THE TWO DUKES.

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BY ANN S. STEPHENS.

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(Continued from page 56.)

The artisan whom we left mounted on Lord Dudley’s charger was, much against his inclinations, swept onward by the crowd, till he found himself heading, like a single item of cavalry, upon the body of Somerset men now drawn up directly before him. He had no power to change his course or dismount from the conspicuous situation which placed him in full view of both parties, and which, under all the circumstances, was rather annoying to a man of his retiring and modest nature. Still he exerted himself to restrain the onward course of his charger with one hand, while the other was bent in and the fingers clenched together over the edge of his sleeve with a prudent regard for the diamond ring and the emeralds which had been so hastily bestowed there. All at once he gave a start that almost unclenched the grasp upon his sleeve and jerked the bridle with a vehemence which brought the red and foaming mouth of the spirited animal he bestrode down upon his chest with a violence that sent the foam flying like a storm of snowflakes over his black shoulders and mane. The proud and fretted creature gave an angry snort and recoiled madly under this rough treatment. With burning eyes and a fiercer toss of the head he recovered himself and leaped into the midst of a body of armed horsemen which that moment formed a line across the street, just above St. Margaret’s, and backed by an armed force, was slowly driving the mob inch by inch from the ground they had occupied.

The plunge was so sudden and furious that a slightly built but stern and aristocratic man, who rode in the centre of his party, was almost unhorsed by the shock, and a great deal of confusion was created among the horses and people thus forced back upon those eagerly pressing toward the church. The man, who had been so nearly flung from his saddle, fiercely curbed his plunging horse, and pressing his feet hard in the broad stirrups, regained his position, but with a pale face and eyes flashing fire at the rude assault which he believed to have been purposely made upon his person.

“What, ho! take yon caitiff in charge,” he shouted, pointing sternly with his drawn sword toward the artisan, “or cleave him to the earth a base leader of a rabble as he seems.”

Instantly the fiery and still restive charger was seized by the bit, a dozen hands were laid upon the pale and frightened being who crouched upon his back, and he was drawn face to face with Somerset, the Lord Protector of England.

There was something in the abject and insignificant figure of the artisan which made the stern anger levelled at him by the haughty man before whom he was forced almost ludicrous. This thought seemed to present itself to the Lord Protector, for his mouth relaxed into a contemptuous smile as he gazed upon his prisoner, and letting his sword drop as if it had been a riding whip, he gave a careless order that the man should be secured, and was about to move forward when his eye fell upon the rich housings of Lord Dudley’s charger. At first a look of surprise arose to his face, which gradually bent his brow into a heavy and portentous frown. Once more lifting his sword, he pointed toward the horse, demanding in a stern voice of the artisan, how he came there, and so mounted?

“May it please your highness,” faltered the artisan, resuming something of his natural audacity when he saw that there was a chance of extricating himself by craft rather than blows,—“May it please your highness, the horse belongs to my good Lord of Dudley whom I left but now among the rioters yonder. They lack a leader and cannot spare him yet, or he would vouch for my honesty and care which I have taken to bestow myself and the good horse into safe quarters without meddling hand or foot in this affray.”

“And how came Lord Dudley or his charger at St. Margaret’s?” said Somerset, frowning still more heavily, “answer the truth now—how came your lord here?”

The artisan seemed at a loss how to reply; but when the Protector grew impatient, he shook his head with a look of shrewd meaning, and said that his lord had ridden forth to seek a fair lady in the morning who had promised him a meeting somewhere in the neighborhood, but that being called upon by the mob, he had led the rioters for a time in their attack upon the workmen, and at last had joined them on foot, consigning the charger to his, the artisan’s care, and that was all he knew of the matter.

“Think ye this varlet speaks truth,” said Somerset, bending to a nobleman who rode at his left hand, “or does he make up this tale of the lady to screen the premeditated share his master has taken in this riot?”

“He has a lying face,” replied the person thus consulted, “the look of an unwashed dog, and but for the charger which speaks for itself, and the cry which arose but now from the heart of the mob, I should doubt.”

“Nay, it must be true, traitor as he looks,” exclaimed Somerset, abruptly interrupting the other, “how could I expect aught else from a Warwick? root and branch they are all alike, ambitious and full of treachery. Take this man in charge!” he called aloud to those about him, “and see that he find no means of escape. And now on, my good men, that we may face this young traitor in the midst of his rabble followers—a glorious band to be led on by a Warwick!” he added, tossing a scornful glance over the rude throng which was beginning to give way before the long pikes of his men.

