Weyman Stanley John
The Story of Francis Cludde

CHAPTER XVII
A LETTER THAT HAD MANY ESCAPES

"Hoity, toity!" the Duchess cried again, looking from one to another of us when Anne had disappeared. "What has come to the little fool? Has she gone crazy?"

I shook my head, too completely at sea even to hazard a conjecture. Master Bertie shook his head also, keeping his eyes glued to the door, as if he could not believe Anne had really gone.

"I said nothing to frighten her!" my lady protested.

"Nothing at all," I answered. For how should the announcement that my real name was Cludde terrify Mistress Anne Brandon nearly out of her senses?

"Well, no," Master Bertie agreed, his thoughtful face more thoughtful than usual; "so far as I heard, you said nothing. But I think, my dear, that you had better follow her and learn what it is. She must be ill."

The Duchess sat down. "I will go by-and-by," she said coolly, at which I was not much surprised, for I have always remarked that women have less sympathy with other women's ailments, especially of the nerves, than have men.

"For the moment I want to scold this brave, silly boy here!" she continued, looking so kindly at me that I blushed again, and forgot all about Mistress Anne. "To think of him leaving his home to become a wandering squire of dames merely because his father was a-well, not quite what he would have liked him to be! I remember something about him," she continued, pursing up her lips, and nodding her head at us. "I fancied him dead, however, years ago. But there! if every one whose father were not quite to his liking left home and went astraying, Master Francis, all sensible folk would turn innkeepers, and make their fortunes."

"It was not only that which drove me from home," I explained. "The Bishop of Winchester gave me clearly to understand-"

"That Coton was not the place for you!" exclaimed my lady scornfully. "He is a sort of connection of yours, is he not? Oh, I know. And he thinks he has a kind of reversionary interest in the property! With you and your father out of the way, and only your girl cousin left, his interest is much more likely to come to hand. Do you see?"

I recalled what Martin Luther had said about the cuckoo. But I have since thought that probably they both wronged Stephen Gardiner in this. He was not a man of petty mind, and his estate was equal to his high place. I think it more likely that his motive in removing me from Coton was chiefly the desire to use my services abroad, in conjunction perhaps with some remoter and darker plan for eventually devoting the Cludde property to the Church. Such an act of piety would have been possible had Sir Anthony died leaving his daughter unmarried, and would certainly have earned for the Chancellor Queen Mary's lasting favor. I think it the more likely to have been in his mind because his inability to persuade the gentry to such acts of restitution-King Harry had much enriched us-was always a sore point with the Queen, and more than once exposed him to her resentment.

"The strangest thing of all," the Duchess continued with alacrity, "seems to me to be this: that if he had not meddled with you, he would not have had his plans in regard to us thwarted. If he had not driven you from home, you would never have helped me to escape from London, nor been with us to foil his agents."

"A higher power than the Chancellor arranged that!" said Master Bertie emphatically.

"Well, at any rate, I am glad that you are you!" the Duchess answered, rising gayly. "A Cludde? Why, one feels at home again. And yet," she continued, her lips trembling suddenly, and her eyes filling with tears as she looked at me, "there was never house raised yet on nobler deed than yours."

"Go! go! go!" cried her husband, seeing my embarrassment. "Go and look to that foolish girl!"

"I will! Yet stop!" cried my lady, pausing when she was half way across the floor, and returning, "I was forgetting that I have another letter to open. It is very odd that this letter was never opened before," she continued, producing that which had lain in my haversack. "It has had several narrow escapes. But this time I vow I will see inside it. You give me leave?"

"Oh, yes," I said, smiling. "I wash my hands of it. Whoever the Mistress Clarence to whom it is addressed may be, it is enough that her name is Clarence! We have suffered too much at his hands."

"I open it, then!" my lady cried dramatically. I nodded. She took her husband's dagger and cut the green silk which bound the packet, and opened and read.

Only a few words. Then she stopped, and looking off the paper, shivered. "I do not understand this," she murmured. "What does it mean?"

"No good! I'll be sworn!" Master Bertie replied, gazing at her eagerly. "Read it aloud, Katherine."

