The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter (novels to read for beginners txt) 📖

back bathed in the same vital stream. Having found his wound, the priests laid him on the ground; and were administering their balsams, when Helen opened her eyes. Her mind was too strongly possessed with the horror which had entered it before she became insensible, to lose the consciousness of her fears; and immediately looking around with an aghast countenance, her sight met the outstretched body of Wallace. "Oh! is it so?" cried she, throwing herself into the bosom of her father. He understood what she meant. "He lives, my child! but he is wounded like yourself. Have courage; revive, for his sake and for mine!"

"Helen! Helen! dear Helen!" cried Murray, clinging to her hand; "while you live, what that loves you can die?"

While these acclamations surrounded her couch, Edwin, in speechless apprehension, supported the insensible head of Wallace; and De Warenne, inwardly execrating the perfidy of De Valence, knelt down to assist the good friars in their office.

A few minutes longer, and the staunched blood refluxing to the chieftain's heart, he too opened his eyes; and instantly turning on his arm-"What has happened to me? Where is Lady Helen?" demanded he.

At his voice, which aroused Helen, who, believing that he was indeed dead, was relapsing into her former state; she could only press her father's hand to her lips, as if he had given the life she so valued, and bursting into a shower of relieving tears, breathed out her rapturous thanks to God. Her low murmurs reached the ears of Wallace.

The dimness having left his eyes, and the blood (the extreme loss of which, from his great agitation, had alone caused him to swoon), being stopped by an embalmed bandage, he seemed to feel no impediment from his wound; and rising, hastened to the side of Helen. Lord Mar softly whispered his daughter-"Sir William Wallace is at your feet, my dearest child; look on him, and tell him that you live."

"I am well, my father," returned she, in a faltering voice; "and may it indeed please the Almighty to preserve him!"

"I, too, am alive and well," answered Wallace; "but thanks to God, and to you, blessed lady, that I am so! Had not that lovely arm received the greater part of the dagger, it must have reached my heart."

An exclamation of horror at what might have been burst from the lips of Edwin. Helen could have re-echoed it, but she now held her feelings under too severe a rein to allow them so to speak.

"Thanks to the Protector of the just," cried she, "for your preservation! Who raised my eyes to see the assassin! His cloak was held before his face, and I could not discern it; but I saw a dagger aimed at the bank of Sir William Wallace! How I caught it I cannot tell, for I seemed to die on the instant."

Lady Mar having recovered, re-entered the hall just as Wallace had knelt down beside Helen. Maddened with the sight of the man on whom her soul doted, in such a position before her rival, she advanced hastily; and in a voice, which she vainly attempted to render composed and gentle, sternly addressed her daughter-in-law: "Alarmed as I have been by your apparent danger, I cannot but be uneasy at the attendant circumstances; tell me, therefore, and satisfy this anxious company, how it happened that you should be with the regent, when we supposed you an invalid in your room, and were told he was gone to the citadel?"

A crimson blush overspread the cheeks of Helen at this question, for it was delivered in a tone which insinuated that something more than accident had occasioned their meeting, but as innocence dictated, she answered, "I was in the chapel at prayers; Sir William Wallace entered with the same design; and at the moment he desired me to mingle mine with his, this assassin appeared and (she repeated) I saw his dagger raised against our protector, and I saw no more."

There was not a heart present that did not give credence to this account, but the polluted one of Lady Mar. Jealousy almost laid it bare. She smiled incredulously, and turning to the company, "Our noble friends will accept my apology, if in so delicate an investigation, I should beg that my family alone may be present."

Wallace perceived the tendency of her words, and not doubting the impression they might make on the minds of men ignorant of the virtues of Lady Helen, he instantly rose. "For once," cried he, "I must counteract a lady's orders. It is my wish, lords, that you will not leave this place till I explain how I came to disturb the devotions of Lady Helen. Wearied with festivities, in which my alienated heart can so little share, I thought to pass an hour with Lord Montgomery in the citadel; and in seeking to avoid the crowded avenues of the palace, I entered the chapel. To my surprise, I found Lady Helen there, I heard her pray for the happiness of Scotland, for the safety of her defenders; and my mind being in a frame to join in such petitions, I apologized for my unintentional intrusion, and begged permission to mingle my devotions with hers. Nay, impressed and privileged by the sacredness of the place, I presumed still further, and before the altar of purity poured forth my gratitude for the duties she had paid to the remains of my murdered wife. It was at this moment that the assassin appeared. I heard Lady Helen scream, I felt her fall on my breast, and at that instant the dagger entered my back.

"This is the history of our meeting; and the assassin, whomsoever he may be, and how long soever he was in the church, before he sought to perpetrate the deed—were he to speak, and capable of uttering truth, could declare no other."

"But where is he to be found?" intemperately and suspiciously demanded
Lady mar.

"If his testimony be necessary to validate mine," returned Wallace, with dignity, "I believe the Lady Helen can point to his name."