The artisan, who had been allowed to sit freely on his horse while under examination, was again seized at the command of Somerset; but this time he refused to submit tamely to the hands laid upon him. In the struggle his fingers were torn from their hold on his sleeve, and the stolen jewels fell sparkling upon the long black mane of the charger. Before he could free his hands and snatch them up, they were observed and secured by one of the men to whom he had been consigned, who approached the Lord Protector, as he finished his scornful comment on the rioters, and laid them in his hand, informing him how they had been obtained.

Somerset glanced carelessly at the jewels, and was about to return them, saying,

“We will attend to it all anon; keep strict guard of the wretch and see that he does not escape.”

He had dropped part of the gems into the messenger’s hand again, when his eye fell upon the ring; instantly the color flashed up to his forehead, and he examined the stones with an intense interest, amounting almost to agitation, for they circled his own family crest, and not many hours before he had seen them on the hand of his youngest and favorite daughter. He cast a keen glance on the man who had brought the jewels to him, as if to ascertain if he had discovered the crest, and then quietly reaching forth his hand he took the emeralds, examined them closely, and forcing his horse up to the artisan, motioned that those around him should draw back. He was obeyed so far as the crowd would permit, and then drawing close to the prisoner, with a face almost as white and agitated as his own, he demanded in a low severe voice how he came in possession of the jewels?

“How did I come in possession? May it please your highness, as an honest man should. The ring was given me by a fair lady for good service rendered in bringing her and her sweet-heart together; and as for the green stones there, which may be of value and may not, there is no gold about them; and I have my doubts, for in these cases I have always found the lady most liberal of the party—for the emeralds—why my young master was generous as well as the lady—and well he might be, for I had much ado to bring them together, besides fighting through the crowd, and caring for the horse, and helping my lord to make a passage for his light-o-love.”

“Hound! speak the word again and I will cleave thee to the earth, if it be with my own sword, loth as I am to stain it so foully!” said Somerset in a voice of intense rage.

“I did but answer the question your highness put,” replied the artisan cringingly.

“Peace!” commanded the Protector. After a moment, he said with more calmness, but still in the low and stern voice of concentrated anger⁠—

“Know you the lady’s name who gave you this ring?”

“My lord called her Jane, or Lady Jane, which may be the true name and may not—such light-o’—I crave your highness’ pardon—such ladies sometimes have as many names as lovers—and this one may be Lady Jane to my lord, and Mistress Jane, or Mary, or⁠—”

“Enough,” interrupted the Protector—“and this ring was given by the—a lady to reward thee for bringing her to an interview with Lord Dudley. How happened it that thy services were required?”

“Well, as near as I can understand the matter,” replied the artisan, somewhat reassured by the low calm tone of his questioner, though there was something in the stern face that made his heart tremble, he knew not why, “the lady, whoever she be, was to have met my lord somewhere near the church yonder, but when he came to meet one person, behold a whole parish of hotheaded people had taken possession, so instead of a love passage he consoled himself by turning captain of the riot, and played the leader to a marvel, as your highness may have heard by the clamorous outcry with which he was cheered by the mob. I am but an humble man and content me with looking on in a broil, so as I bestowed myself to a safe corner, behold the fair lady of the ring had taken shelter there also, and at her entreaties, urged in good sooth by a host of tears and those sparklers almost as bright, she won me to give my lord an inkling of her whereabouts, so as much for the bright tears as the gems I fought my way through the mob and whispered a word in the eagle’s ears, which soon brought him from his war flight to the dove cot, whereupon he gave me charge of the horse here, and, taking the lady under his arm, went⁠—”

“Whither, sirrah, whither did he take her?” said the Lord Protector, in a voice that frightened the man, for it came through his clenched teeth scarcely louder than a whisper, and yet so distinct that it fell upon his ear sharply amid all the surrounding din.

“I lost sight of them in the crowd, for this strong-bitted brute was enough to manage without troubling myself with love matters. They were together, I had my reward, and that is the long and short of the matter,” replied the artisan, mingling truth and falsehood with no little address, considering the state of terror into which he had been thrown.

