UNDER ONE SCEPTRE (continued 3)

Castide's opinion is worth record as to the reasons why the Irish submitted themselves so readily. He thought the "rebellious English" were alarmed at the blockade of their coasts, which was so strict that "neither provision nor merchandise could be landed": but he admitted that the "wild Irish" cared nothing for this, since they lived by hunting, and were strangers to commerce. Their reason, he considered, was the personal respect which they bore to King Richard, whom they accounted to be a prudent and conscientious man, and whose reverence for the memory of Edward the Confessor was shared by themselves,—a fact undisturbed by any inconvenient knowledge that Richard, if not the Irish Kings also, had at least as much sanctity about him as Edward the Confessor. How that most unamiable of men, whose cruelty as a husband was only equalled by his irreverence as a son, ever came to be canonised and honoured as Saint Edward, must be left as one of the many insoluble enigmas which Rome propounds to the crushed hearts, smothered intelligences, and stifled consciences of her votaries. For any other reason, Castide remitted it to the grace of God. The Canon of Chimay, whose exquisite naïve simplicity at times cuts sharply as a knife, made answer, with more wit than he was aware, that "the grace of God is good, and of infinite value to those who can obtain it: but we see few lords now-o'-days augment their territories otherwise than by force."

The campaign thus ended, Roger returned to England in company with his royal cousin, and rejoined his family in London on May, 1395, much to the satisfaction of both himself and Lawrence Madison, who greatly preferred to follow his master out of battle rather than into it, though he wisely kept to himself that sentiment, which would only have earned him a character for cowardice. On very few men had the idea then dawned that any person could love peace for other reasons than laziness and fear of being hurt. The two characteristics of King Richard which his uncle Gloucester specially detested and despised were his religious opinions, and his dislike to war and tumult. It might truly be said, paradox though it be, that Gloucester was never at peace except when he was at war.

During the twelve months following his return to London, Roger kept himself exceedingly quiet. It was the only safe thing he could do. It is said that an eminent man was asked how, being a resident in Paris, he contrived to live through the Reign of Terror. "I made myself of no reputation, and kept silence," was the significant answer. The Earl of March followed the same plan.

The beginning of 1395 was characterised by a strong agitation against the Lollard party, provoked by a very bold step on their part. Sir John Oldcastle, afterwards Lord Cobham, issued his "Book of Conclusions"—an epitome of Lollard doctrines, as well as a damaging attack on the opposite party—which was presented to Parliament by Lord Latimer and Sir Richard Stury, and posted up on the doors of St. Paul's Cathedral and the gates of Westminster Abbey. The two Archbishops took alarm in good earnest. They were strongly opposed to the "new" doctrines—which were not new, but as old as Christianity itself—and they rightly judged that unless these views had been spreading considerably in secret, they would scarcely have made this flourishing appearance in public. King Richard must be appealed to, and entreated to put down this unwelcome manifestation with the strong arm of the law: and the astute prelates well knew that only at one point, like Achilles, was Richard vulnerable on the Lollard question. The religious views were his own, and he would listen to no diatribe against them. But the political aspirations of the advanced Lollards he dreaded and disliked as much as the hierarchy. Archbishop Courtenay trusted to no tongue less skilful than his own the task of winning the King over. He started for Ireland without delay, taking with him Bishop Braybroke, a prelate whom the King liked and respected. Richard, the most open and unsuspicious of men, was no match for one of the wiliest priests who ever wore a mitre. Under his dexterous hands he was induced to believe that the political aims of the advanced section included his own deposition—the exact contrary was the truth—and the beloved Queen, who had hitherto always guided his sceptre on this point, was now beyond the fitful fever of earthly tumults. "Never was there King of England who so easily believed what was told him," says the chronicler Froissart, who knew Richard personally.

The King, thus influenced, departed from the course approved by his own better judgment, and for one moment swerved from that kindly support which he had always given hitherto to the Lollard party. He called before him the four most prominent Lollards then in his suite—Lord Latimer, Sir John Montacute, Sir Lewis Clifford, and Sir Richard Stury—and sharply rebuked them for their favour shown to traitors, with a threat of expulsion from the household if they did not change their political aspect. Latimer, Clifford, and Stury, were terrified, especially the last, who fell upon his knees and vowed that he would never do it again.

All these were old men. But the youngest of the group,—John Montacute, who was but four-and-twenty—held his peace, and promised nothing.

Could King Richard have looked forward five short years, he would have seen that one young man, who now refused to follow his King to evil, alone of all the four giving his life for that King's sake. The man who would not deny his God for fear of his sovereign, was the one who was ready to die for God and him.

It was during this short period of glamour thrown over King Richard by the astute Archbishop that certain Lollards were imprisoned in Beaumaris Castle, that some recanted, and that various edicts were issued, in the strong language wherein Gloucester and Courtenay delighted, against those who "sowed tares among the people." The complete change of tone in the royal mandates is very striking, between those periods when Gloucester's influence paralysed the King, and the two short intervals when Richard was left to himself. Yet to this day Richard, not Gloucester or Courtenay, is assailed with all the obloquy which is due only to the two latter. On this occasion Richard followed the Archbishop's leading up to a certain point. But when Courtenay pressed the advantage which he had gained, and urged capital punishment for the heretics, the King drew back. The cards had been shown a little too plainly. A short term of imprisonment for obnoxious politics was consonant with Richard's ideas of right and justice: but death as the penalty of religious opinions he would not give. Was it likely, when the religious opinions were to some extent his own?

Courtenay appeared to waive the matter. Ostensibly, he deferred to the King's judgment. And Richard never suspected that the sentence of death had merely been, by Courtenay and Gloucester, transferred to another person, and that their resolve was that if he would not permit the heretics to die, Richard must die himself.

It was during this period that Earl Roger kept quiet and silent,—so quiet that we never hear a word about him for a whole twelvemonth, though circumstantial evidence tends to show that he was in London all the time. His high position, and his known opinions, alike placed him in danger. The only safe thing to do was, so far as possible, to reduce himself to a nonentity, and hope that Gloucester and his myrmidons would forget him.

During the last two years death had been very busy in high places. The plague of 1394 had made three royal widowers—the Duke of Lancaster, the King, and the Earl of Derby. In the summer of 1396, Archbishop Courtenay was also summoned to the judgment bar. Removed from Courtenay's influence, the King awoke from his dream, and determined to initiate a new order of things. He knew at last—all but too late—that Gloucester and Arundel were among his worst enemies. Had he seen it with regard to one man more—his cousin Derby—the course of English history would probably have been different.

There was another person awake also, with the important difference that he had never been asleep. Gloucester was ready to act just as soon as his royal nephew: sooner, in fact, for his plans were already matured, while Richard's were only in process of formation. The time was come when that blow was to be struck which he had foreseen so long, for which he had waited so patiently and paved the way so elaborately, and which for so many years past, he had mentally destined Roger Mortimer to strike. The edge of the tool must be felt, to see whether the metal were sufficiently strong for the work to be done, and the point sufficiently sharp.

The July sun streamed full into a large low chamber of a handsome house on St. Paul's Wharf. The chamber was hung with dark blue silk relieved by silver embroidery. Velvet settles of the same colour stood at intervals around the walls, and half-a-dozen curule chairs of ebony inlaid with ivory, and furnished with blue silk cushions, were scattered about the room. On one of the velvet settles, with his head supported by a cushion, lay the only occupant of this handsome chamber—a young man of twenty-two years of age, fair-complexioned and very good-looking. His eyes were closed, but he certainly was not asleep, for he drew long sighs at intervals which were not long. On a small table beside him a large book lay open, bound in violet velvet, and clasped with gold.

A soft scratch at the door without announced a visitor, who was desired to come in, without any change of position on the part of the occupant of the settle. A middle-aged man, clad in blue and gold livery, entered accordingly.

"Please it your Lordship, Master Westcombe is here come from Fleshy, from my Lord Duke of Gloucester, desiring speech of your Lordship."

The slight contraction of his Lordship's brow might indicate that he could have borne to be deprived of the pleasure of an interview with Mr. Westcombe.

"Good. Bring him hither."

He rose from the settle, gave his long blue silk gown a slight shake, and resting his hand on the book, awaited his visitor.

The visitor proved to be a squire in royal livery, with the badge of the Duke of Gloucester—a golden swan—fastened to his left sleeve. He made a courtesy—for in those days the courtesy was the gentleman's reverence—and then with many words and some flowery expletives informed his very dear Lord that his gracious Lord the Duke lovingly prayed him to speed with all haste to Fleshy, for he desired to speak with him immediately.

Earl Roger's expression of face on this communication was much like that of a man who is just on the point of swallowing a necessary but very unpalatable dose of medicine. He gave a rather short reply, to the effect that he would start for Fleshy early the next morning: and having dismissed Mr. Westcombe courteously but quickly, he made his way to another room on the same floor of the house. Sounds of lively conversation and laughter issued from this room as soon as the door was opened. The Earl, in whose face the expression with which he had received his uncle's behest had rather increased than disappeared from it, made his way up the long narrow room, filled with brilliant company, pausing now to greet one, and now another, till he reached a lady attired in white and ruby satin, who sat at the further end in a curule chair, surrounded by gentle men who appeared to be paying court to her.

