Front matter (continued 6)

He turned about and threw out his hand like a blind man feeling his way, then fell back into Portland's arms.

"Fainted," said my lord laconically. With the help of M. Zulestein he laid him on the stiff couch between the windows. One of the servants hurried for a doctor, and in the moment's confusion my Lord Leeds entered unnoticed.

Portland, as he moved from the King's couch, was the first to see him.

"Ah, my lord," he said sorrowfully, "what is to become of us all?"

"The King," murmured Portland, much moved, "is incapable of anything—do you take the direction of affairs."

"Nay, you, my lord," answered Leeds. "You are His Majesty's nearer friend."

"And your Grace is English—it will be more politic should you take this office—what of the Queen?"

"I have just come from her antechamber—even the pages and serving-maids are in tears—this is a heavy business." He himself seemed like a man utterly overcome. "She is certainly sinking—she is in private discourse now with the Archbishop."

"Doth she know?"

Leeds shook his head.

"Dr. Tenison waiteth the King's commands to tell her—but I think she hath an inner knowledge."

M. Auverqueverque came from the group by the window and whispered Portland that the King was conscious.

At this Leeds, ever warm-hearted and impulsive, went on his knees beside the couch and pressed the King's cold hand affectionately to his lips.

William sat up with his head drooping; his back was to the light, and his thick curls almost concealed his face; he held his handkerchief to his lips and shivered continually.

"The Queen," said Leeds, very low, "hath asked for Your Majesty."

The King murmured something incoherent.

"And the Archbishop," continued Leeds, with a grave gentleness, "thinketh she should be told of her danger."

"I would not have her deceived—in so important a matter," whispered the King—"tell him so." He leant forward and took Leeds by the shoulders. "Is it not an awful thing that she should die—she—to die—you ever loved her—God bless you for that, my lord—she had a sad life"—his voice became very indistinct—"she will not be sorry—but as for me——"

His hands loosened on the Duke's shoulders, and with a little moan he fell into another fainting fit, so long and deathlike that they feared for his reason or his life; it seemed, indeed, as if he would scarcely survive her whose danger caused his despair.

CHAPTER XI

THE BITTER PARTING

The Queen's bed stood out into the room, facing the long windows which looked on to the winter twilight; it was hung with four curtains of gold and blue damask sewn with many-coloured wreaths of flowers that Mary and her maids had worked when seated under the alley of wych-elm at Hampton Court.

The coverlet was of crimson satin embroidered with great roses of England and fringed with bullion. The Queen lay so still that the heavy folds were scarcely disturbed about her limbs. The curtains round the head of the bed had been drawn forward, and the pillows and the face of the Queen were in shadow.

She wore a lace cap with long lappets fastened beneath her chin and a little jacket of blue silk over her muslin nightgown. She was not disfigured, it being the most deadly symptom of her disease that there was no sign of it beyond the deep purple marks that had told Dr. Radcliffe—black smallpox—from the first, and the constant internal bleeding of her throat that had so exhausted her; that had stopped now, and she lay quite free from pain quiet for several hours; not sleeping; sleep, she said, gave her no ease.

To the right of the bed the King knelt with his face hidden in the quilt. There were several prelates and doctors in the room, and by the head of the bed Lady Temple, Madame Nienhuys, Basilea de Marsac, and Lady Portland, the Earl's second wife and Lady Temple's daughter.

At a whispered word from Dr. Radcliffe, Tenison, the new Archbishop of Canterbury, successor to the saintly Tillotson, so beloved by the King and Queen, approached the bed.

As his footfall broke the tense silence Mary lifted her languid eyes; he came round to her left, and stood, in a sorrowful attitude, looking down on her.

"Be seated, my lord," she faltered.

But out of respect to her and the presence of the King he remained standing.

Mary made a feeble motion with her right hand, which lay outside the coverlet, and sweetly stammered her repeated commands that he should sit.

Dr. Tenison obeyed, and with a heavy heart. Her gentle patience made his duty the harder. Dr. Radcliffe had just told him that since she now seemed tranquil and in full consciousness he might tell her of her approaching end.

The Bishop, a good heavy man, set about his task with pain and tenderness.

"Your Majesty will forgive me plain speaking, but I am entrusted by the King——"

She lay with her face towards him, and her brown eyes narrowed. He hesitated, fearing to greatly agitate her, and sought for a form of words in which to cast his speech.

"I am greatly grieved to see that Your Majesty is no better," he said. "Your consolation will come from heaven, not earth."

She instantly perceived his drift.

"You are come to tell me that I am dying?" she asked faintly.

He was startled that she had so instantly understood, and could not, for the moment, speak.

"I thank my God," continued the Queen, "that I have had this in my thoughts from the first. And there is nothing to be done. Search for a little escritoire in my cabinet and give it to the King. That is the end of earthly matters."

She closed her eyes and gave a little sigh.

"Will it please Your Majesty receive the Sacrament?" asked the Archbishop.

"Yes," she said at once. "Yes."

He left her, and she turned her head languidly and gazed before her at the window.

Lady Temple came forward lovingly, and looked down at her with sorrowful eyes.

"Before you light the candles," whispered Mary, "will you draw the curtains a little that I may see the sky?"

Lady Portland crossed the floor delicately and pulled back the heavy gold thread and scarlet damask from the December twilight.

A pale glow of colourless light fell across the glittering bed, the wan face of the Queen, and the motionless kneeling figure of her husband.

She could see loose grey clouds, an indistinct trail of yellow fire low behind the leafless trees which tossed slowly in a feeble wind.

She gave another little sigh and again closed her eyes. Lady Portland, weeping, drew the curtains. Basilea de Marsac and Madame de Nienhuys lit the candles on the mantelshelf, on the table between the windows, and the crystal lamp ornamented with the rose, the shamrock, and thistle in silver that hung from the centre of the ceiling.

The Queen lay still all this while; she did not speak till Dr. Tenison approached her bed again, and all the prelates in the chamber went on their knees.

"I doubt if I can swallow the bread," she murmured anxiously.

The bishops in the room took the Sacrament with her; they were all heavy with grief, and the Primate faltered in his ministrations, but she was utterly calm; she followed the holy office clearly with no hesitation. Despite her fears, she swallowed the bread without difficulty, and thanked Dr. Tenison sweetly when he had done, and lay for awhile, praying it seemed. She was so resigned that it seemed she rather desired to die than live.

Presently she whispered, "I would speak to the King."

They all withdrew from the bed to the far end of the room and the antechamber. Mary put out a trembling hand and touched the bent dark head that rested on her quilt.

"Ah, love!" she said.

He raised his face, moving for the first time since she had fallen asleep, two hours ago.

"They have told me," whispered Mary, "that I must say farewell—I always knew—forgive me that I had not the courage to tell you." She smiled. "I am so tired, and I have so much to say."

With her right hand she drew a small gold key from the bosom of her gown and gave it him.

"The little escritoire," she explained. "I asked him to give it you—only a few trifles—but you will understand."

He took it with a shudder, her left hand he held between his tightly; he did not speak; his face was as white, as hallowed, as shadowed by death, it seemed, as hers.

"I have not done much," she said; "but I have had such a little time, and it was difficult—indeed difficult. God will know I did my poor best. And I never failed in love, and I tried to do His will, but I have done nothing, and I meant to do so much——"

The King forced his voice.

"You have been a creature we were none of us fit to touch," he muttered. "You—you—oh, Marie!"

He hid his face upon her hand, and she felt his hot tears on her fingers.

"Do not grieve," she whispered. "There is still so much for you to do——"

"No more," he answered passionately; "that is over now—I shall never do anything again—never——"

Mary half raised herself on the pillows; a feverish colour came into her cheeks.

"You are rebelling against God," she said, between agitated breaths. "You must go on—your work is not finished; but the prospects are so splendid——"

"What is that to me?" he answered, in bitter despair. "I am a poor weak creature—I can do nothing—it was always you, your hope, your faith—I am no better than a thing of nought; in taking you God mocks me——"

"No—no," cried Mary, with a desperate strength. "You are going on—you will conquer—do not make it hard for me to die——"

She sank on to her pillows, coughing a little.

"I have prayed God not to let you despair—I have asked Him to comfort you——"

"There is no more comfort for me," he answered. "I want you—nothing but you on earth or in heaven——"

Mary turned her face towards him; the dark auburn hair, beneath the fine veiling of lace, hung over the edge of the tumbled pillow and touched his hand.

"Oh, my husband," she said faintly; "I have loved you with a passion that cannot end with death. You cannot—ever be alone again—I shall be there——"

Her voice sank and died; she made an effort to lean towards him. He caught her to his bosom and kissed her cold forehead with lips as cold.

"Go on," she stammered, "do not give up—the goal is nearly won——"

She became slack in his arms; he laid her back on the pillow, and rose.

She was smiling up at him, but there was an awful change in her face.

He put his hand before his eyes, and fell down beside her bed, motionless, along the shining floor.

Mary clasped her hands on her bosom, and her head drooped to one side; she continually coughed, and her lids closed heavily.

Lady Temple had run forward as the King fell; Portland and Leeds raised and carried him, easily enough, into the antechamber.

Dr. Radcliffe gave the Queen a cordial; she thanked him, and seemed a little revived.

"Let me sit up," she whispered. Her ladies raised her against the piled-up cushions. "The King"—she added—"the King?—my eyes are weak—I thought—he left me——"

"Dear Lady," answered Dorothy Temple, commanding her own tears, "he is in the next chamber——"

She knew while she spoke that he had fallen into a succession of fits so terrible that not one doctor there thought he could live.

