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When Knighthood Was in Flower

<hr /> <h3>CHAPTER XToC</h3> <h3>Justice, O King!</h3> Such was the state of affairs when I returned from France. How I hated myself because I had not faced the king's displeasure and had not refused to go until Brandon was safely out of his trouble. It was hard for me to believe that I had left such a matter to two foolish girls, one of them as changeable as the wind, and the other completely under her control. I could but think of the difference between myself and Brandon, and well knew, had I been in his place, he would have liberated me or stormed the very walls of London single-handed and alone. When I learned that Brandon had been in that dungeon all that long month, I felt that it would surely kill him, and my self-accusation was so strong and bitter, and my mental pain so great, that I resolved if my friend died, either by disease contracted in the dungeon or by execution of his sentence, that I would kill myself. But that is a matter much easier sincerely to resolve upon than to execute when the time comes. Next to myself, I condemned those wretched girls for leaving Brandon to perish—Brandon, to whom they both owed so much. Their selfishness turned me against all womankind. I did not dally this time. I trusted to no Lady Jane nor Lady Mary. I determined to go to the king at once and tell him all. I did not care if the wretched Mary and Jane both had to marry the French king, or the devil himself. I did not care if they and all the host of their perfidious sisterhood went to the nether side of the universe, there to remain forever. I would retrieve my fault, in so far as it was retrievable, and save Brandon, who was worth them all put together. I would tell Mary and Jane what I thought of them, and that should end matters between us. I felt as I did toward them not only because of their treatment of Brandon, but because they had made me guilty of a grievous fault, for which I should never, so long as I lived, forgive myself. I determined to go to the king, and go I did within five minutes of the time I heard that Brandon was yet in prison. I found the king sitting alone at public dinner, and, of course, was denied speech with him. I was in no humor to be balked, so I thrust aside the guards, and, much to everybody's fright, for I was wild with grief, rage and despair, and showed it in every feature, rushed to the king and fell upon my knees at his feet. "Justice, O king!" I cried, and all the courtiers heard. "Justice, O king! for the worst used man and the bravest, truest soul that ever lived and suffered." Here the tears began to stream down my face and my voice choked in my throat. "Charles Brandon, your majesty's one-time friend, lies in a loathsome, rayless dungeon, condemned to death, as your majesty may know, for the killing of two men in Billingsgate Ward. I will tell you all: I should be thrust out from the society of decent men for not having told you before I left for France, but I trusted it to another who has proved false. I will tell you all. Your sister, the Lady Mary, and Lady Jane Bolingbroke were returning alone, after dark, from a visit to the soothsayer Grouche, of whom your majesty has heard. I had been notified of the Lady Mary's intended visit to him, although she had enjoined absolute secrecy upon my informant. I could not go, being detained upon your majesty's service—it was the night of the ball to the ambassadors—and I asked Brandon to follow them, which he did, without the knowledge of the princess. Upon returning, the ladies were attacked by four ruffians, and would have met with worse than death had not the bravest heart and the best sword in England defended them victoriously against such fearful odds. He left them at Bridewell without hurt or injury, though covered with wounds himself. This man is condemned to be hanged, drawn and quartered, but I know not your majesty's heart if he be not at once reprieved and richly rewarded. Think, my king! He saved the royal honor of your sister, who is so dear to you, and has suffered so terribly for his loyalty and bravery. The day I left so hurriedly for France the Lady Mary promised she would tell you all and liberate this man who had so nobly served her; but she is a woman, and was born to betray." The king laughed a little at my vehemence. "What is this you are telling me, Sir Edwin? I know of Brandon's death sentence, but much as I regret it, I cannot interfere with the justice of our good people of London for the murder of two knights in their streets. If Brandon committed such a crime, and, I understand he does not deny it, I cannot help him, however much I should like to do so. But this nonsense about my sister! It cannot be true. It must be trumped up out of your love in order to save your friend. Have a care, good master, how you say such a thing. If it were true, would not Brandon have told it at his trial?" "It is as true as that God lives, my king! If the Lady Mary and Lady Jane do not bear me out in every word I have said, let my life pay the forfeit. He would not tell of the great reason for killing the men, fearing to compromise the honor of those whom he had saved, for, as your majesty is aware, persons sometimes go to Grouche's for purposes other than to listen to his soothsaying. Not in this case, God knows, but there are slanderous tongues, and Brandon was willing to die with closed lips, rather than set them wagging against one so dear to you. It seems that these ladies, who owe so much to him, are also willing that he should die rather than themselves bear the consequences of their own folly. Do not delay, I beseech your majesty. Eat not another morsel, I pray you, until this brave man, who has so truly served you, be taken from his prison and freed from his sentence of death. Come, come, my king! this moment, and