THE YOUNG LOVELL (continued 4)

It was true that, as the Percy thought, King Henry VII heartily desired the downfall of this Bishop Sherwood. He had supported Richard Crookback and loved little King Henry. And indeed, Sir Bertram knew, for he had the King's private thoughts, that the King would very willingly see the downfall not only of the Bishop Sherwood but of this whole see of Durham. For it was contrary to that Prince's idea of kingship to have within his realm a Palatine county with a Bishop there having such sovereign powers that it was as if there was no King at all in the realm. But, to be rid of the bishopric, even King Henry thought would be impossible since it would raise against him all the Church and get him called heretic and interdicted as King John had been. So that the King would very willingly have had the Percy to act as his catspaw and make civil war upon Bishop Sherwood and so drive him out of the land. That might impoverish and weaken the see a little, but not much. For a Bishop is not like a temporal baron; though Sherwood be cast out another must succeed him and have all his rights and grow as strong or stronger.

It was upon these things that this Sir Bertram—a cool and quiet knight, loving King Henry and beloved by him above most men—meditated whilst that old lady cast up her accounts, and he trimmed his finger nails. So, when he leaned out of that bright window, he perceived how steeply perched was the house in which he was. Sheer down to the river ran rocky paths with here and there a tree. At the bottom was a high wall well battlemented and slit for archers to hold it. The river ran very swiftly. On it there was a fisherman casting his nets from an anchored boat. The boat tugged and tore so at its chain that even the practised fisherman had difficulty to stand. So the river must be very swift, and there would be no mining there.

On the other side of the river the banks rose as steeply and were clothed with trees. There cannon might be set against the town. But to shoot so far they must be great guns and the Percy had none of these, nor were there any large enough nearer than Windsor. If the Percy had them, it was difficult to think that he could drag them there into position, and all that would take a year or two years. So, this Sir Bertram, who had been sent there by the King to advise him, considered, as his first thoughts, that if the Earl of Northumberland attacked this Bishop Palatine he might take the city, but hardly the inner citadel, and never at all the castle within. Or, if the King lent him cannon, he might break the wall of the citadel.

On the other hand, having the Bishop shut up in the castle the Earl might starve him out—but this he could not do unless all the country round were friendly to the Earl and hated the Bishop. Without that there would be no doing it. And the same might be said of any project for dragging cannon on to those heights. For the cannon must be brought up narrow valleys where ambushes very easily could lie, and that could not be thought of in a hostile country.

The Percy had reported himself to King Henry as being cock of all the North parts; if that were true, he might very well be loosed upon the Bishop. But from conversations that he had had with the Lords Dacre and Ogle, as well as with the Abbot of Alnwick and lesser men, this Sir Bertram thought it was possible that the Earl Percy was not so strong nor yet so beloved in those parts as he would have the King believe. In that case, if he relied upon this Earl and this Earl's faith, the King might get great discredit and no profit either in those parts or elsewhere. It was in order to study and inquire into these things that this cautious Sir Bertram was come into those parts. So he leaned upon the sill of the window and looked down upon the river that appeared two hundred feet below.

After he had watched the river and reflected a long time, for he was a slow thinker, adding point to point in his mind, to have as it were a strong platform on which to build, he heard a woman's voice say highly:

"I tell you, ah, gentle Princess, that there is no man more hated in these North parts, and if you will lend your sanction and your wealth we may speedily have down not only these robbers that hold your daughter imprisoned by his encouragement but also that flail of the North himself."

Sir Bertram turned slowly on his elbow, leaning upon the sill and looked into the room. There he saw a monstrous beautiful young lady that kneeled with her voluminous rich gown all about her and held out her two hands towards the Princess whom he could not see. The Princess did not speak, and that lady held her peace, so that knight moved softly and deliberately forward, and when he was near the younger lady he asked her:

"Even who is this man who is so hated in the North parts?"

That young lady looked at him with astonished lowering and resentful eyes, as much as to say, who was he that he should ask her such a question? The Princess had been leaning back in her chair with both elbows upon the arms and a hand caressing her chin, for all the world as if she had been an old man considering a knotty point. But, when she saw Sir Bertram and heard his voice, she said hastily and harshly:

"Get up, child and your ladyship. It is not decent that a lady of high rank and my kinswoman should be spoken to kneeling by a Cornish knight of nowhere and yesterday, God help me, if he be ten times a King's spy!" And so she bade the lady, who was the Lady Margaret of Glororem, to fetch a stool from a corner of the room and set it by her throne on the step. And there she had the Lady Margaret sit beside her and that Sir Bertram fetch off his hat with the large feather and so stand before them. "For," said she to that knight, "you may well be the King's companion, but in this place the King's writ does not run and I am a royal Princess and this is my cousin and niece."

It was nonsense and a tyranny, but Sir Bertram did it with calmness. He cared little about forms when there was news to be had that could help him and only one old woman and one very beautiful and proud one before whom to abase himself. So he made an apology, saying that he had not known that lady to be of such high rank, she being in the dim room and not over plain to his eyes which had been gazing on the sunlight. He bent one knee and stood there composedly with his hat in his hands before him.

Then that old Princess, who had affected anger affected now a complaisance towards that gentleman. She spoke as follows, formally to the Lady Margaret:

"This Sir Bertram of Lyonesse," she said,—"though God knows where Lyonesse is; I have heard it is some poor islands in Scilly or Cornwall or where you will,—so this Sir Bertram of Lyonesse is the King's commissioner to inquire into the state of these North parts. And if you will ask me what make of a thing a commissioner is, I will answer you that he is what you and I and other simple folk do call a spy. But the King calls him his commissioner and that is very well."

She looked upon Sir Bertram maliciously to see if he winced. But that knight turned his face composedly to the Lady Margaret.

"Ah, gentle lady," said he, "you may count that for truth. I am here to find out what I can."

The old Princess liked this Sir Bertram, in truth, very well. She counted him so low, on account of his obscure and distant birth and his former poverty, that she could jest with him as if he had been a peasant boy. She considered English lords as of so low a rank against her own that she thought not much about them, one with another, except may be it was the Dacres and their kin. So she was very glad to keep this Sir Bertram, if she could do it without trouble or expense, and have some amusement from it.

She turned upon the Lady Margaret and said again:

"You must know that, though in a concealed manner, this Sir Bertram is of great worth in the counsels of King Henry VII. Why this should be so, God knows, for one says one thing and one will say another. But so it is; in all matters in which a king may be advised this new knight rules the King."

Then again Sir Bertram looked upon the Lady Margaret:

"Ah, gentle lady," he said, "to dispel what may appear of mystery in this royal Princess's account of me, let me say this—for I would not have you think evil of me: I have twice saved this King's life, once by discovering assassins sent to murder him in France before he was King and once, since, at Windsor where I caught by the wrist a man with a knife that came behind him when he walked in the gardens. And I have farmed the King's private lands to greater profit than came to him before and, having studied the art of fortifying of a pupil of the monk Olberitz that made most of the strong castles of France, I have designed or strengthened successfully certain strong places for this King. If I could say I had saved this King's life in gallant battles I would rather say it, for it would gain me greater honour in your sight. But I am rather a man of the exchequer board than of the tented field. It is for caution, defence and prudence that the King trusts me rather than for things more gallant that should stir your pulse in the recital. I wish it were the other way, but that is not the truth of it."

"Well, it is true what this knight says," the old Princess confirmed him. "He has twice saved the King's life by caution and has increased the King's gear and so on. Now he is sent here as the King's spy—the King's reconciler or the King's trumpeter or what you will. For his mission is to take a survey of these North parts first and then to prove to them that the King is a mild, loving, gracious and economical sovereign."

"Well, that is my mission," Sir Bertram said to the Lady Margaret, "and I hope I may do it."

"I will tell you what I think of it," the Lady Margaret said then, "as soon as I have your opinion on certain words I said two nights ago to Henry Percy, my cousin, Earl of Northumberland."

"I shall hear them very gladly," Sir Bertram answered.

Then, in her own way, the old Princess exposed all these matters to Sir Bertram of Lyonesse, how certain filthy rogues had taken prisoner her daughter Rohtraut, and the rest. Sir Bertram had heard all that before. The King had ordered him to travel to the North with the Princess of Croy, protecting her the better with his train and bearing a share of her expenses, so that he might the better make out the affairs of the Dacres, what was their wealth, who resorted to them, and whether they seemed to conspire with other rebels. And, upon the road, in three various towns, three delayed messengers had met the Princess of Croy, coming from that very Lady Margaret with broad letters in which she told the story of the things that passed at Castle Lovell. So Sir Bertram had heard most of the tale before, nevertheless he heard it very gladly again, more particularly as the Lady Margaret corrected the old Princess here and there and made things the plainer.

