CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
TOO LITTLE.
"God's very kindest answers to our prayers Come often in denials or delays."
S.W. Partridge.
Lord Basset turned back into his house with a sensation akin to relief.Not that he allowed the thought of his wife's unhappiness to deter himfrom any course on which he had set his heart, but that he felt thepressure of her atmosphere, and could not enjoy his transgressions withthe full _abandon_ which he would have liked. Her stately, cold,unbending reserve was like a constant chill and blight. How much morehappy they might have been if they had chosen! The world held many aworse man than Lord Basset; he was rather idle and careless than wicked,though idleness and carelessness are very often the seed of wickedness,when left to go to flower. If she would only have dropped that haughtycoldness, he thought, he could have felt interest in her, and have takensome pleasure in her society; while her conviction was that if he wouldonly have shown some interest, she could have loved him and returned it.Would both have done it together, the result might have been attained.
Mr Godfrey Foljambe was meditating, not on this, but on his ownpersonal wrongs, as he led the little cavalcade in an easterlydirection. First, he had been deprived of that glass of Malvoisie--which would probably have been plural rather than singular--and of aconversation with Lord Basset, which might have resulted in something ofinterest: and life was exceedingly devoid of interest, thought MrGodfrey, in a pessimistic spirit. He had not discovered that, to agreat extent, life is to every man what he chooses to make it; that hewho keeps his eyes fixed on street mud need not expect to discoverpearls, while he who attentively scans the heavens is not at allunlikely to see stars. Let a man set himself diligently to hunt foreither his misfortunes or his mercies, and he will find plenty of thearticle in request. Misfortunes were the present object of MrGodfrey's search, and he had no difficulty in discovering them. He wasdisgusted with the folly of Lady Basset in thus setting off at once, andmaking him set off, without so much as an hour's rest. It was just likea woman! Women never had a scrap of patience. This pleasing illusionthat all patience was masculine was kept up in popular literature justso long as men were the exclusive authors; when women began to write,otherwise than on kingly sufferance of the nobler half of creation, itwas seen that the feminine view of that and similar subjects was notquite so restricted. Last and worst to young Godfrey was theexpectation of his father's displeasure. Sir Godfrey's anger was nopassing cloud, as his son well knew. To be thought to have failed inhis mission--as assuredly he would be--by his own fault, would result inconsiderable immediate discomfort, and might even damage his worldlyprospects in future. He would gladly have prolonged the journey; forhis instinct always led him to put off the evil day rather than to faceit and put it behind him--which last is usually the wiser course; butLady Basset would brook no delay, and on the afternoon of the second dayafter leaving Drayton they rode up to Hazelwood Manor.
Godfrey hastily despatched the porter's lad to inform his mother of LadyBasset's arrival; and Lady Foljambe met her on the steps of the hall.The latter was scandalised to find that the former saw no need forsecrecy, or at any rate had no intention of preserving it.
"Dame," said Lady Foljambe, "I am honoured by your Ladyship's visit.Pray you, suffer me to serve you with hypocras and spice in your privychamber."
This was intended as a gentle hint to the visitor that secrets were notto be talked in the hall; but the hint was not accepted.
"How fares my Lady and mother?" was the response.
"Dame, much worse than when my son departed," said Lady Foljambe, in afluttered manner.
"Then I pray you to break my coming, and lead me to her forthwith," saidLady Basset, in her style of stately calm.
A curtain was drawn aside, and Perrote came forward.
"Damoiselle Jeanne!" she said, greeting Lady Basset by the old youthfultitle unheard for years. "My darling, mine own dear child!"
A smile, not at all usual there, quivered for a moment on the calm fixedlips.
"Is this mine ancient nurse, Perrote de Carhaix?" she said. "I think Iknow her face."
The smile was gone in a moment, as she repeated her wish to be takenimmediately to the Countess.
Lady Foljambe felt she had no choice. She led the way to the chamber ofthe royal prisoner, requesting Lady Basset to wait for a moment at thedoor.
The Countess sat no longer in her cushioned chair by the window. Shewas now confined to her bed, where she lay restlessly, moaning atintervals, but always on one theme. "My children! my lost children!Will not God give me back _one_?"
Lady Foljambe signed to Perrote--she scarcely knew why--to break thenews to the suffering mother.