"Pray, suffer me not to let your diversion," remarked the Earl, with the faintest possible tone of satire under his polished accents: "I suppose I may have leave to speak with her Ladyship among her other servitors.—I came but to say, my Lady, that my fair uncle of Gloucester hath sent unto me this evening, praying me to render visit unto him at Fleshy, as early as may stand at mine ease. I think, therefore, to set forth with the morning light, and I shall maybe not have the pleasure to see your Ladyship again ere my departing."

The voice of the Countess replied, "Then, my Lord, you will not be here for the dance to-morrow? Truly, this is displeasant tidings!" But what her eyes said was,—"Really, what a convenient coincidence! I am delighted to hear it."

"I dare not flatter myself that your Ladyship will miss me," was Earl Roger's answer, in the same slightly ironical tone. Then he turned round, kissed his hand to her, and made his way out of the room.

Just outside he met his children and their nurses, returning from the garden. They were four very pretty, attractive little children, the eldest not quite seven years of age, and the youngest only two. The Earl stopped, and took up the eldest in his arms.

"God bless my Nannette!" he said. "Has Nannette been in the garden?"

Little Anne nodded, and looked earnestly into her father's eyes. The expression of them distressed her. Children can read the expression of a face long before they can read anything else. She thought, in her child language, that "somebody had hurt him;" she realised that he wanted comforting and diversion of thought: and her idea of administering both was to pat his cheek, and to hold up her doll for him to look at.

Somebody had indeed hurt him—somebody who was always hurting him—somebody who cared not a straw whether he was hurt or not. But who that was must never be told, except to the two privileged persons who had discovered it without telling, and whose sympathy was ready and sure.

The Earl kissed his little girl and set her down; laid his hand on his boy's head and blessed him. As he turned away, he said to a gentleman usher who was in waiting,—"Has Dan Robesart returned home?"

"Not yet, my Lord."

"No matter. Send Madison to me." And the Earl went on to the room he had first occupied. There he sat down by the window, and for a moment yielded to his own sorrowful thoughts.

He was not usually a man to brood over his sorrows, nor to nurse grievances. His feelings were more of the sharp and short order, and his disposition was not only cheerful, but playful. But when he had just received a fresh sting, the wound would smart and rankle for a moment. Otherwise, youth and natural good spirits commonly helped him to bear his daily cross. Just now it pressed hard. Those lovely blue eyes—as lovely as they were unloving—had so plainly told him that their owner would be glad to get rid of him, even for a few days. That bright illusion of past days, when he had fancied differently, was over long ago. He had woke early from his sweet dream. He knew that his idol was not merely dethroned—it was broken. The Alianora whom he had so passionately loved was a creature of his own imagination: and the real being, to whom he was tied for life, was neither loveable nor loving.

There was no jealousy mixed with these feelings of disappointed loneliness. It was not that he had any apprehension of her loving some one else better than himself. He said to himself bitterly that she had not heart enough for that. What she enjoyed in those ceaseless flirtations in which she spent her life was just their very emptiness and frivolity. For anything like genuine attachment—anything which involved strength and colour and warmth and reality—her nature was too light.

Oh, when will women learn that a flirt is a woman who has deliberately flung aside the very flower and glory of her womanhood?—who is preparing for herself a middle age of misery, and an old age of contempt and loneliness: to add to them, unless God's mercy interpose to save her, an eternity of remorse. No type of woman is so utterly despicable as this. "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap."

Earl Roger was not a man to shut his eyes to anything which he did not wish to see, nor to go on hoping against hope in the face of what he knew to be facts. His position was very much the same as that of another near connection of royalty, just a hundred years before him.[#] But Earl Edmund of Cornwall and Earl Roger of March were men of two very different types. The one had sunk under his burden; the other rose superior to it. Roger was not so utterly swallowed up in his disappointment as his predecessor had been. For him, his territorial affairs, his children, politics, and other interests, came in to relieve the weight. Only now and then, as it was to-night, his heart sank low, and felt a yearning want of that human sympathy which he never received but from two persons—his family physician, Mr. Robesart, and his body-squire, Lawrence Madison.

[#] The reader who desires to know more of this will find it in "Not For Him."

He lifted his head now to bid the latter enter.

"Your Lordship is not at ease, I fear?" said the squire with an intonation of genuine interest in his master.

He had grown into a taller and stronger-built man than Roger: dark-haired, dark-eyed, with a pale grave face, a smile of considerable sweetness, and a clear pleasant voice.

"Only the old story, lad," was the quiet answer. "Aye, and a little further travail thereto. My Lord of Gloucester, mine uncle, hath sent for me. We must needs be away toward Fleshy as early as the sun to-morrow."

"At your Lordship's pleasure. Shall it be to tarry?"

"I trow not. Best, maybe, to be prepared for a two-three days. But I shall be here again in the even, an' I may."

Lawrence bowed, and withdrew from the chamber.

Half an hour later, Mr. Robesart entered it, and found the Earl bending over the large Bible.

"I was told," said he, "that your Lordship had asked for me a short space agone. Metrusteth you be not indisposed?"

"Not here, good Father, I thank you," answered the Earl, touching his head. "Only here"—and he laid a hand upon his heart. "Methought I would fain hear somewhat of your counsel ere my departing, which shall be right early on the morrow." And he repeated the explanation given to Lawrence.

"Your Lordship," responded the physician, "hath not, as methinks, overmuch trust in my Lord Duke?"

"Fair fall he that hath that in any man!" returned Roger with a gesture of contempt. "In truth, Father, my belief in the Duke's discretion, not to say loyalty, would go by the eye of a needle. If he would but keep his plots to himself and my fair cousin of Rutland, which 'joyeth so much therein that I could not for compassion wish him thereout! Verily, I am alway something afeard lest some day he essay to drag me in."

"Counts your Lordship that his Grace hath sent for you with that intent?"

"I know not wherefore he hath so done, and that is the very truth." And the Earl passed his hand wearily over his forehead.

"It will be well that we both ask God for wisdom for your Lordship. But there is more than that troubling you, or I mistake."

"More than that? Aye so. Not more than custom is. Father, see you yon fly a-walking over the page of this book? If I shall say, That fly is in my way, and brush him thereout, roughly, so that he die—what is it? To me, but a little matter of disease[#] whereof I have rid me. But to him it is the end of health, and life, and all things. Ah! there be many fly-crushers among us human creatures. God help the crushed flies!"

[#] Inconvenience.

"Does He not help them?"

"How wot I? You must needs tell me what is help ere I can answer you. You mind that part of the story of my Lord Saint John Baptist, when he sent them twain to our Lord to ask at Him if He were He that should come, or no? There be will tell us that he sent them for their teaching; it could not be for his own. Methinks such have been in but few deep places, where the floods overflowed them. Was it not that the man's heart was wrung to behold the Christ, his own kinsman, pass him by on the other side—heal and comfort and help all that came, and never turn to him? Ah, it is evil waiting with patience and faith, when Christ passeth a man by."

"And you scarce twenty-three, my Lord!" said Mr. Robesart sadly, and not so inconsequently as it seemed.

"After men's reckoning. Be there any years in God's eternity? A man, methinks, may live a thousand years in one day, whether they be years of happiness or of misery." The Earl's head was lifted suddenly. "Father, tell me, what means He for me? It might have been so different!" And with the saddest of intonations, the young head sank again.

Mr. Robesart laid his hand on that of the Earl.

"He means,—'My son, give Me thine heart.'"

"I thought I had done so."

"Then he means,—My child, come nearer to Me. 'Each branch that beareth fruit, He shall purge it, that it bear the more fruit.'"

The Earl made no reply, except to say after an interval,—"Father, I would fain find you here when I return. I hope that will be to-morrow at even."

"I will await your Lordship," answered Mr. Robesart: and the interview ended.

The journey to Fleshy was hot and dusty, though they arrived there before the sun had reached the meridian. My Lord Duke kept his young kinsman waiting for him some time, and when he came, took him into the most secret recess of his own private room.

"Very dear Cousin," said he—and Roger felt sure from that moment that he meant mischief—"I do earnestly desire to unbosom myself to thee of all the secrets of mine heart. I am well assured that I need not unfold to thee the very numerous reasons which render our fair Lord King Richard wholly unfit to govern this realm, as being neither worthy nor capable to do so."

Roger contrived to hold his tongue, and kept his amazement as much out of his eyes as he could.

"You are well aware," continued the Duke—people are apt to assume your perfect agreement when they utter opinions with which you particularly disagree—"you are well aware, very dear Cousin, that the King cares for nothing but the pleasures of the table and the amusements of ladies."

What Gloucester meant by this sweeping statement[#] was that the King disliked war, which his uncle regarded as the only occupation fit for a prince: and preferred literature, music, conversation, and field sports, which in the eyes of his uncle were sufficiently mean to be level to the feminine intellect.

[#] These words from Gloucester are matter of history, and were used more than once in substance at least.

"Now, very dear Cousin, it is much communed[#] that these things are so: and hard is to know what shall be done in the matter, the rather since the people are right heartily discontent, and action must needs be taken."

[#] Talked about.

My Lord of Gloucester's language was usually as full of "the people" as that of any modern Radical: and, also like some modern speakers, he was greatly given to crediting the people with whatever desires he himself might entertain. Roger felt strongly inclined to inquire (with Lord Melbourne), "Can't you let it alone?" but he held his peace, accounting it the wisest plan to let Gloucester unwind his peroration. Every time that he found himself addressed as "very dear cousin," Roger's sensation of distrust deepened.

