Joan of the Sword Hand. Crockett Samuel Rutherford

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СКАЧАТЬ had his long-desired view in full daylight of the woman whose lips, touched once under cloud of night, had dominated his fancy and enslaved his will during all the weary months of winter.

      Also he had before him, though he knew it not, a somewhat difficult and complicated explanation.

      CHAPTER XIII

      THE SPARHAWK IN THE TOILS

      The Princess Margaret was standing by the window as the young man entered. Her golden curls flashed in the late sunshine, which made a kind of haze of light about her head as she turned the resentful brilliance of her eyes upon Maurice von Lynar.

      "Is it a safe thing, think you, Sir Count, to jest with a princess in her own land and then come back to flout her for it?"

      Maurice understood her to refer to the kiss given and returned in the darkness of the night. He knew not of how many other indiscretions he was now to bear the brunt, or he had turned on the spot and fled once more across the river.

      "My lady," he said, "if I offended you once, it was not done intentionally, but by mistake."

      "By mistake, sir! Have a care. I may have been indiscreet, but I am not imbecile."

      "The darkness of the night – " faltered von Lynar, "let that be my excuse."

      "Pshaw!" flashed the Princess, suddenly firing up; "do you not see, man, that you cannot lie yourself out of this? And, indeed, what need? If I were a secretary of embassy, and a princess distinguished me with her slightest favour, methinks when next I came I would not meanly deny her acquaintance!"

      Von Lynar was distressed, and fortunately for himself his distress showed in his face.

      "Princess," he said, standing humbly before her, "I did wrong. But consider the sudden temptation, the darkness of the night – "

      "The darkness of the night," she said, stamping her foot, and in an instinctively mocking tone; "you are indeed well inspired. You remind me of what I ventured that you should be free. The darkness of the night, indeed! I suppose that is all that sticks in your memory, because you gained something tangible by it. You have forgotten the walk through the corridors of the Palace, all you taught me in the rose garden, and – and – how apt a pupil you said I was. Pray, good Master Forgetfulness, who hath forgotten all these things, forgotten even his own name, tell me what you did in Courtland eight months ago?"

      "I came – I came," faltered the Sparhawk, fearful of yet further committing himself, "I came to find and save my dear mistress."

      "Your – dear – mistress?" The Princess spoke slowly, and the blue eyes hardened till they overtopped and beat down the bold black ones of Maurice von Lynar; "and you dare to tell me this – me, to whom you swore that you had never loved woman in the world before, never spoken to them word of wooing or compliment! Out of my sight, fellow! The Prince, my brother, shall deal with you."

      Then all suddenly her pride utterly gave way. The disappointment was too keen. She sank down on a silk-covered ottoman by the window side, sobbing.

      "Oh, that I could kill you now, with my hands – so," she said in little furious jerks, gripping at the pillow; "I hate you, thus to put a shame upon me – me, Margaret of Courtland. Could it have been for such a thing as you that I sent away the Prince of Muscovy – yes, and many others – because I could not forget you? And after all – !"

      Now Maurice von Lynar was not quick in discernment where woman was concerned, but on this occasion he recognised that he was blindly playing the hand of another – a hand, moreover, of which he could not hope to see the cards. He did the only thing which could have saved him with the Princess. He came near and sank on one knee before her.

      "Madam," he said humbly and in a moving voice, "I beseech you not to be angry – not to condemn me unheard. In the sense of being in love, I never loved any but yourself. I would rather die than put the least slight upon one so surpassingly fair, whose memory has never departed from me, sleeping or waking, whose image, dimly seen, has never for a moment been erased from my heart's tablets."

      The Princess paused and lifted her eyes till they dwelt searchingly upon him. His obvious sincerity touched her willing heart.

      "But you said just now that you came to Courtland to see 'your dear mistress?'"

      The young man put his hand to his head.

      "You must bear with me," he said, "if perchance for a little my words are wild. I had, indeed, no right to speak of you as my dear mistress."

      "Oh, it was of me that you spoke," said the Princess, smiling a little; "I begin to understand."

      "Of what other could I speak?" said the shameless Von Lynar, who now began to feel his way a little clearer. "I have indeed been very ill, and when I am in straits my head is still unsettled. Oftentimes I forget my very name, so sharp a pang striking through my forehead that I dote and stare and forget all else. It springs from a secret wound that at the time I knew nothing of."

      "Yes – yes, I remember. In the duel with the Wasp – in the yew-tree walk it happened. Tell me, is it dangerous? Did it well-nigh cost you your life?"

      The youth modestly hung down his head.

      This sudden spate of falsehood had come upon him, as it were, from the outside.

      "If the truth will not help me," he muttered, "why, I can lie with any man. Else wherefore was I born a Dane? But, by my faith, my mistress must have done some rare tall lying on her own account, and now I am reaping that which she hath sown."

      As he kneeled thus the Princess bent over him with a quizzical expression on her face.

      "You are sure that you speak the truth now? Your wound is not again causing you to dote?"

      "Nay," said the Sparhawk; "indeed, 'tis almost healed."

      "Where was the wound?" queried the Princess anxiously.

      "There were two," answered Von Lynar diplomatically; "one in my shoulder at the base of my neck, and the other, more dangerous because internal, on the head itself."

      "Let me see."

      She came and stood above him as he put his hand to the collar of his doublet, and, unfastening a tie, he slipped it down a little and showed her at the spring of his neck Werner von Orseln's thrust.

      "And the other," she said, covering it up with a little shudder, "that on the head, where is it?"

      The youth blushed, but answered valiantly enough.

      "It never was an open wound, and so is a little difficult to find. Here, where my hand is, above my brow."

      "Hold up your head," said the Princess. "On which side was it? On the right? Strange, I cannot find it. You are too far beneath me. The light falls not aright. Ah, that is better!"

      She kneeled down in front of him and examined each side of his head with interest, making as she did so, many little exclamations of pity and remorse.

      "I think it must be nearer the brow," she said at last; "hold up your head – look at me."

      Von Lynar looked at the Princess. Their position was one as charming as it was dangerous. They were kneeling opposite to one another, their faces, drawn together by the interest of the surgical examination, had approached very close. The dark СКАЧАТЬ