Darnley; or, The Field of the Cloth of Gold

by G. P. R. James

  CHAPTER XXVI.

  He is a worthy gentleman, Exceedingly well read, and profited In strange concealments.--Henry IV.

  It was hardly night when Sir Osborne departed; a faint and diminishingblush still tinged the eastern sky; the blackbird was still singinghis full round notes from every thicket; and not a star had yetventured forth upon the pathway of the sun, except one, that, brightand sweet even then, seemed like a fond and favoured child to themonarch of the sky, following fearlessly on his brilliant steps, whileothers held aloof. The calm of the evening sank down gently on theyoung adventurer's heart: it was so mild, so placid; and though,perhaps, pensive and tinged with melancholy, yet there was a sort ofpromise in that last smile of parting day, which led Hope forward, andtold of brighter moments yet to come. For some time the knightindulged in vague dreams, made up, as indeed is the whole dream ofhuman life, of hopes and fears, expectation and despondency; thengiving up thought for action, he spurred forward his horse, andproceeded as fast as he could towards London. Longpole followed insilence; for, in spite of all his philosophy, he felt a sort of qualmat the idea of the long period which must intervene ere he could hopeto see his pretty Geraldine, that took away several ounces of hisloquacity.

  London, at length, spread wide before them, and after some needlesscircumambulation, owing to the knight's total ignorance of thelabyrinthian intricacies of the city, and the dangerous littleness ofLongpole's knowledge thereof, they at length reached Gracious Street,and discovered the small, square paved court, long since built over,and I believe now occupied by a tea-dealer, but which then afforded asort of area before the dwelling of the Flemish merchant, WilliamHans. On the left hand, nearest the river, was situated thecounting-house; and to the front, as well as to the right, stretched arange of buildings which, from their Polyphemus-like appearance,having but one window or aperture in the front (except the door), theknight concluded to be those warehouses whose indiscriminate mawswallowed up the produce of all parts of the earth. Over thecounting-house, however, appeared several smaller windows, principallyglazed, and through one of these shone forth upon the night the lightof a taper, giving notice that some one still waked within. WhileLongpole dismounted, and knocked with the hilt of his dagger against alittle door by the side of that which led to the counting-house, theknight watched the light in the window; but he watched and Longpoleknocked in vain; for neither did the light move nor the door open,till Sir Osborne bethought him of a stratagem to call the merchant'sattention.

  "Make a low knocking against the windows of the counting-house,Longpole," said he, "as if you were trying to force them. I have knownthese money-getters as deaf as adders to any sound but that whichmenaced the mammon."

  Longpole obeyed, and the moment after the light moved. "Hold! hold!"cried the knight, "he hears;" and the next moment the casement windowwas pushed open, through which the head of the good merchant protrudeditself, vociferating, "Who's tere? What do you want? I'll call tewatch. Watch! Watch!"

  "_Taisez-vous!_" cried the knight, addressing him in French, not beingable to speak the Brabant dialect of the merchant, and yet not wishingto proclaim his errand aloud in English. "_Nous sommes amis_;_descendez, Guillaume Hans: c'est le Sire de Darnley_."

  "Oh! I'll come down, I'll come down," cried the merchant "Run,Skippenhausen, and open te door. I'll come down, my coot lord, in aminute."

  The two travellers had not now long to wait; for in a moment or twothe little door at which Longpole had at first in vain applied foradmission was thrown open by a personage, the profundity of whosenether garments, together with his long waistcoat, square-cut bluecoat, with the seams, and there were many, all bound with white lace,induced Sir Osborne immediately to write him down for a Dutchnavigator. Descending the stairs, immediately behind this firstapparition, came the merchant himself, with his black gown, which hadprobably been laid aside for the night, now hurried on, not with themost correct adjustment in the world, for it looked very much as ifturned inside out, which might well happen to a robe, the sleeves ofwhich were not above six inches long. Sir Osborne, however, did notstay to investigate the subject very minutely; but explaining to thegood merchant that he had something particular to say to him, he wasconducted into the counting-house, where he informed him as succinctlyas possible of what had occurred and what he desired. Good Master Hanswas prodigal of his astonishment, which vented itself in variousexclamations in Flemish, English, and French; after which, coming tobusiness, as he said, he told the knight that he could put up hishorses in the same stable where he kept his drays, and that after thatthey would talk of the rest. "But on my wort, my coot lord," said he,"I must go with your man myself, for there is not one soul in theplace to let him in or out of the stable, which is behind the house."

  The most troublesome part of the affair for the moment was to take offthe bard or horse armour that covered the knight's charger, as itcould not be left in the stable till the next morning, when themerchant's carters would arrive; and poor William Hans was desperatelyafraid that the round of the watch would pass while the operation wasin execution, and suppose that he was receiving some contraband goods,which might cause a search the next day.

