Grisly Grisell

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He added, however, that the best remedy would be a pilgrimage to
Lindisfarne, which, be it observed, really meant absence from the
foul, close, feverish air of the castle, and all the evil odours of
the court. To the lady he thought it would really be healing, but he
doubted whether the poor little boy was not too far gone for such
revival; indeed, he made no secret that he believed the child was
stricken for death.

"Then what boots all your vaunted chirurgery!" cried the mother
passionately. "You outlandish cheat! you! What did you come here
for? You have not even let him blood!"

"Let him blood! good madame," exclaimed Master Lambert. "In his
state, to take away his blood would be to kill him outright!"

"False fool and pretender," cried Lady Whitburn; "as if all did not
ken that the first duty of a leech is to take away the infected
humours of the blood! Demented as I was to send for you. Had you
been worth but a pinch of salt, you would have shown me how to lay
hands on Nan the witch-wife, the cause of all the scathe to my poor
bairn."

Master Lambert could only protest that he laid no claim to the skill
of a witch-finder, whereupon the lady stormed at him as having come
on false pretences, and at her daughter for having brought him, and
finally fell into a paroxysm of violent weeping, during which Grisell
was thankful to convey her guest out of the chamber, and place him
under the care of Ridley, who would take care he had food and rest,
and safe convoy back to Wearmouth when his mule had been rested and
baited.

"Oh, Master Lambert," she said, "it grieves me that you should have
been thus treated."

"Heed not that, sweet lady. It oft falls to our share to brook the
like, and I fear me that yours is a weary lot."

"But my brother! my little brother!" she asked. "It is all out of my
mother's love for him."

"Alack, lady, what can I say? The child is sickly, and little enough
is there of peace or joy in this world for such, be he high or low
born. Were it not better that the Saints should take him to their
keeping, while yet a sackless babe?"

Grisell wrung her hands together. "Ah! he hath been all my joy or
bliss through these years; but I will strive to say it is well, and
yield my will."

The crying of the poor little sufferer for his Grisly called her back
before she could say or hear more. Her mother lay still utterly
exhausted on her bed, and hardly noticed her; but all that evening,
and all the ensuing night, Grisell held the boy, sometimes on her
lap, sometimes on the bed, while all the time his moans grew more and
more feeble, his words more indistinct. By and by, as she sat on the
bed, holding him on her breast, he dropped asleep, and perhaps,
outwearied as she was, she slept too. At any rate all was still,
till she was roused by a cry from Thora, "Holy St. Hilda! the bairn
has passed!"

And indeed when Grisell started, the little head and hand that had
been clasped to her fell utterly prone, and there was a strange cold
at her breast.

Her mother woke with a loud wail. "My bairn! My bairn!" snatching
him to her arms. "This is none other than your Dutchman's doings,
girl. Have him to the dungeon! Where are the stocks? Oh, my pretty
boy! He breathed, he is living. Give me the wine!" Then as there
was no opening of the pale lips, she fell into another tempest of
tears, during which Grisell rushed to the stair, where on the lowest
step she met Lambert and Ridley.

"Have him away! Have him away, Cuthbert," she cried. "Out of the
castle instantly. My mother is distraught with grief; I know not
what she may do to him. O go! Not a word!"

They could but obey, riding away in the early morning, and leaving
the castle to its sorrow.

So, tenderly and sadly was little Bernard carried to the vault in the
church, while Grisell knelt as his chief mourner, for her mother,
after her burst of passion subsided, lay still and listless, hardly
noticing anything, as if there had fallen on her some stroke that
affected her brain. Tidings of the Baron were slow to come, and
though Grisell sent a letter by a wandering friar to York, with
information of the child's death and the mother's illness, it was
very doubtful when or whether they would ever reach him.

CHAPTER XV--WAKEFIELD BRIDGE

I come to tell you things since then befallen.
After the bloody fray at Wakefield fought,
Where your brave father breathed his latest gasp.

SHAKESPEARE, King Henry VI., Part III.

Christmas went by sadly in Whitburn Tower, but the succeeding weeks
were to be sadder still. It was on a long dark evening that a
commotion was heard at the gate, and Lady Whitburn, who had been
sitting by the smouldering fire in her chamber, seemed suddenly
startled into life.

"Tidings," she cried. "News of my lord and son. Bring them,
Grisell, bring them up."

Grisell obeyed, and hurried down to the hall. All the household, men
and maids, were gathered round some one freshly come in, and the
first sound she heard was, "Alack! Alack, my lady!"

