Justin H. McCarthy

“ So deep was Evander in his book that he did not hear a lady’s footfalls on the grass. When the discomfited Sir Blaise had quitted the arena Brilliana held herself unseen and then swiftly sped back to the pleasaunce. She stood for some seconds on the threshold of a yew arch watching the reading man and wondering why it had pleased Providence to make a Puritan so personable and skilful, wondering why she of all women should take any interest either in his person or in his skill, wondering how long he would remain buried in his tiresome book unconscious of her presence. ”

“ Master Peter paid her what he believed to be a courtly bow.
“That same nameless lady shall praise me,” he chuckled, and, turning, made for the house with all speed. When they were alone, Brilliana and Halfman looked at each other with the mirth of children who have successfully raided an orchard.
“I have netted them,” Brilliana said. “If it do but happen pat, we shall have served the King and punished two cozening faint-hearts. For the best of it is that neither can complain. Each is neck-high in the mire of lies, each has plundered the other, and must be dumb for shame of his knavery.” ”

“ She had never seen her King, yet she felt as if she saw him daily, visible in the living flesh, so keenly did her loyalty seem to quicken color and canvas. Brilliana was not the only soul in England whose loyalty gave the King a kind of godhead, but if she had many peers she had none, nor could have, who overpassed her.
On the morning of the third day of Evander’s stay at Harby, Halfman sat on the edge of the table in the garden-room and stared through the open doorway into the green beyond. ”

“ Evander said, gravely.
Brilliana had lifted the big book onto her lap and was turning the pages tenderly, pausing here and there with loving murmurs.
“Had I been a man,” she said, softly, “I should have turned player for the pleasure to speak such golden words.”
Evander, watching her fair, lowered face under its crown of dark hair, thought of all that Imogen might mean, or Rosalind or Juliet, did each of these dear ones show on the stage like this lady. He gave the odd thought form in speech.
“It is strange,” he said, almost to himself, “that a Cavalier world is content without women players.” ”

“ The serving-man scowled at him for a moment; then his frown faded as he faced the smile and the bright, wild eyes of Halfman.
“My name is Thoroughgood,” he answered, and he added, civilly enough, as if conscious of some air of gentility in his companion, “John Thoroughgood, at your service.”
“A right good name for a right good fellow, if I know anything of men,” Halfman approved. “And I take it that you serve a right good lady.” ”

“ Master Vallance dived into the inn, and when he emerged a few seconds later, bearing two large pewter measures, the traveller was still surveying the landscape with the same air of ecstasy. Master Vallance handed him a full tankard, which Halfman drained at a draught and rattled on the table with a sigh of satisfaction.
“Right English ale,” he attested. “Divine English ale. What gold would I not have given, what blood would I not have spilled for such a draught as that, so clean, so cool, so noble, in the lands where I have lived. ”

“ For the gardens that a conqueror had preserved were now very fair indeed for a conquered man to walk in. The October sun shone as if the royal triumph, yonder at Edgehill and here at Harby, had rekindled summer on the chilling altar of the year, and the hues of the lingering flowers flamed in the celestial fires.
If Evander’s thoughts were sable, he did not allow them to stain the fair day and his companion’s gayety. Halfman swam now in the extravagance of admiration for so miraculous a Puritan. ”

“ Whatever joy the tidings gave to Brilliana, she wasted no words from the needs of the moment. Pointing to Evander where he stood, irresolute in surprise, she commanded, “Secure that man!”
Evander’s resolution returned to him with the sound of her voice, but he was one against too many. While he tried to engage the blade of Halfman, a swinging blow from the pike of Garlinge knocked his weapon out of his hand, and in another moment he was gripped in the grasp of the two young country giants, while Thoroughgood covered him with his musketoon. ”

“ If the light of her on his eyes dazzled him, if the riot in his mind overprized her excellence, a saner man could scarce have failed to be delighted with the girl’s beauty, a wiser to have denied her visible promises of merit. If better-balanced minds than the mind of Hercules Halfman, striving to conjure up the image of their dreams, had looked upon the face, upon the form, of Brilliana Harby, they might well have been willing to let imagination rest and be contented with the living flesh. ”

