“Religious ideas and religious emotions, under the influence of the Puritan habit of mind, seek to realise themselves, not in art, but, without any intervening medium, in character, in conduct, in life. It is thus that the gulf between sense and spirit is bridged; not in marble or in colour is the invisible made visible, but in action public and private—‘ye are the temples of the Holy Ghost.’”—Professor E. Dowden.
It was something of a relief to Gabriel to see the well-known spires and towers of Oxford, but he had lived through so much since his undergraduate days that he felt like a returned ghost—aloof from all his past interests, alone in a crowd, remorselessly stared at and criticised by the inhabitants.
At the city gate they were halted while arrangements were made as to their reception. Gabriel was thankful enough for the brief respite; for Norton’s treatment at Marlborough had set up keen pain in his old wound, while the thirty miles’ march from Devizes, bareheaded under a blazing sun, had given him a racking headache.
The last time he had passed out of Oxford by this gateway, three years before, he had been riding home to Herefordshire with Ned Harley, little dreaming of the future that lay before them. He fell now to wondering whether Ned had recovered from the wound he had got at Lansdown, and whether the letter he had left with him had by this time reached his father at Hereford.
Just then the sound of a mellow voice, with a mocking ring about it which spoilt its pleasantness, roused him from his reverie.
“Well, Mr. Harford!” said Norton. “’Tis warm work, isn’t it? You seem exhausted.”
Gabriel at once drew himself up with the undaunted look which had taken Prince Rupert’s fancy. He glanced at the prisoner with the bandaged head who leant heavily upon him, utterly spent with the march. The poor fellow, Passey by name, was one of his own men, and had been wounded and taken in the pursuit.
“This man is in far worse case,” he said. “But I know it is waste of breath to ask mercy of you, sir.”
Norton laughed. “You know me better than the day we spoke together at the gate of Wells. I told you I was not one to be baulked, and mark my words, Mr. Harford, the rest of my prophecy will follow in due time. I shall yet have the hanging of you.”
“Indeed!” exclaimed Gabriel, stung into a bitter retort, “you seem better fitted to play the part of a hangman, sir, than that of an English gentleman.”
“Bravely said, Ecclesiastes! You have clearly studied under the most virulent Puritan preachers of the day,” said Norton, regarding his victim with an amused smile.
“Pardon me, sir,” said Gabriel, ashamed of his words, “I should have held my tongue, for, truth to tell, on first sight of you at Gloucester, I thought you——”
He broke off, puzzled by that same hint of a better nature which made itself visible in his enemy’s face, as if in response to his unspoken idea.
“You thought me as generous and good-hearted a man as ever you had clapped eyes on,” said Norton, laughing. “They all do on occasion, but quickly discover their mistake.”
He strolled away from the prisoners, and entering the alehouse hard by, called for a cup of claret.
“A second,” he said, when he had drained it. “Here, Tarverfield, you are always for pampering these rebels, take this to Mr. Harford, I’ll warrant his throat is as dry as a lime-kiln.” The Captain was willing enough to undertake the errand, and Norton saw the look of surprise on the prisoner’s face when he heard who had sent the claret.
But the next minute an oath burst from the Colonel’s lips. “Curse the fellow! doth he fancy himself at the Sacrament? He but tastes it and passes it on to that wounded wretch beside him, and he again to his neighbour.”
For the third time a twinge of shame dragged him for a little while out of the slough of brutality which threatened to engulph him, and once more there rose before him the vision of the dead wife he still loved, though his profligacy had broken her heart and brought her to the grave.
The incident drove from Gabriel’s mind the despair he had felt since passing the King. He insensibly learnt that in the most unlooked-for ways good would manifest itself in those who seemed most uncongenial, and thus with a brave heart went to meet the troubles that awaited him in Oxford Castle.
Prince Rupert had very truly observed that the prisoners of war were not pampered. The cruelties of Provost-Marshal Smith, the Governor, had been revealed by the Lady Essex, who had been called into the House of Commons some six months before, and had given evidence on her return from Oxford of what the prisoners had to undergo. This had been fully confirmed by Captain Wingate, who after months of imprisonment at Oxford had obtained an exchange.