  The business, however, was happily accomplished by the aid of theDutch captain, who, seeing that there was something mysterious goingforward, and having a taste that way, gave more active assistance thaneither his face or figure might have taught one to expect.

  He also it was who, while the good merchant, with the candle in hishand, led our friend Longpole with the horses to the stable, conductedthe knight up-stairs into the room where they had first discovered thelight, and invited him, in extremely good English, to be seated. Bythe appearance of the chamber it seemed that Master Hans had beenpreparing to make great cheer for his captain; for various were theflagons and bottles that stood upon the table, together with trenchersand plates unused, and a pile of manchet and spice bread, with othersigns and prognostications of a rere-supper; not to mention an immensebowl which stood in the midst, and whose void rotundity seemedyearning for some savoury mass not yet concocted.

  It was not long before the merchant re-appeared, accompanied byLongpole, who, according to the custom of those days, when many avarious rank might be seen at the same board, seated himself at thefarther end of the table, after having taken his master's casque, andsoon engaged the Dutch captain in conversation, while the knightconsulted with William Hans regarding the means of quitting England asspeedily as possible.

  "It is very unlucky you did not let me know before," said themerchant, "for we might easily have cot the ship of my coot friendSkippenhausen there ready to-day, and you could have sailed to-morrowmorning by the first tide. You might trust him; you might trust himwith your life. Bless you, my coot lord! 'tis he that brings me overthe Bibles from Holland."

  "But cannot we sail the day after to-morrow," said the knight, "if oneday will be sufficient to complete his freight?"

  "Oh, that he can!" answered the merchant; "but what will you do tillthen?" he added, with a melancholy shake of the head; "you will neverlike to lie in warehouse like a parcel of dry goods."

  "Why, it must be so, I suppose," said the knight, "if you have anyplace capable of concealing me."

  "Oh, dear life, yes!" cried William Hans; "a place that would conceala dozen. I had it made on purpose after that evil May-day, when thewild rabblement of London rose, and nearly murdered all the strangersthey could find. I thought what had happened once might happen again;and so I had in some of my own country people, and caused it to bemade very securely."

  The matter was now soon arranged. It was agreed that the knight andLongpole should lie concealed at the merchant's till the ship wasready to sail, and that then Master Skippenhausen was to provide thema safe passage to some town in Flanders; which being finally settledbetween all parties, it only remained to fix the price of theirconveyance with the Dutchman. "I am an honest man," said he, on thesubject being mentioned, "and will not rob you. If you were
in nohurry to go, and could go quietly, I would charge you ten marks a ton;but as you are in distress, I will only charge you fifteen."

  "Faith!" burst forth Longpole, "you are very liberal! Why, do youcharge us _more_, not _less_, because we are in distress?"

  "Certainly," answered the Dutchman, with imperturbable tranquillity;"nine men out of ten would charge you five times as much when theyfound you wanted to go very bad, now I only charge you one-half more."

  "I believe you are right," said Sir Osborne. "However, I do not objectto your price; but tell me, what do you mean by fifteen marks a ton?Do you intend to weigh us?"

  "To be sure," answered the Dutchman; "why not? All my freight isweighed, and why not you, too? No, no. I'll have nothing on board thatis not weighed: it's all put in the book."

  "Well," said the knight, with a smile, "it does not much matter. Canyou take my horses too by weight?"

  "Certainly," replied the other, "I can take anything; but I amresponsible for nothing. If your horses kick themselves to death inthe hold, that is not my fault."

  "I will take care of that," said the knight. "Here, Longpole, help meto put off my harness: I cannot sit in it all night."

  While the custrel was thus employed in aiding his lord to disarm,the door opened, and in bustled a servant-maid of about two orthree-and-thirty, whose rosy cheeks had acquired a deeper tinge by thesoft wooing of a kitchen fire, and whose sharp eyes shot forth thosebrilliant rays generally supposed to be more animated by the wrathfulspirit of cookery and of ardent coals than by any softer power orflame. Immediately that she beheld two strangers, forth burst upon thehead of William Hans the impending storm. She abused him for tellingher that there would only be himself and the captain; she vowed thatshe had not cooked half salmon enough for four; she declared that shehad only put down plates and bread for two; and she ended byprotesting that she never in her life had seen anybody so stupid as hehimself, William Hans.

  To the mind of Sir Osborne, the lady somewhat forgot the respect dueto her master; but, however, whether it was from one of those strange,mysterious ascendancies which cooks and housekeepers occasionallyacquire over middle-aged single gentlemen, or whether it was from anatural meekness of disposition in the worthy Fleming, he bore it withmost exemplary patience; and when want of breath for a moment pulledthe check-string of the lady's tongue, he informed her that the twostrangers had come unexpectedly. Thereupon, muttering to herselfsomething very like "Why the devil did they come at all!" she set downon the table a dish of hot boiled salmon; and, after flouncing out ofthe room, returned with the air of the most injured person in theworld, bringing in a platter-full of dried peas, likewise boiled.

