The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson – Swanston Edition. Volume 8

“But did my Dick make love to you?” asked Joanna, clinging to her sweetheart’s side.

“Nay, fool girl,” returned Alicia; “it was I made love to him. I offered to marry him, indeed; but he bade me go marry with my likes. These were his words. Nay, that I will say: he is more plain than pleasant. But now, children, for the sake of sense, set forward. Shall we go once more over the dingle, or push straight for Holywood?”

“Why,” said Dick, “I would like dearly to get upon a horse; for I have been sore mauled and beaten, one way and another, these last days, and my poor body is one bruise. But how think ye? If the men, upon the alarm of the fighting, had fled away, we should have gone about for nothing. ’Tis but some three short miles to Holywood direct; the bell hath not beat nine; the snow is pretty firm to walk upon, the moon clear; how if we went even as we are?”

“Agreed!” cried Alicia; but Joanna only pressed upon Dick’s arm.

Forth, then, they went, through open leafless groves and down snow-clad alleys, under the white face of the winter moon; Dick and Joanna walking hand in hand and in a heaven of pleasure; and their light-minded companion, her own bereavements heartily forgotten, followed a pace or two behind, now rallying them upon their silence, and now drawing happy pictures of their future and united lives.

Still, indeed, in the distance of the wood, the riders of Tunstall might be heard urging their pursuit; and from time to time cries or the clash of steel announced the shock of enemies. But in these young folk, bred among the alarms of war, and fresh from such a multiplicity of dangers, neither fear nor pity could be lightly wakened. Content to find the sounds still drawing farther and farther away, they gave up their hearts to the enjoyment of the hour, walking already, as Alicia put it, in a wedding procession; and neither the rude solitude of the forest nor the cold of the freezing night had any force to shadow or distract their happiness.

At length, from a rising hill, they looked below them on the dell of Holywood. The great windows of the forest abbey shone with torch and candle; its high pinnacles and spires arose very clear and silent, and the gold rood upon the topmost summit glittered brightly in the moon. All about it, in the open glade, camp-fires were burning, and the ground was thick with huts; and across the midst of the picture the frozen river curved.

“By the mass,” said Richard, “there are Lord Foxham’s fellows still encamped. The messenger hath certainly miscarried. Well, then, so better. We have power at hand to face Sir Daniel.”

But if Lord Foxham’s men still lay encamped in the long holm at Holywood, it was from a different reason from the one supposed by Dick. They had marched, indeed, for Shoreby; but ere they were half-way thither, a second messenger met them, and bade them return to their morning’s camp, to bar the road against Lancastrian fugitives, and to be so much nearer to the main army of York. For Richard of Gloucester, having finished the battle and stamped out his foes in that district, was already on the march to rejoin his brother; and not long after the return of my Lord Foxham’s retainers, Crookback himself drew rein before the abbey door. It was in honour of this august visitor that the windows shone with lights; and at the hour of Dick’s arrival with his sweetheart and her friend, the whole ducal party was being entertained in the refectory with the splendour of that powerful and luxurious monastery.

Dick, not quite with his good will, was brought before them. Gloucester, sick with fatigue, sat leaning upon one hand his white and terrifying countenance; Lord Foxham, half recovered from his wound, was in a place of honour on his left.

“How, sir?” asked Richard. “Have ye brought me Sir Daniel’s head?”

“My lord duke,” replied Dick, stoutly enough, but with a qualm at heart, “I have not even the good fortune to return with my command. I have been, so please your grace, well beaten.”

Gloucester looked upon him with a formidable frown.

“I gave you fifty lances,3 sir,” he said.

“My lord duke, I had but fifty men-at-arms,” replied the young knight.

“How is this?” said Gloucester. “He did ask me fifty lances.”

“May it please your grace,” replied Catesby smoothly, “for a pursuit we gave him but the horsemen.”

“It is well,” replied Richard, adding, “Shelton, ye may go.”

“Stay!” said Lord Foxham. “This young man likewise had a charge from me. It may be he hath better sped. – Say, Master Shelton, have ye found the maid?”

“I praise the saints, my lord,” said Dick, “she is in this house.”

“Is it even so? Well, then, my lord the duke,” resumed Lord Foxham, “with your good will, to-morrow, before the army march, I do propose a marriage. This young squire – ”

“Young knight,” interrupted Catesby.

“Say ye so, Sir William?” cried Lord Foxham.

