Chapter XV At Court
Men stopped their work, women turned out on to their door-steps, to see a king’s messenger riding through the hamlet of St. Mary’s. He drew rein at the vicarage gate, threw himself off his horse, and would have knocked at the door had it not been wide open; so he called out:
“In the king’s name, parson!”
The vicar, bending over his next Sunday’s sermon, rose hastily and came out.
“Are you Parson Ewan?” asked the man.
“I am,” answered the vicar, straightening himself.
“Then can you tell me if a woman by name Patience Beaumont is living hereabouts at a place called Holt Farm?”
“Certainly she is,” said the vicar. “She has dwelt there for well-nigh three years.”
“Will you direct me to the farm?” asked the messenger.
Without any further answer the vicar stepped out into the garden.
“You have but to cross yonder bridge and go straight before you. Holt Farm stands just behind that clump of trees.”
“It is a steep ride for a horse,” put in the man.
“Yes; you would do better to go on foot,” answered the vicar. “I will see to your horse; you will find it here on your way back.”
“Thank you!” said the messenger, “I shall be glad to walk. I have been riding since dawn.”
“You come from London?” asked the vicar.
“Naturally,” answered the man. “Do you not see I am a king’s messenger? But I come from a queen.” And he showed on his sleeve the embroidered lilies of France entwined with the rose of England.
“Queen Henrietta Maria of France?” said the vicar slowly.
“The same,” answered the man, giving the reins he still held to the vicar. “Have you no inn in the place?” he asked.
“No,” said the vicar, “but you will find good refreshment up yonder. I would offer you some myself, but it is better for a man to do his work first and eat and drink afterwards. You have not far to go.”
The man shrugged his shoulders.
“Perhaps you are wise,” he said, and went off.
The vicar watched him. “What news can he have brought?” he thought. “Is our peace going to be broken into?” And a look of regret crept over his face. Three peaceful years is a span in a man’s life which he does not willingly see disturbed.
He turned, re-entered the house, and was met by Jessie in her bibbed apron, her hands white from kneading the bread.
“Who is that man, Father?” she asked.
“The king’s messenger,” he answered.
“What can he want? Why has he come here?”
“That I cannot tell you,” answered her father. “We shall probably know in due time.”
“If I had not my first batch ready for the oven, I would run up to the farm at once,” she said regretfully.
“Better wait, my little girl,” said the vicar. “If it is good news it will come to us quickly; if it is bad, there is time enough. Go back to your bread-making; I will go back to my sermon.”
“Oh, that is all very well!” Jessie muttered to herself, “but I am always afraid of what will happen up there, lest something should take them away again, and then, then what should I do?” And tears gathered in her eyes.
If Jessie had had few joys in life, she had had no sorrows, so that even this little cloud, no bigger than a man’s hand in her horizon, frightened her soul. She went back to her bread-making, but her heart was no longer in her work, and the bread suffered; it was long rising, and she felt guilty when on the morrow Mary remarked:
“It’s not so light as it might be, Jessie.”
Agnes was in the garden tying up some plants, gathering the roses, and clearing away any dead leaf or bud which had faded on the bushes. Suddenly she heard a click at the garden gate, looked up, and saw a man in the royal livery she remembered so well, just walking up the gravel path to the house.
He saw her, came up, and doffed his cap.
“Are you Dame Patience Beaumont?” he asked.
“No,” she answered, laughing; “I am Agnes Beaumont. Patience is my aunt. What do you want with her?”
“I have a letter for her,” answered the messenger, opening a satchel which was flung over his shoulder, and drawing forth a somewhat large packet. “I was to deliver this into her own hands,” he continued. “Will you call her? And then will you bid your serving wench give me some food? I have ridden hard since dawn without breaking my fast, and I am both hungry and thirsty—more thirsty than hungry,” he added, with a meaning look.
“Come this way,” said Agnes, and though she was clad in simple homespun, with a white kerchief folded across her bosom and an apron tied over her skirt, and though she wore thick high-heeled shoes—on which, however, were silver buckles—there was about her a something which spoke of gentle birth. She walked so erect, so easily, with such an unspeakably graceful swing.
The man watched her curiously. He was accustomed to court dames, queens, and princesses.
“If you will come this way,” she said, “Martha will give you food and drink, and I will take your letter.”
He followed her to the back premises, and, opening a side door which led into the kitchen, she called out:
“Here is a king’s messenger, Martha, asking for Aunt Patience. He has travelled from London, and is hungry and thirsty. Will you see to him?”
“Lack-a-day!” said Martha, coming forward, “I guess he’ll bring us no good.”
“That’s a hard speech, Mistress Martha,” said the man. “Why should I bring you ought but good from her gracious majesty, Queen Henrietta, whose servant I am?”
She stood before him and looked at him.
“Why,” she cried, “you’re Peter Kemp!”
“And you be Martha,” he said. “Well, the place has agreed with you, Martha; you look ten years younger.” And he caught hold of her two hands and shook them.
“Supposing you give me my aunt’s letter,” broke in Agnes with a stately air, “you can greet each other after.”
“I beg your humble pardon,” said the man, and fumbling once more in the satchel, he drew out the packet, and without any further trouble gave it to her.
She turned to go, but remembering, looked back and said somewhat haughtily:
“You can feed him now, Martha.”
She was hardly outside the door when she heard them talking, fifty to the dozen. She paused, and looked doubtfully at the packet in her hand.
“Is it for good or evil?” she murmured; then she added quickly: “Why should I fear? Surely what God sends must be good.”
