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+The Project Gutenberg EBook Michel and Angle, by Gilbert Parker, v1
+#77 in our series by Gilbert Parker
+
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+Title: Michel and Angele [A Ladder of Swords], Volume 1.
+
+Author: Gilbert Parker
+
+Release Date: August, 2004  [EBook #6250]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on October 31, 2002]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
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+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MICHEL AND ANGELE, PARKER, V1 ***
+
+
+
+This eBook was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
+
+
+
+
+
+MICHEL AND ANGELE
+
+[A Ladder of Swords]
+
+By Gilbert Parker
+
+Volume 1.
+
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+If it does not seem too childish a candour to say so, 'Michel and Angele'
+always seems to me like some old letter lifted out of an ancient cabinet
+with the faint perfume of bygone days upon it.  Perhaps that is because
+the story itself had its origin in a true but brief record of some good
+Huguenots who fled from France and took refuge in England, to be found,
+as the book declares, at the Walloon Church, in Southampton.
+
+The record in the first paragraphs of the first chapter of the book
+fascinated my imagination, and I wove round Michel de la Foret and Angele
+Aubert a soft, bright cloud of romance which would not leave my vision
+until I sat down and wrote out what, in the writing, seemed to me a true
+history.  It was as though some telepathy between the days of Elizabeth
+and our own controlled me--self-hypnotism, I suppose; but still, there it
+was.  The story, in its original form, was first published in 'Harper's
+Weekly' under the name of Michel and Angele, but the fear, I think, that
+many people would mispronounce the first word of the title, induced me to
+change it when, double in length, it became a volume called 'A Ladder of
+Swords'.
+
+As it originally appeared, I wrote it in the Island of Jersey, out at the
+little Bay of Rozel in a house called La Chaire, a few yards away from
+the bay itself, and having a pretty garden with a seat at its highest
+point, from which, beyond the little bay, the English Channel ran away to
+the Atlantic.  It was written in complete seclusion.  I had no visitors;
+there was no one near, indeed, except the landlord of the little hotel in
+the bay, and his wife.  All through the Island, however, were people whom
+I knew, like the Malet de Carterets, the Lemprieres, and old General
+Pipon, for whom the Jersey of three hundred years ago was as near as the
+Jersey of to-day, so do the Jersiais prize, cultivate, and conserve every
+hour of its recorded history.
+
+As the sea opens out to a vessel making between the promontories to the
+main, so, while writing this tale which originally was short, the larger
+scheme of 'The Battle of the Strong' spread out before me, luring me, as
+though in the distance were the Fortunate Isles.  Eight years after
+'Michel and Angele' was written and first published in 'Harper's Weekly',
+I decided to give it the dignity of a full-grown romance.  For years I
+had felt that it had the essentials for a larger canvas, and at the
+earnest solicitation of Messrs. Harper & Brothers I settled to do what
+had long been in my mind.  The narrative grew as naturally from what it
+was to larger stature as anything that had been devised upon a greater
+scale at the beginning; and in London town I had the same joy in the
+company of Michel and Angele--and a vastly increased joy in the company
+of Lempriere, the hulking, joyous giant--as I had years before in Jersey
+itself when the story first stirred in my mind and reached my pen.
+
+While adverse reviews of the book were few if any, it cannot be said that
+this romance is a companion in popularity with, for instance, 'The Right
+of Way'.  It had its friends, but it has apparently appealed to smaller
+audiences--to those who watch the world go by; who are not searching for
+the exposure of life's grim realities; who do not seek the clinic of the
+soul's tragedies.  There was tragedy here, but there was comedy too;
+there was also joy and faith, patience and courage.  The book, taken by
+itself, could not make a permanent reputation for any man, but it has its
+place in the scheme of my work, and I would not have it otherwise than it
+is.
+
+
+
+
+A NOTE
+
+There will be found a few anachronisms in this tale, but none so
+important as to give a wrong impression of the events of Queen
+Elizabeth's reign.
+
+
+
+
+MICHEL AND ANGELE
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+If you go to Southampton and search the register of the Walloon Church
+there, you will find that in the summer of 157_,
+
+     "Madame Vefue de Montgomery with all her family and servants were
+     admitted to the Communion"--"Tous ceux cj furent Recus la a Cene du
+     157_, comme passans, sans avoir Rendu Raison de la foj, mes sur la
+     tesmognage de Mons. Forest, Ministre de Madame, quj certifia quj ne
+     cognoisoit Rien en tout ceux la po' quoy Il ne leur deust administre
+     la Cene s'il estoit en lieu po' a ferre."
+
+There is another striking record, which says that in August of the same
+year Demoiselle Angele Claude Aubert, daughter of Monsieur de la Haie
+Aubert, Councillor of the Parliament of Rouen, was married to Michel de
+la Foret, of the most noble Flemish family of that name.
+
+When I first saw these records, now grown dim with time, I fell to
+wondering what was the real life-history of these two people.  Forthwith,
+in imagination, I began to make their story piece by piece; and I had
+reached a romantic 'denoument' satisfactory to myself and in sympathy
+with fact, when the Angel of Accident stepped forward with some "human
+documents."  Then I found that my tale, woven back from the two obscure
+records I have given, was the true story of two most unhappy yet most
+happy people.  From the note struck in my mind, when my finger touched
+that sorrowful page in the register of the Church of the Refugees at
+Southampton, had spread out the whole melody and the very book of the
+song.
+
+One of the later-discovered records was a letter, tear-stained, faded,
+beautifully written in old French, from Demoiselle Angele Claude Aubert
+to Michel de la Foret at Anvers in March of the year 157_.  The letter
+lies beside me as I write, and I can scarcely believe that three and a
+quarter centuries have passed since it was written, and that she who
+wrote it was but eighteen years old at the time.  I translate it into
+English, though it is impossible adequately to carry over either the
+flavour or the idiom of the language:
+
+     Written on this May Day of the year 157_, at the place hight Rozel
+     in the Manor called of the same of Jersey Isle, to Michel de la
+     Foret, at Anvers in Flanders.
+
+     MICHEL, Thy good letter by safe carriage cometh to my hand, bringing
+     to my heart a lightness it hath not known since that day when I was
+     hastily carried to the port of St. Malo, and thou towards the King
+     his prison.  In what great fear have I lived, having no news of thee
+     and fearing all manner of mischance!  But our God hath benignly
+     saved thee from death, and me He hath set safely here in this isle
+     of the sea.
+
+     Thou hast ever been a brave soldier, enduring and not fearing; thou
+     shalt find enow to keep thy blood stirring in these days of trial
+     and peril to us who are so opprobriously called Les Huguenots.  If
+     thou wouldst know more of my mind thereupon, come hither.  Safety is
+     here, and work for thee--smugglers and pirates do abound on these
+     coasts, and Popish wolves do harry the flock even in this island
+     province of England.  Michel, I plead for the cause which thou hast
+     nobly espoused, but--alas! my selfish heart, where thou art lie work
+     and fighting, and the same high cause, and sadly, I confess, it is
+     for mine own happiness that I ask thee to come.  I wot well that
+     escape from France hath peril, that the way hither from that point
+     upon yonder coast called Carteret is hazardous, but yet-but yet all
+     ways to happiness are set with hazard.
+
+     If thou dost come to Carteret thou wilt see two lights turning this-
+     wards: one upon a headland called Tour de Rozel, and one upon the
+     great rock called of the Ecrehos.  These will be in line with thy
+     sight by the sands of Hatainville.  Near by the Tour de Rozel shall
+     I be watching and awaiting thee.  By day and night doth my prayer
+     ascend for thee.
+
+     The messenger who bears this to thee (a piratical knave with a most
+     kind heart, having, I am told, a wife in every port of France and of
+     England the south, a most heinous sin!) will wait for thy answer, or
+     will bring thee hither, which is still better.  He is worthy of
+     trust if thou makest him swear by the little finger of St. Peter.
+     By all other swearings he doth deceive freely.
+
+     The Lord make thee true, Michel.  If thou art faithful to me, I
+     shall know how faithful thou art in all; for thy vows to me were
+     most frequent and pronounced, with a full savour that might warrant
+     short seasoning.  Yet, because thou mayst still be given to such
+     dear fantasies of truth as were on thy lips in those dark days
+     wherein thy sword saved my life 'twixt Paris and Rouen, I tell thee
+     now that I do love thee, and shall so love when, as my heart
+     inspires me, the cloud shall fall that will hide us from each other
+     forever.
+
+                                             ANGELE.
+
+     An Afterword:
+
+     I doubt not we shall come to the heights where there is peace,
+     though we climb thereto by a ladder of swords.  A.
+
+
+Some years before Angele's letter was written, Michel de la Foret had
+become an officer in the army of Comte Gabriel de Montgomery, and fought
+with him until what time the great chief was besieged in the Castle of
+Domfront in Normandy.  When the siege grew desperate, Montgomery besought
+the intrepid young Huguenot soldier to escort Madame de Montgomery to
+England, to be safe from the oppression and misery sure to follow any
+mishap to this noble leader of the Camisards.
+
+At the very moment of departure of the refugees from Domfront with the
+Comtesse, Angele's messenger--the "piratical knave with the most kind
+heart "presented himself, delivered her letter to De la Foret, and
+proceeded with the party to the coast of Normandy by St. Brieuc.
+Embarking there in a lugger which Buonespoir the pirate secured for them,
+they made for England.