"Perhaps," gasped Mary, "it were better if we—were spared—a final farewell—I could not well bear it——"

She leant against Lady Temple's shoulder, and her lips moved in prayer. Her face was very troubled, and she continually sighed.

"Madam, are you at peace?" asked Lady Temple.

"I am not sorry to go to God," she answered; "but I am weak about the King—I would I might have been spared a little longer with him."

Presently she fell asleep, peacefully it seemed, and still with prayers on her lips.

Lady Temple crept from the bed where Lady Portland pulled the curtains to shield the Queen from the light, and asked Dr. Radcliffe how long it might be now?

He shook his head sadly.

"A few hours, my lady."

Dorothy Temple burst out into subdued grief.

"We have the greatest loss in this lady! I have known her since she was a child, and she had never a fault—this is a bitter thing for all of us, and for England."

The doctor answered grimly—

"A more bitter thing even than you imagine, my lady. I do not think the King will live."

She looked at him in utter terror, and at that moment Portland came out of the antechamber.

"Will you go to His Majesty, doctor?" he said, in a shaking voice. "Millington doth not know what to do."

Radcliffe left them, and Lady Temple desperately seized hold of Portland's arm.

"Oh, William," she whispered; "how is the King?"

"Sorely stricken," he answered. "Is this to be the end?—that he should die for a woman!"

Lady Portland came softly from the bed to her mother and her husband.

"Doth it not seem cruel that the Queen should die?" she murmured. "They say there is no hope——"

"The Queen!" echoed Portland. "I think of the King——"

"Can you not," urged his wife anxiously, "rouse him and bring him back to her? When she wakes she will surely ask for him——"

Portland, with a little sigh of despair and weariness, went into the antechamber.

It was well lit and full of people. The King was seated on his camp-bed—a dishevelled, pitiful figure—lamenting to himself with a violence and boundless passion that had the force and incoherence of insanity.

The only one of the company who had the courage to approach him was a new-comer, my Lord Sunderland; pale, quiet, elegantly dressed, he stood between the King and the wall, and gazed down on his master with an extraordinary expression of resolution and consideration.

Portland went up to him, not without a sense of jealousy for the King's dignity, that was so shattered before these foreigners and a man like Sunderland.

"Sire," he said firmly. "Sire!"

William did not even look up; he was twisting his hands together and staring at the floor, breaking out into the bitter protests of a mind deranged.

Sunderland looked sharply at Portland.

"What do you want of him, my lord?" he asked,

"I would recall him to himself that he may take farewell of the Queen," answered Portland sternly. "But he, it seemeth, is no longer William of Nassau."

Sunderland made no answer to this; he laid his hand lightly on the King's shoulder.

"Your Highness!" he said.

The ancient title struck some chord of memory. The King raised his head; Sunderland was certainly startled at his face.

"Who spoke to me?" asked William thickly.

"The Prince of Orange," answered the Earl, "cannot fail before anything—the King of England must not——"

"Fail?" muttered the King. "Fail? Have I failed? They put too much upon me. Did they tell you of the Queen? My enemies may be satisfied now, for I shall never lift my head again——"

"The Queen," said Sunderland, "will not depart in peace unless she leaveth you calm. Sire, for her sake will you not recall your ancient courage?"

The King shook his head in a faint, exhausted fashion.

"You would not have thought that she would die so young," he murmured, "would you—she was gay, too—there was to have been a ball to-night—and she cannot live till morning——"

Lady Temple came from the Queen's room and whispered something to Lord Portland, who instantly addressed the King.

"Sire, the Queen is awake."

William rose; his cravat and waistcoat were undone over his shirt, his eyes bloodshot and dim, his hair dishevelled and damp on his forehead; he seemed to be making a tremendous effort for control; he noticed his disordered clothes.

"I would not frighten her"—it was Sunderland and not Portland to whom he spoke. The Dutchman drew back a pace. It was ironical that at such a moment the King should turn to such a man; but William had first roused at Sunderland's address, and seemed to look to him for guidance as he had looked, almost unconsciously, to him for support fifteen years ago, in the bitter days before his marriage.

The proud, stern, lonely, and scorned young Prince had then opened his heart to the dishonest, worldly, and cynical minister, and the bond of sympathy that must have been between them then showed now, when the King, fainting with mental agony, clung blindly to Sunderland's unmoved, gentle strength.

Portland marked it then and marked it now; he felt his own love useless in the face of my lord's charm. William had not even noticed his presence. He left him in the arms of Sunderland and returned to the Queen's chamber.

Dr. Tenison had been reading the Scriptures to her, and stood now by her bed with the Bible in his hand.

Lady Temple and her daughter were behind him. The younger woman was crying sadly.

Portland went up to the other side of the Queen's bed.

Mary raised her deep brown eyes and looked at him earnestly.

"My lord," she whispered—he bent over her and she caught his stiff cuff with feverish fingers—"do not let the King despair ... do not let him give up ... I shall have indeed lived in vain if he gives up ... so near too..." She paused to gather strength, and he was too moved to answer. "At first I was so afraid of you," she added wistfully, "so fearful of intruding on you and him—you were his friend before ever I came, and will be when I am gone—but of late you have tolerated me—only a woman, but I have not hindered his destiny—I let nothing stand in the way of his service—indeed, if I have ever vexed you, forgive me——"

"Madam," responded Portland tenderly, "you have been the great comfort of all of us, and we shall be utterly undone without you."

She shook her head on the tumbled pillow.

"I was only a foreigner—a stranger; you were ever extraordinarily kind to me—do not let the King stop—for this."

She fell on to silence, being greatly weakened by this effort of speech, and Portland withdrew to the end of the bed to allow Dr. Radcliffe to approach.

The Queen's words had roused curious memories in the mind of William Bentinck. It did not seem so many years ago since the fair, thoughtless, timid English girl had come, as she said, a foreigner—a stranger—to The Hague, unwanted, mistrusted, despised for her youth and her kinsman's treachery, regarded by her husband as an interruption—a vexation—the mere burden of a marriage of convenience that had been a political failure; and now she had grown to be the support of all his designs, and he was brought to a madness of despair because she lay dying, and those same aims and endeavours which her coming had intruded upon, to his anger, were now nothing to him if she should no longer be there to share them.

It was now past midnight. The Queen, having swallowed Dr. Radcliffe's cordial, spoke again, and took farewell of her ladies.

"This was to have been our dance to-night," she murmured. "I am sorry to have spoilt your pleasure——"

"There will never be any more pleasure for me," answered Dorothy Temple, who loved her exceedingly, "until I meet Your Majesty in Heaven——"

Mary was silent, lying very still. There was a little stir in the chamber as the King entered, followed by Lord Sunderland, who kept his eyes on him keenly.

The King went straight to his wife's side, and lifted the glittering curtain up.

The silence was heavy as these two looked at each other.

"Tell me," he said, "what to do—what you would have me do——"

The Queen tried to answer; but speech was beyond her power; and when she found that she could no more speak to him, for the might of death on her tongue, two tears rolled down her hollow cheeks, and, by the size of them, it was seen that she was dying indeed, for they were large as the grey pearls in her ears.

"Give me one word," said the King, and he bent low over her. She made a second attempt, but in vain. A long shudder shook her, blood came to her lips, and the tears on her face rolled off on to the pillow.

"She cannot speak!" exclaimed the King; he fell along the bed and laid his face against her hand. Sunderland touched him. He gave a sighing sob like a woman, and fainted.

My Lord Leeds helped lift and carry him to the back of the chamber; the others remained about the Queen, who was sinking so rapidly that they feared she would go before the King recovered his senses.

She put up her hands in the attitude of praying, then dropped them and turned her head about on the pillow as if she looked for the King; not seeing him, she moaned and fell into a little swoon, breathing heavily.

The watchers held painful vigil thus for near an hour, when she opened her eyes suddenly and began to speak, in a distinct though low voice; but the words she used showed that her thoughts began to break.

"We have such a short time," she said, "what can any of us do?—I hope this will show you cannot expose yourself with impunity—I shall give God thanks as long as I live for having preserved you—think of me a little and be more careful—Lord Nottingham saw my tears, I could not restrain—my father, my father, there is such a great light here, like the sun at Twickenham, no, The Hague—a letter at last—he loves, after all——"

She moved and half sat up; the lace had fallen from her head, and her hair hung in a dark mass over her shoulders; an extraordinary look of ecstasy overspread her wan face.

"Give me the child," she whispered, and held out her arms; then she coughed a little and dropped back.

A slight convulsion shook her; her breath clove her lips apart, and her lids fluttered over her eyes.

The clergymen were on their knees reading the prayer for the dying. As they finished, Dr. Radcliffe put out the candle, on the table by the bed, that shone over the Queen's face.

"It is over," he said; "Her Majesty is dead."

The Palace clock struck the four quarters, and then the hour of one.

The King opened his eyes and looked about him on the hushed kneeling figures. Portland endeavoured to restrain him, but he rose from the couch and moved slowly and languidly towards the bed.

No one dared speak or move.

When he saw the still, disordered coverlet, the shadowed face, the white hand on which the wedding-ring glowed ghastly bright, he put his hand to his breast, and stood for a full minute so, gazing at her; then his senses reeled back to oblivion and he fainted again, falling at the feet of the Archbishop, as that clergyman rose from his knees.