She was no longer a child but a girl, verging upon womanhood, tall, not over slight of figure, but, as we have said before, graceful and perfectly built. The face was the same child’s face; the tendrils of golden hair still clustered round her head and lay on her white neck; the brown eyes had the same luminous, laughing look in them; her colouring was rich and perfect, a little sunburnt, like a ripe peach, and the lips were ripe too.
A door led from the kitchen to the living-room, so she had not far to go. Patience was sitting at the table with a pile of snowy linen in front of her, which she was sorting and arranging with housewifely care.
“Aunt Patience,” said Agnes, going up to her, “a king’s messenger has just brought this;” and she put the packet down before her. Then she stood at the other side of the table, her hands on her hips, watching her aunt, who took the packet up, turned it over, sighed, and exclaimed:
“Ah me, I have always feared this day would come!”
“Why have you feared it?” asked Agnes sharply.
“Because I am very much mistaken if it does not mean an uprooting,” said Patience.
“But if you do not choose to go, must you?” asked Agnes.
“Yes, I must,” answered Patience. “You are old enough to understand now, Agnes, that I owe it to your father’s honour to show you to the world as his child, the heiress of the De Lisles. There is no need now to hide it; if the queen has sent for me it is because she is of the same mind.” With that she broke the seal and read the queen’s letter.
It contained an express command for her to come to London and bring the child, Agnes De Lisle, with her, with all the papers necessary to prove her father’s marriage with Agnes Beaumont, and her own birth.
“But I do not care,” said Agnes. “I do not want to go; I am quite happy here.”
“We are what we are born,” said Patience. “Have you forgotten your catechism, ‘to do your duty in that state of life in which it has pleased God to place you’? We will go to London, Agnes, and come back here if we can, my child.”
Then Agnes threw herself face downwards on the table and sobbed her heart out. Patience herself was as white as the linen which lay before her, but she never swerved from what she believed to be right. That, too, was her nature; she gave no thought to her own likings or dislikings. Young as she had been when her sister died, all these years she had lived for her child and her duty. She sat quietly waiting till Agnes’s storm of sobs should cease. Upon this scene the vicar entered.
He was evidently very serious and very much troubled. Patience looked up as he entered and their eyes met for one second, then she looked away, and a faint flush coloured her face. He went up to Agnes.
“My little girl,” he said, “why this great grief?”
“The queen has ordered us to London,” said Patience. “She must have divined our hiding-place, or someone must have told her, and she has bidden me take Agnes with me.”
“Well, of course you must go,” said the vicar; “what is there so very terrible in this, Agnes? I have heard you say you loved the queen well, and her daughter too.”
“So I did,” said Agnes, “but all that is past like a dream. I have been so happy here.”
“And you were happy before you came here,” said the vicar, smiling. “I thought you looked the happiest child I had ever seen when I first saw you. You will always find some joy in life, Agnes; it is in your nature. Come, cheer up!”
The vicar’s power over Agnes had always been unquestioned. She stood up, wiped her eyes, and a poor little smile crept over her pretty face.
“There, that’s all right,” said the vicar, patting her on the shoulder. “Now, Mistress Patience, let me see your letter.”
“Well,” he said, laying it down, “much honour awaits you, Agnes, and you must try and do us all credit, and prove yourself worthy to be the representative of so good and so old a family as the De Lisles. You are your father’s daughter, remember. You never knew him, but your Aunt Patience did, and she will tell you that he was a man of high honour and a good Christian soldier. He served God, he honoured his king, and he loved your mother. Is it not so, Patience?”
“Ah, it is indeed!” she said; “he worshipped his young wife. She was so young and fragile, it was something more than ordinary love which he bore her, and she could not live without him, that is why she died, Agnes. I see her now standing at his stirrup as he bade her farewell. She was brave as long as she saw him, but she fainted in my arms when he was out of sight. I tried hard to make her live for love of you, but she shook her head. ‘I cannot’, she said, and so she died.”
Tears filled even the vicar’s eyes as Patience told this story of true love.
Fortunately Martha broke in upon them.
“Peter Kemp says he must be off, that he must be at Skipton before nightfall. The queen was urgent that he should not tarry on the road. He waits your answer.”
“He shall have it,” said Patience, and going to an ancient cabinet she opened it, drew forth paper and pens, sat down and indited her letter, folded and sealed it, and then went herself into the kitchen and gave it to the man.
She knew him well, even as Rolfe, whom Martha had fetched, did. The men had been comrades together.
“You will come back to London, Rolfe,” Peter said, as he took up his cap to go.
“Not I,” answered Rolfe. “I never had much liking for court life; I shall abide here and keep the place together.”
“Then you’ll come, Martha,” said Peter.
“I shall go where my mistress goes,” answered the woman. “Good-day, and good luck go with you, Peter Kemp!”
They shook hands.
“I’ll go down the hill with you,” said Rolfe. “You left your horse at the vicarage?”
“Yes; he was well-nigh done, and it’s a mighty steep climb up here,” said Peter.
“We are near the top,” answered Rolfe carelessly; “it’s fine and airy.”
They went down the hillside together. Before them, flitting like a fairy over the grass, they saw Agnes; she sped so quickly that they could not overtake her. She crossed the bridge and disappeared into the vicarage before they reached it.
“A bird of ill omen he is,” said the vicar’s Mary, standing by Rolfe at the vicarage gate watching Peter ride away; then she added, in a low voice, “Those two young creatures are well-nigh breaking their hearts over the news he brought.”
“They’re young,” answered Rolfe; “their hearts will mend, have no fear, Mary.”