"How--what--how--" she asked breathlessly, just recognising Harry
Featherstone, pale, dusty, blood-stained.

"It is evil news, dear lady," said old Ridley, turning towards her
with outstretched hands, and tears flowing down his cheeks. "My
knight. Oh! my knight! And I was not by!"

"Slain?" almost under her breath, asked Grisell.

"Even so! At Wakefield Bridge," began Featherstone, but at that
instant, walking stiff, upright, and rigid, like a figure moved by
mechanism, Lady Whitburn was among them.

"My lord," she said, still as if her voice belonged to some one else.
"Slain? And thou, recreant, here to tell the tale!"

"Madam, he fell before I had time to strike." She seemed to hear no
word, but again demanded, "My son."

He hesitated a moment, but she fiercely reiterated.

"My son! Speak out, thou coward loon."

"Madam, Robert was cut down by the Lord Clifford beside the Earl of
Rutland. 'Tis a lost field! I barely 'scaped with a dozen men. I
came but to bear the tidings, and see whether you needed an arm to
hold out the castle for young Bernard. Or I would be on my way to my
own folk on the Border, for the Queen's men will anon be everywhere,
since the Duke is slain!"

"The Duke! The Duke of York!" was the cry, as if a tower were down.

"What would you. We were caught by Somerset like deer in a buck-
stall. Here! Give me a cup of ale, I can scarce speak for chill."

He sank upon the settle as one quite worn out. The ale was brought
by some one, and he drank a long draught, while, at a sign from
Ridley, one of the serving-men began to draw off his heavy boots and
greaves, covered with frosted mud, snow, and blood, all melting
together, but all the time he talked, and the hearers remained
stunned and listening to what had hardly yet penetrated their
understanding. Lady Whitburn had collapsed into her own chair, and
was as still as the rest.

He spoke incoherently, and Ridley now and then asked a question, but
his fragmentary narrative may be thus expanded.

All had, in Yorkist opinion, gone well in London. Henry was in the
power of the White Rose, and had actually consented that Richard of
York should be his next heir, but in the meantime Queen Margaret had
been striving her utmost to raise the Welsh and the Border lords on
behalf of her son. She had obtained aid from Scotland, and the
Percies, the Dacres of Gilsland, and many more, had followed her
standard. The Duke of York and Earl of Salisbury set forth to
repress what they called a riot, probably unaware of the numbers who
were daily joining the Queen. With them went Lord Whitburn, hoping
thence to return home, and his son Robert, still a squire of the
Duke's household.

They reached York's castle of Sendal, and there merrily kept
Christmas, but on St. Thomas of Canterbury's Day they heard that the
foe were close at hand, many thousands strong, and on the morrow
Queen Margaret, with her boy beside her, and the Duke of Somerset,
came before the gate and called on the Duke to surrender the castle,
and his own vaunting claims with it, or else come out and fight.

Sir Davy Hall entreated the Duke to remain in the castle till his son
Edward, Earl of March, could bring reinforcements up from Wales, but
York held it to be dishonourable to shut himself up on account of a
scolding woman, and the prudence of the Earl of Salisbury was at
fault, since both presumed on the easy victories they had hitherto
gained. Therefore they sallied out towards Wakefield Bridge, to
confront the main body of Margaret's army, ignorant or careless that
she had two wings in reserve. These closed in on them, and their
fate was certain.

"My lord fell in the melee among the first," said Featherstone. "I
was down beside him, trying to lift him up, when a big Scot came with
his bill and struck at my head, and I knew no more till I found my
master lying stark dead and stripped of all his armour. My sword was
gone, but I got off save for this cut" (and he pushed back his hair)
"and a horse's kick or two, for the whole battle had gone over me,
and I heard the shouting far away. As my lord lay past help,
methought I had best shift myself ere more rascaille came to strip
the slain. And as luck or my good Saint would have it, as I stumbled
among the corpses I heard a whinnying, and saw mine own horse, Brown
Weardale, running masterless. Glad enough was he, poor brute, to
have my hand on his rein.

