CHAPTER 25
It was the custom to conclude the ceremonies of the bestowal of
knighthood by a grand feast given in honor of the newly-created
knight. But in Myles's instance the feast was dispensed with. The
Earl of Mackworth had planned that Myles might be created a
Knight of the Bath with all possible pomp and ceremony; that his
personality might be most favorably impressed upon the King; that
he might be so honorably knighted as to make him the peer of any
who wore spurs in all England; and, finally, that he might
celebrate his new honors by jousting with some knight of high
fame and approved valor. All these desiderata chance had
fulfilled in the visit of the King to Devlen.
As the Earl had said to Myles, he would rather have waited a
little while longer until the lad was riper in years and
experience, but the opportunity was not to be lost. Young as he
was, Myles must take his chances against the years and grim
experience of the Sieur de la Montaigne. But it was also a part
of the Earl's purpose that the King and Myles should not be
brought too intimately together just at that time. Though every
particular of circumstance should be fulfilled in the ceremony,
it would have been ruination to the Earl's plans to have the
knowledge come prematurely to the King that Myles was the son of
the attainted Lord Falworth. The Earl knew that Myles was a
shrewd, coolheaded lad; but the King had already hinted that the
name was familiar to his ears, and a single hasty answer or
unguarded speech upon the young knight's part might awaken him to
a full knowledge. Such a mishap was, of all things, to be avoided
just then, for, thanks to the machinations of that enemy of his
father of whom Myles had heard so much, and was soon to hear
more, the King had always retained and still held a bitter and
rancorous enmity against the unfortunate nobleman.
It was no very difficult matter for the Earl to divert the King's
attention from the matter of the feast. His Majesty was very
intent just then upon supplying a quota of troops to the Dauphin,
and the chief object of his visit to Devlen was to open
negotiations with the Earl looking to that end. He was
interested--much interested in Myles and in the coming jousting
in which the young warrior was to prove himself, but he was
interested in it by way of a relaxation from the other and more
engrossing matter. So, though he made some passing and half
preoccupied inquiry about the feast he was easily satisfied with
the Earl's reasons for not holding it: which were that he had
arranged a consultation for that morning in regard to the troops
for the Dauphin, to which meeting he had summoned a number of his
own more important dependent nobles, that the King himself needed
repose and the hour or so of rest that his barber- surgeon had
ordered him to take after his mid-day meal; that Father Thomas
had laid upon Myles a petty penance--that for the first three
days of his knighthood he should eat his meals without meat and
in his own apartment--and various other reasons equally good and
sufficient. So the King was satisfied, and the feast was
dispensed with.
The next morning had been set for the jousting, and all that day
the workmen were busy erecting the lists in the great quadrangle
upon which, as was said before, looked the main buildings of the
castle. The windows of Myles's apartment opened directly upon the
bustling scene--the carpenters hammering and sawing, the
upholsterers snipping, cutting, and tacking. Myles and Gascoyne
stood gazing out from the open casement, with their arms lying
across one another's shoulders in the old boyhood fashion, and
Myles felt his heart shrink with a sudden tight pang as the
realization came sharply and vividly upon him that all these
preparations were being made for him, and that the next day he
should, with almost the certainty of death, meet either glory or
failure under the eyes not only of all the greater and lesser
castle folk, but of the King himself and noble strangers
critically used to deeds of chivalry and prowess. Perhaps he had
never fully realized the magnitude of the reality before. In that
tight pang at his heart he drew a deep breath, almost a sigh.
Gascoyne turned his head abruptly, and looked at his friend, but
he did not ask the cause of the sigh. No doubt the same thoughts
that were in Myles's mind were in his also.
It was towards the latter part of the afternoon that a message
came from the Earl, bidding Myles attend him in his private
closet. After Myles had bowed and kissed his lordship's hand, the
Earl motioned him to take a seat, telling him that he had some
final words to say that might occupy a considerable time. He
talked to the young man for about half an hour in his quiet,
measured voice, only now and then showing a little agitation by
rising and walking up and down the room for a turn or two. Very
many things were disclosed in that talk that had caused Myles
long hours of brooding thought, for the Earl spoke freely, and
without concealment to him concerning his father and the fortunes
of the house of Falworth.
Myles had surmised many things, but it was not until then that he
knew for a certainty who was his father's malignant and powerful
enemy--that it was the great Earl of Alban, the rival and bitter
enemy of the Earl of Mackworth. It was not until then that he
knew that the present Earl of Alban was the Lord Brookhurst, who
had killed Sir John Dale in the anteroom at Falworth Castle that
morning so long ago in his early childhood. It was not until then
that he knew all the circumstances of his father's blindness;
that he had been overthrown in the melee at the great tournament
at York, and that that same Lord Brookhurst had ridden his
iron-shod war-horse twice over his enemy's prostrate body before
his squire could draw him from the press, and had then and there
given him the wound from which he afterwards went blind. The Earl
swore to Myles that Lord Brookhurst had done what he did
wilfully, and had afterwards boasted of it. Then, with some
hesitation, he told Myles the reason of Lord Brookhurst's enmity,
and that it had arisen on account of Lady Falworth, whom he had
one time sought in marriage, and that he had sworn vengeance
against the man who had won her.
