CHAPTER V
MINE ENEMY'S ROOF-TREE
I rode down the Wye to Rowsley, and by the will of my horse
rather than by any intention of my own took the road up through
Lathkil Dale. I had determined if possible to reach the city of
Chester, and thence to ride down into Wales, hoping to find on the
rough Welsh coast a fishing boat or a smuggler's craft that would
carry me to France. In truth, I cared little whether I went to the
Tower or to France, since in either case I felt that I had looked
my last upon Haddon Hall, and had spoken farewell to the only
person in all the world for whom I really cared. My ride from
Haddon gave me time for deliberate thought, and I fully agreed with
myself upon two propositions. First, I became thoroughly conscious
of my real feeling toward Madge, and secondly, I was convinced that
her kindness and her peculiar attitude toward me when I parted from
her were but the promptings of a tender heart stirred by pity for
my unfortunate situation, rather than what I thought when I said
farewell to her. The sweet Wye and the beautiful Lathkil whispered
to me as I rode beside their banks, but in their murmurings I heard
only the music of her voice. The sun shone brightly, but its
blessed light only served to remind me of the beautiful girl whom I
had left in darkness. The light were worthless to me if I could not
share it with her. What a mooning lout was I!
All my life I had been a
philosopher, and as I rode from Haddon, beneath all my gloominess
there ran a current of amusement which brought to my lips an
ill-formed, half-born laugh when I thought of the plight and
condition in which I, by candid self-communion, found myself. Five
years before that time I had left France, and had cast behind me
all the fair possibilities for noble achievement which were offered
to me in that land, that I might follow the fortunes of a woman
whom I thought I loved. Before my exile from her side I had begun
to fear that my idol was but a thing of stone; and now that I had
learned to know myself, and to see her as she really was, I
realized that I had been worshipping naught but clay for lo, these
many years. There was only this consolation in the thought for me:
every man at some time in his life is a fool—made such by a
woman. It is given to but few men to have for their fool-maker the
rightful queen of three kingdoms. All that was left to me of my
life of devotion was a shame-faced pride in the quality of my
fool-maker. "Then," thought I, "I have at last turned to be my own
fool-maker." But I suppose it had been written in the book of fate
that I should ride from Haddon a lovelorn youth of thirty-five, and
I certainly was fulfilling my destiny to the letter.
I continued to ride up the Lathkil until I came to a fork in the
road. One branch led to the northwest, the other toward the
southwest. I was at a loss which direction to take, and I left the
choice to my horse, in whose wisdom and judgement I had more
confidence than in my own. My horse, refusing the responsibility,
stopped. So there we stood like an equestrian statue arguing with
itself until I saw a horseman riding toward me from the direction
of Overhaddon. When he approached I recognized Sir John Manners. He
looked as woebegone as I felt, and I could not help laughing at the
pair of us, for I knew that his trouble was akin to mine. The pain of love is
ludicrous to all save those who feel it. Even to them it is
laughable in others. A love-full heart has no room for that sort of
charity which pities for kinship's sake.
"What is the trouble with you, Sir John, that you look so
downcast?" said I, offering my hand.
"Ah," he answered, forcing a poor look of cheerfulness into his
face, "Sir Malcolm, I am glad to see you. Do I look downcast?"
"As forlorn as a lover who has missed seeing his sweetheart," I
responded, guessing the cause of Sir John's despondency.
"I have no sweetheart, therefore missing her could not have made
me downcast," he replied.
"So you really did miss her?" I queried. "She was detained at
Haddon Hall, Sir John, to bid me farewell."
"I do not understand—" began Sir John, growing cold in his
bearing.
"I understand quite well," I answered. "Dorothy told me all
to-day. You need keep nothing from me. The golden heart brought her
into trouble, and made mischief for me of which I cannot see the
end. I will tell you the story while we ride. I am seeking my way
to Chester, that I may, if possible, sail for France. This fork in
the road has brought me to a standstill, and my horse refuses to
decide which route we shall take. Perhaps you will direct us."
"Gladly. The road to the southwest—the one I shall
take—is the most direct route to Chester. But tell me, how
comes it that you are leaving Haddon Hall? I thought you had gone
there to marry-" He stopped speaking, and a smile stole into his
eyes.
"Let us ride forward together, and I will tell you about it,"
said I.