"The bridge was choked with fighting men, so I was about to put him
to the river, when whom should I see on the bridge but young Master
Robin, and with him young Lord Edmund of Rutland. There, on the
other side, holding parley with them, was the knight Mistress Grisell
wedded, and though he wore the White Rose, he gave his hand to them,
and was letting them go by in safety. I was calling to Master Rob to
let me pass as one of his own, when thundering on came the grim Lord
Clifford, roaring like the wind in Roker caves. I heard him howl at
young Copeland for a traitor, letting go the accursed spoilers of
York. Copeland tried to speak, but Clifford dashed him aside against
the wall, and, ah! woe's me, lady, when Master Robin threw himself
between, the fellow--a murrain on his name--ran the fair youth
through the neck with his sword, and swept him off into the river.
Then he caught hold of Lord Edmund, crying out, "Thy father slew
mine, and so do I thee," and dashed out his brains with his mace.
For me, I rode along farther, swam my horse over the river in the
twilight, with much ado to keep clear of the dead horses and poor
slaughtered comrades that cumbered the stream, and what was even
worse, some not yet dead, borne along and crying out. A woful day it
was to all who loved the kindly Duke of York, or this same poor
house! As luck would have it, I fell in with Jock of Redesdale and a
few more honest fellows, who had 'scaped. We found none but friends
when we were well past the river. They succoured us at the first
abbey we came to. The rest have sped to their homes, and here am I."

Such was the tenor of Featherstone's doleful history of that blood-
thirsty Lancastrian victory. All had hung in dire suspense on his
words, and not till they were ended did Grisell become conscious that
her mother was sitting like a stone, with fixed, glassy eyes and
dropped lip, in the high-backed chair, quite senseless, and breathing
strangely.

They took her up and carried her upstairs, as one who had received
her death stroke as surely as had her husband and son on the slopes
between Sendal and Wakefield.

Grisell and Thora did their utmost, but without reviving her, and
they watched by her, hardly conscious of anything else, as they tried
their simple, ineffective remedies one after another, with no thought
or possibility of sending for further help, since the roads would be
impassable in the long January night, and besides, the Lancastrians
might make them doubly perilous. Moreover, this dumb paralysis was
accepted as past cure, and needing not the doctor but the priest.
Before the first streak of dawn on that tardy, northern morning,
Ridley's ponderous step came up the stair, into the feeble light of
the rush candle which the watchers tried to shelter from the
draughts.

The sad question and answer of "No change" passed, and then Ridley,
his gruff voice unnecessarily hushed, said, "Featherstone would speak
with you, lady. He would know whether it be your pleasure to keep
him in your service to hold out the Tower, or whether he is free to
depart."

"Mine!" said Grisell bewildered.

"Yea!" exclaimed Ridley. "You are Lady of Whitburn!"

"Ah! It is true," exclaimed Grisell, clasping her hands. "Woe is me
that it should be so! And oh! Cuthbert! my husband, if he lives, is
a Queen's man! What can I do?"

"If it were of any boot I would say hold out the Tower. He deserves
no better after the scurvy way he treated you," said Cuthbert grimly.
"He may be dead, too, though Harry fears he was but stunned."

"But oh!" cried Grisell, as if she saw one gleam of light, "did not I
hear something of his trying to save my brother and Lord Edmund?"

"You had best come down and hear," said Ridley. "Featherstone cannot
go till he has spoken with you, and he ought to depart betimes, lest
the Gilsland folk and all the rest of them be ravening on their way
back."

Grisell looked at her mother, who lay in the same state, entirely
past her reach. The hard, stern woman, who had seemed to have no
affection to bestow on her daughter, had been entirely broken down
and crushed by the loss of her sons and husband.

Probably neither had realised that by forcing Grisell on young
Copeland they might be giving their Tower to their enemy.

She went down to the hall, where Harry Featherstone, whose night had
done him more good than hers had, came to meet her, looking much
freshened, and with a bandage over his forehead. He bent low before
her, and offered her his services, but, as he told her, he and Ridley
had been talking it over, and they thought it vain to try to hold out
the Tower, even if any stout men did straggle back from the battle,
for the country round was chiefly Lancastrian, and it would be
scarcely possible to get provisions, or to be relieved. Moreover,
the Gilsland branch of the family, who would be the male heirs, were
on the side of the King and Queen, and might drive her out if she
resisted. Thus there seemed no occasion for the squire to remain,
and he hoped to reach his own family, and save himself from the risk
of being captured.

"No, sir, we do not need you," said Grisell. "If Sir Leonard
Copeland lives and claims this Tower, there is no choice save to
yield it to him. I would not delay you in seeking your own safety,
but only thank you for your true service to my lord and father."

She held out her hand, which Featherstone kissed on his knee.

