The Prince and the Page: A Story of the Last Crusade, Charlotte M. Yonge [top e book reader .txt] 📗

Richard spent the day in dull despair, listening for sounds without with an intensity of attention that seemed to pervade every limb, and yet with snatches of sleep that brought dreams more intolerable than the reality which they yet seemed to enhance.

At last, however, the sultry closeness of the day subsided, the Angelus bell sounded far off from the churches and convents of Acre, and near from the chapel tent, and the devotions that it proclaimed were not ended when Richard heard the cry of the crusading watch—“Remember the Holy Sepulchre.”

Yes, the Holy Sepulchre might not be recovered and reached by the English army, but it might still be remembered, and therein be laid down all struggles of the will, all rebellious agony, at the being misunderstood, misused, vituperated, all suffering might there be offered up; nor could the most ignominious death stand between him and the thought of that Holy Tomb, and of the joy beyond.—Son of a man who, sorely tried, had drawn his sword against his king, brother of wilful murderers, perhaps to die innocent was the best fate he could hope; and in accordance with the doctrine of his time, he hoped that his death might serve as a part of a sacrifice for the family guilt.  Nay, the Prince gone, wherefore should he wish to live?

“Don’t you see?  The Prince’s signet!  He said I should bring him!  Clown that thou art, hast no eyes nor ears?  What, don’t you know me?  I am the young lord of Dunster, the Prince’s foot-page.  It is his command.”

And amid some perplexed mutterings from the guard, little John of Dunster burst into the tent.  “Up, up,” he cried, “you are to come to the Prince instantly.”

“How fares he?”—Richard’s one question of the day.

“Sorely ill at ease,” said the boy, “but he wants you, he calls for you, and no one would tell him where you were, so I spoke out at last, and he bade me take his ring and bring you, for ’tis his pleasure.  Come now, for the Earl of Lancaster and Hamlyn are gone to take the Princess to Acre, and my Lord of Gloucester has taken his red head off to sleep, and no one is there but old Raymond and some of the grooms.

“The Princess gone!”

“Ay, and Dame Idonea with her.  So we shall hear no more of King Cœur de Lion.  Hamlyn swears she was on his crusade.  Do you think she was, Richard? nobody knows how old she is.”

Richard was a great deal too anxious to ask questions himself, to be able to answer this query.  And as the yeomen let him pass them, only begging him to bear him out with the Princes, he hastily gathered from the boy all that he could tell.  The Prince had, it appeared, been in a most suffering state from pain and fever all the night and the ensuing day, and had hardly noticed any one but his devoted wife, who had attended him unremittingly, until with the cooler air of evening she saw him slightly revived, but was herself so completely spent, and so unwell, as to be incapable of opposing his decision that she should at once be carried into the city to receive the succours her state demanded.  When she was gone, Edward, who had perhaps sought to spare her the sight of his last agony, had roused himself to make his will, and choose protectors for his father and young children; and it was after this that his inquiries became urgent for Richard de Montfort.  He was at length answered by the indignant little foot-page; and greatly resenting the action of the council, he had, as John said, “frowned and spoken like himself,” and sent the little fellow in quest of the young esquire.

The tent was nearly dark, and Richard could only see the outline of the tall form laid prostrate, but the voice he had feared never to hear again, spoke, though slowly and wearily, and a hand was held out.  “Welcome, cousin,” he said.  “Poor boy, they must needs have at thee ere the breath was out of my body; but for that, at least, they shall wait, and longer if my word and will can avail after I am gone.  What has given them occasion against thee, Richard?”

“Alas! my Lord, you are too ill at ease to vex yourself with my matters.”

“Nay, but I must see thee righted, Richard; there are services for thee to do to me.  Hark thee!  I have bequeathed thee thy mother’s lands at Odiham, which my father gave to me.  So mayest thou do for Henry whate’er he will brook,” he added, with a languid smile, holding Richard’s hand in such a manner as to impress that though his words came very tardily, he did not mean to be interrupted.  “Methinks Henry will not grudge a kindly thought and a few prayers for his old comrade.  And, Richard, strive to be near my poor boys; strive that they be bred in strict self-rule, and let them hear of the purposes thy father left to me: I think thou knowst them or canst divine them better than any other near me.  Thou shall be with them if—if Heaven and the blessed Saints bear my sweet wife through this trouble.  She will love and trust thee.”

Edward’s voice broke down in a half-strangled sob between grief and pain; he could not contemplate the thought of his wife, and weakness had broken down much of his power over himself.  He did not speak at once, or invite an answer; and when he did, his words were an exclamation of despairing weariness at the trumpet of a gnat that hovered above him.

Richard presently understood that the thin goats’ hair curtains which even the crusaders had learnt to adopt from their Oriental neighbours as protections against these enemies, being continually disarranged to give the Prince drink or to put cool applications to his wound, the winged foes were sure to enter, and with their exasperating hum further destroy all chance of rest.  The Prince had not slept since he had been wounded, and was well-nigh distraught with wakefulness, and with the continual suffering, which was only diminished at the first moment that a cold lotion touched his arm.  The Hospitaliers had sent in some ice from Mount Hermon, but no one knew how to apply it, and even Dame Idonea had despised it.