+
+Having come but half-way of the Channel, the lugger was stopped by an
+English frigate.  After much persuasion the captain of the frigate agreed
+to land Madame de Montgomery upon the island of Jersey, but forced De la
+Foret to return to the coast of France; and Buonespoir elected to return
+with him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Meanwhile Angele had gone through many phases of alternate hope and
+despair.  She knew that Montgomery the Camisard was dead, and a rumour,
+carried by refugees, reached her that De la Foret had been with him to
+the end.  To this was presently added the word that De la Foret had been
+beheaded.  But one day she learned that the Comtesse de Montgomery was
+sheltered by the Governor, Sir Hugh Pawlett, her kinsman, at Mont Orgueil
+Castle.  Thither she went in fear from her refuge at Rozel, and was
+admitted to the Comtesse.  There she learned the joyful truth that De la
+Foret had not been slain, and was in hiding on the coast of Normandy.
+
+The long waiting was a sore trial, yet laughter was often upon her lips
+henceforth.  The peasants, the farmers and fishermen of Jersey, at first
+--as they have ever been--little inclined towards strangers, learned at
+last to look for her in the fields and upon the shore, and laughed in
+response, they knew not why, to the quick smiling of her eyes.  She even
+learned to speak their unmusical but friendly Norman-Jersey French.
+There were at least a half-dozen fishermen who, for her, would have gone
+at night straight to the Witches' Rock in St. Clement's Bay--and this was
+bravery unmatched.
+
+It came to be known along the coast that "Ma'm'selle" was waiting for a
+lover fleeing from the French coast.  This gave her fresh interest in the
+eyes of the serfs and sailors and their women folk, who at first were not
+inclined towards the Huguenot maiden, partly because she was French, and
+partly because she was not a Catholic.  But even these, when they saw
+that she never talked religiously, that she was fast learning to speak
+their own homely patois, and that in the sickness of their children she
+was untiring in her kindness, forgave the austerity of the gloomy-browed
+old man her father, who spoke to them distantly, or never spoke at all;
+and her position was secure.  Then, upon the other hand, the gentry of
+the manors, seeing the friendship grow between her and the Comtesse de
+Montgomery at Mont Orgueil Castle, made courteous advances towards her
+father, and towards herself through him.
+
+She could scarce have counted the number of times she climbed the great
+hill like a fortress at the lift of the little bay of Rozel, and from the
+Nez du Guet scanned the sea for a sail and the sky for fair weather.
+When her eyes were not thus busy, they were searching the lee of the
+hillside round for yellow lilies, and the valley below for the campion,
+the daffodil, and the thousand pretty ferns growing in profusion there.
+Every night she looked out to see that her signal fire was lit upon the
+Nez du Guet, and she never went to bed without taking one last look over
+the sea, in the restless inveterate hope which at once sustained her and
+devoured her.
+
+But the longest waiting must end.  It came on the evening of the very day
+that the Seigneur of Rozel went to Angele's father and bluntly told him
+he was ready to forego all Norman-Jersey prejudice against the French and
+the Huguenot religion, and take Angele to wife without penny or estate.
+
+In reply to the Seigneur, Monsieur Aubert said that he was conscious of
+an honour, and referred Monsieur to his daughter, who must answer for
+herself; but he must tell Monsieur of Rozel that Monsieur's religion
+would, in his own sight, be a high bar to the union.  To that the
+Seigneur said that no religion that he had could be a bar to anything at
+all; and so long as the young lady could manage her household, drive a
+good bargain with the craftsmen and hucksters, and have the handsomest
+face and manners in the Channel Islands, he'd ask no more; and she might
+pray for him and his salvation without let or hindrance.
+
+The Seigneur found the young lady in a little retreat among the rocks,
+called by the natives La Chaire.  Here she sat sewing upon some coarse
+linen for a poor fisherwoman's babe when the Seigneur came near.  She
+heard the scrunch of his heels upon the gravel, the clank of his sword
+upon the rocks, and looked up with a flush, her needle poised; for none
+should know of her presence in this place save her father.  When she saw
+who was her visitor, she rose.  After greeting and compliment, none too
+finely put, but more generous than fitted with Jersey parsimony, the
+gentleman of Rozel came at once to the point.
+
+"My name is none too bad," said he--"Raoul Lempriere, of the Lemprieres
+that have been here since Rollo ruled in Normandy.  My estate is none
+worse than any in the whole islands; I have more horses and dogs than any
+gentleman of my acres; and I am more in favour at court than De Carteret
+of St. Ouen's.  I am the Queen's butler, and I am the first that royal
+favour granted to set up three dove-cotes, one by St. Aubin's, one by St.
+Helier's, and one at Rozel: and--and," he added, with a lumbering attempt
+at humour--"and, on my oath, I'll set up another dove-cote with out my
+sovereign's favour, with your leave alone.  By our Lady, I do love that
+colour in yon cheek!  Just such a colour had my mother when she snatched
+from the head of my cousin of Carteret's milk-maid wife the bonnet of a
+lady of quality and bade her get to her heifers.  God's beauty!  but 'tis
+a colour of red primroses in thy cheeks and blue campions in thine eyes.
+Come, I warrant I can deepen that colour"--he bowed low--"Madame of
+Rozel, if it be not too soon!"
+
+The girl listened to this cheerful and loquacious proposal and courtship
+all in one, ending with the premature bestowal of a title, in mingled
+anger, amusement, disdain, and apprehension.  Her heart fluttered, then
+stood still, then flew up in her throat, then grew terribly hot and hurt
+her, so that she pressed her hand to her bosom as though that might ease
+it.  By the time he had finished, drawn himself up, and struck his foot
+upon the ground in burly emphasis of his devoted statements, the girl had
+sufficiently recovered to answer him composedly, and with a little glint
+of demure humour in her eyes.  She loved another man; she did not care so
+much as a spark for this happy, swearing, swashbuckling gentleman; yet
+she saw he had meant to do her honour.  He had treated her as courteously
+as was in him to do; he chose her out from all the ladies of his
+acquaintance to make her an honest offer of his hand--he had said nothing
+about his heart; he would, should she marry him, throw her scraps of
+good-humour, bearish tenderness, drink to her health among his fellows,
+and respect and admire her--even exalt her almost to the rank of a man
+in his own eyes; and he had the tolerance of the open-hearted and open-
+handed man.  All these things were as much a compliment to her as though
+she were not a despised Huguenot, an exiled lady of no fortune.  She
+looked at him a moment with an almost solemn intensity, so that he
+shifted his ground uneasily, but at once smiled encouragingly, to relieve
+her embarrassment at the unexpected honour done her.  She had remained
+standing; now, as he made a step towards her, she sank down upon the
+seat, and waved him back courteously.
+
+"A moment, Monsieur of Rozel," she ventured.  "Did my father send you to
+me?"
+
+He inclined his head and smiled again.
+
+"Did you say to him what you have said to me?" she asked, not quite
+without a touch of malice.
+
+"I left out about the colour in the cheek," he answered, with a smirk at
+what he took to be the quickness of his wit.
+
+"You kept your paint-pot for me," she replied softly.
+
+"And the dove-cote, too," he rejoined, bowing finely, and almost carried
+off his feet by his own brilliance.  She became serious at once--so
+quickly that he was ill prepared for it, and could do little but stare
+and pluck at the tassel of his sword; for he was embarrassed before this
+maiden, who changed as quickly as the currents change under the brow of
+the Couperon Cliff, behind which lay his manor-house of Rozel.
+
+"I have visited at your manor, Monsieur of Rozel.  I have seen the state
+in which you live, your retainers, your men-at-arms, your farming-folk,
+and your sailormen.  I know how your Queen receives you; how your honour
+is as stable as your fief."
+
+He drew himself up again proudly.  He could understand this speech.
+
+"Your horses and your hounds I have seen," she added, "your men-servants
+and your maid-servants, your fields of corn, your orchards, and your
+larder.  I have sometimes broken the Commandment and coveted them and
+envied you."
+
+"Break the Commandment again, for the last time," he cried, delighted and
+boisterous.  "Let us not waste words, lady.  Let's kiss and have it
+over."
+
+Her eyes flashed.  "I coveted them and envied you; but then, I am but a
+vain girl at times, and vanity is easier to me than humbleness."
+
+"Blood of man, but I cannot understand so various a creature!" he broke
+in, again puzzled.
+
+"There is a little chapel in the dell beside your manor, Monsieur.  If
+you will go there, and get upon your knees, and pray till the candles no
+more burn, and the Popish images crumble in their places, you will yet
+never understand myself or any woman."
+
+"There's no question of Popish images between us," he answered, vainly
+trying for foothold.  "Pray as you please, and I'll see no harm comes to
+the Mistress of Rozel."
+
+He was out of his bearings and impatient.  Religion to him was a dull
+recreation invented chiefly for women.  She became plain enough now.
+"'Tis no images nor religion that stands between us," she answered,
+"though they might well do so.  It is that I do not love you, Monsieur of
+Rozel."
+
+His face, which had slowly clouded, suddenly cleared.  "Love! Love!"  He
+laughed good-humouredly.  "Love comes, I'm told, with marriage.  But we
+can do well enough without fugling on that pipe.  Come, come, dost think
+I'm not a proper man and a gentleman?  Dost think I'll not use thee well
+and 'fend thee, Huguenot though thou art, 'gainst trouble or fret or any
+man's persecutions--be he my Lord Bishop, my Lord Chancellor, or King of
+France, or any other?"