"I do you to wit, very dear Cousin, that I am already joined by my Lord of Arundel, your old friend and guardian,—his son Sir John, my Lord of Warwick, and many other prelates and barons, all which be at one and busy about this matter. The King shall be deposed, and prisoned so long as he shall live, in due state of a prince, and full provision allowed for his maintenance. We do desire to see you our King, being fully satisfied that you shall be of very diverse liking and conditions from him that is now such, and shall well content your nobles and people. What say you?"

Not what he thought. Had Roger spoken that out, the solitary word "Scoundrel!" would have been sufficient to convey it. But he held his peace. During a few seconds of silence his thoughts rapidly revolved probabilities, possibilities, desirabilities. Gloucester watched him narrowly until at last Roger looked up and spoke.

"Fair Uncle, and my gracious Lord, these matters be of weighty import, and ask grave meditation. It would not be possible that with so little time I should give you an answer touching a business so great."

Roger's manner was so cautious, if not cold, that Gloucester took the alarm.

"Have a care, nevertheless, most sweet Cousin, and this I pray you right heartily, that the matter get not abroad. If it be published, and come to the King's ears, ere the business be ripe——"

"Trust me, fair Uncle. I will take due thought, and observe all secrecy. And now, if your Grace have said so much as it list you, I pray you let me be on my way home, for I have urgent business in hand, and it shall be late ere I win thither."

An hour afterwards, Roger and his suite set out from Fleshy. As he climbed the last slope whence the Castle could be seen, he drew bridle for an instant, and looked back.

"Thank God that I have escaped from that hole with mine head on!" he murmured, in so low a tone that he was unheard except by the safe ears of Lawrence Madison. "If my gracious Lord of Gloucester ever again set eyes on me within those his walls, I grant him free leave to dub Roger Mortimer a fool! 'Very dear Cousin,' forsooth! 'Most sweet Cousin!' Methinks, the further I drew away from him, the dearer and sweeter I became. We will see, most sweet and very dear Uncle, if the young cannot outrun the old!—Lawrence!"

"My Lord?"

"We must be ready, thou and I, to set out for Ireland as to-morrow."

"For Ireland, my Lord!"

"Aye. I shall never feel at ease till I have set the sea betwixt me and those prating traitors. Once at Carrickfergus or Trim Castle, and I may snap my fingers at my very dear uncle and my most sweet cousins. They shall not be so foot-hot to fetch me from Ireland as from Paul's Wharf. The rascal crew!—the vile traitors! Pardoned over and over again as some of them have been!—raised to honours and riches by the King they are ready to betray! Would I be their King?—the ungrateful, disloyal adders! Nay, fair Uncle of Gloucester! Roger Mortimer can lay down his life if need be, but he can never sell his King and betray his friend—never break his trust, nor be unfaithful to his troth! 'Un Dieu, un Roy'—'Fais ce que doy!' Come, let us hie on."

"Methinks," said Lawrence, a little hesitatingly, "her Ladyship shall scantly be ready to obey so unlooked-for a summons."

"Her Ladyship—will do her pleasure." There was a pause between the words. "It may be it shall not list her to follow me thus far. If she so think, she can 'bide at which of my castles she will."

Nothing more was said on the subject until they reached Thames Street, when Lawrence was sent to give instant notice to the servants of their master's sudden departure, and warn them to be ready for him to set out at four o'clock the next morning, and the Earl himself went to convey the intelligence to the Countess.

"Bid Dan Robesart await me in my chamber," he said to the gentleman usher as he passed.

CHAPTER IX.

ROGER FINDS HIS MISSION.

"And how can man die better

Than facing fearful odds,

For the ashes of his fathers

And the temples of his gods?"

—LORD MACAULAY.

Earl Roger found his Countess in the same room in which he had left her when he went to Fleshy. Hypocras and spices, which constituted the "void," a light meal corresponding to afternoon tea, were being served round as he entered. Roger made his way to the side of Alianora, declined the hypocras—a light, sweet wine—and sat down by her while she sipped it.

"You are early, my Lord," said the Countess, whose eyes were occupied in watching an interchange of frothy banter between a knight and a lady at a little distance.

"I had need, my Lady. Will it meet with your wishes to follow me to Ireland, whether urgent cause removeth me, and without delay?"

"Ireland! What part of Ireland?"

"Kilkenny, at the first; afterward, maybe, to Trim."

"And what moveth your Lordship to go among those savages, who should scantly wit if you ware red velvet or blue damask?"

"Those savages are my kinsfolk, under your Ladyship's leave. Moreover, savages commonly have better sight than civil[#] men."

[#] Civilised.

"Verily, your Lordship hath some sweet kinsfolk to wake your pride!" said the Countess with a light laugh.

"Therein is your Ladyship not deceived," was the dry answer. "I leave behind me some most sweet ones. Well, what saith your Ladyship to my point?"

"What, I go to Ireland? Gramercy, your Lordship is pleasant! Aye, when I have cause to wear up mine old gowns and ugsome[#] head-gear, then will I think of following you in that direction. But till it so happen, under your leave, I would as lief 'bide on Paul's Wharf or at Ludlow."

[#] Ugly.

"As your Ladyship will."

"When go you? Soon, is it?—this next week?"

"I set forth as four o'clock to-morrow morning."

"And you looked for me to go withal? Verily, what unwitty[#] fantasies have these men! Why, one might scarce fold a borel[#] cloth in the time. What moveth you to be thus foot-hot,[#] forsooth?"

[#] Silly.

[#] A very common, coarse material.

[#] In hot haste.

"There is cause, Dame," said the Earl gravely.

"Then I bid your Lordship good even," said the Countess, laughing, "for elsewise shall you ne'er have space to put on your hood. I wish you a joyous meeting with those your dear kinsfolk, and that they may not eat you ere I behold you again!"

She held out her hand, and he touched his lips to it.

"May God bless my Lady!" he said very gravely.

Then he left her, and went upstairs, to say good-bye to his children. As he slowly mounted, the thought occurred to him,—What does blessing mean? If God blessed Alianora, what would He do to her? According to the usual ideas of men, He would give her beauty, talent, wealth, luxury, and happiness. But was this what God meant by the word? Had He no better blessings than such as these? Were not His sweetest fruits wrapped often in unsightly husks—His rarest gems in crusts which concealed their brilliance? Might He not be blessing Roger himself by means of his disappointments, and not blessing Alianora through all the gifts He showered on her? Was there not something in that Book which Roger was beginning to know so well, and to apply instinctively to every thing which happened to him, about one to whom God gave corn, and wine, and oil, and silver, and gold, which she prepared for Baal? If men turned His blessings into means of sinning, was there no fear lest He should turn them into curses?

Little Anne ran to meet her father as soon as she heard his step. He stooped and took her in his arms.

"Little Nan," he said rather sadly, "what wilt thou grow to be?"

"A lady," said she readily, with brightening eyes.

"There be two sorts of women, my little maid. There be heart-comforters, and there be heart-breakers. Which wilt thou be?"

The question was beyond her in details. She replied to its scope, which was all that she understood.

"I will be what God makes me."

"Amen," answered the Earl. "Be what God makes thee,—not Satan, nor thine own foolish fantasies. Farewell, my little one. I am going a long journey, my Nannette."

"Will you be back soon?"

"Nay, I think not. Farewell, my darling—God go with thee and bless thee!"

He kissed them all and gave them his blessing. Then he went back to his own room, where he found Mr. Robesart awaiting him.

"Father, it behoveth me to set forth for Ireland with the dawn, and I would vain have taken you withal. Can you be ready?"

"A priest is always ready," was the reply. "At what hour shall I wait upon your Lordship?"

"At four of the clock I think to set out."

"You shall find me in attendance. Can I serve your Lordship in any other way?"

"Methinks not, save by taking that into your safe keeping," said the Earl, touching the large Bible. "I would have it go withal, as well as you. Nought else, I thank you."

But before Mr. Robesart had quite reached the door, his young master's voice arrested his steps.

"Father, tell me ere you go, what doth God when He blesseth us?"

"What do you, my Lord, when you bless your childre?"

"I do desire all good to hap unto them: but I may not ensure it."

"And He alway ensureth it. I see none other difference. God's blessing is God's love. Every gift of God is a loving thought of God's heart toward His childre."

"But how, toward them that are not such?"

"'He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good,'" replied Mr. Robesart. "His common, earthly blessings He gives to all alike."

"And what call you such gifts as beauty, learning, and riches? Be they blessings, or no?"

"All things that God has made are good. They are blessings when they leave His hand. If we would have them abide blessings, we must give them back to Him. If we keep them to adorn ourselves withal, they become curses to us. God's first and greatest blessing is Himself. Let us keep Him in His right place—on the throne of the heart—and all else will fall into his right place, as by the wave of a magician's wand."

"Things be sorely apt to get out of their places!" said the Earl with a sigh. "I thank you, Father."

"My Lord, when you find things out of their places, look and see if you have not given leave to somewhat else to occupy His place. God give you a good even!"

A very small suite accompanied Earl Roger to Ireland; but it included his two best friends, Mr. Robesart and Lawrence Madison. His outside friends were considerably puzzled to know why he should leave England at such a particularly awkward moment as this, when the negotiations for the King's marriage were in progress. The Earl of Kent, his late guardian—since Roger's majority he had ceased to be a practical one so far as any personal control was concerned—was specially perplexed and astonished at this step. But he knew nothing of the interview at Fleshy.