It was a very long congress that they held in that room with the vaulted ceiling and the painted walls, that were all sprays of leaves and dark green boskage with the figures of men and women in scarlets and whites and blues, holding bows and fowling nets and fish nets and falcons. For, when the Princess had told that story she was impatient to know, but with sarcastic and hard words, what this adviser of the King would advise her to do. For her own part, she said, it was her purpose to go with a small train, and unarmed, up to that Castle Lovell and in at the door. And she did not think it was those robbers who would withstand her when she set free her daughter, opening the door of her prison with her own hands, and so leading her out into the light of day and so there to Durham, where she might dwell till justice was done about the lands and other things that were in dispute.

The Lady Margaret said she was very glad to hear this, for she had been afraid that the Princess had too much displeasure against her daughter, seeing that in fifteen years she had not spoken to her or written broad letters.

The Princess erected her old, round head stiffly, with the pillows upon it, and exclaimed that it was not the fashion of their royal house to quarrel with its daughters or to do less than decency demanded for their rescue and sustenance. She would not wish that Lady Rohtraut to dwell in her house and at her charges for ever, for she must have her due train and estate, and that would make a great charge. But, until she were set up in her own lands and had her wealth again, that Princess would there maintain her and her train.

The Lady Margaret said again that she was very glad of it, and she was certain that those robbers would very quickly release the Princess's daughter. For they would fear the might of the Dacres and the Duke of Croy with his tall ships, his cannon, and his thousands of men that would come by sea and burn that Castle.

It was at that that Sir Bertram said that the King of England would not very willingly seE Flemings and Almains landing in his dominion; but the Lady Margaret might be certain that that King would see justice done to that injured lady by his own knights and the terror of his name.

Then the old Princess scowled upon both that knight and the lady so fiercely that her eyes grew red and dreadful. She smote her breast with the handle of the black crutch that dangled from her wrist and cried:

"Mutter Gottes! By the mother of God! It is not the King of England nor my father, the Duke of Croy, that shall go to that Castle but I alone and bij Gott! It is at my wrath that the knees of these robbers shall knock together and the keys fall from their hands."

Then the Lady Margaret said that that might well be the case and Sir Bertram said that so it would be much better. The old Princess bent her brows upon that knight and asked him, jesting bitterly, if he had any better advice to give her. He said that he had none, but that he would very gladly hear what Henry, Earl Percy, had had to say to the Lady Margaret and she to him and also something of Sir Paris Lovell, that well-esteemed lording.

The Lady Margaret told him very clearly all that she knew, and that knight considered her to be as sensible as she was fair. When she told him of the disappearing of her true love and of the rumours that were told against him he had a pensive air; but when she told him of the Percy's high words of how he was minded to break the great lords of the North and that that was the King's mind, Sir Bertram frowned heavily. When she said that it was the duty of great lords not to support too readily a new King that they had set up, nor too abjectly to obey him or lavishly fawn upon him, that knight's eyebrows went up, for this was a new thought to him. And so, whilst she recited to him the history of this realm of England as she had done to the Percy, he continued with his left hand behind his back holding his blue hat with the white feather and his right hand to his mouth whilst he hit the knuckles and reflected.

The old Princess of Croy said that all that the Lady Margaret uttered was nonsense; the truth of the matter was that all the English and their lords were murderers and wallowers in blood, slaying their kings without reason or pity or the fear of God, but like hogs fighting at a trough.

When she was done Sir Bertram took down his hand from his mouth and smoothed his beard. He said that if that was the mind of the Northern lords, though it was a new thought to him, he need quarrel little with it. For, though he might need to reflect further upon the principle, yet undoubtedly the case of King Richard III had gone in favour of the Lady Margaret. He was a King set up by certain lords and pulled down again when they found him evil. And, as far as the practice went, he would be satisfied to have that the touchstone for King Henry VII. For he was certain that that King would prove a dread lord benign, loving and prudent; all mighty lords and Princes of the North parts would gladly acknowledge—in the course of a year or two—that there had never been so good a King and they would all of them very willingly support him. And, if King Henry VII did not prove as good a King as he then reported, Sir Bertram, though he loved him, would very willingly see him cast down as Richard Crookback had been.

The Lady Margaret said she was very glad to hear it, and that upon such terms they might soon be good friends. Then Sir Bertram smiled a little in his beard and said:

"Ah, gentle lady, I perceive from certain words you have dropped that you did not think all these thoughts of the constitution of this realm of England by your lonely self." And so he perceived certain tears in that lady's eyes.

"Nay, truly," she said, "I learned them of the lips of my lord, Sir Paris Lovell, in sweet devising and conversations that we had before his death, and may God receive his poor soul and give him sweet rest in paradise! For such a gentle lording or one so wise in the reading of books, anxious for the good of his estate, so fine of his fair body, so fierce in war and fightful in the breach, or so merciful to his foes, they being down, God never did make. Though he was of young age yet he had fought in Italy, in Ferrara, in Venice, in France, in harness; in this realm against the false Scots and upon fightful journeys into Scotland."

Sir Bertram lowered his head a little.

"I wish I had been such a one," he said. "This was a very gallant gentleman. I have heard other such reports of him."

The old Princess said:

"I did not know I had had such a swan and phoenix amongst my grandchildren."

"Why, it is true, madam," Sir Bertram said. "You have lived too much amongst the Dacres to know that you had this lording for part heir."

Now this house, built in the old days before that time, and all of stone, like a fortress, had for its greater strength only one staircase. It wound round in a little space, all of thick stone, so it would be very difficult for an enemy to come up it if it were at all defended. On the lower floor there were no windows at all towards the street, to make it the stronger, and that staircase served all the rooms. This old fashion struck the Lord Dacre as very barbarous, and he would have it all pulled down, with a big hall and hangings upon the ground floor and large square windows with carvings on them, as was the pleasanter fashion of London and that new day. The paintings, too, in that room he would have whitened over, and the stone ceilings covered in with wood and beams, that should be bossed and carved and gilded and with coats of arms. But, for that time, so it was, and the staircase came up from the street.

Now it happened that, below, the door into the street was open, and a fisherman owing a tithe of fish for that Princess's table stood before it offering fish. The old steward had gone to him and complained that his fish and trout, eels and lampreys, were not fine enough to set before that Princess. Much of this could be heard in that room, and then came the sounds of the feet of a company of horse and the clank of armour and loud knockings upon the gate that went into the cathedral precincts and voices crying out and answering. With one thing and another none of those three could hear a word that there they uttered.

So the Princess was angry and clapped her hands for an old woman to come that had a white clout hanging down before her chin, for all the world as if it were a beard. The Princess bade take that fisherman into the kitchen and he to be given twenty stripes—for she had heard what passed between him and the steward—the door into the street was to be shut and news to be brought her what knight that was that rode with his many up the street. And if it was a knight of these parts and one she knew, she ordered him to come to her for she desired news of that countryside.

So that old woman, as best she could, went down the stairway sideways, for she was very old and fat and the stairway very little and winding. Then they heard her clamorously upbraiding alike old steward and the fisherman for the clamour they had made. Afterwards, the door was closed and there was peace. Then Sir Bertram looked gravely upon the Lady Margaret. And:

"Ah, gentle lady," said he, "from what I have observed of your conversation I can tell you this much. You tell me that this Sir Paris Lovell was a good friend to Richard Crookback that is dead. And I do not much blame him for it, since, as you tell me, that late King showed great courtesy here in the North parts when he was Duke of Gloucester. And well King Richard III knew how to bear courtesy when it suited him, though at other times he was a false tyrant. So that this Sir Paris Lovell was a friend to Crookback and could have aided him against my King if his father would have given him leave. But this his father would not do and it is so much the better.

"And further you have reported to me that this Sir Paris Lovell has said to you, in his own words: 'Now this King Richard is dead and alas for it! And we have another King of whom I, Sir Paris Lovell, know little, though I fear he may be a heavy ruler. But so as it is'—so you say you remember the words of this lord—'what I am minded to do,' said he, 'is to set up a chantry where masses may be said for the dead King's soul. If he had been alive I would have fought for him, but now I will see if I may live at peace with Henry of Richmond for a King. For to be sure, what we need in these North parts is peace amongst ourselves, that husbandry and mining and fisheries may flourish on my lands and others. And so one may make such a great journey into Scotland that the false Scots may not raise their heads for fifty years or more again. And so we may have leisure to go upon our own affairs. Therefore I, Sir Paris Lovell, for one will, if I may, live at peace with King Henry VII and be his subject if he will be bearable.' ... Now therefore I, Sir Bertram of Lyonesse..."