all that I have, my wealth, my life, my honor, are yours for all time." The king remained a moment in thought with knife in hand. "Caskoden, I have never detected you in a lie in all the years I have known you; you are not very large in body, but your honor is great enough to stock a Goliath. I believe you are telling the truth. I will go at once to liberate Brandon; and that little hussy, my sister, shall go to France and enjoy life as best she can with her old beauty, King Louis. I know of no greater punishment to inflict upon her. This determines me; she shall coax me out of it no longer. Sir Thomas Brandon, have my horses ready, and I will go to the lord mayor, then to my lord bishop of Lincoln and arrange to close this French treaty at once. Let everybody know that the Princess Mary will, within the month, be queen of France." This was said to the courtiers, and was all over London before night. I followed closely in the wake of the king, though uninvited, for I had determined to trust to no one, not even his majesty, until Brandon should be free. Henry had said he would go first to the lord mayor and then to Wolsey, but after we crossed the Bridge he passed down Lower Thames street and turned up Fish-street Hill into Grace Church street on toward Bishopsgate. He said he would stop at Mistress Cornwallis's and have a pudding; and then on to Wolsey, who at that time lodged in a house near the wall beyond Bishopsgate. I well knew if the king once reached Wolsey's, it would be wine and quoits and other games, interspersed now and then with a little blustering talk on statecraft, for the rest of the day. Then the good bishop would have in a few pretty London women and a dance would follow with wine and cards and dice, and Henry would spend the night at Wolsey's, and Brandon lie another night in the mire of his Newgate dungeon. I resolved to raise heaven and earth, and the other place, too, if necessary, before this should happen. So I rode boldly up to the king, and with uncovered head addressed him: "Your majesty gave me your royal word that you would go to the lord mayor first, and this is the road to my lord bishop of Lincoln. In all the years I have known your majesty, both as gallant prince and puissant king, this is the first request I ever proffered, and now I only ask of you to save your own noble honor, and do your duty as man and king." These were bold words, but I did not care one little farthing whether they pleased him or not. The king stared at me and said: "Caskoden, you are a perfect hound at my heels. But you are right; I had forgotten my errand. You disturbed my dinner, and my stomach called loudly for one of Mistress Cornwallis's puddings; but you are right to stick to me. What a friend you are in case of need. Would I had one like you." "Your majesty has two of whom I know; one riding humbly by your royal side, and the other lying in the worst dungeon in Christendom." With this the king wheeled about and started west toward Guildhall. Oh, how I hated Henry for that cold-blooded, selfish forgetfulness worse than crime; and how I hoped the Blessed Virgin would forget him in time to come, and leave his soul an extra thousand years in purging flames, just to show him how it goes to be forgotten—in hell. To the lord mayor we accordingly went without further delay. He was only too glad to liberate Brandon when he heard my story, which the king had ordered me to repeat. The only hesitancy was from a doubt of its truth. The lord mayor was kind enough to say that he felt little doubt of my word, but that friendship would often drive a man to any extremity, even falsehood, to save a friend. Then I offered to go into custody myself and pay the penalty, death, for helping a convicted felon to escape, if I told not the truth, to be confirmed or denied by the princess and her first lady in waiting. I knew Jane and was willing to risk her truthfulness without a doubt—it was so pronounced as to be troublesome at times—and as to Mary—well, I had no doubt of her, either. If she would but stop to think out the right she was sure to do it. I have often wondered how much of the general fund of evil in this world comes from thoughtlessness. Cultivate thought and you make virtue—I believe. But this is no time to philosophize. My offer was satisfactory, for what more can a man do than pledge his life for his friend? We have scripture for that, or something like it. The lord mayor did not require my proffered pledge, but readily consented that the king should write an order for Brandon's pardon and release. This was done at once, and we, that is, I, together with a sheriff's sergeant and his four yeomen, hastened to Newgate, while Henry went over to Wolsey's to settle Mary's fate. Brandon was brought up with chains and manacles at his ankles and wrists. When he entered the room and saw me, he exclaimed: "Ah! Caskoden, is that you? I thought they had brought me up to hang me, and was glad for the change; but I suppose you would not come to help at that, even if you have left me here to rot; God only knows how long; I have forgotten." I could not restrain the tears at sight of him. "Your words are more than just," I said; and, being anxious that he should know at once that my fault had not been so great as it looked, continued hurriedly: "The king sent me to France upon an hour's notice, the day after your arrest. I know only too well I should not have gone without seeing you out of this, but you had enjoined silence upon me, and—and I trusted to the promises of another." "I thought as much. You are in no way to blame, my friend; all I ask is that you never mention the subject again." "My friend!" Ah! the words were dear to me as words of love from a sweetheart's lips. I hardly recognized him, he was so frightfully covered with filth and dirt and creeping things. His hair and beard were unkempt and matted, and