To all of them Roger gave a general and vague explanation, which had reference to the necessary care of his Irish estates. His own sole fervent desire was to put himself where Gloucester could not find him—to lose himself, as far as the conspirators were concerned. It was the only way that he could see just then to serve that God, and that King, to both of whom in his early youth he had pledged his heart's devotion.

Rarely has any journey been taken in more feverish haste than that of Roger Earl of March to Ireland in the summer of 1396. He felt as though he were not safe for a day until he had put the breadth of St. George's Channel between himself and his uncle Gloucester. His journey from London to Haverford was almost a flight. His unsuspecting suite complained bitterly of the long forced marches over the mountains of South Wales which their unreasonable master obliged them to take. Two days delay at Haverford, before the wind would serve, brought Roger's patience to the verge of distraction.

"I must go!" he said passionately to Mr. Robesart.

"My Lord," was the grave answer, "it ill suits the archer to wear the uniform of the general. There is no must but one, and it is meet but for the lips of the Lord of all."

"Yet surely He knoweth my necessity?"

"Soothly: but I pray your Lordship to remember that what is must with you may be must not with Him."

"I cannot rest till I be hence!"

"We shall rest in the life to come," quietly replied Mr. Robesart. "In the life that now is, we have but to be and do God's will."

"You take it calmly, Father! But then, for you there is no such need. 'Tis easy gear to counsel a man to lie still whose veins burn with fever, when your own pulse is as quiet as a mill-tarn." And Roger laughed, with a laugh which was not all mirth.

Mr. Robesart's answering smile was rather pathetic.

"Having lived through the fever, I may know your Lordship's feelings."

On the third day the wind changed, and they set sail from Haverford. Three weeks—a very favourable passage—landed them at Wexford; and as Roger set foot upon the shore of Ireland, he turned and looked across to the invisible mountains of Wales.

"Fair fall thou, my native land!" he said half sarcastically. "From henceforth is this land of my fathers mine own land, and thou must serve thee without me."

The autumn and winter of that year found him at Kilkenny, spending his time in an unusual manner for a noble of the fourteenth century. He summoned Irish minstrels and chroniclers around him, and went deep into Irish history. Perhaps it was a natural result that Irish history went deep into him. He became an enthusiastic admirer of the character and annals of the nation the blood of whose kings ran in his veins. His own natural impetuosity drove him along the groove which he had chosen, and ere long one passionate aspiration took possession of his soul, next after that "Un Dieu, un Roy" which had possessed and would possess it for ever. England and Ireland should be at peace, and he would be the means of it. They should live and love as sisters, happy and tranquil, under one sceptre, having but one aim, and the glory of the one should be the glory of the other. To this he would give himself as long as he should live. He would secure it—or die in the attempt.

All the Mortimers had entertained an affection for Ireland, and could never forget their Irish blood. King Richard also had a liking for that country, of which his uncle of Gloucester was pleased to speak very scornfully.

"He is a fool who thinks of conquering Ireland," said Gloucester, in his usual unwatered diction. "The Irish are a poor and wicked people, with an impoverished country; and he who should conquer it one year would lose it the next."

This affection of the young Earl for the Green Isle by no means increased his popularity with his English retainers. Saxon and Celt have always mutually looked down upon each other. The Irish saw in the English intruding strangers, none the more welcome for being conquerors; the English reckoned the Irish uncivilised barbarians with whom no person of refinement could be satisfied to associate. They were not themselves so over-refined that they need have been particular: but the half-educated man (still more woman) is usually more fastidious on the score of vulgarity than the blue-blooded noble. There were murmurs among Roger's suit that he was too accessible to the masses, and that his heart was rather Irish than English.

When the King discovered, somewhat to his surprise, that his chosen heir had so unexpectedly disappeared from the scene on the plea of looking after his Irish property, he sent him a commission of lieutenancy for Ulster, Connaught, and Meath—a most convenient arrangement for Roger, since it afforded him a full excuse for not returning to England until the state of affairs should have changed. His Majesty was not the only person who was puzzled by Roger's proceedings. But there was another person who was not puzzled at all. Of one point Roger might safely have felt assured—that, however his sudden disappearance might surprise and perplex others, his uncle Gloucester at least would not fail to understand it. But the fact that a particular material had proved unsuitable for his purpose was not likely to ruin the designs of so far-seeing and scheming a conspirator as Gloucester. Having convinced himself that his nephew of March was not the soft and malleable article that he had supposed him, Gloucester merely cast the useless thing on one side, and set his busy brain to work to evolve a fresh project. It proved a very different one from the last. His new scheme involved a partition of the kingdom into four parts, of which his brother of Lancaster was to be bought off with one (a matter somewhat easier said than done); York, who was plastic as putty in the hands of Gloucester, was to have another; Arundel was to be rewarded with the third; and the fourth fell to Gloucester himself. March was left out altogether.

How long this sagacious disposition of political affairs would have lasted, may be very reasonably questioned: certainly not, at the furthest, beyond the second generation. A quarter of England would never have contented Derby, for whose ambitious soul the world was scarcely wide enough, nor could Rutland have reigned an hour in his division without plotting against the other three.

The end was near—the end of one phase of the political tumult. On the 28th of July, Gloucester and his fellow conspirators met at Arundel, to perfect their plot. Just eight days later, in full Parliament, at Westminster, that extremely "honourable man," my Lord of Rutland, humbly presented a petition of impeachment against Gloucester, Arundel, and Warwick. Five days afterwards Gloucester was arrested and sent to Calais; and on the 8th of September he died in the Castle of that town. The King had borne with him, to use his own words, "as long as he had been able"—and no other Sovereign, perhaps excepting Henry VI., would have borne with him half so long.

It was asserted by the King's enemies, long afterwards, and is now generally believed, that Gloucester was "murdered" by being smothered between two feather beds. Unfortunately for the assertion, this very report was spread, with the view of aspersing the King, while Gloucester was still alive. The subsequent elaborate account, therefore, was simply a more carefully revised version of the old slander. The truth is that Gloucester was either privately executed, or that he died of apoplexy before the execution took place. Why a man under sentence of death, approved as inevitable by his own brother, the just and humane Lancaster, should not have suffered execution, must be left to those modern writers of the "follow-my-leader" school, who persist in terming the execution a murder. How many times the penalty had been deserved it would not be easy to reckon.

Things were not now, as previously, done by halves—except in one item, and that spoiled the whole. The Earl of Arundel was beheaded on the 21st of September. The Archbishop, Norfolk, and Warwick, were banished for life. If one other execution had taken place, the rebellion would have been crushed, and King Richard's life would have been safe. It was entirely his own fault that it did not. Derby had been engaged in a multitude of plots—more than any one knew except himself—he had plotted the death of the King, and had drawn his sword upon him in the Queen's presence: he had been twice, if not three times, condemned to death by his own father. The Duke of Bretagne had said to the King on their last interview, "You will never be safe while Henry of Lancaster lives." Richard knew all this, but his heart failed him. For all the provocation received both as monarch and as man, that true and tender heart refused to condemn the old playmate, and instead of it lifted him to honour. He fancied this step would ensure the love and fidelity of a man who knew not what love and faithfulness were. He laid this adder to warm in his bosom, and like the adder that it was, it stung him to death.

While these stirring events were passing in England, Earl Roger of March maintained that distance and silence which he had evidently perceived to be the only safe course for himself. How far was he neglecting his duties in so doing? is a question which may reasonably be asked. The date at which he returned to England seems to show that he was actuated, not by a cowardly fear for his personal safety—a supposition contradicted by every other action of his life—but by a fear of his name being dragged into the contest on the wrong side, and without his own consent. As soon as he could feel sure that Gloucester had laid aside the idea of making a tool of him, and before any appearance of retribution had overtaken Gloucester, Roger returned to Usk. The little cloud which had overhung the Lollard party had been long dispersed, and during the period of that shadow Roger had sought safety not in flight, but in silence.

The Countess was still in London, and she made no attempt to join her lord in Monmouthshire. He felt so hopeless of her doing so, that he did not even ask her. But one other thing he did—he sent for his children. Beyond his natural wish for their occasional company, was his strong desire to rescue them from the contamination of the society into which, so soon as they were old enough, their mother was likely to plunge them. He was anxious to accomplish a project which had occurred to him, and which he did not expect her to oppose—to obtain his old foster-mother, Guenllian, to take the same position with respect to his children. Their mother cared too little about them to care who was with them, so long as it was some one who would take all responsibility off her shoulders. Guenllian, on her part, was ready enough to return to her sometime nursling, whom she had always loved the best of all her charges. Roger was more easy when he had secured her. With her came Beatrice, who had always been her satellite since she entered service, and was considered as an indispensable appendage.

The following Michaelmas brought a magnificent ceremony, in the creation of some dozen new peers at Westminster. The list was headed by the traitor Derby and the treacherous Rutland, who were respectively created Dukes of Hereford and Aumerle. But the heir presumptive of the Crown kept away from both politics and pageants in his seclusion at Usk, and never showed himself until the ensuing January, when he was summoned to the Parliament at Shrewsbury, to take an oath which had been administered to all the peers, and which March was the last of the peers to take. It was a particularly useless one, for a member of any party could have taken it with a clear conscience. It was sworn by the body of the peers on the shrine of St. Edward, and by March alone upon the cross of Canterbury (probably as being portable, which the shrine was not): and it bound him who took it "to hold, sustain, and maintain well and loyally, without fraud or evil intent, all statutes, etc., made in this present Parliament, without ever going contrary thereto or to any part of them, and never to revoke nor annul them, nor never to suffer their repeal, living nor dying—saving to the King his royalty and liberty, and the rights of the Crown." The last item annulled all the rest so far as the royalists were concerned; the whole was useless as directed against the traitors.