"God keep us," the old Princess cried out here, "you speak more like a lawyer drawing a bond than a gallant knight."

"Madam and gentle Princess," Sir Bertram said, "I am more like a lawyer than a gallant knight." And so he looked again gravely upon the Lady Margaret who, in her voluminous gown, sat on her little stool beside that kind of throne and leaned her arm along its arm, folding her hands together. She looked upon him earnestly and, after a time, she said:

"Good Knight, if you talk with me thus to make an agreement with me in the gentle Lord Lovell's name, I tell you that can never be, for he is dead."

"Ah, gentle lady," Sir Bertram answered, "how can it be said that any man is dead that is but three months away? These are strange and evil times. God knows I am no very learned knight and one not overways well-read in the lore of Holy Church. Yet nowadays strange things are seen, books not written by hand, Greek sorcerers, as I have heard, driven out of Byzantium by the Sultan, who press with new learnings across Christendom. I have heard there was lately one new Greek Doctor at London called Molossos, or some such name, though I never came to see him. And he had crabbed books of Greek and other sorceries. So, if your true love and lording be but ninety days away..."

"Sir," the Lady Margaret said, "my lord was never for so long a prisoner amongst the false Scots or the thieves of Rokehope without news to me. Surely they have killed him."

"I do not well know this country as you tell me; but let me ask you this: if the false Scots had killed so great a lord would they not boast and say great things? Or if the thieves of Rokehope or the Debateable Lands, or of those places that I do not know, had taken him, would they not have made more attempts at his ransoming than once sending to Castle Lovell? For you tell me that you think he was taken by Gib Elliott, as you call him, or some such naughty villain, and that Gib Elliott sent to Castle Lovell for his ransom and that the Knights of Cullerford and Haltwhistle refused to give either white mail or black, as the saying is. And maybe, as you think, they clapped that messenger into prison for greater secrecy, so that the countryside might have no news of your lord but consider him gone away with warlocks and others. But, in the first place, is it to be thought that such a messenger could be come from that Elliott to Castle Lovell and no one know it? Would not the Castle Lovell bondsmen see him and report it to your bondsmen and so on through all the countryside? For what cause should that messenger have in going to Castle Lovell, to be very secret, though Cullerford and Haltwhistle should desire to keep it secret afterwards? Or again, why should Gib Elliott, if that be his name, slay the Lord of Castle Lovell merely because Haltwhistle and Cullerford refused ransom or imprisoned his messenger? Gib Elliott I take it, is as other men, and seeketh money and how best he may have it. Moreover, Castle Lovell is a great Castle, and cannot be taken in a little corner. I will tell you this: that within a fortnight that news was known to us in London Town; for merchant wrote it to merchant at the bottom of his bills, and packman passed the news on to packman from town to town."

"Say you so!" the old Princess called out at this. "Ye knew it and I did not, yet ye never told me!"

"Madam and gentle Princess," Sir Bertram answered, "that is the duty of the servants of a King, to be all ears and no tongue. And partly that is why I am here, for the King desired to know if such lawless robberies could be done in any part of his realm. So now I am inquiring into this matter. And this I will ask you, my fair and gentle lady—if that news was known in London Town under a fortnight, should not that Gib Elliott know it in a day or two days at the most, seeing that all the countryside talked of that and nought else? For it is not every day that a great lord dies and robbers seize upon his Castle and imprison his sad widow. So, very surely, this Gib Elliott would hear of this thing or ever his messenger could come to Castle Lovell and back again. And then, very surely, he would send another messenger to some friend of the Young Lovell, to see if he might not get a ransom of them, since his enemies held his Castle. Consider how that would be with a cunning robber. Full surely he would have sent a messenger to yourself, ah, fair and gentle lady, to have money of you, if of none others?"

"Sir," the Lady Margaret interrupted him hotly and with a sort of passion—"I am very certain that that lord is dead. For three times Saint Katharine, whom I love above other saints, appeared to me in a gown of gold and damask and leaning upon her wheel. She looked upon me sorrowfully, as who should say my true love—for whom I had besought that saint many times—was dead to me."

The Cornish knight raised his hand.

"God forbid," he said, "that I should say anything against that sweet madam Katharine. Yet there are true dreams and false dreams and dreams wrongly interpreted. And of this I am instantly assured, that this Lord Lovell is held prisoner by no border raiders. It is not to be thought upon."

The Lady Margaret spoke to him contemptuously and almost with hatred, so her breast heaved as she bade him say then where he considered that that lord should have been or should even then be hiding. The Cornish knight answered slowly:

"Ah, gentle lady, what to believe I do not so well know. But this I know that I would rather believe in tales of sorcery in this matter than in that idea of border robbers. For these are strange times of newnesses coming both from the East and the West. From the East is come new learning which is for ordinary men, a thing very evil at all times, leading to sorceries and civil strife and change. And from the West is talk of a New World possessed with demons and pagans and dusky fiends as is now on the lips of all men. And I hold it for certain that, if anything evil and inexplicable shall occur in this land from now on it shall come from that East or that West. The path to the West having been found, shall it not lead those demons and dusky fiends in upon us? And, all the contents of Byzantium having been set flying in upon us, shall we go unharmed?"

"This is very arrant folly," the old Princess said; "what shall a parcel of soft Greeks or Indian savages do to this island in the water?"

"Madam and gentle Princess," the Cornish knight answered, "I speak only the misgivings of wealthy and sufficient men of London Town. It may be a folly here. But this I hold for strange: this lording was the one of all the North parts to have most of new-fangled lore, as I have heard: he has read in many books of which I know not so much as the name; such as Ysidores Ethimologicarum or Summa Reymundi—or maybe I have the names wrong. And he has travelled to Venice where many evil, eldritch and strange things are ready for the learning.... And now I will ask you this: ah, gentle mistress ... Have you of late had news of a monstrous fair lady that several people have seen to ride about these parts, attended, or not attended at all ... upon a white horse?"

"Such a one I saw yesterday," the Lady Margaret said, "and so fair and kind a lady it made me glad to see her."

Then Sir Bertram crossed himself.

"And have you," he asked, "heard where she dwells or who she is?"

"I never heard," she said; "I thought she was the King's mistress of Scotland, for a lesser she could not be."

"I have heard of her this many months," Sir Bertram said, "for, for this many months, I have been set by the King to gather information about these North parts. And now from one correspondent, now from another; now by word of mouth, now here, now in Northumberland, I have heard tell of this White Lady. And this again I will tell you.... An hour agone, as I looked out of this window, I saw a knight, with a monk and a small company of spears go over Framwell Gate Bridge. The sun was upon their armour. And, as they rode over it, I perceived upon the banks before me a wondrous fair figure of a woman in white garments, going among the thick of the trees as lightly as if it had been a flower garden. And, as she went, she held her hand over her eyes to shield them from the sun so as to gaze upon that knight. And I think that was that strange lady. And, if you ask me what she is, I think she is a vampire, a courtesan or a demon from the East. And if you ask me where your lord is, I will say I think she has him captive amongst weary sedges and the bones of other knights, if they have been dead long enough to become bones. And there he sits enthralled by her and she preys upon his heart's blood...."

The Lady Margaret stood up with her hand to her throat. Her face was blanched like faded apple blossom.

"Good sir," she said, "I think ye lie. For that lady had the kindest face that ever I saw."

"Yet such fair faces," Sir Bertram said, "are, as is known to all men, best fed by the heart's blood of true knights."

"Before God," the old Princess cried at him, "I have heard such tales of my bondsmen's wives...."

"Or, if you will have it a little otherwise," Sir Bertram said to the Lady Margaret, "let it be thus. This monstrous fair and magic lady saw this Sir Paris in a grove or amid the smoke of war or where you will in Venice or near it. And so she fell enamoured of him. Such things happen. And so, coming in a magic boat, in the morning before cockcrow she finds him—having waited many years for this chance—by the sea-shore where you say that chapel was. And so she beguiles him to step aboard and miraculously they are transported to the very isles of Greece. And there, poor man, he sitteth in the sun, lamenting beneath a vine as they say there are in Greece, and to beguile him she dances before him...."

The Lady Margaret held out her white hand to silence the words upon his lips. And so they heard a voice speak to the porter below and a heavy tread upon the stairfoot.

