Chapter XVIII. The Prince with the tramps.
The troop of vagabonds turned out at early dawn, and set forward on their march. There was a lowering sky overhead, sloppy ground under foot, and a winter chill in the air. All gaiety was gone from the company; some were sullen and silent, some were irritable and petulant, none were gentle-humoured, all were thirsty.
The Ruffler put ‘Jack’ in Hugo’s charge, with some brief instructions, and commanded John Canty to keep away from him and let him alone; he also warned Hugo not to be too rough with the lad.
After a while the weather grew milder, and the clouds lifted somewhat. The troop ceased to shiver, and their spirits began to improve. They grew more and more cheerful, and finally began to chaff each other and insult passengers along the highway. This showed that they were awaking to an appreciation of life and its joys once more. The dread in which their sort was held was apparent in the fact that everybody gave them the road, and took their ribald insolences meekly, without venturing to talk back. They snatched linen from the hedges, occasionally in full view of the owners, who made no protest, but only seemed grateful that they did not take the hedges, too.
By-and-by they invaded a small farmhouse and made themselves at home while the trembling farmer and his people swept the larder clean to furnish a breakfast for them. They chucked the housewife and her daughters under the chin whilst receiving the food from their hands, and made coarse jests about them, accompanied with insulting epithets and bursts of horse-laughter. They threw bones and vegetables at the farmer and his sons, kept them dodging all the time, and applauded uproariously when a good hit was made. They ended by buttering the head of one of the daughters who resented some of their familiarities. When they took their leave they threatened to come back and burn the house over the heads of the family if any report of their doings got to the ears of the authorities.
About noon, after a long and weary tramp, the gang came to a halt behind a hedge on the outskirts of a considerable village. An hour was allowed for rest, then the crew scattered themselves abroad to enter the village at different points to ply their various trades–‘Jack’ was sent with Hugo. They wandered hither and thither for some time, Hugo watching for opportunities to do a stroke of business, but finding none–so he finally said–
“I see nought to steal; it is a paltry place. Wherefore we will beg.”
“WE, forsooth! Follow thy trade–it befits thee. But _I_ will not beg.”
“Thou’lt not beg!” exclaimed Hugo, eyeing the King with surprise. “Prithee, since when hast thou reformed?”
“What dost thou mean?”
“Mean? Hast thou not begged the streets of London all thy life?”
“I? Thou idiot!”
“Spare thy compliments–thy stock will last the longer. Thy father says thou hast begged all thy days. Mayhap he lied. Peradventure you will even make so bold as to SAY he lied,” scoffed Hugo.
“Him YOU call my father? Yes, he lied.”
“Come, play not thy merry game of madman so far, mate; use it for thy amusement, not thy hurt. An’ I tell him this, he will scorch thee finely for it.”
“Save thyself the trouble. I will tell him.”
“I like thy spirit, I do in truth; but I do not admire thy judgment. Bone-rackings and bastings be plenty enow in this life, without going out of one’s way to invite them. But a truce to these matters; _I_ believe your father. I doubt not he can lie; I doubt not he DOTH lie, upon occasion, for the best of us do that; but there is no occasion here. A wise man does not waste so good a commodity as lying for nought. But come; sith it is thy humour to give over begging, wherewithal shall we busy ourselves? With robbing kitchens?”
The King said, impatiently–
“Have done with this folly–you weary me!”
Hugo replied, with temper–
“Now harkee, mate; you will not beg, you will not rob; so be it. But I will tell you what you WILL do. You will play decoy whilst _I_ beg. Refuse, an’ you think you may venture!”
The King was about to reply contemptuously, when Hugo said, interrupting–
“Peace! Here comes one with a kindly face. Now will I fall down in a fit. When the stranger runs to me, set you up a wail, and fall upon your knees, seeming to weep; then cry out as all the devils of misery were in your belly, and say, ‘Oh, sir, it is my poor afflicted brother, and we be friendless; o’ God’s name cast through your merciful eyes one pitiful look upon a sick, forsaken, and most miserable wretch; bestow one little penny out of thy riches upon one smitten of God and ready to perish!’– and mind you, keep you ON wailing, and abate not till we bilk him of his penny, else shall you rue it.”
Then immediately Hugo began to moan, and groan, and roll his eyes, and reel and totter about; and when the stranger was close at hand, down he sprawled before him, with a shriek, and began to writhe and wallow in the dirt, in seeming agony.
“O, dear, O dear!” cried the benevolent stranger, “O poor soul, poor soul, how he doth suffer! There–let me help thee up.”
“O noble sir, forbear, and God love you for a princely gentleman–but it giveth me cruel pain to touch me when I am taken so. My brother there will tell your worship how I am racked with anguish when these fits be upon me. A penny, dear sir, a penny, to buy a little food; then leave me to my sorrows.”
“A penny! thou shalt have three, thou hapless creature”–and he fumbled in his pocket with nervous haste and got them out. “There, poor lad, take them and most welcome. Now come hither, my boy, and help me carry thy stricken brother to yon house, where–“
“I am not his brother,” said the King, interrupting.
“What! not his brother?”
“Oh, hear him!” groaned Hugo, then privately ground his teeth. “He denies his own brother–and he with one foot in the grave!”
“Boy, thou art indeed hard of heart, if this is thy brother. For shame! –and he scarce able to move hand or foot. If he is not thy brother, who is he, then?”
“A beggar and a thief! He has got your money and has picked your pocket likewise. An’ thou would’st do a healing miracle, lay thy staff over his shoulders and trust Providence for the rest.”
But Hugo did not tarry for the miracle. In a moment he was up and off like the wind, the gentleman following after and raising the hue and cry lustily as he went. The King, breathing deep gratitude to Heaven for his own release, fled in the opposite direction, and did not slacken his pace until he was out of harm’s reach. He took the first road that offered, and soon put the village behind him. He hurried along, as briskly as he could, during several hours, keeping a nervous watch over his shoulder for pursuit; but his fears left him at last, and a grateful sense of security took their place. He recognised, now, that he was hungry, and also very tired. So he halted at a farmhouse; but when he was about to speak, he was cut short and driven rudely away. His clothes were against him.
He wandered on, wounded and indignant, and was resolved to put himself in the way of like treatment no more. But hunger is pride’s master; so, as the evening drew near, he made an attempt at another farmhouse; but here he fared worse than before; for he was called hard names and was promised arrest as a vagrant except he moved on promptly.
The night came on, chilly and overcast; and still the footsore monarch laboured slowly on. He was obliged to keep moving, for every time he sat down to rest he was soon penetrated to the bone with the cold. All his sensations and experiences, as he moved through the solemn gloom and the empty vastness of the night, were new and strange to him. At intervals he heard voices approach, pass by, and fade into silence; and as he saw nothing more of the bodies they belonged to than a sort of formless drifting blur, there was something spectral and uncanny about it all that made him shudder. Occasionally he caught the twinkle of a light–always far away, apparently–almost in another world; if he heard the tinkle of a sheep’s bell, it was vague, distant, indistinct; the muffled lowing of the herds floated to him on the night wind in vanishing cadences, a mournful sound; now and then came the complaining howl of a dog over viewless expanses of field and forest; all sounds were remote; they made the little King feel that all life and activity were far removed from him, and that he stood solitary, companionless, in the centre of a measureless solitude.
He stumbled along, through the gruesome fascinations of this new experience, startled occasionally by the soft rustling of the dry leaves overhead, so like human whispers they seemed to sound; and by-and-by he came suddenly upon the freckled light of a tin lantern near at hand. He stepped back into the shadows and waited. The lantern stood by the open door of a barn. The King waited some time–there was no sound, and nobody stirring. He got so cold, standing still, and the hospitable barn looked so enticing, that at last he resolved to risk everything and enter. He started swiftly and stealthily, and just as he was crossing the threshold he heard voices behind him. He darted behind a cask, within the barn, and stooped down. Two farm-labourers came in, bringing the lantern with them, and fell to work, talking meanwhile. Whilst they moved about with the light, the King made good use of his eyes and took the bearings of what seemed to be a good-sized stall at the further end of the place, purposing to grope his way to it when he should be left to himself. He also noted the position of a pile of horse blankets, midway of the route, with the intent to levy upon them for the service of the crown of England for one night.
By-and-by the men finished and went away, fastening the door behind them and taking the lantern with them. The shivering King made for the blankets, with as good speed as the darkness would allow; gathered them up, and then groped his way safely to the stall. Of two of the blankets he made a bed, then covered himself with the remaining two. He was a glad monarch, now, though the blankets were old and thin, and not quite warm enough; and besides gave out a pungent horsey odour that was almost suffocatingly powerful.
Although the King was hungry and chilly, he was also so tired and so drowsy that these latter influences soon began to get the advantage of the former, and he presently dozed off into a state of semi- consciousness. Then, just as he was on the point of losing himself wholly, he distinctly felt something touch him! He was broad awake in a moment, and gasping for breath. The cold horror of that mysterious touch in the dark almost made his heart stand still. He lay motionless, and listened, scarcely breathing. But nothing stirred, and there was no sound. He continued to listen, and wait, during what seemed a long time, but still nothing stirred, and there was no sound. So he began to drop into a drowse once more, at last; and all at once he felt that mysterious touch again! It was a grisly thing, this light touch from this noiseless and invisible presence; it made the boy sick with ghostly fears. What should he do? That was the question; but he did not know how to answer it. Should he leave these reasonably comfortable quarters and fly from this inscrutable horror? But fly whither? He could not get out of the barn; and the idea of scurrying blindly hither and thither in the dark, within the captivity of the four walls, with this phantom gliding after him, and visiting him with that soft hideous touch upon cheek or shoulder at every turn, was intolerable. But to stay where he was, and endure this living death all night–was that better? No. What, then, was there left to do? Ah, there was but one course; he knew it well–he must put out his hand and find that thing!
It was easy to think this; but it was hard to brace himself up to try it. Three times he stretched his hand a little way out into the dark, gingerly; and snatched it suddenly back, with a gasp–not because it had encountered anything, but because he had felt so sure it was just GOING to. But the fourth time, he groped a little further, and his hand lightly swept against something soft and warm. This petrified him, nearly, with fright; his mind was in such a state that he could imagine the thing to be nothing else than a corpse, newly dead and still warm. He thought he would rather die than touch it again. But he thought this false thought because he did not know the immortal strength of human curiosity. In no long time his hand was tremblingly groping again– against his judgment, and without his consent–but groping persistently on, just the same. It encountered a bunch of long hair; he shuddered, but followed up the hair and found what seemed to be a warm rope; followed up the rope and found an innocent calf!–for the rope was not a rope at all, but the calf’s tail.
