The Buccaneer Part 21

When the sun was set, Barbara entered her room with a slight evening meal. Her mistress was sitting, or rather lying on a low couch, opposite a table, upon which stood a small dial, mounted in chased silver, representing a garland of flowers.

"Lay it down, good girl; I cannot taste it at present. I have been watching the minute-hand pace round that dial.--Is it, indeed, near seven? It was an ill thought of the foreign craftsman to set Time amid roses; he should have placed it among thorns. Is the evening fine?"

"Fine, but yet sober, my lady; the sun has quite set, and the birds are silent and at roost, except the old blackbird, who whistles late, and the wakeful robin, who sometimes bandies music with the nightingale.--Would you like to hear them, madam?"

"Not just now, Barbara: but leave out my hood. Did my father again ask for me?"

"Not since, mistress. Mr. Fleetword is with him." Barbara left the room.

"I cannot tell why, my lady," she said earnestly to Lady Frances, whom she met in the vestibule--"I cannot divine the reason, but this bridal has to me the semblance of a funeral. G.o.d s.h.i.+eld us all from evil! there is a cold deathlike chill throughout the house. I heard--(though, my lady, I do not believe in such superst.i.tions,) but I heard the death-watch tick--tick--ticking, as plain as I hear the old clock now chime seven! And I saw--I was wide awake--yet I saw a thin misty countenance, formed as of the white spray of the salt-sea wave, so sparkling, so shadowy, yet so clear, come between me and the moonbeams, and raise its hand thus.--Oh, mercy--mercy--mercy!" she shrieked, so as to startle the Lady Frances, and then as hastily exclaimed, "La! madam, to think of the like! if it isn't that little muddy, nasty Crisp, who has found me out! I will tell you the rest by and by, madam, only I want to turn this little beast into the shrubbery, that he may find his master."

At another time Lady Frances would have rallied her for accompanying, instead of dismissing Crisp to the garden; but a weight of sorrow seemed also to oppress her. Her usually high spirits were gone, and she made no observation, but retreated to the library.

A few moments after the occurrence of this little incident, Constance was seated on the bank in "the Fairy Ring," pondering the dread change that had taken place since the previous night.

The evening, as Barbara had expressed it, was fine but sober. The lilac and the laburnum were in full blossom, but they appeared faded to Constantia's eyes; so completely are even our senses under the control of circ.u.mstances. Sorrow is a sad mystifier, turning the green leaf yellow and steeping young roses in tears. She had not been long seated, when a step, a separating of the branches, and Walter De Guerre was at her feet. Constance recoiled from what at heart she loved, as it had been a thing she hated; and the look and motion could not have been unnoticed by her lover.

"I have heard, Mistress Cecil--heard all!--that you are about to be married--married to a man you despise--about to sacrifice yourself for some ambitious view--some mad resolve--some to me incomprehensible determination! And I swore to seek you out--to see you before the fatal act, had it been in your own halls; and to tell you that you will never again feel what happiness is----"

"I know it!" interrupted Constance, in a voice whose music was solemn and heavy as her thoughts: "Walter, I know it well. I never shall feel happy--never expect it--and it would have been but humanity to have spared me this meeting, unwished for as it now is. You, of all creatures in this wide, wide world, I would avoid.--Yes, Walter, avoid for ever!

Besides," she continued with energy, "what do you here? This place--this spot, is no more safe from _his_ intrusion than from yours. If you loved, if you ever loved me, away! And oh, Walter! if the knowledge--the most true, most sad knowledge, that I am miserable--more miserable than ever you can be--be any soothing to your spirit, take it with you! only away, away--put the broad sea between us, now and for ever! If Sir Willmott Burrell slept with his fathers the sleep of a thousand dead, I could never be yours. You seem astonished, and so was I yesternight; but it is true--true--true--so put the broad sea between us quickly, Walter--now, and for ever!"

The Cavalier looked as if he understood her not, or thought her senses wandered: at last he said, "But why need you, with a fortune to command, and a spirit to enjoy whatever is bright, or beautiful, or glorious--why should you fetter your free-born will? There is a cunning mystery about it, Constance" (Constance shuddered, and hid her face, lest its expression should betray something of her secret); "a mystery I cannot solve: confide it to me, and solemnly I swear, not only never to divulge, but to peril, with my good sword, my heart's richest and warmest blood, in any cause that can free you from this bad man. Nor do I expect aught of you in return, nor any thing ask, save that you may be happy, with any, any but this---- I cannot speak his hated name."

Constance was too agitated to reply. Under present circ.u.mstances, she would have given worlds not to have seen Walter; and, having seen him, she knew not what to say, or how to think or act: the painful struggle she endured deprived her of the power of utterance.