"Lady, the Lord hath heard your moaning, and hath seen your tears," saidPerrote, kneeling by the bed. "He hath given you back--"
"My son?"
The cry was a pitiful one. Then, as ever, the boy was the dearest tohis mother's heart.
"Very dear Lady, no. Your daughter."
It was painful to see how the sudden gleam died out of the weary eyes.
"Ah, well!" she said, after an instant's pause. "Well! I asked but forone, and when man doth that, he commonly gets the lesser of the twain.Well! I shall be glad to see my Jeanne. Let her come in."
Lady Basset came forward and bent over the dying woman.
"Dame!" she said.
"Come, now!" was the answer. "There be folks enough call me Dame. Onlytwo in all this world can call me Mother."
"Mother!" was the response, in a tremulous voice. And then the icystateliness broke up, and passionate sobs broke in, mingled with thesounds of "O Mother! Mother!"
"That's good, little lass," said the Countess. "It's good to hear that,but once, _ma fillette_. But wherefore tarrieth thy brother away? Itmust be King Edward that will not suffer him to come."
It was piteous to hear her cling thus to the old illusion. All the timeof her imprisonment, though now and then in a fit of anger she couldhurl bitter names at her son, yet, when calm, she had usually maintainedthat he was kept away from her, and refused to be convinced that hisabsence was of his own free will. The longer the illusion lasted, themore stubbornly she upheld it.
"'Tis not always the best-loved that loveth back the best," saidPerrote, gently, "without man's best love be, as it should be, fixed onGod. And 'tis common for fathers and mothers to love better than theybe loved; the which is more than all other true of the Father inHeaven."
"Thou mayest keep thy sermons, old woman, till mass is sung," said theCountess, in her cynical style. "Ah me! My Jean would come to the old,white-haired mother that risked her life for his--he would come if hecould. He must know how my soul hungereth for the sight of his face. Iwant nothing else. Heaven would be Purgatory to me without him."
"Ah, my dear Lady!" tenderly replied Perrote. "If only I might hear yousay that of the Lord that laid down His life for you!"
"I am not a nun," was the answer; "and I shall not say that which I feelnot."
"God forbid you should, Lady! But I pray Him to grant you so to feel."
"I tell thee, I am not a nun," said the Countess, rather pettishly.
Her idea was that real holiness was impossible out of the cloister, andthat to love God was an entirely different type of feeling from theaffection she had for her human friends. This was the usual sentimentin the Middle Ages. But Perrote had been taught of God, and while hereducational prejudices acted like coloured or smoked glass, and dimmedthe purity of the heavenly light, they were unable to hide italtogether.
"Very dear Lady," she said, "God loveth sinners; and He must then loveother than nuns. Shall they not love Him back, though they be not incloister?"
"Thou hadst better win in cloister thyself, when thou art rid of me,"was the answer, in a tone which was a mixture of languor and sarcasm."Thou art scarce fit to tarry without, old woman."
"I will do that which God shall show me," said Perrote, calmly
. "Dame,were it not well your Grace should essay to sleep?"
"Nay, not so. I have my Jeanne to look at, that I have not seen forfive-and-twenty years. I shall sleep fast enough anon. Daughter, artthou a happy woman, or no?"
Lady Basset answered by a shake of the head. "Why, what aileth thee?Is it thy baron, or thy childre?"
"I have no child, Mother."
The Countess heard the regretful yearning of the tone.
"Thank the saints," she said. "Thou wert better. Soothly, to increaseobjects for love is to increase sorrow. If thou have no childre,they'll never be torn from thee, nor they will never break thine heartby ill behaving. And most folks behave ill in this world. _Ha,chetife_! 'tis a weary, dreary place, this world, as ever a poor womanwas in. Hast thou a good man to thy baron, child?"
"He might be worser," said Lady Basset, icily.
"That's true of an handful of folks," said the Countess. "And I reckonhe might be better, eh? That's true of most. Good lack, I marvelwherefore we all were made. Was it by reason God loved or hated us?Say, my Predicant Friaress."
"Very dear Lady, the wise man saith, `God made a man rightful, and hemeddled himself with questions without, number.' [Ecclesiastes eight,verse 29.] And Saint Paul saith that `God commendeth His charity in us,for when we were sinners, Christ was dead for us.' [Romans five, verse8.] Moreover, Saint John--"
"Hold! There be two Scriptures. Where is the sermon?"
