by Talbot Mundy
Then the dam went down and Mrs. Beddington burst into tears. They blinded her. She sobbed into her hands, choking artlessly, and through her hands her words came spluttering and indistinct:
“What shall I say? I’ve done wrong — all my life I’ve done wrong — I admit it — I’ve been a devil — Joe — where are you, Joe—” Rita and Annie Weems made way for her. She staggered — stumbled — almost fell on Amal’s body — ran then — fell at Joe’s feet — groped blindly — raised herself and knelt beside him, burying her face among the blankets:
“ — Joe, say I’m your mother again. Joe, dear — Joe — my boy — can you forgive me? Joe, I’m broken-hearted. Joe, dear — ask her to forgive me — won’t you? — I can’t ask her. Joe, I loved you so much — I was so proud of you. I was just a vain old woman — I wanted to keep you close to me and — Joe, dear, I’ve been wrong, I know I have — Joe, listen to me — listen—” Joe laid his hand on her shoulder. “All right, Mater. Only—” “Joe, don’t say it! I surrender — I give up everything — you have it all. — I’ll sign that trust deed over to you — Joe, dear, you and Rita—” Nobody had seen Ram-Chittra Gunga rise to his feet. He stood erect, tall, shadowy, in the dim light, and his voice was startling with a ring of triumph:
“I have done my dharma. I received — I have delivered judgment.”
THE END
W. H.: A PORTION OF THE RECORD OF SIR WILLIAM HALFAX
OR, THE QUEEN’S WARRANT; HO FOR LONDON TOWN!
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
ALL CHARACTERS IN THIS WORK ARE WHOLLY FICTITIOUS AND ANY RESEMBLANCE (WITH SOME NOTABLE EXCEPTIONS) TO PERSONS LIVING OR DEAD IS PURELY COINCIDENTAL
CHAPTER ONE
How in the year 1585 a certain Master William Halifax set forth to win fame, fortune and fair lady; and how Will Shakespeare pointed the way.
NOTE: The manuscript of this story was discovered in the cellar of a house in Bloomsbury, London, in course of demolition. Such learned authorities as have seen the document are unanimous in denying its historical value, on the reasonable ground that its author is otherwise wholly unknown and his statements are at times apparently in conflict with recorded facts. Furthermore, they say, that period of which he writes produced more literary hoaxes than almost any other, and they add, that many of his statements, though not actually contradicted by the files of history, are not susceptible of proof.
The manuscript is therefore hardly sacrosanct, since men of such authority and learning have denied it credit; it has accordingly been edited, its more archaic phrases being rendered into modem English, and for words that have dropped out of common use or whose meaning has changed in the course of centuries, more modern words have been substituted to convey the writer’s apparent meaning. Many phrases, also, have been modified or totally omitted out of deference to modem taste — a taste that would have seemed inexplicable in the days of Good Queen Bess.
Due to dampness, rats, and the indifference of the workmen who came on the manuscript, some pages from the beginning and from the end are missing or so damaged as to be undecipherable, but the remainder is clearly written in an upright hand that certainly suggests its author may have been the man of character he represents himself to be.
It begins:
So I made up my mind I would leave Brownsover for good and all, for it offended me that such a coney-catching louse as Tony Pepperday should own my father’s mansion. But I will say this for the chuff: ill-favoured caitiff though he was, he had the gift of self-advancement. He had married first into the gentry, which was marvellous enough; and then he served as bailiff of my father’s estate until in the end he possessed the whole of it, and that so legally that none, not even his Grace of Leicester, could deny him right. There was not a horn-book printed that could teach him anything.