Piece by piece the Earl of Mackworth recounted every circumstance
and detail of the revenge that the blind man's enemy had
afterwards wreaked upon him. He told Myles how, when his father
was attainted of high-treason, and his estates forfeited to the
crown, the King had granted the barony of Easterbridge to the
then newly- created Earl of Alban in spite of all the efforts of
Lord Falworth's friends to the contrary; that when he himself had
come out from an audience with the King, with others of his
father's friends, the Earl of Alban had boasted in the anteroom,
in a loud voice, evidently intended for them all to hear, that
now that he had Falworth's fat lands, he would never rest till he
had hunted the blind man out from his hiding, and brought his
head to the block.
"Ever since then," said the Earl of Mackworth "he hath been
striving by every means to discover thy father's place of
concealment. Some time, haply, he may find it, and then--"
Myles had felt for a long time that he was being moulded and
shaped, and that the Earl of Mackworth's was the hand that was
making him what he was growing to be; but he had never realized
how great were the things expected of him should he pass the
first great test, and show himself what his friends hoped to see
him. Now he knew that all were looking upon him to act, sometime,
as his father's champion, and when that time should come, to
challenge the Earl of Alban to the ordeal of single combat, to
purge his father's name of treason, to restore him to his rank,
and to set the house of Falworth where it stood before misfortune
fell upon it.
But it was not alone concerning his and his father's affairs that
the Earl of Mackworth talked to Myles. He told him that the Earl
of Alban was the Earl of Mackworth's enemy also; that in his
younger days he had helped Lord Falworth, who was his kinsman, to
win his wife, and that then, Lord Brookhurst had sworn to compass
his ruin as he had sworn to compass the ruin of his friend. He
told Myles how, now that Lord Brookhurst was grown to be Earl of
Alban, and great and powerful, he was forever plotting against
him, and showed Myles how, if Lord Falworth were discovered and
arrested for treason, he also would be likely to suffer for
aiding and abetting him. Then it dawned upon Myles that the Earl
looked to him to champion the house of Beaumont as well as that
of Falworth.
"Mayhap," said the Earl, "thou didst think that it was all for
the pleasant sport of the matter that I have taken upon me this
toil and endeavor to have thee knighted with honor that thou
mightst fight the Dauphiny knight. Nay, nay, Myles Falworth, I
have not labored so hard for such a small matter as that. I have
had the King, unknown to himself, so knight thee that thou mayst
be the peer of Alban himself, and now I would have thee to hold
thine own with the Sieur de la Montaigne, to try whether thou
be'st Alban's match, and to approve thyself worthy of the honor
of thy knighthood. I am sorry, ne'theless," he added, after a
moment's pause, "that this could not have been put off for a
while longer, for my plans for bringing thee to battle with that
vile Alban are not yet ripe. But such a chance of the King coming
hither haps not often. And then I am glad of this much--that a
good occasion offers to get thee presently away from England. I
would have thee out of the King's sight so soon as may be after
this jousting. He taketh a liking to thee, and I fear me lest he
should inquire more nearly concerning thee and so all be
discovered and spoiled. My brother George goeth upon the first of
next month to France to take service with the Dauphin, having
under his command a company of tenscore men--knights and archers;
thou shalt go with him, and there stay till I send for thee to
return."
With this, the protracted interview concluded, the Earl charging
Myles to say nothing further about the French expedition for the
present--even to his friend--for it was as yet a matter of
secrecy, known only to the King and a few nobles closely
concerned in the venture.
Then Myles arose to take his leave. He asked and obtained
permission for Gascoyne to accompany him to France. Then he
paused for a moment or two, for it was strongly upon him to speak
of a matter that had been lying in his mind all day--a matter
that he had dreamed of much with open eyes during the long vigil
of the night before.
The Earl looked up inquiringly. "What is it thou wouldst ask?"
said he.
Myles's heart was beating quickly within him at the thought of
his own boldness, and as he spoke his cheeks burned like fire.
"Sir," said he, mustering his courage at last, "haply thou hast
forgot it, but I have not; ne'theless, a long time since when I
spoke of serving the--the Lady Alice as her true knight, thou
didst wisely laugh at my words, and bade me wait first till I had
earned my spurs. But now, sir, I have gotten my spurs, and--and
do now crave thy gracious leave that I may serve that lady as her
true knight."
A space of dead silence fell, in which Myles's heart beat
tumultuously within him.
"I know not what thou meanest," said the Earl at last, in a
somewhat constrained voice. "How wouldst thou serve her? What
wouldst thou have?"