The King was cordially ashamed of himself for having gotten all that fright and misery out of so paltry a matter as a slumbering calf; but he need not have felt so about it, for it was not the calf that frightened him, but a dreadful non-existent something which the calf stood for; and any other boy, in those old superstitious times, would have acted and suffered just as he had done.
The King was not only delighted to find that the creature was only a calf, but delighted to have the calf’s company; for he had been feeling so lonesome and friendless that the company and comradeship of even this humble animal were welcome. And he had been so buffeted, so rudely entreated by his own kind, that it was a real comfort to him to feel that he was at last in the society of a fellow-creature that had at least a soft heart and a gentle spirit, whatever loftier attributes might be lacking. So he resolved to waive rank and make friends with the calf.
While stroking its sleek warm back–for it lay near him and within easy reach–it occurred to him that this calf might be utilised in more ways than one. Whereupon he re-arranged his bed, spreading it down close to the calf; then he cuddled himself up to the calf’s back, drew the covers up over himself and his friend, and in a minute or two was as warm and comfortable as he had ever been in the downy couches of the regal palace of Westminster.
Pleasant thoughts came at once; life took on a cheerfuller seeming. He was free of the bonds of servitude and crime, free of the companionship of base and brutal outlaws; he was warm; he was sheltered; in a word, he was happy. The night wind was rising; it swept by in fitful gusts that made the old barn quake and rattle, then its forces died down at intervals, and went moaning and wailing around corners and projections– but it was all music to the King, now that he was snug and comfortable: let it blow and rage, let it batter and bang, let it moan and wail, he minded it not, he only enjoyed it. He merely snuggled the closer to his friend, in a luxury of warm contentment, and drifted blissfully out of consciousness into a deep and dreamless sleep that was full of serenity and peace. The distant dogs howled, the melancholy kine complained, and the winds went on raging, whilst furious sheets of rain drove along the roof; but the Majesty of England slept on, undisturbed, and the calf did the same, it being a simple creature, and not easily troubled by storms or embarrassed by sleeping with a king.
Chapter XIX. The Prince with the peasants.
When the King awoke in the early morning, he found that a wet but thoughtful rat had crept into the place during the night and made a cosy bed for itself in his bosom. Being disturbed now, it scampered away. The boy smiled, and said, “Poor fool, why so fearful? I am as forlorn as thou. ‘Twould be a sham in me to hurt the helpless, who am myself so helpless. Moreover, I owe you thanks for a good omen; for when a king has fallen so low that the very rats do make a bed of him, it surely meaneth that his fortunes be upon the turn, since it is plain he can no lower go.”
He got up and stepped out of the stall, and just then he heard the sound of children’s voices. The barn door opened and a couple of little girls came in. As soon as they saw him their talking and laughing ceased, and they stopped and stood still, gazing at him with strong curiosity; they presently began to whisper together, then they approached nearer, and stopped again to gaze and whisper. By-and-by they gathered courage and began to discuss him aloud. One said–
“He hath a comely face.”
The other added–
“And pretty hair.”
“But is ill clothed enow.”
“And how starved he looketh.”
They came still nearer, sidling shyly around and about him, examining him minutely from all points, as if he were some strange new kind of animal, but warily and watchfully the while, as if they half feared he might be a sort of animal that would bite, upon occasion. Finally they halted before him, holding each other’s hands for protection, and took a good satisfying stare with their innocent eyes; then one of them plucked up all her courage and inquired with honest directness–
“Who art thou, boy?”
“I am the King,” was the grave answer.
The children gave a little start, and their eyes spread themselves wide open and remained so during a speechless half minute. Then curiosity broke the silence–
“The KING? What King?”
“The King of England.”
The children looked at each other–then at him–then at each other again –wonderingly, perplexedly; then one said–
“Didst hear him, Margery?–he said he is the King. Can that be true?”
“How can it be else but true, Prissy? Would he say a lie? For look you, Prissy, an’ it were not true, it WOULD be a lie. It surely would be. Now think on’t. For all things that be not true, be lies–thou canst make nought else out of it.”
It was a good tight argument, without a leak in it anywhere; and it left Prissy’s half-doubts not a leg to stand on. She considered a moment, then put the King upon his honour with the simple remark–
“If thou art truly the King, then I believe thee.”
“I am truly the King.”
This settled the matter. His Majesty’s royalty was accepted without further question or discussion, and the two little girls began at once to inquire into how he came to be where he was, and how he came to be so unroyally clad, and whither he was bound, and all about his affairs. It was a mighty relief to him to pour out his troubles where they would not be scoffed at or doubted; so he told his tale with feeling, forgetting even his hunger for the time; and it was received with the deepest and tenderest sympathy by the gentle little maids. But when he got down to his latest experiences and they learned how long he had been without food, they cut him short and hurried him away to the farmhouse to find a breakfast for him.
The King was cheerful and happy now, and said to himself, “When I am come to mine own again, I will always honour little children, remembering how that these trusted me and believed in me in my time of trouble; whilst they that were older, and thought themselves wiser, mocked at me and held me for a liar.”
The children’s mother received the King kindly, and was full of pity; for his forlorn condition and apparently crazed intellect touched her womanly heart. She was a widow, and rather poor; consequently she had seen trouble enough to enable her to feel for the unfortunate. She imagined that the demented boy had wandered away from his friends or keepers; so she tried to find out whence he had come, in order that she might take measures to return him; but all her references to neighbouring towns and villages, and all her inquiries in the same line went for nothing–the boy’s face, and his answers, too, showed that the things she was talking of were not familiar to him. He spoke earnestly and simply about court matters, and broke down, more than once, when speaking of the late King ‘his father’; but whenever the conversation changed to baser topics, he lost interest and became silent.
The woman was mightily puzzled; but she did not give up. As she proceeded with her cooking, she set herself to contriving devices to surprise the boy into betraying his real secret. She talked about cattle–he showed no concern; then about sheep–the same result: so her guess that he had been a shepherd boy was an error; she talked about mills; and about weavers, tinkers, smiths, trades and tradesmen of all sorts; and about Bedlam, and jails, and charitable retreats: but no matter, she was baffled at all points. Not altogether, either; for she argued that she had narrowed the thing down to domestic service. Yes, she was sure she was on the right track, now; he must have been a house servant. So she led up to that. But the result was discouraging. The subject of sweeping appeared to weary him; fire-building failed to stir him; scrubbing and scouring awoke no enthusiasm. The goodwife touched, with a perishing hope, and rather as a matter of form, upon the subject of cooking. To her surprise, and her vast delight, the King’s face lighted at once! Ah, she had hunted him down at last, she thought; and she was right proud, too, of the devious shrewdness and tact which had accomplished it.
Her tired tongue got a chance to rest, now; for the King’s, inspired by gnawing hunger and the fragrant smells that came from the sputtering pots and pans, turned itself loose and delivered itself up to such an eloquent dissertation upon certain toothsome dishes, that within three minutes the woman said to herself, “Of a truth I was right–he hath holpen in a kitchen!” Then he broadened his bill of fare, and discussed it with such appreciation and animation, that the goodwife said to herself, “Good lack! how can he know so many dishes, and so fine ones withal? For these belong only upon the tables of the rich and great. Ah, now I see! ragged outcast as he is, he must have served in the palace before his reason went astray; yes, he must have helped in the very kitchen of the King himself! I will test him.”
Full of eagerness to prove her sagacity, she told the King to mind the cooking a moment–hinting that he might manufacture and add a dish or two, if he chose; then she went out of the room and gave her children a sign to follow after. The King muttered–
“Another English king had a commission like to this, in a bygone time–it is nothing against my dignity to undertake an office which the great Alfred stooped to assume. But I will try to better serve my trust than he; for he let the cakes burn.”
The intent was good, but the performance was not answerable to it, for this King, like the other one, soon fell into deep thinkings concerning his vast affairs, and the same calamity resulted–the cookery got burned. The woman returned in time to save the breakfast from entire destruction; and she promptly brought the King out of his dreams with a brisk and cordial tongue-lashing. Then, seeing how troubled he was over his violated trust, she softened at once, and was all goodness and gentleness toward him.
The boy made a hearty and satisfying meal, and was greatly refreshed and gladdened by it. It was a meal which was distinguished by this curious feature, that rank was waived on both sides; yet neither recipient of the favour was aware that it had been extended. The goodwife had intended to feed this young tramp with broken victuals in a corner, like any other tramp or like a dog; but she was so remorseful for the scolding she had given him, that she did what she could to atone for it by allowing him to sit at the family table and eat with his betters, on ostensible terms of equality with them; and the King, on his side, was so remorseful for having broken his trust, after the family had been so kind to him, that he forced himself to atone for it by humbling himself to the family level, instead of requiring the woman and her children to stand and wait upon him, while he occupied their table in the solitary state due to his birth and dignity. It does us all good to unbend sometimes. This good woman was made happy all the day long by the applauses which she got out of herself for her magnanimous condescension to a tramp; and the King was just as self-complacent over his gracious humility toward a humble peasant woman.
When breakfast was over, the housewife told the King to wash up the dishes. This command was a staggerer, for a moment, and the King came near rebelling; but then he said to himself, “Alfred the Great watched the cakes; doubtless he would have washed the dishes too–therefore will I essay it.”
He made a sufficiently poor job of it; and to his surprise too, for the cleaning of wooden spoons and trenchers had seemed an easy thing to do. It was a tedious and troublesome piece of work, but he finished it at last. He was becoming impatient to get away on his journey now; however, he was not to lose this thrifty dame’s society so easily. She furnished him some little odds and ends of employment, which he got through with after a fair fashion and with some credit. Then she set him and the little girls to paring some winter apples; but he was so awkward at this service that she retired him from it and gave him a butcher knife to grind. Afterwards she kept him carding wool until he began to think he had laid the good King Alfred about far enough in the shade for the present in the matter of showy menial heroisms that would read picturesquely in story-books and histories, and so he was half-minded to resign. And when, just after the noonday dinner, the goodwife gave him a basket of kittens to drown, he did resign. At least he was just going to resign–for he felt that he must draw the line somewhere, and it seemed to him that to draw it at kitten-drowning was about the right thing–when there was an interruption. The interruption was John Canty–with a peddler’s pack on his back–and Hugo.