But in those days I had so much yet to learn, that now, after a lifetime spent in courts and tented fields and on the sea, and where not else, I am left wondering how so raw a youth as I ever made my way. I was so callow, I expected gratitude, and that from Tony, of all people in the world:
I had risked my father’s anger (not a light thing, as they knew who ever gave him cause) by asking his leave to be betrothed to Mildred, Tony’s wife’s daughter by a former husband, Robert Jackson, who had lost his head and most of his estates befriending the Princess Elizabeth while Mary was Queen. I had brought my father to my view of it, and he a knight, though Tony was no better than a hind until Mildred’s mother married him for the sake of protection for her child. Tony had been one of Bonner’s (The Bishop of London who was responsible for the burning of many “heretics” in Mary’s reign. He died in the Marshalsea prison and was buried at midnight to avoid a hostile demonstration.) men in Bloody Mary’s reign, but now he was all for the new religion and the death of Jesuits.
Tony, you may doubt not, was well pleased to marry the daughter to me for the sake of my position in the county — until my father fell by a violent death and it transpired that Tony had bought up liens on all his land and goods.
And now word reached me through the village barber that the banns might be forbidden, and much mystery about it. But to Tony’s house I went, in my second-best suit, on my good roan horse Robin, and I told ham again how I loved his daughter Mildred, and she me. Nor did I forget to jog his memory of how my father had befriended him; and I spoke with such rein on my temper that I said no word at all concerning how he had deprived me of my heritage (since in truth there was little I could say reasonably, my father having incurred great debts that Tony lawfully had bought up).
Had I been a little wiser in the world’s ways I might have wasted less breath and have been less astonished. Having all my father’s lands, that miserable caitiff coveted my horse, too, knowing that the beast was mine, although he could not prove it. He beshrewed himself to think that anything of value had escaped his clutches. Me and my good name he valued now not at all, so swift is a pick-thank’s somersault. First he visited his cellar to drink cordials, for he was naturally timid unless liquor fortified him; and when he came up into the room where he kept his books and papers, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand and stamping on the flags to warm his feet (for it was winter), he began to make too free with the name of Halifax, that but a week ago had been enough to make him doff his cap at mention of it.
“Will Halifax,” said he, “you are a worse squibbe and a spendthrift than your father was, although Sir Harry was a brave enough knight, which I doubt you will ever be. I tell you, you shall have no girl of mine, nor any of my money.”
I was sitting in a chair my father gave him, looking through a window at the good fat beeves he had acquired by virtue of a lien that he began to enforce the very day my father died. The hobbinoll’s audacity so took my breath away that I could hardly answer him.
“I fear me, you will come to no good end,” he went on, taking courage of my silence, “and shall I give my daughter to stand weeping at a gallow’s-foot?”
Whereat, much wondering that such a coney-catching ban-dog should have bettered his station in life while many an honest gentleman went limping on a broken cause, I decided that patience no longer was seemly:
“If honesty is a cure for sin,” said I, “you are like enough to roast in hell-fire, Tony Pepperday, when your time comes!”
I would have walked out there and then to keep my fists from drubbing him, which I had promised Mildred I would not do, even though he should vex me out of countenance. But where he thought a bargain might be had he recked little of hearing truths about himself, and doubtless he believed that all me
n itched after money as he did. He stayed me.
“I pity your need and will buy your horse,” said he. “I will pay you a good price, although I doubt not you will squander it.
But I was not in mind to walk to London or to mince my speech.
“It puzzles me,” said I, “that such a long-faced, shamble-smelling miser as yourself could foster a sweet maid like Mildred!
I had looked to get back by marriage part of what you cozened from Sir Harry. You may set that rashness to my youth’s account and against it credit me a lesson learned; for by the stomacher of Good Queen Bess, when I have Mildred it shall be without your leave or your endowment! My father Sir Harry always told me gold is not a gentleman, and I perceive it keeps low company!”
With that I left him, honouring him too much with hot words wasted on ears that listened only for the chink of coin. He went hopping in a hurry to the milk-room by the cow-byre, crying to his daughter she should no more see me, and to keep herself within doors.