"The Scriptures, Lady, preach a better sermon than I can."
"That's but a short one. Man's ill, and God is good; behold all thinehomily. That man is ill, I lack no preaching friar to tell me. As toGod being good, the Church saith so, and there I rest. Mary, Mother! ifHe were good, He would bring my Jean back to me."
"Very dear Lady, God is wiser than men, and He seeth the end from thebeginning."
"Have done, Perrotine! I tell thee, if God be good, He will bring myJean to me. There I abide. I'll say it, if He do. I would love anyman that wrought that: and if He will work it, I will love Him--and nototherwise. Hold! I desire no more talk."
The Countess turned her face to the wall, and Perrote retired, withtears in her eyes.
"Lord, Thou art wise!" she said in her heart; "wiser than I, than she,than all men. But never yet have I known her to depart from such a wordas that. Oh, if it be possible,--if it be possible!--Thou who camestdown from Heaven to earth, come down once more to the weak and stubbornsoul of this dying woman, and grant her that which she requests, if soshe may be won to love thee! Father, the time is very short, and hersoul is very dark. O fair Father, Jesu Christ, lose not this soul forwhich Thou hast died!"
Perrote's next move was to await Lady Basset's departure from hermother's chamber, and to ask her to bestow a few minutes' private talkon her old nurse. The Princess complied readily, and came into theopposite chamber where Amphillis sat sewing.
"Damoiselle Jeanne," said Perrote, using the royal title of LadyBasset's unmarried days; "may I pray you tell me if you have of lateseen the Lord Duke your brother?"
"Ay, within a year," said Lady Basset, listlessly.
"Would it please you to say if King Edward letteth his coming?"
"I think not so."
"Would he come, if he were asked yet again, and knew that a few weeks--maybe days--would end his mother's life?"
"I doubt it, Perrotine."
"Wherefore? He can love well where he list."
"Ay, where he list. But I misdoubt if ever he loved her--at the least,sithence she let him from wedding the Damoiselle de Ponteallen."
"Then he loved the Damoiselle very dearly?"
"For a month--ay."
"But wherefore, when the matter was by--"
Lady Basset answered with a bitter little laugh, which reminded Perroteof her mother's.
"Because he loved Jean de Montfort, and she thwarted _him_, not theDamoiselle. He loved Alix de Ponteallen passionately, and passion dies;'tis its nature. It is not passionately, but undyingly, that he loveshimself. Men do; 'tis their nature."
Perrote shrewdly guessed that the remark had especial reference to oneman, and that not the Duke of Bretagne.
"Ah, that is the nature of all sinners," she said, "and therefore of allmen and women also. Dame, will you hearken to your old nurse, and granther one boon?"
"That will I, Perrotine, if it be in my power. I grant not so manyboons, neither can I, that I should grudge one to mine old nurse. Whatwouldst?"
"Dame, I pray you write a letter to my Lord Duke, the pitifullest youmay pen, and send one of your men therewith, to pray him, as he lovethyou, or her, or God, that he will come and look on her ere she die.Tell him his old nurse full lovingly entreateth him, and if he will sodo, I will take veil when my Lady is gone hence, and spend four nightsin the week in prayer for his welfare. Say I will be his bedes-womanfor ever, in any convent he shall name. Say anything that will bringhim!"
"I passed thee my word, and I will keep it," said Lady Basset, as sherose. "But if I know him, what I should say certainly to bring himwould be that Sir Oliver de Clisson lay here in dungeon, and that if hewould come he should see his head strake off in yonder court. He is afair lover, my brother; but he is a far better hater."
Perrote sighed.
"Amphillis!" came faintly up the stairs and along the gallery."Am-phil-lis!"
"Go, child," said Perrote, replying to a look from Amphillis. "'TisAgatha calling thee. What would the foolish maid?"
Amphillis left her work upon the bench and ran down.
"Well, it is merry matter to catch hold of thee!" said Agatha, who waswaiting at the foot of the stairs, and who never could recollect, unlessLady Foljambe were present, that Amphillis was to be addressed with morereverence than before. "Here be friends of thine come to visit thee."
"Friends!--of mine!" exclaimed Amphillis, in surprise. "Why, I haven'tany friends."
"Well, enemies, then," said Agatha, with a giggle. "Come, go into halland see who they be, and then tell me."
Amphillis obeyed, and to her still greater surprise, found herself inthe presence of Mr Altham and Regina.