As he lay along the floor they marked how slight and frail he was, and, when they lifted him, how light his weight, and how reluctantly and slowly the heart that had beaten so high stirred in his bosom.

PART III

THE KING

"Man is God's masterpiece."

FRANCIS QUARLES.

CHAPTER I

VITA SINE AMOR MORS EST

Henry Sidney, Lord Romney, and the Earl of Portland were walking up and down the cloisters of Westminster Abbey. It was the end of April—a bitter spring following a severe winter; constant clouds blotted out the sun, and sudden falls of snow had left the square of grass in the centre of the cloisters wet and white.

The Earl, muffled to the chin in a red mantle, and carrying a great muff of brown fur, was talking earnestly to Lord Romney, who, though a feather-head and useless in politics, was more loved by the King than any Englishman, and of unimpeachable loyalty to the throne.

"This," said Portland, with energy, "is death or madness—nay, worse than either, for he is but a figure of himself that deceiveth us into thinking we have a King."

"God knoweth," returned Romney, who looked old and worn, sad and dejected, "never have we so needed his wisdom and his courage. Whom can we trust since the death of Her Majesty? Not even my Lord Nottingham."

"Sunderland," said the Earl, "is creeping back to favour—the knave of two reigns, who would get a third King in his clutches—and the Lord Keeper is very active in the House. Now I have done what I can to transact necessary business since the Queen's death—but I cannot do much, for the malice against foreigners is incredible——"

"No one but the King can do anything!" broke out Romney.

"I at least can do no more," admitted Portland. "And certainly my heart misgiveth me that this is going to be the end—in miserable failure."

"Why—not failure," protested the Englishman.

Portland paused by the clustered pillars which divided the open windows; a few ghastly flakes of snow were falling from a disturbed sky against the worn, crumbling, and grey masonry.

"Miserable failure," repeated the Earl; his fine fair face was pale and stern in the colourless shadows of the heavy arches. "Parliament needeth a leader, the Republic needeth her magistrate, the allies their commander—there is very much to do—with every day, more—and the man who should do it is as useless as a sick girl."

"I think," said Romney, with some gentleness, "that his heart is broken."

"A man," flashed Portland, "hath no right to a broken heart. Good God, could we not all discover broken hearts if we took time to probe them? I know the Queen's worth, what she was to him, and all of us—but is she served by this weakness of grief? He would best commemorate her by making no pause in his task."

"That is a hard doctrine," answered the Englishman half sadly.

"It is a hard fate to be a great man, my lord—the destinies of nations are not made easily nor cheaply. When the King began his task he was prepared for the price—he should not now shirk the paying of it——"

"It is higher than he thought would be exacted, my lord."

Portland answered sternly—

"You surely do not understand. What was she, after all, but an incident? He had been ten years at his work before she came."

The snow fell suddenly, and, caught and whirled by a powerful wind, filled the air with a thick whiteness like spreading smoke; it blew against the two gentlemen, and in a second covered their mantles with glittering crystals.

Romney stepped back and shook it from him.

"Shall we not go into the church," he said, with a shiver, "and persuade the King return?"

"It doth not matter if he be at her grave or in his cabinet," answered Portland gloomily, "since his temper is the same wherever he be."

Romney turned towards the low door that led into the Abbey.

"Did you mark," he said irrelevantly, "that the robin was still on her gravestone?"

"Yes," replied Portland; "it hath been singing there since she was buried."

They entered the large, mysterious church. The snowstorm had so obscured the light from the tall, high windows that the columns, roof, and tombs were alike enveloped in a deep shade; it was very cold and the air hung misty and heavy.

Above the altar, to their right, swung a red burning lamp that gave no light, but showed as a sudden gleam of crimson.

On the altar itself burnt four tall candles that gleamed on the polished gold sacred vessels and faintly showed the sweep of marble and the violet-hued carpet beyond the brass rails which divided the altar from the steps.

There was only one person visible in this large, cold, dark church, and that was a man in the front pew, entirely in black, who neither sat nor knelt, but drooped languidly against the wooden rest in front of him, with his face hidden in his right hand.

Portland and Romney took off their hats and approached the altar; they had nearly reached it before they noticed the King, whom they had left at his wife's grave.

Their footsteps were very noticeable in the sombre stillness. The King looked up and rose, holding heavily to the arm of the pew.

Romney hesitated, but Portland stepped up to William.

"We had best return, sire."

The King was silent, his eyes fixed on the altar and the fluttering gold light that dwelt there—a radiance in the gloom.

Portland touched his arm and he moved then, with no sign of animation, towards the Abbey door; his two friends followed shivering in the great spaces of the church that were more bitterly cold than the outer air.

The King's eyes turned to the shadowed dark aisles which led to the chapel of the seventh Henry and the spot where the Queen, a few months ago young, and beautiful, and gay, now lay among her royal kinsmen, dust with dust.

The King opened the heavy door and stepped out into the bitter light of the snowstorm which hid sky and houses, whitened the coach waiting and the liveries of the impatient footmen who walked about in the endeavour to keep warm. The King himself was in an instant covered from head to foot; he gave a lifeless shudder as one so sick with life that sun and snow were alike to him.

He entered the coach and the two lords followed him; there was no word spoken; his friends had lost heart in the fruitless endeavour of comfort; he had scarcely spoken since the Queen's death, scarcely raised his eyes; for six weeks he had remained in his chamber, and now he came abroad it was to no purpose, for he took no interest in anything in life.

He gave himself much to religious observances, and was often closeted with the Archbishop; he uttered no word of complaint, never even had mentioned his wife's name, which was the more remarkable after the first frantic passion of his grief; he would attend to no business and see no one; he replied to the addresses of the Houses only by a few incoherent words; his answers as they appeared in the Gazette were written by Portland.

He fainted often, and his spirits sunk so low that the doctors feared he would die of mere apathy, for all their devices were useless to rouse him to any desire to live.

Portland could do nothing. M. Heinsius, Grand Pensionary of Holland, wrote in vain from The Hague; that long, intimate, and important correspondence was broken by the King for the first time since his accession; the allies clamoured in vain for him whose guidance alone kept the coalition together; factions raged in parliament with no authority to check them; the Jacobites raised their heads again, and, the moment the breath was out of the Queen, began their plots for a French invasion and the assassination of the one frail life that stood for the forces of Protestantism; this was generally known, though not proved, but the King cared for none of it.

The home government, since the retirement of Leeds after the East India scandal, was in many hands, mostly incompetent; foreign affairs fared worse, for these the King had always kept almost entirely in his own control, and had scarcely even partially trusted any of his English ministers on these matters, that, as he was well aware, neither their knowledge nor their characters fitted them to deal with. Portland held many of the clues to the King's immense and intricate international policy, and he had done what he could with matters that could not wait, but he could not do everything, nor do anything for long, and what he could not do was left undone.

As the Royal coach swung into Whitehall courtyard the sudden snowstorm had ceased and a pale, cold ray of sun pierced the disturbed clouds.

The King had lately taken a kind of horror to his villa at Kensington, and resided at Whitehall, though he had always detested this palace, and the foul air of London was perilous to his health.

There was, however, no pretence even of a Court. The ladies, with their music, their sewing, their cards and tea drinking, had vanished; the Princess Anne, nominally reconciled to the King, lived at St. James's, and no woman came to Court now; the great galleries, chambers, and corridors were empty save for a few Dutch sentries and ushers and an occasional great lord or foreign envoy waiting to ask my Lord Portland when His Majesty would be fit to do business.

Without a word or a look to any the King passed through the antechamber to his private apartments. Portland stopped to speak to Lord Sunderland, who was talking to the Lord Keeper, Sir John Somers, the Whig lawyer, as industrious, as honest, and as charming as any man in England, and an extraordinary contrast to Sunderland in character. The two were, however, for a moment in league, and had together brought about that reconciliation of the King and the Princess Anne that set the throne on a firmer basis, though neither had as yet dared to bring forward my Lord Marlborough.

Romney, who disliked the everyday virtues of the middle-class Lord Keeper, would have preferred to follow the King, but William gave him no invitation, but entered his apartments and closed the door, so he had to join the little group of three.

Their talk was for a while of general matters—of the heats in parliament and the prospects of the campaign of the allies under Waldeck and Vaudemont; each was silent about the matter uppermost in his mind—the recovery of the King. Portland, the lifelong friend, upright, noble, stern; Romney, gay, impulsive, shallow, but loyal and honest; Somers, worthy, tireless, a Whig, and of the people; Sunderland, aristocrat and twice told a traitor, shameless, secretive, and fascinating, by far the finest statesman of the four—all these had one object in common, to rouse the man on whom depended the whole machinery of the English government and the whole fate of the huge coalition against France, which had taken twenty years to form.

Sunderland, heartily disliked by the other three, yet master of all of them, suddenly, with delicate precision, came to the heart of the matter.

"Unless all Europe is to slip back into the hands of France," he said, "the King must take up his duties."

"This temper of his is making him most unpopular," remarked Somers, who, honestly grateful to his master, had always endeavoured to turn people and parliament to an affection for the King. "Though the Queen was greatly beloved they resent this long mourning."

"She held the King and country together," answered Sunderland. "Her English birth, her tactful, pretty ways did His Majesty more service here than a deal of statecraft—the Jacks know that; the country is swarming with them, and unless it is all to end in disaster—the King must act his old part."

Portland flushed.