While we travelled I told Sir John the circumstances of my
departure from Haddon Hall, concealing nothing save that which touched Madge Stanley. I then
spoke of my dangerous position in England, and told him of my great
desire to reach my mother's people in France.
"You will find difficulty and danger in escaping to France at
this time," said Sir John, "the guard at the ports is very strong
and strict, and your greatest risk will be at the moment when you
try to embark without a passport."
"That is true," I responded; "but I know of nothing else that I
can do."
"Come with me to Rutland Castle," said Sir John. "You may there
find refuge until such time as you can go to France. I will gladly
furnish you money which you may repay at your pleasure, and I may
soon be able to procure a passport for you."
I thanked him, but said I did not see my way clear to accept his
kind offer.
"You are unknown in the neighborhood of Rutland," he continued,
"and you may easily remain incognito." Although his offer was
greatly to my liking, I suggested several objections, chief among
which was the distaste Lord Rutland might feel toward one of my
name. I would not, of course, consent that my identity should be
concealed from him. But to be brief—an almost impossible
achievement for me, it seems—Sir John assured me of his
father's welcome, and it was arranged between us that I should take
my baptismal name, François de Lorraine, and passing for a
French gentleman on a visit to England, should go to Rutland with
my friend. So it happened through the strange workings of fate that
I found help and refuge under my enemy's roof-tree.
Kind old Lord Rutland welcomed me, as his son had foretold, and
I was convinced ere I had passed an hour under his roof that the
feud between him and Sir George was of the latter's brewing.
The happenings in Haddon Hall while I lived at Rutland I knew, of course, only by the mouth of
others; but for convenience in telling I shall speak of them as if
I had seen and heard all that took place. I may now say once for
all that I shall take that liberty throughout this entire
history.
On the morning of the day after my departure from Haddon, Jennie
Faxton went to visit Dorothy and gave her a piece of information,
small in itself, but large in its effect upon that ardent young
lady. Will Fletcher, the arrow-maker at Overhaddon, had observed
Dorothy's movements in connection with Manners; and although
Fletcher did not know who Sir John was, that fact added to his
curiosity and righteous indignation.
"It do be right that some one should tell the King of the Peak
as how his daughter is carrying on with a young man who does come
here every day or two to meet her, and I do intend to tell Sir
George if she put not a stop to it," said Fletcher to some of his
gossips in Yulegrave churchyard one Sunday afternoon.
Dorothy notified John, Jennie being the messenger, of Will's
observations, visual and verbal, and designated another place for
meeting,—the gate east of Bowling Green Hill. This gate was
part of a wall on the east side of the Haddon estates adjoining the
lands of the house of Devonshire which lay to the eastward. It was
a secluded spot in the heart of the forest half a mile distant from
Haddon Hall.
Sir George, for a fortnight or more after my disappearance,
enforced his decree of imprisonment against Dorothy, and she, being
unable to leave the Hall, could not go to Bowling Green Gate to
meet Sir John. Before I had learned of the new trysting-place John
had ridden thither several evenings to meet Dorothy, but had found
only Jennie bearing her mistress's excuses. I supposed his
journeyings had been to Overhaddon; but I did not press his
confidence, nor did he give it.
Sir George's treatment of
Dorothy had taught her that the citadel of her father's wrath could
be stormed only by gentleness, and an opportunity was soon
presented in which she used that effective engine of feminine
warfare to her great advantage.
As I have told you, Sir George was very rich. No man, either
noble or gentle, in Derbyshire or in any of the adjoining counties,
possessed so great an estate or so beautiful a hall as did he. In
France we would have called Haddon Hall a grand château.
Sir George's deceased wife had been a sister to the Earl of
Derby, who lived at the time of which I am now writing. The earl
had a son, James, who was heir to the title and to the estates of
his father. The son was a dissipated, rustic clown—almost a
simpleton. He had the vulgarity of a stable boy and the vices of a
courtier. His associates were chosen from the ranks of gamesters,
ruffians, and tavern maids. Still, he was a scion of one of the
greatest families of England's nobility.
