Rafael Sabatini - "The Trampling of the Lilies"

Rabindranath Tagore - "The Fugitive"

Eliza Lee Follen - "The Talkative Wig"

Jeanie Mrs. Aeneas Gunn - "We of the Never Never"

To Have and To Hold:

M >> Mary Johnston >> To Have and To Hold:




"Master Pory's disinterestedness is perfectly well known," I said,
without a smile. "If he ever chooses the stronger side, sure he has
strong reasons for so doing. He will oblige me by telling his
principal that I ever thought sunrise a pleasant hour for dying, and
that there could be no fitter place than the field behind the church,
convenient as it is to the graveyard. As for weapons, I have heard
that he is a good swordsman, but I have some little reputation that
way myself. If he prefers pistols or daggers, so be it."

"I think we may assume the sword," said Master Pory.

I bowed.

"You'll bring a friend?" he asked.

"I do not despair of finding one," I answered, "though my second,
Master Secretary, will put himself in some jeopardy."

"It is combat … outrance, I believe?"

"I understand it so."

"Then we'd better have Bohun. The survivor may need his
services."

"As you please," I replied, "though my man Diccon dresses my
scratches well enough."

He bit his lip, but could not hide the twinkle in his eye.

"You are cocksure," he said. "Curiously enough, so is my lord.
There are no further formalities to adjust, I believe? To-morrow at
sunrise, behind the church, and with rapiers?"

"Precisely."

He slapped his blade back into its sheath. "Then that's over and
done with, for the nonce at least! Sufficient unto the day, etcetera.
'S life! I'm hot and dry! You've sacked cities, Ralph Percy; now
sack me the minister's closet and bring out his sherris I'll be at
charges for the next communion."

We sat us down upon the doorstep with a tankard of sack between
us, and Master Pory drank, and drank, and drank again.

"How's the crop?" he asked. "Martin reports it poorer in quality
than ever, but Sir George will have it that it is very Varinas."

"It's every whit as good as the Spanish," I answered. "You may tell
my Lord Warwick so, when next you write."

He laughed. If he was a timeserver and leagued with my Lord
Warwick's faction in the Company, he was a jovial sinner. Traveler
and student, much of a philosopher, more of a wit, and boon
companion to any beggar with a pottle of ale, - while the drink
lasted, - we might look askance at his dealings, but we liked his
company passing well. If he took half a poor rustic's crop for his
fee, he was ready enough to toss him sixpence for drink money;
and if he made the tenants of the lands allotted to his office leave
their tobacco uncared for whilst they rowed him on his
innumerable roving expeditions up creeks and rivers, he at least
lightened their labors with most side-splitting tales, and with bottle
songs learned in a thousand taverns.

"After to-morrow there'll be more interesting news to write," he
announced. "You're a bold man, Captain Percy."

He looked at me out of the corners of his little twinkling eyes. I sat
and smoked in silence.

"The King begins to dote upon him," he said; "leans on his arm,
plays with his hand, touches his cheek. Buckingham stands by,
biting his lip, his brow like a thundercloud. You'll find in
to-morrow's antagonist, Ralph Percy, as potent a conjurer as your
cousin Hotspur found in Glendower. He'll conjure you up the
Tower, and a hanging, drawing, and quartering. Who touches the
King's favorite had safer touch the King. It's lŠse-majest‚ you
contemplate."

He lit his pipe and blew out a great cloud of smoke, then burst into
a roar of laughter. "My Lord High Admiral may see you through.
Zooks! there'll be a raree-show worth the penny, behind the church
to-morrow, a Percy striving with all his might and main to serve a
Villiers! Eureka! There is something new under the sun, despite
the Preacher!" He blew out another cloud of smoke. By this the
tankard was empty, and his cheeks were red, his eyes moist, and
his laughter very ready.

"Where's the Lady Jocelyn Leigh?" he asked. "May I not have the
honor to kiss her hand before I go?"

I stared at him. "I do not understand you," I said coldly. "There 's
none within but Mistress Percy. She is weary, and rests after her
journey. We came from Weyanoke this morning."

He shook with laughter. "Ay, ay, brave it out!" he cried. "It's what
every man Jack of us said you would do! But all's known, man!
The Governor read the King's letters in full Council an hour ago.
She's the Lady Jocelyn Leigh; she 's a ward of the King's; she and
her lands are to wed my Lord Carnal!"

"She was all that," I replied. "Now she 's my wife."

"You'll find that the Court of High Commission will not agree with
you."

My rapier lay across my knees, and I ran my hand down its worn
scabbard. "Here 's one that agrees with me," I said. "And up there
is Another," and I lifted my hat.