"You say so, my lord, but who is to rouse a man utterly prostrate? Nothing availeth to draw him from his sloth."

"He is neither dead nor mad," said Sunderland calmly. "And grief is a thing that may be mastered. He should go to Flanders in May and take command of the allies."

"It is impossible!" broke out Sidney. "Did you mark him but now? He hardly lifts his eyes from the floor, and I have not heard him speak one word these ten days."

Sunderland answered quietly—

"A man who hath done what he hath cannot utterly sink into apathy—there is a spirit in him which must respond, if it be but rightly called upon."

"Will you assay to rouse His Majesty?" asked Portland haughtily.

Sunderland's long eyes narrowed.

"I am bold to try where your lordship hath failed," he said, with a deference that was like insolence; "but it is a question of great matters, and I will make the trial."

"You will make it in vain, my lord," answered Romney. "The King is beyond even your arts."

Sunderland delicately lifted his shoulders.

"We can but see." He looked rather cynically round the other three men. "If the King is out of the reach of reason it is as well we should know it, my lords."

Portland did not reply. He bitterly resented that this man, whom he scorned and despised, should gain this intimacy with the King's weakness; but he led the way to William's apartments. He had practically control of affairs since the King's collapse, and no one questioned his coming or going.

They found William in his cabinet that overlooked the privy gardens, at the bottom of which the river rolled black and dismal in contrast to the glitter of the snow on the paths and flowerbeds.

The King sat by the window, gazing out on this prospect, his head sunk on his breast and his left arm along the sill of the window. The crimson cut crystal bracelet round his wrist was the only light or colour on his person, for he wore no sword, and his heavy black clothes were unbraided and plain; the considerable change in his appearance was largely heightened by this complete mourning, for he had seldom before worn black, having, indeed, a curious distaste to it. He had been born in a room hung with funeral trappings and lit only with candles, and for the first months of his life never left this black chamber, which had caused, perhaps, a certain revulsion in him to the sables of mourning, which he had worn only once before, when, a pale child of ten, he had been dressed in black for his young mother, that other Mary Stewart whose coffin lay in Westminster within a few feet of that of his wife.

He did not seem to notice that any had entered upon his privacy. Portland glanced back at Romney and the Lord Keeper with a look that seemed to convey that he felt hopeless of my Lord Sunderland doing what he had boasted; but that lord went forward with his usual quiet carriage.

A large fire filled the room with cheerful light that glowed on the polished Dutch pottery and rich Dutch pictures on the mantelshelf and walls. On a marquetry bureau, with glittering brass fuchsia-shaped handles, was a pile of unopened letters, and amid them a blue-glazed earthenware dragon that used to stand in the Queen's withdrawing-room at Hampton Court.

Sunderland paused, looking at the King. The three other men remained inside the door, watching with painful attention.

"Sire," said the Earl, "there is news from France. M. de Luxembourg, who was your greatest enemy, is dead."

The King did not move.

"It is a great loss to King Louis," added Sunderland. "They say M. de Villeroy is to have the command."

William slowly turned his head and looked at the speaker, but without interest or animation, almost, it seemed, without recognition.

Sunderland came nearer. A book was lying on the window-seat, he glanced at it—it was Dr. Tenison's sermon on the text, "I have sworn and am steadfastly purposed to keep thy righteous judgments," which had been preached after the Queen's death, and printed by the King's command.

Sunderland spoke again.

"The Whigs have ousted my Lord Leeds and his friend Trevor—and continue to press heavily upon him."

Again it was doubtful if the King heard; he fixed his large mournful eyes steadily upon the Earl, and made no sign nor answer.

Sunderland, finding neither of these matters touched the King, drew from the bosom of his grey satin waistcoat a roll of papers.

"Sir Christopher Wren showed me these this morning," he said, "and doubted if he dared bring them to Your Majesty. They are those plans for the turning of Greenwich Palace into a hospital that Her Majesty had ever at heart."

The three men watching caught their breath at the delicate bluntness of my lord. This time there could be no doubt that the King had heard; he made some incoherent answer and held out his hand for the plans, which he unrolled and gazed at.

"It should be a noble monument," said the Earl softly, "to Her Majesty and those who fell at La Hogue fight. Sir Christopher would have an inscription along the river frontage saying she built it, and a statue of her—looking along the Thames to London."

The King answered in a low voice—

"Let it be put in hand at once."

"Will Your Majesty see Sir Christopher?"

William lifted his eyes from the drawings.

"No—let him get to work," he murmured; then, after a second, "Do you not think it will be a worthy monument?"

"So fine that I can but think of one more worthy," answered Sunderland.

A languid colour touched the King's hollow cheek.

"What is that?"

"The completion of Your Majesty's life-work."

There was silence. The King paled again and looked out of the window.

"I cannot talk of business," he said hoarsely, after a while.

"I speak of the Queen—her wishes," answered Sunderland. "She greatly desired the building of Greenwich Hospital, but she still more desired the preservation of this realm—and of the Republic."

At this last word the King gave a little shiver.

"The Republic," repeated Sunderland, "needeth Your Majesty."

William looked round again—his face was troubled.

"You speak to a dead man," he said, in a hurried whisper. "I have finished."

"If that be so," replied the Earl, "we and the United Provinces are lost, and King Louis will triumph after all, yea, after all the toil, and loss, and patience, and endeavour, France will triumph over Europe. Your Majesty had better not have flung the gauntlet in '72—better to have bowed to France then than submit now."

The King seemed disturbed; he laid the plans of Greenwich down and moved his hands restlessly.

"I am not fit for—anything," he muttered. "I am not capable of military command—there are others—I have been at this work twenty years—let some other take it up——"

"There is no other," said Sunderland. "This is Your Majesty's task, and no one else can undertake it."

The King looked round in a desperate fashion; he saw the three men at the other end of the room.

"Why do you come bating me?" he asked. "I tell you there is nothing more in me"—he laid his hand on his heart—"all is dead—here."

A sudden violent cough shook him; he gasped with pain.

"In a few months I shall be with her," he added, and his voice was so weak and shaken that Sunderland could scarcely catch the words.

"Doth not Your Majesty believe in predestination?"

William was silent.

"Doth not Your Majesty believe that God hath some further use for you?"

The King answered simply and with infinite sadness—

"I think He hath had from me all the work I am capable of."

"No," said Sunderland. "Your greatest tasks, your greatest victories lie before you. William of Nassau will not die while the battle rageth. God, who put you in the vanguard of the world, will not let you fall out with the deserters."

The King drew a sharp breath; he seemed considerably moved and agitated; his dark eyes turned to Sunderland.

"What is it to you whether I fail or no?" he asked wildly.

The Earl smiled.

"I stand for England, sire. Besides that, I always believed in you, and you are the only man in Europe worth serving."

William flushed.

"You speak very boldly."

"I spoke boldly to Your Majesty in '77. I said to you then, you are the Prince for England—your moment will come. The little things, sir, often clog, and hamper, and bewilder, but in the end the big things win—as Your Majesty will win, though through wearisome ways. Sir, kingdoms are large stakes. Sir, to be a champion of a creed is a great responsibility, and he who taketh it up must forgo the grief of common men, for surely his tears are demanded as well as his blood."

William sat motionless, with his hand to his side.

"You think I can take it all up again?" he asked, in his hoarse, strained voice. "My God! I think it is too late."

Sunderland turned and whispered something to Somers, who left the room; to the King he said—

"I entreat Your Majesty see a young officer new come from Flanders."

CHAPTER II

THE KING IS NEEDED

Sunderland remained by the silent King, on whom he kept his clear, strong glance; Portland and the beautiful Romney went into the antechamber, where they could speak freely.

"What charlatan's trick is this?" said the Earl, in a low, angry voice. "Who is this officer from Flanders? It is strange to hear my Lord Sunderland mouth these godly sentiments—he, a man merely fighting for a place——"

"Yet he spoke," admitted Romney, "and we were silent. And he roused the King. If it be mere self-interest it had the effect of sincerity."

Portland made no answer; he knew that he could not have spoken to William with the quiet tact and insinuating boldness that Sunderland had, but he knew also that he had served and loved the King in a way Sunderland could probably not even understand, and his heart swelled at what he considered calculated tricks to goad the King into filling a position where he might be useful to my lord; in this Portland's rigid honesty was unfair to Sunderland, who, though he was knavish sometimes in his means, was seldom knavish in his ends, and perhaps strove for as high an ideal as William Bentinck, though by different ways.

Lord Romney spoke again.

"After all, what doth it matter—if the King could be drawn out of his sloth?"

Portland's fair face was still dark and sombre; he rather despised the Englishman; he rather regretted the day when he had come to England to take up these perilous honours among a people who detested him. Romney glanced at him, gave a little shrug, and returned to the King's room; his love for William was of a different quality, his code was easier; he was thankful that the King should, under any circumstances, recover his balance, and he, Henry Sidney, could see no great dishonour in the public actions of my Lord Sunderland, and regarded him from no such stern standpoint as did William Bentinck.

He found the King had moved and now sat beside the bureau piled with the untouched correspondence. Sunderland was still at the window looking out at the inky line of the river between the white banks and the slow progress of a barge with dull yellow sails that struggled with a sluggish wind past Whitehall stairs.

Romney went over to him.

"You have done much, my lord," he whispered warmly; "we must all be grateful."

Sunderland turned his faded, powdered face from the window.

"He will finish the campaign yet, I think," he answered.