+
+She came a step closer to him, even as though she would lay a hand upon
+his arm.  "I believe that you would do all that in you lay," she answered
+steadily.  "Yours is a rough wooing, but it is honest--"
+
+"Rough! Rough!" he protested, for he thought he had behaved like some
+Adonis.  Was it not ten years only since he had been at Court!
+
+"Be assured, Monsieur, that I know how to prize the man who speaks after
+the light given him.  I know that you are a brave and valorous gentleman.
+I must thank you most truly and heartily, but, Monsieur, you and yours
+are not for me.  Seek elsewhere, among your own people, in your own
+religion and language and position, the Mistress of Rozel."
+
+He was dumfounded.  Now he comprehended the plain fact that he had been
+declined.
+
+"You send me packing!" he blurted out, getting red in the face.
+
+"Ah, no!  Say it is my misfortune that I cannot give myself the great
+honour," she said; in her tone a little disdainful dryness, a little
+pity, a little feeling that here was a good friend lost.
+
+"It's not because of the French soldier that was with Montgomery at
+Domfront?--I've heard that story.  But he's gone to heaven, and 'tis vain
+crying for last year's breath," he added, with proud philosophy.
+
+"He is not dead.  And if he were," she added, "do you think, Monsieur,
+that we should find it easier to cross the gulf between us?"
+
+"Tut, tut, that bugbear Love!" he said shortly.  "And so you'd lose a
+good friend for a dead lover?  I' faith, I'd befriend thee well if thou
+wert my wife, Ma'm'selle."
+
+"It is hard for those who need friends to lose them," she answered sadly.
+
+The sorrow of her position crept in upon her and filled her eyes with
+tears.  She turned them to the sea-instinctively towards that point on
+the shore where she thought it likely Michel might be; as though by
+looking she might find comfort and support in this hard hour.
+
+Even as she gazed into the soft afternoon light she could see, far over,
+a little sail standing out towards the Ecrehos.  Not once in six months
+might the coast of France be seen so clearly.  One might almost have
+noted people walking on the beach.  This was no good token, for when that
+coast may be seen with great distinctness a storm follows hard after.
+The girl knew this; and though she could not know that this was Michel de
+la Foret's boat, the possibility fixed itself in her mind.  She quickly
+scanned the horizon.  Yes, there in the north-west was gathering a dark-
+blue haze, hanging like small filmy curtains in the sky.
+
+The Seigneur of Rozel presently broke the silence so awkward for him.
+He had seen the tears in her eyes, and though he could not guess the
+cause, he vaguely thought it might be due to his announcement that she
+had lost a friend.  He was magnanimous at once, and he meant what he said
+and would stand by it through thick and thin.
+
+"Well, well, I'll be thy everlasting friend if not thy husband," he said
+with ornate generosity.  "Cheer thy heart, lady."
+
+With a sudden impulse she seized his hand and kissed it, and, turning,
+ran swiftly down the rocks towards her home.
+
+He stood and looked after her, then, dumfounded, at the hand she had
+kissed.
+
+"Blood of my heart!" he said, and shook his head in utter amazement.
+
+Then he turned and looked out upon the Channel.  He saw the little boat
+Angele had descried making from France.  Glancing at the sky, "What fools
+come there!" he said anxiously.
+
+They were Michel de la Foret and Buonespoir the pirate, in a black-
+bellied cutter with red sails.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+For weeks De la Foret and Buonespoir had lain in hiding at St. Brieuc.
+At last Buonespoir declared all was ready once again.  He had secured for
+the Camisard the passport and clothes of a priest who had but just died
+at Granville.  Once again they made the attempt to reach English soil.
+
+Standing out from Carteret on the Belle Suzanne, they steered for the
+light upon the Marmotier Rocks of the Ecrehos, which Angele had paid a
+fisherman to keep going every night.  This light had caused the French
+and English frigates some uneasiness, and they had patrolled the Channel
+from Cap de la Hague to the Bay of St. Brieuc with a vigilance worthy of
+a larger cause.  One fine day an English frigate anchored off the
+Ecrehos, and the fisherman was seized.  He, poor man, swore that he kept
+the light burning to guide his brother fishermen to and fro between
+Boulay Bay and the Ecrehos.  The captain of the frigate tried severities;
+but the fisherman stuck to his tale, and the light burned on as before--
+a lantern stuck upon a pole.  One day, with a telescope, Buonespoir had
+seen the exact position of the staff supporting the light, and had mapped
+out his course accordingly.  He would head straight for the beacon and
+pass between the Marmotier and the Maitre Ile, where is a narrow channel
+for a boat drawing only a few feet of water.  Unless he made this, he
+must run south and skirt the Ecriviere Rock and bank, where the streams
+setting over the sandy ridges make a confusing perilous sea to mariners
+in bad weather.  Else, he must sail north between the Ecrehos and the
+Dirouilles, in the channel called Etoc, a tortuous and dangerous passage
+save in good weather, and then safe only to the mariner who knows the
+floor of that strait like his own hand.  De la Foret was wholly in the
+hands of Buonespoir, for he knew nothing of these waters and coasts; also
+he was a soldier and no sailor.
+
+They cleared Cape Carteret with a fair wind from the north-east, which
+should carry them safely as the bird flies to the haven of Rozel.  The
+high, pinkish sands of Hatainville were behind them; the treacherous
+Taillepied Rocks lay to the north, and a sweet sea before.  Nothing could
+have seemed fairer and more hopeful.  But a few old fishermen on shore at
+Carteret shook their heads dubiously, and at Port Bail, some miles below,
+a disabled naval officer, watching through a glass, rasped out,
+"Criminals or fools!"  But he shrugged his shoulders, for if they were
+criminals he was sure they would expiate their crimes this night, and if
+they were fools--he had no pity for fools.
+
+But Buonespoir knew his danger.  Truth is, he had chosen this night
+because they would be safest from pursuit, because no sensible seafaring
+man, were he King's officer or another, would venture forth upon the
+impish Channel, save to court disaster.  Pirate, and soldier in priest's
+garb, had frankly taken the chances.
+
+With a fair wind they might, with all canvas set--mainsail, foresail,
+jib, and fore-topsail--make Rozel Bay within two hours and a quarter.
+All seemed well for a brief half-hour.  Then, even as the passage between
+the Marmotier and the Ecrehos opened out, the wind suddenly shifted from
+the north-east to the southwest and a squall came hurrying on them--a few
+moments too soon; for, had they been clear of the Ecrehos, clear of the
+Taillepieds, Felee Bank, and the Ecriviere, they could have stood out
+towards the north in a more open sea.
+
+Yet there was one thing in their favour: the tide was now running hard
+from the north-west, so fighting for them while the wind was against
+them.  Their only safety lay in getting beyond the Ecrehos.  If they
+attempted to run in to the Marmotier for safety, they would presently be
+at the mercy of the French.  To trust their doubtful fortunes and bear on
+was the only way.  The tide was running fast.  They gave the mainsail to
+the wind still more, and bore on towards the passage.  At last, as they
+were opening on it, the wind suddenly veered full north-east.  The sails
+flapped, the boat seemed to hover for a moment, and then a wave swept her
+towards the rocks.  Buonespoir put the helm hard over, she went about,
+and they close-hauled her as she trembled towards the rocky opening.
+
+This was the critical instant.  A heavy sea was running, the gale was
+blowing hard from the north-east, and under the close-hauled sail the
+Belle Suzanne was lying over dangerously.  But the tide, too, was running
+hard from the south, fighting the wind; and, at the moment when all
+seemed terribly uncertain, swept them past the opening and into the
+swift-running channel, where the indraught sucked them through to the
+more open water beyond.
+
+Although the Belle Suzanne was in more open water now, the danger was not
+over.  Ahead lay a treacherous sea, around them roaring winds, and the
+perilous coast of Jersey beyond all.
+
+"Do you think we shall land?" quietly asked De la Foret, nodding towards
+the Jersey coast.
+
+"As many chances 'gainst it as for it, M'sieu'," said Buonespoir, turning
+his face to the north, for the wind had veered again to north-east, and
+he feared its passing to the north-west, giving them a head-wind and a
+swooping sea.
+
+Night came down, but with a clear sky and a bright moon; the wind,
+however, not abating.  The next three hours were spent in tacking, in
+beating towards the Jersey coast under seas which almost swamped them.
+They were standing off about a mile from the island, and could see
+lighted fires and groups of people upon the shore, when suddenly a gale
+came out from the southwest, the wind having again shifted.  With an
+oath, Buonespoir put the helm hard over, the Belle Suzanne came about
+quickly, but as the gale struck her, the mast snapped like a pencil, she
+heeled over, and the two adventurers were engulfed in the waves.
+
+A cry of dismay went up from the watchers on the shore.  They turned with
+a half-conscious sympathy towards Angele, for her story was known by all,
+and in her face they read her mortal fear, though she made no cry, but
+only clasped her hands in agony.  Her heart told her that yonder Michel
+de la Foret was fighting for his life.  For an instant only she stood,
+the terror of death in her eyes, then she turned to the excited fishermen
+near.
+
+"Men, oh men," she cried, "will you not save them?  Will no one come with
+me?"
