Joan of the Sword Hand

"Ah!" he said at last, for all comment.

The Princess rose to her feet and approached the priest.

"My Father," she said swiftly, "this is not the Lady Joan, my brother's wife, but a youth marvellously like her, who hath offered himself in her place that she might escape – "

"Nay," said the Sparhawk, "it was to see you once again, Lady Margaret, that I came to Courtland!"

"Hush! you must not interrupt," she went on, putting him aside with her hand. "He is the Count von Löen, a lord of Kernsberg. And I love him. We want you to marry us now, dear Father – now, without a moment's delay; for if you do not, they will kill him, and I shall have to marry Prince Wasp!"

She clasped her hands about his arm.

"Will you?" she said, looking up beseechingly at him.

The Princess Margaret was a lady who knew her mind and so bent other minds to her own.

The Father stood smiling a little down upon her, more with his eyes than with his lips.

"They will kill him and marry you, if I do. And, moreover, pray tell me, little one, what will they do to me?" he said.

"Father, they would not dare to meddle with you. Your office – your sanctity – Holy Mother Church herself would protect you. If Conrad were here, he would do it for me. I am sure he would marry us. I could tell him everything. But he is far, far away, on his knees at the shrine of Holy Saint Peter, most like."

"And you, young masquerader," said Father Clement, turning to the Sparhawk, "what say you to all this? Is this your wish, as well as that of the Princess Margaret? I must know all before I consent to put my old neck into the halter!"

"I will do whatever the Princess wishes. Her will is mine."

"Do not make a virtue of that, young man," said the priest smiling; "the will of the Princess is also that of most people with whom she comes in contact. Submission is no distinction where our Lady Margaret is concerned. Why, ever since she was so high" (he indicated with his hand), "I declare the minx hath set her own penances and dictated her own absolutions."

"You have indeed been a sweet confessor," murmured Margaret of Courtland, still clasping the Father's arm and looking up fondly into his face. "And you will do as I ask you this once. I will not ask for such a long time again."

The priest laughed a short laugh.

"Nay, if I do marry you to this gentleman, I hope it will serve for a while. I cannot marry Princesses of the Empire to carnival mummers more than once a week!"

A quick frown formed on the brow of Maurice von Lynar. He took a step nearer. The priest put up his hand, with the palm outspread in a sort of counterfeit alarm.

"Nay, I know not if it will last even a week if bride and groom are both so much of the same temper. Gently, good sir, gently and softly. I must go carefully myself. I am bringing my grey hairs unpleasantly near the gallows. I must consider my duty, and you must respect my office."

The Sparhawk dropped on one knee and bent his head.

"Ah, that is better," said the priest, making the sign of benediction above the clustered raven locks. "Rise, sir, I would speak with you a moment apart. My Lady Margaret, will you please to walk on the terrace there while I confer with – the Lady Joan upon obedience, according to the commandment of the Prince."

As he spoke the last words he made a little movement towards the corridor with his hand, at the same moment elevating his voice. The Princess caught his meaning and, before either of her companions could stop her, she tiptoed to the door, set her hand softly to the latch, and suddenly flung it open. Prince Louis stood without, with head bowed to listen.

The Princess shrilled into a little peal of laughter.

"Brother Louis!" she cried, clapping her hands, "we have caught you. You must restrain your youthful, your too ardent affections. Your bride is about to confess. This is no time for mandolins and serenades. You should have tried those beneath her windows in Kernsberg. They might have wooed her better than arbalist and mangonel."

The Prince glared at his débonnaire sister as if he could have slain her on the spot.

"I returned," he said formally, speaking to the disguised Maurice, "to inform the Princess that her rooms in the main palace were ready for her whenever she deigns to occupy them."

"I thank you, Prince Louis," returned the false Princess, bowing. In his character of a woman betrayed and led prisoner the Sparhawk was sparing of his words – and for other reasons as well.

"Come, brother, your arm," said the Princess. "You and I must not intrude. We will leave the good Father and his fair penitent. Will you walk with me on the terrace? I, on my part, will listen to your lover's confessions and give you plenary absolution – even for listening at keyholes. Come, dear brother, come!"

And with one gay glance shot backward at the Sparhawk, half over her shoulder, the Lady Margaret took the unwilling arm of her brother and swept out. Verily, as Father Clement had said, she was a royal minx.

