Grisly Grisell Or The Laidly Lady of Whitburn Part 18

"Best not ask," said Brother Christopher, who was, however, an inveterate gossip, and went on in reply to Lambert's question as to the place of the wound. "In the shoulder is the worst, the bullet wound where the Brother Infirmarer has poured in hot oil. St. Bede! How the poor knight howled, though he tried to stop it, and brought it down to moaning. His leg is broken beside, but we could deal with that. His horse went down with him, you see, when he was overtaken and shot down by the Gilsland folk."

"The Gilsland folk!"

"Even so, poor lad; and he was only on his way to see after his own, or his wife's, since all the Whitburn sons are at an end, and the Tower gone to the spindle side. They say, too, that the damsel he wedded perforce was given to magic, and fled in form of a hare. But be that as it will, young Copeland - St. Bede, pardon me! What have I let out?"

"Reck not of that, brother. The tale is all over the town. How of Copeland?"

"As I said even now, he was on his way to the Tower, when the Dacres - Will and Harry - fell on him, and left him for dead; but by the Saints' good providence, his squire and groom put him on a horse, and brought him to our Abbey at night, knowing that he is kin to our Sub-Prior. And there he lies, whether for life or death only Heaven knows, but for death it will be if only King Edward gets a scent of him; so hold your peace, Master Groats, as to who it be, as you live, or as you would not have his blood on you."

Master Groats promised silence, and gave numerous directions as to the application of his medicaments, and Brother Kit took his leave, reiterating a.s.surances that Sir Leonard's life depended on his secrecy.

Whatever was said in the booth was plainly audible in the inner room. Grisell and Clemence were packing linen, and the little shutter of the wooden part.i.tion was open. Thus Lambert found Grisell standing with clasped hands, and a face of intense attention and suspense.

"You have heard, lady," he said.

"Oh, yea, yea! Alas, poor Leonard!" she cried.

"The Saints grant him recovery."

"Methought you would be glad to hear you were like to be free from such a yoke. Were you rid of him, you, of a Yorkist house, might win back your lands, above all, since, as you once told me, you were a playmate of the King's sister."

"Ah! dear master, speak not so! Think of him! treacherously wounded, and lying moaning. That gruesome oil! Oh! my poor Leonard!" and she burst into tears. "So fair, and comely, and young, thus stricken down!"

"Bah!" exclaimed Lambert. "Such are women! One would think she loved him, who flouted her!"

"I cannot brook the thought of his lying there in sore pain and dolour, he who has had so sad a life, baulked of his true love."

Master Lambert could only hold up his hands at the perversity of womankind, and declare to his Clemence that he verily believed that had the knight been a true and devoted Tristram himself, ever at her feet, the lady could not have been so sore troubled.

The next day brought Brother Kit back with an earnest request from the Infirmarer and the Sub-Prior that "Master Groats" would come to the monastery, and give them the benefit of his advice on the wounds and the fever which was setting in, since gun-shot wounds were beyond the scope of the monastic surgery.

To refuse would not have been possible, even without the earnest entreaty of Grisell; and Lambert, who had that medical instinct which no training can supply, went on his way with the lay brother.

He came back after many hours, sorely perturbed by the request that had been made to him. Sir Leonard, he said, was indeed sick nigh unto death, grievously hurt, and distraught by the fever, or it might be by the blow on his head in the fall with his horse, which seemed to have kicked him; but there was no reason that with good guidance and rest he should not recover. But, on the other hand, King Edward was known to be on his progress to Durham, and he was understood to be especially virulent against Sir Leonard Copeland, under the impression that the young knight had a.s.sisted in Clifford's slaughter of his brother Edmund of Rutland. It was true that a monastery was a sanctuary, but if all that was reported of Edward Plantagenet were true, he might, if he tracked Copeland to the Abbey, insist on his being yielded up, or might make Abbot and monks suffer severely for the protection given to his enemy; and there was much fear that the Dacres might be on the scent. The Abbot and Father Copeland were anxious to be able to answer that Sir Leonard was not within their precincts, and, having heard that Master Groats was about to sail for Flanders, the Sub-Prior made the entreaty that his nephew might thus be conveyed to the Low Countries, where the fugitives of each party in turn found a refuge. Father Copeland promised to be at charges, and, in truth, the scheme was the best hope for Leonard's chances of life. Master Groot had hesitated, seeing various difficulties in the way of such a charge, and being by no means disposed towards Lady Grisell's unwilling husband, as such, though in a professional capacity he was interested in his treatment of his patient, and was likewise touched by the good mien of the fine, handsome, straight-limbed young man, who was lying unconscious on his pallet in a narrow cell.