His horse was terribly jaded, and he thought he could make his way
more safely on foot than in the panoply of an esquire, for in this
war, the poorer sort were hardly touched; the attacks were chiefly
made on nobles and gentlemen. So he prepared to set forth, but
Grisell obtained from him what she had scarcely understood the night
before, the entire history of the fall of her father and brother, and
how gallantly Leonard Copeland had tried to withstand Clifford's
rage.

"He did his best for them," she said, as if it were her one drop of
hope and comfort.

Ridley very decidedly hoped that Clifford's blow had freed her from
her reluctant husband; and mayhap the marriage would give her claims
on the Copeland property. But Grisell somehow could not join in the
wish. She could only remember the merry boy at Amesbury and the fair
face she had seen sleeping in the hall, and she dwelt on
Featherstone's assurance that no wound had pierced the knight, and
that he would probably be little the worse for his fall against the
parapet of the bridge. Use her as he might, she could not wish him
dead, though it was a worthy death in defence of his old playfellow
and of her own brother.

CHAPTER XVI--A NEW MASTER

In the dark chambere, if the bride was fair,
Ye wis, I could not see.
. . . .
And the bride rose from her knee
And kissed the smile of her mother dead.

E. B. BROWNING, The Romaunt of the Page.

The Lady of Whitburn lingered from day to day, sometimes showing
signs of consciousness, and of knowing her daughter, but never really
reviving. At the end of a fortnight she seemed for one day somewhat
better, but that night she had a fresh attack, and was so evidently
dying that the priest, Sir Lucas, was sent for to bring her the last
Sacrament. The passing bell rang out from the church, and the old
man, with his little server before him, came up the stair, and was
received by Grisell, Thora, and one or two other servants on their
knees.

Ridley was not there. For even then, while the priest was crossing
the hall, a party of spearmen, with a young knight at their head,
rode to the gate and demanded entrance.

The frightened porter hurried to call Master Ridley, who, instead of
escorting the priest with the Host to his dying lady, had to go to
the gate, where he recognised Sir Leonard Copeland, far from dead, in
very different guise from that in which he had been brought to the
castle before. He looked, however, awed, as he said, bending his
head -

"Is it sooth, Master Ridley? Is death beforehand with me?"

"My old lady is in extremis, sir," replied Ridley. "Poor soul, she
hath never spoken since she heard of my lord's death and his son's."

"The younger lad? Lives here?" demanded Copeland. "Is it as I have
heard?"

"Aye, sir. The child passed away on the Eve of St. Luke. I have my
lady's orders," he added reluctantly, "to open the castle to you, as
of right."

"It is well," returned Sir Leonard. Then, turning round to the
twenty men who followed him, he said, "Men-at-arms, as you saw and
heard, there is death here. Draw up here in silence. This good
esquire will see that you have food and fodder for the horses. Kemp,
Hardcastle," to his squires, "see that all is done with honour and
respect as to the lady of the castle and mine. Aught unseemly shall
be punished."

Wherewith he dismounted, and entered the narrow little court, looking
about him with a keen, critical, soldierly eye, but speaking with
low, grave tones.

"I may not tarry," he said to Ridley, "but this place, since it falls
to me and mine, must be held for the King and Queen."

"My lady bows to your will, sir," returned Ridley.

Copeland continued to survey the walls and very antiquated defences,
observing that there could have been few alarms there. This lasted
till the rites in the sick-room were ended, and the priest came
forth.

"Sir," he said to Copeland, "you will pardon the young lady. Her
mother is in articulo mortis, and she cannot leave her."

"I would not disturb her," said Leonard. "The Saints forbid that I
should vex her. I come but as in duty bound to damn this Tower on
behalf of King Harry, Queen Margaret, and the Prince of Wales against
all traitors. I will not tarry here longer than to put it into hands
who will hold it for them and for me. How say you, Sir Squire?" he
added, turning to Ridley, not discourteously.

"We ever did hold for King Harry, sir," returned the old esquire.

"Yea, but against his true friends, York and Warwick. One is cut
off, ay, and his aider and defender, Salisbury, who should rather
have stood by his King, has suffered a traitor's end at Pomfret."

"My Lord of Salisbury! Ah! that will grieve my poor young lady,"
sighed Ridley.

"He was a kind lord, save for his treason to the King," said Leonard.
"We of his household long ago were happy enough, though strangely
divided now. For the rest, till that young wolf cub, Edward of
March, and his mischief-stirring cousin of Warwick be put down, this
place must be held against them and theirs--whosoever bears the White
Rose. Wilt do so, Master Seneschal?"