“I did myself, and for good service, dub him knight,” said Gloucester. “He hath twice manfully served me. It is not valour of hands, it is a man’s mind of iron, that he lacks. He will not rise, Lord Foxham. ’Tis a fellow that will fight indeed bravely in a mellay, but hath a capon’s heart. Howbeit, if he is to marry, marry him in the name of Mary, and be done!”

“Nay, he is a brave lad – I know it,” said Lord Foxham. “Content ye, then, Sir Richard. I have compounded this affair with Master Hamley, and to-morrow ye shall wed.”

Whereupon Dick judged it prudent to withdraw; but he was not yet clear of the refectory, when a man, but newly alighted at the gate, came running four stairs at a bound, and brushing through the abbey servants, threw himself on one knee before the duke.

“Victory, my lord,” he cried.

And before Dick had got to the chamber set apart for him as Lord Foxham’s guest, the troops in the holm were cheering around their fires; for upon that same day, not twenty miles away, a second crushing blow had been dealt to the power of Lancaster.

CHAPTER VII

DICK’S REVENGE

The next morning Dick was afoot before the sun, and, having dressed himself to the best advantage, with the aid of the Lord Foxham’s baggage, and got good reports of Joan, he set forth on foot to walk away his impatience.

For some while he made rounds among the soldiery, who were getting to arms in the wintry twilight of the dawn and by the red glow of torches; but gradually he strolled farther afield, and at length passed clean beyond the outpost, and walked alone in the frozen forest, waiting for the sun.

His thoughts were both quiet and happy. His brief favour with the duke he could not find it in his heart to mourn; with Joan to wife, and my Lord Foxham for a faithful patron, he looked most happily upon the future; and in the past he found but little to regret.

As he thus strolled and pondered, the solemn light of the morning grew more clear, the east was already coloured by the sun, and a little scathing wind blew up the frozen snow. He turned to go home; but even as he turned, his eye lit upon a figure behind a tree.

“Stand!” he cried. “Who goes?”

The figure stepped forth and waved its hand like a dumb person. It was arrayed like a pilgrim, the hood lowered over the face, but Dick, in an instant, recognised Sir Daniel.

He strode up to him, drawing his sword; and the knight, putting his hand in his bosom, as if to seize a hidden weapon, steadfastly awaited his approach.

“Well, Dickon,” said Sir Daniel, “how is it to be? Do ye make war upon the fallen?”

“I made no war upon your life,” replied the lad; “I was your true friend until ye sought for mine; but ye have sought for it greedily.”

“Nay – self-defence,” replied the knight. “And now, boy, the news of this battle, and the presence of yon crooked devil here in mine own wood, have broken me beyond all help. I go to Holywood for sanctuary; thence over-seas, with what I can carry, and to begin life again in Burgundy or France.”

“Ye may not go to Holywood,” said Dick.

“How! May not?” asked the knight.

“Look ye, Sir Daniel, this is my marriage morn,” said Dick; “and yon sun that is to rise will make the brightest day that ever shone for me. Your life is forfeit – doubly forfeit, for my father’s death and your own practices to meward. But I myself have done amiss; I have brought about men’s deaths; and upon this glad day I will be neither judge nor hangman. An ye were the devil, I would not lay a hand on you. An ye were the devil, ye might go where ye will for me. Seek God’s forgiveness; mine ye have freely. But to go on to Holywood is different. I carry arms for York, and I will suffer no spy within their lines. Hold it, then, for certain, if ye set one foot before another, I will uplift my voice and call the nearest post to seize you.”

“Ye mock me,” said Sir Daniel. “I have no safety out of Holywood.”

“I care no more,” returned Richard. “I let you go east, west, or south; north I will not. Holywood is shut against you. Go, and seek not to return. For, once ye are gone, I will warn every post about this army, and there will be so shrewd a watch upon all pilgrims that, once again, were ye the very devil, ye would find it ruin to make the essay.”

“Ye doom me,” said Sir Daniel gloomily.

“I doom you not,” returned Richard. “If it so please you to set your valour against mine, come on; and though I fear it be disloyal to my party, I will take the challenge openly and fully, fight you with mine own single strength, and call for none to help me. So shall I avenge my father, with a perfect conscience.”

“Ay,” said Sir Daniel, “y’ have a long sword against my dagger.”

“I rely upon Heaven only,” answered Dick, casting his sword some way behind him on the snow. “Now, if your ill-fate bids you, come; and, under the pleasure of the Almighty, I make myself bold to feed your bones to foxes.”