After Sir George's trouble with Dorothy, growing out of his
desire that I should wed her, the King of the Peak had begun to
feel that in his beautiful daughter he had upon his hands a
commodity that might at any time cause him trouble. He therefore
determined to marry her to some eligible gentleman as quickly as
possible, and to place the heavy responsibility of managing her in
the hands of a husband. The stubborn violence of Sir George's
nature, the rough side of which had never before been shown to
Dorothy, in her became adroit wilfulness of a quality that no
masculine mind may compass. But her life had been so entirely
undisturbed by opposing influences that her father, firm in the
belief that no one in his household would dare to thwart his will,
had remained in dangerous ignorance of the latent trouble which
pervaded his daughter from the soles of her shapely feet to the top
of her glory-crowned head.
Sir George, in casting about
for a son-in-law, had hit upon the heir to the house of Derby as a
suitable match for his child, and had entered into an alliance
offensive and defensive with the earl against the common enemy,
Dorothy. The two fathers had partly agreed that the heir to Derby
should wed the heiress of Haddon. The heir, although he had never
seen his cousin except when she was a plain, unattractive girl, was
entirely willing for the match, but the heiress—well, she had
not been consulted, and everybody connected with the affair
instinctively knew there would be trouble in that quarter. Sir
George, however, had determined that Dorothy should do her part in
case the contract of marriage should be agreed upon between the
heads of the houses. He had fully resolved to assert the majesty of
the law vested in him as a father and to compel Dorothy to do his
bidding, if there were efficacy in force and chastisement. At the
time when Sir George spoke to Dorothy about the Derby marriage, she
had been a prisoner for a fortnight or more, and had learned that
her only hope against her father lay in cunning. So she wept, and
begged for time in which to consider the answer she would give to
Lord Derby's request. She begged for two months, or even one month,
in which to bring herself to accede to her father's commands.
"You have always been so kind and good to me, father, that I
shall try to obey if you and the earl eventually agree upon terms,"
she said tearfully, having no intention whatever of trying to do
anything but disobey.
"Try!" stormed Sir George. "Try to obey me! By God, girl, I say
you shall obey!"
"Oh, father, I am so young. I have not seen my cousin for years.
I do not want to leave you, and I have never thought twice of any
man. Do not drive me from you."
Sir George, eager to crush in the outset any disposition
to oppose his will, grew violent
and threatened his daughter with dire punishment if she were not
docile and obedient.
Then said rare Dorothy:—
"It would indeed be a great match." Greater than ever will
happen, she thought. "I should be a countess." She strutted across
the room with head up and with dilating nostrils. The truth was,
she desired to gain her liberty once more that she might go to
John, and was ready to promise anything to achieve that end. "What
sort of a countess would I make, father?"
"A glorious countess, Doll, a glorious countess," said her
father, laughing. "You are a good girl to obey me so readily."
"Oh, but I have not obeyed you yet," returned Dorothy, fearing
that her father might be suspicious of a too ready
acquiescence.
"But you will obey me," answered Sir George, half in command and
half in entreaty.
"There are not many girls who would refuse the coronet of a
countess." She then seated herself upon her father's knee and
kissed him, while Sir George laughed softly over his easy
victory.
Blessed is the man who does not know when he is beaten.
Seeing her father's kindly humor, Dorothy said:—
"Father, do you still wish me to remain a prisoner in my
rooms?"
"If you promise to be a good, obedient daughter," returned Sir
George, "you shall have your liberty."
"I have always been that, father, and I am too old to learn
otherwise," answered this girl, whose father had taught her
deception by his violence. You may drive men, but you cannot drive
any woman who is worth possessing. You may for a time think you
drive her, but in the end she will have her way.
Dorothy's first act of
obedience after regaining liberty was to send a letter to Manners
by the hand of Jennie Faxton.
John received the letter in the evening, and all next day he
passed the time whistling, singing, and looking now and again at
his horologue. He walked about the castle like a happy wolf in a
pen. He did not tell me there was a project on foot, with Dorothy
as the objective, but I knew it, and waited with some impatience
for the outcome.
Long before the appointed time, which was sunset, John galloped
forth for Bowling Green Gate with joy and anticipation in his heart
and pain in his conscience. As he rode, he resolved again and again
that the interview toward which he was hastening should be the last
he would have with Dorothy. But when he pictured the girl to
himself, and thought upon her marvellous beauty and infinite
winsomeness, his conscience was drowned in his longing, and he
resolved that he would postpone resolving until the morrow.