“ Brilliana had much ado to keep from laughing in the face of the uncouth genuflector, but she kept a grave face and uttered grave complaint.
“Master Hungerford! Master Hungerford! They tell me sad tales of you. Though you are as wealthy as wealthy you will not mend the King’s exchequer.”
Master Paul gave vent to such a wail as a dog makes when one treads unaware upon his tail, and clapped his hands about piteously.
“I wealthy! Forgive you, lady, for listening to such tales. I am not so graced. I am little bigger than a beggar.”
Brilliana wagged her curls. ”

“ Then came such a tintamar, rebels firing on us, we firing on rebels, and so in such noise and thunder we have been eclipsed out of the world these weary days.”
“Never were such days better lived through since the world began,” said Rufus. “You do well to call this Loyalty House which has held out so well against the King’s enemies.”
Brilliana now turned to where Halfman stood apart, his hands resting on the hilt of his sword, and the shadow of a frown on his forehead as he eyed the babbling gallants. ”

“ Halfman stopped him. “She waits you in the garden-room,” he said; “I will hold your cloak and hat for you here while you make your adieus. A lover should not be cumbered.” Evander thanked him, surrendered cloak and hat, and entered the garden-room. He did not hear what Halfman said, though Halfman spoke it aloud, with all the lovers of all time for audience: “There goes the blessedest man in all the world.” Then, with Evander’s cloak about him and Evander’s hat upon his head, Halfman went out into the garden.
At the sound of Evander’s step Brilliana turned and rose to greet him. ”

“ In the headiness of their brawl none of the party had noticed how the door had opened again and how a man stood at gaze in the doorway. A slender man of middle height, in travel-stained riding-habit of black; a man with a comely, melancholy face and sad eyes; a man who seemed very weary. He wore a jewelled George. For a moment the new-comer stood unheeded, then he advanced into the room. Sir Rufus heard him, turned, and cried, “The King!” Evander sent his sword back into its sheath. Brilliana knelt in reverence. ”

“ His sense of humor tempted him to the sanctimonious suit of your out-and-out Parliament man; his love for finery and the high horse lured him to lovelocks and feathers. The old piratical instinct which he thought he had put to bed forever was awake in him, too, and asking which side could be made to pay the best for his services. If he must take sides, which side would fill his pockets the fuller? It was in the thick of these thoughts that he found himself within a few feet of the walls of the park of Harby. ”

“ Thoroughgood answered. “But there is an end to all things, and it looks to me as if we were mighty near to an end of the siege of Harby. Why else should there be a truce called that the Roundhead captain may have speech with my lady.”
“Honest John Thoroughgood,” Halfman answered, with great composure, “you are not so wise as you think. This Roundhead captain has sent us hither the most passionate pleadings to be admitted to parley. Why deny him? It will advantage him no jot, but it is possible we may learn from the leakage of his lips something at least of what is going on in the world.” ”

“ Evander asked, sadly.
Brilliana denied him feverishly.
“What can be—what must be!” she cried. “The King has promised.”
“I am a soldier of the Parliament,” Evander asserted. “I cannot abandon my cause.”
Brilliana almost screamed at him in her anger and despair.
“You are a prisoner under sentence of death. If you die, what gain has the Parliament of you, and I must live a widowed woman.” ”

“ Master Hungerford emerged radiant. For a moment neither squire saw the other. Then Master Rainham, looking away from Brilliana, saw Master Hungerford; and Master Hungerford, looking away from Halfman, saw Master Rainham.
To those who watched the comedy the silence was intense, and throbbing with possibilities as summer air throbs with heat. Brilliana heard Master Rainham say, “What a devil, Master Hungerford,” and Halfman, for his part, averred later that Master Hungerford, too, greeted his neighbor’s presence with an oath. ”

“ Again Dame Satchell parried.
“He is much,” she screamed, and her face was poppy-red with passion, but Tiffany, retreating warily and persistent to tease, was about to start some fresh disclaimer of the Puritan’s merits when she caught sight through a yew arch vista of a gown of gold and gray, and her tongue faltered.
“Our lady,” she whispered to Mistress Satchell, who had barely time to compose her ruffled countenance when Brilliana came through the yew arch and paused on the edge of the pleasaunce surveying the belligerents with an amused smile. ”

“ Halfman had passed much time there with the brisker fellows of the garrison, breaking them in to feats of weapon-play, and he smiled at the memory and the magnitude of his own dexterity. He paused for a moment at the threshold and looked round at Evander.
“Here,” he said, with a smile that was half a leer and an intonation that was little less than a sneer—“here is a spot that will scarce have enough attraction for your worship to merit your worship’s stay.” ”