He stared. "God and my good sword!" he cried. "A very knightly
dependence, but not to be mentioned nowadays in the same breath
with gold and the King's favor. Better bend to the storm, man; sing
low while it roars past. You can swear that you did n't know her to
be of finer weave than dowlas. Oh, they'll call it in some sort a
marriage, for the lady's own sake; but they'll find flaws enough to
crack a thousand such mad matches. The divorce is the thing!
There's precedent, you know. A fair lady was parted from a brave
man not a thousand years ago, because a favorite wanted her. True,
Frances Howard wanted the favorite, whilst this beauty of yours" -

"You will please not couple the name of my wife with the name of
that adulteress!" I interrupted fiercely.

He started; then cried out somewhat hurriedly: "No offense, no
offense! I meant no comparisons; comparisons are odorous, saith
Dogberry. All at court know the Lady Jocelyn Leigh for a very
Britomart, a maid as cold as Dian!"

I rose, and began to pace up and down the bit of green before the
door. "Master Pory," I said at last, coming to a stop before him, "if,
without breach of faith, you can tell me what was said or done at
the Council to-day anent this matter, you will lay me under an
obligation that I shall not forget."

He studied the lace on his sleeve in silence for a while; then
glanced up at me out of those small, sly, merry eyes. "Why," he
answered, "the King demands that the lady be sent home forthwith,
on the ship that gave us such a turn to-day, in fact, with a couple of
women to attend her, and under the protection of the only other
passenger of quality, to wit, my Lord Carnal. His Majesty cannot
conceive it possible that she hath so far forgotten her birth, rank,
and duty as to have maintained in Virginia this mad masquerade,
throwing herself into the arms of any petty planter or broken
adventurer who hath chanced to have an hundred and twenty
pounds of filthy tobacco with which to buy him a wife. If she hath
been so mad, she is to be sent home none the less, where she will
be tenderly dealt with as one surely in this sole matter under the
spell of witchcraft. The ship is to bring home also - and in irons -
the man who married her. If he swears to have been ignorant of her
quality, and places no straws in the way of the King's
Commissioners, then shall he be sent honorably back to Virginia
with enough in his hand to get him another wife. Per contra, if he
erred with open eyes, and if he remain contumacious, he will have
to deal with the King and with the Court of High Commission, to
say nothing of the King's favorite. That's the sum and substance,
Ralph Percy."

"Why was my Lord Carnal sent?" I asked.

"Probably because my Lord Carnal would come. He hath a will,
hath my Lord, and the King is more indulgent than Eli to those
upon whom he dotes. Doubtless, my Lord High Admiral sped him
on his way, gave him the King's best ship, wished him a favorable
wind - to hell."

"I was not ignorant that she was other than she seemed, and I
remain contumacious."

"Then," he said shamelessly, "you'll forgive me if in public, at
least, I forswear your company? You're plague-spotted, Captain
Percy, and your friends may wish you well, but they must stay at
home and burn juniper before their own doors."

"I'll forgive you," I said, "when you 've told me what the Governor
will do."

"Why, there's the rub," he answered. "Yeardley is the most
obstinate man of my acquaintance. He who at his first coming,
beside a great deal of worth in his person, brought only his sword
hath grown to be as very a Sir Oracle among us as ever I saw. It's
'Sir George says this,' and 'Sir George says that,' and so there's an
end on't. It's all because of that leave to cut your own throats in
your own way that he brought you last year. Sir George and Sir
Edwyn! Zooks! you had better dub them St. George and St. Edwyn
at once, and be done with it. Well, on this occasion Sir George
stands up and says roundly, with a good round oath to boot: 'The
King's commands have always come to us through the Company.
The Company obeys the King; we obey the Company. His
Majesty's demand (with reverence I speak it) is out of all order. Let
the Company, through the treasurer, command us to send Captain
Percy home in irons to answer for this passing strange offense, or
to return, willy nilly, the lady who is now surely his wife, and we
will have no choice but to obey. Until the Company commands us
we will do nothing; nay we can do nothing.' And every one of my
fellow Councilors (for myself, I was busy with my pens) saith, 'My
opinion, Sir George.' The upshot of it all is that the Due Return is
to sail in two days with our humble representation to his Majesty
that though we bow to his lightest word as the leaf bows to the
zephyr, yet we are, in this sole matter, handfast, compelled by his
Majesty's own gracious charter to refer our slightest official doing
to that noble Company which owes its very being to its rigid
adherence to the terms of said charter. Wherefore, if his Majesty
will be graciously pleased to command us as usual through the said
Company - and so on. Of course, not a soul in the Council, or in
Jamestown, or in Virginia dreams of a duel behind the church at
sunrise to-morrow." He knocked the ashes from his pipe, and by
degrees got his fat body up from the doorstep. "So there's a
reprieve for you, Ralph Percy, unless you kill or are killed
to-morrow morning. In the latter case, the problem's solved; in the
former, the best service you can do yourself, and maybe the
Company, is to walk out of the world of your own accord, and that
as quickly as possible. Better a cross-roads and a stake through a
dead heart than a hangman's hands upon a live one."