Roger did not remain at Shrewsbury. He followed the King and Parliament to Bristol, and as soon as he was released from his parliamentary duties, he came on to London. He was there for a few weeks, until signs appeared in the political world of another tumult. It is popularly said that when thieves fall out, honest men come by their own: and in this instance the thieves, who were Hereford and Norfolk, fell out most decidedly. They appeared together before the King, each of them bringing against the other a charge of that disloyalty of which both were as guilty as any man could well be. A rumour of disturbances in Ireland afforded Roger a chance of getting out of the way, before either of these most honourable men should drag him into their toils, or bring charges against him which, however untrue, he might find it difficult to refute.

Once more he offered to Alianora the choice of accompanying him. They had been separated for nearly two years, and had only met a few weeks before. But the Countess could not think of it. In fact, she declared herself quite astonished that her lord could be so unreasonable as to ask for her company. Her new dresses for Whitsuntide were in course of preparation, and had cost her a month's reflection. Did he suppose that they could be finished in a day? or if they had been finished, how could he imagine that she would be satisfied to waste their resplendency on a handful of common knights and squires, or a horde of Irish barbarians? Leave Town in the beginning of April! It was perfectly preposterous, impossible. And she was quite sure he did not want her—which last was said in a tone decidedly indicative of the companion fact that she did not want him.

He did not want her as he had once done. His wish for the company of the real woman whom he had long seen her to be, was far less than it had been erewhile for the society of the loved and loveable ideal which he was now convinced that she was not. Still the old love, though stifled, repressed, and repulsed, was yet alive, and might have been blown into a flame had Alianora cared to take the trouble. Roger sighed as he turned away.

"Be it so, Dame," he answered, speaking more lightly than he felt. "But your Ladyship will scarce look for me to rest content in being utterly bereft of the company of ladies. I shall take Nannette withal from Usk."

"Gramercy! to what end?" demanded Alianora, opening her handsome eyes in astonishment.

A smile of rather bitter amusement played round the lips of the Earl. "Choose your Ladyship the reason," said he, still lightly. "You have no grudge thereunto?"

"I? Good lack, nay! An' it like your Lordship to burden you with a maid of nine years, you be welcome of very inwitte.[#] I shall have the lesser charge."

[#] Most heartily.

Her husband might reasonably have inquired what charge she had ever taken of the children, or how it was to be lessened when they were already out of her care: but he passed it by.

"Wenteline will ease you thereof," said he. "Your Ladyship grudgeth not, methinks, that she should bide hence with the childre?"

"Not I, forsooth! Have with them whom you will," was the careless answer. "I love none of them so dear that I may not live without them."

Roger knew as well as Alianora that the pronoun included himself. He sent Anne into raptures, and Guenllian into much surprise, by an order that they should be ready to accompany him. His male friends were inclined to be exceedingly merry over this odd notion of the Earl. That he should have taken even his heir, at that early age, would have seemed to them amusing; but to choose a girl of nine for his companion struck them as a preposterous absurdity. Earl Roger paid no attention to them. Extremely sensitive to the lightest censure from lips that he loved, he was now perfectly callous alike to ridicule and to anger from others.

Of the four children, Anne was his special darling. She and her brother Roger took after himself in character, while Edmund and Alianora were their mother's children. Least attractive of them was Edmund, in whose disposition indolence and selfishness were already manifesting themselves strongly. When the children were summoned in the morning, Anne and Roger were always up in a moment, while Edmund had to be dug out of bed amid a storm of grumbles. All that Anne owed to her mother was that graceful and gracious manner, which with the mother was merely artificial polish, but in the daughter was ingrained as a part of her character. The child's affection for her father was intense: she always shrank from her mother. The instinct of her true heart discerned the utter hollowness of Alianora, and the two natures could never amalgamate.

April had almost bloomed into May when the party reached Trim Castle, where Roger meant to remain for a few weeks.

CHAPTER X.

MARCUS CURTIUS.

"Yet thy true heart and loving faith,

And agony of martyr death,

God saw,—and He remembereth."

—F. J. PALGRAVE.

"What think you on thus sadly, my son?" said Mr. Robesart to Lawrence Madison, whom he found standing with folded arms, gazing out of an embrasure as though he were not contemplating the landscape.

"I was thinking, Father," was the answer, in a low, dreamy tone, "wherein success lieth."

"What fashion of success?"

Lawrence smiled, "I am beginning to learn that there be more fashions thereof than one."

"It is good to learn it early," said the priest. "For man is apt to think that alone success which hath a gloss and a glitter about it. We be too oft like childre, which would rather a brass counter that did shine bravely, than a gold noble that was dull and covered with dirt. But what be thy thoughts thereon, my son?"

"I thought, Father, that many men did destroy their own success by being too eager to grasp thereat, afore God had it ready."

"Thou hast well spoken, Lawrence—'afore God had it ready.' Hast thou read certain words of Saint Stephen the martyr touching Moyses, that great Prophet of God? 'He guessed that his brethren should understand that God should give to them health by the hand of him: but they understood not.' How should they? Nor was it they that were lacking. It was Moyses that understood not—understood not that the day of deliverance was not come by forty years—that forty years' keeping of sheep in Midian must needs be first. Yet God did mean to deliver them by his hand; it was not undone, only latered.[#] He did so when the right time came—when He was ready, and when Moyses was ready, and when Israel was ready."

[#] Deferred.

"It seemeth me," answered Lawrence, sighing, "that man lacketh much training at our Lord's hand, ere he be fit for a deliverer."

"More than any can rightly judge, out-taken our Lord. The fellowship of Christ's work may well include the fellowship of Christ's sufferings. Mark thou, a stone-breaker needs no training; a goldsmith must have much. The finer the tool shall be, the sharper must be the grinding of it. What is behind thy thoughts, Lawrence?"

"Methinks, Father, you wit my Lord's earnest desire to be he that should peace Ireland with England?—and you know how foot-hot he flingeth himself, soul and body, into all that cometh to his hand for to be done?"

"I know," said Mr. Robesart, with a smile in which amusement and pity had equal shares.

"I was marvelling if he were ready," said Lawrence in the same low voice. "I am something feared lest he may run ere he be sent."

"Men of his disposition are prone to make that blunder."

"That would not bring success."

"Not the brass counter of it, in very sooth: yet it might be a step on the way to the gold. It were more like to bring a lesson to himself than success to his plan. Yet even there, Lawrence, that is at times the truest success which hath most the look of failure. It did not look like success when the cross was reared on the hill of Calvary. Yet that night he was destroyed that had the power of death, and the gates of the kingdom of Heaven were flung open to all believers."

Lawrence did not answer for a moment. Then he said, in a lower tone than ever,—"There be that seem as though they could not learn from the past."

"Let us have a care we be not of them. And for others let us pray."

"It is hard," was the reply with an unsteady voice, "to see a life flung away and lost, for the which you would give your own and count it nothing worth."

"That is not lost," was Mr. Robesart's answer, "which is given to God and our neighbour. The only lost lives are those that be cast away upon Satan and ourselves. He will not lose his life: another may."

Lawrence had no need to inquire if Mr. Robesart were thinking of the Countess.

"And if it were as thou shouldst seem to fear," resumed the priest, "if our young Lord should fling away all, even to earthly life, upon this earnest burning desire that hath possessed him,—who are we to say him nay? This may be God's work for him. It were a good work, surely, if it could be done."

"It were a good work to dry up a quicksand," answered Lawrence, significantly: "yet if a man flung therein all the gold of his having, it should be cast away, and the quicksand be no drier. Father, it seems to me a work that cannot be done, or that, if it were done, should cost a thousand lives as fair as his, and take maybe a thousand years to do it."

"Lawrence Madison," said Mr. Robesart, gravely, "thou and I had better let the Lord's purposes alone, for the chances be an hundred to one that we shall do them mischief. It were unwisdom to stay the wheels of the world lest they should crush a fly."

Lawrence gave a gesture of impatience, almost involuntary.

"My son," continued the priest, laying his hand on Lawrence's shoulder, "childre be apt to make wrong reckonings. Remember, He that driveth the charette is the Father of us all. He will not crush, nor 'noy one of his childre without good cause. And mind thou, that meaneth good cause for him, no less than for the general matter. If the Master of the garden will pluck one of His flowers in the bud, which of His weeding-lads shall say Him nay? And if our Father see it well to call His child to Him, somewhat sooner than the other childre would fain part with him, is it ill for the child thus called, or is it well?"

"By how rough a road!"

"It will not matter when he hath reached Home. Yet is it so? Dost thou know which road should be the rougher—the short, sharp climb up the steep rock, or the weary winding around it? I would scarce presume to say. Forty years in the wilderness be apt to tire a man sorely. Let it rest, Lawrence; it is better. Only pray for him. He will give his life for somewhat, either by the sharp climb or the weary desert way. Pray that he may give it for what God means it. We shall meet and rest at Home."

