Kenilworth, Walter Scott [children's books read aloud txt] 📗

followed Master Mumblazen slowly to a large oaken desk, on which a ponderous volume lay open, and then rested, as if in uncertainty, on the stranger who had entered along with him. The curate, a grey-headed clergyman, who had been a confessor in the days of Queen Mary, sat with a book in his hand in another recess in the apartment. He, too, signed a mournful greeting to Tressilian, and laid his book aside, to watch the effect his appearance should produce on the afflicted old man.

As Tressilian, his own eyes filling fast with tears, approached more and more nearly to the father of his betrothed bride, Sir Hugh's intelligence seemed to revive. He sighed heavily, as one who awakens from a state of stupor; a slight convulsion passed over his features; he opened his arms without speaking a word, and, as Tressilian threw himself into them, he folded him to his bosom.

“There is something left to live for yet,” were the first words he uttered; and while he spoke, he gave vent to his feelings in a paroxysm of weeping, the tears chasing each other down his sunburnt cheeks and long white beard.

“I ne'er thought to have thanked God to see my master weep,” said Will Badger; “but now I do, though I am like to weep for company.”

“I will ask thee no questions,” said the old knight; “no questions—none, Edmund. Thou hast not found her—or so found her, that she were better lost.”

Tressilian was unable to reply otherwise than by putting his hands before his face.

“It is enough—it is enough. But do not thou weep for her, Edmund. I have cause to weep, for she was my daughter; thou hast cause to rejoice, that she did not become thy wife.—Great God! thou knowest best what is good for us. It was my nightly prayer that I should see Amy and Edmund wedded,—had it been granted, it had now been gall added to bitterness.”

“Be comforted, my friend,” said the curate, addressing Sir Hugh, “it cannot be that the daughter of all our hopes and affections is the vile creature you would bespeak her.”

“Oh, no,” replied Sir Hugh impatiently, “I were wrong to name broadly the base thing she is become—there is some new court name for it, I warrant me. It is honour enough for the daughter of an old Devonshire clown to be the leman of a gay courtier—of Varney too—of Varney, whose grandsire was relieved by my father, when his fortune was broken, at the battle of—the battle of—where Richard was slain—out on my memory!—and I warrant none of you will help me—”

“The battle of Bosworth,” said Master Mumblazen—“stricken between Richard Crookback and Henry Tudor, grandsire of the Queen that now is, PRIMO HENRICI SEPTIMI; and in the year one thousand four hundred and eighty-five, POST CHRISTUM NATUM.”

“Ay, even so,” said the old knight; “every child knows it. But my poor head forgets all it should remember, and remembers only what it would most willingly forget. My brain has been at fault, Tressilian, almost ever since thou hast been away, and even yet it hunts counter.”

“Your worship,” said the good clergyman, “had better retire to your apartment, and try to sleep for a little space. The physician left a composing draught; and our Great Physician has commanded us to use earthly means, that we may be strengthened to sustain the trials He sends us.”

“True, true, old friend,” said Sir Hugh; “and we will bear our trials manfully—we have lost but a woman.—See, Tressilian,”—he drew from his bosom a long ringlet of glossy hair,—“see this lock! I tell thee, Edmund, the very night she disappeared, when she bid me good even, as she was wont, she hung about my neck, and fondled me more than usual; and I, like an old fool, held her by this lock, until she took her scissors, severed it, and left it in my hand—as all I was ever to see more of her!”

Tressilian was unable to reply, well judging what a complication of feelings must have crossed the bosom of the unhappy fugitive at that cruel moment. The clergyman was about to speak, but Sir Hugh interrupted him.

“I know what you would say, Master Curate,—After all, it is but a lock of woman's tresses; and by woman, shame, and sin, and death came into an innocent world.—And learned Master Mumblazen, too, can say scholarly things of their inferiority.”

“C'EST L'HOMME,” said Master Mumblazen, “QUI SE BAST, ET QUI CONSEILLE.”

“True,” said Sir Hugh, “and we will bear us, therefore, like men who have both mettle and wisdom in us.—Tressilian, thou art as welcome as if thou hadst brought better news. But we have spoken too long dry-lipped.—Amy, fill a cup of wine to Edmund, and another to me.” Then instantly recollecting that he called upon her who could not hear, he shook his head, and said to the clergyman, “This grief is to my bewildered mind what the church of Lidcote is to our park: we may lose ourselves among the briers and thickets for a little space, but from the end of each avenue we see the old grey steeple and the grave of my forefathers. I would I were to travel that road tomorrow!”

Tressilian and the curate joined in urging the exhausted old man to lay himself to rest, and at length prevailed. Tressilian remained by his pillow till he saw that slumber at length sunk down on him, and then returned to consult with the curate what steps should be adopted in these unhappy circumstances.

They could not exclude from these deliberations Master Michael Mumblazen; and they admitted him the more readily, that besides what hopes they entertained from his sagacity, they knew him to be so great a friend to taciturnity, that there was no doubt of his keeping counsel. He was an old bachelor, of good family, but small fortune, and distantly related to the House of Robsart; in virtue of which connection, Lidcote Hall had been honoured with his residence for the last twenty years. His company was agreeable to Sir Hugh, chiefly on account of his profound learning, which, though it only related to heraldry and genealogy, with such scraps of history as connected themselves with these subjects, was precisely of a kind to captivate the good old knight; besides the convenience which he found in having a friend to appeal to when his own memory, as frequently happened, proved infirm and played him false concerning names and dates, which, and all similar deficiencies, Master Michael Mumblazen supplied with due brevity and discretion. And, indeed, in matters concerning the modern world, he often gave, in his enigmatical and heraldic phrase, advice which was well worth attending to, or, in Will Badger's language, started the game while others beat the bush.

“We have had an unhappy time of it with the good knight, Master Edmund,” said the curate. “I have not suffered so much since I was torn away from my beloved flock, and compelled to abandon them to the Romish wolves.”

“That was in TERTIO MARIAE,” said Master Mumblazen.

“In the name of Heaven,” continued the curate, “tell us, has your time been better spent than ours, or have you any news of that unhappy maiden, who, being for so many years the principal joy of this broken-down house, is now proved our greatest unhappiness? Have you not at least discovered her place of residence?”

“I have,” replied Tressilian.