"One moment," I said. "Doth my Lord Carnal know of this
decision of the Governor's?"

"Ay, and a fine passion it put him into. Stormed and swore and
threatened, and put the Governor's back up finely. It seems that he
thought to 'bout ship to-morrow, lady and all. He refuseth to go
without the lady, and so remaineth in Virginia until he can have
his will. Lord! but Buckingham would be a happy man if he were
kept here forever and a day! My lord knows what he risks, and he's
in as black a humor as ever you saw. But I have striven to drop oil
on the troubled waters. 'My lord,' I told him, 'you have but to
posses your soul with patience for a few short weeks, just until the
ship the Governor sends can return. Then all must needs be as your
lordship wishes. In the meantime, you may find existence in these
wilds and away from that good company which is the soul of life
endurable, and perhaps pleasant. You may have daily sight of the
lady who is to become your wife, and that should count for much
with so ardent and determined a lover as your lordship hath shown
yourself to be. You may have the pleasure of contemplating your
rival's grave, if you kill him. If he kills you, you will care the less
about the date of the Santa Teresa's sailing. The land, too, hath
inducements to offer to a philosophical and contemplative mind
such as one whom his Majesty delighteth to honor must needs
possess. Beside these crystal rivers and among these odoriferous
woods, my lord, one escapes much expense, envy, contempt,
vanity, and vexation of mind.'"

The hoary sinner laughed and laughed. When he had gone away,
still in huge enjoyment of his own mirth, I, who had seen small
cause for mirth, went slowly indoors. Not a yard from the door, in
the shadow of the vines that draped the window, stood the woman
who was bringing this fate upon me.

"I thought that you were in your own room," I said harshly, after a
moment of dead silence.

"I came to the window," she replied. "I listened. I heard all." She
spoke haltingly, through dry lips. Her face was as white as her ruff,
but a strange light burned in her eyes, and there was no trembling.
"This morning you said that all that you had - your name and your
sword - were at my service. You may take them both again, sir. I
refuse the aid you offer. Swear what you will, tell them what you
please, make your peace whilst you may. I will not have your
blood upon my soul."

There was yet wine upon the table. I filled a cup and brought it to
her. "Drink!" I commanded.

"I have much of forbearance, much of courtesy, to thank you for,"
she said. "I will remember it when - Do not think that I shall blame
you" -

I held the cup to her lips. "Drink!" I repeated. She touched the red
wine with her lips. I took it from her and put it to my own. "We
drink of the same cup," I said, with my eyes upon hers, and drained
it to the bottom. "I am weary of swords and courts and kings. Let
us go into the garden and watch the minister's bees."



CHAPTER X IN WHICH MASTER PORY GAINS TIME TO SOME PURPOSE


ROLFE coming down by boat from Varina, had reached the town
in the dusk of that day which had seen the arrival of the Santa
Teresa, and I had gone to him before I slept that night. Early
morning found us together again in the field behind the church.
We had not long to wait in the chill air and dew-drenched grass.
When the red rim of the sun showed like a fire between the trunks
of the pines came my Lord Carnal, and with him Master Pory and
Dr. Lawrence Bohun.

My lord and I bowed to each other profoundly. Rolfe with my
sword and Master Pory with my lord's stepped aside to measure the
blades. Dr. Bohun, muttering something about the feverishness of
the early air, wrapped his cloak about him, and huddled in among
the roots of a gigantic cedar. I stood with my back to the church,
and my face to the red water between us and the illimitable forest;
my lord opposite me, six feet away. He was dressed again
splendidly in black and scarlet, colors he much affected, and, with
the dark beauty of his face and the arrogant grace with which he
stood there waiting for his sword, made a picture worth looking
upon.

Rolfe and the Secretary came back to us. "If you kill him, Ralph,"
said the former in a low voice, as he took my doublet from me,
"you are to put yourself in my hands and do as you are bid."

"Which means that you will try to smuggle me north to the Dutch.
Thanks, friend, but I'll see the play out here."