Fortunately, however, Richard had spent a few weeks on his first arrival in the infirmary of the Knights of St. John, and before his recovery had become familiar with their treatment of both ice and mosquito curtains; and when Edmund of Lancaster came into the tent cautiously in early dawn, he could hardly credit his eyes, for the squire whom he believed to be in close custody was beside his brother, holding the cold applications on the arm, and it was impossible to utter inquiry or remonstrance, for the Prince was in the profoundest, most tranquil slumber.

Nor did he awake till the camp was astir in the morning with the activity that in this summer time could only be exerted before the sun had come to his full strength.  Then, when at length he opened his eyes, he pronounced himself to be greatly refreshed; and the physician at the same time found the state of the wound greatly improved.  A cheerful answer was returned by the patient to the message of anxious inquiry sent from his Princess at Acre and then looking up kindly at Richard, he said, “Boy, if my wife saved my life once, I think thou hast saved it a second time.”

“Brother!” here broke in the Earl of Lancaster, “I would not grieve you, but for your own safety you ought to know of the grave suspicion that has fallen on this youth.”

“I know that you all have suspected him from the first, Edmund,” returned the Prince coolly, “but I little expected that the first hour of my sickness would be spent in slaking your hatred of him.”

“You do not know the reasons, brother,” said Edmund, confused; “nor are you in a state to hear them.”

“Wherefore not?” said Edward.  “Thanks to him, I have my wits clear and cool, and ere the day is older his cause shall be heard.  Fetch Gloucester, fetch the rest of the council, and let me hear your witnesses against him!  What! do you think I could rest or amend while I know not whether I have a traitor or not beside me?”

There could be no doubt that Edward was fully himself after his night’s rest, determined and prompt as ever.  No one durst withstand him, and Edmund went to take measures for his being obeyed.  Meantime, the Prince grasped Richard by the wrist, and looking him through with the keen blue eyes that seemed capable of piercing any disguise, he said, “Boy, hast thou aught that thou wouldst tell to thy kinsman Edward in this strait, that thou couldst not say to the Prince in council?”

“Sir,” said Richard, with choking voice, “I was on my way to give that very warning, when I found that the blow had fallen.  My Lord,” he added, lowering his tone, as he knelt by the Prince’s couch, “Simon lives; I met him on Mount Carmel.”

“I thought so,” muttered the Prince.  “And this is his work?”

Richard hurriedly told the circumstances of the encounter, a matter on which he had the less scruple as Simon was entirely out of reach.  He had hardly completed his narration when Prince Edmund returned, and with him came others of the council.  Edmund was followed by his squire, Hamlyn; and some of the archers were left without.  Richard had told his tale, but had had no assurance of how the Prince would act upon it, nor how far the brand of shame might be made to rest on him and his unhappy house.  He had avowed his brother’s guilt to the Prince; alas! must it again be blazoned through the camp?

The greetings and inquiries of the new arrivals were hastily got over by the Prince, who lay—holding truly a bed of justice—partly raised by his cushions, with bloodless cheeks indeed, but with flashing eyes, and lips set to all their wonted resoluteness.

“Let me hear, my Lords,” he said, “wherefore—so soon as I was disabled—you thought it meet to put mine own body squire and kinsman in ward?”

“Sir,” said the Provost Marshal, “these knaves of mine have let an accomplice escape who peradventure might have been made to tell more.”

“An accomplice?  Of whom?” demanded the Prince.

“Of the—the assassin, my Lord, on whom your own strong hand inflicted chastisement.  This Dustifoot, who was the yeoman on guard by your tent, and introduced him to your presence, was seized by the villains at night, endeavouring to hold converse with this gentleman, and was by them taken into custody, whence, I grieve to say, he hath escaped.”

“Give his guard due punishment!” said Edward shortly.  “But how concerns this the Lord Richard de Montfort’s durance?”

“Sir,” added the Earl of Gloucester, “is it known to you that the dog of a murderer was yet no Moslem?”

“What of that?” sharply demanded Edward.

“There can scarcely be a doubt,” continued the red-haired Earl, “that an attempt on your life, my Lord, could only come from one quarter.”

“Oh,” dryly replied Edward, “good cause for you to be willing that the Saracen captives should be massacred.”

“Sir, I did not then know that the miscreant was not of their faith,” said Gloucester.  “I now believe that the same revenge that caused the death of Lord Henry of Almayne has now nearly quenched the hope of England, that if you will not be warned, my Lord, worse evil may yet betide.”

Gloucester spoke with much feeling, but Edward did not show himself touched; he only said, “All this may be very well, but my question is not answered—Why was my squire put in ward?”

“Speak, Hamlyn,” said Edmund of Lancaster; “say to the Prince what thou didst tell me.”

Hamlyn stood forth, excusing himself for the painful task of accusing his kinsman, but seeing the Prince’s impatient frown, he came to the point, and declared that Richard de Montfort, on meeting him speeding to Acre, had eagerly asked him if aught had befallen the Prince, and had looked startled and confused on being taxed with being aware of what had taken place.

“Well!” said Edward.

Gloucester next beckoned a yeoman forward, who, much confused under the Prince’s keen eye, stammered out that he did not wish to harm the young gentleman, but that he had seemed mighty anxious to spare the Pagan hounds of prisoners, and had even been heard to say that their revenge would better fall on himself.

“And is this all for which you had laid hands on him?” said the Prince, looking from one to the other.

“Nay, brother,” said Edmund.  “It might have been unmarked by thee, but in the first hour myself and others heard him speak of having made speed to warn thee, but finding it too late.  Therefore did we conclude that it were well to have him in ward, lest, as in the former