his eyes and cheeks were lusterless and sunken; but I will describe him no further. Suffering had well-nigh done its work, and nothing but the hardihood gathered in his years of camp life and war could have saved him from death. I bathed and reclothed him as well as I could at Newgate, and then took him home to Greenwich in a horse litter, where my man and I thoroughly washed, dressed and sheared the poor fellow and put him to bed. "Ah! this bed is a foretaste of paradise," he said, as he lay upon the mattress. It was a pitiful sight, and I could hardly refrain from tears. I sent my man to fetch a certain Moor, a learned scholar, though a hated foreigner, who lived just off Cheap and sold small arms, and very soon he was with us. Brandon and I both knew him well, and admired his learning and gentleness, and loved him for his sweet philosophy of life, the leaven of which was charity—a modest little plant too often overshadowed by the rank growth of pompous dogmatism. The Moor was learned in the healing potions of the east, and insisted, privately, of course, that all the shrines and relics in Christendom put together could not cure an ache in a baby's little finger. This, perhaps, was going too far, for there are some relics that have undoubted potency, but in cases where human agency can cure, the people of the east are unquestionably far in advance of us in knowledge of remedies. The Moor at once gave Brandon a soothing drink, which soon put him into a sweet sleep. He then bathed him as he slept, with some strengthening lotion, made certain learned signs, and spoke a few cabalistic words, and, sure enough, so strong were the healing remedies and incantations that the next morning Brandon was another man, though very far from well and strong. The Moor recommended nutritious food, such as roast beef and generous wine, and, although this advice was contrary to the general belief, which is, with apparent reason, that the evil spirit of disease should be starved and driven out, yet so great was our faith in him that we followed his directions, and in a few days Brandon had almost regained his old-time strength. I will ask you to go back with me for a moment. During the week, between Brandon's interview with Mary in the ante-room of the king's bed-chamber and the tragedy at Billingsgate, he and I had many conversations about the extraordinary situation in which he found himself. At one time, I remember, he said: "I was safe enough before that afternoon. I believe I could have gone away and forgotten her eventually, but our mutual avowal seems to have dazed me and paralyzed every power for effort. I sometimes feel helpless, and, although I have succeeded in keeping away from her since then, I often find myself wavering in my determination to leave England. That was what I feared if I allowed the matter to go to the point of being sure of her love. I only wanted it before, and very easily made myself believe it was impossible, and not for me. But now that I know she loves me it is like holding my breath to live without her. I feel every instant that I can hold it no longer. I know only too well that if I but see her face once more I shall breathe. She is the very breath of life for me. She is mine by the gift of God. Curses upon those who keep us apart." Then musingly and half interrogatively: "She certainly does love me. She could not have treated me as she did unless her love was so strong that she could not resist it." "Let no doubt of that trouble you," I answered. "A woman like Mary cannot treat two men as she treated you. Many a woman may love, or think she loves many times, but there is only one man who receives the full measure of her best. Other women, again, have nothing to give but their best, and when they have once given that, they have given all. Unless I have known her in vain, Mary, with all her faults, is such a woman. Again I say, let no doubt of that trouble you." Brandon answered with a sad little smile from the midst of his reverie. "It is really not so much the doubt as the certainty of it that troubles me." Then, starting to his feet: "If I thought she had lied to me; if I thought she could wantonly lead me on to suffer so for her, I would kill her, so help me God." "Do not think that. Whatever her faults, and she has enough, there is no man on earth for her but you. Her love has come to her through a struggle against it because it was her master. That is the strongest and best, in fact the only, love; worth all the self-made passions in the world." "Yes, I believe it. I know she has faults; even my partiality cannot blind me to them, but she is as pure and chaste as a child, and as gentle, strong and true as—as—a woman. I can put it no stronger. She has these, her redeeming virtues, along with her beauty, from her plebeian grandmother, Elizabeth Woodville, who, with them, won a royal husband and elevated herself to the throne beside the chivalrous Edward. This sweet plebeian heritage bubbles up in the heart of Mary, and will not down, but neutralizes the royal poison in her veins and makes a goddess of her." Then with a sigh: "But if her faults were a thousand times as many, and if each fault were a thousand times as great, her beauty would atone for all. Such beauty as hers can afford to have faults. Look at Helen and Cleopatra, and Agnes Sorel. Did their faults make them less attractive? Beauty covereth more sins than charity—and maketh more grief than pestilence." The last clause was evidently an afterthought. After his month in Newgate with the hangman's noose about his neck all because of Mary's cruel neglect, I wondered if her beauty would so easily atone for her faults. I may as well tell you that he changed his mind concerning this particular doctrine of atonement. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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