"You were ever obstinate, self-willed, reckless - and the man most
to my heart," he continued. " Have your way, in God's name, but I
wish not to see what will come of it! All's ready, Master
Secretary."

Very slowly that worthy stooped down and examined the ground,
narrowly and quite at his leisure. "I like it not, Master Rolfe," he
declared at length. "Here is a molehill, and there a fairy ring."

"I see neither," said Rolfe. "It looks as smooth as a table. But we
can easily shift under the cedars where there is no grass."

"Here's a projecting root," announced the Secretary, when the new
ground had been reached.

Rolfe shrugged his shoulders, but we moved again.

"The light comes jaggedly through the branches," objected my
lord's second. "Better try the open again."

Rolfe uttered an exclamation of impatience, and my lord stamped
his foot on the ground. "What is this foolery, sir?" the latter cried
fiercely. "The ground's well enough, and there 's sufficient light to
die by."

"Let the light pass, then," said his second resignedly. "Gentlemen,
are you read - Ods blood! my lord, I had not noticed the roses upon
your lordship's shoes! They are so large and have such a fall that
they sweep the ground on either side your foot; you might stumble
in all that dangling ribbon and lace. Allow me to remove them."

He unsheathed his knife, and, sinking upon his knees, began
leisurely to sever the threads that held the roses to the leather. As
he worked, he looked neither at the roses nor at my lord's angry
face, but beneath his own bent arm toward the church and the town
beyond.

How long he would have sawed away at the threads there is no
telling; for my lord, amongst whose virtues patience was not one,
broke from him, and with an oath stooped and tore away the
offending roses with his own hand, then straightened himself and
gripped his sword more closely. "I've learned one thing in this d - d
land," he snarled, "and that is where not to choose a second. You,
sir," to Rolfe, "give the word."

Master Pory rose from his knees, unruffled and unabashed, and
still with a curiously absent expression upon his fat face and with
his ears cocked in the direction of the church. "One moment,
gentlemen," he said. "I have just bethought me" -

"On guard!" cried Rolfe, and cut him short.

The King's favorite was no mean antagonist. Once or twice the
thought crossed my mind that here, where I least desired it, I had
met my match. The apprehension passed. He fought as he lived,
with a fierce intensity, a headlong passion, a brute force, bearing
down and overwhelming most obstacles. But that I could tire him
out I soon knew.

The incessant flash and clash of steel, the quick changes in
position, the need to bring all powers of body and mind to aid of
eye and wrist, the will to win, the shame of loss, the rage and lust
of blood, - there was no sight or sound outside that trampled circle
that could force itself upon our brain or make us glance aside. If
there was a sudden commotion amongst the three witnesses, if an
expression of immense relief and childlike satisfaction reigned in
Master Pory's face, we knew it not. We were both bleeding, - I
from a pin prick on the shoulder, he from a touch beneath the arm.
He made a desperate thrust, which I parried, and the blades
clashed. A third came down upon them with such force that the
sparks flew.

"In the King's name!" commanded the Governor.

We fell apart, panting, white with rage, staring at the unexpected
disturbers of our peace. They were the Governor, the commander,
the Cape Merchant, and the watch.

"Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace!" exclaimed
Master Pory, and retired to the cedar and Dr. Bohun.

"This ends here, gentlemen," said the Governor firmly. "You are
both bleeding. It is enough."

"Out of my way, sir!" cried my lord, foaming at the mouth. He
made a mad thrust over the Governor's extended arm at me, who
was ready enough to meet him. "Have at thee, thou bridegroom!"
he said between his teeth.

The Governor caught him by the wrist. "Put up your sword, my
lord, or, as I stand here, you shall give it into the commander's
hands!"

"Hell and furies!" ejaculated my lord. "Do you know who I am,
sir?"

"Ay," replied the Governor sturdily, "I do know. It is because of
that knowledge, my Lord Carnal, that I interfere in this affair.
Were you other than you are, you and this gentleman might fight
until doomsday, and meet with no hindrance from me. Being what
you are, I will prevent any renewal of this duel, by fair means if I
may, by foul if I must."

He left my lord, and came over to me. "Since when have you been
upon my Lord Warwick's side, Ralph Percy?" he demanded,
lowering his voice.

"I am not so," I said.

"Then appearances are mightily deceitful," he retorted.