John hitched his horse near the gate and stood looking between
the massive iron bars toward Haddon Hall, whose turrets could be
seen through the leafless boughs of the trees. The sun was sinking
perilously low, thought John, and with each moment his heart also
sank, while his good resolutions showed the flimsy fibre of their
fabric and were rent asunder by the fear that she might not come.
As the moments dragged on and she did not come, a hundred alarms
tormented him. First among these was a dread that she might have
made resolves such as had sprung up so plenteously in him, and that
she might have been strong enough to act upon them and to remain at
home. But he was mistaken in the girl. Such resolutions as he had
been making and breaking had never come to her at all. The
difference between the man and the woman was this: he resolved in
his mind not to see her and failed in keeping to his resolution; while she resolved in her heart
to see him—resolved that nothing in heaven or earth or the
other place could keep her from seeing him, and succeeded in
carrying out her resolution. The intuitive resolve, the one that
does not know it is a resolution, is the sort before which
obstacles fall like corn before the sickle.
After John had waited a weary time, the form of the girl
appeared above the crest of the hill. She was holding up the skirt
of her gown, and glided over the earth so rapidly that she appeared
to be running. Beat! beat! oh, heart of John, if there is aught in
womanhood to make you throb; if there is aught in infinite grace
and winsomeness; if there is aught in perfect harmony of color and
form and movement; if there is aught of beauty, in God's power to
create that can set you pulsing, beat! for the fairest creature of
His hand is hastening to greet you. The wind had dishevelled her
hair and it was blowing in fluffy curls of golden red about her
face. Her cheeks were slightly flushed with joy and exercise, her
red lips were parted, and her eyes—but I am wasting words. As
for John's heart it almost smothered him with its beating. He had
never before supposed that he could experience such violent
throbbing within his breast and live. But at last she was at the
gate, in all her exquisite beauty and winsomeness, and something
must be done to make the heart conform to the usages of good
society. She, too, was in trouble with her breathing, but John
thought that her trouble was owing to exertion. However that may
have been, nothing in heaven or earth was ever so beautiful, so
radiant, so graceful, or so fair as this girl who had come to give
herself to John. It seems that I cannot take myself away from the
attractive theme.
"Ah, Sir John, you did come," said the girl, joyously.
"Yes," John succeeded in replying, after an effort, "and
you—I thank you, gracious lady, for coming. I do not deserve—" the heart again
asserted itself, and Dorothy stood by the gate with downcast eyes,
waiting to learn what it was that John did not deserve. She thought
he deserved everything good.
"I fear I have caused you fatigue," said John, again thinking,
and with good reason, that he was a fool.
The English language, which he had always supposed to be his
mother tongue, had deserted him as if it were his step-mother.
After all, the difficulty, as John subsequently said, was that
Dorothy's beauty had deprived him of the power to think. He could
only see. He was entirely disorganized by a girl whom he could have
carried away in his arms.
"I feel no fatigue," replied Dorothy.
"I feared that in climbing the hill you had lost your breath,"
answered disorganized John.
"So I did," she returned. Then she gave a great sigh and said,
"Now I am all right again."
All right? So is the morning sun, so is the arching rainbow, and
so are the flitting lights of the north in midwinter. All are "all
right" because God made them, as He made Dorothy, perfect, each
after its kind.
A long, uneasy pause ensued. Dorothy felt the embarrassing
silence less than John, and could have helped him greatly had she
wished to do so. But she had made the advances at their former
meetings, and as she had told me, she "had done a great deal more
than her part in going to meet him." Therefore she determined that
he should do his own wooing thenceforward. She had graciously given
him all the opportunity he had any right to ask.
While journeying to Bowling Green Gate, John had formulated many
true and beautiful sentiments of a personal nature which he
intended expressing to Dorothy; but when the opportunity came for
him to speak, the weather, his horse, Dorothy's mare Dolcy, the
queens of England and Scotland
were the only subjects on which he could induce his tongue to
perform, even moderately well.
Dorothy listened attentively while John on the opposite side of
the gate discoursed limpingly on the above-named themes; and
although in former interviews she had found those topics quite
interesting, upon that occasion she had come to Bowling Green Gate
to listen to something else and was piqued not to hear it. After
ten or fifteen minutes she said demurely:—
"I may not remain here longer. I shall be missed at the Hall. I
regained my liberty but yesterday, and father will be suspicious of
me during the next few days. I must be watchful and must have a
care of my behavior."