"I would have only a little matter just now," answered Myles. "I
would but crave of her a favor for to wear in the morrow's
battle, so that she may know that I hold her for my own true
lady, and that I may have the courage to fight more boldly,
having that favor to defend."
The Earl sat looking at him for a while in brooding silence,
stroking his beard the while. Suddenly his brow cleared. "So be
it," said he. "I grant thee my leave to ask the Lady Alice for a
favor, and if she is pleased to give it to thee, I shall not say
thee nay. But I set this upon thee as a provision: that thou
shalt not see her without the Lady Anne be present. Thus it was,
as I remember, thou saw her first, and with it thou must now be
satisfied. Go thou to the Long Gallery, and thither they will
come anon if naught hinder them."
Myles waited in the Long Gallery perhaps some fifteen or twenty
minutes. No one was there but himself. It was a part of the
castle connecting the Earl's and the Countess's apartments, and
was used but little. During that time he stood looking absently
out of the open casement into the stony court-yard beyond, trying
to put into words that which he had to say; wondering, with
anxiety, how soon the young ladies would come; wondering whether
they would come at all. At last the door at the farther end of
the gallery opened, and turning sharply at the sound, he saw the
two young ladies enter, Lady Alice leaning upon Lady Anne's arm.
It was the first time that he had seen them since the ceremony of
the morning, and as he advanced to meet them, the Lady Anne came
frankly forward, and gave him her hand, which Myles raised to his
lips.
"I give thee joy of thy knighthood, Sir Myles," said she, "and do
believe, in good sooth, that if any one deserveth such an honor,
thou art he."
At first little Lady Alice hung back behind her cousin, saying
nothing until the Lady Anne, turning suddenly, said: "Come, coz,
has thou naught to say to our new-made knight? Canst thou not
also wish him joy of his knighthood?"
Lady Alice hesitated a minute, then gave Myles a timid hand,
which he, with a strange mixture of joy and confusion, took as
timidly as it was offered. He raised the hand, and set it lightly
and for an instant to his lips, as he had done with the Lady
Anne's hand, but with very different emotions.
"I give you joy of your knighthood, sir," said Lady Alice, in a
voice so low that Myles could hardly hear it.
Both flushed red, and as he raised his head again, Myles saw that
the Lady Anne had withdrawn to one side. Then he knew that it was
to give him the opportunity to proffer his request.
A little space of silence followed, the while he strove to key
his courage to the saying of that which lay at his mind. "Lady,"
said he at last, and then again--"Lady, I--have a favor for to
ask thee."
"What is it thou wouldst have, Sir Myles?" she murmured, in
reply.
"Lady," said he, "ever sin I first saw thee I have thought that
if I might choose of all the world, thou only wouldst I choose
for--for my true lady, to serve as a right knight should." Here
he stopped, frightened at his own boldness. Lady Alice stood
quite still, with her face turned away. "Thou--thou art not
angered at what I say?" he said.
She shook her head.
"I have longed and longed for the time," said he, to ask a boon
of thee, and now hath that time come. Lady, to-morrow I go to
meet a right good knight, and one skilled in arms and in
jousting, as thou dost know. Yea, he is famous in arms, and I be
nobody. Ne'theless, I fight for the honor of England and
Mackworth--and--and for thy sake. I-- Thou art not angered at
what I say?"
Again the Lady Alice shook her head.
"I would that thou--I would that thou would give me some favor
for to wear--thy veil or thy necklace."
He waited anxiously for a little while, but Lady Alice did not
answer immediately.
"I fear me," said Myles, presently, "that I have in sooth
offended thee in asking this thing. I know that it is a parlous
bold matter for one so raw in chivalry and in courtliness as I
am, and one so poor in rank, to ask thee for thy favor. An I ha'
offended, I prithee let it be as though I had not asked it."
Perhaps it was the young man's timidity that brought a sudden
courage to Lady Alice; perhaps it was the graciousness of her
gentle breeding that urged her to relieve Myles's somewhat
awkward humility, perhaps it was something more than either that
lent her bravery to speak, even knowing that the Lady Anne heard
all. She turned quickly to him: "Nay, Sir Myles," she said, "I am
foolish, and do wrong thee by my foolishness and silence, for,
truly, I am proud to have thee wear my favor." She unclasped, as
she spoke, the thin gold chain from about her neck. "I give thee
this chain," said she, "and it will bring me joy to have it
honored by thy true knightliness, and, giving it, I do wish thee
all success." Then she bowed her head, and, turning, left him
holding the necklace in his hand.
Her cousin left the window to meet her, bowing her head with a
smile to Myles as she took her cousin's arm again and led her
away. He stood looking after them as they left the room, and when
they were gone, he raised the necklace to his lips with a heart
beating tumultuously with a triumphant joy it had never felt
before.
