Two Penniless Princesses

C >> Charlotte M. Yonge >> Two Penniless Princesses

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16

Margaret still held the King's hand, and sought to detain him.
'Beau pere, beau pere,' she said, 'you will not believe them!
You will silence them.'

'Whom, what, ma mie?'

'The evil-speakers. Ah! Jamet.'

'I believe nothing my fair daughter tells me not to believe.'

'Ah! sire, he speaks against me. He says--'

'Hush! hush, child. Whoever vexes my daughter shall have his
tongue slit for him. But here we must give place to Maitre
Bertrand.'

Maitre Bertrand was a fat and stolid personage, who,
nevertheless, had a true doctor's squabble with the Jew Samiel
and drove him out. His treatment was to exclude all the air
possible, make the patient breathe all sorts of essences, and
apply freshly-killed pigeons to the painful side.

Margaret did not mend under this method. She begged for Samiel,
who had several times before relieved her in slight illnesses;
but she was given to understand that the Dauphin would not permit
him to interfere with Maitre Bertrand.

'Ah!' she said to Dame Lilias, in their own language, 'my
husband calls Bertrand an old fool! He does not wish me to
recover! A childless wife is of no value. He would have me
dead! And so would I--if my fame were cleared. If my sisters
were found! Oh! my Lord, my Lord, I loved him so!'

Poor Margaret! Such was her cry, whether sane or delirious,
hour after hour, day after day. Only when delirious she rambled
into Scotch and talked of Perth; went over again her father's
murder, or fancied her sisters in the hands of some of the
ferocious chieftains of the North, and screamed to Sir Patrick
or to Geordie Douglas to deliver them. Where was all the
chivalry of the Bleeding Heart?

Or, again, she would piteously plead her own cause with her
husband--not that he was present, a morning glance into her room
sufficed him; but she would excuse her own eager folly--telling
him not to be angered with her, who loved him wholly and
entirely, and begging him to silence the wicked tongues that
defamed her.

When sensible she was very weak, and capable of saying very
little; but she clung fast to Lady Drummond, and, Dauphin or no
Dauphin, Dame Lilias was resolved on remaining and watching her
day and night, Madame de Craylierre becoming ready to leave the
nursing to her when it became severe.

The King came to see his daughter-in-law almost every day, and
always spoke to her in the same kindly but unmeaning vein,
assuring her that her sisters must be safe, and promising to
believe nothing against herself; but, as the Lady of Glenuskie
knew from Olivier de Terreforte, taking no measures either to
discover the fate of the princesses or to banish and silence
Jamet de Tillay, though it was all over the Court that the
Dauphiness was dying for love of Alain Chartier. Was it that
his son prevented him from acting, or was it the strange
indifference and indolence that always made Charles the Well-
Served bestir himself far too late?

Any way, Margaret of Scotland was brokenhearted, utterly weary
of life, and with no heart or spirit to rally from the illness
caused by the chill of her hasty walk. She only wished to live
long enough to know that her sisters were safe, see them again,
and send them under safe care to Brittany. She exacted a
promise from Dame Lilias never to leave them again till they
were in safe hands, with good husbands, or back in Scotland with
their brother and good Archbishop Kennedy. 'Bid Jeanie never
despise a true heart; better, far better, than a crown,' she
sighed.

Louis concerned himself much that all the offices of religion
should be provided. He attended the mass daily celebrated in her
room, and caused priests to pray in the farther end continually.
Lady Drummond, who had not given up hope, and believed that good
tidings of her sisters might almost be a cure, thought that he
really hurried on the last offices, at which he devoutly
assisted. However, the confession seemed to have given Margaret
much comfort. She told Dame Lilias that the priest had shown
her how to make an offering to God of her sore suffering from
slander and evil report, and reminded her that to endure it
patiently was treading in the steps of her Master. She was
resolved, therefore, to make no further struggle nor complaint,
but to trust that her silence and endurance would be accepted.
She could pray for her sisters and their safety, and she would endeavour to yield up even that last earthly desire to be
certified of their safety, and to see their bonnie faces once
more. So there she lay, a being formed by nature and intellect
to have been the inspiring helpmeet of some noble-hearted man,
the stay of a kingdom, the education of all around her in all
that was beautiful and refined, but cast away upon one of the
most mean and selfish-hearted of mankind, who only perceived her
great qualities to hate and dread their manifestation in a woman,
to crush them by his contempt; and finally, though he did not
originate the cruel slander that broke her heart, he envenomed
it by his sneers, so as to deprive her of all power of resistance.