John summoned his wits and might have spoken his mind freely had
he not feared to say too much. Despite Dorothy's witchery, honor,
conscience, and prudence still bore weight with him, and they all
dictated that he should cling to the shreds of his resolution and
not allow matters to go too far between him and this fascinating
girl. He was much in love with her; but Dorothy had reached at a
bound a height to which he was still climbing. Soon John, also, was
to reach the pinnacle whence honor, conscience, and prudence were
to be banished.
"I fear I must now leave you," said Dorothy, as darkness began
to gather.
"I hope I may soon see you again," said John.
"Sometime I will see you if—if I can," she answered with
downcast eyes. "It is seldom I can leave the Hall alone, but I
shall try to come here at sunset some future day." John's silence
upon a certain theme had given offence.
"I cannot tell you how greatly I thank you," cried John.
"I will say adieu," said Dorothy, as she offered him her hand
through the bars of the gate. John raised the hand gallantly to his
lips, and when she had withdrawn it there seemed no reason for her to remain. But she stood
for a moment hesitatingly. Then she stooped to reach into her
pocket while she daintily lifted the skirt of her gown with the
other hand and from the pocket drew forth a great iron key.
"I brought this key, thinking that you might wish to unlock the
gate—and come to—to this side. I had great difficulty
in taking it from the forester's closet, where it has been hanging
for a hundred years or more."
She showed John the key, returned it to her pocket, made a
courtesy, and moved slowly away, walking backward.
"Mistress Vernon," cried John, "I beg you to let me have the
key."
"It is too late, now," said the girl, with downcast eyes.
"Darkness is rapidly falling, and I must return to the Hall."
John began to climb the gate, but she stopped him. He had thrown
away his opportunity.
"Please do not follow me, Sir John," said she, still moving
backward. "I must not remain longer."
"Only for one moment," pleaded John.
"No," the girl responded, "I—I may, perhaps, bring the key
when I come again. I am glad, Sir John, that you came to meet me
this evening." She courtesied, and then hurried away toward Haddon
Hall. Twice she looked backward and waved her hand, and John stood
watching her through the bars till her form was lost to view
beneath the crest of Bowling Green Hill.
"'I brought this key, thinking that you might wish to unlock the
gate and come to this side,'" muttered John, quoting the girl's
words. "Compared with you, John Manners, there is no other fool in
this world." Then meditatively: "I wonder if she feels toward me as
I feel toward her? Surely she does. What other reason could bring
her here to meet me unless she is a brazen, wanton creature who is
for every man." Then came a jealous thought that hurt him like the piercing of a knife.
It lasted but a moment, however, and he continued muttering to
himself: "If she loves me and will be my wife, I will—I will
... In God's name what will I do? If I were to marry her, old
Vernon would kill her, and I—I should kill my father."
Then John mounted his horse and rode homeward the unhappiest
happy man in England. He had made perilous strides toward that
pinnacle sans honor, sans caution, sans conscience, sans everything
but love.
That evening while we were walking on the battlements, smoking,
John told me of his interview with Dorothy and extolled her beauty,
grace, and winsomeness which, in truth, as you know, were
matchless. But when he spoke of "her sweet, shy modesty," I came
near to laughing in his face.
"Did she not write a letter asking you to meet her?" I
asked.
"Why—y-e-s," returned John.
"And," I continued, "has she not from the first sought you?"
"It almost seems to be so," answered John, "but notwithstanding
the fact that one might say—might call—that one might
feel that her conduct is—that it might be—you know,
well—it might be called by some persons not knowing all the
facts in the case, immodest—I hate to use the word with
reference to her—yet it does not appear to me to have been at
all immodest in Mistress Vernon, and, Sir Malcolm, I should be
deeply offended were any of my friends to intimate—"
"Now, John," I returned, laughing at him, "you could not, if you
wished, make me quarrel with you; and if you desire it, I will
freely avow my firm belief in the fact that my cousin Dorothy is
the flower of modesty. Does that better suit you?"
I could easily see that my
bantering words did not suit him at all; but I laughed at him, and
he could not find it in his heart to show his ill-feeling.