"'To Mistress A- B-. I am advertised by my trusty agent, Master Clarence, that he hath benefited much by your aid in the matter in which I have employed him. Such service goeth always for much, and never for naught, with me. In which belief confirm yourself. For the present, working with him as heretofore, be secret, and on no account let your true sentiments come to light. So you will be the more valuable to me, even as it is more easy to unfasten a barred door from within than from without.'"

Here the Duchess broke off abruptly, and turned on us a face full of wonder. "What does it mean?" she asked.

"Is that all?" her husband said.

"Not quite," she answered, returning to it, and reading:

"'Those whom you have hitherto served have too long made a mockery of sacred things, but their cup is full and the business of seeing that they drink it lieth with me, who am not wont to be slothful in these matters. Be faithful and secret. Good speed and fare you well. – Ste. Winton."

"One thing is quite clear!" said Master Bertie slowly. "That you and I are the persons whose cup is full. You remember how you once dressed up a dog in a rochet, and dandled it before Gardiner? And it is our matter in which Clarence is employed. Then who is it who has been cooperating with him, and whose aid is of so much value to him?"

"'Even as it is easier,'" I muttered thoughtfully, "'to unfasten a barred door from within than from without." What was it of which that strange sentence reminded me? Ha! I had it. Of the night on which we had fled from Master Lindstrom's house, when Mistress Anne had been seized with that odd fit of perverseness, and had almost opened the door looking upon the river in spite of all I could say or do. It was of that the sentence reminded me. "To whom is it addressed?" I asked abruptly.

"To Mistress Clarence," my lady answered.

"No; inside, I mean."

"Oh! to Mistress A- B-. But that gives us no clew," she added. "It is a disguise. You see they are the two first letters of the alphabet."

So they were. And the initial letters of Anne Brandon! I wondered that the Duchess did not see it, that she did not at once turn her suspicions toward the right quarter. But she was, for a woman, singularly truthful and confiding. And she saw nothing.

I looked at Master Bertie. He seemed puzzled, discerning, I fancy, how strangely the allusions pointed to Mistress Anne, but not daring at once to draw the inference. She was his wife's kinswoman by marriage-albeit a distant one-and much indebted to her. She had been almost as his own sister. She was young and fair, and to associate treachery and ingratitude such as this with her seemed almost too horrible.

Then why was I so clear sighted as to read the riddle? Why was I the first to see the truth? Because I had felt for days a vague and ill-defined distrust of the girl. I had seen more of her odd fits and caprices than had the others. Looking back now I could find a confirmation of my idea in a dozen things which had befallen us. I remembered how ill and stricken she had looked on the day when I had first brought out the letter, and how strangely she had talked to me about it. I remembered Clarence's interview with, not Dymphna, – as I had then thought, – but, as I now guessed, Anne, wearing her cloak. I recalled the manner in which she had used me to persuade Master Bertie to take the Wesel instead of the Santon road; no doubt she had told Clarence to follow in that direction, if by any chance we escaped him on the island. And her despair when she heard in the church porch that I had killed Clarence at the ford! And her utter abandonment to fear-poor guilty thing! – when she thought that all her devices had only led her with us to a dreadful death! These things, in the light in which I now viewed them, were cogent evidences against her.

"It must have been written to some one about us!" said the Duchess at length. "To some one in our confidence. 'On our side of the door,' as he calls it."

"Yes, that is certain," I said.

"And on the wrapper he styles her Mistress Clarence. Now who-"

"Who could it have been? That is the question we have to answer," Master Bertie replied dryly. Hearing his voice, I knew he had come at last to the same conclusion to which I had jumped. "I think you may dismiss the servants from the inquiry," he continued. "The Bishop of Winchester would scarcely write to them in that style."

"Dismiss the servants? Then who is left?" she protested.

"I think-" He lost courage, hesitated, and broke off. She looked at him wonderingly. He turned to me, and, gaining confirmation from my nod, began again. "I think I should ask A- B-," he said.

"A- B-?" she cried, still not seeing one whit.

"Yes. Anne Brandon," he answered sternly.

She repeated his words softly and stood a moment gazing at him. In that moment she saw it all. She sat down suddenly on the chair beside her and shuddered violently, as if she had laid her hand unwittingly upon a snake. "Oh, Richard," she whispered, "it is too horrible!"

"I fear it is too true," he answered gloomily.

