He gave Edward the scroll, at which the Prince looked half smiling. "So! A dagger in store for me too, is there? Well, my cousins have a goodly thirst for vengeance! Hast thou any suspicion how this billet came here?"
"Ay, my Lord; and for that cause I would warn you against two of the archers, one of whom was in Simon's troop, and went with the late prince to Viterbo. I gave them no promise of silence."
"You spoke with them?"
"With one, who was charged to let me through the outposts to a spot where means were provided for bringing me to Guy."
"And thou," said Edward, smiling, "didst choose to bide the buffet?"
"Sir," said Richard, "I did indeed long after my brethren when Guy had been so near me in Africa; but now, I would far rather die than cast in my lot with them."
"Thou art wise," said Edward; "not merely right, but wise. I have sent Gloucester to my uncle of Sicily with such messages that he will scarce dare to leave them scatheless! Then, at supper-time we meet again-in thine own name, Richard, and as my kinsman and esquire. Thou shalt bear thine own name and arms. I will cause a mourning suit to be sent to thee-thou art equally of kin with myself to poor Henry-and shalt mourn him with Edmund and me at the requiem to- morrow. So will it best be manifest to the camp, that we exempt thee from all blame." Again he was departing, when Richard added-"The archers, my Lord-were it not good to dismiss them?"
"Tush," said Edward; "tell me not their names. So soon as the wind veers, they will be beyond Guy's reach; and if I were to stand on my guard against every man who loved thy father better than mine, what good would my life do me? The poor knaves will be true enough when they see a Saracen before them!"
And away went Edward, to be glanced at as he passed through the camp, as a severe, hard, cruel tyrant. Had he only been gay, open-hearted, and careless, he might have hung both the guilty archers, and a dozen innocent ones into the bargain, and yet have never won the character for harshness and unmercifulness that he had acquired even while condoning many a dire offence, simply from his stern gravity, and his punctilious exactitude in matters of discipline. But the evils of a lax and easy-going court had been so fatal, and had produced such suffering, that it was no marvel that he had adopted a rule of iron; and in the pain and distress of seeing his closest friends, the noblest subjects in the realm, pushed into a rebellion where he had himself to maintain his father's cause, and then to watch, without being able to hinder, the mean-spirited revenge of his own partizans, his manner had acquired that silent reserve and coldness which made him feared and hated by the many, while intensely beloved by the few. Even towards those few it was absolutely difficult to him to unbend, as he had done in this hour of effusion towards Richard; and the youth was proportionably moved and agitated with fervent gratitude and affection.
He had scarcely had so happy an evening since he had been a boy at Odiham. He was indeed feeble and dizzy at times, but with a far from painful languor; and the Princess, enjoying the permission to follow the dictates of her own heart, was kind to him with a motherly or sisterly kindness, could not bear to receive from him his wonted attendance, but made him lie upon the cushions at her feet, and when out of hearing of every one, talked of the faithful Isabel, and of "pretty Bessee," on whom she already looked as the companion of her little Eleanor, whom she had left at home.
It might be questioned whether Richard did not undergo more in watching little John de Mohun's endeavours at waiting than he would have suffered from doing it himself. And not a few dissatisfied glances were levelled at the favoured stripling, besides the literally as well as figuratively sour glances of Dame Idonea.
Edward, being of course unable to betray his real grounds for acquitting Richard, had only deigned to inform Prince Edmund that he knew all, and was perfectly satisfied. Now Prince Edmund, as well as all the old court faction, deemed Edward's regard for the Barons' party an unreasonable weakness that they durst not indeed combat openly, but which angered them as a species of disaffection to his own cause. The outer world thought him a tyrant, but there was an inner world to whom he appeared weakly good-natured and generous; and this inner world thought Richard had successfully hoodwinked him!
Therefore Edmund of Lancaster desired to adopt Hamlyn de Valence as his own squire, to save him from association with Richard; and both prince and squire, and all the rest of the train, made it perfectly evident to the young Montfort that he was barely tolerated out of respect for the Prince.
But Richard in his joy could have borne worse than this, for the Prince had not relaxed in his kindness, and made his young cousin's wound an excuse for showing him more tenderness and consideration than he would otherwise have thought befitting. Moreover, an esquire, as Richard had now become, might be in much closer relations of intimacy with his master than was possible to a page; and the day that had begun so sadly was like the dawn of a brighter period.
Sir Raynald Ferrers had been invited to the Prince's pavilion, but the rules of his Order did not permit his joining a secular entertainment in Lent, and he did not admit either the camp life or the gravity of the Prince's mourning household as a dispensation. However, when Richard, leaning fondly on little John's ready shoulder, crossed to his own tent, he found his good friend waiting there to attend to his wound, which Sir Raynald professed to regard as an excellent subject to practise upon, and likewise to hear whether all had been cleared up, and had gone right with him.
"Though," he said, "I could not doubt of it when that fair and lovely Princess had taken your matters in hand. Tell me, Richard, have you secular men many such dames as that abroad in the world?"
"Not many such as she," said Richard, smiling.
"Well, I have not spoken to a female thing, save perhaps pretty Bessee, since I went into the Spital, ten years ago; and verily the sound of the lady's voice was to me as if St. Margaret had begun talking to me! And so wise and clear of wit too. I thought women were feather-pated wilful beings, from whom there was no choice but to shut oneself up! I trow, that now all is well with thee, thou wilt scarce turn a thought again towards our brotherhood, where to glance at such a being becomes a sin." And Raynald crossed himself, with an effort to recall his wonted asceticism.
"Ladies' love is not like to be mine," said Richard, laughing, as one not yet awake to the force of the motive. "No! Gladly would I be one of your noble brotherhood, where alone have I met with kindness- but, Sir Raynald, my first duty under Heaven must be to redeem my father's name, by my service to the Prince. My brothers think they uphold it by deadly revenge. I want to show what a true Montfort can be with such a master as my father never had! And, Raynald, I cannot but fear that further schemes of vengeance may be afloat. The Prince is too fearless to take heed to himself, and who is so bound to watch for him as I?"
CHAPTER XI-THE VIEW FROM CARMEL
"On her who knew that love can conquer death; Who, kneeling with one arm about her king, Drew forth the poison with her balmy breath, Sweet as new buds in spring."-TENNYSON.
A year had elapsed since the crusaders had landed in Palestine; Nazareth had been taken, and the Christian host were encamped upon the plain before Acre, according to their Prince's constant habit of preferring to keep his troops in the open field, rather than to expose them to the temptations of the city-which was, alas! in a state most unworthy of the last stronghold of Latin Christianity in the Holy Land.