'Does he live?' gasped Malcolm.
'He will not,' said the King, 'if his nation be known here. Keep out of his sight! He must hear only French!'
Remembering how inexorably Henry hung every Scotch prisoner, Malcolm's heart sank. This was why no one had sought the prisoner. A Scot was not available for ransom! Should he be the murderer of his cousin, Lily's love?
Meantime James hurriedly explained to Kitson that here was the sick man left by the enemy, summoned Sir Nigel to his side, closed his own visor, and called for water; then hung over the prisoner, anxious to prevent the first word from being broad Scotch. In the free air, some long sobs showed that Patrick was struggling back to life; and James at once said, 'Rendez vous, Messire;' but he neither answered, nor was there meaning in his eyes. And James perceived that he was bandaged as though for broken ribs, and that his right shoulder was dislocated, and no doubt had been a second time pulled out when Malcolm had grasped him by the arms. He swooned again at the first attempt to lift him, and a hay-cart having been left in the flight of the marauders, he was laid in it, and covered with the King's cloak, to be conveyed to Corbeil, where James trusted to secure his life by personal intercession with Henry. He groaned heavily several times, but never opened his eyes or spoke articulately the whole way; and James and Sir Nigel kept on either side of the cart, ready to address him in French the first moment, having told the English that he was a prisoner of quality, who must be carefully conveyed to King James's tent at Corbeil. Malcolm was not allowed to approach, lest he should be recognized; and he rode along in an agony of shame and suspense, with very different feelings towards Patrick than those with which he had of late thought of him, or of his own promises. If Patrick died through this plundering raid, how should he ever face Lily?
It was nearly night ere they reached Corbeil, where the tents were pitched outside the little town. James committed his captive to the prudent care of old Baird, bidding him send for a French or Burgundian surgeon, unable to detect the Scottish tongue; and then, taking Malcolm with him, he crossed the square in the centre of the camp to the royal pavilion, opposite to which his own was pitched.
It was a sultry night, and Henry had insisted on sleeping in his tent, declaring himself sick of stone walls; and as they approached his voice could be heard in brief excited sentences, giving orders, and asking for the King of Scots.
'Here, Sir,' said James, stopping in where the curtain was looped up, and showed King Henry half sitting, half lying, on a couch of cushions and deer-skins, his eyes full of fire, his thin face flushed with deep colour; Bedford, March, Warwick, and Salisbury in attendance.
'Ho! you are late!' said Henry. 'Did you come up with the caitiff robbers?'
'They made off as we rode up. The village was already burnt.'
'Who were they? I hope you hung them on the spot, as I bade,' continued Henry, coughing between his sentences, and almost in spite of himself, putting his hand to his side.
'I was delayed. There was a life to save: a gentleman who lay sick and stifled in a burning house.'
'And what was it to you,' cried Henry, angrily, 'if a dozen rebel Armagnacs were fried alive, when I sent you to hinder my men from growing mere thieves? Gentleman, forsooth! One would think it the Dauphin himself; or mayhap Buchan. Ha! it is a Scot, then!'
'Yes, Sir,' said James; 'Sir Patrick Drummond, a good knight, hurt and helpless, for whom I entreat your grace.'
'You disobeyed me to spare a Scot!' burst forth Henry. 'You, who call yourself a captain of mine, and who know my will! He hangs instantly!'
'Harry, bethink yourself. This is no captive taken in battle. He is a sick man, left behind, sorely hurt.'
'Then wherefore must you be meddling, instead of letting him burn as he deserved, and heeding what you undertook for me? I WILL have none of your traitor ruffians here. Since you have brought him in, the halter for him!--Here, Ralf Percy, tell the Provost-marshal--'
He was interrupted, for James unbuckled his sword, and tendered it to him.
'King Harry,' he said gravely, 'this morning I was your friend and brother-in-arms; now I am your captive. Hang Patrick Drummond, who aided me at Meaux in saving my honour and such freedom as I have, and I return to any prison you please, and never strike blow for you again.'
'Take back your sword,' said Henry. 'What folly is this? You knew that I count not your rebel subjects as prisoners of war.'