“And thou art ignorant where she is now?” inquired Somerset, still in a calm constrained voice.

“Even so, your highness. Lord Dudley has doubtless nestled his dove into some safe nook hereabouts, while he leads on the rioters near the church. I heard them shouting his name just as your lordly followers seized my mettlesome beast by the bit. So there is little fear that he will not be found all in good time.”

The Lord Protector turned away his head and wheeled his horse around without speaking a word, but his followers were struck by the fierce deep light that burned in his eyes and the extraordinary whiteness of his face. The artisan took this movement as a sign of his own liberation, and, glad to escape even with the loss of his plunder, he gathered up the bridle and was about to push his way from a presence that filled him with fear and trembling.

The Lord Protector’s quick eye caught the motion, and, as if all the passions of his nature broke forth in the command, he thundered out⁠—

“Seize that man and take good care that he neither speaks nor is spoken to. God of Heaven!” he added, suddenly bending forward with all the keen anguish of a father and a disgraced noble breaking over his pale features as they almost touched the saddle-bow—“Father of Heaven, that the honor of a brave house should lie at the mercy of a slippery knave’s tongue!”

These words, spoken in a low stifled voice, were lost amid the din of surrounding strife; but instantly that pale proud head was lifted again and turned almost fierce upon his followers. The naked sword flashed upward, and a shout, like that of a wounded eagle fierce in his death-struggle, broke upon his white lips and rang almost like a shriek upon the burthened air.

“On to the church—on, on through the mob—trample them to the earth till we stand face to face with the leader!”

Instantly the men with their long pikes made a rush upon the multitude. The horsemen plunged recklessly forward, crushing the unarmed people to the earth, and trampling the warm life from many a human heart beneath the hoofs of their chargers.

It was the cry and struggle which arose from this onset that reached the Lord Dudley in the dim and solemn quietude of St. Margaret’s church. It was this which made the Lady Jane spring wildly upon the altar where she had been extended so weak and helpless, put back the hair from her face and listen, white and breathless as a statue, for another sound of her father’s voice like the one shrill war-cry that had cut to her heart like a denunciation.

Lord Dudley hurried down the aisle again, for there was something in the wild terror of her look that made him forgetful of everything but her. As his foot was lifted upon the first step of the altar, the tumult increased around the church till its foundation seemed tottering beneath the levers of a thousand fiends, all fierce and clamorous for a fragment of the sacred pile. There was a sound of heavy weapons battering against the entrance. Shout rang upon shout—a terrible crash—the great arched window was broken in. A fragment of the stone casement fell upon the baptismal font, forcing it in twain and dashing the consecrated water about till the censers and velvet footcloths were deluged with it. A storm of painted glass filled the church—whirled and flashed in the burst of sunshine, thus rudely let in, and fell upon the white altar-stone, and the scarcely less white beings that stood upon it, like a shower of gems shattered and ground to powder in their fall. Then the door gave way, and those who had kept guard rushed in with uplifted hands, and faces filled with terrible indignation, beseeching Lord Dudley to arouse himself and come to their aid against the tyrant who even then was planting his foot upon the ashes of their dead.

It was no time for deliberation or delay; the foundation of the church shook beneath their feet, a body of armed men hot with anger and chafed by opposition thundered at the scarcely bolted entrance. Perhaps the brave blood which burned in Dudley’s veins, urged him on to the step which now seemed unavoidable. Still he would have died, like a lion in his lair, rather than become in any way the leader of a mob, but he could not see that bright and gentle being, so good and so beloved, perish by the violence of her own father. He snatched her from the altar where she stood, and bearing her to a corner of the church most distant from the entrance, forced her clinging arms from his neck, pressed his lips hurriedly to her forehead, and rushed toward the door, followed by the men who had hitherto guarded it. The effort proved a useless one. The doors were blocked up by a phalanx of parishioners, and he could not make himself known or force a passage out. The brave band was almost crushed between the walls of the church and the Lord Protector, who, with his horsemen, had driven them back, step by step, till they were wedged together, resolute but almost helpless from want of room.

“To the window—stand beneath that I may mount by your shoulders,” exclaimed Dudley to the men who surrounded him.

