Sir John Constantine Part 2

For Christian charity then the youth, having his sword ready, cut him down, and the gallows knave fell on his feet and warmed himself at the lit fire. 'And now,' said he, being warmed, 'you must take me up behind your saddle; for there is a plot laid to-night from which I only can deliver you.' So they mounted and rode together to the house, where, having entered the garden by stealth, they found the ladder ready set. 'You must let me climb first,' said the knave; and had no sooner reached the ladder's top than two or three pistol shots were fired upon him from the window and as many hands reached out and stabbed him through and through until he dropped into the ditch; whence, however, he sprang on his feet, and catching our hidalgo by the arm hurried him back through the garden to the gate where his horse stood tethered. There they mounted and rode away into safety, the dead behind the living. 'All this is enchantment to me,' said the youth as they went. 'But I must thank you, my friend; for whether dead or alive--and to my thinking you must be doubly dead-- you have rendered me a great service.' 'You may say a ma.s.s for me, and thank you,' the dead man answered; 'but for the service you must thank the Mother of G.o.d, who commanded me and gave me power to deliver you, and has charged me to tell you the reason of her kindness: which is, that every day you say her rosary.' 'I do thank her and bless her then,' replied the youth, 'and henceforth will I say her rosary not once daily but thrice, for that she hath preserved my life to-night.'"

"A very proper resolution," said my uncle.

"And I hope, sir, he kept it," chimed in Billy Priske; "good Protestant though I be."

"The story is not ended," said my father. "The dead man--they were dismounted now and close under the gallows--looked at the young man angrily, and said he, 'I doubt Our Lady's pains be wasted, after all.

Is it possible, sir, you think she sent me to-night to save your life?' 'For what else?' inquired the youth. 'To save your soul, sir, and your lady's; both of which (though you guessed not or forgot it) stood in jeopardy just now, so that the gate open to you was indeed the gate of h.e.l.l. Pray hang me back as you found me," he concluded, 'and go your ways for a fool.'"

"Now see what happened. The murderers in the house, coming down to bury the body and finding it not, understood that the young man had not come alone; from which they reasoned that his servants had carried him off and would publish the crime. They therefore, with their master, hurriedly fled out of the country. The lady betook herself to a religious house, where in solitude questioning herself she found that in will, albeit not in act, she had been less than faithful. As for the hidalgo, he rode home and shut himself within doors, whence he came forth in a few hours as a man from a sepulchre--which, indeed, to his enemies he evidently was when they heard that he was abroad and unhurt whom they had certainly stabbed to death; and to his friends almost as great a marvel when they perceived the alteration of his life; yea, and to himself the greatest of all, who alone knew what had pa.s.sed, and, as by enchantment his life had taken this turn, so spent its remainder like a man enchanted rather than converted. I am told," my father concluded, "though the sermon says nothing about it, that he and the lady came in the end, and as by an accident, to be buried side by side, at a little distance, in the Chapel of Our Lady of Succour in the Cathedral church of Valencia, and there lie stretched--two parallels of dust--to meet only at the Resurrection when the desires of all dust shall be purged away."

With this story my father beguiled the road down into Guildford, and of his three listeners I was then the least attentive.

Years afterwards, as you shall learn, I had reason to remember it.

At Guildford, where we fed ourselves and hired a relay of horses, I took Billy aside and questioned him (forgetting the example of Isaac) why we were going to London and on what business. He shook his head.

"Squire knows," said he. "As for me, a still tongue keeps a wise head, and moreover I know not. Bain't it enough for 'ee to be quit of school and drinking good ale in the kingdom o' Guildford?

Very well, then."

"Still, one cannot help wondering," said I, half to myself; but Billy dipped his face stolidly within his pewter.

"The last friend a man should want to take up with is his Future,"

said he, sagely. "I knows naught about en but what's to his discredit--as that I shall die sooner or later, a thing that goes against my stomach; or that at the best I shall grow old, which runs counter to my will. He's that uncomfortable, too, you can't please him. Take him hopeful, and you're counting your chickens; take him doleful, and foreboding is worse than witchcraft. There was a Mevagissey man I sailed with as a boy--and your father's tale just now put me in mind of him--paid half a crown to a conjurer, one time, to have his fortune told; which was, that he would marry the ugliest maid in the parish. Whereby it preyed on his mind till he hanged hisself. Whereby along comes the woman in the nick o' time, cuts him down, an' marries him out o' pity while he's too weak to resist.