He had replied that he would answer the next day, when he had consulted his wife and the s.h.i.+p-master, whose consent was needful; and there was of course another, whom he did not mention.

As he told all the colour rose in Grisell's face, rosy on one side, purple, alas, on the other. "O master, good master, you will, you will!"

"Is it your pleasure, then, mistress? I should have held that the kindness to you would be to rid you of him."

"No, no, no! You are mocking me! You know too well what I think! Is not this my best hope of making him know me, and becoming his true and - and - "

A sob cut her short, but she cried, "I will be at all the pains and all the cost, if only you will consent, dear Master Lambert, good Master Groot."

"Ah, would I knew what is well for her!" said Lambert, turning to his wife, and making rapid signs with face and fingers in their mutual language, but Grisell burst in -

"Good for her," cried she. "Can it be good for a wife to leave her husband to be slain by the cruel men of York and Warwick, him who strove to save the young Lord Edmund? Master, you will suffer no such foul wrong. O master, if you did, I would stay behind, in some poor hovel on the sh.o.r.e, where none would track him, and tend him there. I will! I vow it to St. Mary."

"Hush, hush, lady! Cease this strange pa.s.sion. You could not be more moved if he were the tenderest spouse who ever breathed."

"But you will have pity, sir. You will aid us. You will save us. Give him the chance for life."

"What say you, housewife?" said Groot, turning to the silent Clemence, whom his signs and their looks had made to perceive the point at issue. Her reply was to seize Grisell's two hands, kiss them fervently, clasp both together, and utter in her deaf voice two Flemish words, "Goot Vrow." Grisell eagerly embraced her in tears.

"We have still to see what Skipper Vrowst says. He may not choose to meddle with English outlaws."

"If you cannot win him to take my knight, he will not take me," said Grisell.

There was no more to be said except something about the waywardness of the affections of women and dogs; but Master Groot was not ill-pleased at the bottom that both the females of the household took part against him, and they had a merry supper that night, amid the chests in which their domestic apparatus and stock-in-trade were packed, with the dried lizard, who pa.s.sed for a crocodile, sitting on the settle as if he were one of the company. Grisell's spirits rose with an undefined hope that, like Sir Gawaine's bride, or her own namesake, Griselda the patient, she should at last win her lord's love; and, deprived as she was of all her own relatives, there arose strongly within her the affection that ten long years ago had made her haunt the footsteps of the boy at Amesbury Manor.

Groot was made to promise to say not a word of her presence in his family. He was out all day, while Clemence worked hard at her demenagement, and only with scruples accepted the a.s.sistance of her guest, who was glad to work away her anxiety in the folding of curtains and stuffing of mails.

At last Lambert returned, having been backwards and forwards many times between the Vrow Gudule and the Abbey, for Skipper Vrowst drove a hard bargain, and made the most of the inconvenience and danger of getting into ill odour with the authorities; and, however anxious Father Copeland might be to save his nephew, Abbot and bursar demurred at gratifying extortion, above all when the King might at any time be squeezing them for contributions hard to come by.

However, it had been finally fixed that a boat should put in to the Abbey steps to receive the fleeces of the sheep-shearing of the home grange, and that, rolled in one of these fleeces, the wounded knight should be brought on board the Vrow Gudule, where Groot and the women would await him, their freight being already embarked, and all ready to weigh anchor.