Still bound to Passey, Gabriel was ordered up to the highest room in one of the towers of the Castle with four other officers and six of the rank and file. The place seemed already full of men, and the exhausted prisoners looked round blankly enough, wondering how they were to find room in these wretched quarters.
The unhappy inmates, however, gave them a warm welcome, and it was pitiful to see the way in which these half-famished men crowded round them, eager to gain some news from the outer world.
“Where do you come from?” demanded a grey-haired prisoner, seizing upon Gabriel.
“We lay at Marlborough last night, sir,” he replied, looking with something like awe at the emaciated face of the speaker.
“Marlborough!” cried the prisoner, his eyes lighting up; “I was carried off from Marlborough last winter.”
And he poured out question after question in the vain hope of gaining news of his family.
“But may you not receive visitors?” asked Gabriel, knowing that even criminals were not debarred from this privilege.
“We may see no one,” said the poor lawyer, for such he proved to be. “Come, you are unbound now, sit here and I will tell you what to expect.”
“With your permission, sir, I will first find some place for my companion to lie; he is wounded, and well-nigh spent.”
“I should stow him in yonder corner, next to the man with the fever,” said the lawyer, bitterly. “The air is so foul there that he’ll get a few inches more space.”
Gabriel went to reconnoitre the ground, but was fairly beaten back by the pestilent atmosphere.
“Any crowding is better than that,” he said. “Here, Passey, stretch yourself by the wall; maybe they will give us food presently.”
“Not till to-morrow morning,” said the lawyer; “and then the Provost-Marshal will not overfeed you, my friend. For though the King allows sixpence a day for the prisoners—a fair enough sum—this miserable governor of ours keeps for himself all but five farthings a head.”
“And what doth that furnish?” asked Gabriel, beginning to understand the lean and hungry looks of his companions.
“A pennyworth of bread, and a little can of a most vile mixture of beer and water,” said the lawyer.
Gabriel reflected that by the next morning hunger and thirst would probably be so keen that any diet would be endurable. To him the worst trial at present was the sickening atmosphere of the overcrowded room, which, to one accustomed to sleeping more often than not in the open air, seemed on this hot July night well-nigh insufferable. In a space measuring, perhaps, twenty feet square, some fifty prisoners were pent up night and day.
“’Twas here that Mr. Franklyn, Member of Parliament for Marlborough, died,” said the lawyer, in his melancholy voice, “and yonder man with the fever will scarce recover, I think. But hark! there is the curfew ringing, we shall have prayers before settling for the night.”
The prisoners all stood, and a short service, led by one of the captive officers, was held. It was this habit which kept the place from becoming the hell on earth which most prisons of the day were apt to become. And that grand simplicity which is the strength of Puritanism made its mighty influence felt, for all present, from the highest to the lowest, held the same religious ideal, and were ready to die for their conviction that each individual soul should have direct communion with God.
Wearied by all that he had undergone in the last few days, Gabriel soon slept with Falkland’s cloak wrapped about him, and though stretched on the bare boards of the prison floor, his sleep was more profound and restful than any that for many months had visited the careworn Secretary of State.
It was sheer hunger that at last disturbed him, and feeling stiff and miserable he raised himself, looking in a bewildered way round the room. The moonlight shone in patches on the grim stone walls, and on the strange spectacle of the prisoners lying in rows on the bare floor. The dismal sound of clanking fetters echoed through the place, when some of the men, who for attempted escape were heavily ironed, stirred in their sleep. The man with the fever was muttering and groaning horribly.
A sudden wave of realisation swept over Gabriel. He was in prison, and must starve and pine, and as likely as not die, in this horrible place, no longer a free agent, but wholly at the mercy of tyrants. The bitterness of death seemed already to overwhelm him.
“Let me out! Let me out!” moaned the sick man in his delirium “My house is burning—my children—my wife! How can you do it, you fiends? Let me go home, I say! Let me out!”
Gabriel roused himself from the despair into which he had fallen, and picking his way cautiously across the forms of the sleeping prisoners, sat down beside the man with the fever. There was still a little water left in the earthenware mug near him, and, raising the poor fellow into an easier posture, he held this to his parched lips.
“Where do you come from?” he asked.