“I did but try you, Dickon,” returned the knight, with an uneasy semblance of a laugh. “I would not spill your blood.”

“Go, then, ere it be too late,” replied Shelton. “In five minutes I will call the post. I do perceive that I am too long-suffering. Had but our places been reversed, I should have been bound hand and foot some minutes past.”

“Well, Dickon, I will go,” replied Sir Daniel. “When we next meet, it shall repent you that ye were so harsh.”

And with these words, the knight turned and began to move off under the trees. Dick watched him with strangely mingled feelings, as he went, swiftly and warily, and ever and again turning a wicked eye upon the lad who had spared him, and whom he still suspected.

There was upon one side of where he went a thicket strongly matted with green ivy, and, even in its winter state, impervious to the eye. Herein, all of a sudden, a bow sounded like a note of music. An arrow flew, and with a great, choked cry of agony and anger, the Knight of Tunstall threw up his hands and fell forward in the snow.

Dick bounded to his side and raised him. His face desperately worked; his whole body was shaken by contorting spasms.

“Is the arrow black?” he gasped.

“It is black,” replied Dick gravely.

And then, before he could add one word, a desperate seizure of pain shook the wounded man from head to foot, so that his body leaped in Dick’s supporting arms, and with the extremity of that pang his spirit fled in silence.

The young man laid him back gently on the snow and prayed for that unprepared and guilty spirit, and as he prayed the sun came up at a bound, and the robins began chirping in the ivy.

When he rose to his feet, he found another man upon his knees but a few steps behind him, and, still with uncovered head, he waited until that prayer also should be over. It took long; the man, with his head bowed and his face covered with his hands, prayed like one in a great disorder or distress of mind; and by the bow that lay beside him, Dick judged that he was no other than the archer who had laid Sir Daniel low.

At length he also rose, and showed the countenance of Ellis Duckworth.

“Richard,” he said, very gravely, “I heard you. Ye took the better part and pardoned; I took the worse, and there lies the clay of mine enemy. Pray for me.”

And he wrung him by the hand.

“Sir,” said Richard, “I will pray for you, indeed; though how I may prevail I wot not. But if ye have so long pursued revenge, and find it now of such a sorry flavour, bethink ye, were it not well to pardon others? Hatch – he is dead, poor shrew! I would have spared a better; and for Sir Daniel, here lies his body. But for the priest, if I might anywise prevail, I would have you let him go.”

A flash came into the eyes of Ellis Duckworth.

“Nay,” he said, “the devil is still strong within me. But be at rest; the Black Arrow flieth nevermore – the fellowship is broken. They that still live shall come to their quiet and ripe end, in Heaven’s good time, for me; and for yourself, go where your better fortune calls you, and think no more of Ellis.”

CHAPTER VIII

CONCLUSION

About nine in the morning Lord Foxham was leading his ward, once more dressed as befitted her sex, and followed by Alicia Risingham, to the church of Holywood, when Richard Crookback, his brow already heavy with cares, crossed their path and paused.

“Is this the maid?” he asked; and when Lord Foxham had replied in the affirmative, “Minion,” he added, “hold up your face until I see its favour.”

He looked upon her sourly for a little.

“Ye are fair,” he said at last, “and, as they tell me, dowered. How if I offered you a brave marriage, as became your face and parentage?”

“My lord duke,” replied Joanna, “may it please your grace, I had rather wed with Sir Richard.”

“How so?” he asked harshly. “Marry but the man I name to you, and he shall be my lord, and you my lady, before night. For Sir Richard, let me tell you plainly, he will die Sir Richard.”

“I ask no more of Heaven, my lord, than but to die Sir Richard’s wife,” returned Joanna.

“Look ye at that, my lord,” said Gloucester, turning to Lord Foxham. “Here be a pair for you. The lad, when for good services I gave him his choice of my favour, chose but the grace of an old drunken shipman. I did warn him freely, but he was stout in his besottedness. ‘Here dieth your favour,’ said I: and he, my lord, with a most assured impertinence, ‘Mine be the loss,’ quoth he. It shall be so, by the rood!”

“Said he so?” cried Alicia. “Then well said, lion-driver!”

“Who is this?” asked the duke.

“A prisoner of Sir Richard’s,” answered Lord Foxham; “Mistress Alicia Risingham.”

“See that she be married to a sure man,” said the duke.

