-glancing eyes, a flushed face,and a loud manner; a fierce, blusterous prince, as I have heard. Hewas plainly dressed in a leather hunting-suit, and wore huge gauntletsand brown boots, with a broad-leaved hat pinned up on one side. Yet helooked a prince.

  Somehow I stammered out the tale of the surrender.

  "But why? why? why, man?" he asked, when I had finished; "why did youlet them think it was you who wounded the burgher, if it was not?"

  "Your highness," I answered, "I had received nothing but good from hergrace, I had eaten her bread and been received into her service.Besides, it was through my persuasion that we came by the road whichled to this misfortune instead of by another way. Therefore it seemedto me right that I should suffer, who stood alone and could bespared--and not her husband."

  "It was a great deed!" cried the prince loudly. "I would I had such aservant. Are you noble, lad?"

  I colored high, but not in pain or mortification. The old wound mightreopen, but amid events such as those of this morning it was a slightmatter. "I come of a noble family, may it please your highness," Ianswered modestly; "but circumstances prevent me claiming kinship withit."

  He was about, I think, to question me further, when the Duchess lookedup, and said something to him and he something to her. She spoke againand he answered. Then he nodded assent. "You would fain stand on yourown feet?" he cried to me. "Is that so?"

  "It is, sire," I answered.

  "Then so be it!" he replied loudly, looking round on the throng with afrown. "I will ennoble you. You would have died for your lord andfriend, and therefore I give you a rood of land in the commongraveyard of Santon to hold of me, and I name you Von Santonkirch. AndI, William, Duke of Cleves, Julich and Guelders, prince of the Empire,declare you noble, and give you for your arms three swords of justice;and the motto you may buy of a clerk! Further, let this decree beenrolled in my Chancery. Are you satisfied?"

  As I dropped on my knees, my eyes sparkling, there was a momentarydisturbance behind me. It was caused by the abrupt entrance of theSub-dean. He took in part of the situation at a glance; that is, hesaw me kneeling before the Duke. But he could not see the Duchess ofSuffolk, the Duke's figure being interposed. As he came forward, thecrowd making way for him, he cast an angry glance at me, and scarcelysmoothed his brow even to address the prince. "I am glad that yourhighness has not done what was reported to me," he said hastily, hisobeisance brief and perfunctory. "I heard an uproar in the town, andwas told that this man was pardoned."

  "It is so!" said the Duke curtly, eying the ecclesiastic with no greatfavor. "He is pardoned."

  "Only in part, I presume," the priest rejoined urgently. "Or, ifotherwise, I am sure that your highness has not received certaininformation with which I can furnish you."

  "Furnish away, sir," quoth the Duke, yawning.

  "I have had letters from my Lord Bishop of Arras respecting him."

  "Respecting him!" exclaimed the prince, starting and bending his browsin surprise.

  "Respecting those in whose company he travels," the priest answeredhastily. "They are represented to me as dangerous persons, pestilentrefugees from England, and obnoxious alike to the Emperor, the Princeof Spain, and the Queen of England."

  "I wonder you do not add also to the King of France and the Soldan ofTurkey!" growled the Duke. "Pish! I am not going to be dictated to byMaster Granvelle--no, nor by his master, be he ten times Emperor! Goto! Go to! Master Sub-dean! You forget yourself, and so does yourmaster the Bishop. I will have you know that these people are not whatyou think them. Call you my cousin, the widow of the consort of thelate Queen of France, an obnoxious person? Fie! Fie! You forgetyourself!"

  He moved as he stopped speaking, so that the astonished churchmanfound himself confronted on a sudden by the smiling, defiant Duchess.The Sub-dean started and his face fell, for, seeing her seated in theDuke's presence, he discerned at once that the game was played out.Yet he rallied himself, bethinking him, I fancy, that there were manyspectators. He made a last effort. "The Bishop of Arras----" he began.

  "Pish!" scoffed the Duke, interrupting him.

  "The Bishop of Arras----" the priest repeated firmly.

&n
bsp; "I would he were hung with his own tapestry!" retorted the Duke, witha brutal laugh.

  "Heaven forbid!" replied the ecclesiastic, his pale face reddening andhis eyes darting baleful glances at me. But he took the hint, andhenceforth said no more of the Bishop. Instead, he continued smoothly,"Your highness has, of course, considered the danger--the danger, Imean, of provoking neighbors so powerful by shielding this lady andmaking her cause your own. You will remember, sir----"

  "I will remember Innspruck!" roared the Duke, in a rage, "where theEmperor, ay, and your everlasting Bishop too, fled before a handful ofProtestants, like sheep before wolves. A fig for your Emperor! I neverfeared him young, and I fear him less now that he is old and decrepitand, as men say, mad. Let him get to his watches, and you to yourprayers. If there were not this table between us, I would pull yourears, Master Churchman!"

  * * * * *

  "But tell me," I asked Master Bertie as I stood beside his couch anhour later, "how did the Duchess manage it? I gathered from somethingyou or she said, a short time back, that you had no influence with theDuke of Cleves."