"Sir," the Lady Margaret said to the Cornish knight, "I think you do lie. For I hear my true love's voice and his foot upon the stair."

At that heavy beating of an iron foot on the stone steps a sort of fear descended upon both Sir Bertram and the Lady Margaret; but the old Princess said jestingly:

"Now I shall see the eighth wonder of the world."

VI

John Sherwood, Bishop Palatine of Durham, was seated in a deep chair, in the vestiary of his dwelling in Durham Castle. He had just come in there from the cathedral, and he was very weary with having sung a solemn mass for the soul of Sir Leofric Bertram, one that had, in times past, been a great benefactor of that see. This mass was sung every year upon the second day of July and, along with the oration, it lasted a full two hours. He had had a little fever too, and was weak with the monthly bloodletting which had been done the day before; for the Prince Bishop and his household were bled upon the first day of each month. Moreover, he was fasting till then, and it was close on the stroke of eleven.

So, although a good dinner awaited him, of five courses, each of fifteen dishes, he had felt so tired that there, in his own vestiary—for he did not wear the vestments of the cathedral or the monastery, but, in all his canonicals, walked across the green from the cathedral down to the castle with the people all kneeling and candles and a great cross and his crozier carried before him—he had fallen down into the deep chair in his mass garments. It made it the worse that his vestiary was up two flights of stairs in the castle that was old and not well arranged.

This vestiary was a large hall, but so tall that it seemed narrow and, in spite of two deep window spaces, its sombre vaulting of stone went up into darkness. The Bishops of Durham had always very many and very splendid vestments of their own, not belonging to the cathedral, and so on three sides of the room and from twelve feet high or more there were chests of oaken wood to hold vestments, with round cupboards in which copes could be laid out. In the two angles of the wall between the windows were all manner of great pegs and wooden bases upon which armour was hung or displayed. Upon three of these pegs were three helmets, the gauntlets hanging beneath them. Below each were the breastplates, the thigh pieces and so on. The great swords, with their crossed hilts, and scabbards covered in yellow velvet, were in stands along the bottom of the wall, like a fence. Above them were the more splendid and bejewelled plumed hoods for his falcons, their jesses, and leashes for his hounds; and tall steel maces made, as it were, panels between them. Spears or lances this Bishop had none, his arm being the heavy mace. He had four suits of armour, a black one, English, and kept well greased, for rainy weather or dangerous times; a French one of bright and fluted steel that he wore on Spring days; and one Milanese, very light and so beautiful in its lines that it pleased him to see it—a steel helmet that seemed to float like a coif, without a visor at all, and steel chain-mail as light as silk yet impenetrable even to the steel quarrels of arbalests.

These three suits were arranged upon the wall. The suit of state, of black steel inlaid thickly with gold, stood upon a stand, like a threatening man, between the two windows and catching the light from each. This piece came from Nuremberg, where it had been worked for the Prince Bishop of Münster, but he dying, the Bishop had bought it of the heirs. Upon the helmet was a prince's circlet of gold and all the breastplate, the thigh and kneepieces were hammered and graved and inlaid in gold with scenes from the life of Our Lady. Her Coronation in Heaven was shown upon the visor. This fine piece the Bishop wore only upon occasions of great state, such as if he should make a progress through the Palatinate with the King upon his right hand out of courtesy, since, of right, his left alone belonged to the King and the right to the Pope of Rome alone. This Bishop Palatine thought himself a delicate rather than a splendid prince; he had, before being Bishop, spent many years in Rome, as the King of England's friend and advocate; so he thought that better could be done by a display of simplicity and elegance, for a sovereign Bishop, than by great profusion of coarse things. Thus, such Bishops as Anthony Bek, that was Patriarch of Jerusalem as well, had had forty suits of mail to his own body alone.

So there, now, Bishop Sherwood sat, leaning back in his chair and crushing up his cope which was a grief to his vestiarius, an old and orderly man. For this was a very splendid cope of black velvet from Genoa; it was worked with broad silver in pomegranates, the sacred initials being of seed pearls over silver, and the vestiarius did not like to see it crushed. The crozier leant against an oaken case in the corner; and a great cross was against the heavy table where the Bishop sat. The Bishop had sent away his pages and attendants, saying that his head ached so that he could not bear the opening and closing of cases where these things should be placed. He had sent for some wine, a manchet of bread and a little salt to refresh himself with and these, in vessels of silver, stood before him. He had made shift to pull the rich glove off his right hand, and so he had taken a sip of wine and was dipping the bread in the salt. He felt himself a little refreshed. Before him, upon the table, stood two mitres, and his glove lay between the silver dish of bread and the wine cup.

Then the vestiarius, who stood in the doorway, perceived that Bishop, all black and silver, lean forward in his chair, gazing out of the window with his jaw falling down. The sunlight was streaming in. The vestiarius considered with disfavour—for he was a sour old priest—that the Bishop was undoubtedly ill, and God knew when he should get those vestments put away, which should be done before the stroke of noon. So the Bishop passed his hand across his eyes, after he had made the sign of the cross repeatedly.

"Gilbert," the Bishop said, "my eyes are very tired."

"It would be better, then," the vestiarius said, "not to look out at that window upon the sunlight. You have tired them with looking upon the picture of the new missal while you said mass."

"That may well be," the Bishop said. He was a little afeared of the anger of his vestiarius, who had been with him twenty years, and would not let him do as he would. So he continued for a little looking at the napkin they had laid beneath his refection. It was worked in white damask with the letter M, being the initial of Our Lady's name.

After a while, being anxious to lessen his weakness in the eyes of his servant, the Bishop raised his eyes to the two mitres that stood before him. Both were of white silk stuff, very curiously and beautifully sown, but one was high and the other more squat. The Bishop was about to speak of these, to placate the old sour man—for it was in such things that he took most interest. It was very quiet in that room.

There came a knocking, like a fumbling at the door. So the vestiarius went to it, and, opening it by a crack, whispered out by that way. And then he turned and said sourly:

"Here is a monk. A monk of Belford called Francis. He says he has your word that he may come to you at all times and seasons." The Bishop made a sign with the hand, that hung over the arm of his chair, that that monk should come in. And indeed the Bishop had given orders that the monk Francis should come in to him at all times.

For those, as the Bishop saw them, were evil days and full of sudden perils that must very suddenly be reported to him. And, as far as peril from the North went—and mostly from Alnwick way—he knew no man, monk or laymen, that could more swiftly warn him. Besides, the Bishop heard his conversation with pleasure and counted him a very holy young monk, so that he would gladly have had him for his confessor.

He accounted him the best adviser that a Bishop could have in that see. For of the religious that he had round him there, the lay priests were too ignorant, with a rustic simplicity; the monks of Durham were too haughty; those of Belford too learned; those of Alnwick too set upon the glory of their abbey. The ecclesiastical lawyers quibbled too much over parcels of land; the knights were too formal and concerned for the state of the see. But this monk Francis loved God and considered the world.

The Bishop had been reflecting in that way for some time whilst the monk, entering in his woollen robes had knelt beside his chair. Then the Bishop stretched his hand languidly out and the monk set his lips to the ring upon it. So the Bishop pointed a finger to the taller of the two mitres.

"This is my new one," he said, "it has just come to me from Flanders, while I was at mass."

The monk Francis looked upon the new mitre.

"I have never seen finer stitching in silver," he said. The vestiarius said harshly:

"I consider the old one more fitting. For a Prince of the Church Militant it is more fitting. It sits more squatly upon the head, like a helmet."

The monk Francis looked upon him, and seeing that the Bishop did not wish to speak, he said:

"That is true! But then this new one, with its greater height is more graceful and seemly. Moreover there is room upon it for another panel over the forehead. The old one, you perceive, has only a picture of the crucifixion of our Lord worked in pearls and silk. Whereas the new one has below it a picture of Our Lady at the Tomb. It is always good to have a picture of Our Lady."

This was a thing that the vestiarius could not gainsay. So he brought out:

"Well, if the Bishop and monks are content with it, it may work to the greater glory of God;" and then he said: "Prince Bishop, I would have you go to another room that I may put away your vestments."

The Bishop stood up upon his feet and the vestiarius went down upon his knees. So the Bishop blessed him and put his hand heavily into the arm of the monk Francis.

"You shall lead me to my chamber," he said.

"God help us," the vestiarius cried, "shall I not first take off your vestments?"

