Unknown to History: A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland by Yonge (best book club books for discussion TXT) 📖

the present, adding that there had been love passages between her and his son Humfrey, who intended to wed her and see some foreign service. Lord Shrewsbury showed at first some offence at having been kept in ignorance all these years of such a fact, and wondered what his Countess would say, marvelled too that his cousin should consent to his son's throwing himself away on a mere stranger, of perilous connection, and going off to foreign wars; but the good nobleman was a placable man, and always considerably influenced by the person who addressed him, and he ended by placing the Mastiff at Richard's disposal to take the young people to Scotland or Holland, or wherever they might wish to go.

This decided Mr. Talbot on making at once for the seaport; and accordingly he left behind him the horse, which was to serve as a token to his son that such was his course. Cicely had been worn out with her day's journey, and slept late and sound, so that she was not ready to leave her chamber till the Earl and his retinue were gone, and thus she was spared actual contact with him who was to doom her mother, and see that doom carried out. She was recruited by rest, and more ready to talk than on the previous day, but she was greatly disappointed to find that she might not be taken to Bridgefield.

"If I could only be with Mother Susan for one hour," she sighed.

"Would that thou couldst, my poor maid," said Richard. "The mother hath the trick of comfort."

"'Twas not comfort I thought of. None can give me that," said the poor girl; "but she would teach me how to be a good wife to Humfrey."

These words were a satisfaction to Richard, who had begun to feel somewhat jealous for his son's sake, and to doubt whether the girl's affection rose to the point of requiting the great sacrifice made for his sake, though truly in those days parents were not wont to be solicitous as to the mutual attachment between a betrothed pair. However, Cicely's absolute resignation of herself and her fate into Humfrey's hands, without even a question, and with entire confidence and peace, was evidence enough that her heart was entirely his; nay, had been his throughout all the little flights of ambition now so entirely passed away, without apparently a thought on her part.

It was on the Friday forenoon, a day very unlike their last entrance into Hull, that they again entered the old town, in the brightness of a crisp frost; but poor Cicely could not but contrast her hopeful mood of November with her present overwhelming sorrow, where, however, there was one drop of sweetness. Her foster-father took her again to good Mr. Heatherthwayte's, according to the previous invitation, and was rejoiced to see that the joyous welcome of Oil-of-Gladness awoke a smile; and the little girl, being well trained in soberness and discretion, did not obtrude upon her grief.

Stern Puritan as he was, the minister himself contained his satisfaction that the Papist woman was to die and never reign over England until he was out of hearing of the pale maiden who had—strange as it seemed to him—loved her enough to be almost broken-hearted at her death.

Richard saw Goatley and set him to prepare the Mastiff for an immediate voyage. Her crew, somewhat like those of a few modern yachts, were permanently attached to her, and lived in the neighbourhood of the wharf, so that, under the personal superintendence of one who was as much loved and looked up to as Captain Talbot, all was soon in a state of forwardness, and Gillingham made himself very useful. When darkness put a stop to the work and supper was being made ready, Richard found time to explain matters to Mr. Heatherthwayte, for his honourable mind would not permit him to ask his host unawares to perform an office that might possibly be construed as treasonable. In spite of the preparation which he had already received through Colet's communications, the minister's wonder was extreme. "Daughter to the Queen of Scots, say you, sir! Yonder modest, shamefast maiden, of such seemly carriage and gentle speech?"

Richard smiled and said—"My good friend, had you seen that poor lady—to whom God be merciful—as I have done, you would know that what is sweetest in our Cicely's outward woman is derived from her; for the inner graces, I cannot but trace them to mine own good wife."

Mr. Heatherthwayte seemed at first hardly to hear him, so overpowered was he with the notion that the daughter of her, whom he was in the habit of classing with Athaliah and Herodias, was in his house, resting on the innocent pillow of Oil-of-Gladness. He made his guest recount to him the steps by which the discovery had been made, and at last seemed to embrace the idea. Then he asked whether Master Talbot were about to carry the young lady to the protection of her brother in Scotland; and when the answer was that it might be poor protection even if conferred, and that by all accounts the Court of Scotland was by no means a place in which to leave a lonely damsel with no faithful guardian, the minister asked—

"How then will you bestow the maiden?"

"In that, sir, I came to ask you to aid me. My son Humfrey is following on our steps, leaving Fotheringhay so soon as his charge there is ended; and I ask of you to wed him to the maid, whom we will then take to Holland, when he will take service with the States."

The amazement of the clergyman was redoubled, and he began at first to plead with Richard that a perilous overleaping ambition was leading him thus to mate his son with an evil, though a royal, race.