CHAPTER XXXII

THE PRINCESS MARGARET IS IN A HURRY

The priest waited till their footsteps died away down the corridor before going to the door to shut it. Then he turned and faced the Sparhawk with a very different countenance to that which he had bent upon the Princess Margaret.

Generally, when women leave a room the thermometer drops suddenly many degrees nearer the zero of verity. There is all the difference between velvet sheath and bare blade, between the courtesies of seconds and the first clash of the steel in the hands of principals. There are, let us say, two men and one woman. The woman is in the midst. Smile answers smile. Masks are up. The sun shines in. She goes – and before the smile of parting has fluttered from her lips, lo! iron answers iron on the faces of the men. Off, ye lendings! Salute! Engage! To the death!

There was nothing, however, very deadly in the encounter of the Sparhawk and Father Clement. It was only as if a couple of carnival maskers had stepped aside out of the whirl of a dance to talk a little business in some quiet alcove. The Father foresaw the difficulty of his task. The Sparhawk was conscious of the awkwardness of maintaining a manly dignity in a woman's gown. He felt, as it were, choked about the legs in another man's presence.

"And now, sir," said the priest abruptly, "who may you be?"

"Father, I am a servant to the Duchess Joan of Hohenstein and Kernsberg. Maurice von Lynar is my name."

"And pray, how came you so like the Duchess that you can pass muster for her?"

"That I know not. It is an affair upon which I was not consulted. But, indeed, I do it but poorly, and succeed only with those who know her little, and who are in addition men without observation. Both the Princess and yourself saw through me easily enough, and I am in fear every moment I am near Prince Ivan."

"How came the Princess to love you?"

"Well, for one thing, I loved her. For another, I told her so!"

"The points are well taken, but of themselves insufficient," smiled the priest. "So also have others better equipped by fortune to win her favour than you. What else?"

Then, with a certain shamefaced and sulky pride, the Sparhawk told Father Clement all the tale of the mission of the Duchess Joan of Courtland, of the liking the Princess had taken to that lady in her secretary's attire, of the kiss exchanged upon the dark river's bank, the fragrant memory of which had drawn him back to Courtland against his will. And the priest listened like a man of many counsels who knows that the strangest things are the truest, and that the naked truth is always incredible.

"It is a pretty tangle you have made between you," said Father Clement when Maurice finished. "I know not how you could more completely have twisted the skein. Every one is somebody else, and the devil is hard upon the hindmost – or Prince Ivan, which is apparently the same thing."

The priest now withdrew in his turn to where he could watch the Alla curving its back a little in mid-stream as the summer floods rushed seaward from the hills. To true Courtland folk its very bubbles brought counsel as they floated down towards the Baltic.

"Let me see! Let me see!" he murmured, stroking his chin.

Then after a long pause he turned again to the Sparhawk.

"You are of sufficient fortune to maintain the Princess as becomes her rank?"

"I am not a rich man," answered Von Lynar, "but by the grace of the Duchess Joan neither am I a poor one. She hath bestowed on me one of her father's titles, with lands to match."

"So," said the priest; "but will Prince Louis and the Muscovites give you leave to enjoy them?"

"The estates are on the borders of Plassenburg," said Maurice, "and I think the Prince of Plassenburg for his own security will provide against any Muscovite invasion."

"Princes are but princes, though I grant you the Executioner's Son is a good one," answered the priest. "Well, better to marry than to burn, sayeth Holy Writ. It is touch and go, in any event. I will marry you and thereafter betake me to the Abbey of Wolgast, where dwells my very good friend the Abbot Tobias. For old sake's sake he will keep me safe there till this thing blows over."

"With my heart I thank you, my Father," said the Sparhawk, kneeling.

"Nay, do not thank me. Rather thank the pretty insistency of your mistress. Yet it is only bringing you both one step nearer destruction. Walking upon egg-shells is child's play to this. But I never could refuse your sweetheart either a comfit or an absolution all my days. To my shame as a servant of God I say it. I will go and call her in."

He went to the door with a curious smile on his face. He opened it, and there, close by the threshold, was the Princess Margaret, her eyes full of a bright mischief.

