Emma Marshall

WHAT RIGHT?

'Her look and countenance was settled, her face soft, and almost still, of one measure! without any passionate gesture or violent motion, till at length, as it were, awakening and strengthening herself, "Well," she said, "yet this is best; and of this I am sure, that, however they wrong me, they cannot overmaster God. No darkness blinds His eyes, no gaol bars Him out; to whom else should I fly but to Him for succour."'—The Arcadia.

The Countess of Pembroke was sitting in the chamber which overlooked the pleasance at Penshurst and the raised terrace above it, on a quiet autumn day of the year of 1586.

She had come to her early home to arrange the letters and papers which her mother, Lady Mary, had committed to her care on her deathbed.

There were other matters, too, which demanded her attention, and which the Earl was only too glad to help her to settle; he was now in London for that purpose.

There were many difficulties to meet in the division of the property, and Sir Henry had been so terribly hampered by the want of money, that debts sprang up on every side.

Lady Pembroke had great administrative power, and, added to her other gifts, a remarkable clearheadedness and discernment.

The sombre mourning which she wore accentuated her beauty, and set off the lovely pink-and-white of her complexion, and the radiant hair, which was, as she laughingly told her brother, 'the badge of the Sidneys.'

The profound stillness which brooded over Penshurst suited Lady Pembroke's mood, and, looking out from the casement, she saw Lucy Forrester, playing ball with her boy Will on the terrace. Lucy's light and agile figure was seen to great advantage as she sprang forward or ran backward, to catch the ball from the boy's hands. His laughter rang through the still air as, at last, Lucy missed the catch, and then Lady Pembroke saw him run down the steps leading to the pleasance below to meet George Ratcliffe, who was coming in from the entrance on that side of the park.

Lady Pembroke smiled as she saw George advance with his cap in his hand towards Lucy. His stalwart figure was set off by the short green tunic he wore, and a sheaf of arrows at his side, and a bow strapped across his broad shoulders, showed that he had been shooting in the woods.

Only a few words were exchanged, and then Lucy turned, and, leaving George with little Will Herbert, she came swiftly toward the house, and Lady Pembroke presently heard her quick, light tread in the corridor on which her room opened.

'Madam!' Lucy said, entering breathlessly, 'I bear a letter from Humphrey to his brother; it has great news for me. Mary has found her boy, and that evil man, Ambrose Gifford, is dead. Will it please you to hear the letter. I can scarcely contain my joy that Mary has found her child; he was her idol, and I began to despair that she would ever set eyes on him again.'

Lady Pembroke was never too full of her own interests to be unable to enter into those of her ladies and dependants.

'I am right glad, Lucy,' she said. 'Let me hear what good Humphrey has to say, and, perchance, there will be mention of my brothers in the letter. Read it, Lucy. I am all impatience to hear;' and Lucy read, not without difficulty, the large sheet of parchment, which had been sent, with other documents, from the seat of war by special messenger.

'To my good brother, George Ratcliffe, from before Zutphen,—'This to tell you that I, making an expedition by order of my master, Sir Philip Sidney, to reconnoitre the country before Zutphen, where, please God, we will in a few days meet and vanquish the enemy, fell upon a farm-house, and entering, asked whether the folk there were favourable to the righteous cause we have in hand or the contrary. Methinks there never was a joy greater than mine, when, after some weeks of despair, I found there Mistress Mary Gifford and her son! Three weeks before the day on which I write, Mistress Gifford had disappeared from the town of Arnhem, nor could we find a trace of her. I have before told you how, in the taking of Axel, I got a wound in my back from the hand of a traitor, when I had rescued his son from the burning house, where a nest of Jesuits were training young boys in their damnable doctrines.

'From the moment I was carried wounded to Arnhem I heard nought of the child, snatched by the villain from my arms, till that evening when, God be praised, I was led to the very place where he has been nursed by his mother in a sore sickness. It has been my good fortune to give her, my ever-beloved mistress, safe convoy to Arnhem, where they are, thank God, safe under the care of that God-fearing man and worthy divine, Master George Gifford.

'Here I left them, returning to Flushing, where a strong force is ready to meet the enemy, ay, and beat them back with slaughter when they advance. The Earl of Leicester is in command, but the life and soul and wisdom of the defence lie with my noble master, Sir Philip. To serve under him is sure one of the greatest honours a man can know. We have his brave brothers also at hand. Robert is scarce a whit less brave than his brother, and of Mr Thomas, it is enough to say of him he is a Sidney, and worthy of that name.

'I write in haste, for the despatches are made up, thus I can say but little of the hope within my heart, which, God grant, will now at last be not, as for so many long years, a hope in vain.