+
+Some shook their heads sullenly, others appeared uncertain, but their
+wives and children clung to them, and none stirred.  Looking round
+helplessly, Angele saw the tall figure of the Seigneur of Rozel.  He had
+been watching the scene for some time.  Now he came quickly to her.
+
+"Is it the very man?" he asked her, jerking a finger towards the
+struggling figures in the sea.
+
+"Yes, oh yes," she replied, nodding her head piteously.  "God tells my
+heart it is."
+
+Her father drew near and interposed.
+
+"Let us kneel and pray for two dying men," said he, and straightway knelt
+upon the sand.
+
+"By St. Martin, we've better medicine than that, apothecary!" said
+Lempriere of Rozel loudly, and, turning round, summoned two serving-men.
+"Launch my strong boat," he added.  "We will pick these gentlemen from
+the brine, or know the end of it all."
+
+The men hurried gloomily to the long-boat, ran her down to the shore and
+into the surf.
+
+"You are going--you are going to save him, dear Seigneur?" asked the
+girl tremulously.
+
+"To save him--that's to be seen, mistress," answered Lempriere, and
+advanced to the fishermen.  By dint of hard words, and as hearty
+encouragement and promises, he got a half-dozen strong sailors to man the
+boat.
+
+A moment after, they were all in.  At a motion from the Seigneur, the
+boat was shot out into the surf, and a cheer from the shore gave heart to
+De la Foret and Buonespoir, who were being driven upon the rocks.
+
+The Jerseymen rowed gallantly; and the Seigneur, to give them heart,
+promised a shilling, a capon, and a gallon of beer to each, if the rescue
+was made.  Again and again the two men seemed to sink beneath the sea,
+and again and again they came to the surface and battled further, torn,
+battered, and bloody, but not beaten.  Cries of "We're coming, gentles,
+we're coming!" from the Seigneur of Rozel, came ringing through the surf
+to the dulled ears of the drowning men, and they struggled on.
+
+There never was a more gallant rescue.  Almost at their last gasp the two
+were rescued.
+
+"Mistress Aubert sends you welcome, sir, if you be Michel de la Foret,"
+said Lempriere of Rozel, and offered the fugitive his horn of liquor as
+he lay blown and beaten in the boat.
+
+"I am he," De la Foret answered.  "I owe you my life, Monsieur," he
+added.
+
+Lempriere laughed.  "You owe it to the lady; and I doubt you can properly
+pay the debt," he answered, with a toss of the head; for had not the lady
+refused him, the Seigneur of Rozel, six feet six in height, and all else
+in proportion, while this gentleman was scarce six feet.
+
+"We can have no quarrel upon the point," answered De la Foret, reaching
+out his hand; "you have at least done tough work for her, and if I cannot
+pay in gold, I can in kind.  It was a generous deed, and it has made a
+friend for ever of Michel de la Foret."
+
+"Raoul Lempriere of Rozel they call me, Michel de la Foret, and by Rollo
+the Duke, but I'll take your word in the way of friendship, as the lady
+yonder takes it for riper fruit!  Though, faith, 'tis fruit of a short
+summer, to my thinking."
+
+All this while Buonespoir the pirate, his face covered with blood, had
+been swearing by the little finger of St. Peter that each Jerseyman there
+should have the half of a keg of rum.  He went so far in gratitude as to
+offer the price of ten sheep which he had once secretly raided from the
+Seigneur of Rozel and sold in France; for which he had been seized on his
+later return to the island, and had escaped without punishment.
+
+Hearing, Lempriere of Rozel roared at him in anger: "Durst speak to me!
+For every fleece you thieved I'll have you flayed with bow-strings if
+ever I sight your face within my boundaries."
+
+"Then I'll fetch and carry no more for M'sieu' of Rozel," said
+Buonespoir, in an offended tone, but grinning under his reddish beard.
+
+"When didst fetch and carry for me, varlet?" Lempriere roared again.
+
+"When the Seigneur of Rozel fell from his horse, overslung with sack, the
+night of the royal Duke's visit, and the footpads were on him, I carried
+him on my back to the lodge of Rozel Manor.  The footpads had scores to
+settle with the great Rozel."
+
+For a moment the Seigneur stared, then roared again, but this time with
+laughter.
+
+"By the devil and Rollo, I have sworn to this hour that there was no man
+in the isle could have carried me on his shoulders.  And I was right, for
+Jersiais you're none, neither by adoption nor grace, but a citizen of the
+sea."
+
+He laughed again as a wave swept over them, drenching them, and a sudden
+squall of wind came out of the north.  "There's no better head in the
+isle than mine for measurement and thinking, and I swore no man under
+eighteen stone could carry me, and I am twenty-five--I take you to be
+nineteen stone, eh?"
+
+"Nineteen, less two ounces," grinned Buonespoir.
+
+"I'll laugh De Carteret of St. Ouen's out of his stockings over this,"
+answered Lempriere.  "Trust me for knowing weights and measures!  Look
+you, varlet, thy sins be forgiven thee.  I care not about the fleeces, if
+there be no more stealing.  St. Ouen's has no head--I said no one man in
+Jersey could have done it--I'm heavier by three stone than any man in the
+island."  Thereafter there was little speaking among them, for the danger
+was greater as they neared the shore.  The wind and the sea were against
+them; the tide, however, was in their favour.  Others besides M. Aubert
+offered up prayers for the safe-landing of the rescued and rescuers.
+Presently an ancient fisherman broke out into a rude sailor's chanty, and
+every voice, even those of the two Huguenots, took it up:
+
+          "When the Four Winds, the Wrestlers, strive with the Sun,
+          When the Sun is slain in the dark;
+          When the stars burn out, and the night cries
+          To the blind sea-reapers, and they rise,
+          And the water-ways are stark--
+               God save us when the reapers reap!
+          When the ships sweep in with the tide to the shore,
+          And the little white boats return no more;
+          When the reapers reap, Lord give Thy sailors sleep,
+          If Thou cast us not upon the shore,
+          To bless Thee evermore:
+          To walk in Thy sight as heretofore
+          Though the way of the Lord be steep!
+          By Thy grace,
+          Show Thy face,
+               Lord of the land and the deep!"
+
+The song stilled at last.  It died away in the roar of the surf,
+in the happy cries of foolish women, and the laughter of men back from
+a dangerous adventure.  As the Seigneur's boat was drawn up the shore,
+Angele threw herself into the arms of Michel de la Foret, the soldier
+dressed as a priest.
+
+Lempriere of Rozel stood abashed before this rich display of feeling.
+In his hottest youth he could not have made such passionate motions of
+affection.  His feelings ran neither high nor broad, but neither did they
+run low and muddy.  His nature was a straight level of sensibility--a
+rough stream between high banks of prejudice, topped with the foam of
+vanity, now brawling in season, and now going steady and strong to the
+sea.  Angele had come to feel what he was beneath the surface.  She felt
+how unimaginative he was, and how his humour, which was but the horse-
+play of vanity, helped him little to understand the world or himself.
+His vanity was ridiculous, his self-importance was against knowledge or
+wisdom; and Heaven had given him a small brain, a big and noble heart, a
+pedigree back to Rollo, and the absurd pride of a little lord in a little
+land.  Angele knew all this; but realised also that he had offered her
+all he was able to offer to any woman.
+
+She went now and put out both hands to him.  "I shall ever pray God's
+blessing on the lord of Rozel," she said, in a low voice.
+
+"'Twould fit me no better than St. Ouen's sword fits his fingers.  I'll
+take thine own benison, lady--but on my cheek, not on my hand as this day
+before at four of the clock."  His big voice lowered.  "Come, come, the
+hand thou kissed, it hath been the hand of a friend to thee, as Raoul
+Lempriere of Rozel said he'd be.  Thy lips upon his cheek, though it be
+but a rough fellow's fancy, and I warrant, come good, come ill, Rozel's
+face will never be turned from thee.  Pooh, pooh! let yon soldier-priest
+shut his eyes a minute; this is 'tween me and thee; and what's done
+before the world's without shame."
+
+He stopped short, his black eyes blazing with honest mirth and kindness,
+his breath short, having spoken in such haste.
+
+Her eyes could scarce see him, so full of tears were they; and, standing
+on tiptoe, she kissed him upon each cheek.
+
+"'Tis much to get for so little given," she said, with a quiver in her
+voice; "yet this price for friendship would be too high to pay to any
+save the Seigneur of Rozel."
+
+She hastily turned to the men who had rescued Michel and Buonespoir.
+"If I had riches, riches ye should have, brave men of Jersey," she said;
+"but I have naught save love and thanks, and my prayers too, if ye will
+have them."
+
+"'Tis a man's duty to save his fellow an' he can," cried a gaunt
+fisherman, whose daughter was holding to his lips a bowl of conger-eel
+soup.
+
+"'Twas a good deed to send us forth to save a priest of Holy Church,"
+cried a weazened boat-builder with a giant's arm, as he buried his face
+in a cup of sack, and plunged his hand into a fishwife's basket of
+limpets.
+
+"Aye, but what means she by kissing and arm-getting with a priest?"
+cried a snarling vraic-gatherer.  "'Tis some jest upon Holy Church, or
+yon priest is no better than common men but an idle shame."
+
+By this time Michel was among them.  "Priest I am none, but a soldier,"
+he said in a loud voice, and told them bluntly the reasons for his
+disguise; then, taking a purse from his pocket, thrust into the hands of
+his rescuers and their families pieces of silver and gave them brave
+words of thanks.