"God grant it be so!"

"And one other thing, Lawrence, I will say unto thee, of the which I think thou hast need. Be not too careful to spare pain to them thou lovest. It is not the best kind of love. And too often—I would but caution thee, my son, to keep out of the wiles of Satan—what it truly signifieth is that we would fain spare ourselves the pain of seeing it. Methinks thy danger should be on that side, wherefore have a care. God loves us better than that. Aye, and He only knows our hearts, as He only knows those good works which He hath prepared for us to walk in. 'It sufficeth to each day his own evil.' Pray as much as ever thou wilt; only beware of giving commands to God. And when thou hast prayed, and canst do nothing, then is the time to stand still and see His salvation. Remember, for him that is God's child, nothing is verily ill that God doth to him."

"Nay, but if it break his heart?"

"Hearts take more breaking than men think," said Mr. Robesart, quietly. "And He healeth 'all that have need of healing.' By times, when we think we lack the plaster, we do in very deed want the probe."

Lawrence looked up suddenly, with pained eyes.

"The probe gives the most pain when a man shall struggle against it. 'Thy will, not mine,' is the most wholesome medicine for all our ills, my son."

"It is a bitter one," said Lawrence, his lip slightly trembling.

"Aye, whiles we be swallowing of it. But if thou wouldst make thy physic specially bitter, the way is to look thereon a while aforehand, and feed thy fantasy with the bitterness thereof, and swallow the same grudgingly at last."

Lawrence smiled.

"Aye me!" said Mr. Robesart, sadly. "For every time that we say to God with our lips, 'Fiat voluntas tua' how many times do we say to Him with our hearts, 'Fiat voluntas mea!' Nay, at times we pass a step further yet, and say, 'Do Thou my will!' May God save thee and me from that rank treason against our heavenly King! We be all likely to fall therein. And yet His will is for our best welfare—our sanctification here, our bliss hereafter; and our will is but for present ease and passing pleasure. Lord, teach us to do Thy will!"

The same evening, a horn sounded without the gate, and the Earl of Ormonde was announced in the hall of Trim Castle. Roger, who was playing chess with one of his knights, rose to meet his kinsman, a man ten years older than himself.

"Fair fall your Lordship in your light battle to-night!" said Ormonde, with a rather grim smile and a glance at the chess-board. "If you be of my mind, we shall find somewhat heavier work to-morrow."

"Truly, what mean you, fair Cousin?"

"The O'Brien is up, my Lord: and that means work for me—and for you, if you will have with me."

"Have with you? Aye, with all my heart!" returned the Viceroy, with a flash in his eyes. "The O'Brien! ungrateful traitor! was it for this the King knighted him in Dublin Cathedral? Howbeit, you and I shall soon bring him to book, and without tumult, I would fain hope."

"Your Pandora hath her coffer a good size," answered Ormonde, with the same grim smile.

"You think my hopes be over-great, trow?"

"A dram or so bigger than mine."

"I will never fight mine own kin, if I may away therewith," said Roger, cheerfully. "Let me but parley with the Irishry myself, and you shall behold somewhat come thereof."

"Truly, of that doubt I nothing," said Ormonde in the same tone. "But whether that which comes thereof shall be to your gracious Lordship's ease—well, I was not bred up for a prophet."

"Whither march we?"

"Down the Boyne and up the Blackwater. The sept are gathered at Kenles."[#]

[#] Now called Kells.

"How much is your following?"

"All the Botelers, and a good parcel more of the English pale. We are well enough for that."

"I will march to meet them with the dawn," said the Viceroy. "Madison, order all things in good readiness for early morrow. Maybe I shall find my work there."

It was said in a cheerful, almost exultant voice; and Roger quitted the hall, leaving Lawrence very, very sad.

"Maybe he shall find his death there!" he said in a low mournful voice to Mr. Robesart.

"Be it so, my son," answered the priest, though his own tones were not without sorrow. "Let him only find God's work; and then he shall find also God's hire unto His servants. He gives not grudgingly, Lawrence Madison."

The armies met at Kenles, on the 20th of July 1398. When they were yet at a short distance, the Earl of March suddenly sprang from his horse, and bade Lawrence dismount also.

"Quick, and aid me!" said he, in his usual impulsive manner. "I will don the Irish habit, and meet them thus arrayed. They will list me if I come to them in their own habit, and speaking their own tongue. Is not the blood of their ancient kings mine own? Lolly"—the old childish epithet came back to his lips in this moment of haste and excitement—"wherefore standest gazing thus moonstruck? Make haste and help me."

"My Lord, I am sore afeared lest they hurt you."

"They hurt me! Am I not one of them by blood? Have I not learned to be one of them in language? Let me but don their habit, and I am of them in all things. Quick! Cast thy fears and fantasies to the winds! This is no time for them."

While Roger spoke, he was hastily throwing aside his English dress, and arraying himself in the Irish national costume—the tunic and braccæ which dated from Roman days, the loose hood, the plaid, the bare foot in the stirrup, and the spear in the hand. Thus accoutred, and commanding his men to stand still until after the parley, he dashed up the slope to meet the Irish leaders.

For an instant Roger's handsome face and lithe figure were seen at the summit of the knoll, as he cried in Irish to the advancing host.

"God speed you, my brethren! What are your demands?"

There was a moment's pause for consultation among the Irish leaders. Then two appeared to separate from the rest, and to come forth towards Roger.

At that moment came the sharp whirr of an arrow whizzing past, a wild passionate cry, a sudden rush forward, and the next instant a prostrate figure lay on the ground at the top of the slope, and over it stood Lawrence Madison, sword in hand, guarding it alike from friend and foe. Then a sudden word of command from the Irish chieftain, and down the side of the slope charged the sept of the O'Briens, completely overwhelming the English forces.

Let us draw a veil over the next scene. The customs of the Irish septs in war were very terrible. The enemy who fell into their hands alive could rarely expect mercy: while he who met their vengeance dead was sure of a form of wild revenge which makes the reader shudder.

Six hours later, the returned relics of the English army were reviewed, and the roll called, in the courtyard of Trim Castle. Ten disabled archers were answered for by others: so were twenty-seven wounded or captured spearmen. So men spoke up for Lawrence Madison, rescued alive almost by miracle, but brought home sorely wounded and insensible, and delivered into the tender care of Guenllian, to be nursed back to life if that might be.

But there was one name which won no answer of any kind, except the bare bowed heads which greeted its sound, and let it pass by them in solemn silence. And that was Roger Mortimer, Earl of Ulster and March, and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

The drawbridge was in place at Trim Castle; the portcullis was lifted, and the gates stood open. In the hall was a great catafalque of black and silver, where lighted tapers burned at the head and foot of the bier. And into that hall, now open to every comer, came men of all kinds and classes, and of both rival nationalities—soldiers in uniform, and squires of the neighbourhood, of the English pale, and bare-footed Irish peasantry wrapped in their tartan cloaks, to gaze upon that still white face which lay so calm and quiet now. The words which could be heard whispered were not all alike. Some of the squires and the soldiers said angrily, "He was too much for the Irish"—"He was no true Englishman." Others hushed them, with, "Nay, he was England's heir," or, "He meant well, poor young gentleman!" But at last came one old man wrapped in the national tartan, and bearing a harp upon his back, who sat down, and played upon the instrument a wild, weird, sweet keen, in the softest notes it would produce. And then, rising, he bound his harp again upon his shoulders, and went up to the black-robed priest who stood holding the sprinkler with the holy water, which each one who pleased it took and sprinkled the corpse. The old man took it from his hand, and softly scattered the fresh drops on the calm figure lying there. While he did so he spoke in Irish.

"Sweet be thy sleep, son of the Kings of Erin! Light lie the earth upon thy fair young face! May He that reigneth in the heavens count thee among the white-winged, and the dark spirits of evil flee away from thy path to glory! Sleep, son of Una the daughter of Cahil! The winds, whistling in thy soft hair, shall not awaken thee. Depart on thy wings, O blast of the north! for thou shalt not disturb his rest. Long is the night that cometh, but his eyes are heavy. Draw over him the curtain of peace, and let peace be his coverlet."

As his murmured words ended he caught the eyes of the priest.

"I was only blessing him, Father!" said the old man quietly. "Didst thou think the words in my lips were reproaches or curses? A bard of Roscommon curse the son of Cahil! We could not do it, Father. And he loved us, and died for us. They will not leave us his dust, methinks. We would enshrine it at Tara where holy Patrick preached, or on the Rock of Cashel with the dust of his royal fathers. Ah, it is not likely. They do not trust us. And maybe, at times, we have not deserved the trust. But we would not have hurt him."

"Yet you killed him!" said Mr. Robesart in a choked voice.

"We?" was the significant answer, in a pathetic tone. "God be Judge between us. You will know one day,—not, perchance, till the great doom shall be. Father!"—the old man, who had moved a little away, suddenly stopped, and fixed his eyes on Mr. Robesart. "There will be some wrong things to be set right, when that shall be."

"There will," was the answer in the same tone.

"Aye," pursued the aged bard, dreamily. "Some false things to be made true, and crooked things to be made straight, and justice to be done by the great Judge that day. It will be a long day, that—the longest earth shall know. It may well take a thousand years." He turned to the corpse. "Sleep till the morning come, golden-haired love of Erin! We shall all be there, every one, the accuser and the accused, the oppressor and the oppressed, the murderer and the slain. There will be some of us who would be glad to change. Peace be on thee, and God forgive us all!"