Instantly the group gathered in a compact knot beneath the shattered window. Lord Dudley sprang upon the sort of platform made by their shoulders, and thence, with a vigorous leap to the stone sill where he stood, exposed and unarmed before the people—his cloak swaying loosely back from his shoulder—his cap off and his fine hair falling in damp heavy curls over his pale forehead.

A joyful shout and a fierce cry burst from the multitude and mingled together as he appeared before them. A world of flashing eyes and working faces was uplifted to the window, and for a moment the strife raging about the church was relaxed, for men were astonished by his appearance there, almost in open rebellion, face to face with the Lord Protector.

“Bring that man to the earth dead,” shouted Somerset, pointing toward the young nobleman, “and then set fire to the building, to-morrow shall not see a single stone in its place.”

A shower of deadly missiles flew around the young noble, but he sprang unhurt into the midst of the throng, which made way for him to pass till he stood front to front with the man who had just commanded his death. Somerset turned deadly pale, and, clenching his teeth with intense rage, lifted his sword with both hands, as if to cleave the youth through the head.

“My Lord Duke,” said Dudley, in a manner so calm that it arrested the proud nobleman’s hand, though his weapon was still kept uplifted, “I do beseech your grace draw the soldiers away; the parishioners are furious, and I am convinced will defend the church till you trample an entrance over their dead bodies.”

Dudley spoke respectfully and as a son to his parent, but with much agitation, for everything that he held dear seemed involved in the safety of the church. He knew that estrangement existed between the duke and his own noble father, but up to that moment had no idea that his personal favor with Somerset was in the least impaired. He had not believed that the command levelled against his life was indeed intended for him, and was therefore both astonished and perplexed when the duke bent his face bloodless and distorted with rage close down to his and exclaimed,

“Dastard and traitor! where is my child?”

“She is yonder within the church,” replied Dudley with prompt and manly courage. “Safe, thank God! as yet, but if this fierce assault continue she must perish in the ruin!”

“So shall it be,” replied the Protector fiercely. “Let her life and her shame be buried together.”

“Her shame, my Lord Duke,” said Dudley, laying his hand on Somerset’s bridle-rein, and meeting the stern glance fixed on him with one full of proud feeling. “Another lip than yours had not coupled such words with the pure name of Jane Seymour, and lived to utter another. But you are her father.”

“Ay, to my curse and bitter shame be it said, I am her father,” replied the duke, “and have power to punish both the victim and the tempter. Your conduct, base son of a baser father, shall be answered for before the king, but first stand by and see your weak victim meet the reward of her art.”

As he spoke, Somerset grasped the youth by his arm, and hurling him among his followers, shouted, “secure the traitor, or if he resist cut him down. Now on to the attack. A hundred pounds to the first man who forces an entrance to the church. Set fire to it if our strength be not enough, and let no one found there escape alive.”

The confusion which followed this order was instant and tremendous. The mob rushed fiercely upon the Protector in a fruitless effort to rescue Lord Dudley, while the soldiers sprang forward upon the building, and half a score were seen clambering like wild animals along the rough stone-work toward the windows, for still the mob kept possession of the door.

The group which we left within the church hearing this command, looked sternly into each other’s faces, and their leader—he who had admitted Dudley and his companion—was aided by his friends, and sprang within the shattered window just as the head of a clambering assailant was raised above the sill. The sexton, for the man held that office in the church, planted one foot upon the soldier’s fingers, when they clung with a fierce gripe upon the stone, and stooping down he secured the poor fellow by both shoulders, bent him back till his body was almost doubled, and then with hands and foot spurned him from the wall with a violence that hurled him many paces into the crowd. Another and another shared the fate of this unfortunate man, and there stood the sexton, unharmed, guarding the pass like a lion at bay, and tearing up fragments of stone to hurl at the soldiers whenever he was not compelled to act on the defensive; but his situation soon became very critical, for his station became the point of general attack, and Somerset’s voice was still heard fiercely ordering his men to fire the building; for a moment the shower of missiles hurled from the soldiers beat him down, and he was forced to spring into the church among his companions again for shelter. The poor young lady heard the savage command of her parent, and, rushing to the men, frantically besought them to inform the Duke of Somerset his child was in the building, and that, she was certain, would save it from destruction. There was something in the helplessness and touching beauty of that young creature as she stood before them, wringing her hands, and with tears streaming down her pale cheek, that touched the men with compassion, or she might have perished by their hands when her connection with their oppressor was made known. They looked in each other’s faces and a few rapid words passed between them. The sexton sprang once more upon the window, the rest turned upon the terrified lady and she was lifted from hand to hand, till at last they placed her by his side, trembling and almost senseless.