“From Marlborough,” said the man, speaking rationally for a minute. “I was one of the wealthiest of the burgesses; my name is Rawlyns.” Then suddenly relapsing into his fevered ravings, “Let me out! Let me out! They are burning my home.”
“I came from Marlborough yesterday, and there was no house burning,” said Gabriel soothingly. “Come, be at rest, you’ll need all your strength.”
His quiet words, and perhaps some subtle magnetism in his hands as he smoothed back the sick man’s hair, certainly calmed the poor fellow. The Hereford people always declared that Dr. Harford had what they called “the healing touch,” and possibly Gabriel had inherited a similar power. At any rate, the patient fell into a sound sleep, and his sore need had done much to chase despair from the mind of his helper.
Noiselessly he stole back to his former place and once more lay down, and as he mused over past and future there suddenly flashed into his mind the perception that here and now in this distasteful present the wish of his childhood had been granted. He had longed to be like his hero Sir John Eliot, and to give his life for the country’s freedom; and now, like Eliot, he was to languish in prison, debarred from air and exercise and all that makes life sweet.
Gazing at the sharp contrasts of shadow and moonlight on the Castle wall, an indescribable sense of strength and consolation came to him; for he grasped the truth that, however the war ended, even if for awhile utter defeat and ruin should overwhelm the cause, in the future Justice was bound to triumph, being Divine, and every sacrifice honestly made in her cause would prove to have been infinitely worth while, and would hearten future generations to resist everything which threatened the liberties so dearly bought.
Musing over Eliot’s imprisonment of nearly four years and his lonely death, musing over the eleven years’ imprisonment of Valentine and Strode, who still valiantly fought against the despotism of the King, he fell asleep once more, and never woke until the surly gaoler, Aaron, brought the day’s rations, when, as he had foreseen, desperate hunger and thirst made the pennyworth of bread and the can of beer-and-water welcome enough.
But the unutterable tedium of the long, hot day in the stifling room seemed to him well-nigh unendurable, and when in the afternoon the gaoler threw open the door and shouted his name, he felt that even if the summons meant death he would hail it as a relief.
Without a word, Aaron fastened a pair of shackles round his ankles, and signed to him to follow up the steps leading to the top of the tower.
“I shall await you below,” he said, pushing the prisoner through the small opening on to the leads.
Gabriel drew in a deep breath of the fresh, sweet air. The tower was not battlemented in the ordinary way, but the high wall surrounding it was pierced on the north and south sides by openings. Standing by one of these, he perceived the short and somewhat insignificant-looking Secretary of State, and hurried forward with an eager exclamation of pleasure.
Falkland, who had always been entirely free from the arrogance of manner which characterised his class in those days, greeted the prisoner with his usual simplicity, and with that gentle sweetness of expression which was peculiarly his own.
“You must not hope much from my visit, Mr. Harford,” he said. “I have tried my best to plead for you, but I fear you will not see your way to accepting the conditions imposed. Prince Rupert, pleased with your soldierly bearing yesterday, begged to have you in his troop, and His Majesty deputed me to offer you his pardon on your consenting to serve under the Prince.”
As he spoke he looked searchingly at the prisoner, and read in his clear, undaunted eyes exactly what he had expected. The offer was not even a temptation to him—to accept it would have been a sheer impossibility.
“My lord,” said Gabriel, “for your kindness in remembering me amid all your arduous work I thank you heartily; but for this offer—I feel sure you did not expect me to accept it.”
“In truth I did not, and told His Majesty as much with a bluntness he did not altogether like,” said Falkland. “Yet I can see that this prison life proves a hard trial to one of your temperament.”
“’Tis hard for all of them,” said Gabriel. “Some of the poor fellows have already been cooped up in the room for seven months, having been taken at the siege of Marlborough, and they say the winter proved fatal to many, for they were allowed neither light nor firing. Just now the suffocating heat is the worst part of it, for the overcrowding is terrible.”
He pulled himself up abruptly, not wishing to trouble his kindly visitor with complaints, but Falkland could well imagine what a purgatory the prison would prove to a man of refined tastes and of great natural reserve.
“Have you written any letters?” he asked. “If so, I will gladly have them sent for you. We must try to get you an exchange.”
“Paper and ink and books are all forbidden,” said Gabriel.