+
+But the Seigneur was not to be outdone in generosity.  His vanity ran
+high; he was fain to show Angele what a gorgeous gentleman she had failed
+to make her own; and he was in ripe good-humour all round.
+
+"Come, ye shall come, all of ye, to the Manor of Rozel, every man and
+woman here.  Ye shall be fed, and fuddled too ye shall be an' ye will;
+for honest drink which sends to honest sleep hurts no man.  To my kitchen
+with ye all; and you, messieurs"--turning to M. Aubert and De la Fore-
+"and you, Mademoiselle, come, know how open is the door and full the
+table at my Manor of Rozel--St. Ouen's keeps a beggarly board."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+Thus began the friendship of the bragging Seigneur of Rozel for the
+three Huguenots, all because he had seen tears in a girl's eyes and
+misunderstood them, and because the same girl had kissed him.  His pride
+was flattered that they should receive protection from him, and the
+flattery became almost a canonising when De Carteret of St. Ouen's
+brought him to task for harbouring and comforting the despised Huguenots;
+for when De Carteret railed he was envious.  So henceforth Lempriere
+played Lord Protector with still more boisterous unction.  His pride knew
+no bounds when, three days after the rescue, Sir Hugh Pawlett, the
+Governor, answering De la Foret's letter requesting permission to visit
+the Comtesse de Montgomery, sent him word to fetch De la Foret to Mont
+Orgueil Castle.  Clanking and blowing, he was shown into the great hall
+with De la Foret, where waited Sir Hugh and the widow of the renowned
+Camisard.  Clanking and purring like an enormous cat, he turned his head
+away to the window when De la Foret dropped on his knees and kissed the
+hand of the Comtesse, whose eyes were full of tears.  Clanking and
+gurgling, he sat to a mighty meal of turbot, eels, lobsters, ormers,
+capons, boar's head, brawn, and mustard, swan, curlew, and spiced meats.
+This he washed down with bastard, malmsey, and good ale, topped with
+almonds, comfits, perfumed cherries with "ipocras," then sprinkled
+himself with rose-water and dabbled his face and hands in it.  Filled to
+the turret, he lurched to his feet, and drinking to Sir Hugh's toast, 27
+
+"Her sacred Majesty!" he clanked and roared.  "Elizabeth!" as though
+upon the field of battle.  He felt the star of De Carteret declining and
+Rozel's glory ascending like a comet.  Once set in a course, nothing
+could change him.  Other men might err, but once right, the Seigneur of
+Rozel was everlasting.
+
+Of late he had made the cause of Michel de la Foret and Angele Aubert
+his own.  For this he had been raked upon the coals by De Carteret of St.
+Ouen's and his following, who taunted him with the saying: "Save a thief
+from hanging and he'll cut your throat."  Not that there was ill feeling
+against De la Foret in person.  He had won most hearts by a frank yet
+still manner, and his story and love for Angele had touched the women
+folk where their hearts were softest.  But the island was not true to
+itself or its history if it did not divide itself into factions, headed
+by the Seigneurs, and there had been no ground for good division for five
+years till De la Foret came.
+
+Short of actual battle, this new strife was the keenest ever known,
+for Sir Hugh Pawlett was ranged on the side of the Seigneur of Rozel.
+Kinsman of the Comtesse de Montgomery, of Queen Elizabeth's own
+Protestant religion, and admiring De la Foret, he had given every
+countenance to the Camisard refugee.  He had even besought the Royal
+Court of Jersey to grant a pardon to Buonespoir the pirate, on condition
+that he should never commit a depredation upon an inhabitant of the
+island--this he was to swear to by the little finger of St. Peter.
+Should he break his word, he was to be banished the island for ten years,
+under penalty of death if he returned.  When the hour had come for
+Buonespoir to take the oath, he failed to appear; and the next morning
+the Seigneur of St. Ouen's discovered that during the night his cellar
+had been raided of two kegs of canary, many flagons of muscadella, pots
+of anchovies and boxes of candied "eringo," kept solely for the visit
+which the Queen had promised the island.  There was no doubt of the
+misdemeanant, for Buonespoir returned to De Carteret from St. Brieuc the
+gabardine of one of his retainers, in which he had carried off the stolen
+delicacies.
+
+This aggravated the feud between the partisans of St. Ouen's and Rozel,
+for Lempriere of Rozel had laughed loudly when he heard of the robbery,
+and said "'Tis like St. Ouen's to hoard for a Queen and glut a pirate.
+We feed as we get at Rozel, and will feed the Court well too when it
+comes, or I'm no butler to Elizabeth."
+
+But trouble was at hand for Michel and for his protector.  The spies of
+Catherine de Medici, mother of the King of France, were everywhere.
+These had sent word that De la Foret was now attached to the meagre suite
+of the widow of the great Camisard Montgomery, near the Castle of Mont
+Orgueil.  The Medici, having treacherously slain the chief, became mad
+with desire to slay the lieutenant.  She was set to have the man, either
+through diplomacy with England, or to end him by assassination through
+her spies.  Having determined upon his death, with relentless soul she
+pursued the cause as closely as though this exiled soldier were a
+powerful enemy at the head of an army in France.
+
+Thus it was that she wrote to Queen Elizabeth, asking that "this arrant
+foe of France, this churl, conspirator, and reviler of the Sacraments,
+be rendered unto our hands for well-deserved punishment as warning to all
+such evil-doers."  She told Elizabeth of De la Foret's arrival in Jersey,
+disguised as a priest of the Church of France, and set forth his doings
+since landing with the Seigneur of Rozel.  Further she went on to say to
+"our sister of England" that "these dark figures of murder and revolt be
+a peril to the soft peace of this good realm."
+
+To this, Elizabeth, who had no knowledge of Michel, who desired peace
+with France at this time, who had favours to ask of Catherine, and who
+in her own realm had fresh reason to fear conspiracy through the Queen of
+the Scots and others, replied forthwith that "If this De la Foret falleth
+into our hands, and if it were found he had in truth conspired against
+France its throne, had he a million lives, not one should remain."
+Having despatched this letter, she straightway sent a messenger to Sir
+Hugh Pawlett in Jersey, making quest of De la Foret, and commanding that
+he should be sent to her in England at once.
+
+When the Queen's messenger arrived at Orgueil Castle, Lempriere chanced
+to be with Sir Hugh Pawlett, and the contents of Elizabeth's letter were
+made known to him.
+
+At the moment Monsieur of Rozel was munching macaroons and washing them
+down with canary.  The Governor's announcement was such a shock that he
+choked and coughed, the crumbs flying in all directions; and another pint
+of canary must be taken to flush his throat.  Thus cleared for action, he
+struck out.
+
+"'Tis St. Ouen's work," he growled.
+
+"'Tis the work of the Medici," said Sir Hugh.  "Read," he added, holding
+out the paper.
+
+Now Lempriere of Rozel had a poor eye for reading.  He had wit enough to
+wind about the difficulty.
+
+"If I see not the Queen's commands, I've no warrant but Sir Hugh
+Pawlett's words, and I'll to London and ask 'fore her Majesty's face if
+she wrote them, and why.  I'll tell my tale and speak my mind, I pledge
+you, sir."
+
+"You'll offend her Majesty.  Her commands are here."  Pawlett tapped the
+letter with his finger.
+
+"I'm butler to the Queen, and she will list to me.  I'll not smirk and
+caper like St. Ouen's; I'll bear me like a man not speaking for himself.
+I'll speak as Harry her father spoke--straight to the purpose.  .  .  .
+No, no, no, I'm not to be wheedled, even by a Pawlett, and you shall not
+ask me.  If you want Michel de la Foret, come and take him.  He is in my
+house.  But ye must take him, for come he shall not!"
+
+"You will not oppose the Queen's officers?"
+
+"De la Foret is under my roof.  He must be taken.  I will give him up
+to no one; and I'll tell my sovereign these things when I see her in her
+palace."
+
+"I misdoubt you'll play the bear," said Pawlett, with a dry smile.
+
+"The Queen's tongue is none so tame.  I'll travel by my star, get sweet
+or sour."
+
+"Well, well, 'give a man luck, and throw him into the sea,' is the old
+proverb.  I'm coming for your friend to-night."
+
+"I'll be waiting with my fingers on the door, sir," said Rozel, with a
+grim vanity and an outrageous pride in himself.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+The Seigneur of Rozel found De la Foret at the house of M. Aubert.  His
+face was flushed with hard riding, and perhaps the loving attitude of
+Michel and Angele deepened it, for at the garden gate the lovers were
+saying adieu.
+
+"You have come for Monsieur de la Foret?" asked Angele anxiously.  Her
+quick look at the Seigneur's face had told her there were things amiss.
+
+"There's commands from the Queen.  They're for the ears of De la Foret,"
+said the Seigneur.
+
+"I will hear them too," said Angele, her colour going, her bearing
+determined.
+
+The Seigneur looked down at her with boyish appreciation, then said to
+De la Foret: "Two Queens make claim for you.  The wolfish Catherine
+writes to England for her lost Camisard, with much fool's talk about
+'dark figures,' and 'conspirators,' 'churls,' and foes of 'soft peace';
+and England takes the bait and sends to Sir Hugh Pawlett yonder.  And, in
+brief, Monsieur, the Governor is to have you under arrest and send you to
+England.  God knows why two Queens make such a pother over a fellow with
+naught but a sword and a lass to love him--though, come to think,
+'a man's a man if he have but a hose on his head,' as the proverb runs."