"Name him, Helen; name him, my dear cousin," cried Murray, "that I may have some link with thee. O! let me avenge this deed! Tell me his name! and so yield to me all that thou canst now bestow on Andrew Murray!"

There was something in the tone of Murray's voice that penetrated to the heart of Helen. "I cannot name him whom I suspect to any but Sir William Wallace; and I would not do it to him," replied she, "were it not to warn him against future danger. I did not see the assassin's face, therefore, how dare I set you to take vengeance on one who perchance may be innocent? I forgive him, my blood, since Heaven has spared to Scotland its protector."

"If he be a Southron," cried Baron Hilton, coming forward, "name him, gracious lady, and I will answer for it, that were he the son of a king, he would meet death from our monarch for this unknightly outrage."

"I thank your zeal, brave chief," replied she; "but I would not abandon to certain death even a wicked man. May he repent! I will name him to Sir William Wallace alone; and when he knows his secret enemy, the vigilance of his own honor, I trust, will be his guard. Meanwhile, my father, I would withdraw." Then whispering to him, she was lifted in his arms and Murray's and carried from the hall.

As she moved away her eyes met those of Wallace. He arose; but she waved her hand to him, with an expression in her countenance of an adieu so firm, yet so tender, that feeling as if he were parting from a beloved sister, who had just risked her life for him, and whom he might never see again, he uttered not a word to any that were present, but leaning on Edwin, left the hall by an opposite door.

Chapter XLIII.

The Carse of Stirling.

Daybreak gleamed over the sky before the wondering spectators of the late extraordinary scene had dispersed to their quarters.

De Warenne was so well convinced by what had dropped from De Valence, of his having been the assassin, that when they met at sunrise to take horse for the borders, he made him no other salutation than an exclamation of surprise, "not to find him under an arrest for the last night's work!"

"The wily Scot knew better," replied De Valence, "than so to expose the reputation of the lady. He knew that she received the wound in his arms, and he durst not seize me, for fear I should proclaim it."

"He cannot fear that," replied De Warenne, "for he has proclaimed it himself. He has told every particular of his meeting with Lady Helen in the chapel, even her sheltering him with her arms; so there is nothing for you to declare but your own infamy. For infamous I must call it, Lord Aymer; and nothing but the respect I owe my country, prevents me pointing the eyes of the indignant Scots to you; nothing but the stigma your exposure would bring upon the English name, could make me conceal the dead."

De Valence laughed at this speech of De Warenne's. "Why, my lord warden," said he, "have you been taking lessons of this doughty Scot, that you talk thus? It was not with such sentiments you overthrew the princes of Wales, and made the kings of Ireland fly before you! You would tell another story were your own interest in question; and I can tell you that any vengeance is not satisfied, I will yet see the brightness of those eyes on which the proud daughter of Mar hangs so fondly, extinguished in death. Maid, or wife, Helen shall be torn from his arms, and if I cannot make her a virgin bride, she shall at least be mine as his widow; for I swear not to be disappointed."

"Shame, De Valence! I should blush to owe my courage to rivalry, or my perseverance in the field to a licentious passion! You know what you have confessed to me were once your designs on Helen Mar."

"Every man according to his nature!" returned De Valence; and shrugging his shoulders, he mounted his horse.

The cavalcade of Southrons now appeared. They were met on the Carse by the regent, who, not regarding the smart of a closing wound, advanced at the head of ten thousand men to see his prisoners over the borders. By Helen's desire, Lord Mar had informed Wallace what had been the threats of De Valence, and that she suspected him to be the assassin. But this suspicion was put beyond a doubt by the evidence of the dagger, which Edwin had found in the chapel; its hilt was enameled with the martlets of De Valence.

At sight of it a general indignation filled the Scottish chiefs, and assembling round their regent, with one breath they demanded that the false earl should be detained and punished as became the honor of nations, for so execrable a breach of all laws, human and divine. Wallace replied that he believed the attack to have been instigated by a personal motive, and therefore, as he was the object, not the state of Scotland, he should merely acquaint the earl that his villainy was known, and let the shame of disgrace be his punishment.

"Ah," observed Lord Bothwell, "men who trample on conscience soon get over shame."

"True," replied Wallace, "but I suit my actions to my mind, not to my enemy's; and if he cannot feel dishonor, I will not so far disparage myself as to think one so base worthy my resentment."

While he was quieting the reawakened indignation of his nobles, whose blood began to boil afresh at sight of the assassin, the Southron lords, conducted by Lord Mar, approached. When that nobleman drew near, Wallace's first inquiry was for Lady Helen. The earl informed him he had received intelligence of her having slept without fever, and that she was not awake when the messenger came off with his good tidings. That all was likely to be well with her was comfort to Wallace; and, with an unruffled brow, riding up to the squadron of Southrons which was headed by De Warenne and De Valence, he immediately approached the latter, and drawing out the dagger, held