"Ah, here she cometh!" was her uncle's greeting. "Well, my maid, I amfain to see thee so well-looking, I warrant thee. Can'st love a newaunt, thinkest?"
"That am I secure," replied Amphillis, smiling, and kissing thegoldsmith's daughter.
"And an old uncle belike?" pursued Mr Altham, kissing her in his turn.
"Assuredly, dear Uncle; but I pray, how came you hither?"
"Dat shall I tell you," said Mrs Altham, "for oderwise you shall notknow what good uncle you have. He promise to take me to mine own homein Dutchland, to see my greatmoder and mine aunts; and when we nighready were, he say, `See you, now! shall we not go round by Derbyshire,to see Amphillis, and sail from Hull?' So we come round all dis way; hemiss you so, and want to make him sure you be well and kindly used. Seeyou?"
"How kind and good are you both!" said Amphillis, gratefully. "Prayyou, good Aunt Regina, came Ricarda home safe?"
"She came safe, and she had but de scold well, tanks to your message; ifnot, she had de beat, beat, I ensure you, and she deserve dat full well.She was bad girl, bad. Said I not to you, De mans is bad, and dewomans is badder? It is true."
"She's a weary hussy!" said Mr Altham; "but she's been a sight bettermaid sithence she came back. She saith 'tis thy doing, Phyllis."
"Mine?" exclaimed Amphillis.
"She saith so. I wis not how. And art happy here, my maid? Doth thydame entreat thee well? and be thy fellows pleasant company? Because ifno, there's room for thee in the patty-shop, I can tell thee.Saundrina's wed, and Ricarda looks to be, and my wife and I should befull fain to have thee back for our daughter. Howbeit, if thou art herewelsome and comfortable, we will not carry thee off against thy will.What sayest?"
"Truly, dear Uncle, I am here full welsome, saving some small matters oflittle moment; and under your good pleasure, I would fain not go henceso
long as one liveth that is now sore sick in this house, and nigh todeath. Afterward, if it like you to dispose of me otherwise, I am alwayat your bidding."
"Well said. But what should best like thee?"
Amphillis felt the question no easy one. She would not wish to leavePerrote; but if Perrote took the veil, that obstacle would be removed;and even if she did not, Amphillis had no certain chance of accompanyingher wherever she might go, which would not improbably be to DraytonManor. To leave the rest of her present companions would be no hardshipat all, except--
Amphillis's heart said "except," and her conscience turned away anddeclined to pursue that road. Norman Hylton had shown no preference forher beyond others, so far as she knew, and her maidenly instinct warnedher that even her thoughts had better be kept away from him. Before sheanswered, a shadow fell between her and the light; and Amphillis lookedup into the kindly face of Archbishop Neville.
The Archbishop had delayed his further journey for the sake of the dyingCountess, whom he wished to see again, especially if his influence couldinduce her son to come to her. He now addressed himself to Mr Altham.
"Master Altham, as I guess?" he asked, pleasantly.
Mr Altham rose, as in duty bound, in honour to a priest, and a priestwho, as he dimly discerned by his canonicals, was not altogether acommon one.
"He, and your humble servant, holy Father."
"You be uncle, I count, of my cousin Amphillis here?"
"Sir! Amphillis your cousin!"
"Amphillis is my cousin," was the quiet answer; "and I am the Archbishopof York."
To say that Mr Altham was struck dumb with amazement would be no figureof speech. He stared from the Archbishop to Amphillis, and back again,as if his astonishment had fairly paralysed his powers, that of sightonly excepted; and had not Regina roused him from his condition ofhelplessness by an exclamation of "_Ach, heilige, Maria_!" there is nosaying how long he might have stood so doing.
"Ay, Uncle," said Amphillis, with a smile; "this is my Lord elect ofYork, and he is pleased to say that my father was his kinsman."
"And if it serve you, Master Altham," added the Archbishop, "I wouldfain have a privy word with you touching this my cousin."
Mr Altham's reply was two-fold. "Saints worshipped might they be!" wasmeant in answer to Amphillis. Then, to the Archbishop, he hastilycontinued, "Sir, holy Father, your Grace's most humble servant! I holdmyself at your Grace's bidding, whensoever it shall please your Grace."
"That is well," said the Archbishop, smiling. "We will have some talkthis evening, if it serve you."