+
+De la Foret smiled, then looked grave, as he caught sight of Angele's
+face.  "'Tis arrest, then?" he asked.
+
+"'Tis come willy nilly," answered the Seigneur.  "And once they've forced
+you from my doors, I'm for England to speak my mind to the Queen.  I can
+make interest for her presence--I hold court office," he added with
+puffing confidence.
+
+Angele looked up at him with quick tears, yet with a smile on her lips.
+
+"You are going to England for Michel's sake?" she said in a low voice.
+
+"For Michel, or for you, or for mine honour, what matter, so that I go!"
+he answered, then added: "there must be haste to Rozel, friend, lest the
+Governor take Lempriere's guest like a potato-digger in the fields."
+
+Putting spurs to his horse, he cantered heavily away, not forgetting to
+wave a pompous farewell to Angele.  De la Foret was smiling as he turned
+to Angele.  She looked wonderingly at him, for she had felt that she must
+comfort him, and she looked not for this sudden change in his manner.
+
+"Is prison-going so blithe, then?" she asked, with a little uneasy laugh
+which was half a sob.
+
+"It will bring things to a head," he answered.  "After danger and busy
+days, to be merely safe, it is scarce the life for Michel de la Foret.
+I have my duty to the Comtesse; I have my love for you; but I seem of
+little use by contrast with my past.  And yet, and yet," he added, half
+sadly, "how futile has been all our fighting, so far as human eye can
+see."
+
+"Nothing is futile that is right, Michel," the girl replied.  "Thou hast
+done as thy soul answered to God's messages: thou hast fought when thou
+couldst, and thou hast sheathed thy blade when there was naught else to
+do.  Are not both right?"
+
+He clasped her to his breast; then, holding her from him a little, looked
+into her eyes steadily a moment.  "God hath given thee a true heart, and
+the true heart hath wisdom," he answered.
+
+"You will not seek escape?  Nor resist the Governor?" she asked eagerly.
+
+"Whither should I go?  My place is here by you, by the Comtesse de
+Montgomery.  One day it may be I shall return to France, and to our
+cause--"
+
+"If it be God's will."
+
+"If it be God's will."
+
+"Whatever comes, you will love me, Michel?"
+
+"I will love you, whatever comes."
+
+"Listen."  She drew his head down.  "I am no dragweight to thy life?
+Thou wouldst not do otherwise if there were no foolish Angele?"
+
+He did not hesitate.  "What is best is.  I might do otherwise if there
+were no Angele in my life to pilot my heart, but that were worse for me."
+
+"Thou art the best lover in all the world."
+
+"I hope to make a better husband.  To-morrow is carmine-lettered in my
+calendar, if thou sayst thou wilt still have me under the sword of the
+Medici."
+
+Her hand pressed her heart suddenly.  "Under the sword, if it be God's
+will," she answered.  Then, with a faint smile: "But no, I will not
+believe the Queen of England will send thee, one of her own Protestant
+faith, to the Medici."
+
+"And thou wilt marry me?"
+
+"When the Queen of England approves thee," she answered, and buried her
+face in the hollow of his arm.
+
+An hour later Sir Hugh Pawlett came to the manor-house of Rozel with
+two-score men-at-arms.  The Seigneur himself answered the Governor's
+knocking, and showed himself in the doorway, with a dozen halberdiers
+behind him.
+
+"I have come seeking Michel de la Foret," said the Governor.
+
+"He is my guest."
+
+"I have the Queen's command to take him."
+
+"He is my cherished guest."
+
+"Must I force my way?"
+
+"Is it the Queen's will that blood be shed?"
+
+"The Queen's commands must be obeyed."
+
+"The Queen is a miracle of the world, God save her!  What is the charge
+against him?"
+
+"Summon Michel de la Foret, 'gainst whom it lies."
+
+"He is my guest; ye shall have him only by force."  The Governor turned
+to his men.  "Force the passage and search the house," he commanded.
+
+The company advanced with levelled pikes, but at a motion from the
+Seigneur his men fell back before them, and, making a lane, disclosed
+Michel de la Foret at the end of it.  Michel had not approved of
+Lempriere's mummery of defence, but he understood from what good spirit
+it sprung, and how it flattered the Seigneur's vanity to make show of
+resistance.
+
+The Governor greeted De la Foret with a sour smile, read to him the
+Queen's writ, and politely begged his company towards Mont Orgueil
+Castle.
+
+"I'll fetch other commands from her Majesty, or write me down a pedlar of
+St. Ouen's follies," the Seigneur said from his doorway, as the Governor
+and De la Foret bade him good-bye and took the road to the Castle.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+Michel de la Foret was gone, a prisoner.  From the dusk of the trees by
+the little chapel of Rozel, Angele had watched his exit in charge of the
+Governor's men.  She had not sought to show her presence: she had seen
+him--that was comfort to her heart; and she would not mar the memory of
+that last night's farewell by another before these strangers.  She saw
+with what quiet Michel bore his arrest, and she said to herself, as the
+last halberdier vanished:
+
+"If the Queen do but speak with him, if she but look upon his face and
+hear his voice, she must needs deal kindly by him.  My Michel--ah, it is
+a face for all men to trust and all women--"
+
+But she sighed and averted her head as though before prying eyes.
+
+The bell of Rozel Chapel broke gently on the evening air; the sound,
+softened by the leaves and mellowed by the wood of the great elm-trees,
+billowed away till it was lost in faint reverberation in the sea beneath
+the cliffs of the Couperon, where a little craft was coming to anchor in
+the dead water.
+
+At first the sound of the bell soothed her, softening the thought of the
+danger to Michel.  She moved with it towards the sea, the tones of her
+grief chiming with it.  Presently, as she went, a priest in cassock and
+robes and stole crossed the path in front of her, an acolyte before him
+swinging a censer, his voice chanting Latin verses from the service for
+the sick, in his hands the sacred elements of the sacrament for the
+dying.  The priest was fat and heavy, his voice was lazy, his eyes
+expressionless, and his robes were dirty.  The plaintive, peaceful
+sense which the sound of the vesper bell had thrown over Angele's sad
+reflections passed away, and the thought smote her that, were it not for
+such as this black-toothed priest, Michel would not now be on his way to
+England, a prisoner.  To her this vesper bell was the symbol of tyranny
+and hate.  It was fighting, it was martyrdom, it was exile, it was the
+Medici.  All that she had borne, all that her father had borne, the
+thought of the home lost, the mother dead before her time, the name
+ruined, the heritage dispossessed, the red war of the Camisards, the
+rivulets of blood in the streets of Paris and of her loved Rouen, smote
+upon her mind, and drove her to her knees in the forest glade, her hands
+upon her ears to shut out the sound of the bell.  It came upon her that
+the bell had said "Peace!  Peace!" to her mind when there should be no
+peace; that it had said "Be patient!" when she should be up and doing;
+that it had whispered "Stay!" when she should tread the path her lover
+trod, her feet following in his footsteps as his feet had trod in hers.
+
+She pressed her hands tight upon her ears and prayed with a passion and
+a fervour she had never known before.  A revelation seemed to come upon
+her, and, for the first time, she was a Huguenot to the core.  Hitherto
+she had suffered for her religion because it was her mother's broken
+life, her father's faith, and because they had suffered, and her lover
+had suffered.  Her mind had been convinced, her loyalty had been
+unwavering, her words for the great cause had measured well with her
+deeds.  But new senses were suddenly born in her, new eyes were given
+to her mind, new powers for endurance to her soul.  She saw now as the
+martyrs of Meaux had seen; a passionate faith descended on her as it had
+descended on them; no longer only patient, she was fain for action.
+Tears rained from her eyes.  Her heart burst itself in entreaty and
+confession.
+
+"Thy light shall be my light, and Thy will my will, O Lord," she cried at
+the last.  "Teach me Thy way, create a right spirit within me.  Give me
+boldness without rashness, and hope without vain thinking.  Bear up my
+arms, O Lord, and save me when falling.  A poor Samaritan am I.  Give me
+the water that shall be a well of water springing up to everlasting life,
+that I thirst not in the fever of doing.  Give me the manna of life to
+eat that I faint not nor cry out in plague, pestilence, or famine.  Give
+me Thy grace, O God, as Thou hast given it to Michel de la Foret, and
+guide my feet as I follow him in life and in death, for Christ's sake.
+Amen."
+
+As she rose from her knees she heard the evening gun from the castle of
+Mont Orgueil, whither Michel was being borne by the Queen's men.  The
+vesper bell had stopped.  Through the wood came the salt savour of the
+sea on the cool sunset air.  She threw back her head and walked swiftly
+towards it, her heart beating hard, her eyes shining with the light of
+purpose, her step elastic with the vigour of youth and health.  A
+quarter-hour's walking brought her to the cliff of the Couperon.
+
+As she gazed out over the sea, however, a voice in the bay below caught
+her ear.  She looked down.  On the deck of the little craft which had
+entered the harbour when the vesper bell was ringing stood a man who
+waved a hand up towards her, then gave a peculiar call.  She stared with
+amazement: it was Buonespoir the pirate.  What did this mean?  Had God
+sent this man to her, by his presence to suggest what she should do in
+this crisis in her life?  For even as she ran down the shore towards him,
+it came to her mind that Buonespoir should take her in his craft to
+England.