"I hold for my lady. That is all I know," said Ridley, "and she
holds herself bound to you, sir."

"Faithful. Ay? You will be her guardian, I see; but I must leave
half a score of fellows for the defence, and will charge them that
they show all respect and honour to the lady, and leave to you, as
seneschal, all the household, and of all save the wardship of the
Tower, calling on you first to make oath of faith to me, and to do
nought to the prejudice of King Henry, the Queen, or Prince, nor to
favour the friends of York or Warwick."

"I am willing, sir," returned Ridley, who cared a great deal more for
the house of Whitburn than for either party, whose cause he by no
means understood, perhaps no more than they had hitherto done
themselves. As long as he was left to protect his lady it was all he
asked, and more than he expected, and the courtesy, not to say
delicacy, of the young knight greatly impressed both him and the
priest, though he suspected that it was a relief to Sir Leonard not
to be obliged to see his bride of a few months.

The selected garrison were called in. Ridley would rather have seen
them more of the North Country yeoman type than of the regular
weather-beaten men-at-arms whom wars always bred up; but their
officer was a slender, dainty-looking, pale young squire, with his
arm in a sling, named Pierce Hardcastle, selected apparently because
his wound rendered rest desirable. Sir Leonard reiterated his charge
that all honour and respect was to be paid to the Lady of Whitburn,
and that she was free to come and go as she chose, and to be obeyed
in every respect, save in what regarded the defence of the Tower. He
himself was going on to Monks Wearmouth, where he had a kinsman among
the monks.

With an effort, just as he remounted his horse, he said to Ridley,
"Commend me to the lady. Tell her that I am grieved for her sorrow
and to be compelled to trouble her at such a time; but 'tis for my
Queen's service, and when this troublous times be ended, she shall
hear more from me." Turning to the priest he added, "I have no coin
to spare, but let all be done that is needed for the souls of the
departed lord and lady, and I will be answerable."

Nothing could be more courteous, but as he rode off priest and squire
looked at one another, and Ridley said, "He will untie your knot, Sir
Lucas."

"He takes kindly to castle and lands," was the answer, with a smile;
"they may make the lady to be swallowed."

"I trow 'tis for his cause's sake," replied Ridley. "Mark you, he
never once said 'My lady,' nor 'My wife.'"

"May the sweet lady come safely out of it any way," sighed the
priest. "She would fain give herself and her lands to the Church."

"May be 'tis the best that is like to befall her," said Ridley; "but
if that young featherpate only had the wit to guess it, he would find
that he might seek Christendom over for a better wife."

They were interrupted by a servant, who came hurrying down to say
that my lady was even now departing, and to call Sir Lucas to the
bedside.

All was over a few moments after he reached the apartment, and
Grisell was left alone in her desolation. The only real, deep,
mutual love had been between her and poor little Bernard; her elder
brother she had barely seen; her father had been indifferent, chiefly
regarding her as a damaged piece of property, a burthen to the
estate; her mother had been a hard, masculine, untender woman, only
softened in her latter days by the dependence of ill health and her
passion for her sickly youngest; but on her Grisell had experienced
Sister Avice's lesson that ministry to others begets and fosters
love.

And now she was alone in her house, last of her household, her work
for her mother over, a wife, but loathed and deserted except so far
as that the tie had sanctioned the occupation of her home by a
hostile garrison. Her spirit sank within her, and she bitterly felt
the impoverishment of the always scanty means, which deprived her of
the power of laying out sums of money on those rites which were
universally deemed needful for the repose of souls snatched away in
battle. It was a mercenary age among the clergy, and besides, it was
the depth of a northern winter, and the funeral rites of the Lady of
Whitburn would have been poor and maimed indeed if a whole band of
black Benedictine monks had not arrived from Wearmouth, saying they
had been despatched at special request and charge of Sir Leonard
Copeland.

CHAPTER XVII--STRANGE GUESTS

The needle, having nought to do,
Was pleased to let the magnet wheedle,
Till closer still the tempter drew,
And off at length eloped the needle.

T. MOORE.

The nine days of mourning were spent in entire seclusion by Grisell,
who went through every round of devotions prescribed or recommended
by the Church, and felt relief and rest in them. She shrank when
Ridley on the tenth day begged her no longer to seclude herself in
the solar, but to come down to the hall and take her place as Lady of
the Castle, otherwise he said he could not answer for the conduct of
Copeland's men.

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