And the old bard, with the harp bound upon his back, went slowly out of the hall: and Mr. Robesart, looking after him, murmured, "Pax tecum!"

In the upper chambers of Trim Castle, the scenes were nearly as sad as in the hall beneath. In the private rooms of the ladies' tower, the dead father's darling had wept herself to sleep, when exhausted nature could bear no more grief for the moment: and in an upper chamber of the adjoining tower, Lawrence Madison lay in fever and delirium. Between the two Guenllian came and went, with light steps and heavy heart: and Beatrice sat by the velvet bed, watching for the child to wake, and longing to comfort her.

There were two reasons why Guenllian kept Beatrice out of the sick chamber, but neither of them was the one which would occur to a modern nurse. Our fathers, at that time, had little fear of contagion, for they scarcely realised its existence: when an infectious disease broke out, they immediately thought the wells had been poisoned—which perhaps they had, though not by deliberate malice, as was then imagined. One of Guenllian's motives was a desire to keep the young girl from hearing poor Lawrence's perpetual repetition of the dreadful scene just enacted at Kenles—that was one of the two topics on which his fevered thoughts ran endlessly: and the other—motive and topic alike—was that Lawrence in his delirium had told Guenllian a secret, which she wanted time to consider whether it would be well to share with Beatrice. Guenllian had entertained some suspicion of the truth already, but she knew now with certainty that Lawrence loved Beatrice, and that he felt certain she did not love him. On the latter point Guenllian was entirely ignorant, for if Beatrice had any secret feelings of this kind, she confided them to no one. The former was inclined to think that any partiality which Beatrice might feel for Lawrence was only the sisterly kindness which had always existed between them, and if that were so, she was very sorry for Lawrence. Guenllian knew him well enough to be aware that his love, once given, would be given for ever, and that there could be no second time for him. But it was only now and then that Beatrice's name came into the passionate flood of words which were poured forth from the unguarded lips of the sufferer. Nearly all night through he was at Kenles, going over, over, over that awful scene, but—Guenllian noticed—never coming quite to the end. When he reached the most terrible point—just before the death of his master—he always gave a sob and a low cry as if in pain, and turned back again to the beginning. This peculiarity, however, had not struck her as any thing remarkable, until the second day, when in giving a minute account of the patient, she mentioned it among other items to the physician.

"Aye so?" asked Mr. Robesart significantly. "Methinks, Mistress Guenllian, that hath a meaning. I would fain be here the next time that it happeth."

"That may you with little trouble, good Father, since I count it happeth every hour at the furthest."

Mr. Robesart sat down and waited. He had no need to wait long. Before the hour was over, poor Lawrence was once more pouring out his fervid and dreadful tale, as though he were relating it to a listener, broken constantly by disjointed words, yet ever coming back to the one subject.

"Then he rade to the top of the mount—primroses grow there—no, not primroses—what call you them?—he rade up, in his Irish habit—habit—Mistress Wenteline, can you amend this rent in mine habit? The Irish have torn it—he called to them in the Irish tongue—nay, I cannot tell you; I wis not the Irish—they be wild folk. They talk alway; they talked then. And two of them came riding forward at after—Master Byterre, look to your saddle-girth; methinks there is somewhat awry—my Lord bent to his saddle-bow when he answered them. Then one of them laid his spear in rest—rest! Oh for rest! Mine head burneth—'I will give you rest'—aye, only He can give it—but methought the man were not hostile, he seemed as though he held forth his hand—O wala, wala wa! Help, my God!"

And with this cry, not sharply and loudly delivered, but in a low voice of intense anguish, poor Lawrence sank back upon his pillow, and a cold perspiration broke out over his face.

"Lo' you, right this doth he alway!" whispered Guenllian.

Mr. Robesart shook his head. He laid his soft, cool, quieting hand upon the patient's brow.

"My son Lawrence, dost thou hear me?"

A lucid interval seemed to occur, for Lawrence looked up into his old friend's face, with calm weak eyes.

"I see thou dost. What came then to pass? Try to tell me."

"When, Father?" answered the faint voice. He had evidently no recollection of what had just happened.

"When the Irish leader came up to thy Lord with his spear in rest, and held forth his hand, or seemed as though he should do it."

A look of unutterable pain came into the sick man's eyes, and his tongue appeared to refuse its office.

"Tell me, my son," urged Mr. Robesart with gentle firmness. "Was it then the Irish shot him?"

Lawrence tried to lift himself, and looked round uneasily. Mr. Robesart helped him into a more elevated position, and with a look to Guenllian sent her behind the curtain.

"Under benedicite, if I must!" whispered the patient.

"Be it so," answered the priest, and signed to Guenllian to quit the chamber. "Now, my son, here be no ears save mine—and His that knoweth all things. Speak on."

"Father!" continued the low but fervent tone, "the Irish never shot him. That shot came from our own side."

"Never!" broke from the amazed priest. "Lawrence, my son, calm thee! Thou art speaking——"

"I am speaking the heavy truth," answered the sufferer. "Nay Father, I am in good wit now, whatso I may have been. I tell you again, the Irish did it not. It was his own men that slew him."

"Christ pardon him that did it!"

"I will say Amen so soon as I can," answered Lawrence Madison with a sob. "That is not yet."

The priest did not reprove him. Perhaps he was too shocked to say anything: or perhaps he felt that in a case like this, nature must have its way at first, and even grace could hardly overcome it in the opening bitterness of love's agony.

Guenllian had felt much afraid of Mr. Robesart's making Lawrence thus speak out the point which in his delirium he seemed unable to utter, like a nervous horse refusing to pass a special object. But the event proved the physician's judgment right. From the hour that the burden was shared with another, the patient began to amend.

Who was it that slew Roger Mortimer, and why? God knoweth, and men never knew. The chroniclers plainly enough assert the fact of his death; but they content themselves with the vaguest possible hints at the further facts—that his own men slew him, and that they did it out of jealousy on account of what they deemed his Irish proclivities. Just enough to make us guess it they suggest: they were evidently afraid to say more.

The old bard had spoken truly, for the dust of Roger Mortimer was not left to repose in Ireland. Amid solemn pomp and glittering funeral gloom, the coffin of the heir of England was borne over St. George's Channel to his ancestral home at Wigmore. There they laid him with the elder Mortimers, and not, like his father, with his Montacute ancestors, at Bisham. There, by the side of the valiant and wise Edmund Mortimer and his royally descended Margaret, who may be termed the founders of the house, by the first Earl of darkened memory, by the young and royal mother whom he could barely remember, sleeps Roger Mortimer, heir presumptive of England, first and last Lollard of the House of March.

England has forgotten him long ago, her own chosen heir to whom her faith was sworn, and from whose lips, time after time, the cup of success seemed snatched, just as he was about to drink the sweet wine. But should Ireland utterly forget that scion of her ancient kings, the young, warm-hearted, gallant Prince who, prudently of imprudently, gave his life for her, and did not achieve the end in the hope of which he gave it?

CHAPTER XI.

HOME TO USK.

"We buried him where he was wont to pray,

By the calm lake,—even here,—at eventide;

We reared this cross in token where he lay,

For on the cross, he said, his Lord had died;

Now hath he surely reached, o'er mount and wave,

That flowery land whose green turf hides no grave."

—FELICIA HEMANS.

If any further item of failure could have come into the life of Roger Mortimer, it would have been conveyed by a royal letter, dated at Westminster just one week after his death, and, being addressed to himself, before the news of the calamity at Kenles had reached the King. In this letter, Roger Earl of Ulster and March, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, is told that "as, by the advice of our Council, we have constituted our beloved nephew Thomas Duke of Surrey our Lieutenant in our said land from the first day of September next, for one year, we command that you shall not hinder the said Duke from the execution of his office, and we also exonerate you from the charge aforesaid, from the coming of the said Duke."[#]

[#] Close Roll, 22 Ric. II., Part 1.

Roger was superseded—why, there is no information. It does not necessarily mean, by any means, that the King was displeased with him, or desired to revoke his policy. It may even have been at his own desire, but there remains no evidence of this. It is more probable that his royal cousin wished to have him nearer, and considered that the presence of his heir presumptive would be of service to himself in that thorny and difficult path which it had been the lot of Richard of Bordeaux to tread from his early youth. And now all that remained of Roger Mortimer was coming home indeed, but to another home and a longer rest than those which his royal cousin had designed for him. His crown was no longer a future possibility: it had come. He should never see evil any more.

It has been left on record that King Richard's grief and indignation at the news of Roger's death were very deep and true. It was indeed, apart from the personal regard which he entertained for his young cousin, one of the saddest calamities which could have happened for himself. His heir presumptive, instead of being a man who loved and honoured him, was now his most implacable enemy—that Henry of Bolingbroke who hated him worse than any other. For according to the old law of England, Roger's reign would have been an interlude, and his claim, without some further distinct disposition of the Crown, could scarcely devolve upon his children. Before the funeral procession set forth, there was an arrival at Trim Castle. The Lord Bardolf arrived from England, accompanied by his mother, the Lady Agnes Mortimer, wife of that Sir Thomas Mortimer who had played a part in Roger's early life. He had chosen to cast in his lot with Gloucester and the Lords Appellants, and he was now a fugitive in hiding.[#]

[#] The Irish Government was charged to search for him in September, 1397, as he was supposed to be in that country; and he was executed in England, before May 27th, 1399. (Close Roll, 21 Ric. II., Part 1; Patent Roll, 23 ib.)