“There is literally nothing to do the livelong day, except, indeed, to try to slaughter the vermin. One of our officers managed to smuggle in his copy of Cromwell’s ‘Soldier’s Pocket Bible, but it is doubtful if he will be able to keep it, for the gaoler is a very dragon.”
“I brought you a couple of books,” said Falkland. “You will find them in the pockets of this coat, which you had best don here before the gaoler sees you again. Whether you elected to stay in prison or to fight under Prince Rupert I knew you would stand in need of a garment to replace the one they robbed you of.”
“My lord——” faltered Gabriel, touched inexpressibly by the thoughtful kindness which contrasted so sharply with the harshness he had lately encountered, “I wish I could thank you as I would—— He broke off, unable to find the words he wanted, and Falkland, with the smile that since the opening of the war had scarcely been seen, took advantage of the silence.
“Nay, no thanks,” he said. “But you shall do this for me, Mr. Harford; you shall tell me something I am eager to know. With your General hopelessly beaten and yourself a prisoner, made to suffer moral and physical torture, how was it that we found you tied up to the pillar in that church bearing the look of a conqueror? Of what were you thinking?”
“One does not think much in pain,” said Gabriel. “I believe I thought most of Burton when he had his ears cut off.”
“Of Burton!” exclaimed Falkland, in astonishment; for, though he disliked Archbishop Laud’s fussiness and disapproved of his system, he held men like Burton, Bastwick and Prynne in yet greater abhorrence. Himself liberal-minded and moderate, both extremes offended his taste. It startled him to find that the prisoner, who was clearly not the type of man to interest himself in dogmatic theology, should speak of the ardent Puritan controversialist in such a way.
“What can have attracted you at such a time to Burton?” he asked.
“The words he used while he suffered,” said Gabriel, his colour rising a little.
“What were they?” said Falkland, gently.
“‘Seeing I have so noble a Captain that hath gone before me with so undaunted a spirit, shall I be ashamed of a pillory for Christ, who was not ashamed of a cross for me?’” quoted Gabriel, his eyes fixed on the gleaming river down below as it sped on its way to freedom and the sea.
Falkland watched in silence, coming nearer than he had ever done before to a comprehension of the true power of Puritanism, its direct appeal to the individual soul, the force, and simplicity, and strenuousness with which it laid siege not to the intellect and fine taste of the cultivated and learned few, but to the highest and noblest part in the nature of the mass of men.
He sighed heavily, only too conscious of the cruel loneliness that must always be the portion of those in his position during times of strife.
“Think yourself a happy man, Mr. Harford,” he said. “You believe in your Cause.”
There was something in the sadness and isolation of the speaker that strongly appealed to Gabriel; he knew how bitterly the Parliamentarians condemned Falkland for forsaking his old allies, and he had learnt of late to understand how intolerable to a high-minded and scrupulously honourable man the office of Secretary of State to King Charles must be. It was impossible to be in Falkland’s presence without realising that he was, indeed, as commonly reported, “so severe an adorer of truth that he could as easily have given himself leave to steal as to dissemble.” The same deep admiration and love which he had learnt to feel for the Bishop of Hereford stirred in his heart now, as he felt the strong but indescribable influence of one who has the power of forming the highest ideals, and the courage to strive for their attainment. There was, moreover, already in Falkland’s dark eyes, the pathos which tells of latent disease and an early death. He would strive for peace to the last, but the long and seemingly hopeless struggle had broken his heart.
“My lord,” said Gabriel, with some hesitation, “there is a great favour I would ask at your hands.”
“If I can in any way serve you,” said Falkland, “nothing would please me more. But little enough seems permitted in Oxford Castle. Could you conceal more books? If so, I will gladly bring you more, for books are friends that bite no man’s meat or reputation.”
“It is that I cannot endure to think that Lord Harry Dalblane should have my favourite horse, Harkaway. If he could be in your hands——”
“A doubtful blessing for the horse,” said Falkland, smiling as he noted the eager, boyish face of his petitioner. “For I tell you frankly, Mr. Harford, I ever ride where the danger is the hottest, and am in the case of Job when he cried, ‘Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul: which long for death but it cometh not, and dig for it more than for hid treasures.’”