“Behold,” cried the sexton, lifting the poor girl up before the multitude and flinging back the hair from her pale and affrighted features, that her father might recognise them, and feel to his heart, all the indignity and peril of her position. “Behold, I say, lift but another pike, hurl a stone but the size of a hazelnut against these walls, and this proud lady shall share them all side by side with the humble sexton. My Lord of Somerset,” he shouted, grasping the lady firm with one arm, as if about to hurl her from the window, “Draw off your soldiers, leave these old walls, where we may worship our God in peace, or I will hurl your child into the midst of my brethren, that she may be trampled beneath their feet, even as you have crushed human limbs this day under your iron-shod war horses.”

These words were uttered by a rude man, but excitement had made him eloquent, and his voice rang over the crowd like the blast of a trumpet. When he ceased speaking, a silence almost appalling, after the previous wild sounds, fell upon the multitude. The horsemen stayed their swords, and the soldiers stood with their pikes half lifted, and Somerset himself sat like one stupified by the sudden apparition of his child; among all that rude throng there was no hand brutal enough to lift itself against that beautiful and trembling girl, but many a glistening eye turned from her to the stern but now agonized face of the duke, anxious that he should draw off his men. He was very pale, his lip quivered for a moment, and then his face hardened again like marble.

“Her blood be upon thy head, young man,” he exclaimed, bending his keen but troubled eyes on Lord Dudley, who stood vainly struggling with his captors; then lifting his voice he cried out,

“Tear down the church; neither wall of stone nor human being must stop our way!”

Still a profound silence lay upon the multitude. There was something horrible in the command that caused the coarsest heart to revolt at its cruelty. So still and motionless remained the throng that the faint shriek which died on the pale lips of that helpless girl as her father’s command fell upon her ear, was distinctly heard even by the stern parent himself. He lifted his eyes to the place where she was kneeling, her hands clasped, her face like marble, and those eyes, usually so tranquil and dove-like, glittering with terror and fixed imploringly upon his face.

He turned away his head and tried to repeat his command, but the words died in his throat, and he could not utter them. Again her locked hands were extended, and her heart seemed breaking with wonder at his cruelty as she uttered the single word, “Father!”

That little word as it came like a frightened dove over the listening mob, settled upon the heart of that stern man, and awoke feelings which would not be hushed again. It was the first word his child had ever spoken. Her rosy infancy was before him—the sweet smile, the soft tiny hands clasped triumphantly together, when those syllables were mastered, seemed playing with his heart-strings, the same heart which had thrilled with so sweet a pleasure to her infant greeting. It was a strange thing that these memories should fall upon him when his passions were all aroused and amid a concourse of rough contending people, but the heart is an instrument of many tones, and nature sometimes hangs forth its sweetest music in singular places, and amid scenes that we cannot comprehend. The Lord Protector bent his head, for tears were in his eyes, and, like many a being before and since, he was ashamed of his better nature. At last he conquered his agitation, and in a loud firm voice, commanded his soldiers to withdraw, and pledged his knightly word to the rioters that the church should receive no farther injury.

The people were generally satisfied with this assurance, and began to disperse when they saw the soldiery filing away toward the river. The duke dismissed his followers at the door of St. Margaret’s, saw Lord Dudley conducted from his presence under a strong guard, and then entered the church alone and much agitated. He found his child sitting upon a step of the altar, shivering as with cold, and with her face buried in her hands. She knew his step as he came slowly down the aisle, and lifted her dim eyes with a look of touching appeal to his face. It was stern, cold, and unforgiving. She arose timidly and moved with a wavering step to meet him. His face was still averted, but she reached up her arms, wound them about his neck, and swooned away with her cheek pressed to his, like a grieved child that had sobbed itself to sleep. Again the thoughts of her infancy came to his heart, and though it was wrung with a belief that she had been very blameable and had trifled with her proud name, she was senseless and could not know that he had caressed her as of old; so the stern man bent his head and wept, as he kissed her forehead.

(To be continued.)

My Bonnie Steed