The King discovered these rascals approaching the front gate before they had had a chance to see him; so he said nothing about drawing the line, but took up his basket of kittens and stepped quietly out the back way, without a word. He left the creatures in an out-house, and hurried on, into a narrow lane at the rear.
Chapter XX. The Prince and the hermit.
The high hedge hid him from the house, now; and so, under the impulse of a deadly fright, he let out all his forces and sped toward a wood in the distance. He never looked back until he had almost gained the shelter of the forest; then he turned and descried two figures in the distance. That was sufficient; he did not wait to scan them critically, but hurried on, and never abated his pace till he was far within the twilight depths of the wood. Then he stopped; being persuaded that he was now tolerably safe. He listened intently, but the stillness was profound and solemn– awful, even, and depressing to the spirits. At wide intervals his straining ear did detect sounds, but they were so remote, and hollow, and mysterious, that they seemed not to be real sounds, but only the moaning and complaining ghosts of departed ones. So the sounds were yet more dreary than the silence which they interrupted.
It was his purpose, in the beginning, to stay where he was the rest of the day; but a chill soon invaded his perspiring body, and he was at last obliged to resume movement in order to get warm. He struck straight through the forest, hoping to pierce to a road presently, but he was disappointed in this. He travelled on and on; but the farther he went, the denser the wood became, apparently. The gloom began to thicken, by- and-by, and the King realised that the night was coming on. It made him shudder to think of spending it in such an uncanny place; so he tried to hurry faster, but he only made the less speed, for he could not now see well enough to choose his steps judiciously; consequently he kept tripping over roots and tangling himself in vines and briers.
And how glad he was when at last he caught the glimmer of a light! He approached it warily, stopping often to look about him and listen. It came from an unglazed window-opening in a shabby little hut. He heard a voice, now, and felt a disposition to run and hide; but he changed his mind at once, for this voice was praying, evidently. He glided to the one window of the hut, raised himself on tiptoe, and stole a glance within. The room was small; its floor was the natural earth, beaten hard by use; in a corner was a bed of rushes and a ragged blanket or two; near it was a pail, a cup, a basin, and two or three pots and pans; there was a short bench and a three-legged stool; on the hearth the remains of a faggot fire were smouldering; before a shrine, which was lighted by a single candle, knelt an aged man, and on an old wooden box at his side lay an open book and a human skull. The man was of large, bony frame; his hair and whiskers were very long and snowy white; he was clothed in a robe of sheepskins which reached from his neck to his heels.
“A holy hermit!” said the King to himself; “now am I indeed fortunate.”
The hermit rose from his knees; the King knocked. A deep voice responded–
“Enter!–but leave sin behind, for the ground whereon thou shalt stand is holy!”
The King entered, and paused. The hermit turned a pair of gleaming, unrestful eyes upon him, and said–
“Who art thou?”
“I am the King,” came the answer, with placid simplicity.
“Welcome, King!” cried the hermit, with enthusiasm. Then, bustling about with feverish activity, and constantly saying, “Welcome, welcome,” he arranged his bench, seated the King on it, by the hearth, threw some faggots on the fire, and finally fell to pacing the floor with a nervous stride.
“Welcome! Many have sought sanctuary here, but they were not worthy, and were turned away. But a King who casts his crown away, and despises the vain splendours of his office, and clothes his body in rags, to devote his life to holiness and the mortification of the flesh–he is worthy, he is welcome!–here shall he abide all his days till death come.” The King hastened to interrupt and explain, but the hermit paid no attention to him–did not even hear him, apparently, but went right on with his talk, with a raised voice and a growing energy. “And thou shalt be at peace here. None shall find out thy refuge to disquiet thee with supplications to return to that empty and foolish life which God hath moved thee to abandon. Thou shalt pray here; thou shalt study the Book; thou shalt meditate upon the follies and delusions of this world, and upon the sublimities of the world to come; thou shalt feed upon crusts and herbs, and scourge thy body with whips, daily, to the purifying of thy soul. Thou shalt wear a hair shirt next thy skin; thou shalt drink water only; and thou shalt be at peace; yes, wholly at peace; for whoso comes to seek thee shall go his way again, baffled; he shall not find thee, he shall not molest thee.”
The old man, still pacing back and forth, ceased to speak aloud, and began to mutter. The King seized this opportunity to state his case; and he did it with an eloquence inspired by uneasiness and apprehension. But the hermit went on muttering, and gave no heed. And still muttering, he approached the King and said impressively–
“‘Sh! I will tell you a secret!” He bent down to impart it, but checked himself, and assumed a listening attitude. After a moment or two he went on tiptoe to the window-opening, put his head out, and peered around in the gloaming, then came tiptoeing back again, put his face close down to the King’s, and whispered–
“I am an archangel!”
The King started violently, and said to himself, “Would God I were with the outlaws again; for lo, now am I the prisoner of a madman!” His apprehensions were heightened, and they showed plainly in his face. In a low excited voice the hermit continued–
“I see you feel my atmosphere! There’s awe in your face! None may be in this atmosphere and not be thus affected; for it is the very atmosphere of heaven. I go thither and return, in the twinkling of an eye. I was made an archangel on this very spot, it is five years ago, by angels sent from heaven to confer that awful dignity. Their presence filled this place with an intolerable brightness. And they knelt to me, King! yes, they knelt to me! for I was greater than they. I have walked in the courts of heaven, and held speech with the patriarchs. Touch my hand–be not afraid–touch it. There–now thou hast touched a hand which has been clasped by Abraham and Isaac and Jacob! For I have walked in the golden courts; I have seen the Deity face to face!” He paused, to give this speech effect; then his face suddenly changed, and he started to his feet again saying, with angry energy, “Yes, I am an archangel; A MERE ARCHANGEL!–I that might have been pope! It is verily true. I was told it from heaven in a dream, twenty years ago; ah, yes, I was to be pope!– and I SHOULD have been pope, for Heaven had said it–but the King dissolved my religious house, and I, poor obscure unfriended monk, was cast homeless upon the world, robbed of my mighty destiny!” Here he began to mumble again, and beat his forehead in futile rage, with his fist; now and then articulating a venomous curse, and now and then a pathetic “Wherefore I am nought but an archangel–I that should have been pope!”
So he went on, for an hour, whilst the poor little King sat and suffered. Then all at once the old man’s frenzy departed, and he became all gentleness. His voice softened, he came down out of his clouds, and fell to prattling along so simply and so humanly, that he soon won the King’s heart completely. The old devotee moved the boy nearer to the fire and made him comfortable; doctored his small bruises and abrasions with a deft and tender hand; and then set about preparing and cooking a supper– chatting pleasantly all the time, and occasionally stroking the lad’s cheek or patting his head, in such a gently caressing way that in a little while all the fear and repulsion inspired by the archangel were changed to reverence and affection for the man.
This happy state of things continued while the two ate the supper; then, after a prayer before the shrine, the hermit put the boy to bed, in a small adjoining room, tucking him in as snugly and lovingly as a mother might; and so, with a parting caress, left him and sat down by the fire, and began to poke the brands about in an absent and aimless way. Presently he paused; then tapped his forehead several times with his fingers, as if trying to recall some thought which had escaped from his mind. Apparently he was unsuccessful. Now he started quickly up, and entered his guest’s room, and said–
“Thou art King?”
“Yes,” was the response, drowsily uttered.
“What King?”
“Of England.”
“Of England? Then Henry is gone!”
“Alack, it is so. I am his son.”
A black frown settled down upon the hermit’s face, and he clenched his bony hands with a vindictive energy. He stood a few moments, breathing fast and swallowing repeatedly, then said in a husky voice–
“Dost know it was he that turned us out into the world houseless and homeless?”
There was no response. The old man bent down and scanned the boy’s reposeful face and listened to his placid breathing. “He sleeps–sleeps soundly;” and the frown vanished away and gave place to an expression of evil satisfaction. A smile flitted across the dreaming boy’s features. The hermit muttered, “So–his heart is happy;” and he turned away. He went stealthily about the place, seeking here and there for something; now and then halting to listen, now and then jerking his head around and casting a quick glance toward the bed; and always muttering, always mumbling to himself. At last he found what he seemed to want–a rusty old butcher knife and a whetstone. Then he crept to his place by the fire, sat himself down, and began to whet the knife softly on the stone, still muttering, mumbling, ejaculating. The winds sighed around the lonely place, the mysterious voices of the night floated by out of the distances. The shining eyes of venturesome mice and rats peered out at the old man from cracks and coverts, but he went on with his work, rapt, absorbed, and noted none of these things.
At long intervals he drew his thumb along the edge of his knife, and nodded his head with satisfaction. “It grows sharper,” he said; “yes, it grows sharper.”
He took no note of the flight of time, but worked tranquilly on, entertaining himself with his thoughts, which broke out occasionally in articulate speech–
“His father wrought us evil, he destroyed us–and is gone down into the eternal fires! Yes, down into the eternal fires! He escaped us–but it was God’s will, yes it was God’s will, we must not repine. But he hath not escaped the fires! No, he hath not escaped the fires, the consuming, unpitying, remorseless fires–and THEY are everlasting!”
And so he wrought, and still wrought–mumbling, chuckling a low rasping chuckle at times–and at times breaking again into words–
“It was his father that did it all. I am but an archangel; but for him I should be pope!”
The King stirred. The hermit sprang noiselessly to the bedside, and went down upon his knees, bending over the prostrate form with his knife uplifted. The boy stirred again; his eyes came open for an instant, but there was no speculation in them, they saw nothing; the next moment his tranquil breathing showed that his sleep was sound once more.
The hermit watched and listened, for a time, keeping his position and scarcely breathing; then he slowly lowered his arms, and presently crept away, saying,–
“It is long past midnight; it is not best that he should cry out, lest by accident someone be passing.”
He glided about his hovel, gathering a rag here, a thong there, and another one yonder; then he returned, and by careful and gentle handling he managed to tie the King’s ankles together without waking him. Next he essayed to tie the wrists; he made several attempts to cross them, but the boy always drew one hand or the other away, just as the cord was ready to be applied; but at last, when the archangel was almost ready to despair, the boy crossed his hands himself, and the next moment they were bound. Now a bandage was passed under the sleeper’s chin and brought up over his head and tied fast–and so softly, so gradually, and so deftly were the knots drawn together and compacted, that the boy slept peacefully through it all without stirring.