Not finding her, he followed footprints in the snow around the copse behind the house, until he came on Madge Ambleby the maid-of-all-work. And her tongue was brisker than his. As I mounted my horse in the yard I could hear the two of them hard at it, he swearing she had purposely decoyed him and she bidding him remember his years and behave more seemly. Might an honest wench not go, forsooth, to see that her master’s geese were out of reach of foxes, without that old fox of a master risking his ears boxed for pursuing her like a horse after a mare? ‘Od’s teeth! the frosty morning rang with the clap-clapper of their tongues.
I rode along the hedgerow, where the horses had trodden the mud of the lane and there was no snow left to show a footstep, only cat’s-ice in the holes. And when I reached the clump of beeches by the frozen pond where the lane turns into the high road, there was Mildred waiting for me in her new red cloak with its hood drawn up over her hair. She wore the Flemish stockings I had bought for her from Will o’ Bruges last fairing time, and she had done on the little gold necklace that had been my mother’s — something I had set aside before the sheriff’s bailiffs came; and that, if Tony knew of it at all, had irked him little, since it came within his reach in any case.
By the whistling wind that blew across the common and shook the crisp snow from the elms, her hood was not much redder than her lips and cheeks. I lifted her up in front of me, and that which followed fired my blood. I bade her look her last on Tony Pepperday (for we could see him in the distance pegging around the yard with his stick and slamming shed doors, looking for her). I told her she should come with me to London, two of us on one horse. I would make her my lawful wife as soon as might be.
But she set a hand across my mouth to stop such talk. And when she had done twisting at the little new moustache that I had grown to cut a figure with in London, and when I had boasted myself dry of lover’s oaths and arguments (for love makes lawyers of us all) she slipped a purse into my hand. But whence she had the money she would not say, only this:
“All’s fair in love, Will Halifax! My father cozened yours, and what he doesn’t know won’t rob sleep. Haste and win a fortune! Ride straight, fight hard, and remember me!”
Forgetfulness was likely to come limping after such a speech in any event, I take it, but I loved her, as I do yet. With her lips on mine I swore to myself not to be faced out of my livelihood by Tony Pepperday — nay, nor by fourtune neither; I would answer her challenge with deeds that should make England know me!
What with my horse Robin feeling the chill wind and kicking, and what with her pressing her fingers against my ribs where I am ticklish, she managed to free herself then, and right bravely she stood, smiling and waving to me, though the tears were like dew on her lashes and she trusted herself no more to speak.
So I rode away, with very fierce determination, thinking of the Dons whom I would beat to their knees and hold for ransom, and of the knighthood that Queen Elizabeth should presently bestow on me (for it was common talk that Queen Bess loved a man of mettle, and I had no doubt that I should bring myself by some means to her notice). But what was passing in Mildred’s mind I knew not, neither greatly cared, provided she were true to me, not having learned yet that a woman’s wit has several sorts of merit. I loved, but without that disposition to be fore-horse to a kirtle that has robbed some men I know of self-esteem — aye, and of the esteem of others.
I could see her standing there, her red cloak bright against the grey pond ice, until I topped the brow of the hill and paused to wave to her a last time. Then I turned my horse toward Walter Turner’s house to get my saddlebags.
For I had stayed with Walter Turner since my father’s death, which was how it happened that I had a good new suit and new hat preserved from the sheriffs men. Walter had begged the loan of them to wear at his cousin’s wedding, and by the same good stroke of fortune he had borrowed my horse Robin. Whether the sheriff’s men ever heard of it and looked the other way from loving-kindness, or whether they really believed my horse and German suit and hat were Walter’s, is something that the Lord God will determine at the Judgement Seat.
There was another reason, besides his being beholden to me, why Walter Turner was a comfortable friend to leave behind, he being recently betrothed to Ann Guest and much enamoured of the girl as well as eager to pocket the rents that should come with her. It was with no small measure of confidence that I commended Mildred to his and to his sister’s care, bidding them pass the time of day with her whenever an occasion offered and to lend her their encouragement against old Tony Pepperday’s attempts to marry her to someone else.