  These various ingredients (the salmon was salted) William Hansimmediately seized upon, and emptied them into the great bowl we havealready mentioned. Then casting off his gown, and tucking up thesleeves of his coat, he mashed them all together; adding variousslices of some well-preserved pippins, a wooden spoon's capacity offine oil, and three of vinegar. Fancy such a mess to eat at eleveno'clock at night, and then go to bed and dream! Boiled salmon andpeas! apples and oil! and vinegar to crown it!

  However, Sir Osborne resisted the tempting viands, and contentedhimself with some of the plain bread, although both the merchant andthe captain pressed him several times to partake; assuring him, whilethe oil and vinegar ran out at the corners of their mouths, that itwas "very coot; very coot indeed; excellent!" And so much did theyseem to enjoy it, that the unhappy Longpole was tempted for his sinsto taste the egregious compound, and begged a small quantity at thehands of good Master Hans. The bountiful merchant shovelled awaggon-load of it upon his plate, and the yeoman, fancying himselfbound in common politeness to eat it, contrived to swallow three wholemouthfuls with a meekness and patience that in the succeeding reignwould have classed him with the martyrs; but at the fourth hishumanity rebelled, and thrusting the plate from him with a vehemencethat nearly overturned all the rest, "No!" cried he. "No, by----!there is no standing that!"

  The merchant and his countryman chuckled amazingly at poor Longpole'swant of taste, and even the knight, albeit in no very laughter-lovingmood, could not help smiling at his custrel's discomfiture. But as allthings must come to an end, the salt salmon and peas were at lengthconcluded, and some marmalades and confections substituted in theirplace, which proved much more suitable to the taste of such of thecompany as were uninitiated in the mysteries of Flemish cookery.

  With the sweatmeats came the wines, which were all of peculiar rarityand excellence; for in this particular, at least, William Hans was aman of no small taste, which he kept indeed in continual practice. Notthat we would imply that he drank too much or too often, but still thegod of the gilded horns had been gently fingering his nose, and with alight and skilful pencil had decorated all the adjacent parts with aminute and delicate tracery of interwoven rosy lines.

  As the wine diffused itself over his stomach, it seemed to buoy up hisheart to his lips. Prudence, too, slackened her reins, and on went histongue, galloping as a beggar's horse is reported to do, on a way thatshall be nameless. Many were the things he said which he should nothave said, and many were the things he told which would have beenbetter left untold. Amongst others, he acknowledged himself aLutheran, which in that age, if it tended to find out bliss in theother world, was very likely to bring down damnation in this. Heaverred that he looked upon the Bishop of Rome, as he called the pope,in the light of that Babylonish old lady whose more particularqualification is not fit for ears polite; and he confessed that whenDr. Fitz-James, the Bishop of London, had bought up all thetranslations of the Bible he could find, and burnt them all at Paul'sCross, he had furnished the furious Romanist with a whole cargo ofincomplete copies. "So that," continued he, "the bishop damned his ownsoul the more completely by burning God's Word, and paid the freightand binding of a new and complete set into the bargain." And hechuckled and grinned with mercantile glee at his successfulspeculation, and with puritanic triumph over the persecutors of hissect.

  Sir Osborne soon began to be weary of the scene, and begged to knowwhere he should find his chamber, upon which Master Hans rose toconduct him, with perfect steadiness of limb, the wine having affectednothing but his tongue. Lighting a lamp, he preceded the knight withgreat reverence; and while Longpole followed with the armour, he ledthe way up a little narrow stair to a small room, the walls of which,though not covered with arras, were hung with painted canvass, after acommon fashion of the day, representing the whole history of Jonah andthe whale; wherein the fish was decidedly cod, and the sea undoubtedlybutter and parsley, notwithstanding anything that the scientific maysay to such an assemblage. The ship was evidently one that would havesunk in any sea except that she was in: she could not have sailedacross Chancery Lane in a wet day without foundering; and, as if torender her heavier, the artist had stowed her to the head withDutchmen, rendering her, like the _dinde ? la Sainte Alliance_ (viz. aturkey stuffed with woodcocks), one heavy thing crammed full ofanother.

  The whole of the room, however, was cleanliness itself: the little bedthat stood in the corner with its fine linen sheets, the small dealtable, even the very sand upon the floor, all were as white as snow."I am afraid, my coot lord," said the merchant, who never lost hisrespect for his guest, "that your lordship will be poorly lodged; butthese three chambers along in front are what I keep always ready, incase of any of my captains arriving unexpectedly, and it is all cleanand proper, I can assure you. I will now go and bring you a cushionfor your head, and what the French call the _coupe de bonne nuit_, andwill myself call your lordship to-morrow, before any one is up, thatyou may take your hiding-place without being seen."