"I had forgotten," the Bishop said. So he stood by the table whilst that old man took off the great cope, the silver cross and the white robes and stole that were beneath and fetched a purple gown edged with fur—for he considered that Bishop to be cold and weak with the blood that had been let from him the day before as the custom was. Upon the Bishop's head he set a furred cap, covering his ears, and hung round his neck once more the silver chain with the great crucifix in silver dependent. And so the Bishop, when he had drunk a little more wine, went up the stairs slowly to his chamber, and the vestiarius called in several pages and young boys and saw to it that they laid those vestments away in due order.

The Bishop's chamber had been taken out of a Norman gallery with pillars and arcades. Here many men-at-arms in parti-coloured woollen garments of natural wool and yellow, sat about on the floor or between the arcades, playing at dice together or drinking from flagons. Their immensely long pikes stood against the arches beside them. One, with his eyes shut, leaned back against the wall, saying prayers in penance for a crime he had committed.

The Bishop, upon the monk's arm passed slowly down this corridor to his chamber which had bare walls painted yellow in honour of St. Cuthbert; a great quantity of books, very big or very little, were upon shelves. A great many manuscripts in rolls lay upon other shelves, and papers that overflowed from chests, of which there were five, along one wall. There was a pallet bed in this room; a three-cornered stool and a coarsely hewed lectern; a prie-dieu and a crucifix. Thus it was a very bare room. This Bishop, though he affected somewhat great state before the people, was, in secret, a very ascetic man.

Few people, however, came into this bare room—not even his highest officers. The square windows—but that had been done in Bishop Skirlawe's days just a hundred years ago—were filled with bright glass, showing once again the history of the translation of St. Cuthbert. All in little squares this history was, monks with shaven heads crouching down as if the space would not contain them, and the head of Dun Cow showing yellow against a background of glass shining like pigeon's blood rubies. One of these little, square casements hung open and through it the distant landscape showed clear, with hills grey and woods grey-blue, astonishing for its tranquillity.

So, the monk Francis being sat up on his three-legged stool, the Bishop began to pace up and down before the long window space—backwards and forwards over the tiles, with an immense swiftness. Once he turned his face imperiously to where the monk sat and said harshly:

"Pray God, you bring me no ill news."

The monk, who had been gazing, out of respect, at the tiles, raised his glance to say:

"I think it is rather good news."

The Bishop said:

"I thank God!" and touched his fur cap. Once again he resumed his pacing, biting his lips and clenching and unclenching his fingers.

Suddenly, in the stillness there resounded a rustle of wings, and, balancing unsteadily upon the iron frame of the open window, there appeared a blue pigeon that craned its head to one side or the other, watching the Bishop. From outside there came a still greater rustle of wings.

Then the monk's face grew colourless.

"Father in God," he said in a low voice, "what is that fowl?"

The Bishop turned his lean head round over his shoulder, when he saw the pigeon that gazed anxiously at him, he smiled a kindly and soft smile.

"That is my weakness, Brother Francis," he said. With his brushing step he crossed the smooth tiles towards one of the chests that was filled with parchments. As he lifted the lid that pigeon flew from the window on to his shoulder. And immediately another pigeon took its place in the opening. "Brother Francis," he continued, "you are a stern man, yet be indulgent to my weakness. It was your namesake that was called 'of the Birds.' And in Scripture you may read the exhortation: 'Be ye guileless as doves and with the wisdom of the serpent.'" So he lifted that chest-lid and took from it a little linen bag of pease.

Then the face of the monk became radiant.

"Father in God," he said, "I thank heaven for this. For those very words I used twenty hours ago and now you use them again."

"Why," the Bishop said, "what harm ever came from these pretty fowls of heaven?" The pigeon on his shoulder stretched its neck out to reach his mouth with its bill. Urgently and insistently it did this. And others were entering the window space. Then, before the flutter of their wings should drown his voice, the Bishop said that these birds reminded him that his dinner hour was come. And he begged the monk Francis to tell a page that he should find amongst the men-at-arms in the gallery that the Lord Bishop would have his guests sit down to dinner and eat with a good appetite; whereas he himself was a little indisposed and would have his own cook send up to him four eggs with a little saffron and some of the drink called clary, such as the cook knew he wished for when he was ill. So, the monk Francis went out and, after some time, found that page, who was playing knucklebones with another in the stairway. And when the monk had cuffed him well he sent him upon his errand, and so went back to the room. The Bishop was smiling down at from twenty to thirty pigeons. They were around his feet, upon his bed where he had sat down, upon his knees and, precariously they found footholds, fluttering their wings upon his moving arms.

So there he sat, looking upon those fowls of the air and smiling. And in a little time that page brought him the four eggs, the saffron and the beverage called clary. And so the Bishop ate his meal, sprinkling the saffron upon the eggs. He scattered fragments of the hard yolk amongst the pigeons. And when he was done and had drunk his drink he shook the crumbs off his gown and came over towards the monk Francis, all the pigeons scattering before his feet.

The Bishop was a man much taller than the monk and much thinner in the features. That is to say that, of late years, he had grown thin with his cares, but his purple and furred gown gave him a certain bulk. So he looked down upon the monk and said:

"My brother in God, you have perceived my weakness, for each day I spend certain minutes upon these birds and gain comfort from the contemplation of their beauty and guilelessness. And I think they are the only friends I have, so lonely is my state in these great and peopled halls. Time was, no doubt, when a Prince Bishop was beloved, dwelling amongst people of a simple piety. And in such a day I could have done well. But, as I have often told you, my brother, in this place I cannot see my way. I am troubled with many doubts. If these were again the days of St. Thomas of Canterbury, I could at least extend my neck to the butcher's sword. I think I should have had that courage.... But this then is my road and in which God has set me. And very willingly I totter along it. Only, from time to time, my brain reels; I seem to see nothing, amongst great defiles, with rocks that roll down upon me. And this my see appears like a little church set between towering precipices.... And so I rest my brain by playing with these birds."

"So," the monk Francis said, "St. Gerome had a lion, that lightened his labours and the solitude of his cell, and so many other saints had."

"But I am no saint," the Bishop said, "and have no licences so to disport myself as they had.... But even so it is! God give me guidance. For it is certain that the King that we have hates me a little and in some sort fears me. And he is a strong, persevering and cunning prince. And I do take him to be an evil prince that murdered a very good King, my friend and the friend of this see. And if I had courage and could see clearly, I should raise up the standard of this my see and call to me the barons and the knights and so, in a crusade, march to the dethroning of this King. But, as you know, I am not framed for such a part. I am no commander, neither has God given me the golden gift of oratory to inflame men's hearts to a holy war. Nor yet, in this age, is the spirit of piety abroad among the people, and I know not who are my friends.... So here I sit in doubt and perplexity. And now there is come, even to this my city, a man calling himself commissioner of this upstart King. For such a man thundered upon the city gates last night. And very willingly I could have refused him entrance, but in my trouble and perplexity I did not dare. What say you then, brother Francis, to all these things, for I will hear you very willingly?"

The monk kept his eyes for some time longer upon the floor and at last he spoke:

"My lord and prince," he said, "pardon me beforehand if in what I shall tell you now I have done aught amiss. But this I will tell you at once: this commissioner of King Henry's is a subtle spy. Therefore, taking upon my own person the shame, if shame there be, I have set myself to counterspy him. For it fell out in this way: in certain secret manners—not under seal of confession—I have known for some time past that this Sir Bertram of Lyonesse, was gathering news of the North parts. There are certain contractors for the building of our Tower in Belford, and one of them is called Richard Chambre, a burgess of Newcastle. And because I have lent him now and then a little money and much good advice, this contractor is my good friend and child. So one day, last September, this Richard Chambre told me, whilst devising of other things, that there was one, John of Whitley, a burgess of Newcastle, that went gathering news for a knight of the King's court called Sir Bertram, of Lyonesse. He was writing him letters and the like, and this John of Whitley had come to Richard Chambre, and had asked him for news of our monastery of Belford, and of how we monks were affected towards the new King.... And so, gathering here a piece of news and there another, I gathered that this Sir Bertram had agents here and there—one a monk in Alnwick called Ludovicus and another, a bailiff of our own, called the Magister Stone at Castle Lovell. But that Magister is much in Durham...."

"God help me," the Bishop said, "I have seen him often upon the affairs of the Knights of Cullerford and Haltwhistle...."

"Well, he is an agent of that Sir Bertram's," the monk said. "Now let me go on further with my story."

"But this is very terrible hearing," the Bishop said. "All this spying and treachery is a new thing. It is even as it is in Italy."