Gabriel was too thoroughly healthy in body and mind to grasp the full import of the words; he thought the speaker only referred to that brief and natural craving for freedom which assails everyone in the extremity of pain, whether mental or physical. He himself had so quickly overcome the craving at Hereford and at Edgehill that it never occurred to him that one so immeasurably his superior could not also overcome it.
But the surgeon at Marlborough had surmised rightly enough; Falkland, handicapped in the race by months of sleeplessness, could only see that his present position was untenable, could only yearn to exchange the prolonged and thankless suffering of one who metaphorically stands between two fires, for a literal and brief riding forth alone between the two armies, welcoming a bullet in the heart from Royalist or Parliamentarian, since with both alike he was out of harmony.
“I shall be sending a messenger to the West to-morrow,” he said, after a minute’s silence. “If you will give me your father’s address I will myself write to him and tell him what has befallen you. Since you are known to Sir Ralph Hopton and Sir William Waller, and since your father and Sir Robert Harley are lifelong friends, it will assuredly be possible in time to get you exchanged. And for your horse, I will speak to Lord Harry about it ere he goes to the siege of Bristol. An you wish it, I will myself ride Harkaway.”
So they parted, the prisoner to return to his stifling and noisome quarters, the Secretary of State to the equally uncongenial atmosphere of the Court and the presence of a King whose obstinacy and insincerity made it hard, even for Falkland, who was noted for the sweet graciousness of his manners, to refrain from sharp words and caustic comments.
Return him safe; learning would rather choose
Her Bodley or her Vatican to lose,
All things that are but writ or printed there,
In his unbounded breast engraven are.
And this great prince of knowledge is by Fate
Thrust into th’ noise and business of a State.
He is too good for war, and ought to be
As far from danger as from fear he’s free.
“Lines on Lord Falkland.”—Cowley.
Little Helena Locke was made happy one day towards the end of July, by receiving a letter from her father. That it had been long upon the road did not surprise her, for letters naturally led a hazardous existence in war time, and she never knew how nearly she had missed receiving this one; never guessed that for many days it had lain securely in Colonel Norton’s pocket, that it had been through the battles of Lansdown and Roundway Down, and had finally been given by Norton, at Marlborough, to the first messenger he came across.
Whether the sight of the Major’s dead face had pricked his conscience, or whether he deemed it most to his own interest to have the little heiress safely bestowed at Notting-hill Manor, it would be hard to say. For a minute or two Helena’s fate had hung in the balance, but chancing to come across a man who was riding westward, Norton had entrusted him with the letter, and after many vicissitudes it had been delivered.
The very day after she had received it came tidings that Prince Rupert had taken Bristol, and the news so appalled the citizens that Alderman Pury determined to lose no time in sending his charge to London, for it was now almost certain that the Royalists would besiege Gloucester.
Helena, glad of any change, and heartily tired of the somewhat sombre atmosphere of the Pury household, made her preparations in high glee, and was singing a cheerful ditty that evening as she packed up her belongings, when a knock at the door of her bedroom recalled her from dreams of Gabriel Harford to the facts of real existence.
To her surprise, she found pretty Mistress Clemency Coriton standing without.
“How good of you to come and see me; ’tis a sure sign that Captain Heyworth is on the high road to recovery,” she said, gaily, “or you would never have quitted him.”
“Yes, in truth, he is recovering fast,” said Clemency, yet her face remained grave and sad, and something in her tone puzzled Helena.
“Will you not come to the parlour?” she said. “My room, as you see, is all in disorder.”
“They gave me leave to seek you out here, because I wanted to see you alone, dear Helena,” replied Clemency. “Alderman Pury has received a letter from Lord Falkland, and he tells him that Major Locke was sorely wounded at Roundway Down. You remember Sir William Waller could give us no news of him when he passed through Gloucester a few days since.”
“No, for the whole army was dispersed,” said Helena, her face growing white. “But what more does Lord Falkland say, and how came he to know? Oh! I understand! My father is a prisoner.”
Clemency put her arms round the girl.
“He is not a prisoner now, dear Nell. He is safe and at rest.”
Helena’s grief was speechless; she only clung to her friend in the numbing, paralysing shock of a first great sorrow.