Chapter XXI. Hendon to the rescue.
The old man glided away, stooping, stealthy, cat-like, and brought the low bench. He seated himself upon it, half his body in the dim and flickering light, and the other half in shadow; and so, with his craving eyes bent upon the slumbering boy, he kept his patient vigil there, heedless of the drift of time, and softly whetted his knife, and mumbled and chuckled; and in aspect and attitude he resembled nothing so much as a grizzly, monstrous spider, gloating over some hapless insect that lay bound and helpless in his web.
After a long while, the old man, who was still gazing,–yet not seeing, his mind having settled into a dreamy abstraction,–observed, on a sudden, that the boy’s eyes were open! wide open and staring!–staring up in frozen horror at the knife. The smile of a gratified devil crept over the old man’s face, and he said, without changing his attitude or his occupation–
“Son of Henry the Eighth, hast thou prayed?”
The boy struggled helplessly in his bonds, and at the same time forced a smothered sound through his closed jaws, which the hermit chose to interpret as an affirmative answer to his question.
“Then pray again. Pray the prayer for the dying!”
A shudder shook the boy’s frame, and his face blenched. Then he struggled again to free himself–turning and twisting himself this way and that; tugging frantically, fiercely, desperately–but uselessly–to burst his fetters; and all the while the old ogre smiled down upon him, and nodded his head, and placidly whetted his knife; mumbling, from time to time, “The moments are precious, they are few and precious–pray the prayer for the dying!”
The boy uttered a despairing groan, and ceased from his struggles, panting. The tears came, then, and trickled, one after the other, down his face; but this piteous sight wrought no softening effect upon the savage old man.
The dawn was coming now; the hermit observed it, and spoke up sharply, with a touch of nervous apprehension in his voice–
“I may not indulge this ecstasy longer! The night is already gone. It seems but a moment–only a moment; would it had endured a year! Seed of the Church’s spoiler, close thy perishing eyes, an’ thou fearest to look upon–“
The rest was lost in inarticulate mutterings. The old man sank upon his knees, his knife in his hand, and bent himself over the moaning boy.
Hark! There was a sound of voices near the cabin–the knife dropped from the hermit’s hand; he cast a sheepskin over the boy and started up, trembling. The sounds increased, and presently the voices became rough and angry; then came blows, and cries for help; then a clatter of swift footsteps, retreating. Immediately came a succession of thundering knocks upon the cabin door, followed by–
“Hullo-o-o! Open! And despatch, in the name of all the devils!”
Oh, this was the blessedest sound that had ever made music in the King’s ears; for it was Miles Hendon’s voice!
The hermit, grinding his teeth in impotent rage, moved swiftly out of the bedchamber, closing the door behind him; and straightway the King heard a talk, to this effect, proceeding from the ‘chapel’:–
“Homage and greeting, reverend sir! Where is the boy–MY boy?”
“What boy, friend?”
“What boy! Lie me no lies, sir priest, play me no deceptions!–I am not in the humour for it. Near to this place I caught the scoundrels who I judged did steal him from me, and I made them confess; they said he was at large again, and they had tracked him to your door. They showed me his very footprints. Now palter no more; for look you, holy sir, an’ thou produce him not–Where is the boy?”
“O good sir, peradventure you mean the ragged regal vagrant that tarried here the night. If such as you take an interest in such as he, know, then, that I have sent him of an errand. He will be back anon.”
“How soon? How soon? Come, waste not the time–cannot I overtake him? How soon will he be back?”
“Thou need’st not stir; he will return quickly.”
“So be it, then. I will try to wait. But stop!–YOU sent him of an errand?–you! Verily this is a lie–he would not go. He would pull thy old beard, an’ thou didst offer him such an insolence. Thou hast lied, friend; thou hast surely lied! He would not go for thee, nor for any man.”
“For any MAN–no; haply not. But I am not a man.”
“WHAT! Now o’ God’s name what art thou, then?”
“It is a secret–mark thou reveal it not. I am an archangel!”
There was a tremendous ejaculation from Miles Hendon–not altogether unprofane–followed by–
“This doth well and truly account for his complaisance! Right well I knew he would budge nor hand nor foot in the menial service of any mortal; but, lord, even a king must obey when an archangel gives the word o’ command! Let me–‘sh! What noise was that?”
All this while the little King had been yonder, alternately quaking with terror and trembling with hope; and all the while, too, he had thrown all the strength he could into his anguished moanings, constantly expecting them to reach Hendon’s ear, but always realising, with bitterness, that they failed, or at least made no impression. So this last remark of his servant came as comes a reviving breath from fresh fields to the dying; and he exerted himself once more, and with all his energy, just as the hermit was saying–
“Noise? I heard only the wind.”
“Mayhap it was. Yes, doubtless that was it. I have been hearing it faintly all the–there it is again! It is not the wind! What an odd sound! Come, we will hunt it out!”
Now the King’s joy was nearly insupportable. His tired lungs did their utmost–and hopefully, too–but the sealed jaws and the muffling sheepskin sadly crippled the effort. Then the poor fellow’s heart sank, to hear the hermit say–
“Ah, it came from without–I think from the copse yonder. Come, I will lead the way.”
The King heard the two pass out, talking; heard their footsteps die quickly away–then he was alone with a boding, brooding, awful silence.
It seemed an age till he heard the steps and voices approaching again– and this time he heard an added sound,–the trampling of hoofs, apparently. Then he heard Hendon say–
“I will not wait longer. I CANNOT wait longer. He has lost his way in this thick wood. Which direction took he? Quick–point it out to me.”
“He–but wait; I will go with thee.”
“Good–good! Why, truly thou art better than thy looks. Marry I do not think there’s not another archangel with so right a heart as thine. Wilt ride? Wilt take the wee donkey that’s for my boy, or wilt thou fork thy holy legs over this ill-conditioned slave of a mule that I have provided for myself?–and had been cheated in too, had he cost but the indifferent sum of a month’s usury on a brass farthing let to a tinker out of work.”
“No–ride thy mule, and lead thine ass; I am surer on mine own feet, and will walk.”
“Then prithee mind the little beast for me while I take my life in my hands and make what success I may toward mounting the big one.”
Then followed a confusion of kicks, cuffs, tramplings and plungings, accompanied by a thunderous intermingling of volleyed curses, and finally a bitter apostrophe to the mule, which must have broken its spirit, for hostilities seemed to cease from that moment.
With unutterable misery the fettered little King heard the voices and footsteps fade away and die out. All hope forsook him, now, for the moment, and a dull despair settled down upon his heart. “My only friend is deceived and got rid of,” he said; “the hermit will return and–” He finished with a gasp; and at once fell to struggling so frantically with his bonds again, that he shook off the smothering sheepskin.
And now he heard the door open! The sound chilled him to the marrow– already he seemed to feel the knife at his throat. Horror made him close his eyes; horror made him open them again–and before him stood John Canty and Hugo!
He would have said “Thank God!” if his jaws had been free.
A moment or two later his limbs were at liberty, and his captors, each gripping him by an arm, were hurrying him with all speed through the forest.
Chapter XXII. A victim of treachery.
Once more ‘King Foo-foo the First’ was roving with the tramps and outlaws, a butt for their coarse jests and dull-witted railleries, and sometimes the victim of small spitefulness at the hands of Canty and Hugo when the Ruffler’s back was turned. None but Canty and Hugo really disliked him. Some of the others liked him, and all admired his pluck and spirit. During two or three days, Hugo, in whose ward and charge the King was, did what he covertly could to make the boy uncomfortable; and at night, during the customary orgies, he amused the company by putting small indignities upon him–always as if by accident. Twice he stepped upon the King’s toes–accidentally–and the King, as became his royalty, was contemptuously unconscious of it and indifferent to it; but the third time Hugo entertained himself in that way, the King felled him to the ground with a cudgel, to the prodigious delight of the tribe. Hugo, consumed with anger and shame, sprang up, seized a cudgel, and came at his small adversary in a fury. Instantly a ring was formed around the gladiators, and the betting and cheering began. But poor Hugo stood no chance whatever. His frantic and lubberly ‘prentice-work found but a poor market for itself when pitted against an arm which had been trained by the first masters of Europe in single-stick, quarter-staff, and every art and trick of swordsmanship. The little King stood, alert but at graceful ease, and caught and turned aside the thick rain of blows with a facility and precision which set the motley on-lookers wild with admiration; and every now and then, when his practised eye detected an opening, and a lightning-swift rap upon Hugo’s head followed as a result, the storm of cheers and laughter that swept the place was something wonderful to hear. At the end of fifteen minutes, Hugo, all battered, bruised, and the target for a pitiless bombardment of ridicule, slunk from the field; and the unscathed hero of the fight was seized and borne aloft upon the shoulders of the joyous rabble to the place of honour beside the Ruffler, where with vast ceremony he was crowned King of the Game-Cocks; his meaner title being at the same time solemnly cancelled and annulled, and a decree of banishment from the gang pronounced against any who should thenceforth utter it.
All attempts to make the King serviceable to the troop had failed. He had stubbornly refused to act; moreover, he was always trying to escape. He had been thrust into an unwatched kitchen, the first day of his return; he not only came forth empty-handed, but tried to rouse the housemates. He was sent out with a tinker to help him at his work; he would not work; moreover, he threatened the tinker with his own soldering-iron; and finally both Hugo and the tinker found their hands full with the mere matter of keeping his from getting away. He delivered the thunders of his royalty upon the heads of all who hampered his liberties or tried to force him to service. He was sent out, in Hugo’s charge, in company with a slatternly woman and a diseased baby, to beg; but the result was not encouraging–he declined to plead for the mendicants, or be a party to their cause in any way.
Thus several days went by; and the miseries of this tramping life, and the weariness and sordidness and meanness and vulgarity of it, became gradually and steadily so intolerable to the captive that he began at last to feel that his release from the hermit’s knife must prove only a temporary respite from death, at best.
But at night, in his dreams, these things were forgotten, and he was on his throne, and master again. This, of course, intensified the sufferings of the awakening–so the mortifications of each succeeding morning of the few that passed between his return to bondage and the combat with Hugo, grew bitterer and bitterer, and harder and harder to bear.
The morning after that combat, Hugo got up with a heart filled with vengeful purposes against the King. He had two plans, in particular. One was to inflict upon the lad what would be, to his proud spirit and ‘imagined’ royalty, a peculiar humiliation; and if he failed to accomplish this, his other plan was to put a crime of some kind upon the King, and then betray him into the implacable clutches of the law.
