CHAPTER XXVI
THE LION TAMER
On this summer afternoon the girl's beauty seemed more wondrous andmagical than ever. Her eyes were purple-black, like the berries of thedeadly nightshade seen in the twilight. Her face was pale, and thescarlet of her lips lay like twin geranium petals on new-fallen snow.
Gilles de Retz followed her with a certain grim and ghastly pride, ashe marked the sensation caused by her entrance.
"This," he said, "is my lion tamer!"
But the girl never looked at him, nor in any way responded to hisglances.
"Sybilla," said de Retz, holding her with his eyes, "these gentlemenare with us. They also are of the enemies of the house ofDouglas--speak freely that which is in your heart!"
"My lords," said the Lady Sybilla, speaking in a level voice, and withher eyes fixed on the leaf-shadowed square of grass, which alone couldbe seen through the open window, "you have, I doubt not, each declaredyour grievance against William, Earl of Douglas. I alone have none. Heis a gallant gentleman. France I have travelled, Spain also, andPortugal, and have explored the utmost East,--wherever, indeed, myLord of Retz hath voyaged thither I have gone. But no braver or morechivalrous youth than William Douglas have I found in any land. I haveno grievance against him, as I say, yet for that which hath been willI deliver him into your hands."
One of the men before her grew manifestly uneasy.
"We did not come hither to listen to the praises of the Earl ofDouglas, even from lips so fair as yours!" sneered Crichton theChancellor, lifting his eyes one moment from the parchment before himto the girl's face.
"He is our enemy," said the tutor of the King, Alexander Livingston,more generously, "but I will never deny that he is a gallant youth;also of his person proper to look upon."
And very complacently he smoothed down the lace ruffles which fellfrom the neck of his silken doublet midway down its front.
"The young man is a Douglas," said James the Gross, curtly; "if hewere of coward breed, we had not needed to come hither secretly!"
"It needeth not four butchers to kill a sheep!" said de Retz."Concerning that, we agree. Proceed, my Lady Sybilla."
The girl was now breathing more quickly, her bosom rising and fallingvisibly beneath her light silken gown.
"Yet because of those that have been of the house of Douglas beforehim, shall I have no pity upon William, sixth Earl thereof! Andbecause of two dead Dukes of Touraine, will I deliver to you the thirdDuke, into whose mouth hath hardly yet come the proper gust of living.This is the tale I have heard a thousand times. There was in France,it skills not where, a vale quiet as a summer Sabbath day. The vineshung ripe-clustered in wide and pleasant vineyards. The olives rustledgrey on the slopes. The bell swung in the monastery tower. The cottagein the dell was safe as the chateau on the hill. Then came the foreignleader of a foreign army, and lo! in a day, there were a hundred deadmen in the valley, all honourable men slain in defence of their owndoors. The smoky flicker of flames broke through the roof in thedaylight. There was heard the crying of many women. And the man whowrought this was an Earl of Douglas."
The girl paused, and in a low whisper, intense as the breathing of thesea, she said:
_"And for this will I deliver into your hands his grandson, William ofDouglas!"_
Then her voice came again to the ears of the four listeners, in a notelow and monotonous like the wind that goes about the house on autumnevenings.
"There was also one who, being but a child, had escaped from thattumult and had found shelter in a white convent with the sistersthereof, who taught her to pray, and be happy in the peace of the hourthat is exactly like the one before it. The shadow of the dial fingerupon the stone was not more peaceful than the holy round of her life.
"Then came one who met her by the convent wall, met her under theshade of the orchard trees, met her under cloud of night, till hissoul had power over hers. She followed him by camp and city, fearingno man's scorn, feeling no woman's reproach, for love's sake and his.Yet at the last he cast her away, like an empty husk, and sailed overthe seas to his own land. She lived to wed the Sieur de Thouars and tobecome my mother."
_"And for this will I reckon with his son William, Duke of Touraine."_
She ceased, and de Retz began to speak.
