A Ladder of Swords: A Tale of Love, Laughter and Tears. Gilbert Parker

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      “ ’Tis much to get for so little given,” she said, with a quiver in her voice; “yet this price for friendship would be too high to pay to any save the Seigneur of Rozel.”

      She hastily turned to the men who had rescued Michel and Buonespoir. “If I had riches, riches ye should have, brave men of Jersey,” she said, “but I have naught save love and thanks, and my prayers, too, if ye will have them.”

      “ ’Tis a man’s duty to save his fellow an’ he can,” cried a gaunt fisherman, whose daughter was holding to his lips a bowl of congereel soup.

      “ ’Twas a good deed to send us forth to save a priest of Holy Church,” cried a weazened boat-builder with a giant’s arm, as he buried his face in a cup of sack and plunged his hand into a fishwife’s basket of limpets.

      “Ay, but what means she by kissing and arm-getting with a priest?” cried a snarling vraic-gatherer. “ ’Tis some jest upon Holy Church, or yon priest is no better than common men, but an idle shame.”

      By this time Michel was among them. “Priest I am none, but a soldier,” he said, in a loud voice, and told them bluntly the reasons for his disguise; then, taking a purse from his pocket, thrust into the hands of his rescuers and their families pieces of silver and gave them brave words of thanks.

      But the seigneur was not to be outdone in generosity. His vanity ran high; he was fain to show Angèle what a gorgeous gentleman she had failed to make her own; and he was in ripe good-humor all round.

      “Come, ye shall come, all of ye, to the Manor of Rozel, every man and woman here. Ye shall be fed, and fuddled too ye shall be an’ ye will; for honest drink which sends to honest sleep hurts no man. To my kitchen with ye all; and you, messieurs”—turning to M. Aubert and De la Forêt—“and you, mademoiselle, come, know how open is the door and full the table at my Manor of Rozel—St. Ouen’s keeps a beggarly board.”

IV

       Table of Contents

       THUS began the friendship of the bragging Seigneur of Rozel for the three Huguenots, all because he had seen tears in a girl’s eyes and misunderstood them, and because the same girl had kissed him. His pride was flattered that they should receive protection from him, and the flattery became almost a canonizing when De Carteret of St. Ouen’s brought him to task for harboring and comforting the despised Huguenots; for when De Carteret railed he was envious. So henceforth Lemprière played lord protector with still more boisterous unction. His pride knew no bounds when, three days after the rescue, Sir Hugh Pawlett, the governor, answering De la Forêt’s letter requesting permission to visit the Comtesse de Montgomery, sent him word to fetch De la Forêt to Mont Orgueil Castle. Clanking and blowing, he was shown into the great hall with De la Forêt, where waited Sir Hugh and the widow of the renowned Camisard. Clanking and purring like an enormous cat, he turned his head away to the window when De la Forêt dropped on his knees and kissed the hand of the comtesse, whose eyes were full of tears. Clanking and gurgling, he sat at a mighty meal of turbot, eels, lobsters, ormers, capons, boar’s head, brawn and mustard, swan, curlew, and spiced meats. This he washed down with bastard, malmsey, and good ale, topped with almonds, comfits, perfumed cherries with “ipocras,” then sprinkled himself with rose-water and dabbled his face and hands in it. Filled to the turret, he lurched to his feet, and, drinking to Sir Hugh’s toast, “Her sacred Majesty!” he clanked and roared “Elizabeth!” as though upon the field of battle. He felt the star of De Carteret declining and Rozel’s glory ascending like a comet. Once set in a course, nothing could change him. Other men might err, but, once right, the Seigneur of Rozel was everlasting.

      Of late he had made the cause of Michel de la Forêt and Angèle Aubert his own. For this he had been raked upon the coals by De Carteret of St. Ouen’s and his following, who taunted him with the saying, “Save a thief from hanging and he’ll cut your throat.” Not that there was ill feeling against De la Forêt in person. He had won most hearts by a frank yet still manner, and his story and love for Angèle had touched the women folk where their hearts were softest. But the island was not true to itself or its history if it did not divide itself into factions, headed by the seigneurs, and there had been no ground for good division for five years till De la Forêt came.

      Short of actual battle, this new strife was the keenest ever known, for Sir Hugh Pawlett was ranged on the side of the Seigneur of Rozel. Kinsman of the Comtesse de Montgomery, of Queen Elizabeth’s own Protestant religion, and admiring De la Forêt, he had given every countenance to the Camisard refugee. He had even besought the royal court of Jersey to grant a pardon to Buonespoir the pirate, on condition that he should never commit a depredation upon an inhabitant of the island—this he was to swear to by the little finger of St. Peter. Should he break his word he was to be banished the island for ten years, under penalty of death if he returned. When the hour had come for Buonespoir to take the oath he failed to appear, and the next morning the Seigneur of St. Ouen’s discovered that during the night his cellar had been raided of two kegs of canary, many flagons of muscadella, pots of anchovies and boxes of candied “eringo,” kept solely for the visit which the Queen had promised the island. There was no doubt of the misdemeanant, for Buonespoir returned to De Carteret from St. Brieuc the gabardine of one of his retainers, in which he had carried off the stolen delicacies.

      This aggravated the feud between the partisans of St. Ouen’s and Rozel, for Lemprière of Rozel had laughed loudly when he heard of the robbery, and said: “ ’Tis like St. Ouen’s to hoard for a queen and glut a pirate. We feed as we get at Rozel, and will feed the court well, too, when it comes, or I’m no butler to Elizabeth!”

      But trouble was at hand for Michel and for his protector. The spies of Catherine de Medici, mother of the King of France, were everywhere. These had sent word that De la Forêt was now attached to the meagre suite of the widow of the great Camisard Montgomery, near the Castle of Mont Orgueil. The Medici, having treacherously slain the chief, became mad with desire to slay the lieutenant. She was set to have the man, either through diplomacy with England, or to end him by assassination through her spies. Having determined upon his death, with relentless soul she pursued the cause as closely as though this exiled soldier were a powerful enemy at the head of an army in France.

      Thus it was that she wrote to Queen Elizabeth, asking that “this arrant foe of France, this churl, conspirator, and reviler of the sacraments, be rendered unto our hands for well-deserved punishment as warning to all such evil-doers.” She told Elizabeth of De la Forêt’s arrival in Jersey, disguised as a priest of the Church of France, and set forth his doings since landing with the Seigneur of Rozel. Further she went on to say to “our sister of England” that “these dark figures of murder and revolt be a peril to the soft peace of this good realm.”

      To this Elizabeth, who had no knowledge of Michel, who desired peace with France at this time, who had favors to ask of Catherine, and who in her own realm had fresh reason to fear conspiracy through the Queen of the Scots and others, replied forthwith that, “If this De la Forêt falleth into our hands, and if it were found he had in truth conspired against France its throne, had he a million lives, not one should remain.” Having despatched this letter, she straightway sent a messenger to Sir Hugh Pawlett in Jersey, making quest of De la Forêt, and commanding that he should be sent to her in England at once.

      When the Queen’s messenger arrived at Orgueil Castle, Lemprière chanced to be with Sir Hugh Pawlett, and the contents of Elizabeth’s letter were made known to him.

      At the moment Monsieur of Rozel was munching macaroons СКАЧАТЬ