"Yes, I was listening," she cried, shaking her head defiantly. "I do not care. So would you, Father, if you had been a woman and in love – "

"God forbid!" said Father Clement, crossing himself.

"You may well make sure of heavenly happiness, my Father, for you will never know what the happiness of earth is!" cried Margaret. "I would rather be a woman and in love, than – than the Pope himself and sit in the chair of St. Peter."

"My daughter, do not be irreverent."

"Father Clement, were you ever in love? No, of course you cannot tell me; but I think you must have been. Your eyes are kind when you look at us. You are going to do what we wish – I know you are. I heard you say so to Maurice. Now begin."

"You speak as if the Holy Sacrament of matrimony were no more than saying 'Abracadabra' over a toadstool to cure warts," said the priest, smiling. "Consider your danger, the evil case in which you will put me when the thing is discovered – "

"I will consider anything, dear Father, if you will only make haste," said the Princess, with a smiling natural vivacity that killed any verbal disrespect.

"Nay, madcap, be patient. We must have a witness whose head sits on his shoulders beyond the risk of Prince Louis's halter or Prince Ivan's Muscovite dagger. What say you to the High Councillor of Plassenburg, Von Dessauer? He is here on an embassy."

The Princess clapped her hands.

"Yes, yes. He will do it. He will keep our secret. He also likes pretty girls."

"Also?" queried Father Clement, with a grave and demure countenance.

"Yes, Father, you know you do – "

"It is a thing most strictly forbidden by Holy Church that in fulfilling the duties of sacred office one should be swayed by any merely human considerations," began the priest, the wrinkles puckering about his eyes, though his lips continued grave.

"Oh, please, save the homily till after sacrament, dear Father!" cried the Princess. "You know you like me, and that you cannot help it."

The priest lifted up his hand and glanced upward, as if deprecating the anger of Heaven.

"Alas, it is too true!" he said, and dropped his hand again swiftly to his side.

"I will go and summon Dessauer myself," she went on. "I will run so quick. I cannot bear to wait."

"Abide ye – abide ye, my daughter," said Father Clement; "let us do even this folly decently and in order. The day is far spent. Let us wait till darkness comes. Then when you are rested – and" (he looked towards the Sparhawk) "the Lady Joan also – I will return with High Councillor Dessauer, who, without observance or suspicion, may pay his respects to the Princesses upon their arrival."

"But, Father, I cannot wait," cried the impetuous bride. "Something might happen long before then. My brother might come. Prince Wasp might find out. The Palace itself might fall – and then I should never be married at all!"

And the very impulsive and high-strung daughter of the reigning house of Courtland put a kerchief to her eyes and tapped the floor with the silken point of her slipper.

The holy Father looked at her a moment and turned his eyes to Maurice von Lynar. Then he shook his head gravely at that proximate bridegroom as one who would say, "If you be neither hanged nor yet burnt here in Courtland – if you get safely out of this with your bride – why, then, Heaven have mercy on your soul!"

CHAPTER XXXIII

A WEDDING WITHOUT A BRIDEGROOM

It was very quiet in the river parlour of the Summer Palace. A shaded lamp burned in its niche over the desk of Prince Conrad. Another swung from the ceiling and filled the whole room with dim, rich light. The window was a little open, and the Alla murmured beneath with a soothing sound, like a mother hushing a child to sleep. There was no one in the great chamber save the youth whose masquerading was now well nigh over. The Sparhawk listened intently. Footsteps were approaching. Quick as thought he threw himself upon a couch, and drew about him a light cloak or woollen cloth lined with silk. The footsteps stopped at his door. A hand knocked lightly. The Sparhawk did not answer. There was a long pause, and then footsteps retreated as they had come. The Sparhawk remained motionless. Again the Alla, outside in the mild autumnal gloaming, said, "Hush!"

Tired with anxiety and the strain of the day, the youth passed from musing to real sleep and the stream of unconsciousness, with a long soothing swirl like that of the green water outside among the piles of the Summer Palace, bore him away. He took longer breaths, sighing in his slumbers like a happy tired child.

Again there came footsteps, quicker and lighter this time; then the crisp rustle of silken skirts, a warm breath of scented air, and the door was closed again. No knocking this time. It was some one who entered as of right.