'Ambrose Gifford died of the fever, and, having made his confession, was absolved by the priest, and forgiven by that saint who has suffered from his sins! This last more for his benefit than the first, methinks! But I can no more.

'Commend me to our mother and Mistress Lucy Forrester. If I fall in the coming fight, I pray you, George, remember to protect one dearest to me on earth.—I rest your loving brother,

'Humphrey Ratcliffe.'

'Post Scriptum.—The enemy is advancing, and we shall be ordered out to meet them ere sunset. God defend the right.

H. R.'

'What is the date of that letter, Lucy?' Lady Pembroke asked.

'The twenty-first day of September, Madam.'

'And this is the twenty-sixth. More news will sure be here ere long, and another victory assured, if it please God. May He protect my brothers in the fight. But, Lucy, I rejoice to hear of your sister's happiness in the recovery of her child; and now, in due course, I trust my brother's faithful servant and friend, Master Humphrey, will have the reward of his loyalty.'

'Yes, Madam; I hope Mary may, as you say, reward Humphrey.'

'And you, Lucy; sure Master George is worthy that you should grant him his reward also.'

Lucy's bright face clouded as the Countess said this, and a bright crimson flush rose to her cheeks.

'Dear Madam,' she said, 'I shrink from giving a meagre return for such faithful love. Sure ere a woman gives herself to a man till death, she should make certain that he is the one in all the world for her.'

'I will not contradict this, Lucy; but many women misjudge their own hearts, and—'

Lady Pembroke hesitated. Then, after a pause, she said,—

'There are some women who make their own idol, and worship it. After all, it is an unreality to them, because unattainable.'

'Nay, Madam,' Lucy said, with kindling eyes. 'I crave pardon; but the unattainable may yet be a reality. Because the sun is set on high in the heavens, it is yet our own when warmed by its beams and brightened by its shining. True, many share in this, but yet it is—we cannot help it—ours by possession when we feel its influence. Methinks,' the girl said, her face shining with a strange light—'methinks I would sooner worship—ay, and love—the unattainable, if pure, noble and good, than have part and lot with the attainable that did not fulfil my dream of all that a true knight and noble gentleman should be.'

Lady Pembroke drew Lucy towards her, and, looking into her face, said,—

'May God direct you aright, dear child! You have done me and mine good service, and the day, when it comes, that I lose you will be no day of rejoicing for me. When first you entered my household I looked on you as a gay and thoughtless maiden, and felt somewhat fearful how you would bear yourself in the midst of temptations, which, strive as we may, must beset those who form the household of a nobleman like the Earl, my husband. He makes wise choice, as far as may be, of the gentlemen attached to his service; but there is ever some black sheep in a large flock, and discretion is needed by the gentlewomen who come into daily intercourse with them. You have shown that discretion, Lucy, and it makes me happy to think that you have learned much that will be of use to you in the life which lies before you.'

'Dear Madam,' Lucy said, 'I owe you everything—more than tongue can tell; and as long as you are fain to keep me near you, I am proud to stay.'

'I feel a strange calm and peace to-day,' Lady Pembroke said, as she leaned out of the casement and looked down on the scene familiar to her from childhood. 'It is the peace of the autumn,' she said; 'and I am able to think of my father—my noble father and dear mother at rest in Paradise—gathered in like sheaves of ripe corn into the garner—meeting Ambrosia and the other younger children, whom they surrendered to God with tears, but not without hope. I am full of confidence that Philip will win fresh laurels, and I only grieve that the parents, who would have rejoiced at his success, will never know how nobly he has borne himself in this war. There will be news soon, and good Sir Francis Walsingham is sure to send it hither post haste. Till it comes, let us be patient.'

It was the afternoon of the following day that Lucy Forrester crossed the Medway by the stepping-stones, and went up the hill to Ford Manor.

It was her custom to do so whenever Lady Pembroke was at Penshurst. Her stepmother was greatly softened by time, and subdued by the yoke which her Puritan husband, who was now lord and master of the house and all in it, had laid upon her.

As Lucy turned into the lane, she met Ned coming along with a calf, which he was leading by a strong rope, to the slaughter-house in the village.

Ned's honest face kindled with smiles as he exclaimed,—

'Well-a-day, Mistress Lucy, you are more like an angel than ever. Did I ever see the like?'

'Have you heard the good news, Ned?' Lucy asked. 'Mistress Gifford has her boy safe and sound at Arnhem.'

Ned opened eyes and mouth with astonishment which deprived him of the power of speech.

'Yes,' Lucy continued, 'and she is a free woman now, Ned, for her husband is dead.'