At this Richard smiled and shook his head, pointing out that the very last thing any of them desired was that Cicely's birth should be known; and that even if it were, her mother's marriage was very questionable. It was no ambition, he said, that actuated his son, "But you saw yourself how, nineteen years ago, the little lad welcomed her as his little sister come back to him. That love hath grown up with him. When, at fifteen years old, he learnt that she was a nameless stranger, his first cry was that he would wed her and give her his name. Never hath his love faltered; and even when this misfortune of her rank was known, and he lost all hope of gaining her, while her mother bade her renounce him, his purpose was even still to watch over and guard her; and at the end, beyond all our expectations, they have had her mother's dying blessing and entreaty that he would take her."

"Sir, do you give me your word for that?"

"Yea, Master Heatherthwayte, as I am a true man. Mind you, worldly matters look as different to a poor woman who knoweth the headsman is in the house, as to one who hath her head on her dying pillow. This Queen had devised plans for sending our poor Cis abroad to her French and Lorraine kindred, with some of the French ladies of her train."

"Heaven forbid!" broke out Heatherthwayte, in horror. "The rankest of Papists—"

"Even so, and with recommendations to give her in marriage to some adventurous prince whom the Spaniards might abet in working woe to us in her name. But when she saw how staunch the child is in believing as mine own good dame taught her, she saw, no doubt, that this would be mere giving her over to be persecuted and mewed in a convent."

"Then the woman hath some bowels of mercy, though a Papist."

"She even saith that she doubteth not that such as live honestly and faithfully by the light that is in them shall be saved. So when she saw she prevailed nothing with the maid, she left off her endeavours. Moreover, my son not only saved her life, but won her regard by his faith and honour; and she called him to her, and even besought him to be her daughter's husband. I came to you, reverend sir, as one who has known from the first that the young folk are no kin to one another; and as I think the peril to you is small, I deemed that you would do them this office. Otherwise, I must take her to Holland and see them wedded by a stranger there."

Mr. Heatherthwayte was somewhat touched, but he sat and considered, perceiving that to marry the young lady to a loyal Englishman was the safest way of hindering her from falling into the clutches of a Popish prince; but he still demurred, and asked how Mr. Talbot could talk of the mere folly of love, and for its sake let his eldest son and heir become a mere exile and fugitive, cut off, it might be, from home.

"For that matter, sir," said Richard, "my son is not one to loiter about, as the lubberly heir, cumbering the land at home. He would, so long as I am spared in health and strength, be doing service by land or sea, and I trust that by the time he is needed at home, all this may be so forgotten that Cis may return safely. The maid hath been our child too long for us to risk her alone. And for such love being weak and foolish, surely, sir, it was the voice of One greater than you or I that bade a man leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife."

Mr. Heatherthwayte still murmured something about "youth" and "lightly undertaken," and Master Talbot observed, with a smile, that when he had seen Humfrey he might judge as to the lightness of purpose.

Richard meanwhile was watching somewhat anxiously for the arrival of his son, who, he had reckoned, would make so much more speed than was possible for Cis, that he might have almost overtaken them, if the fatal business had not been delayed longer than he had seen reason to anticipate. However, these last words had not long been out of his mouth when a man's footsteps, eager, yet with a tired sound and with the clank of spurs, came along the paved way outside, and there was a knock at the door. Some one else had been watching; for, as the street door was opened, Cicely sprang forward as Humfrey held out his arms; then, as she rested against his breast, he said, so that she alone could hear, "Her last words to me were, 'Give her my love and blessing, and tell her my joy is come—such joy as I never knew before.'"

Then they knew the deed was done, and Richard said, "God have mercy on her soul!" Nor did Mr. Heatherthwayte rebuke him. Indeed there was no time, for Humfrey exclaimed, "She is swooning." He gathered her in his arms, and carried her where they lighted him, laying her on Oil's little bed, but she was not entirely unconscious, and rallied her senses so as to give him a reassuring look, not quite a smile, and yet wondrously sweet, even in the eyes of others. Then, as the lamp flashed on his figure, she sprang to her feet, all else forgotten in the exclamation.

"O Humfrey, thou art hurt! What is it? Sit thee down."

They then saw that his face was, indeed, very pale and jaded, and that his dress was muddied from head to foot, and in some places there were marks of blood; but as she almost pushed him down on the chest beside the bed, he said, in a voice hoarse and sunk, betraying weariness—

"Naught, naught, Cis; only my beast fell with me going down a hill, and lamed himself, so that I had to lead him the last four or five miles. Moreover, this cut on my hand must needs break forth bleeding more than I knew in the dark, or I had not frighted thee by coming in such sorry plight," and he in his turn gazed reassuringly into her eyes as she stood over him, anxiously examining, as if she scarce durst trust him, that if stiff and bruised at all, it mattered not. Then she begged a cup of wine for him, and sent Oil for water and linen, and Humfrey had to abandon his hand to her, to be cleansed and bound up, neither of them uttering a word more than needful, as she knelt by the chest performing this work with skilful hands, though there was now and