“The letter,” she said at last. “I want to see it.”
And Clemency put it into her hands, knowing that Lord Falkland’s delicately worded and thoughtful kindness would be the best means of conveying to her the details of her father’s death. She guessed, moreover, that the news of Gabriel Harford’s imprisonment at Oxford would rouse her, and fill to some extent the terrible blank that had come in her life.
“I must do what my father bids me, and go at once to London,” said Nell, her childlike face looking all at once years older under the strain of this sudden grief and desolation. “Madam Harford may be able to help her grandson, and at least I can tell her of his sore need.”
“Yes, you see what Lord Falkland says about trying to effect an exchange,” said Clemency, glad that she had turned to this practical thought. “Alderman Pury bid me ask whether you knew who was your father’s trustee.”
“It is his cousin, Dr. Twisse, the rector of Newbury; he told me so when we parted; and his attorney is Mr. Corbett, here in Gloucester,” said Helena.
“I will go and take him word,” said Clemency, “for he is anxious that no time should be lost; we are in great danger, they say, now that Bristol hath fallen.”
“But what will become of you if Gloucester is besieged?” said Helena. “If you could but come with me to London, you would be far safer.”
“My brother-in-law is against it,” said Clemency; “and, indeed, I could not bear to be parted just now from Joscelyn. It hath been settled that we shall be married next Saturday.” Promising to return, she went down in search of the master of the house, and poor Helena, still with a dazed look of hopeless grief, went on mechanically with her preparations, her mind haunted now by a vision of her father lying dead, now by a vivid picture of Gabriel Harford in Oxford Castle, and again by the thought of Joscelyn Heyworth and Clemency Coriton hurriedly married ere the perils of the siege began.
When the next day she set off on her journey, under the charge of her cousin and an escort which Alderman Pury had provided, she was far more composed than Mistress Malvina, said her farewells without any emotion, and, like one in a dream, quitted Gloucester for the long and dangerous journey to London, caring very little what happened to her.
It had been arranged that they should visit Dr. Twisse, the Puritan rector of Newbury, and her only surviving kinsman, on the way; and Cousin Malvina found some comfort in this plan, for as they journeyed Helena’s looks began to alarm her. By day she was silent and pale, at night flushed and feverish, and when at length they reached Newbury, and dismounted at the Rectory, it was quite clear that the girl was very ill.
The rector, however, proved a kindly host, and his wife, though secretly dismayed when the next day the physician plainly told her that weeks must elapse before their guest could travel, was an indefatigable nurse, and never let Helena feel that she was giving trouble.
And so the poor little heiress fought her way through sorrow and suffering, helped on by an illusion, dreaming of Gabriel Harford and of how she could best gain his release, dreaming also—not of the marriage of Captain Heyworth and her friend Clemency—but of that other marriage which her father had twice suggested to her. Had it, she wondered, ever been mentioned to Lieutenant Harford? And if so, had he perhaps thought of her when he so gallantly tried to save her father? And did he now at Oxford call to mind the maid he had so gallantly rescued from Colonel Norton’s villainy? Alas! she knew nothing of Gabriel’s grave words at West Kennet, and never dreamed that at this very time his red-letter days were the ones when, while others slept, he found a chance of looking at the carefully concealed miniature of a dark-eyed, darkhaired maiden, whose sweet yet wilful lips were the only lips in the world he cared to kiss.
By the time Helena had recovered from her illness, news had reached them that Lord Essex had relieved Gloucester, and was endeavouring to return with his victorious army to London, while the King was concentrating all his efforts on the attempt to block his road. To let two ladies travel while the country was in such a disturbed state seemed out of the question, and though it was now past the middle of September, Dr. Twisse insisted on keeping his visitors. Nor was Helena at all averse to staying, for she was still very far from strong, and shrank from the idea of the tedious journey still before them.
Yet Dr. Twisse half wished he had let them go when on the 18th September it seemed likely that the two armies would encounter each other in the near neighbourhood of Newbury. A sharp skirmish was reported from Aldbourn Chase, and on the 19th the King’s forces took possession of Newbury, to the great disgust of the inhabitants, who were strongly in favour of the Parliament. In their breasts bitter memories still lingered which made them little inclined to favour a king who was swayed by his “popish” wife. Some of the old people could well recall the burning of the Newbury martyrs, and all the grown folk had heard from their fathers and mothers details which had sown in their hearts an unconquerable Protestantism, just as past persecutions have firmly established in Ireland an unconquerable Catholicism.