  "Not quite that," he answered. "My wife and the late Duke of Suffolkhad much to do with wedding the Prince's sister to King Henry,thirteen--fourteen years back, is it? And so far we might have feltconfident of his protection. But the marriage turned out ill, orturned out short, and Queen Anne of Cleves was divorced. And--well, wefelt a little less confident on that account, particularly as he hasthe name of a headstrong, passionate man."

  "Heaven keep him in it!" I said, smiling. "But you have not told meyet what happened."

  "The Duchess was still asleep this morning, fairly worn out, as youmay suppose, when a great noise awoke her. She got up and went toDymphna, and learned it was the Duke's trumpets. Then she went to thewindow, and, seeing few people in the streets to welcome him, inquiredwhy this was. Dymphna broke down at that, and told her what washappening to you, and that you were to die at that very hour. She wentout straightway, without covering her head,--you know how impetuousshe is,--and flung herself on her knees in the mud before the Duke'shorse as he entered. He knew her, and the rest you can guess."

  Can guess? Ah, what happiness it was! Outside, the sun fell hotly onthe steep red roofs, with their rows of casements, and on the sleepysquare, in which knots of people still lingered, talking of themorning's events. I could see below me the guard which Duke William,shrewdly mistrusting the Sub-dean, had posted in front of the house,nominally to do the Duchess honor. I could hear in the next room thecheerful voices of my friends. What happiness it was to live! Whathappiness to be loved! How very, very good and beautiful and gloriousa world, seemed the world to me on that old May morning in that quaintGerman town which we had entered so oddly!

  As I turned from the window full of thankfulness, my eyes met those ofMistress Anne, who was sitting on the far side of the sick man'scouch, the baby in a cradle beside her. The risk and exposure of thelast week had made a deeper mark upon her than upon any of us. She waspaler, graver, older, more of a woman and less, much less, of a girl.And she looked very ill. Her eyes, in particular, seemed to have grownlarger, and as they dwelt on me now there was a strange and solemnlight in them, under which I grew uneasy.

  "You have been wonderfully preserved," she said presently, speakingdreamily, and as much to herself as to me.

  "I have, indeed," I answered, thinking she referred only to my escapeof the morning.

  But she did not.

  "There was, firstly, the time on the river when you were hurt with theoar," she continued, gazing absently at me, her hands in her lap; "andthen the night when you saw Clarence with Dymphna."

  "Or, rather, saw him without her," I interposed, smiling. It wasstrange that she should mention it as a fact, when at the time she hadso scolded me for making the statement.

  "And then," she continued, disregarding my interruption, "there wasthe time when you were stabbed in the passage; and again when you hadthe skirmish by the river; and then to-day you were within a minute ofdeath. You have been wonderfully preserved!"

  "I have," I assented thoughtfully. "The more as I suspect that I haveto thank Master Clarence for all these little adventures."

  "Strange--very strange!" she muttered, removing her eyes from me thatshe might fix them on the floor.

  "What is strange?"

  The abrupt questioner was the Duchess, who came bustling in at themoment. "What is strange?" she repeated, with a heightened color anddancing eyes. "Shall I tell you?" She paused and looked brightly atme, holding something concealed behind her. I guessed in a moment,from the aspect of her face, what it was: the letter which I had givento Master Lindstrom in the morning, and which, with a pardonableforgetfulness, I had failed to reclaim.

  I turned very red. "It was not intended for you now," I said shyly.For in the letter I had told her my story.

  "Pooh! pooh!" she cried. "It is just as I thought. A pretty piece offolly! No," she continued, as I opened my mouth, "I am not going tokeep your secret, sir. You may go down on your knees. It will be of nouse. Richard, you remember Sir Anthony Cludde of Coton End inWarwickshire?"

  "Oh, yes," her husband said, rising on his elbow, while his face litup, and I stood bashfully, shifting my feet.

  "I have danced with him a dozen times, years ago!" she continued, hereyes sparkling with mischief. "Well, sir, this gentleman, MasterFrancis Carey, otherwise Von Santonkirch, is Francis Cludde, hisnephew!"

  "Sir Anthony's nephew?"

  "Yes, and the son of Ferdinand Cludde, whom you also have heard of, ofwhom the less----"

  She stopped, and turned quickly, interrupted by a half-stifled scream.It was a scream full of sudden horror and amazement and fear; and itcame from Mistress Anne. The girl had risen, and was gazing at me withdistended eyes and blanched cheeks, and hands stretched out to keep meoff--gazing, indeed, as if she saw in me some awful portent or somedreadful threat. She did not speak, but she began, without taking hereyes from me, to retreat toward the door.

  "Hoity toity!" cried my lady, stamping her foot in anger. "What hashappened to the girl? What----"

  What, indeed? The Duchess stopped, still more astonished. For, withoututtering a word of explanation or apology, Mistress Anne had reachedthe door, groped blindly for the latch, found it, and gone out, hereyes, with the same haunted look of horror in them, fixed on me to thelast.