Then the Princess Margaret, with clasped hands and parted lips, stood still and watched the slumber of the man she loved. Though she knew it not, it was one of the crucial moments in the chronicle of love. If a woman's heart melts from tolerant friendship to a kind of motherhood at the sight of a man asleep; if something draws tight about her heart like the strings of an old-fashioned purse; if there is a pulse beating where no pulse should be, a pleasurable lump in the throat, then it is come – the not-to-be-denied, the long-expected, the inevitable. It is a simple test, and one not always to be applied (as it were) without a doctor's prescription; but, when fairly tried, it is infallible. If a woman is happier listening to a man's quiet breathing than she has ever been hearkening to any other's flattery, it is no longer an affair – it is a passion.

The Princess Margaret sat down by the couch of Maurice von Lynar, and, after this manner of which I have told, her heart was moved within her. As she bent a little over the youth and looked into his sleeping face, the likeness to Joan the Duchess came out more strongly than ever, emerging almost startlingly, as a race stamp stands out on the features of the dead. She bent her head still nearer the slightly parted lips. Then she drew back.

"No," she murmured, smiling at her intent, "I will not – at least, not now. I will wait till I hear them coming."

She stole her hand under the cloak which covered the sleeper till her cool fingers rested on Maurice's hand. He stirred a little, and his lips moved. Then his eyelids quivered to the lifting. But they did not rise. The ear of the Princess was very near them now.

"Margaret!" she heard him say, and as the low whisper reached her she sat erect in her chair with a happy sigh. So wonderful is love and so utterly indifferent to time or place, to circumstance or reason.

The Alla also sighed a sigh to think that their hour would pass so swiftly. So Margaret of Courtland, princess and lover, sat contentedly by the pillow of him who had once been a prisoner in the dungeon of Castle Kernsberg.

But in the palace of the Prince of Courtland time ran even more swiftly than the Alla beneath its walls.

Margaret caught a faint sound far away – footsteps, firm footfalls of men who paced slowly together. And as these came nearer, she could distinguish, mixed with them, the sharp tapping of one who leans upon a staff. She did not hesitate a moment now. She bent down upon the sleeper. Her arm glided under his neck. Her lips met his.

"Maurice," she whispered, "wake, dearest. They are coming."

"Margaret!" he would have answered – but could not.

The greetings were soon over. The tale had already been told to Von Dessauer by Father Clement. The pair stood up under the golden glow of the swinging silver lamps. It was a strange scene. For surely never was marriage more wonderfully celebrated on earth than this of two fair maidens (for so they still appeared) taking hands at the bidding of God's priest and vowing the solemn vows, in the presence of a prince's chancellor, to live only for each other in all the world.

Maurice, tall and dark, a red mantle thrown back from his shoulders, confined at the waist and falling again to the feet, stood holding Margaret's hand, while she, younger and slighter, her skin creamily white, her cheek rose-flushed, her eyes brilliant as with fever, watched Father Clement as if she feared he would omit some essential of the service.

Von Dessauer, High Councillor of Plassenburg, stood leaning on the head of his staff and watching with a certain gravity of sympathy, mixed with apprehension, the simple ceremonial.

Presently the solemn "Let no man put asunder" was said, the blessing pronounced, and Leopold von Dessauer came forward with his usual courtly grace to salute the newly made Countess von Löen.

He would have kissed her hand, but with a swift gesture she offered her cheek.

"Not hands to-day, good friend," she said. "I am no more a princess, but my husband's wife. They cannot part us now, can they, High Councillor? I have gotten my wish!"

"Dear lady," the Chancellor of Plassenburg answered gently. "I am an old man, and I have observed that Hymen is the most tricksome of the divinities. His omens go mostly by contraries. Where much is expected, little is obtained. When all men speak well of a wedding, and all the prophets prophesy smooth things – my fear is great. Therefore be of good cheer. Though you have chosen the rough road, the perilous venture, the dark night, the deep and untried ford, you will yet come out upon a plain of gladness, into a day of sunshine, and at the eventide reach a home of content."

"So good a fortune from so wise a soothsayer deserves – this!"

And she kissed the Chancellor frankly on the mouth.

"Father Clement," she said, turning about to the priest with a provocative look on her face, "have you a prophecy for us worthy a like guerdon?"