'And right good news that is, anyhow,' Ned gasped out at last. 'Dead; then there's one rogue the less in the world. But to think of the boy. What is he like, I wonder? He was a young torment sometimes, and I've had many a chase after him when he was meddling with the chicks. The old hen nearly scratched his eyes out one day when he tapped the end of an egg to see if he could get the chick out. Lord, he was a jackanapes, surely; but we all made much of him.'

'He has been very sick with fever,' Lucy said, 'and, I dare say, marvellously changed in four years. You are changed, Ned,' Lucy said; 'you are grown a big man.'

'Ay,' Ned said, tugging at the mouth of the calf, which showed a strong inclination to kick out, and butt with his pretty head against Ned's ribs. 'Ay; and I am a man, Mistress Lucy. I have courted Avice; and—well—we were asked in church last Sunday.'

'I am right glad to hear it, Ned; and I wish you happiness. I must go forward now to the house.'

'I say!—hold! Mistress Lucy!' Ned said, with shamefaced earnestness. 'Don't think me too free and bold—but are you never going to wed? You are a bit cruel to one I could name.'

This was said with such fervour, mingled with fear lest Lucy should be offended, that she could not help smiling as she turned away, saying,—

'The poor calf will kick itself wild if you stay here much longer. So, good-day to you, good Ned; and I will send Avice a wedding gift. I have a pretty blue kerchief that will suit her of which I have no need; for we are all in sombre mourning garments for the great and good lord and lady of Penshurst.'

Lucy found her stepmother seated in the old place on the settle, but not alone. 'Her master,' as she called him with great truth, was with her, and two of 'the chosen ones,' who were drinking mead and munching cakes from a pile on the board.

He invited Lucy to partake of the fare, but she declined, and, having told her stepmother the news about Mary, she did not feel much disposed to remain.

'The boy found, do you say?' snarled her stepmother's husband. 'It would have been a cause of thankfulness if that young limb of the Evil One had never been found. You may tell your sister, Mistress Lucy, that neither her boy nor herself will ever darken these doors. We want no Papists here.'

'Nay, nay, no Papists,' echoed one of the brethren, with his mouth full of cake.

'Nay, nay,' chimed in another, as he set down the huge cup of mead after a prolonged pull. 'No Papists here to bring a curse upon the house.'

Lucy could not help feeling pity for her stepmother, who sat knitting on the settle—her once voluble tongue silenced, her mien dejected and forlorn. Lucy bent down and kissed her, saying in a low voice,—

'You are glad, I know, Mary has found her child.'

And the answer came almost in a whisper, with a scared glance in the direction of her husband and his guests,—

'Ay, ay, sure I am glad.'

Lucy lingered on the rough ground before the house, and looked down upon the scene before her, trying in vain to realise that this had ever been her home.

The wood-crowned heights to the left were showing the tints of autumn, and a soft haze lay in the valley, and brooded over the home of the Sidneys, the stately walls of the castle and the tower of the church clearly seen through the branches of the encircling trees, which the storm of a few days before had thinned of many of their leaves.

The mist seemed to thicken every minute, and as Lucy turned into the road she gave up a dim idea she had of going on to Hillside to pay her respects to Madam Ratcliffe, and hastened toward the village. The mist soon became a fog, which crept up the hillside, and, before she had crossed the plank over the river, it had blotted out everything but near objects. There seemed a weight over everything, animate and inanimate. The cows in the meadow to the right of the bridge stood with bent heads and depressed tails. They looked unnaturally large, seen through the thick atmosphere; and the melancholy caw of some belated rooks above Lucy's head, as they winged their homeward way, deepened the depression which she felt creeping over her, as the fog had crept over the country side. The village children had been called in by their mothers, and there was not the usual sound of boys and girls at play in the street. The rumble of a cart in the distance sounded like the mutter and mumble of a discontented spirit; and as Lucy passed through the square formed by the old timbered houses by the lych gate, no one was about.

The silence and gloom were oppressive, and Lucy's cloak was saturated with moisture. She entered the house by the large hall, and here, too, was silence. But in the President's Court beyond, Lucy heard voices, low and subdued. She listened, with the foreshadowing of evil tidings upon her, and yet she stood rooted to the spot, unwilling to turn fears into certainty, suspense into the reality of some calamity.

Presently a gentleman, who had evidently ridden hard, came into the hall, his cloak and buskins bespattered with mud. He bowed to Lucy, and said,—

'I am a messenger sent post haste from Mr Secretary Walsingham, with despatches for the Countess of Pembroke. I have sent for one Mistress Crawley, who, I am informed, is the head of the Countess's ladies. My news is from the Netherlands.'