"By me this girl has been taught the deepest wisdom of the ancients. Ihave delved deep in the lore of the ages that this maiden might befitted for her task. For I also, that am a marshal of France and ofkin to my Lord Duke of Brittany, have a score to settle with William,Earl of Douglas, as hath also my master, Louis the Dauphin!"
"It is enough," interjected Crichton the Chancellor, who had listenedto the recital of the Lady Sybilla with manifest impatience, "it isthe old story--the sins of the fathers are upon the children. And thisyoung man must suffer for those that went before him. They drank ofthe full cup, and so he hath come now to the drains. It skills not whywe each desire to make an end of him. We are agreed on the fact. Thequestion is _how_."
It was again the voice of de Retz which replied, the deep silence ofafternoon resting like a weight upon all about them.
"If we write him a letter inviting him to the Castle of Edinburgh, hewill assuredly not come; but if we first entertain him with opencourtesy at one of your castles on the way, where you, most wiseChancellor, must put yourself wholly in his hands, he will suspectnothing. There, when all his suspicions are lulled, he will again meetthe Lady Sybilla; it will rest with her to bring him to Edinburgh."
The Chancellor had been busily writing on the parchment before himwhilst de Retz was speaking. Presently he held up his hand and readaloud that which he had written.
"To the most noble William, Earl of Douglas and Duke of Touraine,greeting! In the name of King James the Second, whom God preserve, andin order that the realm may have peace, Sir William Crichton,Chancellor of Scotland, and Sir Alexander Livingston, Governor of theKing's person, do invite and humbly intreat the Earl of Douglas tocome to the City of Edinburgh, with such following as shall seem goodto him, in order that he may be duly invested with the office ofLieutenant-General of the Kingdom, which office was his father'sbefore him. So shall the realm abide in peace and evil-doers be putdown, the peaceable prevented with power, and the Earl of Douglasstand openly in the honourable place of his forebears."
The Chancellor finished his reading and looked around for approbation.James of Avondale was nodding gravely. de Retz, with a ghastly smileon his face, seemed to be weighing the phrases. Livingston wasadmiring, with a self-satisfied smile, the pinkish lights upon hisfinger-nails, and the girl was gazing as before out of the window intothe green close wherein the leaves stirred and the shadows had begunto swim lazily on the grass with the coming of the wind from off thesea.
"To this I would add as followeth," continued Crichton. "TheChancellor of Scotland to William, Earl of Douglas, greeting andhomage! Sir William Crichton ventures to hope that the Earl of Douglaswill do him the great honour to come to his new Castle of Crichton,there to be entertained as beseemeth his dignity, to the healing ofall ancient enmities, and also that they both may do honour to theambassador of the King of France ere he set sail again for his ownland."
"It is indeed a worthy epistle," said James the Gross, who, beingsleepy, wished for an end to be made.
"There is at least in it no lack of 'Chancellor of Scotland!'" sneeredLivingston, covertly.
"Gently, gently, great sirs," interposed de Retz, as the Chancellorlooked up with anger in his eye; "have out your quarrels as youwill--after the snapping of the trap. Remember that this which we dois a matter of life or death for all of us."
"But the Douglases will wash us off the face of Scotland if we so muchas lay hand on the Earl," objected Livingston. "It might even affectthe safety of his Majesty's person!"
James the Gross laughed a low laugh and looked at Crichton.
"Perhaps," he said; "but what if the gallant boy David go with hisbrother? Whoever after that shall be next Earl of Douglas
can easilyprevent that. Also Angus is for us, and my Lord Maxwell will move nohand. There remains, therefore, only Galloway, and my son William willanswer for that. I myself am old and fat, and love not fighting, butto tame the Douglases shall be my part, and assuredly not the least."
All this while the Lady Sybilla had been standing motionless gazingout of the window. de Retz now motioned her away with an almostimperceptible signal of his hand, whereat Sir Alexander Livingston,seeing the girl about to leave the chamber of council, courteouslyrose to usher her out. And with the very slightest acknowledgment ofhis profound obeisance, Sybilla de Thouars went forth and left thefour men to their cabal of treachery and death.