"It is not for myself I speak, Constantia; though now I need not tell you that the love of boyhood has never been banished from my bosom. The remembrance of the hours we spent together, before a knowledge of the world, before a change in the const.i.tution of our country, shed its malign influence, not over our hearts, but over our destinies--the remembrance of those hours has been the blessing, the solitary blessing, of my exile; it has been the green oasis in the desert of my existence: amid the turmoil of battle, it has led me on to victory; amid the dissipation of the royal court, it has preserved me from taint. The remembrance of Constance, like the night-star that cheers the mariner on the wide sea, has kept all holy and hopeful feelings around my heart; telling of home, my early home, and its enjoyments--of Constance, the little affectionate, but high-souled girl--the----"

"Stop!" interrupted Constance, with an agonised expression--"Stop, I conjure you! I know what you were going to say; you were about to repeat that which my mother loved to call me--your wife! She did not mean it in mockery, though it sounds so now, like a knell from the lower earth. But one thing, Walter, one request I have to make--you pray sometimes?--the time has been when we have prayed together!--when _next_ you pray, thank G.o.d that SHE is dead!"

"How! thank G.o.d that my kind and early friend--that your mother is dead!" repeated the young man, in a voice of astonishment.

"Even so, Walter. You would not see her stretched upon the rack? would not see her exposed to tortures, such as, at no very distant period, the saints of our own church endured?--would not see her torn limb from limb by wild horses?"

"Heavens! Constantia, are you mad?" exclaimed Walter, terrified at her excited and distraught manner.

"I am not mad," she replied, in a changed and subdued tone; "but do not forget (and let it be on your knees) to thank G.o.d that my mother is dead; and that the cold clay presses the temples, which, if they were alive, would throb and burn as mine do now."

She pressed her hands on her brow; while the youth, appalled and astonished, gazed on her in silence.

"It is well thought on," she said, recovering her self-command much more quickly than he could have imagined possible. "I will give it you; it would be sinful to keep it after that dread to-morrow; even now, what do I with your gift?" She drew forth from her bosom the locket of which we have before spoken, and, looking on it fondly for a moment, thought, though not aloud, "Poor little fragment of the glittering sin that tempts mankind to their destruction! I heeded not your chasing nor your gems; but once (forgive it, G.o.d, forgive it!) thought far too much of him who gave it: I should have known better. I will not look on you again, lest you take root within the heart on which you have rested: though it was then in innocence, yet _now_ it is a crime; there--" she held it towards him with a trembling hand. While her arm was thus extended, Burrell rushed from behind the covert of a wide-spreading laurel, and, with an action at once unmanly and insulting, s.n.a.t.c.hed the trinket from her hand and flung it on the sward.

Magic itself could not have occasioned a greater change in the look, the manner, the entire appearance of the heiress of Cecil. She drew herself up to her full height, and instantly demanded, "How Sir Willmott Burrell _dared_ to act thus in her presence?"

The Cavalier drew his sword from its sheath; Burrell was not backward in following the example. He returned Constantia's look of contempt with one of sarcasm--the peculiar glance that becomes so effective from under a half-closed lid--and then his eye glared like that of the hooded snake, while he replied,--

"Methought the lady in her chamber: the destined bride, during the day, keeps to her own apartment; 'tis the soft night that draws her forth to interchange love-pledges and soft sayings."

"Villain!" exclaimed De Guerre with startling energy, "hold thy blaspheming tongue, nor dare to imagine, much less express, aught of this lady that is not pure as heaven's own firmament!"

"Oh, my good sir," said the other, "I know you now! the braggart at my Lady Cecil's funeral--the pall-bearer--the church-yard lounger--the----!"

"Hold, coward!" interrupted the Cavalier, grinding the words between his teeth. "Lady, I entreat you to retire; this is no scene for you:--nay, but you must!"

"Touch her not," exclaimed Burrell, the brutality of his vile nature fully awakened at perceiving Walter attempt to take her hand; "touch her not, though you are doubtless the youth to whom her heart is given."

"Forbear, sir!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Constance; "if you have the spirit of a man, forbear!"

"Oh, then, your pa.s.sion has not been declared by words--you have spoken by actions!" he retorted with redoubled acrimony.

The reply to this gross insult was made by the point of De Guerre's sword resting on Burrell's breast.

"Defend yourself, or die like a vile dog!" thundered the Cavalier, and Sir Willmott was obliged to stand on his defence.