The Lady Agnes Mortimer, who came to conduct the little Lady Anne back to her English friends, while her son attended to the more public necessities of the case, was an elderly woman of girlish character. She was by birth a Poynings, and sister-in-law of that Lollard Lady Poynings who was the daughter of a Princess of Lancaster, and who had been ejected from King Richard's household by the Lords Appellants. But Lady Agnes was no Lollard, as she showed a few years later by making painful pilgrimage to Cologne and Rome for the good of her soul. She came forward now to meet Guenllian, answering her deliberate and modest reverence with a shower of rapid words.

"Mistress Wenteline Bevan, is it not so? Not Bevan? 'Ap Evan'! Gramercy, what matter? Ap Evan is Bevan, and Bevan is Ap Evan—'tis all one. I pray you, Mistress Wenteline, carry me whither I may dry me, for my skirts be all sore bemired this rainy day. Good lack, but it witteth how to rain in this country, by my troth! And how doth your little Lady, trow? Verily, poor child, she must have been moped well-nigh to death, with all this doole about her. Young things love gleesomeness, and should have it. Is she yet abed?"

Lady Agnes paused a second for the answer, and Guenllian managed to glide in—"No, Madam. Truly I think the child hath too much sorrowed for her father to take any grief at the doole."

"Ah, well, we will soon have that amended," said Lady Agnes cheerfully. "I will have the maid away at once, and not await for aught but the bare needful: we can amend all when we come to Usk, where my Lady her mother now abideth."

The Countess had always expressed so much dislike to Usk that it rather surprised Guenllian to hear that she was there. Lady Agnes answered her look.

"Ah, my Lady loveth not doole, no more than other folk. She hath held fair court at Usk, trust me, with a merry lot of knights and dames: and in especial—mark you, Mistress Wenteline—in especial—my good Lord Charlton of Powys. Marry, but when the news came, she was aggrieved!"

Guenllian was glad to hear it. The thought had lain heavy at her heart, that Alianora would not sorrow. Yet to think of her "holding fair court" with gay company, while that terrible scene was enacting at Kenles, went sorely against her.

"She might well," continued the garrulous lady. "Gramercy, but I would have done the like in the same case! 'Twas but two days—nay, methinks, but one—sithence all her Michaelmas gowns were home from the tailor, new fashioned and right fair—and now but to think of putting all away for a lot of dreary doole! Dear heart, but it were enough to aggrieve one! If there had not been at hand my Lord Charlton to divert her withal, methinks she should well-nigh have gone distraught! We shall hear of a wedding there, Mistress Wenteline, by my troth, so soon as this weary, dreary doole be but got o'er."

Guenllian's tongue required some hard discipline to keep it quiet. Could he hear it through his coffin-lid,—that still sleeper in the hall beneath? Would he not almost stir upon his satin pillow, if this tale reached him of the utter apathy and heartlessness of the woman to whom he had given his heart's best love, and to whom the news of his loss brought bitter regret—for the deferred wearing of her Michaelmas wardrobe? Guenllian severely schooled her heart down, and then said—as calmly as was in her warm Welsh nature—and as soon as a hiatus occurred in Lady Agnes's persistent rattle—

"Would it like your Ladyship to tell me what manner of man is this Lord Charlton? Shall he be one that should deal gently with the childre, or no?"

For Guenllian's heart yearned over her darlings, and especially over Anne.

"Eh, good lack!" laughed Lady Agnes, "he shall neither make nor mell with them. My Lord Charlton is not he that should befool him a-laking with childre. 'Tis the mother he loveth, not them. And in good sooth, he is scantly the man for one of her high estate: but—there! you wit, Mistress Wenteline, love is a leveller."

"Love?" said Guenllian inquiringly to her own heart—not to Lady Agnes. Ay, she knew, better than her companion could tell her, of what material Alianora was made. She was likely enough to

"Crawl to the next shrub or bramble vile,

Though from the cedar's stately arm she fell."

"And look you," pursued Lady Agnes, breaking in upon Guenllian's sorrowful thoughts, "truly it hath been a great trouble unto my Lady, the coming down. She looked to be one day Queen of England, and should have been, had my sometime Lord (whom God pardon) been more wary and witful. Do but think, to aventure himself afore his army in an Irish habit—was it not thus he did? Any man with his wits in his head should have wist he might as well have writ his death-warrant. And now all that lost! Dear, dear, what a misaventure! Verily, I do think my Lady of March sore to pity, I warrant you. To lose a crown, and spoil an whole wardrobe, all of a blow—well, as to the losing her baron, the world holdeth more than one man—" Lady Agnes had found it so—"but in very deed it should sorrowfully grudge me to be in like case."

Guenllian made no answer. She only threw open the door of the Lady Anne's apartments, and motioned to the new disposer of the child's destiny to enter. If she thought that both the Countess and the Lady Agnes Mortimer mistook their pearls for pebbles, and their pebbles for pearls, she gave no hint of doing so.

The funeral procession set forth, and the lonely and sorrowful child who had been one of his dearest treasures, followed the coffin of the dead father. Lady Agnes Mortimer had taken Anne's future into her own hands, and being Guenllian's nominal superior, the latter was bound to obey. She was about to deliver the child into the yet more nominal care of the Countess, to be plunged, when she grew a little older, into all those pomps and vanities of this wicked world which her father had foreseen and feared for her. So sorrowfully reckoned Guenllian ap Evan: but the God of Roger Mortimer reckoned very differently. The lot He had prepared for Anne was far away from pomp and vanity,—a long, eventless, monotonous imprisonment in Windsor Castle, with her sister and brothers,—the bitter disappointment of an attempted and almost successful rescue, for the lot of Roger Mortimer seemed to pursue his children—an imprisonment straiter and sadder than before, until that one of them whom the usurper had really cause to fear, Roger's bright little namesake, his own true son, fervent and energetic like himself, died in his weary prison; till a greater King than Henry of Bolingbroke undrew the bolts, and set the prisoner free. Then the other three were allowed to come forth. The King was not afraid of Edmund,—dreamy, indolent, ease-loving Edmund—nor of Alianora, who shared his character. He gave to Edmund, to ensure his safe keeping, a wife of a different type from himself, a daughter of the Romish House of Stafford, and a grand-daughter of Gloucester. Alianora was handed over to the care of the heir of Courtenay, ever a Lancastrian House. The most wary and cautious men sometimes blunder. And surely it was in a moment of blunder that that wariest and coldest-hearted of English kings and statesmen permitted Anne Mortimer,—the heir of Duke Lionel of Clarence if her brother should die issueless, as he did—to wed the loyal and true-hearted Richard of Conisborough, a Prince of the Blood, in whose eyes Richard of Bordeaux, whose godson he was, was the King, and Henry of Bolingbroke a usurper. Richard of Conisborough was the one love of Anne Mortimer's true heart. Every fibre of that sterling character—silent, shy, undemonstrative, but deep and loyal to the heart's core,—wound itself around him by whose side she dwelt in a dream of bliss for three short years, and then God called her away from the evil to come. He lies—murdered, or rather martyred—in the precincts of "God's House" at Southampton, she in the Abbey Church of King's Langley. They have met in the Garden of God. And if a text were to be engraven on the tomb of Anne Mortimer, it might well be this,—"I will be a God to thee, and to thy seed after thee."

She was the mother of all our kings. When one grand climacteric of years had rolled round from the death of Roger Mortimer at Kenles, the Lancastrian episode was over, and the grandson of Anne Mortimer sat upon the throne of England. The cup of success, dashed so frequently from Roger, came to his children's lips at last. But the one point in which success would have been dearest to his heart has never come. Is it yet in reserve for some descendant of his blood?—or shall the rival sister nations only see eye to eye, when He shall come who is the Desire of all nations—when the Lord shall bring again Zion? One event happened, of a different character, before Lord Bardolf and Lady Mortimer set forth, which greatly astonished every body in Trim Castle, and the person most concerned more than any other.

Lawrence Madison was slowly creeping back to ordinary life, and was now able to sit up most of the day, propped with pillows; and with some difficulty, and a helping arm, to walk the length of the chamber. Lord Bardolf had shown a particular wish to see him, and to hear the story of the Earl's death from his lips, and had pressed Mr. Robesart to allow the prudence of his doing so before the physician was quite ready to admit it. The latter, however, was overruled by his superior, and Lord Bardolf had his wish. The tale was told, at what cost to Lawrence he best knew.

"And now," said Lord Bardolf, when he paused, exhausted, and Guenllian held a cup of wine to his white weary lips, "methinks, Master Madison, you have scantly yet told all. We heard of a young squire that, in the thickest of the fight, stood o'er his Lord's body, and well-nigh gave his own life that the foe should not touch the same. Was it thus, pray you, or no?"

There was a moment's flash of fiery light in the weak sunken eyes.

"What looked you for?" said Lawrence Madison. "Had he loved me, and freed me, and grown with me, child and boy and man, and set me, so far as meetness might, as his very self, and should I reckon my poor worthless life as aught beside his? Had a thousand lives been mine, I would have given them for his life: and when nought but his dust was left to give them for, they were at his service for that!"