"I know what you mean, Sir George," I answered. "I know that if
the King's darling should meet death or maiming in this fashion,
upon Virginian soil, the Company, already so out of favor, might
find some difficulty in explaining things to his Majesty's
satisfaction. But I think my Lord Southampton and Sir Edwyn
Sandys and Sir George Yeardley equal to the task, especially if
they are able to deliver to his Majesty the man whom his Majesty
will doubtless consider the true and only rebel and murderer. Let
us fight it out, sir. You can all retire to a distance and remain in
profound ignorance of any such affair. If I fall, you have nothing to
fear. If he falls, - why, I shall not run away, and the Due Return
sails to-morrow."

He eyed me closely from under frowning brows.

"And when your wife's a widow, what then?" he asked abruptly.

I have not known many better men than this simple,
straightforward, soldierly Governor. The manliness of his
character begot trust, invited confidence. Men told him of their
hidden troubles almost against their will, and afterward felt neither
shame nor fear, knowing the simplicity of his thoughts and the
reticence of his speech. I looked him in the eyes, and let him read
what I would have shown to no other, and felt no shame. "The
Lord may raise her up a helper," I said. "At least she won't have to
marry him."

He turned on his heel and moved back to his former station
between us two. "My Lord Carnal," he said, "and you, Captain
Percy, heed what I say; for what I say I will do. You may take your
choice: either you will sheathe your swords here in my presence,
giving me your word of honor that you will not draw them upon
each other before his Majesty shall have made known his will in
this matter to the Company, and the Company shall have
transmitted it to me, in token of which truce between you you shall
touch each other's hands; or you will pass the time between this
and the return of the ship with the King's and the Company's will
in strict confinement, - you, Captain Percy, in gaol, and you, my
Lord Carnal, in my own poor house, where I will use my best
endeavors to make the days pass as pleasantly as possible for your
lordship. I have spoken, gentlemen."

There was no protest. For my own part, I knew Yeardley too well
to attempt any; moreover, had I been in his place, his course
should have been mine. For my Lord Carnal, - what black thoughts
visited that fierce and sullen brain I know not, but there was
acquiescence in his face, haughty, dark, and vengeful though it
was. Slowly and as with one motion we sheathed our swords, and
more slowly still repeated the few words after the Governor. His
Honor's countenance shone with relief. "Take each other by the
hand, gentlemen, and then let 's all to breakfast at my own house,
where there shall be no feud save with good capon pasty and jolly
good ale." In dead silence my lord and I touched each other's finger
tips.

The world was now a flood of sunshine, the mist on the river
vanishing, the birds singing, the trees waving in the pleasant
morning air. From the town came the roll of the drum summoning
all to the week-day service. The bells too began to ring, sounding
sweetly through the clear air. The Governor took off his hat. "Let's
all to church, gentlemen," he said gravely. "Our cheeks are flushed
as with a fever and our pulses run high this morning. There be
some among us, perhaps, that have in their hearts discontent,
anger, and hatred. I know no better place to take such passions,
provided we bring them not forth again."

We went in and sat down. Jeremy Sparrow was in the pulpit.
Singly or in groups the town folk entered. Down the aisle strode
bearded men, old soldiers, adventurers, sailors, scarred body and
soul; young men followed, younger sons and younger brothers,
prodigals whose portion had been spent, whose souls now ate of
the husks; to the servants' benches came dull laborers, dimly
comprehending, groping in the twilight; women entered softly and
slowly, some with children clinging to their skirts. One came alone
and knelt alone, her face shadowed by her mantle. Amongst the
servants stood a slave or two, blindly staring, and behind them all
one of that felon crew sent us by the King.

Through the open windows streamed the summer sunshine, soft
and fragrant, impartial and unquestioning, caressing alike the
uplifted face of the minister, the head of the convict, and all
between. The minister's voice was grave and tender when he read
and prayed, but in the hymn it rose above the people's like the
voice of some mighty archangel. That triumphant singing shook
the air, and still rang in the heart while we said the Creed.

When the service was over, the congregation waited for the
Governor to pass out first. At the door he pressed me to go with
him and his party to his own house, and I gave him thanks, but
made excuse to stay away. When he and the nobleman who was
his guest had left the churchyard, and the townspeople too were
gone, I and my wife and the minister walked home together
through the dewy meadow, with the splendor of the morning about
us, and the birds caroling from every tree and thicket.



CHAPTER XI IN WHICH I MEET AN ITALIAN DOCTOR


THE summer slipped away, and autumn came, with the purple of
the grape and the yellowing corn, the nuts within the forest, and
the return of the countless wild fowl to the marshes and reedy river
banks, and still I stayed in Jamestown, and my wife with me, and
still the Santa Teresa rode at anchor in the river below the fort. If
the man whom she brought knew that by tarrying in Virginia he
risked his ruin with the King, yet, with a courage worthy of a better
cause, he tarried.

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