That's your Future; and, as I say, I keeps en at arm's length."

With this philosophy of Billy I had to be content and find my own guesses at the mystery. But as the afternoon wore on I kept no hold on any speculation for more than a few minutes. I was saddle-weary, drowsed with sunburn and the moving landscape over which the sun, when I turned, swam in a haze of dust. The villages crowded closer, and at the entry of each I thought London was come; but anon the houses thinned and dwindled and we were between hedgerows again.

So it lasted, village after village, until with the shut of night, when the long shadows of our horses before us melted into dusk, a faint glow opened on the sky ahead and grew and brightened.

I knew it: but even as I saluted it my chin dropped forward and I dozed. In a dream I rode through the lighted streets, and at the door of our lodgings my father lifted me down from the saddle.

CHAPTER III.

I ACQUIRE A KINGDOM.

"_Gloucester_. The trick of that voice I do well remember: Is't not the king?"

"_Lear_. Ay, every inch a king."

_King Lear_.

From our lodgings, which were in Bond Street, we sallied forth next morning to view the town; my father leading us first by way of St.

James's and across the Park to the Abbey, and on the way holding discourse to which I recalled myself with difficulty from London's shows and wonders--his Majesty's tall guards at the palace gates, the gorgeous promenaders in the Mall, the swans and wild fowl on the lake.

"I wish you to remark, my dear child," said he, "that between a capital and solitude there is no third choice; nor, I would add, can a mind extract the best of solitude unless it bring urbanity to the wilderness. Your rustic is no philosopher, and your provincial townsman is the devil: if you would meditate in Arden, your company must be the Duke, Jaques, Touchstone--courtiers all--or, again, Rosalind, the Duke's daughter, if you would catch the very mood of the forest. I tell you this, child, that you may not be misled by my example (which has a reason of its own and, I trust, an excuse) into shunning your destiny though it lead and keep you in cities and among crowds; for we have it on the word of no less busy a man than the Emperor Marcus Aurelius that to seek out private retiring-rooms for the soul such as country villages, the sea-sh.o.r.e, mountains, is but a mistaken simplicity, seeing that at what time soever a man will it is in his power to retire into himself and be at rest, dwelling within the walls of a city as in a shepherd's fold of the mountain. So also the sainted Juan de Avila tells us that a man who trusts in G.o.d may, if he take pains, recollect G.o.d in streets and public places better than will a hermit in his cell; and the excellent Archbishop of Cambrai, writing to the Countess of Gramont, counselled her to practise recollection and give a quiet thought to G.o.d at dinner times in a lull of the conversation, or again when she was driving or dressing or having her hair arranged; these hindrances (said he) profited more than any _engouement_ of devotion.

"But," he went on, "to bear yourself rightly in a crowd you must study how one crowd differs from another, and how in one city you may have that great orderly movement of life (whether of business or of pleasure) which is the surrounding joy of princes in their palaces, and an insensate mob, which is the most brutal and vilest aspect of man. For as in a thronged street you may learn the high meaning of citizens.h.i.+p, so in a mob you may unlearn all that makes a man dignified. Yet even the mob you should study in a capital, as Shakespeare did in his 'Julius Caesar' and 'Coriola.n.u.s;' for only so can you know it in its quiddity. I conjure you, child, to get your sense of men from their capital cities."

He had something to tell of almost every great house we pa.s.sed.

He seemed--he that had saluted no one as we crossed the Mall, saluted of none--to walk this quarter of London with a proprietary tread; and by and by, coming to the river, he waved an arm and broke into panegyric.

"Other capitals have had their turn, and others will overtake and outstrip her; but where is one in these times to compare with London?

Where in Europe will you see streets so well ordered, squares so s.p.a.cious, houses so comfortable, yet elegant, as in this mile east and south of Hyde Park? Where such solid, self-respecting wealth as in our City? Where such merchant-princes and adventurers as your Whittingtons and Greshams? Where half its commerce? and where a commerce touched with one t.i.the of its imagination? Where such a river, for trade as for pageants? On what other sh.o.r.e two buildings side by side so famous, the one for just laws, civil security, liberty with obedience, the other for heroic virtues resumed, with their propagating dust, into the faith which sowed all and, having reaped, renews?"