'I did not know that I was saving a defenceless man from the flames to be used like a dog. I never offered my arm to serve a savage tyrant.'
'Take your sword!' reiterated Henry, his passion giving way before James's steady calmness. 'We will look into it to-morrow: but it was no soldierly act to take advantage of my weariness, to let my commands be broken the first day of taking the field, and bring the caitiff here. We will leave him for the night, I say. Take up your sword.'
'Not till I am sure of my liegeman's life,' said James.
'No threats, Sir. I will make no promise,' said Henry, haughtily; but the words died away in a racking cough.
And Bedford, laying his hand on James's arm, said, 'He is fevered and weary. Fret him no longer, but take your sword, and get your fellow out of the camp.'
James was too much hurt to make a compromise. 'No,' he said; 'unless your brother freely spares the life of a man thus taken, I must be his prisoner--but his soldier never!'
He left the tent, followed by Malcolm in an agony of despair and self-reproach.
Henry's morning decisions were not apt to vary from his evening ones. There was a terrible implacability about him at times, and he had never ceased to visit his brother of Clarence's death upon the Scots, on the plea that they were in arms against their king. Even Bedford obviously thought that the prisoner would be safest out of his reach; and this could hardly be accomplished, since Patrick had been placed in James's tent, in the very centre of the camp, near the King's own. And though Bedford and March might have connived at his being taken away, yet the mass of the soldiery would, if they detected a Scot being smuggled away into the town, have been persuaded that King James was acting treacherously.
Besides, the captive himself proved to be so exhausted, that to transport him any further in his present state would have been almost certainly fatal. A barber surgeon from Corbeil had been fetched, and was dealing with the injuries, which had apparently been the effect of a fall some days previously, probably when on his way to join the French army at Cosne; and the first fever of these hurts had no doubt been aggravated by the adventures of the day. At any rate Patrick lay unconscious, or only from time to time groaning or murmuring a few words, sometimes French, sometimes Scotch.
Malcolm would have fallen on his knees by his side, and striven to win a word or a look, but James forcibly withheld him. 'If you roused him into loud ravings in our own tongue, all hope of saving him would be gone,' he said.
'Shall we? Oh, can we?' cried Malcolm, catching at the mere word HOPE.
'I only know,' said the King, 'that unless we do so by Harry's good- will, I will never serve under him again.'
'And if he persists in his cruelty?'
'Then must some means be found of carrying Drummond into Corbeil. It will go hard with me but he shall be saved, Malcolm. But this whole army is against a Scot; and Harry's eye is everywhere, and his fierceness unrelenting. Malcolm, this IS bondage! May God and St. Andrew aid us!'
When the King came to saying that, it was plain he deemed the case past all other aid.
Malcolm's misery was great. The very sight of Patrick had made a mighty revulsion in his feelings. The almost forgotten associations of Glenuskie were revived; the forms of his guardian and of Lily came before him, as he heard familiar names and phrases in the dear home accent fall from the fevered lips. Coldingham rose up before him, and St. Abbs, with Lily watching on the rocks for tidings of her knight--her knight, to whom her brother had once promised to resign all his lands and honours, but who now lay captured by plunderers, among whom that b
rother made one, and in peril of a shameful death. Oh, far better die in his stead, than return to Lily with tidings such as these!
Was this retribution for his broken purpose, and for having fallen away, not merely into secular life, but into sins that stood between him and religious rites? The King had called St. Andrew to aid! Must a proof of repentance and change be given, ere that aid would come? Should he vow himself again to the cloister, yield up the hope of Esclairmonde, and devote himself for Patrick's sake? Could he ever be happy with Patrick dead, and Esclairmonde driven and harassed into being his wife? Were it not better to vow at once, that so his cousin were spared he would return to his old purposes?
Almost had he uttered the vow, when, tugging hard at his heart, came the vision of Esclairmonde's loveliness, and he felt it beyond his strength to resign her voluntarily; besides, how Madame of Hainault and Monseigneur de Therouenne would deride his uncertainties; and how intolerable it would be to leave Esclairmonde to fall into the hands of Boemond of Burgundy.