The lot of Margaret of Scotland was as piteous as that of any of
the doomed house of Stewart. And there the Lady of Glenuskie
and Annis de Terreforte watched her sinking day by day, and
still there were no tidings of Jean and Eleanor from Nanci, no messenger from Sir Patrick to tell where the search was directed.

CHAPTER 9

BALCHENBURG

'In these wylde deserts where she now abode
There dwelt a salvage nation, which did live
On stealth and spoil, and making nightly rade
Into their neighbours' borders.'--SPENSER.

A terrible legacy of the Hundred Years' War, which, indeed, was
not yet entirely ended by the Peace of Tours, was the existence
of bands of men trained to nothing but war and rapine, and
devoid of any other means of subsistence than freebooting on
the peasantry or travellers, whence they were known as
routiers--highwaymen, and ecorcheurs--flayers. They were a
fearful scourge to France in the early part of the reign of
Charles VII., as, indeed, they had been at every interval of
peace ever since the battle of Creci, and they really made a
state of warfare preferable to the unhappy provinces, or at
least to those where it was not actually raging. In a few
years more the Dauphin contrived to delude many of them into an
expedition, where he abandoned them and left them to be
massacred, after which he formed the rest into the nucleus of a
standing army; but at this time they were the terror of
travellers, who only durst go about any of the French provinces
in well-armed and large parties.

The domains of King Rene, whether in Lorraine or Provence,
were, however, reckoned as fairly secure, but from the time the
little troop, with the princesses among them, had started from
Nanci, Madame de Ste. Petronelle became uneasy. She looked up
at the sun, which was shining in her face, more than once, and
presently drew the portly mule she was riding towards George
Douglas.

'Sir,' she said, 'you are the ladies' squire?'

'I have that honour, Madame.'

'And a Scot?'

'Even so.'

'I ask you, which way you deem that we are riding?'

'Eastward, Madame, if the sun is to be trusted. Mayhap
somewhat to the south.'

'Yea; and which side lies Chalons?'

This was beyond George's geography. He looked up with open
mouth and shook his head.

'Westward!' said the lady impressively. 'And what's yon in the
distance?'

'Save that this land is as flat as a bannock, I'd have said
'twas mountains.'

'Mountains they are, young man!' said Madame de Ste. Petronelle
emphatically--'the hills between Lorraine and Alsace, which we
should be leaving behind us.'

'Is there treachery?' asked George, reining up his horse. 'Ken
ye who is the captain of this escort?'

'His name is Hall; he is thick with the Dauphin. Ha! Madame,
is he sib to him that aided in the slaughter of Eastern's Eve
night?'

'Just, laddie. 'Tis own son to him that Queen Jean made dae
sic a fearful penance. What are ye doing?'

'I'll run the villain through, and turn back to Nanci while yet
there is time,' said George, his hand on his sword.

'Hold, ye daft bodie! That would but bring all the lave on ye.
There's nothing for it but to go on warily, and maybe at the
next halt we might escape from them.'

But almost while Madame de Ste. Petronelle spoke there was a
cry, and from a thicket there burst out a band of men in steel
headpieces and buff jerkins, led by two or three horsemen.
There was a confused outcry of 'St. Denys! St. Andrew!' on one
side, 'Yield!' on the other. Madame's rein was seized, and
though she drew her dagger, her hand was caught before she
could strike, by a fellow who cried, 'None of that, you old
hag, or it shall be the worse for thee!'

'St. Andrew! St. Andrew!' screamed Eleanor. 'Scots, to the
rescue of your King's sisters!'

'Douglas--Douglas, help!' cried Jean. But each was surrounded
by a swarm of the ruffians; and as George Douglas hastily
pushed down some with his horse, and struck down one or two
with his sword, he was felled by a mighty blow on the head, and
the ecorcheurs thronged over him, dragging him off his horse,
any resistance on the part of the Scottish archers, their
escort, they could not tell; they only heard a tumult of shouts
and cries, and found rude hands holding them on their horses
and dragging them among the trees. Their screams for help were
answered by a gruff voice from a horseman, evidently the leader
of the troop. 'Hold that noise, Lady! No ill is meant to you,
but you must come with us. No; screams are useless! There's
none to come to you. Stop them, or I must!'

'There is none!' said Madame de Ste. Petronelle's voice in her
own tongue; 'best cease to cry, and not fash the loons more.'