In pursuance of the first plan, he purposed to put a ‘clime’ upon the King’s leg; rightly judging that that would mortify him to the last and perfect degree; and as soon as the clime should operate, he meant to get Canty’s help, and FORCE the King to expose his leg in the highway and beg for alms. ‘Clime’ was the cant term for a sore, artificially created. To make a clime, the operator made a paste or poultice of unslaked lime, soap, and the rust of old iron, and spread it upon a piece of leather, which was then bound tightly upon the leg. This would presently fret off the skin, and make the flesh raw and angry-looking; blood was then rubbed upon the limb, which, being fully dried, took on a dark and repulsive colour. Then a bandage of soiled rags was put on in a cleverly careless way which would allow the hideous ulcer to be seen, and move the compassion of the passer-by. {8}
Hugo got the help of the tinker whom the King had cowed with the soldering-iron; they took the boy out on a tinkering tramp, and as soon as they were out of sight of the camp they threw him down and the tinker held him while Hugo bound the poultice tight and fast upon his leg.
The King raged and stormed, and promised to hang the two the moment the sceptre was in his hand again; but they kept a firm grip upon him and enjoyed his impotent struggling and jeered at his threats. This continued until the poultice began to bite; and in no long time its work would have been perfected, if there had been no interruption. But there was; for about this time the ‘slave’ who had made the speech denouncing England’s laws, appeared on the scene, and put an end to the enterprise, and stripped off the poultice and bandage.
The King wanted to borrow his deliverer’s cudgel and warm the jackets of the two rascals on the spot; but the man said no, it would bring trouble –leave the matter till night; the whole tribe being together, then, the outside world would not venture to interfere or interrupt. He marched the party back to camp and reported the affair to the Ruffler, who listened, pondered, and then decided that the King should not be again detailed to beg, since it was plain he was worthy of something higher and better–wherefore, on the spot he promoted him from the mendicant rank and appointed him to steal!
Hugo was overjoyed. He had already tried to make the King steal, and failed; but there would be no more trouble of that sort, now, for of course the King would not dream of defying a distinct command delivered directly from head-quarters. So he planned a raid for that very afternoon, purposing to get the King in the law’s grip in the course of it; and to do it, too, with such ingenious strategy, that it should seem to be accidental and unintentional; for the King of the Game-Cocks was popular now, and the gang might not deal over-gently with an unpopular member who played so serious a treachery upon him as the delivering him over to the common enemy, the law.
Very well. All in good time Hugo strolled off to a neighbouring village with his prey; and the two drifted slowly up and down one street after another, the one watching sharply for a sure chance to achieve his evil purpose, and the other watching as sharply for a chance to dart away and get free of his infamous captivity for ever.
Both threw away some tolerably fair-looking opportunities; for both, in their secret hearts, were resolved to make absolutely sure work this time, and neither meant to allow his fevered desires to seduce him into any venture that had much uncertainty about it.
Hugo’s chance came first. For at last a woman approached who carried a fat package of some sort in a basket. Hugo’s eyes sparkled with sinful pleasure as he said to himself, “Breath o’ my life, an’ I can but put THAT upon him, ’tis good-den and God keep thee, King of the Game-Cocks!” He waited and watched–outwardly patient, but inwardly consuming with excitement–till the woman had passed by, and the time was ripe; then said, in a low voice–
“Tarry here till I come again,” and darted stealthily after the prey.
The King’s heart was filled with joy–he could make his escape, now, if Hugo’s quest only carried him far enough away.
But he was to have no such luck. Hugo crept behind the woman, snatched the package, and came running back, wrapping it in an old piece of blanket which he carried on his arm. The hue and cry was raised in a moment, by the woman, who knew her loss by the lightening of her burden, although she had not seen the pilfering done. Hugo thrust the bundle into the King’s hands without halting, saying–
“Now speed ye after me with the rest, and cry ‘Stop thief!’ but mind ye lead them astray!”
The next moment Hugo turned a corner and darted down a crooked alley–and in another moment or two he lounged into view again, looking innocent and indifferent, and took up a position behind a post to watch results.
The insulted King threw the bundle on the ground; and the blanket fell away from it just as the woman arrived, with an augmenting crowd at her heels; she seized the King’s wrist with one hand, snatched up her bundle with the other, and began to pour out a tirade of abuse upon the boy while he struggled, without success, to free himself from her grip.
Hugo had seen enough–his enemy was captured and the law would get him, now–so he slipped away, jubilant and chuckling, and wended campwards, framing a judicious version of the matter to give to the Ruffler’s crew as he strode along.
The King continued to struggle in the woman’s strong grasp, and now and then cried out in vexation–
“Unhand me, thou foolish creature; it was not I that bereaved thee of thy paltry goods.”
The crowd closed around, threatening the King and calling him names; a brawny blacksmith in leather apron, and sleeves rolled to his elbows, made a reach for him, saying he would trounce him well, for a lesson; but just then a long sword flashed in the air and fell with convincing force upon the man’s arm, flat side down, the fantastic owner of it remarking pleasantly, at the same time–
“Marry, good souls, let us proceed gently, not with ill blood and uncharitable words. This is matter for the law’s consideration, not private and unofficial handling. Loose thy hold from the boy, goodwife.”
The blacksmith averaged the stalwart soldier with a glance, then went muttering away, rubbing his arm; the woman released the boy’s wrist reluctantly; the crowd eyed the stranger unlovingly, but prudently closed their mouths. The King sprang to his deliverer’s side, with flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes, exclaiming–
“Thou hast lagged sorely, but thou comest in good season, now, Sir Miles; carve me this rabble to rags!”
Chapter XXIII. The Prince a prisoner.
Hendon forced back a smile, and bent down and whispered in the King’s ear–
“Softly, softly, my prince, wag thy tongue warily–nay, suffer it not to wag at all. Trust in me–all shall go well in the end.” Then he added to himself: “SIR Miles! Bless me, I had totally forgot I was a knight! Lord, how marvellous a thing it is, the grip his memory doth take upon his quaint and crazy fancies! . . . An empty and foolish title is mine, and yet it is something to have deserved it; for I think it is more honour to be held worthy to be a spectre-knight in his Kingdom of Dreams and Shadows, than to be held base enough to be an earl in some of the REAL kingdoms of this world.”
The crowd fell apart to admit a constable, who approached and was about to lay his hand upon the King’s shoulder, when Hendon said–
“Gently, good friend, withhold your hand–he shall go peaceably; I am responsible for that. Lead on, we will follow.”
The officer led, with the woman and her bundle; Miles and the King followed after, with the crowd at their heels. The King was inclined to rebel; but Hendon said to him in a low voice–
“Reflect, Sire–your laws are the wholesome breath of your own royalty; shall their source resist them, yet require the branches to respect them? Apparently one of these laws has been broken; when the King is on his throne again, can it ever grieve him to remember that when he was seemingly a private person he loyally sank the king in the citizen and submitted to its authority?”
“Thou art right; say no more; thou shalt see that whatsoever the King of England requires a subject to suffer, under the law, he will himself suffer while he holdeth the station of a subject.”
When the woman was called upon to testify before the justice of the peace, she swore that the small prisoner at the bar was the person who had committed the theft; there was none able to show the contrary, so the King stood convicted. The bundle was now unrolled, and when the contents proved to be a plump little dressed pig, the judge looked troubled, whilst Hendon turned pale, and his body was thrilled with an electric shiver of dismay; but the King remained unmoved, protected by his ignorance. The judge meditated, during an ominous pause, then turned to the woman, with the question–
“What dost thou hold this property to be worth?”
The woman courtesied and replied–
“Three shillings and eightpence, your worship–I could not abate a penny and set forth the value honestly.”
The justice glanced around uncomfortably upon the crowd, then nodded to the constable, and said–
“Clear the court and close the doors.”
It was done. None remained but the two officials, the accused, the accuser, and Miles Hendon. This latter was rigid and colourless, and on his forehead big drops of cold sweat gathered, broke and blended together, and trickled down his face. The judge turned to the woman again, and said, in a compassionate voice–
“‘Tis a poor ignorant lad, and mayhap was driven hard by hunger, for these be grievous times for the unfortunate; mark you, he hath not an evil face–but when hunger driveth–Good woman! dost know that when one steals a thing above the value of thirteenpence ha’penny the law saith he shall HANG for it?”
The little King started, wide-eyed with consternation, but controlled himself and held his peace; but not so the woman. She sprang to her feet, shaking with fright, and cried out–
“Oh, good lack, what have I done! God-a-mercy, I would not hang the poor thing for the whole world! Ah, save me from this, your worship–what shall I do, what CAN I do?”
The justice maintained his judicial composure, and simply said–
“Doubtless it is allowable to revise the value, since it is not yet writ upon the record.”
“Then in God’s name call the pig eightpence, and heaven bless the day that freed my conscience of this awesome thing!”
Miles Hendon forgot all decorum in his delight; and surprised the King and wounded his dignity, by throwing his arms around him and hugging him. The woman made her grateful adieux and started away with her pig; and when the constable opened the door for her, he followed her out into the narrow hall. The justice proceeded to write in his record book. Hendon, always alert, thought he would like to know why the officer followed the woman out; so he slipped softly into the dusky hall and listened. He heard a conversation to this effect–
“It is a fat pig, and promises good eating; I will buy it of thee; here is the eightpence.”
“Eightpence, indeed! Thou’lt do no such thing. It cost me three shillings and eightpence, good honest coin of the last reign, that old Harry that’s just dead ne’er touched or tampered with. A fig for thy eightpence!”
“Stands the wind in that quarter? Thou wast under oath, and so swore falsely when thou saidst the value was but eightpence. Come straightway back with me before his worship, and answer for the crime!–and then the lad will hang.”
“There, there, dear heart, say no more, I am content. Give me the eightpence, and hold thy peace about the matter.”
The woman went off crying: Hendon slipped back into the court room, and the constable presently followed, after hiding his prize in some convenient place. The justice wrote a while longer, then read the King a wise and kindly lecture, and sentenced him to a short imprisonment in the common jail, to be followed by a public flogging. The astounded King opened his mouth, and was probably going to order the good judge to be beheaded on the spot; but he caught a warning sign from Hendon, and succeeded in closing his mouth again before he lost anything out of it. Hendon took him by the hand, now, made reverence to the justice, and the two departed in the wake of the constable toward the jail. The moment the street was reached, the inflamed monarch halted, snatched away his hand, and exclaimed–
“Idiot, dost imagine I will enter a common jail ALIVE?”