Such a renunciation could not be made; he did not even know that Patrick's safety depended on it; and instead of that, he promised, with great fervency of devotion, that if St. Andrew would save Patrick Drummond, and bring about the two marriages, a most splendid monastery for educational purposes, such as the King so much wished to found, should be his reward. It should be in honour of St. Andrew, and should be endowed with Esclairmonde's wealth, which would be quite ample enough, both for this and for a noble portion for Lily. Surely St. Andrew must accept such a vow, and spare Patrick! So Malcolm tried to pacify an anguish of suspense that would not be pacified.
CHAPTER XII: THE LAST PILGRIMAGE
The summer morning came; the reveille sounded, Mass was sung in the chapel tent, without which Henry never moved; and Malcolm tried to reassure his sinking heart by there pledging his vow to St. Andrew.
The English king was not present; but the troops were drawing up in complete array, that he might inspect them before the march. And a glorious array they were, of steel-clad men-at-arms on horseback, in bands around their leader's banner, and of ranks of sturdy archers, with their long-bows in leathern cases; the orderly multitude, stretching as far as the eye could reach, glittering in the early sun, and waiting with bold and glad hearts to greet the much-loved king, who had always led them to victory.
The only unarmed knight was James of Scotland. He stood in the space beside the standard of England, in his plain suit of chamois leather, his crimson cloak over his shoulder, but with no weapon about him, waiting with crossed arms for the morning's decision.
Close outside the royal tent waited Henry's horse, and those of his brother and other immediate attendants; and after a short interval the King came forth in his brightest armour, with the coronal on his helmet, and the beaver up; and as he mounted, not without considerable aid, enthusiastic shouts of 'Long live King Harry!' broke forth, and came echoing back and back from troop to troop, gathering fervour as they rose.
The King rode forward towards the standard; but while yet the shouts were pealing from the army, be suddenly caught at his saddle-bow, reeled visibly, and would have fallen before Bedford could bring his horse to his side, had not James sprung forward, and laid one arm round him, and a hand on his rein.
'It is nothing,' said Henry. 'Let me alone.'
Ere the words were finished, he put his hand to his side, dropped his bridle, and gasped, while a look of intense suffering passed over his features; and he was passive while his horse was led back to the tent, and he was lifted down and placed on the couch he had just quitted.
'Loose my belt,' he gasped; then trying to smile, 'Percy has strained it three holes tighter.'
Alas! though it was indeed thus drawn in, his armour was hanging on him like the shell of a last year's nut. They released him from it, and he lay against the cushions with short painful respiration, and frequent cough.
'You must go on with the men at once, John,' he said. 'I will but be blooded, and follow in the litter.'
'Warwick and Salisbury--' began Bedford.
'No, no!' peremptorily gasped Henry. 'It must be you or I, I would, but this stitch in the side catches me, so that I can neither ride nor speak. Go, instantly. You know what I have ordered. I'll be up with you ere the battle.'
He brooked no resistance. His impatience, and with it the oppression and pain, only grew by remonstrance; and Bedford was forced to obey the command to go himself, and leave no one he could help behind him.
'You will stay, at least,' said John, in his distress, turning to the Scottish king.
'I must,' said James.
'You hold not your wrath?' said Bedford. 'It will madden me to leave him to any save you in this stress. Some are dull; some he will not heed.'
'I will tend him like yourself, John,' said the Scot, taking his hand. 'Do what he may, Harry is Harry still. Hasten to your command, John; he will be calmer when you are gone.'
Bedford groaned. It was hard to leave his brother at a moment when he must be more than himself--become general of an army, with a battle imminent; but he was under dire necessity, and forced himself to listen to and gather the import of the few terse orders and directions that Henry, breathless as he was, rendered clear and trenchant as ever.
The King almost drove his brother away at last, while a barber was taking a copious stream of blood from him; and as the army had already been set in motion, a great stillness soon prevailed, no one being left save a small escort, and part of the King's own immediate household, for Henry had himself ordered away Montagu, his chamberlain, Percy, and almost all on whom his eyes fell. The bleeding relieved him; he breathed less tightly, but became deadly pale, and sank into a doze of extreme exhaustion.