The sisters heard, and in her natural tone Eleanor said in
French, 'Sir, know you who you are thus treating? The King's daughter--sisters of the Dauphiness!'

He laughed. 'Full well,' he answered, in very German-sounding
French.

'Such usage will bring the vengeance of the King and Dauphin on
you.'

He laughed yet more loudly. His face was concealed by his
visor, but the ill-fitting armour and great roan horse made
Jean recognise the knight whose eyes had dwelt on her so boldly
at the tournament, and she added her voice.

'Your Duke of the Tirol will punish this.'

'He has enough to do to mind his own business,' was the answer.

'Come, fair one, hold your tongue! There's no help for it, and
the less trouble you give us the better it will be for you.'

'But our squire!' Jean exclaimed, looking about her. 'Where is
he?'

Again there was a rude laugh.

'Showed fight. Disposed of. See there!' and Jean could not
but recognise the great gray horse from the Mearns that George
Douglas had always ridden. Had she brought the gallant youth
to this, and without word or look to reward his devotion? She
gave one low cry, and bowed her head, grieved and sick at
heart. While Eleanor, on her side, exclaimed,

'Felon, thou hast slain a nobleman's brave heir! Disgrace to
knighthood!'

'Peace, maid, or we will find means to silence thy tongue,'
growled the leader; and Madame de Ste. Petronelle interposed,
'Whisht--whisht, my bairn; dinna anger them.' For she saw that
there was more disposition to harshness towards Eleanor than
towards Jean, whose beauty seemed to command a sort of regard.

Eleanor took the hint. Her eyes filled with tears, and her
bosom heaved at the thought of the requital of the devotion of
the brave young man, lying in his blood, so far from his father
and his home; but she would not have these ruffians see her
weep and think it was for herself, and she proudly straightened
herself in her saddle and choked down the rising sob.

On, on they went, at first through the wood by a tangled path,
then over a wide moor covered with heather, those mountains,
which had at first excited the old lady's alarm, growing more
distinct in front of them; going faster, too, so that the men
who held the reins were half running, till the ground began to
rise and grow rougher, when, at an order in German from the
knight, a man leapt on in front of each lady to guide her
horse.

Where were they going? No one deigned to ask except Madame de
Ste. Petronelle, and her guard only grunted, 'Nicht verstand,'
or something equivalent.

A thick mass of wood rose before them, a stream coming down
from it, and here there was a halt, the ladies were lifted
down, and the party, who numbered about twelve men, refreshed
themselves with the provisions that the Infanta Yolande had
hospitably furnished for her guests. The knight awkwardly, but
not uncivilly, offered a share to his captives, but Eleanor
would have moved them off with disdain, and Jean sat with her
head in her hands, and would not look up.

The old lady remonstrated. 'Eat--eat,' she said. 'We shall
need all our spirit and strength, and there's no good in being
weak and spent with fasting.'

Eleanor saw the prudence of this, and accepted the food and
wine offered to her; but Jean seemed unable to swallow anything
but a long draught of wine and water, and scarcely lifted her
head from her sister's shoulder. Eleanor held her rosary, and
though the words she conned over were Latin, all her heart was
one silent prayer for protection and deliverance, and
commendation of that brave youth's soul to bis Maker.

The knight kept out of their way, evidently not wishing to be
interrogated, and he seemed to be the only person who could
speak French after a fashion. By and by they were remounted
and led across some marshy ground, where the course of the
stream was marked by tall ferns and weeds, then into a wood of
beeches, where the sun lighted the delicate young foliage,
while the horses trod easily among the brown fallen leaves.
This gave place to another wood of firs, and though the days
were fairly long, here it was rapidly growing dark under the
heavy branches, so that the winding path could only have been
followed by those well used to it. As it became steeper and
more stony the trees became thinner, and against the eastern
sky could be seen, dark and threatening, the turrets of a
castle above a steep, smooth-looking, grassy slope, one of the
hills, in fact, called from their shape by the French, ballons.

Just then Jean's horse, weary and unused to mountaineering,
stumbled. The man at its head was perhaps not attending to it,
for the sudden pull he gave the rein only precipitated the
fall. The horse was up again in a moment, but Jean lay still.
Her sister and the lady were at her side in a moment; but when
they tried to raise her she cried out, at first inarticulately,
then, 'Oh, my arm!' and on another attempt to lift her she
fainted away. The knight was in the meantime swearing in
German at the man who had been leading her, then asking
anxiously in French how it was with the maiden, as she lay with
her head on her sister's lap, Madame answered,

'Hurt--much hurt.'