"I will not quarrel with you," he returned; "but in plain words,
I do not like the tone in which you speak of her. It hurts me, and
I do not believe you would wilfully give me pain."
"Indeed, I would not," I answered seriously.
"Mistress Vernon's conduct toward me," John continued, "has been
gracious. There has been no immodesty nor boldness in it."
I laughed again and said: "I make my humble apologies to her
Majesty, Queen Dorothy. But in all earnestness, Sir John, you are
right: Dorothy is modest and pure. As for her conduct toward you,
there is a royal quality about beauty such as my cousin possesses
which gives an air of graciousness to acts that in a plainer girl
would seem bold. Beauty, like royalty, has its own
prerogatives."
For a fortnight after the adventures just related, John, in
pursuance of his oft-repeated resolution not to see Dorothy, rode
every evening to Bowling Green Gate; but during that time he failed
to see her, and the resolutions, with each failure, became weaker
and fewer.
One evening, after many disappointments, John came to my room
bearing in his hands a letter which he said Jennie Faxton had
delivered to him at Bowling Green Gate.
"Mistress Vernon," said John, "and Lady Madge Stanley will ride
to Derby-town to-morrow. They will go in the Haddon Hall coach, and
Dawson will drive. Mistress Vernon writes to me thus:—
"'To SIR JOHN MANNERS:—
"'My good wishes and my kind greeting. Lady Madge Stanley, my
good aunt, Lady Crawford, and myself do intend journeying to
Derby-town to-morrow. My aunt,
Lady Crawford, is slightly ill, and although I should much regret
to see her sickness grow greater, yet if ill she must be, I do hope
that her worst day will be upon the morrow, in which case she could
not accompany Lady Madge and me. I shall nurse my good aunt
carefully this day, and shall importune her to take plentifully of
physic that she may quickly recover her health—after
to-morrow. Should a gentleman ask of Will Dawson, who will be in
the tap-room of the Royal Arms at eleven o'clock of the morning,
Dawson will be glad to inform the gentleman concerning Lady
Crawford's health. Let us hope that the physic will cure Lady
Crawford—by the day after to-morrow at furthest. The said
Will Dawson may be trusted. With great respect,
DOROTHY VERNON.'"
"I suppose the gentleman will be solicitous concerning Lady
Crawford's health to-morrow morning at eleven o'clock," said I.
"The gentleman is now solicitous concerning Lady Crawford's
health," answered John, laughingly. "Was there ever a lady more
fair and gracious than Mistress Vernon?"
I smiled with a superior air at John's weakness, being, as you
know, entirely free from his complaint myself, and John
continued:—
"Perhaps you would call Mistress Dorothy bold for sending me
this letter?"
"It is redolent with shyness," I answered. "But would you really
wish poor Lady Crawford to be ill that you might witness Mistress
Dorothy's modesty?"
"Please don't jest on that subject," said John, seriously. "I
would wish anything, I fear, that would bring me an opportunity to
see her, to look upon her face, and to hear her voice. For her I
believe I would sacrifice every one who is dear to me. One day she
shall be mine—mine at
whatever cost—if she will be. If she will be. Ah, there is
the rub! If she will be. I dare not hope for that."
"I think," said I, "that you really have some little cause to
hope."
"You speak in the same tone again. Malcolm, you do not
understand her. She might love me to the extent that I sometimes
hope; but her father and mine would never consent to our union, and
she, I fear, could not be induced to marry me under those
conditions. Do not put the hope into my heart."
"You only now said she should be yours some day," I
answered.
"So she shall," returned John, "so she shall."
"But Lady Madge is to be with her to-morrow," said I, my own
heart beating with an ardent wish and a new-born hope, "and you may
be unable, after all, to see Mistress Dorothy."
"That is true," replied John. "I do not know how she will
arrange matters, but I have faith in her ingenuity."
Well might he have faith, for Dorothy was possessed of that sort
of a will which usually finds a way.
"If you wish me to go with you to Derby-town, I will do so.
Perhaps I may be able to entertain Lady Madge while you have a word
with Dorothy. What think you of the plan?" I asked.
"If you will go with me, Malcolm, I shall thank you with all my
heart."
And so it was agreed between us that we should both go to
Derby-town for the purpose of inquiring about Lady Crawford's
health, though for me the expedition was full of hazard.