"This is a new age, Father in God," the monk said, "and you will find this King to employ as many spies as any Duke Borgia or of Ferrara. And so it will go from bad to worse. Therefore let us be prepared.... So this matter is: I came this morning, riding with a certain knight and lord, to Framwell Gate Bridge, just as they opened it. And because I would speak certain private words with that lord I had ridden with him a mile ahead of his spears. So we waited at the bridge for them to come up. Then I fell a-talking with the captain of the bridge as to the news and so I heard, as ye know, that this same Sir Bertram, calling himself commissioner of the King had come in last night with the old Princess of Croy and her train—but his own train had been sent to lodge in Old Elvet. So I learned where he was, for every woman in the street could tell me.

"I went swiftly afoot to the house of the Princess of Croy, and the door stood open with the old steward before it, chaffering with a fisherman. So, frowning fiercely upon that steward, I crept up that stairway, my sandals making no sound, and going higher than the door, I stood upon the stairs and had a fair view of this Sir Bertram and heard much of what he said.... I would have come to you the sooner, Father in God, but this was a very pertinent matter and I heard you were saying of mass."

Then the monk Francis reported to the Prince Bishop much of what that Sir Bertram had said, but keeping back some of it for the time. The Bishop stood before him, clasping and unclasping his hands; the pigeons, having dispersed about the tiles in the search of pease that had rolled away, flew now, by ones and twos, out of the little window again.

In the view of the monk Francis the coming of this Sir Bertram meant, as he under-read that knight's words, an immediate calm in those parts, but afterwards, in three years or four, a much greater danger. For, as the monk saw it, it was the design of that King Henry Seventh to show himself to the great lords of the North, a very kind, indulgent and lenient ruler. So he should gather them under his wing to be a potent engine against that see of Durham, that powerful kingdom within his kingdom. Thus, for the time being, the monk perceived no danger for that see. He thought—and time would very likely prove him right—that that Sir Bertram would begin, to the Bishop as to the great lords, with kind and soothing words, or even with presents. So, peace being there established and the memory of King Richard forgotten, the King would begin to move the lords of the North against that bishopric. And, doubtless, the further extent of his design—the bishopric being weakened by the meeting of the lords—would be to lop off the great lords, one by one, advisedly and with caution until the King had the upper hand of all in those parts....

"This is a very fell scheme, my brother," the Bishop said. "I had rather the King would march upon me with his flags on high."

"So would all the King's enemies," the monk Francis said, "for that would bring him down. He is not strong enough for that." He paused for a moment: "If my lord and prince will let me speak my mind..." he began again.

"You are here for that," the Bishop said. "What I need is counsel."

"Then I will say this," the monk Francis began again: "To a mine you set a countermine and so may we. This subtle King will by acts of graciousness win the North parts to him. My lord and prince under God, you may do this very much more easily than he. For, by the grace of God, in these days you are a very wealthy Prince but he for a King is very poor, he having great expenses for wars in France and elsewhere where rebellions break out. And acts of graciousness, in this world, end either in gifts of money or the remission of fines, rents and amercements. These this King cannot come to do, or he will starve. But all these things you can do very easily. If he can spare the nobles a little he will do it, but he must then press the more heavily upon the commons and so great cries against him will rise up in these parts.... But you, lord and prince, can be gracious to all. And so I would have you show yourself. Thus, at the end of three or four years this King may find himself only the poorer for his efforts."

"I hope you may be right," the Bishop said.

"Time will show it," the monk answered, "and the grace of God. Now I will talk to you of the Young Lovell.... He is come here again."

"God help me," the Bishop said, "I have been talking of him all this morning."

The monk Francis said:

"Ah, that is what I had thought. And it was with that bailiff—the lawyer, Master Stone."

"It was even with him," the Bishop said. "He seemed a worthy and a pious man and full of zeal for this see of Durham."

"Well, you shall hear," the monk said. "I will wager he came with this advice—that you should lay hands upon the estates of the Young Lovell under a writ of sorcery, and so divide them between yourself and the Knights of Haltwhistle and Cullerford. Thus you should be beforehand with the Earl of Northumberland who would do as much for the King's disgrace in these parts."

"It was even that that he reded me do," the Bishop said. "He urged the see should gain much good land thereby."

"And lose much worship," the monk said. "It is that that Sir Bertram wishes."

"I can see as much as that," the Bishop answered. "And this Master Stone—who is an ill-looking man—never told me that the Young Lovell, as you say, was come again, but said that he was dead and that Cullerford and Haltwhistle, being by marriage his heirs, would very willingly divide with me. He was insistent with me to issue that writ this afternoon."

"Well, it was a clever, foul scheme," the monk Francis said. "For well that bailiff knew the Young Lovell had been seen riding into Castle Lovell! Hard he has ridden here—if a lawyer can ride hard—to get that writ against the Young Lovell or ever we could come to you. So with that he would have earned great disgrace for you and this see. But what I would have you do is to confirm, as far as the see goes, that Young Lovell in his inheritance. So it will rest with the King, the Earl of Northumberland, and this Sir Bertram to dispossess him. And thus shall their names stink in the nostrils of all this country-side. For that young man is very beloved, by gentle and simple, having fought well against the false Scots at Kenchie's Burn, as these eyes did see."

The monk spoke long and earnestly in that sense; and indeed he had the right of it. There would have been none in that country that would not have cried shame on the Church for her greed, if the Bishop had divided these lands with foul knights like Sir Walter Limousin and Symonde Vesey and Vesey the outlaw and the Decies. But if the Bishop would confirm Sir Paris Lovell in the lands over which the see had rights and overlordships, great discredit would fall upon the Percy for having, in a Warden's Court, essayed to ruin the Young Lovell on a false charge.

And after the monk Francis had talked in that way for some time, the Bishop was convinced of—nay he shuddered at—the trap into which he had nearly fallen. But, he said, the lawyer Stone had so bewildered him with one legal point and another—such as how the Decies, being knighted and plighted by the Prince Bishop himself in the name of the Young Lovell, had all the rights forfeited by that lording. He would very willingly resign a portion of his rights by way of fine; it was, moreover, in the protocol of the Bishops of Durham that no Bishop could refuse such a gift freely made, to the disadvantage of the see. And the lawyer said, from his knowledge of canon law, that, the Bishop having made the Decies into Young Lovell and a knight of the Church and the betrothed of the Lady Margaret of Glororem, nothing could undo all those things but a bull or dispensation of the Pope.

"Well," the monk Francis said, "I have considered that point and have read in such books as our poor monastery hath, both upon the canon and the civil law—such as the book of decrees of which the first leaf begins 'Jejunandi' and the penultimate leaf ends 'digestus erif,' or the book of decretals which begins 'Nullain res est' and ends: 'in causa negligenciae.' Also I have spoken with the most learned of our brethren upon this case and with your sergeants of law and your justices and all with one accord agree that a long law case might be made out of it. That Decies hath his grounds of appeal, at least upon the matter of knighthood and betrothal. For it is very uncertain if you could unknight him or break his betrothal with the Lady Margaret of Glororem without an appeal to our Father in Rome.

"As to the matter of the other rights conveyed by that name, that is much simpler. For the Young Lovell has only to make appeal to you through a person of the Church as his best friend. Then you shall give him licence, under the decretal 'in causa negligenciae' and he may at once enter upon his lands by force or how he may...."

"What then should the man called Decies do?" the Bishop asked. "I am not very learned in these laws; but that lawyer Stone said he may do great things."

"For that," the monk Francis said, "he might. But, if I can have a say with that Decies, he shall hang from a very high tree. Or, if the Young Lovell is too tender of his half-brother, for that the Decies is, the Decies shall at my complaint to your officers and, after a fair trial, be broken upon the wheel. For before a court non-ecclesiastical he hath brought false witness against a vassal of your see upon an ecclesiastical charge, to wit sorcery. There is no escape for him."

The Bishop was, by that, hot to do grace to the Young Lovell. And, after he had made the monk Francis recite over again all that he had said, he agreed very heartily to do all that that monk asked of him. For that was a position that jumped very well with Bishop Sherwood's character, and one that made all things the plainer to him. Being a churchman, subtle rather than vigorous, he desired above all things the good and glory of his see. He desired that, so much above his own glory and good, that in later years he left his see and went into exile rather than that the bishopric should suffer from the King's hatred of his person. But he could see very well that the bishopric of Durham would lose rather than gain by taking the lands of a young lord, well loved and deserving well of those parts. The Church, as he was aware, was called, in those days, avaricious, gluttonous and avid of lands and rent. But here, by a shining instance, he might show that the see-palatine of Durham held its hand and so that see should gain in credit and renown at the expense even of all other bishoprics in the realm and of the realm itself. And here was a course of action that this Bishop could very well understand and set going. Besides, of his own predilection, he had a hearty inclination towards such high and chivalric natures as was the Young Lovell's. He saw in him a shining and armoured protector against the foes of his see. Seeing things very much in symbols and pictures, this Bishop seemed to see that young lord, in silver harness, shining in the sun and raising his sword against the mists, fumes and flames that beset this fair city of Durham.