+
+What to do in England?  Who could tell?  She only knew that a voice
+called her to England, to follow the footsteps of Michel de la Foret, who
+even this night would be setting forth in the Governor's brigantine for
+London.
+
+Buonespoir met her upon the shore, grinning like a boy.
+
+"God save you, lady!" he said.
+
+"What brings you hither, friend?" she asked.
+
+If he had said that a voice had called him hither as one called her to
+England, it had not sounded strange; for she was not thinking that this
+was one who superstitiously swore by the little finger of St. Peter, but
+only that he was the man who had brought her Michel from France, who had
+been a faithful friend to her and to her father.
+
+"What brings me hither?"  Buonespoir laughed low in his chest.  "Even to
+fetch to the Seigneur of Rozel, a friend of mine by every token of
+remembrance, a dozen flagons of golden muscadella."
+
+To Angele no suggestion flashed that these flagons of muscadella had
+come from the cellar of the Seigneur of St. Ouen's, where they had been
+reserved for a certain royal visit.  Nothing was in her mind save the one
+thought-that she must follow Michel.
+
+"Will you take me to England?" she asked, putting a hand quickly on his
+arm.
+
+He had been laughing hard, picturing to himself what Lempriere of Rozel
+would say when he sniffed the flagon of St. Ouen's best wine, and for an
+instant he did not take in the question; but he stared at her now as the
+laugh slowly subsided through notes of abstraction and her words worked
+their way into his brain.
+
+"Will you take me, Buonespoir?" she urged.  "Take you--?" he questioned.
+
+"To England."
+
+"And myself to Tyburn?"
+
+"Nay, to the Queen."
+
+"'Tis the same thing.  Head of Abel!  Elizabeth hath heard of me.  The
+Seigneur of St. Ouen's and others have writ me down a pirate to her.  She
+would not pardon the muscadella," he added, with another laugh, looking
+down where the flagons lay.
+
+"She must pardon more than that," exclaimed Angele, and hastily she told
+him of what had happened to Michel de la Foret, and why she would go.
+
+"Thy father, then?" he asked, scowling hard in his attempt to think it
+out.
+
+"He must go with me--I will seek him now."
+
+"It must be at once, i' faith, for how long, think you, can I stay here
+unharmed?  I was sighted off St. Ouen's shore a few hours agone."
+
+"To-night?" she asked.
+
+"By twelve, when we shall have the moon and the tide," he answered.
+"But hold!" he hastily added.  "What, think you, could you and your
+father do alone in England?  And with me it were worse than alone.  These
+be dark times, when strangers have spies at their heels, and all
+travellers are suspect."
+
+"We will trust in God," she answered.
+
+"Have you money?" he questioned--"for London, not for me," he added
+hastily.
+
+"Enough," she replied.
+
+"The trust with the money is a weighty matter," he added; "but they
+suffice not.  You must have 'fending."
+
+"There is no one," she answered sadly, "no one save--"
+
+"Save the Seigneur of Rozel!" Buonespoir finished the sentence.  "Good.
+You to your father, and I to the Seigneur.  If you can fetch your father
+by your pot-of-honey tongue, I'll fetch the great Lempriere with
+muscadella.  Is't a bargain?"
+
+"In which I gain all," she answered, and again touched his arm with her
+finger-tips.
+
+"You shall be aboard here at ten, and I will join you on the stroke of
+twelve," he said, and gave a low whistle.
+
+At the signal three men sprang up like magic out of the bowels of the
+boat beneath them, and scurried over the side; three as ripe knaves as
+ever cheated stocks and gallows, but simple knaves, unlike their master.
+Two of them had served with Francis Drake in that good ship of his lying
+even now not far from Elizabeth's palace at Greenwich.  The third was a
+rogue who had been banished from Jersey for a habitual drunkenness which
+only attacked him on land--at sea he was sacredly sober.  His name was
+Jean Nicolle.  The names of the other two were Herve Robin and Rouge le
+Riche, but their master called them by other names.
+
+"Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego," said Buonespoir in ceremony, and waved
+a hand of homage between them and Angele.  "Kiss dirt, and know where
+duty lies.  The lady's word on my ship is law till we anchor at the
+Queen's Stairs at Greenwich.  So, Heaven help you, Shadrach, Meshach, and
+Abednego!" said Buonespoir.
+
+A wave of humour passed over Angele's grave face, for a stranger quartet
+never sailed high seas together: one blind of an eye, one game of a leg,
+one bald as a bottle and bereft of two front teeth; but Buonespoir was
+sound of wind and limb, his small face with the big eyes lost in the
+masses of his red hair, and a body like Hercules.  It flashed through
+Angele's mind even as she answered the gurgling salutations of the
+triumvirate that they had been got together for no gentle summer sailing
+in the Channel.  Her conscience smote her that she should use such
+churls; but she gave it comfort by the thought that while serving her
+they could do naught worse; and her cause was good.  Yet they presented
+so bizarre an aspect, their ugliness was so varied and particular, that
+she almost laughed.  Buonespoir understood her thoughts, for with a look
+of mocking innocence in his great blue eyes he waved a hand again towards
+the graceless trio, and said, "For deep-sea fishing."  Then he solemnly
+winked at the three.
+
+A moment later Angele was speeding along the shore towards her home on
+the farther hillside up the little glen; and within an hour Buonespoir
+rolled from the dusk of the trees by the manor-house of Rozel and knocked
+at the door.  He carried on his head, as a fishwife carries a tray of
+ormers, a basket full of flagons of muscadella; and he did not lower the
+basket when he was shown into the room where the Seigneur of Rozel was
+sitting before a trencher of spiced veal and a great pot of ale.
+Lempriere roared a hearty greeting to the pirate, for he was in a sour
+humour because of the taking off of Michel de la Foret; and of all men
+this pirate-fellow, who had quips and cranks, and had played tricks on
+his cousin of St. Ouen's, was most welcome.
+
+"What's that on your teacup of a head?" he roared again as Buonespoir
+grinned pleasure at the greeting.  "Muscadella," said Buonespoir, and
+lowered the basket to the table.
+
+Lempriere seized a flagon, drew it forth, looked closely at it, then
+burst into laughter, and spluttered: "St. Ouen's muscadella, by the hand
+of Rufus!"
+
+Seizing Buonespoir by the shoulders, he forced him down upon a bench at
+the table, and pushed the trencher of spiced meat against his chest.
+"Eat, my noble lord of the sea and master of the cellar," he gurgled out,
+and, tipping the flagon of muscadella, took a long draught.  "God-a-
+mercy--but it has saved my life," he gasped in satisfaction as he lay
+back in his great chair, and put his feet on the bench whereon Buonespoir
+sat.
+
+They raised their flagons and toasted each other, and Lempriere burst
+forth into song, in the refrain of which Buonespoir joined boisterously:
+
+              "King Rufus he did hunt the deer,
+                 With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!
+               It was the spring-time of the year,
+                 Hey ho, Dolly shut her eyes!
+               King Rufus was a bully boy,
+               He hunted all the day for joy,
+               Sweet Dolly she was ever coy:
+                 And who would e'er be wise
+                 That looked in Dolly's eyes?
+
+               "King Rufus he did have his day,
+                 With a hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!
+               So get ye forth where dun deer play--
+                 Hey ho, Dolly comes again!
+               The greenwood is the place for me,
+               For that is where the dun deer be,
+               'Tis where my Dolly comes to me:
+                 And who would stay at home,
+                 That might with Dolly roam?
+               Sing hey ho, come and kiss me, Dolly!"
+
+Lempriere, perspiring with the exertion, mopped his forehead, then lapsed
+into a plaintive mood.
+
+"I've had naught but trouble of late," he wheezed.  "Trouble, trouble,
+trouble, like gnats on a filly's flank!" and in spluttering words, twice
+bracketed in muscadella, he told of Michel de la Foret's arrest, and of
+his purpose to go to England if he could get a boat to take him.
+
+"'Tis that same business brings me here," said Buonespoir, and forthwith
+told of his meeting with Angele and what was then agreed upon.
+
+"You to go to England!" cried Lempriere amazed.  "They want you for
+Tyburn there."
+
+"They want me for the gallows here," said Buonespoir.  Rolling a piece of
+spiced meat in his hand, he stuffed it into his mouth and chewed till the
+grease came out of his eyes, and took eagerly from a servant a flagon of
+malmsey and a dish of ormers.
+
+"Hush, chew thy tongue a minute!" said the Seigneur, suddenly starting
+and laying a finger beside his nose.  "Hush!" he said again, and looked
+into the flicker of the candle by him with half-shut eyes.
+
+"May I have no rushes for a bed, and die like a rat in a moat, if I don't
+get thy pardon too of the Queen, and bring thee back to Jersey, a thorn
+in the side of De Carteret for ever!  He'll look upon thee assoilzied by
+the Queen, spitting fire in his rage, and no canary or muscadella in his
+cellar."
+
+It came not to the mind of either that this expedition would be made at
+cost to themselves.  They had not heard of Don Quixote, and their gifts
+were not imitative.  They were of a day when men held their lives as
+lightly as many men hold their honour now; when championship was as the
+breath of life to men's nostrils, and to adventure for what was worth
+having or doing in life the only road of reputation.