  The knight was somewhat surprised to find his host's recollection soclear, notwithstanding his potations; but he knew not what much habitin that kind will do, and still doubted whether his memory would beactive enough to remind him that he was to call him when the nextmorning should really come.

  However, he did Master Hans injustice; for w
ithout fail, at the hourof five, he presented himself at the knight's door; and soon afterrousing Longpole, he conducted them both down to the warehouses,through whose deep obscurity they groped their way, amidst tuns, andbags, and piles, and bales, with no other light than such stragglingrays as found their way through the chinks and crevices of the boardswhich covered the windows for the night.

  At length an enormous butt presented itself, which appeared to beempty; for without any great effort the old merchant contrived to moveit from its place. Behind this appeared a pile of untanned hides,which he set himself to put on one side as fast as possible, thoughfor what purpose Sir Osborne did not well understand, as he beheldnothing behind them but the rough planks which formed the wall of thewarehouse. As the pile diminished, a circumstance occurred which madeall the parties hurry their movements, and despatch the hides as fastas possible. This was nothing else than a loud and reiterated knockingat the outer door, which at first induced Master Hans to raise hishead and listen; but then, without saying a word, he set himself towork again harder than ever, and with the assistance of the knight andLongpole, soon cleared away all obstruction, and left the fair face ofthe boarded wall before them.

  Kneeling down, the merchant now thrust his fingers under the planks,where the apparently rude workmanship of the builder had left a chinkbetween them and the ground, then applied all his strength to avigorous heave, and in a moment three of the planks at once slid up,being made to play in a groove, like the door of a lion's den, anddiscovered a small chamber beyond, lighted by a glazed aperturetowards the sky.

  "In, in, my coot lord!" cried the merchant; "don't you hear how theyare knocking at the door? They will soon rouse my maid Julian, thoughshe sleeps like a marmot. What they want I don't know."

  Sir Osborne and Longpole were not tardy in taking possession of theirhiding-place; and having themselves pulled down the sliding door bymeans of the cross-bars, which in the inside united the three plankstogether, they fastened it with a little bolt, whereby any one withincould render his retreat as firm, and, to all appearance, asimmoveable as the rest of the wall. They then heard the carefulWilliam Hans replace the hides, roll back the butt, and pace away;after which nothing met their ear but the unceasing knocking at theouter door, which seemed every minute to assume a fiercer character,and which was perfectly audible in their place of refuge.

  The merchant appeared to treat the matter very carelessly, and not tomake any reply till it suited his convenience; for during some minuteshe let the knockers knock on. At length, however, that particularsound ceased, and from a sort of rush and clatter of several tongues,the knight concluded that the door had been at length opened. At thesame time the voice of the Fleming made itself heard, in well-assumedtones of passion, abusing the intruders for waking him so early in themorning, bringing scandal upon his house, and taking away hischaracter.

  "Seize the old villain!" cried another voice; "we have certaininformation that they are here. Search every hole and corner; theymust have arrived last night."

  Such, and various other broken sentences, pronounced by the loudtongue of some man in office, reached the ears of Sir Osborne,convincing him, notwithstanding Henry's assurance that till noon ofthat day he should remain unpursued, that Wolsey, taking advantage ofthe king's absence at Richmond, had lost no time in issuing thewarrant for his arrest.

  Sitting down on a pile of books, which was the only thing that thelittle chamber contained, he listened with some degree of anxiety tothe various noises of the search. Now it was a direction from thechief of the party to look here or to look there; now the variouscries of the searchers when they either thought they had discoveredsomething suspicious or were disappointed in some expectation; now therolling of the butts, the overturning of the bales, the casting downof the skins and leathers; now the party was far off, and now so nearthat the knight could hear every movement of the man who examined thehides before the door of his hiding-place. At one time, in theeagerness of his search, the fellow even struck his elbow against theboarding, and might probably have discovered that it was hollowunderneath, had not the tingling pain of his arm engaged all hisattention, passing off in a fit of dancing and stamping, mingled withvarious ungodly execrations.

  At length, however, the pursuers seemed entirely foiled; andafter having passed more than two hours, some in examining thedwelling-house and some the warehouse, after having tumbled over everyarticle of poor William Hans's goods, their loud cries and insolentswaggering dwindled away to low murmurs of disappointment; and growingfainter and fainter as they proceeded to the door, the sounds atlength ceased entirely, and left the place in complete silence. Notlong after, the workmen arrived and began their ordinary occupationsfor the day; and Sir Osborne and Longpole thanked their happy stars,both for having escaped the present danger, and for their enemy'ssearch being now probably turned in some other direction.