Hendon bent down and said, somewhat sharply–
“WILL you trust in me? Peace! and forbear to worsen our chances with dangerous speech. What God wills, will happen; thou canst not hurry it, thou canst not alter it; therefore wait, and be patient–’twill be time enow to rail or rejoice when what is to happen has happened.” {1}
Chapter XXIV. The escape.
The short winter day was nearly ended. The streets were deserted, save for a few random stragglers, and these hurried straight along, with the intent look of people who were only anxious to accomplish their errands as quickly as possible, and then snugly house themselves from the rising wind and the gathering twilight. They looked neither to the right nor to the left; they paid no attention to our party, they did not even seem to see them. Edward the Sixth wondered if the spectacle of a king on his way to jail had ever encountered such marvellous indifference before. By-and- by the constable arrived at a deserted market-square, and proceeded to cross it. When he had reached the middle of it, Hendon laid his hand upon his arm, and said in a low voice–
“Bide a moment, good sir, there is none in hearing, and I would say a word to thee.”
“My duty forbids it, sir; prithee hinder me not, the night comes on.”
“Stay, nevertheless, for the matter concerns thee nearly. Turn thy back a moment and seem not to see: LET THIS POOR LAD ESCAPE.”
“This to me, sir! I arrest thee in–“
“Nay, be not too hasty. See thou be careful and commit no foolish error”–then he shut his voice down to a whisper, and said in the man’s ear–“the pig thou hast purchased for eightpence may cost thee thy neck, man!”
The poor constable, taken by surprise, was speechless, at first, then found his tongue and fell to blustering and threatening; but Hendon was tranquil, and waited with patience till his breath was spent; then said–
“I have a liking to thee, friend, and would not willingly see thee come to harm. Observe, I heard it all–every word. I will prove it to thee.” Then he repeated the conversation which the officer and the woman had had together in the hall, word for word, and ended with–
“There–have I set it forth correctly? Should not I be able to set it forth correctly before the judge, if occasion required?”
The man was dumb with fear and distress, for a moment; then he rallied, and said with forced lightness–
“‘Tis making a mighty matter, indeed, out of a jest; I but plagued the woman for mine amusement.”
“Kept you the woman’s pig for amusement?”
The man answered sharply–
“Nought else, good sir–I tell thee ’twas but a jest.”
“I do begin to believe thee,” said Hendon, with a perplexing mixture of mockery and half-conviction in his tone; “but tarry thou here a moment whilst I run and ask his worship–for nathless, he being a man experienced in law, in jests, in–“
He was moving away, still talking; the constable hesitated, fidgeted, spat out an oath or two, then cried out–
“Hold, hold, good sir–prithee wait a little–the judge! Why, man, he hath no more sympathy with a jest than hath a dead corpse!–come, and we will speak further. Ods body! I seem to be in evil case–and all for an innocent and thoughtless pleasantry. I am a man of family; and my wife and little ones–List to reason, good your worship: what wouldst thou of me?”
“Only that thou be blind and dumb and paralytic whilst one may count a hundred thousand–counting slowly,” said Hendon, with the expression of a man who asks but a reasonable favour, and that a very little one.
“It is my destruction!” said the constable despairingly. “Ah, be reasonable, good sir; only look at this matter, on all its sides, and see how mere a jest it is–how manifestly and how plainly it is so. And even if one granted it were not a jest, it is a fault so small that e’en the grimmest penalty it could call forth would be but a rebuke and warning from the judge’s lips.”
Hendon replied with a solemnity which chilled the air about him–
“This jest of thine hath a name, in law,–wot you what it is?”
“I knew it not! Peradventure I have been unwise. I never dreamed it had a name–ah, sweet heaven, I thought it was original.”
“Yes, it hath a name. In the law this crime is called Non compos mentis lex talionis sic transit gloria mundi.”
“Ah, my God!”
“And the penalty is death!”
“God be merciful to me a sinner!”
“By advantage taken of one in fault, in dire peril, and at thy mercy, thou hast seized goods worth above thirteenpence ha’penny, paying but a trifle for the same; and this, in the eye of the law, is constructive barratry, misprision of treason, malfeasance in office, ad hominem expurgatis in statu quo–and the penalty is death by the halter, without ransom, commutation, or benefit of clergy.”
“Bear me up, bear me up, sweet sir, my legs do fail me! Be thou merciful–spare me this doom, and I will turn my back and see nought that shall happen.”
“Good! now thou’rt wise and reasonable. And thou’lt restore the pig?”
“I will, I will indeed–nor ever touch another, though heaven send it and an archangel fetch it. Go–I am blind for thy sake–I see nothing. I will say thou didst break in and wrest the prisoner from my hands by force. It is but a crazy, ancient door–I will batter it down myself betwixt midnight and the morning.”
“Do it, good soul, no harm will come of it; the judge hath a loving charity for this poor lad, and will shed no tears and break no jailer’s bones for his escape.”
Chapter XXV. Hendon Hall.
As soon as Hendon and the King were out of sight of the constable, his Majesty was instructed to hurry to a certain place outside the town, and wait there, whilst Hendon should go to the inn and settle his account. Half an hour later the two friends were blithely jogging eastward on Hendon’s sorry steeds. The King was warm and comfortable, now, for he had cast his rags and clothed himself in the second-hand suit which Hendon had bought on London Bridge.
Hendon wished to guard against over-fatiguing the boy; he judged that hard journeys, irregular meals, and illiberal measures of sleep would be bad for his crazed mind; whilst rest, regularity, and moderate exercise would be pretty sure to hasten its cure; he longed to see the stricken intellect made well again and its diseased visions driven out of the tormented little head; therefore he resolved to move by easy stages toward the home whence he had so long been banished, instead of obeying the impulse of his impatience and hurrying along night and day.
When he and the King had journeyed about ten miles, they reached a considerable village, and halted there for the night, at a good inn. The former relations were resumed; Hendon stood behind the King’s chair, while he dined, and waited upon him; undressed him when he was ready for bed; then took the floor for his own quarters, and slept athwart the door, rolled up in a blanket.
The next day, and the day after, they jogged lazily along talking over the adventures they had met since their separation, and mightily enjoying each other’s narratives. Hendon detailed all his wide wanderings in search of the King, and described how the archangel had led him a fool’s journey all over the forest, and taken him back to the hut, finally, when he found he could not get rid of him. Then–he said–the old man went into the bedchamber and came staggering back looking broken-hearted, and saying he had expected to find that the boy had returned and laid down in there to rest, but it was not so. Hendon had waited at the hut all day; hope of the King’s return died out, then, and he departed upon the quest again.
“And old Sanctum Sanctorum WAS truly sorry your highness came not back,” said Hendon; “I saw it in his face.”
“Marry I will never doubt THAT!” said the King–and then told his own story; after which, Hendon was sorry he had not destroyed the archangel.
During the last day of the trip, Hendon’s spirits were soaring. His tongue ran constantly. He talked about his old father, and his brother Arthur, and told of many things which illustrated their high and generous characters; he went into loving frenzies over his Edith, and was so glad- hearted that he was even able to say some gentle and brotherly things about Hugh. He dwelt a deal on the coming meeting at Hendon Hall; what a surprise it would be to everybody, and what an outburst of thanksgiving and delight there would be.
It was a fair region, dotted with cottages and orchards, and the road led through broad pasture lands whose receding expanses, marked with gentle elevations and depressions, suggested the swelling and subsiding undulations of the sea. In the afternoon the returning prodigal made constant deflections from his course to see if by ascending some hillock he might not pierce the distance and catch a glimpse of his home. At last he was successful, and cried out excitedly–
“There is the village, my Prince, and there is the Hall close by! You may see the towers from here; and that wood there–that is my father’s park. Ah, NOW thou’lt know what state and grandeur be! A house with seventy rooms–think of that!–and seven and twenty servants! A brave lodging for such as we, is it not so? Come, let us speed–my impatience will not brook further delay.”
All possible hurry was made; still, it was after three o’clock before the village was reached. The travellers scampered through it, Hendon’s tongue going all the time. “Here is the church–covered with the same ivy–none gone, none added.” “Yonder is the inn, the old Red Lion,–and yonder is the market-place.” “Here is the Maypole, and here the pump– nothing is altered; nothing but the people, at any rate; ten years make a change in people; some of these I seem to know, but none know me.” So his chat ran on. The end of the village was soon reached; then the travellers struck into a crooked, narrow road, walled in with tall hedges, and hurried briskly along it for half a mile, then passed into a vast flower garden through an imposing gateway, whose huge stone pillars bore sculptured armorial devices. A noble mansion was before them.
“Welcome to Hendon Hall, my King!” exclaimed Miles. “Ah, ’tis a great day! My father and my brother, and the Lady Edith will be so mad with joy that they will have eyes and tongue for none but me in the first transports of the meeting, and so thou’lt seem but coldly welcomed–but mind it not; ’twill soon seem otherwise; for when I say thou art my ward, and tell them how costly is my love for thee, thou’lt see them take thee to their breasts for Miles Hendon’s sake, and make their house and hearts thy home for ever after!”
The next moment Hendon sprang to the ground before the great door, helped the King down, then took him by the hand and rushed within. A few steps brought him to a spacious apartment; he entered, seated the King with more hurry than ceremony, then ran toward a young man who sat at a writing-table in front of a generous fire of logs.
“Embrace me, Hugh,” he cried, “and say thou’rt glad I am come again! and call our father, for home is not home till I shall touch his hand, and see his face, and hear his voice once more!”
But Hugh only drew back, after betraying a momentary surprise, and bent a grave stare upon the intruder–a stare which indicated somewhat of offended dignity, at first, then changed, in response to some inward thought or purpose, to an expression of marvelling curiosity, mixed with a real or assumed compassion. Presently he said, in a mild voice–
“Thy wits seem touched, poor stranger; doubtless thou hast suffered privations and rude buffetings at the world’s hands; thy looks and dress betoken it. Whom dost thou take me to be?”
“Take thee? Prithee for whom else than whom thou art? I take thee to be Hugh Hendon,” said Miles, sharply.
The other continued, in the same soft tone–
“And whom dost thou imagine thyself to be?”