With what feelings Helena watched the entry of the King’s forces may easily be imagined, but it was at least some satisfaction to her to learn that Prince Maurice’s troop was not in that part of the country, and that she ran no danger of seeing Colonel Norton.
The window of the Rector’s study commanded a good view of the street, and she sat looking out at the busy throng below, while Dr. Twisse worked at his Sunday sermon, pausing now and then to ask some question of his sad little kinswoman, more for the sake of breaking the monotony for her than because the movements of the soldiers interested him.
Presently a knock at the front door aroused him.
“Who comes hither, Nell?” he asked. “’Tis late for visitors.”
“It is the gentleman you spoke with as we walked to church on Sunday, sir,” said Nell.
“What! good Mr. Adam Head, of Cheap-street? I trust he does not want us to lodge any of the King’s officers.”
“There is an officer with him, sir,” said Helena. “A gentleman with lank black hair.”
Before more could be said the two visitors were shown into the room, and the good Rector was courteously receiving them with bows, and no apparent lack of hospitality, though in the dim recesses of his mind there lurked a troubled consciousness that the guest rooms were already full.
“I must present you, sir, to my noble guest, Lord Falkland,” said Mr. Head.
(“After all he does not want to lie here this night,” reflected the Rector, his manner becoming still more cordial.)
“My lord, this is Dr. Twisse, who will, I am sure, be ready to serve your lordship.”
Falkland’s greeting was full of charm. He bowed low to Helena as she was about to glide quietly by them to the door, but the Rector put his hand on her arm and stayed her.
“Wait, Helena,” he said, “I am sure my Lord Falkland will spare a moment to let us thank him for the very kind trouble he took in sending you the last details as to your father. This, my lord, is the daughter of Major Locke, whose death at Marlborough you notified to us.”
Falkland gave a glance full of kindness and pity at the delicate, fair-haired girl; the colour had risen in her pale face, and her blue eyes were bright with tears. He bent down and kissed her hand, vividly recalling as he did so the face of the dead Parliamentary officer lying in the church at Marlborough.
“It was through Mr. Harford, madam, that I learnt your address; being unable to write to you himself while a prisoner, he begged me to send you word of what had passed.”
As he spoke he saw the colour deepen and spread in Helena’s pretty face, and knew by the tone of her voice that she was far from indifferent to the young lieutenant. Remembering the miniature of the beautiful dark-haired girl, and Gabriel’s own words as to a kinswoman of the Bishop of Hereford, he guessed that there were all the materials for a tragedy in this little maid’s romance.
“Is it true, my lord, that the prisoners in Oxford Castle are cruelly treated?” asked Helena. “We have heard such shocking tales of their sufferings.”
“I fear the tales are o’er true,” said Falkland, sadly. “I did what little was possible for Mr. Harford, and have spoken to those in authority as to his exchange, but at present there is nothing for it but patience, and that he has—the patience of a man who believes in his cause.”
“We owe Lieutenant Harford a debt of gratitude, my lord,” said the Rector, “not only for rescuing Helena from the vile scheme of Colonel Norton, an ill-conditioned neighbour of her father’s, but for all that he did for my dead kinsman. Helena hopes shortly to be in London under the charge of her godmother, Madam Harford, a kinswoman of the lieutenant’s, and she will do her utmost to obtain his exchange. But we trouble your lordship too much with our affairs. In what can I serve you, my lord?”
“In truth, sir, I came to ask if you would administer the sacrament to me and to the family of my kindly host, Mr. Head, to-morrow morning, before I go forth to the expected battle,” said Falkland.
The Rector gladly consented, and the time having been arranged the two visitors withdrew, Falkland pausing for a few words aside with Helena, regretting that he could tell her so little with regard to her father, since all that he knew had been already put in his letter.
Nevertheless his sympathy was no small comfort to the girl, and did much to take the sting from her grief.