I shrank from looking at them, from meeting her eyes or his. I felt as if this shame had come upon us all. The thought that the culprit might walk into the room at any moment filled me with terror. I turned away and looked through the window, leaving the husband and wife together.

"Is it only the name you are thinking of?" she muttered.

"No," he answered. "Before I left England to go to Calais I saw something pass between them-between her and Clarence-which, surprised me. Only in the confusion of those last days it slipped from my memory for the time."

"I see," she said quietly. "The villain!"

Looking back on the events of the last week, I found many things made plain by the lurid light now cast upon them. I understood how Master Lindstrom's vase had come to be broken when we were discussing the letter, which in my hands must have been a perpetual terror to the girl. I discerned that she had purposely sown dissension between myself and Van Tree, and recalled how she had striven to persuade us not to leave the island; then, how she had induced us to take that unlucky road; finally, how on the road her horse had lagged and lagged behind, detaining us all when every minute was precious. The things all dovetailed into one another; each by itself was weak, but together they formed a strong scaffold-a scaffold strong enough for the hanging of a man, if she had been a man! The others appealed to me, the Duchess feverishly anxious to be assured one way or the other. The very suspicion of the existence of such treachery at her side seemed to stifle her. Still looking out of the window I detailed the proofs I have mentioned, not gladly, Heaven knows, or in any spirit of revenge. But my duty was rather to my companions who had been true to me, than to her. I told them the truth as far as I knew it. The whole wretched, miserable truth was only to become known to me later.

"I will go to her," the Duchess said presently, rising from her seat.

"My dear!" her husband cried. He stretched out his hand, and grasping her skirt detained her. "You will not-"

"Do not be afraid!" she replied sadly, as she stooped over him and kissed his forehead. "It is a thing past scolding, Richard; past love and even hope, and all but past pity. I will be merciful as we hope for mercy, but she can never be friend of ours again, and some one must tell her. I will do so and return. As for that man!" she continued, obscuring suddenly the fair and noble side of her character which she had just exhibited, and which I confess had surprised me, for I had not thought her capable of a generosity so uncommon; "as for that man," she repeated, drawing herself up to her full height, while her eyes sparkled and her cheek grew red, "who has turned her into a vile schemer and a shameless hypocrite, as he would fain have turned better women, I will show him no mercy nor grace if I ever have him under my feet. I will crush him as I would an adder, though I be crushed next moment myself!"

She was sweeping with that word from the room, and had nearly reached the door before I found my voice. Then I called out "Stay!" just in time. "You will do no good, madam, by going!" I said, rising. "You will not find her. She is gone."

"Gone?"

"Yes," I said quietly. "She left the house twenty minutes ago. I saw her cross the market-place, wearing her cloak and carrying a bag. I do not think she will return."

"Not return? But whither has she gone?" they both cried at once.

I shook my head.

"I can only guess," I said in a low voice. "I saw no more than I have told you."

"But why did you not tell me'" the Duchess cried reproachfully. "She shall be brought back."

"It would be useless," Master Bertie answered. "Yet I doubt if it be as Carey thinks. Why should she go just at this time? She does not know that she is found out. She does not know that this letter has been recovered. Not a word, mind, was said of it before she left the room."

"No," I allowed; "that is true."

I was puzzled on this point myself, now I came to consider it. I could not see why she had taken the alarm so opportunely; but I maintained my opinion nevertheless.

"Something frightened her," I said; "though it may not have been the letter."

"Yes," said the Duchess, after a moment's silence. "I suppose you are right. I suppose something frightened her, as you say. I wonder what it was, poor wretch!"

It turned out that I was right. Mistress Anne had gone indeed, having stayed, so far as we could learn from an examination of the room which she had shared with Dymphna, merely to put together the few things which our adventures had left her. She had gone out from among us in this foreign land without a word of farewell, without a good wish given or received, without a soul to say God speed! The thought made me tremble. If she had died it would have been different. Now, to feel sorrow for her as for one who had been with us in heart as well as in body, seemed a mockery. How could we grieve for one who had moved day by day and hour by hour among us, only that with each hour and day she might plot and scheme and plan our destruction? It was impossible!