'But not to the death?'

'Who knows? No thanks to you.' He tendered a flask where only
a few drops of wine remained, growling something or other about
the Schelm; and when Jean's lips had been moistened with it she
opened her eyes, but sobbed with pain, and only entreated to be
let alone. This, of course, was impossible; but with double
consternation Eleanor looked up at what, in the gathering
darkness, seemed a perpendicular height. The knight made them
understand that all that could be done was to put the sufferer
on horseback and support her there in the climb upwards, and he
proceeded without further parley to lift her up, not entirely
without heed to her screams and moans, for he emitted such
sounds as those with which he might have soothed his favourite
horse, as he placed her on the back of a stout, little, strong,
mountain pony. Eleanor held her there, and he walked at its
head. Madame de Ste. Petronelle would fain have kept up on the
other side, but she had lost her mountain legs, and could not
have got up at all without the mule on which she was replaced.
Eleanor's height enabled her to hold her arm round her sister,
and rest her head on her shoulder, though how she kept on in
the dark, dragged along as it were blindly up and up, she never
could afterwards recollect; but at last pine torches came down
to meet them, there was a tumult of voices, a yawning black
archway in front, a light or two flitting about. Jean lay
helplessly against her, only groaning now and then; then, as
the arch seemed to swallow them up, Eleanor was aware of an old
man, lame and rugged, who bawled loud and seemed to be the
highly displeased master; of calls for 'Barbe,' and then of an
elderly, homely-looking woman, who would have assisted in
taking Jean off the pony but that the knight was already in the
act. However, he resigned her to her sister and Madame de Ste.
Petronelle, while Barbe led the way, lamp in hand. It was just
as well poor Jeanie remained unconscious or nearly so while she
was conveyed up the narrow stairs to a round chamber, not worse
in furnishing than that at Dunbar, though very unlike their
tapestried rooms at Nanci.

It was well to be able to lay her down at all, and old Barbe
was not only ready and pitying, but spoke French. She had some
wine ready, and had evidently done her best in the brief
warning to prepare a bed. The tone of her words convinced
Madame de Ste. Petronelle that at any rate she was no enemy.
So she was permitted to assist in the investigation of the
injuries, which proved to be extensive bruises and a dislocated
shoulder. Both had sufficient experience in rough-and-ready
surgery, as well as sufficient strength, for them to be able to
pull in the shoulder, while Eleanor, white and trembling, stood
on one side with the lamp, and a little flaxen-haired girl of
twelve years old held bandages and ran after whatever Barbe
asked for.

This done, and Jean having been arranged as comfortably as
might be, Barbe obeyed some peremptory summonses from without,
and presently came back.

'The seigneur desires to speak with the ladies,' she said; 'but
I have told him that they cannot leave la pauvrette, and are
too much spent to speak with him to-night. I will bring them
supper and they shall rest.'

'We thank you,' said Madame de Ste. Petronelle, 'Only, de
grace, tell us where we are, and who this seigneur is, and what
he wants with us poor women.'

'This is the Castle of Balchenburg,' was the reply; 'the
seigneur is the Baron thereof. For the next'--she shrugged her
shoulders--'it must be one of Baron Rudiger's ventures. But I
must go and fetch the ladies some supper. Ah! the demoiselle
surely needs it.'

'And some water!' entreated Eleanor.

'Ah yes,' she replied; 'Trudchen shall bring some.'

The little girl presently reappeared with a pitcher as heavy as
she could carry. She could not understand French, but looked
much interested, and very eager and curious as she brought in
several of the bundles and mails of the travellers.

'Thank the saints,' cried the lady, 'they do not mean to strip
us of our clothes!'

'They have stolen us, and that is enough for them,' said
Eleanor.

Jean lay apparently too much exhausted to take notice of what
was going on, and they hoped she might sleep, while they moved
about quietly. The room seemed to be a cell in the hollow of
the turret, and there were two loophole windows, to which
Eleanor climbed up, but she could see nothing but the stars.
'Ah! yonder is the Plough, just as when we looked out at it at
Dunbar o'er the sea!' she sighed. 'The only friendly thing I
can see! Ah! but the same God and the saints are with us
still!' and she clasped her rosary's cross as she returned to
her sister, who was sighing out an entreaty for water.