Unable to sleep, partly from excitement, partly from the disturbed state of the town, she rose early and joining the Rector as he was about to go to the church, begged leave to accompany him. The quiet service over, she was waiting at the church door for Dr. Twisse, when Mr. Head and his guest passed out. She looked in astonishment at Lord Falkland’s face, for the deep sadness which had struck her so much on the previous night had utterly gone, his dark eyes were radiant, his manner cheerful and buoyant; even in his dress, which had before been somewhat disordered and neglected, she noticed a change. Recognising her, as Mr. Head bowed in passing, he paused, and in his gentlest and most winning manner said, “There is a favour I would ask at your hands, Mistress Locke. By Mr. Harford’s express wish I have in my possession his horse Harkaway. I do not propose, however, to ride it this morning, and will give orders that it is to be sent to the Rector’s stables. Perhaps you will be good enough to use it on your journey to London, so that it may await its owner on his release.”
“But, my lord,” said Helena, hesitatingly. “If he wished you to have the horse——?”
“Tell him I have ridden Harkaway ever since quitting Oxford,” said Falkland. “And if,” he added, gently, “I may venture a word to you in your bereavement, I would bid you not to weep for the dead, but for those who live on in these grievous times. It needs no prophet to foresee much misery to our unhappy country. But I do believe I shall be out of it ere night.”
Then, with a kindly and courteous farewell, he walked on with his host, and, mounting at the door of the house in Cheap-street, rode to join Sir John Byron’s brigade of horse.
All noticed the cheerfulness of his manner and bearing in, the charge across Wash Common; every hedge in the neighbourhood was lined by the Parliamentary Musketeers, and the guns on the heights in front of them were doing their utmost to decimate the troop. But still in the front rank Falkland rode unscathed; it seemed as if death shrank from taking one whose noble heart and great intellect so far surpassed all others on that fatal field, destined to see the slaughter of well-nigh three thousand Englishmen.
At the end of the Common there came a pause, for it was necessary that Sir John Byron should reconnoitre the enclosed ground. Finding that the Parliamentary foot were drawn up at the further side of a large field, fenced on all sides by high, quickset hedges, and that the only entrance into this field was far too narrow to allow of the safe passage of the cavalry, Sir John gave orders that the gap should be widened, and even as he gave the word it was evident that the whole fire of the foot soldiers would be concentrated on this spot directly any should-pass it, for his horse was shot in the throat. Springing to the ground, he called for another, and in that moment Falkland—ever the first to rush upon danger—spurred his horse forward.
There was a happy light in his face, as was always the case in moments of peril.
Here was the chance he had long looked for! He passed through the gap—one man alone betwixt the two armies; the next instant horse and rider fell riddled with bullets.
The narrow entrance had proved for the heart-broken hero the gate of life.
All through the day the battle raged; the Parliamentary troops under Essex and Lord Roberts, with starvation staring them in the face, knew that they must conquer their foes or die and leave the city unprotected; the Royalists were determined to block the road to London, cost what it might.
At last darkness made further fighting impossible, and it was evident that the Parliamentary army had gained ground; moreover, the men could starve another day, but the King, whose ammunition had failed, was in a worse plight.
At midnight, Helena, lying sleepless in her room at the Rectory, heard the rumbling of gun carriages, and the tramp of armed men, and sprang up to hear what had passed. Dr. Twisse could only learn that the King’s troops were falling back on Newbury, and it was not until the next morning that they learnt that the London road was free. Later in the day Mr. Head brought them the news of Lord Falkland’s death.
“His body hath but now been recovered from the field,” he said; “and is to be borne to Oxford and thence to Great Tew. The peace of which he was a passionate promoter will be long in dawning for England, but it hath dawned for him.”
Helena’s own grief was too new, however, to endure listening to further details; she stole from the room, and ran for comfort and quiet to the stables, where in Harkaway’s stall she could cry unmolested, finding some comfort in leaning her aching head on the neck of the horse which Gabriel had ridden when he had gallantly tried to rescue her father.
It seemed to her that all the great and good were dying; her own father, Hampden the patriot, Lord Brooke and a host of others within the last few months—and now the noble-hearted Falkland, with whom only the day before she had received the sacrament. Who in that generation would rise to fill the terrible gaps which this great struggle betwixt opposing principles had caused?