We made inquiries indeed, but without result; and so, abruptly and terribly she passed-for the time-out of our knowledge, though often afterward I recalled sadly the weary, hunted look which I had sometimes seen in her eyes when she sat listless and dreamy. Poor girl! Her own acts had placed her, as the Duchess said, beyond love or hope, but not beyond pity.

So it is in life. The day which sees one's trial end sees another's begin. We-the Duchess and her child, Master Bertie and I-stayed with our good and faithful friends the Lindstroms a while, resting and recruiting our strength; and during this interval, at the pressing instance of the Duchess, I wrote letters to Sir Anthony and Petronilla, stating that I was abroad, and was well, and looked presently to return; but not disclosing my refuge or the names of my companions. At the end of five days, Master Bertie being fairly strong again and Santon being considered unsafe for us as a permanent residence, we went under guard to Wesel, where we were received as people of quality, and lodged, there being no fitting place, in the disused church of St. Willibrod. Here the child was christened Peregrine-a wanderer; the governor of the city and I being godfathers. And here we lived in peace-albeit with hearts that yearned for home-for some months.

During this time two pieces of news came to us from England: one, that the Parliament, though much pressed to it, had refused to acquiesce in the confiscation of the Duchess's estates; the other, that our joint persecutor, the great Bishop of Winchester, was dead. This last we at first disbelieved. It was true, nevertheless. Stephen Gardiner, whose vast schemes had enmeshed people so far apart in station, and indeed in all else, as the Duchess and myself, was dead at last; had died toward the end of 1555, at the height of his power, with England at his feet, and gone to his Maker. I have known many worse men.

We trusted that this might open the way for our return, but we found on the contrary that fresh clouds were rising. The persecution of the Reformers, which Queen Mary had begun in England, was carried on with increasing rigor, and her husband, who was now King of Spain and master of the Netherlands, freed from the prudent checks of his father, was inclined to pleasure her in this by giving what aid he could abroad. His Minister in the Netherlands, the Bishop of Arras, brought so much pressure to bear upon our protector to induce him to give us up, that it was plain the Duke of Cleves must sooner or later comply. We thought it better, therefore, to remove ourselves, and presently did so, going to the town of Winnheim in the Rhine Palatinate.

We found ourselves not much more secure here, however, and all our efforts to discover a safe road into France failing, and the stock of money which the Duchess had provided beginning to give out, we were in great straits whither to go or what to do.

At this time of our need, however, Providence opened a door in a quarter where we least looked for it. Letters came from Sigismund, the King of Poland, and from the Palatine of Wilna in that country, inviting the Duchess and Master Bertie to take up their residence there, and offering the latter an establishment and honorable employment. The overture was unlooked for, and was not accepted without misgivings, Wilna being so far distant, and there being none of our race in that country. However, assurance of the Polish King's good faith reached us-I say us, for in all their plans I was included-through John Alasco, a nobleman who had visited England. And in due time we started on this prodigious journey, and came safely to Wilna, where our reception was such as the letters had led us to expect.

I do not propose to set down here our adventures, though they were many, in that strange country of frozen marshes and endless plains, but to pass over eighteen months which I spent not without profit to myself in the Pole's service, seeing something of war in his Lithuanian campaigns, and learning much of men and the world, which here, to say nothing of wolves and bears, bore certain aspects not commonly visible in Warwickshire. I pass on to the early autumn of 1558, when a letter from the Duchess, who was at Wilna, was brought to me at Cracovy. It was to this effect:

"Dear Friend: Send you good speed! Word has come to us here of an enterprise Englandward, which promises, if it be truly reported to us, to so alter things at home that there may be room for us at our own firesides. Heaven so further it, both for our happiness and the good of the religion. Master Bertie has embarked on it, and I have taken upon myself to answer for your aid and counsel, which have never been wanting to us. Wherefore, dear friend, come, sparing neither horse nor spurs, nor anything which may bring you sooner to Wilna, and your assured and loving friend, Katherine Suffolk."

In five days after receiving this I was at Wilna, and two months later I saw England again, after an absence of three years. Early in November, 1558, Master Bertie and I landed at Lowestoft, having made the passage from Hamburg in a trading vessel of that place. We stopped only to sleep one night, and then, dressed as traveling merchants, we set out on the road to London, entering the city without accident or hindrance on the third day after landing.