“I had thought of my kinsman, Hamley, an it like your grace,” returned Lord Foxham. “He hath well served the cause.”

“It likes me well,” said Richard. “Let them be wedded speedily. – Say, fair maid, will you wed?”

“My lord duke,” said Alicia, “so as the man is straight – ” And there, in a perfect consternation, the voice died on her tongue.

“He is straight, my mistress,” replied Richard calmly. “I am the only crookback of my party; we are else passably well shapen. – Ladies, and you, my lord,” he added, with a sudden change to grave courtesy, “judge me not too churlish if I leave you. A captain, in the time of war, hath not the ordering of his hours.”

And with a very handsome salutation he passed on, followed by his officers.

“Alack,” cried Alicia, “I am shent!”

“Ye know him not,” replied Lord Foxham. “It is but a trifle; he hath already clean forgot your words.”

“He is, then, the very flower of knighthood,” said Alicia.

“Nay, but he mindeth other things,” returned Lord Foxham. “Tarry we no more.”

In the chancel they found Dick waiting, attended by a few young men; and there were he and Joan united. When they came forth again, happy and yet serious, into the frosty air and sunlight, the long flies of the army were already winding forward up the road; already the Duke of Gloucester’s banner was unfolded and began to move from before the abbey in a clump of spears; and behind it, girt by steel-clad knights, the bold, black-hearted, and ambitious hunchback moved on towards his brief kingdom and his lasting infamy. But the wedding party turned upon the other side, and sat down, with sober merriment, to breakfast. The father cellarer attended on their wants, and sat with them at table. Hamley, all jealousy forgotten, began to ply the nowise loath Alicia with courtship. And there, amid the sounding of tuckets and the clash of armoured soldiery and horses continually moving forth, Dick and Joan sat side by side, tenderly held hands, and looked, with ever growing affection, in each other’s eyes.

Thenceforth the dust and blood of that unruly epoch passed them by. They dwelt apart from alarms in the green forest where their love began.

Two old men in the meanwhile enjoyed pensions in great prosperity and peace, and with perhaps a superfluity of ale and wine, in Tunstall hamlet. One had been all his life a shipman, and continued to the last to lament his man Tom. The other, who had been a bit of everything, turned in the end towards piety, and made a most religious death under the name of Brother Honestus in the neighbouring abbey. So Lawless had his will, and died a friar.

MARKHEIM

“Yes,” said the dealer, “our windfalls are of various kinds. Some customers are ignorant, and then I touch a dividend on my superior knowledge. Some are dishonest,” and here he held up the candle, so that the light fell strongly on his visitor, “and in that case,” he continued, “I profit by my virtue.”

Markheim had but just entered from the daylight streets, and his eyes had not yet grown familiar with the mingled shine and darkness in the shop. At these pointed words, and before the near presence of the flame, he blinked painfully and looked aside.

The dealer chuckled. “You come to me on Christmas Day,” he resumed, “when you know that I am alone in my house, put up my shutters, and make a point of refusing business. Well, you will have to pay for that; you will have to pay for my loss of time, when I should be balancing my books; you will have to pay, besides, for a kind of manner that I remark in you to-day very strongly. I am the essence of discretion, and ask no awkward questions; but when a customer cannot look me in the eye, he has to pay for it.” The dealer once more chuckled; and then, changing to his usual business voice, though still with a note of irony, “You can give, as usual, a clear account of how you came into the possession of the object?” he continued. “Still your uncle’s cabinet? A remarkable collector, sir!”

And the little pale, round-shouldered dealer stood almost on tip-toe, looking over the top of his gold spectacles, and nodding his head with every mark of disbelief. Markheim returned his gaze with one of infinite pity, and a touch of horror.

“This time,” said he, “you are in error. I have not come to sell, but to buy. I have no curios to dispose of; my uncle’s cabinet is bare to the wainscot; even were it still intact, I have done well on the Stock Exchange, and should more likely add to it than otherwise, and my errand to-day is simplicity itself. I seek a Christmas present for a lady,” he continued, waxing more fluent as he struck into the speech he had prepared; “and certainly I owe you every excuse for thus disturbing you upon so small a matter. But the thing was neglected yesterday; I must produce my little compliment at dinner; and, as you very well know, a rich marriage is not a thing to be neglected.”

There followed a pause, during which the dealer seemed to weigh this statement incredulously. The ticking of many clocks among the curious lumber of the shop, and the faint rushing of the cabs in a near thoroughfare, filled up the interval of silence.