'Ill news?' Lucy asked.

'Sir Philip Sidney is sorely wounded in the fight before Zutphen, I grieve to say.'

'Wounded!' Lucy repeated the word. 'Sore wounded!' Then, in a voice so low that it could scarcely be heard, she added, 'Dead! is he dead?'

'Nay, Madam; and we may hope for better tidings. For—'

He was interrupted here by the entrance of Mistress Crawley.

'Ill news!' she exclaimed. 'And who is there amongst us who dare be the bearer of it to my lady? Not I, not I! Her heart will break if Sir Philip is wounded and like to die.'

Several young maidens of Lady Pembroke's household had followed Mistress Crawley into the hall, regardless of the reproof they knew they should receive for venturing to do so.

'I cannot tell my lady—nay, I dare not!' Mistress Crawley said, wringing her hands in despair.

'Here is the despatch which Sir Francis Walsingham has committed to me,' the gentleman said. 'I crave pardon, but I must e'en take yonder seat. I have ridden hard, and I am well-nigh exhausted,' he continued, as he threw himself on one of the benches, and called for a cup of sack.

Lucy meanwhile stood motionless as a statue, her wet cloak clinging to her slender figure, the hood falling back from her head, the long, damp tresses of hair rippling over her shoulders.

'I will take the despatch to my lady,' she said, in a calm voice, 'if so be I may be trusted to do so.'

'Yes, yes!' Mistress Crawley said. 'Go—go, child, and I will follow with burnt feathers and cordial when I think the news is told,' and Mistress Crawley hurried away, the maidens scattering at her presence like a flock of pigeons.

Lucy took the despatch from the hand of the exhausted messenger, and went to perform her task.

Lady Pembroke was reading to her boy Will some passages from the Arcadia, which, in leisure moments, she was condensing and revising, as a pleasant recreation after the work of sorting the family letters and papers, and deciding which to destroy and which to keep.

When Lucy tapped at the door, Will ran to open it.

Even the child was struck by the white face which he saw before him, and he exclaimed,—

'Mistress Lucy is sick, mother.'

'No,' Lucy said, 'dear Madam,' as Lady Pembroke turned, and, seeing her, rose hastily. 'No, Madam, I am not sick, but I bring you a despatch from Sir Francis Walsingham. It is ill news, dearest lady, but not news which leaves no room for hope.'

'It is news of Philip—Philip!' Lady Pembroke said, trying with trembling fingers to break the seal and detach the silk cord which fastened the letter. 'Take it, Lucy, and—and tell me the contents. I cannot see. I cannot open it!'

Then, while the boy nestled close to his mother, as if to give her strength by putting his arms round her, Lucy obeyed her instructions, and opening it, read the Earl of Leicester's private letter, which had accompanied the official despatch, giving an account of the investment of Zutphen and the battle which had been fought before its walls. This private letter was enclosed for Lady Pembroke in that to his Right Honourable and trusted friend Sir F. Walsingham.

'In the mist of the morning of the 23d, my incomparably brave nephew and your brother, Philip Sidney, with but five hundred foot and seven hundred horsemen, advanced to the very walls of Zutphen.

'It was hard fighting against a thousand of the enemy. Philip's horse was killed under him, and alas! he heightened the danger by his fearless courage; for he had thrown off his cuisses to be no better equipped than Sir William Pelham, who had no time to put on his own, and, springing on a fresh horse, he went hotly to the second charge. Again there was a third onset, and our incomparable Philip was shot in the left leg.

'They brought him near me, faint from loss of blood, and he called for water. They brought him a bottle full, and he was about to raise it to his parched lips, when he espied a poor dying soldier cast greedy, ghastly eyes thereon. He forbore to drink of the water, and, handing the bottle to the poor wretch, said,—

'"Take it—thy need is greater than mine."'

'Oh! Philip! Philip!' Lady Pembroke said, 'in death, as in life, self-forgetting and Christ-like in your deeds.'

Lucy raised her eyes from the letter and they met those of her mistress with perfect sympathy which had no need of words.

'Doth my uncle say more, Lucy? Read on.'

'And,' Lucy continued, in the same low voice, which had in it a ring of mingled pride in her ideal hero and sorrow for his pain, 'my nephew would not take on himself any glory or honour when Sir William Russel, also sorely wounded, exclaimed,—

'"Oh, noble Sir Philip, never did man attain hurt so honourably or so valiantly as you," weeping over him as if he had been his mistress.