“Imagination hath nought to do with it! Dost thou pretend thou knowest me not for thy brother Miles Hendon?”
An expression of pleased surprise flitted across Hugh’s face, and he exclaimed–
“What! thou art not jesting? can the dead come to life? God be praised if it be so! Our poor lost boy restored to our arms after all these cruel years! Ah, it seems too good to be true, it IS too good to be true–I charge thee, have pity, do not trifle with me! Quick–come to the light–let me scan thee well!”
He seized Miles by the arm, dragged him to the window, and began to devour him from head to foot with his eyes, turning him this way and that, and stepping briskly around him and about him to prove him from all points of view; whilst the returned prodigal, all aglow with gladness, smiled, laughed, and kept nodding his head and saying–
“Go on, brother, go on, and fear not; thou’lt find nor limb nor feature that cannot bide the test. Scour and scan me to thy content, my good old Hugh–I am indeed thy old Miles, thy same old Miles, thy lost brother, is’t not so? Ah, ’tis a great day–I SAID ’twas a great day! Give me thy hand, give me thy cheek–lord, I am like to die of very joy!”
He was about to throw himself upon his brother; but Hugh put up his hand in dissent, then dropped his chin mournfully upon his breast, saying with emotion–
“Ah, God of his mercy give me strength to bear this grievous disappointment!”
Miles, amazed, could not speak for a moment; then he found his tongue, and cried out–
“WHAT disappointment? Am I not thy brother?”
Hugh shook his head sadly, and said–
“I pray heaven it may prove so, and that other eyes may find the resemblances that are hid from mine. Alack, I fear me the letter spoke but too truly.”
“What letter?”
“One that came from over sea, some six or seven years ago. It said my brother died in battle.”
“It was a lie! Call thy father–he will know me.”
“One may not call the dead.”
“Dead?” Miles’s voice was subdued, and his lips trembled. “My father dead!–oh, this is heavy news. Half my new joy is withered now. Prithee let me see my brother Arthur–he will know me; he will know me and console me.”
“He, also, is dead.”
“God be merciful to me, a stricken man! Gone,–both gone–the worthy taken and the worthless spared, in me! Ah! I crave your mercy!–do not say the Lady Edith–“
“Is dead? No, she lives.”
“Then, God be praised, my joy is whole again! Speed thee, brother–let her come to me! An’ SHE say I am not myself–but she will not; no, no, SHE will know me, I were a fool to doubt it. Bring her–bring the old servants; they, too, will know me.”
“All are gone but five–Peter, Halsey, David, Bernard, and Margaret.”
So saying, Hugh left the room. Miles stood musing a while, then began to walk the floor, muttering–
“The five arch-villains have survived the two-and-twenty leal and honest –’tis an odd thing.”
He continued walking back and forth, muttering to himself; he had forgotten the King entirely. By-and-by his Majesty said gravely, and with a touch of genuine compassion, though the words themselves were capable of being interpreted ironically–
“Mind not thy mischance, good man; there be others in the world whose identity is denied, and whose claims are derided. Thou hast company.”
“Ah, my King,” cried Hendon, colouring slightly, “do not thou condemn me –wait, and thou shalt see. I am no impostor–she will say it; you shall hear it from the sweetest lips in England. I an impostor? Why, I know this old hall, these pictures of my ancestors, and all these things that are about us, as a child knoweth its own nursery. Here was I born and bred, my lord; I speak the truth; I would not deceive thee; and should none else believe, I pray thee do not THOU doubt me–I could not bear it.”
“I do not doubt thee,” said the King, with a childlike simplicity and faith.
“I thank thee out of my heart!” exclaimed Hendon with a fervency which showed that he was touched. The King added, with the same gentle simplicity–
“Dost thou doubt ME?”
A guilty confusion seized upon Hendon, and he was grateful that the door opened to admit Hugh, at that moment, and saved him the necessity of replying.
A beautiful lady, richly clothed, followed Hugh, and after her came several liveried servants. The lady walked slowly, with her head bowed and her eyes fixed upon the floor. The face was unspeakably sad. Miles Hendon sprang forward, crying out–
“Oh, my Edith, my darling–“
But Hugh waved him back, gravely, and said to the lady–
“Look upon him. Do you know him?”
At the sound of Miles’s voice the woman had started slightly, and her cheeks had flushed; she was trembling now. She stood still, during an impressive pause of several moments; then slowly lifted up her head and looked into Hendon’s eyes with a stony and frightened gaze; the blood sank out of her face, drop by drop, till nothing remained but the grey pallor of death; then she said, in a voice as dead as the face, “I know him not!” and turned, with a moan and a stifled sob, and tottered out of the room.
Miles Hendon sank into a chair and covered his face with his hands. After a pause, his brother said to the servants–
“You have observed him. Do you know him?”
They shook their heads; then the master said–
“The servants know you not, sir. I fear there is some mistake. You have seen that my wife knew you not.”
“Thy WIFE!” In an instant Hugh was pinned to the wall, with an iron grip about his throat. “Oh, thou fox-hearted slave, I see it all! Thou’st writ the lying letter thyself, and my stolen bride and goods are its fruit. There–now get thee gone, lest I shame mine honourable soldiership with the slaying of so pitiful a mannikin!”
Hugh, red-faced, and almost suffocated, reeled to the nearest chair, and commanded the servants to seize and bind the murderous stranger. They hesitated, and one of them said–
“He is armed, Sir Hugh, and we are weaponless.”
“Armed! What of it, and ye so many? Upon him, I say!”
But Miles warned them to be careful what they did, and added–
“Ye know me of old–I have not changed; come on, an’ it like you.”
This reminder did not hearten the servants much; they still held back.
“Then go, ye paltry cowards, and arm yourselves and guard the doors, whilst I send one to fetch the watch!” said Hugh. He turned at the threshold, and said to Miles, “You’ll find it to your advantage to offend not with useless endeavours at escape.”
“Escape? Spare thyself discomfort, an’ that is all that troubles thee. For Miles Hendon is master of Hendon Hall and all its belongings. He will remain–doubt it not.”
Chapter XXVI. Disowned.
The King sat musing a few moments, then looked up and said–
“‘Tis strange–most strange. I cannot account for it.”
“No, it is not strange, my liege. I know him, and this conduct is but natural. He was a rascal from his birth.”
“Oh, I spake not of HIM, Sir Miles.”
“Not of him? Then of what? What is it that is strange?”
“That the King is not missed.”
“How? Which? I doubt I do not understand.”
“Indeed? Doth it not strike you as being passing strange that the land is not filled with couriers and proclamations describing my person and making search for me? Is it no matter for commotion and distress that the Head of the State is gone; that I am vanished away and lost?”
“Most true, my King, I had forgot.” Then Hendon sighed, and muttered to himself, “Poor ruined mind–still busy with its pathetic dream.”
“But I have a plan that shall right us both–I will write a paper, in three tongues–Latin, Greek and English–and thou shalt haste away with it to London in the morning. Give it to none but my uncle, the Lord Hertford; when he shall see it, he will know and say I wrote it. Then he will send for me.”
“Might it not be best, my Prince, that we wait here until I prove myself and make my rights secure to my domains? I should be so much the better able then to–“
The King interrupted him imperiously–
“Peace! What are thy paltry domains, thy trivial interests, contrasted with matters which concern the weal of a nation and the integrity of a throne?” Then, he added, in a gentle voice, as if he were sorry for his severity, “Obey, and have no fear; I will right thee, I will make thee whole–yes, more than whole. I shall remember, and requite.”
So saying, he took the pen, and set himself to work. Hendon contemplated him lovingly a while, then said to himself–
“An’ it were dark, I should think it WAS a king that spoke; there’s no denying it, when the humour’s upon on him he doth thunder and lighten like your true King; now where got he that trick? See him scribble and scratch away contentedly at his meaningless pot-hooks, fancying them to be Latin and Greek–and except my wit shall serve me with a lucky device for diverting him from his purpose, I shall be forced to pretend to post away to-morrow on this wild errand he hath invented for me.”
The next moment Sir Miles’s thoughts had gone back to the recent episode. So absorbed was he in his musings, that when the King presently handed him the paper which he had been writing, he received it and pocketed it without being conscious of the act. “How marvellous strange she acted,” he muttered. “I think she knew me–and I think she did NOT know me. These opinions do conflict, I perceive it plainly; I cannot reconcile them, neither can I, by argument, dismiss either of the two, or even persuade one to outweigh the other. The matter standeth simply thus: she MUST have known my face, my figure, my voice, for how could it be otherwise? Yet she SAID she knew me not, and that is proof perfect, for she cannot lie. But stop–I think I begin to see. Peradventure he hath influenced her, commanded her, compelled her to lie. That is the solution. The riddle is unriddled. She seemed dead with fear–yes, she was under his compulsion. I will seek her; I will find her; now that he is away, she will speak her true mind. She will remember the old times when we were little playfellows together, and this will soften her heart, and she will no more betray me, but will confess me. There is no treacherous blood in her–no, she was always honest and true. She has loved me, in those old days–this is my security; for whom one has loved, one cannot betray.”
He stepped eagerly toward the door; at that moment it opened, and the Lady Edith entered. She was very pale, but she walked with a firm step, and her carriage was full of grace and gentle dignity. Her face was as sad as before.
Miles sprang forward, with a happy confidence, to meet her, but she checked him with a hardly perceptible gesture, and he stopped where he was. She seated herself, and asked him to do likewise. Thus simply did she take the sense of old comradeship out of him, and transform him into a stranger and a guest. The surprise of it, the bewildering unexpectedness of it, made him begin to question, for a moment, if he WAS the person he was pretending to be, after all. The Lady Edith said–
“Sir, I have come to warn you. The mad cannot be persuaded out of their delusions, perchance; but doubtless they may be persuaded to avoid perils. I think this dream of yours hath the seeming of honest truth to you, and therefore is not criminal–but do not tarry here with it; for here it is dangerous.” She looked steadily into Miles’s face a moment, then added, impressively, “It is the more dangerous for that you ARE much like what our lost lad must have grown to be if he had lived.”
“Heavens, madam, but I AM he!”