With good cheer then, when they had buckled on my saddlebags, and Kate, at risk of greasing my best suit, had stuffed in two fat capons along with other eatables, I turned Robin’s head toward London, malting no more speed (because the road was long) than was enough to keep the frost out of his joints and mine.
I felt as full of spirits as the good horse capering under me though, reckoning Mildred’s purse which I was minded to keep against dire extremity, I had little enough money. “Naked and without a purse I came into the world,” thought I, “and that journey may have been longer than this one, though I don’t remember it. It shall go hard if I don’t win fortune, and the Queen herself shall have to use her very sceptre to prevent me.” (But I little knew the strength of Queen Elizabeth in those days, nor would I have believed her courage, nor the skill with which she reined men to her uses.)
I had a good short English sword, which my father began to teach me how to use before I knew my alphabet, and, notwithstanding I had heard the new Italian long-swords were all the rage in London, I had no doubt of giving a handsome account of myself in that particular.
Nor did I lack for schooling, as so many did who went to seek their fortunes at the court. We have a school at Rugby, near Brownsover, which Master Laurence Sheriff, the alderman, endowed before he died. And if the frequent soreness of my hams from caning is the measure of my scholarship, then few youths ever set forth better versed in Latin, to say nothing of French and Spanish that had cost me no pain, having learned them from my father and from the servants whom he had brought with him from foreign parts and kept until they died of old age and too much eating.
Circumstances had unfortunately robbed me of the favour of the Earl of Leicester, who was Lord-Lieutenant of our county and a great man at court, but I thought there could be few things more likely than that I should find service in some nobleman’s retinue. It was common talk, too, that the Queen welcomed young men of good looks and breeding, to serve as pages, and I knew I did not lack for manners or appearance. Did not Mildred love me? That should put conceit in any man.
It suited me to be alone that morning; for a good horse snorting at the frosty air, his ears a-twitch to catch the roadside sounds, is better company than any chattering companion when a man sets forth to win his spurs and dreams of all the vanquishments he will accomplish. If a dream had only substance in it I was general of armies, admiral of fleets
, and Mister Secretary Halifax, Lord Councillor of Queen Elizabeth, that minute!
So it sorrily displeased me when I saw a horseman resting at the signpost where the road turns in from Stratford. He had saddlebags like mine, and a bulging roll of blankets that looked as if a farmer’s wife had packed them full of all the stuff she had for market. He was dressed in good stout woollen cloth, and wore an old felt hat with a goose-wing feather in it, so I took him for a farmer on his way to London.
I did not hail him and he let me ride abreast before he spoke, swinging himself into the saddle and smiling whimsically, as I noticed with the corner of my eye. I had a better horse than his, and I was better dressed. He had no right to speak to me.
“Well met, Sir Venturer!” quoth he. “I ride the same road. Though your horse’s rump is comelier, maybe, than mine, ’tis not so comely that I yearn to see it all the way to London!”
It was his voice that pleased. It softened the edge of impudence. He was rather a swarthy fellow with a little chin-beard and upturned moustachios, much shorter than myself, but of the same age. He had brown eyes, wondrous dark and mocking, with a sort of sadness brooding in their depths.
I yielded room beside me and he drew abreast, gnawing a red apple. Presently he drew another from his saddlebag and offered it. Not willing to be churlish on a merry morning I rubbed the apple on my sleeve and bit deep. There was a worm in it. I showed him and he laughed.
“What, again?” said he. “There is a canker at the heart of all things. God made apples, but the devil used one to tempt Adam. Adam ate it, and the worms ate him. Which had the best of it, God or worm? Or did God win, who made the worm, so to win whichever way the die falls?”
I had no answer ready, being neither puritan nor papist, but a man of sense, moreover, well on guard against such dangerous talk with strangers; for the land was full of Jesuits and of spies out watching for them, so that far too many honest men were rotting in the prisons for a word let fall by way of hasty jest. I asked his name instead, and whence he was.