Therefore he said hastily to the monk Francis that if that monk would take a sheet of parchment and write the various matters of canon law and the rest, he, the Bishop, would commit them to memory, and, that evening he would call before him the lawyer Stone, the Young Lovell and, if it seemed advisable, the King's commissioner and announce to them what his rede was in all these matters.

So he gave the monk a great sheet of parchment from a chest and the monk turned round to the pulpit and began to write. The Bishop walked up and down behind his back, rubbing his hands delicately together with pleasure at that their scheme and at the discomfiture of the King's commissioner that must ensue therefrom.

Now let us turn for a moment to what passed in the house of the Princess Rohtraut of Croy, Lady mother of Dacre, during this time, whilst the monk wrote.

VII

At that heavy beating of iron upon the stair the Lady Margaret and Sir Bertram of Lyonesse looked into each other's eyes, crossing glances of apprehension in the one case and of terror in the other. For the Lady Margaret was divided between joy and love and the sad and sorrowful gaze that three times the Bride of Christ had cast upon her in her dreams. Sir Bertram, for his part, was filled with dread of sorceries, fearing for his soul. For, if in matters of statecraft and the affairs of this world he was a very cool man, yet—as is often the case with those who are half men of law, half men of state, new and rising men not very scrupulous of means but solidly set upon matters of their day—this Sir Bertram quailed like a dog before thoughts of death, sorcery, the omens of superstition and hell fire. So he crossed himself again and again. For, though much of his talk with those ladies had been wary and cautious, he had very sincerely believed when he said that this Paris Lovell had been carried off by a white witch or a magic courtesan. Such things he believed in as he believed in treachery, guile, want of faith in men and the deceit that lies in women, coming from Adam's snake-wife, called Lilith.

Only the old Princess leaned forward in her throne-chair, watching the dark stone doorway with pleasant eyes, for she believed neither in the sorceries nor the prowess of her grandson, but made sure of finding him an arrant fool.

So a figure in very shining steel stood in that little painted arch. At sight of it, at the very first, the Lady Margaret cried out. For she knew very well every detail of the silken dresses and accoutrements of her lord and love. And there he stood in his armour of state, fluted, with long steel shoes and a round helmet without a plume, like the head of a bull-dog. This suit of armour she had last seen upon the Decies, and it seemed to her like a sort of sorcery that he should wear it there. For she never thought it was the Decies that stood before her; she had known too well the young lord's voice upon the stairs.

How he had come by that suit was no sorcery but a very simple matter.

At Castle Lovell, since they could by no means come at the late lord's gold in the White Tower, they were much in need of money; for they could gather no rents and no fines and no tolls. The people would not pay them. Therefore, in those months past, without remorse they had sold all such furnishings of the Castle as they could find buyers for. For the jewels of the Lady Rohtraut they could not do it very easily, since the goldsmiths of Newcastle set their heads together and would have none of them, fearing the reprisals of the Dacres and suits at law and the like. But certain hangings and furniture they sold for a good price to a German of Sunderland, who shipped them beyond the seas. And certain arms that they had, more than they had men for, they sold for what little these would fetch to certain armourers of the town of Morpeth. Amongst these had been this suit of state. For this suit was too small for the Decies; it had galled him very uncomfortably beneath the arm-pits and between the thighs, when he had played the part of his half-brother, and he had been heartily glad to be out of it. It had been too large for the Knights of Cullerford and Haltwhistle, so that they rattled inside it like walnuts in their shells in June. As for Henry Vesey of Wall Houses, the evil knight, he said he would be hanged if he wore the Young Lovell's armour, for it would bring him ill-luck. So they sold it for forty shillings to a Morpeth armourer called Simon Armstrong, who thought he had a bargain. But he found that neither knight nor esquire of that countryside would take it of him, for the reasons given by Henry Vesey. So there it was in his store.

Now two days before, very early in the morning, the monk Francis, Young Lovell and ten men-at-arms, well found, had set out from the monastery of Belford, the monk upon a trotting mule, the Young Lovell, in light armour, upon Hamewarts, and the men-at-arms upon little galloways, small horses such as the Scots use when they came raiding over the borders. But at the monastery gate they found nine men of the old Lovell men-at-arms waiting to come into Young Lovell's service. There was no room for them to be harboured in the monastery, so they must come along with the Young Lovell. And, ever as he rode along—and he went slowly for that purpose—came men-at-arms and bowmen hastening out of the hay-fields, where they had taken service, to come under the banner of the Young Lovell, until he had forty men and more. And at a cross in the hill-paths, ten miles below Belford, there were awaiting them Cressingham and La Rougerie, esquires that had been in service at Castle Lovell. They were well armed, upon little Scots horses, and came out of the hills where there was a deserted tower. They had with them seventeen men, and four women that had served in Castle Lovell, and all were well fed and found, so what they had done in the meantime it was better not to inquire, though they swore that all they had came from the Scots' side of the border. The Young Lovell was well heartened by the sight of all these men, and they rode onward, to the number of sixty-five men and two esquires; twenty-two men having no horses and holding by the stirrups of them that had.

They made a circuit round Alnwick, for the monk Francis doubted the friendship of the Earl of Northumberland. So they went from the high ground by Hagdon to Eglingham and so, holding always to the hills and moors, above Broom Park and Overthwarts and across the North Forest, going south and to the east of Rothbury. There they deemed themselves safe of the Percy, and they could take to the lower grounds and such roads as there were. There being a good road from Eshot Hill to Morpeth, they made for that, and hit upon it towards two in the afternoon, having come nearly forty miles since four of that morning because of the roundabout path they had followed.

There, because they were near his mother's lands, it came into the Young Lovell's head, and seemed good to him to visit these places and take possession of them in her name. Therefore they made what haste they could and so came to the Castle at Cramlin by six of the evening. This Castle of his wife's the late Lord Lovell had very much neglected, having stripped it of all its furnishings and even of much of the lead upon the roofs. And, where there were slates or stone roofing, the rains and snows had penetrated to the upper floors. Nevertheless the lower rooms were sound enough. So the Young Lovell said that that night he would sleep there. Mattresses and bedding were brought from the bondsmen of that place for the Young Lovell, the monk and the two esquires; the men slept very well upon straw in the stables. Also the Young Lovell sent the esquire Cressingham with the men to his mother's house at Killingworth, and the esquire La Rougerie with the men to her other house at Plessey, which stood in a pleasant place. So then the monk Francis went to his prayers and the Young Lovell round the battlements of that smallish Castle. He noted carefully what stones were sound and which tottered, and so he came to the conclusion that, with a little mason's work well expended, his men might hold it very well for a space.

Then came back those two esquires, having left five men each in the houses at Plessey and Killingworth. The houses they reported to be in as sad a plight as that Castle, or worse, so that it seemed that they must fall into utter ruin. At a bondsman's house the esquire Cressingham had come upon a fellow calling himself the receiver for the Knights of Cullerford and Haltwhistle. This man the esquire had brought with him and he proved of much use. For, in the first place, he had taken some money which he had about him and, in the second, he had a great book of accounts which showed what was due to the Lady Rohtraut from each holding. So they kept that fellow in a stable, taking from him the money and the book. Both these esquires said that all the men of these villages and hamlets welcomed the coming of their lord and were ready to do him suit and service. In those parts the Lady Rohtraut had nine thousand acres of serviceable land and twenty of heathery and indifferent. So they slept very well that night.

On the morrow they had much to do. Thus the monk went with the esquire Cressingham and men bravely armed from farm to farm, warning the men there that those were the lands of the Lord Lovell and his mother. They had that false bailiff well trussed upon a little horse to show them the way; but long before noon he had begged to be allowed to take up the service of the Lord Lovell, and so they were the quicker done and had no hindrances, all the peasants vowing to do their services very willingly.