In the Abbey--where my Uncle Gervase was forced to withdraw behind a pillar and rub Billy Priske's neck, which by this time had a crick in it--my father's voice, as he moved from tomb to tomb, deepened to a regal solemnity. He repeated Beaumont's great lines--

"Mortality, behold and fear!

What a change of flesh is here!"

laying a hand on my shoulder the while; and in the action I understood that this and all his previous discourse was addressed to me with a purpose, and that somehow our visit to London had to do with that purpose.

"Here they lie had realms and lands Who now want strength to stir their hands; Where from their pulpits seal'd with dust They preach 'In greatness is no trust' . . .

Here are sands, ign.o.ble things, Dropt from the ruin'd sides of kings. . . ."

I must have fallen a-wondering while he quoted in a low sonorous voice, like a last echo of the great organ, rolling among the arches; for as it ceased I came to myself with a start and found his eyes searching me; also his hold on my shoulder had stiffened, and he held me from him at arm's length.

"And yet," said he, as if to himself, "this dust is the strongest man can build with; and we must build in our generation--quickly, trusting in the young firm flesh; yes, quickly--and trusting--though we know what its end must be."

These last words he muttered, and afterwards seemed to fall into a meditation, which lasted until we found ourselves outside the Abbey and in the light again.

From Westminster we took boat to Blackfriars, and, landing there, walked up through the crowded traffic to a gateway opening into Clement's Inn. I did not know its name at the time, nor did I regard the place as we entered, being yet fascinated with the sight of Temple Bar and of the heads of four traitors above it on poles, blackening in the sun; but within the courtyard we turned to the right and mounted a staircase to the head of the second flight and to a closed door on which my father knocked. A clerk opened, and presently we pa.s.sed through an office into a well-sized room where, from amid a pile of books, a grave little man rose, reached for his wig, and, having adjusted it, bowed to us.

"Good morning! Good morning, gentlemen! Ah--er--Sir John Constantine, I believe?"

My father bowed. "At your service, Mr. Knox. You received my letter, then? Let me present my brother-in-law and man of affairs, Mr. Gervase Arundel, who will discuss with you the main part of our business; also my son here, about whom I wrote to you."

"Eh? Eh?" Mr. Knox, after bowing to my uncle, put on his spectacles, took them off, wiped them, put them on again, and regarded me benevolently. "Eh? so this is the boy--h'm--Jasper, I believe?"

"Prosper," my father corrected.

"Ah, to be sure--Prosper--and I hope he will, I'm sure." Mr. Knox chuckled at his mild little witticism and twinkled at me jocosely.

"Your letter, Sir John? Yes, to be sure, I received it. What you propose is practicable, though irregular."

"Irregular?"

"Not legally irregular--oh no, not in the least. Legally the thing's as simple as A B C. The man has only to take the benefit of the Act of Insolvency, a.s.sign his estate to his creditors, and then-- supposing that they are agreed--"

"There can be no question of their agreement or disagreement.

His creditors do not exist. As I told you, I have paid them off, bought up all their debts, and the yes or no rests with me alone."

"Quite so; I was merely putting it as the Act directs. Very well then, supposing _you_ agree, nothing more is necessary than an appearance--a purely formal appearance--at the Old Bailey, and your unfortunate friend--"

"Pardon me," my father put in; "he is not my friend."

"Eh?" . . . Mr. Knox removed his spectacles, breathed on them, and rubbed them, while he regarded my father with a bewildered air.

"You'll excuse me . . . but I must own myself entirely puzzled.

Even for a friend's sake, as I was about to protest, your conduct, sir, would be Quixotic; yes, yes, Quixotic in the highest degree, the amount being (as you might say) princely, and the security--"

Mr. Knox paused and expressed his opinion of the security by a pitying smile. "But if," he resumed, "this man be not even your friend, then, my dear sir, I can merely wonder."

For a moment my father seemed about to argue with him, but checked himself.