The Lord Keeper and Lord Portland re-entered the room, and with them was a third gentleman, who went at once to Lord Sunderland, like one waiting for directions; that nobleman took him gently by the arm and drew him towards the King, who had not yet looked up.

"Sire," he said, "Your Majesty knoweth M. van Keppel, who hath been some years in your service."

The King raised his eyes and saw the splendid figure of a young Dutch officer standing before him with great humility and respect.

"Yes, I remember you, Mynheer," he murmured, with a faint animation, and speaking his own language.

Sunderland stepped back and the young soldier went on one knee.

"Are you come from Flanders?" asked William.

"Yes, sire."

"From my Cousin Vaudemont's force?"

"Yes, sire."

"What is your business with us?" asked the King faintly.

Joost van Keppel rose.

"My business is more than I dare broach," he said humbly.

The King looked at him kindly.

"I shall not be angry." He exerted himself to graciousness, and his glance seemed to rest with a wistful kind of pleasure on the youth.

Certainly Joost van Keppel had an appearance well calculated to win the hearts of those who looked upon him, for a mingled sweetness and ardour made a kind of radiance in his face, as if he gave forth the light of hope and courage. He was tall and robust, of a bright fairness, with dark brown eyes of an extraordinary power and gentleness, a smiling, strong mouth, and a fine carriage of nobility in his port; his rich-coloured brown hair hung in full curls over his gay and vivid uniform; there was a great quantity of gold on his sword belt and in his shoulder knots; in the firelight he glittered from head to foot with a changing light of gold; but despite his youthful strength and the magnificence of his appointments the prevailing impression of his person was that of a gentle, soft, and winning sweetness that sat very graciously on the unconscious demeanour of a noble soldier.

"Were you not a page to us?" asked the King.

"Yes, Your Majesty. I was with those who had the honour to come to England with Your Majesty," answered M. van Keppel. "Your Majesty showed me great kindness in promoting me."

He had a gentle and charming address, an eager air of deference wholly pleasing.

"I had forgotten," said the King. "So you have come from Flanders?"

He gave a little sigh.

"Oh, sire!" cried Joost van Keppel, "I am come to tell Your Majesty that we need you!"

The King sat up and looked at Portland and the Englishmen.

"Ah!" he said, in an angry, broken voice. "What device is this you put upon me? No use, my lords, no use; this back will bear no more burdens."

"Absolve me," cried Portland. "I know nothing of this——"

"A trick," continued the King—"a trick to spur me. What are you, Mynheer, to come and tell me of my duty?"

van Keppel threw himself again on his knees.

"The King is needed," he repeated, with great passion. "I love Your Majesty enough to dare tell you so. Sire, the Republic crieth out to Your Majesty!"

"Who told you to speak thus?" asked William bitterly.

"M. Heinsius," answered the young soldier instantly.

At that name the King changed countenance.

"M. Heinsius," he muttered; then he fixed M. van Keppel with a keen look and added—"Why did he choose you?"

"Because Your Majesty used to have some kindness for me," was the reply, given with a frank modesty; "because no man living could revere Your Majesty more than I do."

"I am not used to be so courted," said William sternly. "You have too ready a tongue. M. Heinsius may find another messenger."

He rose and would have turned away, but the young man, still on his knees, caught the King's stiff silk coat skirts.

"Will the Prince of Orange ever refuse to listen to the appeal of the United Provinces?" he asked, with singular sweetness and force.

William looked down at him, hesitated, then said faintly—

"Rise, Mynheer. I am not your King. As for the Republic"—he sank into the great wand-bottomed chair again and said abruptly—"how think they the campaign will go?"

M. van Keppel got to his feet and stood his full splendid height.

"M. de Vaudemont saith, sire, that if Your Majesty would come to lead us there is no question that the allies might do more than they have ever done." He paused a moment, then continued, "M. de Boufflers is guarding the banks of the Sambre; a great army is collected from the Lys to the Scheldt. M. de Villeroy, they say, is to fix his headquarters at Tournay; but the allies are ready to take the field—operations could begin next month. M. de Vaudemont and M. Heinsius have written so to Your Majesty."

William glanced at the pile of unopened correspondence; he flushed and looked again at M. van Keppel.

"Sire," said the young soldier proudly, "there is Fleurus, Steinkirk, and Landen to avenge. I rode past Namur a week ago and saw the Bourbon lilies flying above the keep."

"Namur!" repeated William, and his eyes widened.

The loss of Namur had been the worst disaster of all the disasters of the war. William had perhaps never known such humiliation as when the great fortress fell before his eyes.

"M. de Vauban," continued Joost van Keppel, "hath added to the fortifications of M. Kohorn and declared the town impregnable; they have fixed a vaunting notice over the gate defying us to retake it—but, sire, it could be done."

"There spoke a soldier!" flashed the King. "That spirit in my men wrested back the three Provinces in '74."

"That spirit is alive still, sire—they who drove back the French then could take Namur now."

William looked at Sunderland.

"Would your English be pleased," he asked, "if we took Namur?"

"There is nothing would so delight the people as a great victory in the Low Countries," answered that nobleman.

"So they defy us," said the King. "And Namur is even more important than it was; it must be the strongest fortress in Europe. Certainly it is a prize worth while."

van Keppel spoke again.

"M. de Maine is to be sent with M. de Villeroy."

"So they send M. de Maine to fight us, do they?" exclaimed the King. "We should be the equal of M. de Maine."

He looked kindly and steadily at M. van Keppel.

"My child," he said, "you are a good patriot, and that is the best thing in the world to be. We must give you a regiment. We hope to see you in Flanders."

He smiled, and the young soldier, who had been taught all his life to regard him as the first of living men, bowed, overwhelmed, with tears of pleasure in his eyes.

William gave him his hand and Joost van Keppel kissed it reverently, then, at a delicate sign from Sunderland, retired, followed by the Lord Keeper.

The King sat very quiet, looking into the fire. Portland came and stood behind his chair.

"Will you go out to the war?" he asked.

"Yes," said William simply.

Sunderland darted a sideway look at Portland, who flushed.

"I am indeed glad of that," he said sternly.

"That is a gallant youngster," said the King. "I ever liked him. I will keep him about me; he is a pleasant creature."

"He is," replied Portland; "a rakehelly good-for-nought, as every one knows."

William smiled faintly; he was the most tolerant of men, and had no interest in those faults that did not cross his designs.

"I have loved rakes before," he said, and looked at my Lord Romney.

The two Englishmen laughed a little, but Portland answered, with some anger—

"He is a young prodigal with more debts than wits; you should not have given him your hand."

The King did not resent his friend's brusque address, he answered quietly, in his weak voice—

"It would give me pleasure to pay some of those debts."

Sunderland softly put in a remark.

"M. van Keppel is the most obliging, sweet-tempered gentleman in the world, and one most devoted to Your Majesty."

"And a great friend of your lordship," said Portland, with a cold haughtiness. He perceived, as he thought, a design on the part of Sunderland and Somers, with perhaps Marlborough behind them, to put up a rival to share with him the King's affections, which had been wholly his for near their joint lives, and he could not contain his scorn and resentment, nor was he assuaged by the obvious unconsciousness of the King.

Romney made some attempt to shift the subject; he came forward in the easy gracious way habitual to him.

"Your Majesty will be soon for Flanders, then?" he asked. "It is a noble resolution."

William rose.

"I think it is my duty," he answered. He took up the plans of Greenwich Palace from the window-sill. "I think it is all there is for me to do. I thank you, my lords," he added, with dignity, "for having so long borne with me."

He gave a little bow and left them to enter the inner room. As the door closed on him Sunderland smiled at the other two.

"Have I not succeeded?" he demanded. "He is roused, he will go out to the war, I even think that he will take Namur."

"You are very clever, my lord," admitted Romney, "and surely you have done the King a great service."

Portland broke in hotly—

"You pulled the strings of your puppet very skilfully; you know how to deal with the weaknesses of men, but those who are the King his friends do not love to see him practised on for party purposes."

"I stand for more than party purposes," answered Sunderland, with sudden haughtiness. "My cause is the King his cause—that is sufficient—and for the rest, my deeds are not answerable at the tribunal of your virtues, my lord."

Portland came a step nearer to him.

"You scarce believe in God—you are little better than an atheist—yet all these terms are glib upon your tongue, and your tool, a shallow popinjay, can prate very nicely of sacred things. You are not sincere—you care for nothing—for no one."

Romney made a little movement as if he would have stepped between the two earls, but Sunderland answered unmoved—

"I have my policy too much at heart to jeopardize it by expounding it myself. I fear that my principles would suffer by my lack of eloquence."

"Your principles!" cried Portland. "Your policy—what is it?"

"Too precious a thing for me to risk on a turn of the tongue, I repeat, my lord. I speak in actions. Watch them and know my answer."

CHAPTER III

ATTAINMENT

It was the commencement of the campaign of 1695; as yet nothing had been done either side. The men at Versailles who managed the war had concentrated their forces in Flanders, and there the allies had gathered to meet them; the Elector of Bavaria and other princes of the Empire were encamped with the Germans guarding Brussels; the Brandenburghers and Spanish lay at Huy; the Dutch and British under the command of the King of England, at Ghent.

The French waited. Villeroy was not Luxembourg; he had no genius for command, and he was hampered by the presence of the Duc de Maine, his pupil and his superior, who showed no aptitude for war, not even common courage. Boufflers watched the King of England, the meaning of whose marches he could not fathom; his oblique moves might cover a design on either Ypres or Dunkirk; for a month they continued, and neither Villeroy nor Boufflers suspected an attempt on Namur.