The feelings of the woman overcame those of the heroine, and Constance shrieked for help, when she beheld the combatants fairly engaged in a feud where the shedding of blood appeared inevitable. Her call was answered, but not by words; scarcely more than three or four thrusts had been made and returned, when a stout gentleman, clad in a dark and tight-fitting vest, strode nearly between them, and clashed the tough blade of his broad basket-hilted sword upon their more graceful, but less substantial, weapons, so as to strike them to the earth. Thus, without speaking word or farther motion, he cast his eyes, first on the one, then on the other, still holding their weapons under, more, however, by the power of his countenance, than of his arm.

"Put up your swords!" he said at length, in a low stern voice--"put up your swords!" he repeated; then, seeing that, though Burrell's rapier had leaped into its rest, De Guerre retained his unsheathed, "put up your sword, sir!" he said again in a loud tone, that sounded awfully through the still twilight, and then stamped upon the ground with force and energy: "the air is damp, I say, and good steel should be kept from rust. Young men, keep your weapons in their scabbards, until G.o.d and your country call them forth; then draw according to the knowledge--according to the faith that is in ye; but a truce to idle brawling."

"I would first know who it is," demanded Walter, still in fierce anger, "who breaks in upon us, and commands us thus?"

"Have you so soon forgotten Major Wellmore, young man?" replied the stranger in his harshest voice: "I little thought that he of the English graft upon a French stock would have carried such brawling into the house of my ancient friend.--Sir Willmott Burrell, I lament that the fear of the Lord is not with you, or you would not use carnal weapons so indiscriminately: go to, and think what the Protector would say, did he find you thus employed."

"But, sir," said De Guerre, in no degree overawed by the imperative manner of Major Wellmore, "I, at least, care not for the Protector, nor am I to be baffled of my just revenge by any of his officers."

"Wouldst fight with me, then?" inquired the Major, with much good temper, and placing himself between the opponents.

"If it so pleasure you," replied the youth, abating not a jot of his determination; "when I have made this treacherous and false fellow apologise to the Lady Constance, and afterwards to me, for his unproved and unprovoked words."

During the parley, Constance had remained fixed and immovable; but a new feeling now seemed to animate her, as she approached, and, clinging to Major Wellmore's arm for support, spoke in an audible but tremulous voice,--

"Walter, I entreat, I command you to let this matter rest. I shall not debase myself by condescending to a.s.sert, what Sir Willmott Burrell ought, and does believe--that I came not here to meet you by any appointment. I say his heart tells him, at this moment, that such a proceeding would be one of which he knows I am incapable."

"If any reflection has been made upon Mistress Cecil," observed Major Wellmore, "I will be the first to draw steel in her cause. Sir Willmott, explain this matter.--Young sir," he continued, noting Walter's ire and impatience, "a soldier's honour is as dear to me as it can be to you."

Burrell felt and appeared exceedingly perplexed; but with his most insinuating manner, and a tremulous voice, he replied:--

"Mistress Cecil will, I hope, allow for the excess of affection that gave rise to such needless jealousy. On consideration, I perceive, at once, that she would not, could not, act or think in any way unworthy of herself." He bowed profoundly, as he spoke, to Constantia, who clung still more closely to Major Wellmore's arm, and could hardly forbear uttering the contempt she felt; at every instant, her truthful nature urged her to speak all she thought and knew, to set Burrell at defiance, and hold him up to the detestation he merited: but her father, and her father's crime! the dreadful thought sent back the blood that rushed so warmly from her heart in icy coldness to its seat; and the high-souled woman was compelled to receive the apology with a drooping head, and a spirit bowed almost to breaking by intense and increasing anguish.

"And you are satisfied with this!" exclaimed the Cavalier, striding up to her; "you, Constance Cecil, are satisfied with this! But, by Him whose unquenchable stars are now s.h.i.+ning in their pure glory over our heads, I am not!--Coward! coward! and liar! in your teeth, Sir Willmott Burrell! as such I will proclaim you all through his majesty's dominions, by word of mouth and deed of sword!"

"Walter, Walter!" exclaimed Constance, clasping her hands.

"I crave your pardon, Lady," said Burrell, without altering his tone; "but do not thus alarm yourself: my sword shall not again be drawn upon a low and confirmed malignant. Sir," turning from his opponent and addressing the stranger, "heard you not how he applied the forbidden t.i.tle of majesty to the man Charles Stuart; shall I not forthwith arrest him for high treason?--runneth not the act so, formed for the renouncing and disannulling of the pretended t.i.tle of the late man's progeny?"

"Perish such acts and their devisers!" shouted the Cavalier, losing all prudence in the excitement of the moment. "Let the lady retire, while we end this quarrel as becomes men!"

"Heed him not, heed him not, I implore, I entreat you!" exclaimed Constance, sinking to the earth at the feet of Major Wellmore, by whom the hint of Burrell was apparently unnoticed; "the lion takes not advantage of the deer caught in the hunter's toils, and he is distraught, I know he is!"