"Avaunt, witch! Get thee behind me, pretty impling! Tempt not an old man to forget his office, or I will set thee such a penance as will take months to perform."

Nevertheless his face softened as he spoke. He saw too plainly the perils which encompassed Maurice von Lynar and his wife. Yet he held out his hand benignantly and they sank on their knees.

"God bring you well through, beloveds!" he said. "May He send His angels to succour the faithful and punish the guilty!"

"I bid you fair good-night!" said Leopold von Dessauer at the threshold. But he added in his heart, "But alas for the to-morrow that must come to you twain!"

"I care for nothing now – I have gotten my will!" said the Princess Margaret, nodding her head to the Father as he went out.

She was standing on the threshold with her husband's hand in hers, and her eyes were full of that which no words can express.

"May that which is so sweet in the mouth now, never prove bitter in the belly!"

That was the Father's last prayer for them.

But neither Margaret nor Maurice von Lynar so much as heard him, for they had turned to one another.

For the golden lamp was burning itself out, and without in the dark the Alla still said, "Hush!" like a mother who soothes her children to sleep.

CHAPTER XXXIV

LITTLE JOHANNES RODE

"But this one day, beloved," the Sparhawk was saying. "What is one day among our enemies? Be brave, and then we will ride away together under cloud of night. Von Dessauer will help us. For love and pity Prince Hugo of Plassenburg will give us an asylum. Or if he will not, by my faith! Helene the Princess will – or her kind heart is sore belied! Fear not!"

"I am not afraid – I have never feared anything in my life," answered the Princess Margaret. "But now I fear for you, Maurice. I would give all I possess a hundred times over – nay, ten years of my life – if only you were safe out of this Courtland!"

"It will not be long," said the Sparhawk soothingly. "To-morrow Von Dessauer goes with all his train. He cannot, indeed, openly give us his protection till we are past the boundaries of the State. But at the Fords of the Alla we must await him. Then, after that, it is but a short and safe journey. A few days will bring us to the borderlands of Plassenburg and the Mark, where we are safe alike from prince brother and prince wooer."

"Maurice – I would it were so, indeed. Do you know I think being married makes one's soul frightened. The one you love grows so terrifyingly precious. It seems such a long time since I was a wild and reckless girl, flouting those who spoke of love, and boasting (oh, so vainly!) that love would never touch me. I used to, not so long ago – though you would not think it now, knowing how weak and foolish I am."

The Sparhawk laughed a little and glanced fondly at his wife. It was a strange look, full of the peculiar joy of man – and that, where the essence of love dwells in him, is his sense of unique possession.

"Do keep still," said the Princess suddenly, stamping her foot. "How can I finish the arraying of your locks, if you twist about thus in your seat? It is fortunate for you, sir, that the Duchess Joan wears her hair short, like a Northman or a bantling troubadour. Otherwise you could not have gone masquerading till yours had grown to be something of this length."

And, with the innocent vanity of a woman preferred, she shook her own head backward till the rich golden tresses, each hair distinct and crisp as a golden wire of infinite thinness, fell over her back and hung down as low as the hollows of her knees.

"Joan could not do that!" she cried triumphantly.

"You are the most beautiful woman in the world," said the Sparhawk, with appreciative reverence, trying to rise from the low stool in front of the Venice mirror upon which he was submitting to having his toilet superintended – for the first time by a thoroughly competent person.

The Princess Margaret bit her lip vixenishly in a pretty way she had when making a pretext of being angry, at the same time sticking the little curved golden comb she was using upon his raven locks viciously into his head.

"Oh, you hurt!" he cried, making a grimace and pretending in his turn.

"And so I will, and much worse," she retorted, "if you do not be still and do as I bid you. How can a self-respecting tire-woman attend to her business under such circumstances? I warn you that you may engage a new maid."

"Wickedest one!" he murmured, gazing fondly up at Margaret, "there is no one like you!"

"Well," she drolled, "I am glad of your opinion, though sorry for your taste. For me, I prefer the Lady Joan."

"And why?"

"Because she is like you, of course!"

So, on the verge perilous, lightly and foolishly they jested as all those who love each other do (which folly is the only wisdom), while the green Alla sped swiftly on to the sea, and the city in which Death waited for Maurice von Lynar began to hum about them.