But on June 28th, the King, the Elector, and the Brandenburghers advanced with a swift concerted movement straight on Namur with such suddenness and rapidity that M. de Boufflers had scarcely time to throw himself into the fortress before the three divisions of the allied army closed round the walls of the town.

The Prince de Vaudemont had been left in Flanders to watch Villeroy. That general believed he could wipe out this force and then drive the allies from Namur—he said as much in his dispatches to Versailles; but M. de Vaudemont effected a masterly retreat into Ghent, and the easiness of the French Court was disturbed, especially as it was whispered that an action had been avoided owing to the poltroonery of M. de Maine.

M. de Kohorn, the principal engineer of the allies, had set his heart on the capture of the fortress that he had seen taken by his great master and rival, M. de Vauban. The Frenchman had since added considerably to the fortifications, and rendered Namur the strongest fortress in the world, and M. de Kohorn was spurred by professional pride into a desperate attempt to make good his failure of three years ago.

A week after the trenches were opened the English foot guards gained the outworks on the Brussels side; on the seventeenth the first counterscarp of the town was captured; on the twentieth the Germans gained Vauban's line of fortifications cut in the rock from the Sambre to the Meuse and the great sluice or waterworks; on the twenty-third the Dutch and English made conquest of the second counterscarp, and the town capitulated, Boufflers and the garrison retiring into the citadel, leaving behind them about fifteen hundred wounded men to be cared for by the allies.

On the 6th of August the allies, led by the King of England, marched into Namur by the St. Nicolas Gate, and prepared for the last and terrible assault on the garrison.

Villeroy, who had meantime taken the petty towns of Dixmuyde and Deynse, endeavoured to induce the King to raise the siege of Namur by menacing Brussels, which he shelled and greatly damaged; but in vain, for William was not to be lured into relinquishing his prey, and Villeroy, after two days, marched on to Enghien, and, having collected the greater number of the French troops in the Netherlands, amounting in all to over eighty thousand men, advanced to the relief of Namur.

But the Prince de Vaudemont having now joined the allied forces it was considered that they were strong enough to face Villeroy, and at the same time continue the siege of the castle and hold the town.

On the fifteenth the French host fired a salute of ninety guns as a haughty promise of relief to Boufflers; from then to the nineteenth the two mighty armies faced each other, neither making any movement. Europe held its breath, Paris and London, The Hague and Vienna, Brussels, still half prostrate from French fires, Rome and Madrid waited in almost unbearable suspense for the result of the promised and, it seemed, inevitable combat between the two finest and largest armies that had ever met on European soil.

Boufflers burnt fire signals every night on his watch-towers, which urged haste to Villeroy, who still lay beyond the mighty ring of the confederate army who incessantly stormed the citadel.

On the nineteenth the King rose at dawn, got his forces under arms, and rode from post to post surveying his troops and watching the enemy; he was in the saddle from four in the morning till nightfall, and tired out three horses. When he returned to his tent that had been pitched in the encampment on the west of the town near the Abbey of Salsines, there was no portion of his vast army that he had not personally inspected.

He dined alone; the Elector of Bavaria and the other German princes being in immediate command of the troops that were actually storming Namur.

He expected that Villeroy would attack him as soon as it was light, and his preparations were complete.

He had an interview with M. Dyckfelt, who was with the army as representative of the States General, and was then alone, it being about ten of the clock and a hot summer night.

All the light in the tent came from a silver lamp suspended from the cross-poles, which gave an uncertain and wavering illumination. The King sat in the shadows; on the little table beside him was his sword, his pistols, and a map of Namur.

He was thinking of twenty-three years ago when, in his early youth, he had first led an army against France; his entire force then had numbered little more than the servants, footmen, and attendants in his retinue now. All Europe had been against him, half his country in the hands of the enemy, the home government in the control of the opposing factions. The man of forty-four looked back at the achievements of the youth of twenty-one with an extraordinary sense—almost of wonder.

He recalled with painful vividness how Buckingham and Arlington had come to offer him the shameful terms of France and England, their scorn at his rejection of the bitter bargain, and how even William Bentinck, gay and thoughtless then, had despaired. Hopeless, indeed, it had seemed; there had not been one to believe in him; but he had never doubted his own destiny.

And now he was justified in what he had undertaken, at least that, whatever sorrows, humiliations, and disappointments had darkened his way the outward semblance was of great and steady success.

The Prince, who had been little better than a State prisoner and a pawn in the politics of Europe, heir to a ruined family and leader of a despairing nation, was now a King, directing half Europe, with one of the mightiest armies the world had seen behind him. Of the monarchs who had offered to silence his despised defiance with dishonourable terms one was now dead, and he held his kingdoms; and the other, who then had threatened to overrun the world, was now with difficulty holding his own against a coalition that included all the principal countries of Europe.

Not without concession, infinite patience, endless trouble, and long waiting had William got these allies together. For the support and the millions of England he was paying a price none but himself could gauge the bitterness of. To Scandinavia he had had to sacrifice some of his cherished maritime privileges; Spain, the most provoking of the confederates, had been kept by much expenditure of art and money; the German princes had been held together by a title, a garter, a subsidy, an honour, a promise of a prospective dignity. Now, before the walls of Namur, the man whose genius and indomitable courage had, during twenty years, toiled towards this end, might feel that he was beginning to taste his reward.

He was facing France, equal to equal; he was feared and respected throughout the world. The Protestant faith, threatened with extinction by Louis, he had placed on a basis from which, as long as any faith lasted, it could never be displaced. His country was free, and prosperous, and foremost among nations again; the power of France was already too crippled for there to be longer any fear of her upsetting the balance of power.

The English fleet, useless since Elizabeth, again was mistress of the seas. Russell passed unmolested between Spain and Italy, defied the remnant of the French fleet imprisoned in Toulon port, and dared the whole of the Mediterranean seaboard. Berkeley passed unmolested along the French coast, burnt Granville, shelled Calais and Dunkirk, and kept the English flag high and undisputed above the Channel.

The man who had been the boy who had once passionately resolved to do these things found the realization of them different indeed to those bright imaginings. Attainment of fame, honour, power, success could not give more than a faint remembrance of the throb of exultation the youthful Prince had felt when he, penniless, unsupported, hampered in every possible way, had first flung his challenge to overwhelming odds. Then there had been everything to do; but ardent courage and unspoilt faith had gilded difficulties, and the heroic pride of youth had smiled at obstacles; now the loss of a love the boy had never dreamt of had made all things else appear small to the man.

Twenty years of toil, of acquaintance with treachery, deceit, smallness, weakness, twenty years of misunderstood endeavour, of constant strain, of constant fatigue had done their work. The fine spirit did not shrink from its task, but never again could it recapture the early glow of hope, the early ecstasy of labour, the early pride of achievement.

What was his achievement, after all. He might well think that the God he had served so patiently had mocked him. He had loved but to lose his love; he had bartered his personal ease, almost his liberty, almost his pride for bitter honours held in exile; his health was utterly worn out, his days were a continual weariness and pain; he was again as lonely as he had been when he was the prisoner of the States; he had no heir, and the main branch of his family died with him; if he could not finish himself his task he must entrust it to strangers to complete. Surely all was utter vanity and vexation. The cold consolations of a sombre faith only supported him. He clung to those beliefs in which Mary had died, and faced the few years that at best remained to him with the same high courage with which she had met her fate.

He rose presently, in the perfect stillness, and went to the entrance of his tent, lifted the flap, and looked out.

The French red flares on the towers of Namur were visible across the great plain of the Sambre and Meuse; the starlight showed the huge encampment stretching out of sight under the clear sky: near by a sentry paced with his musket over his shoulder; it was very hot and not a blade of grass stirred in the absolute arrested stillness.

Presently a surgeon passed through the tents carrying a lantern and followed by a servant leading a mule laden with his chest. The light flickered awhile amid the canvas then disappeared; a dog barked and a man whistled to it; the silence fell again as intense as before.

The King went back and flung himself on his couch; he could not come near sleep, but lay watching the long, pale beams of light the lamp cast over the worn grass that formed the floor of the hastily constructed tent.

His mind kept dwelling on his first campaign, his miserable army, his own ignorance of all but book tactics, his lack of money, of authority—yet that had been the first spark of that fire that now lit Europe. He had formed and trained his own armies—Dutch, Brandenburghers, Swedes, Germans, and lately the English—until they were equal to those consummate French troops who had laughed at him in '72; but they fought with no more devotion and courage than the handful of Hollanders who had rallied round him then, now incorporated into the famous Dutch Guards, the most beloved of all his beloved army.

He thought of these Guards marching against Villeroy now, feared and honoured, and his heart fluttered faintly with a fleeting pleasure that they should ever face the French on these terms.

He closed his eyes and instantly there spread before him a vision of the great banqueting hall at Whitehall hung with black, and the banners and armours of his family, while in the centre was a mighty catafalque of black velvet which bore an open coffin, at the foot of which lay a royal crown and sceptre. She who rested there was covered to the chin in gold stuff, and round her head was twisted her dark, curling, auburn hair.

The King sprang up and walked up and down the uneven ground; he drew from under his shirt and cravat a long, black ribbon, to which was attached a gold wedding-ring and a long lock of that same rich hair that he had seen in his vision.