One other thing was good, and that was that the esquire La Rougerie was the son of a Frenchman, very skilled in matters of fortifying and building in stone. This Frenchman the old Lord Lovell had brought from France to see to the building of the White Tower, which he wished to make a citadel, as it were, of Castle Lovell. And this esquire had learned much of his father; the Young Lovell could trust him very well. So the Young Lovell sent that La Rougerie into the countryside to find masons and stone workers, and he found some, though not many, for most men of that class worked in the fisheries in summertime, coming back to building only when the storms drove them off the seas. The Young Lovell was minded to have that Castle put first into a state to withstand an assault and later to have it roofed and rendered fair, with the lower part of one of the round towers turned into a wheat-pit and another made into a great pit of brine, in which they could cure whole carcases of oxen, swine and sheep, to the number of five hundred or more. So, when he had showed La Rougerie the weak places he had discovered the night before, he took thirty of his men for the greater safety and rode unto the town of Morpeth, Here he sent for the bailiff of that town to come to the market place and told him that his errand was very peaceable. For he desired to buy arms and bows for twenty of his men, with twenty-five pikes and two hundred barrels of arrows and several pack-horses, and a saker or two for the defence of Castle Cramlin and ten or more pack-horses to carry all these things. So the bailiff of that town answered him very civilly saying that he was glad of that lord's visit because he was akin to the Dacres and the Ogles and the Bertrams and other lords that had been friends to the good town of Morpeth. And he did what he could amongst the armourers and citizens that had arms to sell. So, in a short time, the Young Lovell had a good part of what he sought. This would not have been the case so easily but for the arms that those of Castle Lovell had sold to these very armourers. As it was, many of the Young Lovell's men got back arms that they had borne in that Castle before. Then came the armourer called Armstrong to the Young Lovell and begged him to be his good lord and pardon him. This the Young Lovell said he would do if his crime was not very great. So that armourer revealed to the Young Lovell that he had that lord's armour of state which he had bought for forty shillings, but no knight of that part would buy it of him. And he said that if the Lord Lovell was his very good lord he would pay him again that forty shillings, but, if not, he might take it and welcome. Then the Young Lovell was glad of that armourer, and said that if Armstrong would put new straps to all places where straps should go he would pay him fifty shillings for his honesty. So the armourer was very glad.

It was four of the afternoon before the Young Lovell came back to Cramlin Castle, having nearly all that he needed of harness, pikes, bows, pack-horses and the rest, but only one hundred and twenty barrels of arrows, three sakers and a little gunpowder, for the town of Morpeth could not supply more at that time. Still it was well enough, and there he found that La Rougerie had brought masons and carpenters enough to do his work roughly in a week's time, and afterwards to amend it fairly and in permanence. And, towards six, came back the monk Francis and the others with good news of the bondsmen's submission. They drove before them three young oxen and over thirty sheep and lambs, and these things were offerings from the various hamlets of the Lady Rohtraut, together with eleven hogsheads of beer and other things eatable that should come after. And these bondsmen promised that for six months they would supply all that should be needed for the support of such men as the Lord Lovell should see fit to leave in that Castle, the price being left in account between that lord and them, and the men-at-arms to be ready to defend them against raiders if any should come.

So the Young Lovell began to be of better spirits for, with all these preparations for warfare, he had thought less of the lady of the doves. And the monk Francis encouraged him in this, though once or twice he sighed. But when the Young Lovell asked him why this was, he said it was because of his cousin that he had slain. One thing that had given heart to the Young Lovell was this, that amongst the arms that had come from Castle Lovell unto the hands of the Morpeth armourers was a fair lance and rolled round it a small fine banner of silk with the arms of Lovell upon it. Now, the Lord Lovell, because of his estate in those parts, had the right to ride across the lands of the Bishop of Durham with his banner displayed, and he would have ridden to that city very unwillingly without it.

So, after taking counsel together, they decided that they would lie down and sleep at six and, rising at twelve, should ride to Durham so as to come there at the dawn. The Young Lovell would take with him twenty spears and the esquire Cressingham to bear the banner, who was a fine man of thirty with good armour of his own. And the twenty spears should be all fine men on the best horses that they had. So they should make a fair show when they rode into the city of Durham; and, the more to that end, the Young Lovell took with him his armour of state upon a pack horse, that he might put it on when he was a mile or so away from the bridge.

The remaining five and forty men with the esquire La Rougerie, who was a man to be trusted, should remain to hold Castle Cramlin for the Young Lovell and to aid in the buildings that should go forward there. In that way the Young Lovell rode out from a Castle of his own.

And, in that way too, he came before the Lady Margaret and his grandmother, the Princess Rohtraut, as well as Sir Bertram of Lyonesse, in his armour of state. He seemed to survey them for a space through the opening of his helmet. This he had kept closed in riding through the city for fear any friend of the Knights of Cullerford and Haltwhistle should by chance be in those streets and aim an arrow at him from a window or from behind a buttress. Then he pushed up the visor.

Stern he always looked when his face was framed in iron, but so stern as he looked that day the Lady Margaret considered that she had never seen him. He had broad, level eyebrows of brown, a pointed nose, firm lips and a determined chin. The Lady Margaret knew that he had a pleasant smile but he showed none of it then, and he paid no attention either to her or to the Cornish knight. His grandmother regarded him with a keen, hostile glance, and with his eyes set upon hers he advanced grimly towards her. His short dagger was girt around him, but he had no sword. So, in that shining harness, he knelt before that old lady on the second step. He lifted up his hands and said:

"Madam, Princess and my Granddam, to whom I owe great honour...."

"That is a good beginning, by Our Lady," the Princess said.

"I would not so soon have come to you," he continued in firm tones, "but that you sent me your commands."

"Well, this grows better and better," the old woman said.

"It is neither out of lack of duty, nor of due awe and natural affection, that I had not the sooner come," the Young Lovell said.

"That passes me!" the Princess cried out. "By Our Lady, I do not understand that speech."

The Young Lovell who towered on high when he stood, and was tall enough though he knelt, appeared like a great hound, attacked by this fierce little woman as by a savage lap-dog.

"Madam and gentle Princess," he said slowly, "I cannot easily say what I would say, for no man would say it easily."

"Then you are on a fool's errand," the Princess said, "for a wise man can say most things." She considered him for a moment and then said jeeringly: "If you had business in the town, stiff grandson of mine, say you had business: if you were gone after wenches, lie about it. But I care very little. I sent for you to have your news; so leave the complimenting and give me that."

"Madam and gentle Princess," he began again, though the old lady grunted and mumbled. "I did not come before because I sought assoilment."

"What is assoilment?" she asked.

He answered briefly:

"Pardon for sin, witting and unwitting."

"Well, get on," she said impatiently.

"Lacking that assoilment," he said, "I did not know if I were a fit knight to come into your presence."

"Why, I am an old horse," she said, "and not to be frightened by a dab of pitch. If you never showed yourself but after confession you might live in a cave, or so it was in my time."

"Then," said he, "know this. I came to my Castle and they shot upon me. So I have gathered together certain of my men and have taken my mother's Castle of Cramlin and hold it. So that is my news. And when I have the pardon of the Bishop and have paid forfeit, or what it is, I will get more of my men. For my standard is set up in Castle Cramlin and my men come to it from here and there. So in a fortnight or less I will retake my Castle; and I shall hang my brothers-in-law, send my half-brother across the sea, and put my sisters into nunneries. These are my projects."

"Body of God!" the old lady said. "By the Body of God!"

Then the Cornish knight moved round and stood beside the Princess and spoke to the Young Lovell.

"Ah, gentle lord," he said, "may I ask you a fair question?"

"By God's wounds," the Young Lovell said, "you shall ask me none. Who be you?"

"A poor knight," Sir Bertram answered, "but the commissioner of the most dread King Henry!"

"Then you are a friend of the false Percy," the Young Lovell said. "Get you gone. You are no friend to me."

And at that the old Princess cried out:

"Body of God! You have taken Castle Cramlin? Then without doubt you have taken Plessey House and Killingworth?"

"Madam and gentle Princess," the Young Lovell said, "I have taken and hold them for my mother. And so I will do for all my mother's lands whether round Morpeth or elsewhere."

"Then I have no more to say," the old Princess said. "Get you gone." The Young Lovell remained nevertheless kneeling for a space.

"Madam," he said, "it comes to me now that ye have a lawsuit with my mother for certain of those lands."

"Aye, and I will have them," she said. "It is not you nor any stiff popinjay shall hold them from me." She leaned out from her chair and cried these words into his face, her own being purple and her eyes bloodshot. So he crossed himself with his hand of bright steel.

"Madam," he said, "I cannot talk of lawsuits. They have done me too much wrong."

"But I will talk of lawsuits," she said. "By God, I will take a score of my fellows and drive your rats from my Castle of Cramlin!"