“Well, sir,” said the dealer, “be it so. You are an old customer after all; and if, as you say, you have the chance of a good marriage, far be it from me to be an obstacle. – Here is a nice thing for a lady now,” he went on, “this hand-glass – fifteenth-century, warranted; comes from a good collection, too; but I reserve the name, in the interests of my customer, who was just like yourself, my dear sir, the nephew and sole heir of a remarkable collector.”

The dealer, while he thus ran on in his dry and biting voice, had stooped to take the object from its place; and, as he had done so, a shock had passed through Markheim, a start both of hand and foot, a sudden leap of many tumultuous passions to the face. It passed as swiftly as it came, and left no trace beyond a certain trembling of the hand that now received the glass.

“A glass,” he said hoarsely, and then paused, and repeated it more clearly. “A glass? For Christmas? Surely not?”

“And why not?” cried the dealer. “Why not a glass?”

Markheim was looking upon him with an indefinable expression. “You ask me why not?” he said. “Why, look here – look in it – look at yourself! Do you like to see it? No! nor I – nor any man.”

The little man had jumped back when Markheim had so suddenly confronted him with the mirror; but now, perceiving there was nothing worse on hand, he chuckled. “Your future lady, sir, must be pretty hard favoured,” said he.

“I ask you,” said Markheim, “for a Christmas present, and you give me this – this damned reminder of years, and sins and follies – this hand-conscience. Did you mean it? Had you a thought in your mind? Tell me. It will be better for you if you do. Come, tell me about yourself. I hazard a guess now, that you are in secret a very charitable man?”

The dealer looked closely at his companion. It was very odd, Markheim did not appear to be laughing; there was something in his face like an eager sparkle of hope, but nothing of mirth.

“What are you driving at?” the dealer asked.

“Not charitable?” returned the other gloomily. “Not charitable? not pious; not scrupulous; unloving, unbeloved; a hand to get money, a safe to keep it. Is that all? Dear God, man, is that all?”

“I will tell you what it is,” began the dealer, with some sharpness, and then broke off again into a chuckle. “But I see this is a love-match of yours, and you have been drinking the lady’s health.”

“Ah!” cried Markheim, with a strange curiosity. “Ah, have you been in love? Tell me about that.”

“I,” cried the dealer. “I in love! I never had the time, nor have I the time to-day for all this nonsense. – Will you take the glass?”

“Where is the hurry?” returned Markheim. “It is very pleasant to stand here talking; and life is so short and insecure that I would not hurry away from any pleasure – no, not even from so mild a one as this. We should rather cling, cling to what little we can get, like a man at a cliff’s edge. Every second is a cliff, if you think upon it – a cliff a mile high – high enough, if we fall, to dash us out of every feature of humanity. Hence it is best to talk pleasantly. Let us talk of each other: why should we wear this mask? Let us be confidential. Who knows? – we might become friends.”

“I have just one word to say to you,” said the dealer. “Either make your purchase, or walk out of my shop!”

“True, true,” said Markheim. “Enough fooling. To business. Show me something else.”

The dealer stooped once more, this time to replace the glass upon the shelf, his thin blond hair falling over his eyes as he did so. Markheim moved a little nearer, with one hand in the pocket of his greatcoat: he drew himself up and filled his lungs; at the same time many different emotions were depicted together on his face – terror, horror, and resolve, fascination and a physical repulsion; and through a haggard lift of his upper lip his teeth looked out.

“This, perhaps, may suit,” observed the dealer: and then, as he began to re-arise, Markheim bounded from behind upon his victim. The long, skewer-like dagger flashed and fell. The dealer struggled like a hen, striking his temple on the shelf, and then tumbled on the floor in a heap.

Time had some score of small voices in that shop, some stately and slow, as was becoming to their great age; others garrulous and hurried. All these told out the seconds in an intricate chorus of tickings. Then the passage of a lad’s feet, heavily running on the pavement, broke in upon these smaller voices and startled Markheim into the consciousness of his surroundings. He looked about him awfully. The candle stood on the counter, its flame solemnly wagging in a draught; and by that inconsiderable movement the whole room was filled with noiseless bustle and kept heaving like a sea: the tall shadows nodding, the gross blots of darkness swelling and dwindling as with respiration, the faces of the portraits and the china gods changing and wavering like images in water. The inner door stood ajar, and peered into that leaguer of shadows with a long slit of daylight like a pointing finger.