He paused under the lamp and gazed at it; in that moment he prayed that he might find his death in to-morrow's battle with as much passion as any poor wretch ever prayed for hope of life. He was still standing so, forgetful of time and place, when he heard voices without, and hastily put the ribbon back over his heart.

The flap was raised and the figure of a young officer showed against the paling sky.

"Is it M. van Keppel?" asked the King quietly.

"Yes, sire." The speaker entered. He had been sent with the King's commands to the Elector of Bavaria.

"M. de Bavaria understands everything?" inquired William.

"He is quite ready, sire."

"So are we," said the King. "I should think M. de Villeroy would make the attack in an hour or so—the dawn is breaking, is it not?"

"The sun was just rising, sire, above the river, as I rode from the camp of His Highness."

"Yet the light is very faint here. Will you, Mynheer, light the other lamp?" The King spoke gently, but he had quite regained that command of himself which rendered his demeanour so stately and impressive.

M. van Keppel obeyed and was then retiring, but William, who was seated by the table, asked him to stay.

"I may have another message for you," he added.

The officer bowed.

William rang the little hand-bell near him and a valet instantly appeared from the curtained inner portion of the tent. The King lived very simply when at the camp. He now asked for wine, and when it was brought made M. van Keppel drink with him, which honour caused the young soldier to redden with pleasure.

"I hear," said William, "that the garrisons of Dixmuyde and Deynse have been sent prisoners to France. That breaketh the treaty we made for the exchange of captives—treachery and insolence, it seemeth, are the only methods of France."

"Treachery and insolence will not for ever prevail," answered Joost van Keppel, in his sweet, ardent voice. "The fortunes of Your Majesty begin to overleap the arrogance of France."

"There will be a great battle to-day," remarked the King quietly and irrelevantly.

The powerful summer dawn, strengthening with every moment, penetrated the tent and mingled with the beams of the two lamps. The King sat in the crossed lights; his gentleman knelt before him, fastening the great gilt spurs to his close riding-boots. He looked at Joost van Keppel gravely and kindly; his face, pale in its proper complexion, was tanned darkly by the Lowland sun; his eyes were extraordinarily bright and flashing, but languid lidded and heavily shadowed beneath; his large, mobile mouth was set firmly; his long, thick curls hung over his black coat, across which showed the blue ribbon and star that he had not removed since he had reviewed his forces yesterday.

"Mynheer," he said to M. van Keppel. "Lift the flap and look out——"

The young Dutchman obeyed and a full sunbeam struck across the dim artificial light.

"A fine day," remarked William; he was ever fond of sun and warmth.

As M. van Keppel stood so, holding back the canvas and gazing over the tents that spread across the plain of the Meuse, a gentleman, armed on back and breast with a gold inlaid cuirass, wrapped in a black silk mantle and carrying a hat covered with white plumes, rode up, dismounted, and entered the King's tent without a word of ceremony.

M. van Keppel bowed very respectfully; it was the Earl of Portland.

On seeing the King alone with the young officer his face darkened; he answered the King's greeting of unconscious affection with stern brusqueness.

"There are letters from England—I met the messenger," he said, and laid the packet on the table by the wine-glasses.

Joost van Keppel was quick to see the instant shock that William quivered under, and to perceive the cause of it. When last the King had been at the war not a post had arrived from London without a letter from the Queen. The young man thought Portland had acted with some harshness; he came forward and said impulsively—

"Letters from England, my lord, are not of such importance that they cannot wait till after the battle."

This was to Portland incredible impertinence; he stared at the flushed, generous face with bitterly angry eyes; but William seemed relieved.

"Yes, let the news wait," he said, and rose.

"If this was known in London what would they say?" broke out Portland.

"How can it be known in London when I have none here but friends?" answered the King.

"I thank Your Majesty for including me with M. van Keppel as your friend," flashed Portland.

The King looked at him sharply, then from one man to another.

"Mynheer van Keppel," he said, "you will return to M. de Bavaria and tell him to be in readiness for a message from us."

The officer bowed with great deference and sweetness to his master and the Earl, and instantly retired.

"Will you not read those letters?" asked Portland, in no way appeased.

William gave him a glance between reproach and wonder, broke the seals, and looked over the letters.

"Nothing," he said, when he laid them down, "save that some sugar ships from Barbadoes have been taken by the French, that there is great uneasiness on the Stock Exchange."

"Nothing of M. de Leeds?" asked Portland.

"No," said the King; he was standing up and his gentleman buckled him into his light cuirass; "but I will not have him touched—he is punished enough." He added, with some contempt, "Is Leeds so much worse than the herd that he should be hunted from it?"

"A corrupt man," answered Portland gloomily; "but you were always tender with him."

William was silent. His obligation to Leeds consisted entirely of that nobleman's devotion to the Queen; he thought that Portland knew this and despised him for such sentiment in politics. Neither spoke any more on the subject.

"M. Montague is a clever man," remarked the King, after a little; "another pensioner of my Lord Dorset. How goeth the other, your secretary?"

"Ah, Prior," replied the Earl, "well enough, but I think him an atheist. His poetry is full of heathen gods, and when I probed him on the subject he was not satisfactory in his answers, but well enough."

"Put my Lord Sarum on to converting him," said William drily; "but I should not take much account of his poetry."

The King's gentleman went into the back part of the tent and Portland instantly addressed his master with great heat.

"Sir, I must tell you that it is a source of great wonder to all that you should so encourage, favour, and caress a worthless young rake like M. van Keppel—a mere hanger-on to court favour; your dignity suffers by it——"

The King interrupted.

"Are you jealous—you—of him?" he asked mournfully.

"I have enough to make me jealous," was the hot answer, "when I see the creature of such as my Lord Sunderland creep into your affections."

The King answered in gentle, dignified tones, without a touch of anger or resentment—

"You are indeed wrong. I like M. van Keppel for himself—I find him sweet and intelligent, a willing servant—and I have not too many. But you know, even while you speak, that nothing could come between me and you."

"I think he hath come between us," said Portland sternly; "during the whole campaign he hath hardly left your side. I believe you even consult him as to your actions—he!—why, the whole camp knoweth his reputation. I could tell some tales——"

The King broke in.

"I'll hear no scandals. You know that of me. If we are to listen to tale-bearing there is not one of us safe. If I favoured any man do you not think there would be tales against him? But I did not think to find you leaning on gossip."

He still spoke with an utter calm; but Portland took his words heavily.

"If you choose to reprimand me——" he began.

"Forgive me," said the King instantly. "I thought you would understand. Indeed, forgive me. I would do anything in the world not to vex you."

The return of the gentleman with William's gloves and cloak cut short the conversation. The King fastened his sword-belt over his shoulder and adjusted the weapon; as he took up his hat with the long black feathers a magnificent Brandenburgher officer entered, followed by M. Dyckfelt.

"Your Majesty," said the Dutchman quietly, "M. de Villeroy hath retreated in the night—leaving M. de Boufflers to his fate."

The Brandenburgher went on one knee and handed William a dispatch from the commander of the scouts, who had seen the last vanishing rearguard of the French.

The King showed no emotion of any kind.

"Count," he said to the officer, "you will go to M. de Bavaria and request him to make an immediate assault on Namur."

When the officer had withdrawn, with profound obeisance, William turned to Portland.

"I will ask you to go to M. de Boufflers and demand a surrender. Tell him that there is no further hope for him from M. de Villeroy, and that if he wisheth to spare his garrison he must capitulate to-day."

Portland bowed gravely and turned away. William looked after him keenly, then took up his perspective glass, his gloves, and his baton, and left the tent.

CHAPTER IV

A MAN'S STRENGTH

M. de Boufflers refused to surrender; he was a Maréchal de France, he had still many thousand men, including M. Megrigny, the engineer esteemed second only to M. de Vauban, and the castle was deemed impregnable. The assault was fixed for one in the afternoon. The King of England, the Elector of Bavaria, the Landgrave of Hesse, other German potentates and the officers of their staff gathered on the rocky promontory immediately below the ramparts of the citadel; before them rose the castle ringed with walls, batteries, palisades, fosses, dykes, and traverses, and set back two miles or more in elaborate ramparts and outworks.

The allies had formed a complete circumvallation round the huge fortress, and had opened their trenches at the very foot of the rock which M. de Vauban had fortified with such deadly skill.

The day was extraordinarily hot and cloudless; the sun, being now just overhead, blazed with equal light on the ruined town, the lofty castle, on counterscarp, glacis, and half-moon, on the trenches, the defences of wattled sticks lined with sandbags, on the distant spreading encampment of the allies, on the still more distant sparkle of the Meuse, which glittered across the great plain and on the walls of the Abbey of Salsines.

It shone, too, on a thousand flags, a thousand squads of men moving with bayonets and matchlocks set to the attack, and gleamed in the armour of the little group of gentlemen who were directing the operations, and sometimes sent a long ray of burning light from their perspective glasses as they turned them on the castle or the approaching regiments of their own troop as they defiled through the town.

It had been arranged that the assault was to be made in four places at once, by the Dutch, Brandenburghers, Bavarians, and English severally; the first three were tried and veteran troops, the fourth, however, consisted of recruits who were seeing their first campaign and had never been under fire before; the best English troops had marched to encounter Villeroy, and had not been summoned to the attack.

The King turned his glasses on the trenches where these regiments waited; they were under the command of John Cutts, as brave and gallant an officer as ever breathed.