The chief danger was in a King's officer coming on board to weigh the fleeces, and obtaining the toll on them. But Sunderland either had no King, or had two just at that time, and Father Copeland handed Master Groot a sum which might bribe one or both; while it was to the interest of the captain to make off without being overhauled by either.

CHAPTER XXII - THE CITY OF BRIDGES

So for long hours sat Enid by her lord, There in the naked hall, propping his head, And chafing his pale hands, and calling to him.

And at the last he waken'd from his swoon.

TENNYSON, Enid.

The transit was happily effected, and closely hidden in wool, Leonard Copeland was lifted out the boat, more than half unconscious, and afterwards transferred to the vessel, and placed in wrappings as softly and securely as Grisell and Clemence could arrange before King Edward's men came to exact their poundage on the freight, but happily did not concern themselves about the sick man.

He might almost be congratulated on his semi-insensibility, for though he suffered, he would not retain the recollection of his suffering, and the voyage was very miserable to every one, though the weather was far from unfavourable, as the captain declared. Grisell indeed was so entirely taken up with ministering to her knight that she seemed impervious to sickness or discomfort. It was a great relief to enter on the smooth waters of the great ca.n.a.l from Ostend, and Lambert stood on the deck recognising old landmarks, and pointing them out with the joy of homecoming to Clemence, who perhaps felt less delight, since the joys of her life had only begun when she turned her back on her unkind kinsfolk.

Nor did her face light up as his did while he pointed out to Grisell the beauteous belfry, rising on high above the many-peaked gables, though she did smile when a long-billed, long-legged stork flapped his wings overhead, and her husband signed that it was in greeting. The greeting that delighted him she could not hear, the sweet chimes from that same tower, which floated down the stream, when he doffed his cap, crossed himself, and clasped his hands in devout thanksgiving.

It was a wonderful scene of bustle; where vessels of all kinds thronged together were drawn up to the wharf, the beautiful tall painted s.h.i.+ps of Venice and Genoa pre-eminent among the stoutly-built Netherlanders and the English traders. Shouts in all languages were heard, and Grisell looked round in wonder and bewilderment as to how the helpless and precious charge on the deck was ever to be safely landed.

Lambert, however, was truly at home and equal to the occasion. He secured some of the men who came round the vessel in barges clamouring for employment, and - Grisell scarce knew how - Leonard on his bed was lifted down, and laid in the bottom of the barge. The big bundles and cases were committed to the care of another barge, to follow close after theirs, and on they went under, one after another, the numerous high-peaked bridges to which Bruges owes its name, while tall sharp-gabled houses, walls, or sometimes pleasant green gardens, bounded the margins, with a narrow foot-way between. The houses had often pavement leading by stone steps to the river, and stone steps up to the door, which was under the deep projecting eaves running along the front of the house - a stoop, as the Low Countries called it. At one of these - not one of the largest or handsomest, but far superior to the old home at Sunderland - hung the large handsome painted and gilded sign of the same serpent which Grisell had learnt to know so well, and here the barge hove to, while two servants, the man in a brown belted jerkin, the old woman in a narrow, tight, white hood, came out on the steps with outstretched hands.

"Mein Herr, my dear Master Lambert. Oh, joy! Greet thee well. Thanks to our Lady that I have lived to see this day," was the old woman's cry.

"Greet thee well, dear old Mother Abra. Greet thee, trusty Anton. You had my message? Have you a bed and chamber ready for this gentleman?"

Such was Lambert's hasty though still cordial greeting, as he gave his hand to the man-servant, his cheek to his old nurse, who was mother to Anton. Clemence in her gentle dumb show shared the welcome, and directed as Leonard was carried up an outside stone stair to a guest-chamber, and deposited in a stately bed with fresh, cool, lace-bordered, lavender-scented sheets, and Grisell put between his lips a spoonful of the cordial with which Lambert had supplied her.

More distinctly than before he murmured, "Thanks, sweet Eleanor."

The move in the open air had partly revived him, partly made him feverish, and he continued to murmur complacently his thanks to Eleanor for tending her "wounded knight," little knowing whom he wounded by his thanks.