“ Brilliana still seemed to hesitate. That word “honor” had frightened her for Evander, had frightened her for herself. She now groped uncertain, who thought to tread so surely.
“Will you do as I wish if I tell you?” she asked, trying to mask anxiety with a jesting manner. And when Evander responded gravely, “If I can,” she pressed him impetuously again.
“Nay, now, make me a square promise.” She looked very fair as she pleaded.
“All that a doomed man can do—” Evander replied, smiling somewhat wistfully.
Brilliana shook her head vehemently and her Royalist curls danced round her bright cheeks. ”

“ I am skilled in the uses of falcon-gentle, gerfalcon, saker, lanner, merlin, hobby, goshawk, sparrow-hawk, and musket—”
Brilliana interrupted him with an impetuous gesture of command, and Evander made an end of his display.
“Enough, enough!” she cried. “I feel like Balkis when she came to sip wisdom from Solomon’s goblet. If I question you further I may find that, like my Lord Verulam, you have taken all knowledge for your province. This is something uncanny in a Puritan.”
Evander protested.
“Why should a man deny the arts of life because he finds strength in the faith of the Puritans?” ”

“ The gardens of Harby were captain jewels in the crown of Oxfordshire. From the terrace they spread in spaces of changeful beauty over many acres of fruitful earth. Evander had seen to it that no further harm was done to these lovely spaces than was inevitable for the conduct of the siege. There were some in his company, hissing hot zealots, who were all for laying violating hands upon the temples of Baal and the shrines of Ashtaroth, by which Evander rightly interpreted them to mean the pleasaunces of clipped yews, the rose bowers, the box hedges, and the generous autumnal orchards. ”

“ Halfman echoed, dully. “You wed an enemy to the King?”
Brilliana sighed.
“Love is the greatest power in all the world,” she said; “greater than kings, greater than emperors, greater than popes. But I will wed no enemy to the King. If these wars were to endure forever, then forever my dear friend and I would remain unwed and bear our single souls to heaven.” ”

“ Bring hither a bunch of your subalterns, the rosiest, the most jovial, if any still carry such colors and boast such spirit; let them gather in the banqueting-hall, where, with such wit as French wine can give, let them sing as if they were merry and well fed. Our sanctimonious spy-out-the-nakedness-of-the-land must think we are well victualled, he must think we are well mannered.”
Halfman made her a sweeping reverence which was not without its play-actor’s grace, though its honesty might have pardoned a greater awkwardness. ”

“ Satchell shook her head at Brilliana and her fist at Tiffany.
“Tiffany is a minx, but I am an honest woman; and as I am an honest woman, there are honest qualities in this honest Puritan.”
Brilliana knew as much herself and fretted at the knowledge. It cut against the grain of her heart to admit that a rebel could have any redemption by gifts. But she still questioned Mistress Satchell smoothly, thinking the while of a man intrenched behind a table, one man against six. ”

“ His fantastic wit idealized wildly enough. “An angel among angels,” he exulted. “Ecce Rosa Mundi,” his rusty scholarship trumpeted. His brain was a tumult of passionate phrases from passionate play-books, “Oh, thou art fairer than the evening air,” overriding them all like a fairy swan upon a fairy sea. There never was such a woman since the [Pg 27] world began; there never could be such a woman again till the world should end. And while his mind whirled with his own ecstasies and the ecstasies of dead players, the Lady Brilliana came slowly down the great stairs. ”

“ Halfman shook his head reprovingly.
“Why, for my part, I should like to learn why in all this great gap of time nothing has been done to help one side or the other. If the gentry of Harby have made no effort to relieve us, neither, on the other hand, has our leaguer been augmented by any reinforcements. If my lady has been surprised that Sir Blaise Mickleton has made no show of coming to her succor, I, for my part, am woundily surprised that the Cropheads of Cambridge have sent no further levies for our undoing.” ”

“ Halfman watched with grim amusement. If he loved Evander little, come to think of it he loved Rufus less, all said and done; so he grinned at his discomfiture.
“A wonder,” Randolph said. “When they had the time to try me, their fools’ court-martial, thanks to that damned Cromwell, settled me for a spy and sentenced me to be shot. But the jailer where I lay had a daughter. Need I say more? We Harbys are invincible. Any way, there was no prisoner when the shooting-party came to claim me, and here I am, in time, I hope, to save the life of that poor Puritan devil.” ”