William put down his glasses and looked up at the grim citadel.

"This is a severe test for them," he remarked.

The Electoral Prince was taking a bet from the exultant Kohorn that they would enter Namur by the 31st of August. William laughed.

"I am sorry that Your Highness should put money on our failure," he said. "I hear that the betting in London is greatly in our favour."

"This is a matter of dates, Your Majesty," answered M. de Bavaria. "I say 'No' only to August the 31st."

"I am glad M. de Kohorn is so confident," said William graciously to the great engineer.

M. de Hesse, who wore on his finger a watch in a great ring of brilliants, remarked that the time was near ten minutes to one; M. de Bavaria bowed profoundly and galloped off to direct his own men in person; the King looked keenly round to see that none of his servants were lurking in the line of fire. Interference was almost as unendurable to him as cowardice; more than once during the siege he had been exasperated into horsewhipping some daring footmen or valet out of the trenches. During the assault of July the 27th he had been considerably vexed to see M. Godfrey, one of the directors of the new Bank of England, among his officers, and had severely reprimanded him for his presence in so dangerous a position.

"But I run no more risk than you, sire," M. Godfrey had protested.

The King's answer and the sequel were long remembered.

"I, sir," he replied, "may safely trust to God, since I am doing my duty in being here, while you——"

The sentence remained unfinished, for a French cannon shot laid M. Godfrey dead at the King's side. William had hoped that this would prove a lesson to useless meddlers, but even since he had been provoked by various people who had business at the camp, and who strayed into the trenches to get a view of real fighting, often with no conception of the danger of the slow dropping bombs and bullets.

But this afternoon the King's eagle eyes were satisfied that the works were clear of sightseers; it had been fairly well spread abroad that this assault would be, beyond experience, terrible, and those whose duty did not take them to the front were well in the rear.

M. de Hesse and the other Germans having galloped off to their posts, the King remained alone with his staff, midway between the ramparts that were to be attacked and the English trenches, full in the cross-line of fire, and motionless and conspicuous as a target on the little jutting shelf of rock; his officers were a little way behind, and his figure was completely outlined against the blue gap of sun-filled air behind the rock slope.

He rode a huge grey Flemish horse, dark as basalt and as smooth—very lightly trapped with red leather linked with silver gilt—that he managed as well as a man can. He had always been renowned for his consummate horsemanship, and this great beast, that had taken two footmen to hold in before he mounted, he held delicately with one hand on the reins with such a perfect control, that the creature was utterly motionless on the narrow ledge of slippery rock.

The hot air was full of different distant and subdued sounds—the rattle of the guns, the clink of the matchlocks striking the cobbles of the town below, the tramp of feet, the neighing of horses, and, occasionally, the crowing of a cock on some farm outside Namur.

The King sat with his reins loose, holding in his right hand his baton that he rested against his hip. He was intently watching the English trenches.

The clocks of the churches in Namur struck one; instantly a loud report and a jet of flame came from the trenches below; two barrels of gunpowder had been blown up as a signal for the attack.

Before the smoke had cleared, all the minor sounds were silenced by the steady beat of drums and kettledrums, and the King perceived the Grenadiers marching from behind their defences and earthworks steadily towards the ramparts of Namur—these were the men of Cutt's own regiment. They were immediately followed by the four new battalions. They came on steadily, in good order, with their bright, unspoilt colours in their midst, their colonels riding before them. The King could discern the slender figure of John Cutts marching on foot before the Grenadiers with his drawn sword in his hand.

There was no sign from the castle. The English leapt, man after man, the last deep trench of their own earthworks, and suddenly, at a word from their leader, whose voice came faintly to the King's ears, broke into a run and dashed up the slope at the foot of the rock, and full at the first wall of the French fortifications.

Instantly the batteries of the garrison opened a terrible fire, and a confused echo to their thunder told that the other three divisions of the confederates were meeting a like reception.

The English kept on; the little body of the Grenadiers, with the four battalions supporting them and at the head of all John Cutts, climbed the face of the rock with no sign of disorder.

The King wheeled his horse round to face them, and his brilliant eyes never left their ranks.

The French commenced fire from the guns behind their first palisade, which swept the ranks of the advancing English with deadly effect.

Almost every officer of the Grenadiers fell on the hot, bare rock. The drums began to give a disconnected sound, the colours wavered, but the men pressed on, with Cutts still running before them and the recruits doggedly behind them.

The King sent one of his officers with orders for the English batteries to open fire as soon as the breach had been made.

There was, in the space of a few seconds, hardly an officer left among the English, the colonels, captains, and lieutenants, who had dashed forward to encourage their men, were lying scattered about the hill-side—patches of scarlet and steel—with their riderless horses running frantically back towards the camp.

Still Cutts came on. The smoke was thick about him, but the King could see him clearly as he came every moment nearer. The Grenadiers had gained a firm footing on the ledge of rock beneath the palisade, and were about to hurl themselves against it. The cannonade was now supplemented by a storm of bullets. Cutts gave a shout, raised his sword, and pitched to the ground, shot through the head, while the thinned ranks of the Grenadiers rolled backwards down the rocks.

The King uttered a passionate exclamation; a bomb, cast from the castle, burst near him, and his horse reared frantically at the explosion. When he had quieted the animal and the smoke had cleared, he saw two of the Grenadiers coming towards him supporting John Cutts between them. As they reached a deep, natural gully that cleft the rock, one fell and rolled down the precipice; the other caught his officer by the arm and swung him across the chasm; the King galloped up to them.

"Is my lord slain?" he asked.

The wounded man lifted his brown eyes and laughed. Blood blotched the left side of his face and ran through the bright brown English locks.

"Why, no, sir," he answered.

"I am glad of that," said the King. "But your men are being repulsed——"

"God help me—not for long!" cried my lord, and dashed the blood out of his eyes, and with that movement fainted.

"Call up my surgeon," commanded William to one of his officers. Lord Cutts was carried out of the firing line, and the King again directed his attention to the English, who, leaderless, were nevertheless dashing forward, though without order or method, sheer against the French fire.

"It is too much for them," muttered William.

This wild charge was suddenly checked by a deep precipice blown in the rock by underground powder magazines; the raw soldiers stood helpless, baffled. The air was of a continuous redness; the half-naked French gunners could be seen, running in and out of their vaulted galleries and crouching, behind the black shape of the guns; flying fragments of shell, masonry, and rock fell among the leaderless English, who hesitated, gave way, and retreated down the bloody slope they had gained, each rank falling back on the other in confusion, while a shout of triumph rose from the fiery ramparts of Namur.

The King urged his beautiful horse up the zigzag path. The bullets flattened themselves on the rocks about him with a dull, pattering sound; the horse laid back its ears and showed the scarlet of its nostrils; the King, with infinite skill and gentleness, brought it to a higher ridge where he could better survey the heights. The English, rolling back beneath him, looked up and saw him though the smoke, the sun darting broken rays off the star on his breast. He took off his hat covered with black plumes and waved it to them to encourage them to come on. A ragged cheer broke from them; they plunged forward again, but a terrific fire swept them back with half their number fallen. At this moment the King saw Lord Cutts, hatless and with a bandaged head, running up towards the glacis.

William rode up to him. The red fire was about them as if it had been the colour of the atmosphere.

"My lord," said the King, reining up his horse, "they cannot do it."

A young man in a splendid uniform came riding through the strong smelling smoke.

"Sire," he said, saluting, "the Bavarians are giving way—their general hath fallen——"

William spoke swiftly to the Englishman.

"Can you rally your men to the assistance of the Bavarians, my lord? 'Tis hopeless to attempt to make a breach here."

John Cutts smiled up at his master; he had to shout to make his voice heard through the rattle of the cannonade—

"'Tis done, Your Majesty!"

His gallant figure slipped, like a hound from the leash, into the smoke, towards where the English Footguards were retreating, and William, pointing with his baton to where he rode that his officers might follow him, swept round the ramparts to where the Bavarians wavered before the fire of the French. Regiment after regiment had hurled in vain against the palisades, the ditches and clefts were choked with corpses, and in every squad of men a great lane was torn every time the French gunners fired their pieces, while the Dragoons stood on the glacis, sword in hand, ready to cut down whoever should touch the palisade.

"They are very determined," remarked William calmly, glancing up at the red-hot line of fire bursting from the French batteries; "but so am I."

As he spoke a bullet passed through his hair so close to his cheek that he felt the warm whizz of it; and another, almost simultaneously, tore through the ends of his scarf.

"For God's sake, sire," cried the officer near him, "this is certain death."

But the King took no heed of him; his sparkling eyes were fastened on the faltering ranks of Bavaria, who were being borne, steadily but surely, down the slopes, leaving dead behind them, their commander, and most of their officers.

At the very moment when it seemed that they had hopelessly lost ground, John Cutts came running up with the colours of the Grenadiers in one hand and his sword in the other, behind him two hundred of the English recruits whom he had rallied from the retreat.

The Bavarians, encouraged by this help, took heart and came forward again and began climbing up the rock; but Cutts and his English dashed ahead of them right into the cannon fire, forced their way through the palisade, and engaged in a hand to hand fight with the gunners and Dragoons, who were driven back from their defences and hurled over their own ramparts on to the bayonets of the Bavarians below. In a few moments the English had captured the battery, swung the guns round and directed them at the Castle. With a shout the Bavarians dashed through the breach in the wall and, climbing over corpses of men and horses, poured into the enemy's lines.