“I truly think you think it, sir. I question not your honesty in that; I but warn you, that is all. My husband is master in this region; his power hath hardly any limit; the people prosper or starve, as he wills. If you resembled not the man whom you profess to be, my husband might bid you pleasure yourself with your dream in peace; but trust me, I know him well; I know what he will do; he will say to all that you are but a mad impostor, and straightway all will echo him.” She bent upon Miles that same steady look once more, and added: “If you WERE Miles Hendon, and he knew it and all the region knew it–consider what I am saying, weigh it well–you would stand in the same peril, your punishment would be no less sure; he would deny you and denounce you, and none would be bold enough to give you countenance.”
“Most truly I believe it,” said Miles, bitterly. “The power that can command one life-long friend to betray and disown another, and be obeyed, may well look to be obeyed in quarters where bread and life are on the stake and no cobweb ties of loyalty and honour are concerned.”
A faint tinge appeared for a moment in the lady’s cheek, and she dropped her eyes to the floor; but her voice betrayed no emotion when she proceeded–
“I have warned you–I must still warn you–to go hence. This man will destroy you, else. He is a tyrant who knows no pity. I, who am his fettered slave, know this. Poor Miles, and Arthur, and my dear guardian, Sir Richard, are free of him, and at rest: better that you were with them than that you bide here in the clutches of this miscreant. Your pretensions are a menace to his title and possessions; you have assaulted him in his own house: you are ruined if you stay. Go–do not hesitate. If you lack money, take this purse, I beg of you, and bribe the servants to let you pass. Oh, be warned, poor soul, and escape while you may.”
Miles declined the purse with a gesture, and rose up and stood before her.
“Grant me one thing,” he said. “Let your eyes rest upon mine, so that I may see if they be steady. There–now answer me. Am I Miles Hendon?”
“No. I know you not.”
“Swear it!”
The answer was low, but distinct–
“I swear.”
“Oh, this passes belief!”
“Fly! Why will you waste the precious time? Fly, and save yourself.”
At that moment the officers burst into the room, and a violent struggle began; but Hendon was soon overpowered and dragged away. The King was taken also, and both were bound and led to prison.
Chapter XXVII. In prison.
The cells were all crowded; so the two friends were chained in a large room where persons charged with trifling offences were commonly kept. They had company, for there were some twenty manacled and fettered prisoners here, of both sexes and of varying ages,–an obscene and noisy gang. The King chafed bitterly over the stupendous indignity thus put upon his royalty, but Hendon was moody and taciturn. He was pretty thoroughly bewildered; he had come home, a jubilant prodigal, expecting to find everybody wild with joy over his return; and instead had got the cold shoulder and a jail. The promise and the fulfilment differed so widely that the effect was stunning; he could not decide whether it was most tragic or most grotesque. He felt much as a man might who had danced blithely out to enjoy a rainbow, and got struck by lightning.
But gradually his confused and tormenting thoughts settled down into some sort of order, and then his mind centred itself upon Edith. He turned her conduct over, and examined it in all lights, but he could not make anything satisfactory out of it. Did she know him–or didn’t she know him? It was a perplexing puzzle, and occupied him a long time; but he ended, finally, with the conviction that she did know him, and had repudiated him for interested reasons. He wanted to load her name with curses now; but this name had so long been sacred to him that he found he could not bring his tongue to profane it.
Wrapped in prison blankets of a soiled and tattered condition, Hendon and the King passed a troubled night. For a bribe the jailer had furnished liquor to some of the prisoners; singing of ribald songs, fighting, shouting, and carousing was the natural consequence. At last, a while after midnight, a man attacked a woman and nearly killed her by beating her over the head with his manacles before the jailer could come to the rescue. The jailer restored peace by giving the man a sound clubbing about the head and shoulders–then the carousing ceased; and after that, all had an opportunity to sleep who did not mind the annoyance of the moanings and groanings of the two wounded people.
During the ensuing week, the days and nights were of a monotonous sameness as to events; men whose faces Hendon remembered more or less distinctly, came, by day, to gaze at the ‘impostor’ and repudiate and insult him; and by night the carousing and brawling went on with symmetrical regularity. However, there was a change of incident at last. The jailer brought in an old man, and said to him–
“The villain is in this room–cast thy old eyes about and see if thou canst say which is he.”
Hendon glanced up, and experienced a pleasant sensation for the first time since he had been in the jail. He said to himself, “This is Blake Andrews, a servant all his life in my father’s family–a good honest soul, with a right heart in his breast. That is, formerly. But none are true now; all are liars. This man will know me–and will deny me, too, like the rest.”
The old man gazed around the room, glanced at each face in turn, and finally said–
“I see none here but paltry knaves, scum o’ the streets. Which is he?”
The jailer laughed.
“Here,” he said; “scan this big animal, and grant me an opinion.”
The old man approached, and looked Hendon over, long and earnestly, then shook his head and said–
“Marry, THIS is no Hendon–nor ever was!”
“Right! Thy old eyes are sound yet. An’ I were Sir Hugh, I would take the shabby carle and–“
The jailer finished by lifting himself a-tip-toe with an imaginary halter, at the same time making a gurgling noise in his throat suggestive of suffocation. The old man said, vindictively–
“Let him bless God an’ he fare no worse. An’ _I_ had the handling o’ the villain he should roast, or I am no true man!”
The jailer laughed a pleasant hyena laugh, and said–
“Give him a piece of thy mind, old man–they all do it. Thou’lt find it good diversion.”
Then he sauntered toward his ante-room and disappeared. The old man dropped upon his knees and whispered–
“God be thanked, thou’rt come again, my master! I believed thou wert dead these seven years, and lo, here thou art alive! I knew thee the moment I saw thee; and main hard work it was to keep a stony countenance and seem to see none here but tuppenny knaves and rubbish o’ the streets. I am old and poor, Sir Miles; but say the word and I will go forth and proclaim the truth though I be strangled for it.”
“No,” said Hendon; “thou shalt not. It would ruin thee, and yet help but little in my cause. But I thank thee, for thou hast given me back somewhat of my lost faith in my kind.”
The old servant became very valuable to Hendon and the King; for he dropped in several times a day to ‘abuse’ the former, and always smuggled in a few delicacies to help out the prison bill of fare; he also furnished the current news. Hendon reserved the dainties for the King; without them his Majesty might not have survived, for he was not able to eat the coarse and wretched food provided by the jailer. Andrews was obliged to confine himself to brief visits, in order to avoid suspicion; but he managed to impart a fair degree of information each time– information delivered in a low voice, for Hendon’s benefit, and interlarded with insulting epithets delivered in a louder voice for the benefit of other hearers.
So, little by little, the story of the family came out. Arthur had been dead six years. This loss, with the absence of news from Hendon, impaired the father’s health; he believed he was going to die, and he wished to see Hugh and Edith settled in life before he passed away; but Edith begged hard for delay, hoping for Miles’s return; then the letter came which brought the news of Miles’s death; the shock prostrated Sir Richard; he believed his end was very near, and he and Hugh insisted upon the marriage; Edith begged for and obtained a month’s respite, then another, and finally a third; the marriage then took place by the death- bed of Sir Richard. It had not proved a happy one. It was whispered about the country that shortly after the nuptials the bride found among her husband’s papers several rough and incomplete drafts of the fatal letter, and had accused him of precipitating the marriage–and Sir Richard’s death, too–by a wicked forgery. Tales of cruelty to the Lady Edith and the servants were to be heard on all hands; and since the father’s death Sir Hugh had thrown off all soft disguises and become a pitiless master toward all who in any way depended upon him and his domains for bread.
There was a bit of Andrew’s gossip which the King listened to with a lively interest–
“There is rumour that the King is mad. But in charity forbear to say _I_ mentioned it, for ’tis death to speak of it, they say.”
His Majesty glared at the old man and said–
“The King is NOT mad, good man–and thou’lt find it to thy advantage to busy thyself with matters that nearer concern thee than this seditious prattle.”
“What doth the lad mean?” said Andrews, surprised at this brisk assault from such an unexpected quarter. Hendon gave him a sign, and he did not pursue his question, but went on with his budget–
“The late King is to be buried at Windsor in a day or two–the 16th of the month–and the new King will be crowned at Westminster the 20th.”
“Methinks they must needs find him first,” muttered his Majesty; then added, confidently, “but they will look to that–and so also shall I.”
“In the name of–“
But the old man got no further–a warning sign from Hendon checked his remark. He resumed the thread of his gossip–
“Sir Hugh goeth to the coronation–and with grand hopes. He confidently looketh to come back a peer, for he is high in favour with the Lord Protector.”
“What Lord Protector?” asked his Majesty.
“His Grace the Duke of Somerset.”
“What Duke of Somerset?”
“Marry, there is but one–Seymour, Earl of Hertford.”
The King asked sharply–
“Since when is HE a duke, and Lord Protector?”
“Since the last day of January.”
“And prithee who made him so?”
“Himself and the Great Council–with help of the King.”
His Majesty started violently. “The KING!” he cried. “WHAT king, good sir?”
“What king, indeed! (God-a-mercy, what aileth the boy?) Sith we have but one, ’tis not difficult to answer–his most sacred Majesty King Edward the Sixth–whom God preserve! Yea, and a dear and gracious little urchin is he, too; and whether he be mad or no–and they say he mendeth daily– his praises are on all men’s lips; and all bless him, likewise, and offer prayers that he may be spared to reign long in England; for he began humanely with saving the old Duke of Norfolk’s life, and now is he bent on destroying the cruellest of the laws that harry and oppress the people.”
This news struck his Majesty dumb with amazement, and plunged him into so deep and dismal a reverie that he heard no more of the old man’s gossip. He wondered if the ‘little urchin’ was the beggar-boy whom he left dressed in his own garments in the palace. It did not seem possible that this could be, for surely his manners and speech would betray him if he pretended to be the Prince of Wales–then he would be driven out, and search made for the true prince. Could it be that the Court had set up some sprig of the nobility in his place? No, for his uncle would not allow that–he was all-powerful and could and would crush such a movement, of course. The boy’s musings profited him nothing; the more he tried to unriddle the mystery the more perplexed he became, the more his head ached, and the worse he slept. His impatience to get to London grew hourly, and his captivity became almost unendurable.
Hendon’s arts all failed with the King–he could not be comforted; but a couple of women who were chained near him succeeded better. Under their gentle ministrations he found peace and learned a degree of patience. He was very grateful, and came to love them dearly and to delight in the sweet and soothing influence of their presence. He asked them why they were in prison, and when they said they were Baptists, he smiled, and inquired–
“Is that a crime to be shut up for in a prison? Now I grieve, for I shall lose ye–they will not keep ye long for such a little thing.”