'"I have done no more," he said, "than God and England claimed of me. My life could not be better spent than in this day's service." I ordered my barge to be prepared, and, the surgeons doing all they could to stanch the blood, Philip was conveyed to Arnhem. He rests now in the house of one Madam Gruithuissens, and all that love and care can do, dear niece, shall be done by his and your sorrowing uncle,

Leicester.

'Pardon this penmanship. It is writ in haste, and not without tears, for verily, I seem now to know, as never before, what the world and his kindred possess in Philip Sidney.

R. L.

'To my dear niece, Mary, Countess of Pembroke, from before Zutphen, on the twenty-second day of September, in the year of grace 1586. Enclosed in despatch to the Right Honourable Sir Francis Walsingham.'

When Lucy had finished reading, the Countess took the letter, and rising, left the room, bidding Will to remain behind.

Mistress Crawley, who was waiting in the corridor to be called in with cordials and burnt feathers, was amazed to see her lady pass out with a faint, sad smile putting aside the offered cordial.

'Nay, good Crawley, my hurt lies beyond the cure of aught but that of Him who has stricken me. I would fain be alone.'

'Dear heart!' Mistress Crawley exclaimed, as she bustled into the room where Lucy still sat motionless, while Will, with childlike intolerance of suspense, ran off to seek someone who would speak, and not sit dumb and white like Lucy. 'Dear heart! I daresay it is not a death-wound. Sure, if there is a God in heaven, He will spare the life of a noble knight like Sir Philip. He will live,' Mistress Crawley said, taking a sudden turn from despair and fear to unreasonable hope. 'He will live, and we shall see him riding into the Court ere long, brave and hearty, so don't pine like that, Mistress Lucy; and I don't, for my part, know what right you have to take on like this; have a sup of cordial, and let us go about our business.'

But Lucy turned away her head, and still sat with folded hands where Lady Pembroke had left her.

Mistress Crawley finished by emptying the silver cup full of cordial herself, and, pressing her hand to her heart, said,—'She felt like to swoon at first, but it would do no good to sit moping, and Lucy had best bestir herself, and, for her part, she did not know why she should sit there as if she were moon-struck.'

The days were long over since Mistress Crawley had ordered Lucy, in the same commanding tones with which she often struck terror into the hearts of the other maidens, threatening them with dismissal and report of their ill-conduct to Lady Pembroke.

Lucy had won the place she held by her gentleness and submission, and, let it be said, by her quickness and readiness to perform the duties required of her.

So Mistress Crawley, finding her adjurations unheeded, bustled off to see that the maidens were not gossiping in the ante-chamber, but had returned to their work.

Lucy was thus left alone with her thoughts, and, in silence and solitude, she faced the full weight of this sorrow which had fallen on the house of Sidney, yes, and on her also.

'What right had she to sit and mourn? What part was hers in this great trouble?' Mistress Crawley's words were repeated again and again in a low whisper, as if communing with her own heart.

'What right have I? No right if right goes by possession. What right? Nay, none.'

Then, with a sudden awaking from the trance of sorrow, Lucy rose, the light came back to her eyes, the colour to her cheeks.

'Right? What right? Yes, the right that is mine, that for long, long years he has been as the sun in my sky. I have gloried in all his great gifts, I have said a thousand times that there were none like him, none. I have seen him as he is, and his goodness and truth have inspirited me in my weakness and ignorance to reach after what is pure and noble. Yes, I have a right, and oh! if, indeed, I never see him again, to my latest day I shall thank God I have known him, Philip, Sir Philip Sidney, true and noble knight.'

There was now a sound of more arrivals in the hall, and Lucy was leaving the room, fearing, hoping, that there might be yet further tidings, when the Earl of Pembroke came hastily along the corridor.

'How fares it with my lady, Mistress Forrester? I have come to give her what poor comfort lies in my power.'

The Earl's face betrayed deep emotion and anxiety.

Will came running after his father, delighted to see him; and in this delight forgetting what had brought him.

'Father! father! I have ridden old black Joan, and I can take a low fence, father.'

'Hush now, my son, thy mother is in sore trouble, as we all must be. Take me to thy mother, boy.'

'Uncle Philip will soon be well of his wound,' the child said, 'the bullet did not touch his heart, Master Ratcliffe saith.'

The Earl shook his head.

'It will be as God pleases, boy,' and there, in the corridor, as he was hastening to his wife's apartments, she came towards him with outstretched arms.

'Oh! my husband,' she said, as he clasped her to his breast. 'Oh! pity me, pity me! and pray God that I may find comfort.'

'Yes, yes, my sweetheart,' the Earl said, and then husband and wife turned into their own chamber, Will, subdued at the sight of his mother's grief, not attempting to follow them, and Lucy was again alone.