By and by the woman returned, and with her the child. She made
a low reverence as she entered, having evidently been informed
of the rank of her captives. A white napkin was spread over
the great chest that served for a table--a piece of
civilisation such as the Dunbar captivity had not known--three
beechen bowls and spoons, and a porringer containing a not
unsavoury stew of a fowl in broth thickened with meal. They
tried to make their patient swallow a little broth, but without
much success, though Eleanor in the mountain air had become
famished enough to make a hearty meal, and feel more cheered
and hopeful after it. Barbe's evident sympathy and respect
were an element of comfort, and when Jean revived enough to
make some inquiry after poor Skywing, and it was translated
into French, there was an assurance that the hawk was cared
for--hopes even given of its presence. Barbe was not only
compassionate, but ready to answer all the questions in her
power. She was Burgundian, but her home having been harried in
the wars, her husband had taken service as a man-at-arms with
the Baron of Balchenburg, she herself becoming the bower-woman
of the Baroness, now dead. Since the death of the good lady,
whose influence had been some restraint, everything had become
much rougher and wilder, and the lords of the castle, standing
on the frontier as it did, had become closely connected with
the feuds of Germany as well as the wars in France. The old
Baron had been lamed in a raid into Burgundy, since which time
he had never left home; and Barbe's husband had been killed,
her sons either slain or seeking their fortune elsewhere, so
that nothing was left to her but her little daughter Gertrude,
for whose sake she earnestly longed to find her way down to
more civilised and godly life; but she was withheld by the
difficulties in the path, and the extreme improbability of
finding a maintenance anywhere else, as well as by a certain
affection for her two Barons, and doubts what they would do
without her, since the elder was in broken health and the
younger had been her nursling. In fact, she was the highest
female authority in the castle, and kept up whatever semblance
of decency or propriety remained since her mistress's death.
All this came out in the way of grumbling or lamentation, in
the satisfaction of having some woman to confide in, though her
young master had made her aware of the rank of his captives.
Every one, it seemed, had been taken by surprise. He was in
the habit of making expeditions on his own account, and
bringing home sometimes lawless comrades or followers,
sometimes booty; but this time, after taking great pains to
furbish up a suit of armour brought home long ago, he had set
forth to the festivities at Nanci. The lands and castle were
so situated, that the old Baron had done homage for the greater
part to Sigismund as Duke of Elsass, and for another portion to
King Rene as Duke of Lorraine, as whose vassal the young Baron
had appeared. No more had been heard of him till one of his
men hurried up with tidings that Herr Rudiger had taken a bevy
of captives, with plenty of spoil, but that one was a lady much
hurt, for whom Barbe must prepare her best.

Since this, Barbe had learnt from her young master that the
injured lady was the sister of the Dauphiness, and a king's
daughter, and that every care must be taken of her and her
sister, for he was madly in love with her, and meant her to be
his wife.

Eleanor and Madame de Ste. Petronelle cried out at this with
horror, in a stifled way, as Barbe whispered it.

'Too high, too dangerous game for him, I know,' said the old
woman. 'So said his father, who was not a little dismayed when
he heard who these ladies were.'

'The King, my brother, the Dauphin, the Duke of Brittany--'
began Eleanor.

'Alas! the poor boy would never have ventured it but for
encouragement,' sighed Barbe. 'Treacherous I say it must be!'

'I knew there was treachery, 'exclaimed Madame de Ste.
Petronelle, 'so soon as I found which way our faces were
turned.'

'But who could or would betray us?' demanded Eleanor.

'You need not ask that, when your escort was led by Andrew
Hall,' returned the elder lady. 'Poor young George of the Red
Peel had only just told me so, when the caitiffs fell on him,
and he came to his bloody death.'

'Hall! Then I marvel not,' said Eleanor, in a low, awe-struck
voice. 'My brother the Dauphin could not have known.'

The old Scotswoman refrained from uttering her belief that he
knew only too well, but by the time all this had been said
Barbe was obliged to leave them, having arranged for the night
that Eleanor should sleep in the big bed beside her sister, and
their lady across it at their feet--a not uncommon arrangement
in those days.

Sleep, however, in spite of weariness, was only to be had in
snatches, for poor Jean was in much pain, and very feverish,
besides being greatly terrified at their situation, and full of
grief and self-reproach for the poor young Master of Angus,
never dozing off for a moment without fancying she saw him
dying and upbraiding her, and for the most part tossing in a
restless misery that required the attendance of one or both.
She had never known ailment before, and was thus all the more
wretched and impatient, alarming and distressing Eleanor
extremely, though Madame de Ste. Petronelle declared it was
only a matter of course, and that the lassie would soon be
well.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16