'Who is here?' he said, awakening. 'Some drink! What you, Jamie! You that were on fire to see a stricken field!'
'Not so much as to see you better at ease,' said James.
'I am better,' said Henry. 'I could move now; and I must. This tent will stifle me by noon.'
'You will not go forward?'
'No; I'll go back. A sick man is best with his wife. And I can battle it no further, nor grudge the glory of the day to John. He deserves it.'
The irascible sharpness had passed from his voice and manner, and given place to a certain languid cheerfulness, as arrangements were made for his return to Vincennes.
There proved to be a large and commodious barge, in which the transit could be effected on the river, with less of discomfort than in the springless horse litter by which he had travelled the day before; and this was at once prepared.
Malcolm had meanwhile remained, as in duty bound, in attendance on his king. James had found time to enjoin him to stay, being, to say the truth, unwilling to trust one so inexperienced and fragile in the melee without himself; nor indeed would this have been a becoming moment for him to put himself forward to win his spurs in the English cause.
Nothing had passed about Patrick Drummond, nor the high words of last night. Henry seemed to have forgotten them, between his bodily suffering and the anxiety of being forced to relinquish the command just before a battle; and James would have felt it ungenerous to harass him at such a moment, when absolutely committed to his charge. For the present, there was no fear of the prisoner being summarily executed by any lawful authority, since the King had promised to take cognizance of the case; and the chief danger was from his chance discovery by some lawless man-at-arms, who would think himself doing good service by killing a concealed Scot under any circumstances.
Drummond himself, after his delirious night, had sunk into a heavy sleep; and the King thought the best hope for him would be to remain under the care of Sir Nigel Baird for the present, until he could obtain favour for him from Henry, and could send back orders from Vincennes. He would not leave Malcolm to share the care of him, declaring that the canny Sir Nigel would have quite enough to do in averting suspicion without him; and, besides, he needed Malcolm himself, in the scarcity of attendants who had an
y tenderness or dexterity of hand to wait upon the suffering King.
Henry had rallied enough to walk down to the river, leaning upon James; and he smiled thanks when he was assisted by Trenton and Kitson to lie along on cushions. 'So, my Yorkshire knights,' he said, ''tis you that have had to stop from the battle to watch a sick man home!'
'Ay, Sir,' said Sir Christopher; 'I did it with the better will, that Trenton here has not been his own man since the fever; and 'twere no fair play in the matter your Grace wets of, did I go into battle whole and sound, and he sick and sorry.'
Henry's look of amusement brightened him into his old self, as he said, 'Honester guards could I scarce have, good friend.'
At that moment, after a nudge or two from Trenton, Kitson and he came suddenly down on their knees, with an impetus that must have tried the boards of the bottom of the barge. 'Sir,' said Kitson, always the spokesman, 'we have a grace to ask of you.'
'Say on,' said Henry. 'Any boon, save the letting you cut one another's throats.'
'No, Sir. Will Trenton's scarce my match now, more's the pity; and, moreover, we've lost the good will to it we once had. No, Sir; 'twas license to go a pilgrimage.'
'On pilgrimage!'
'Ay, Sir; to yon shrine at Breuil--St. Fiacre's, as they call him. Some of our rogues pillaged his shrine, as you know, Sir; and those that know these parts best, say he was a Scottish hermit, and bears malice like a Scot, saint though he be; and that your sickness, my lord, is all along of that. So we two have vowed to go barefoot there for your healing, my liege, if so be we have your license.'
'And welcome, with my best thanks, good friends,' said Henry, exerting himself to lean forward and give his hand to their kiss. Then, as they fell back into their places, with a few inarticulate blessings and assurances that they only wished they could go to Rome, or to Jerusalem, if it would restore their king, Henry said, smiling, as he looked at James, 'Scotsmen here, there, and everywhere--in Heaven as well as earth! What was it last night about a Scot that moved thine ire, Jamie? Didst not tender me thy sword? By my faith, thou hast it not! What was the rub?'
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