+
+Buonespoir was as much a champion in his way as Lempriere of Rozel.
+They were of like kidney, though so far apart in rank.  Had Lempriere
+been born as low and as poor as Buonespoir, he would have been a pirate
+too, no doubt; and had Buonespoir been born as high as the Seigneur, he
+would have carried himself with the same rough sense of honour, with as
+ripe a vanity; have been as naive, as sincere, as true to the real heart
+of man untaught in the dissimulation of modesty or reserve.  When they
+shook hands across the trencher of spiced veal, it was as man shakes hand
+with man, not man with master.
+
+They were about to start upon their journey when there came a knocking at
+the door.  On its being opened the bald and toothless Abednego stumbled
+in with the word that immediately after Angele and her father came aboard
+the Honeyflower some fifty halberdiers suddenly appeared upon the
+Couperon.  They had at once set sail, and got away even before the
+sailors had reached the shore.  As they had rounded the point, where they
+were hid from view, Abednego dropped overboard and swam ashore on the
+rising tide, making his way to the manor to warn Buonespoir.  On his way
+hither, stealing through the trees, he had passed a half-score of
+halberdiers making for the manor, and he had seen others going towards
+the shore.
+
+Buonespoir looked to the priming of his pistols, and buckling his belt
+tightly about him, turned to the Seigneur and said: "I will take my
+chances with Abednego.  Where does she lie--the Honeyflower, Abednego?"
+
+"Off the point called Verclut," answered the little man, who had
+travelled with Francis Drake.
+
+"Good; we will make a run for it, flying dot-and-carry-one as we go."
+
+While they had been speaking the Seigneur had been thinking; and now,
+even as several figures appeared at a little distance in the trees,
+making towards the manor, he said, with a loud laugh:
+
+"No.  'Tis the way of a fool to put his head between the door and the
+jamb.  'Tis but a hundred yards to safety.  Follow me--to the sea--
+Abednego last.  This way, bullies!"
+
+Without a word all three left the house and walked on in the order
+indicated, as De Carteret's halberdiers ran forward threatening.
+
+"Stand!" shouted the sergeant of the halberdiers.  "Stand, or we fire!"
+
+But the three walked straight on unheeding.  When the sergeant of the
+men-at-arms recognised the Seigneur, he ordered down the blunderbusses.
+
+"We come for Buonespoir the pirate," said the sergeant.
+
+"Whose warrant?" said the Seigneur, fronting the halberdiers, Buonespoir
+and Abednego behind him.  "The Seigneur of St. Ouen's," was the reply.
+
+"My compliments to the Seigneur of St. Ouen's, and tell him that
+Buonespoir is my guest," he bellowed, and strode on, the halberdiers
+following.  Suddenly the Seigneur swerved towards the chapel and
+quickened his footsteps, the others but a step behind.  The sergeant of
+the halberdiers was in a quandary.  He longed to shoot, but dared not,
+and while he was making up his mind what to do, the Seigneur had reached
+the chapel door.  Opening it, he quickly pushed Buonespoir and Abednego
+inside, whispering to them, then slammed the door and put his back
+against it.
+
+There was another moment's hesitation on the sergeant's part, then a door
+at the other end of the chapel was heard to open and shut, and the
+Seigneur laughed loudly.  The halberdiers ran round the chapel.  There
+stood Buonespoir and Abednego in a narrow roadway, motionless and
+unconcerned.  The halberdiers rushed forward.
+
+"Perquage!  Perquage!  Perquage!" shouted Buonespoir, and the bright
+moonlight showed him grinning.  For an instant there was deadly
+stillness, in which the approaching footsteps of the Seigneur sounded
+loud.
+
+"Perquage!" Buonespoir repeated.
+
+"Perquage!  Fall back!" said the Seigneur, and waved off the pikes of
+the halberdiers.  "He has sanctuary to the sea."
+
+This narrow road in which the pirates stood was the last of three in the
+Isle of Jersey running from churches to the sea, in which a criminal was
+safe from arrest by virtue of an old statute.  The other perquages had
+been taken away; but this one of Rozel remained, a concession made by
+Henry VIII to the father of this Raoul Lempriere.  The privilege had been
+used but once in the present Seigneur's day, because the criminal must be
+put upon the road from the chapel by the Seigneur himself, and he had
+used his privilege modestly.
+
+No man in Jersey but knew the sacredness of this perquage, though it was
+ten years since it had been used; and no man, not even the Governor
+himself, dare lift his hand to one upon that road.
+
+So it was that Buonespoir and Abednego, two fugitives from justice,
+walked quietly to the sea down the perquage, halberdiers, balked of their
+prey, prowling on their steps and cursing the Seigneur of Rozel for his
+gift of sanctuary: for the Seigneur of St. Ouen's and the Royal Court had
+promised each halberdier three shillings and all the ale he could drink
+at a sitting, if Buonespoir was brought in alive or dead.
+
+In peace and safety the three boarded the Honeyflower off the point
+called Verclut, and set sail for England, just seven hours after Michel
+de la Foret had gone his way upon the Channel, a prisoner.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+A fortnight later, of a Sunday morning, the Lord Chamberlain of England
+was disturbed out of his usual equanimity.  As he was treading the rushes
+in the presence-chamber of the Royal Palace at Greenwich, his eye busy in
+inspection--for the Queen would soon pass on her way to chapel--his head
+nodding right and left to archbishop, bishop, councillors of state,
+courtiers, and officers of the crown, he heard a rude noise at the door
+leading into the ante-chapel, where the Queen received petitions from the
+people.  Hurrying thither in shocked anxiety, he found a curled gentleman
+of the guard, resplendent in red velvet and gold chains, in peevish
+argument with a boisterous Seigneur of a bronzed good-humoured face, who
+urged his entrance to the presence-chamber.
+
+The Lord Chamberlain swept down upon the pair like a flamingo with wings
+outspread.  "God's death, what means this turmoil?  Her Majesty comes
+hither!" he cried, and scowled upon the intruder, who now stepped back a
+little, treading on the toes of a huge sailor with a small head and bushy
+red hair and beard.
+
+"Because her Majesty comes I come also," the Seigneur interposed grandly.
+
+"What is your name and quality?"
+
+"Yours first, and I shall know how to answer."
+
+"I am the Lord Chamberlain of England."
+
+"And I, my lord, am Lempriere, Seigneur of Rozel--and butler to the
+Queen."
+
+"Where is Rozel?" asked my Lord Chamberlain.
+
+The face of the Seigneur suddenly flushed, his mouth swelled, and then
+burst.
+
+"Where is Rozel!" he cried in a voice of rage.  "Where is Rozel!  Have
+you heard of Hugh Pawlett," he asked, with a huge contempt--" of Governor
+Hugh Pawlett?"  The Lord Chamberlain nodded.  "Then ask his Excellency
+when next you see him, Where is Rozel?  But take good counsel and keep
+your ignorance from the Queen," he added.  "She has no love for stupids."
+"You say you are butler to the Queen?  Whence came your commission?"
+said the Lord Chamberlain, smiling now; for Lempriere's words and ways
+were of some simple world where odd folk lived, and his boyish vanity
+disarmed anger.
+
+"By royal warrant and heritage.  And of all of the Jersey Isle, I only
+may have dove-totes, which is the everlasting thorn in the side of De
+Carteret of St. Ouen's.  Now will you let me in, my lord?" he said, all
+in a breath.
+
+At a stir behind him the Lord Chamberlain turned, and with a horrified
+exclamation hurried away, for the procession from the Queen's apartments
+had already entered the presence-chamber: gentlemen, barons, earls,
+knights of the garter, in brave attire, with bare heads and sumptuous
+calves.  The Lord Chamberlain had scarce got to his place when the
+Chancellor, bearing the seals in a red silk purse, entered, flanked by
+two gorgeous folk with the royal sceptre and the sword of state in a red
+scabbard, all flourished with fleur-de-lis.  Moving in and out among them
+all was the Queen's fool, who jested and shook his bells under the noses
+of the highest.
+
+It was an event of which the Seigneur of Rozel told to his dying day:
+that he entered the presence-chamber of the Royal Palace of Greenwich at
+the same instant as the Queen--"Rozel at one end, Elizabeth at the other,
+and all the world at gaze," he was wont to say with loud guffaws.  But
+what he spoke of afterwards with preposterous ease and pride was neither
+pride nor ease at the moment; for the Queen's eyes fell on him as he
+shoved past the gentlemen who kept the door.  For an instant she stood
+still, regarding him intently, then turned quickly to the Lord
+Chamberlain in inquiry, and with sharp reproof too in her look.  The Lord
+Chamberlain fell on his knee and with low uncertain voice explained the
+incident.
+
+Elizabeth again cast her eyes towards Lempriere, and the Court, following
+her example, scrutinised the Seigneur in varied styles of insolence or
+curiosity.  Lempriere drew himself up with a slashing attempt at
+composure, but ended by flaming from head to foot, his face shining like
+a cock's comb, the perspiration standing out like beads upon his
+forehead, his eyes gone blind with confusion.  That was but for a moment,
+however, and then, Elizabeth's look being slowly withdrawn from him, a
+curious smile came to her lips, and she said to the Lord Chamberlain:
+"Let the gentleman remain."
+
+The Queen's fool tripped forward and tapped the Lord Chamberlain on the
+shoulder.  "Let the gentleman remain, gossip, and see you that remaining
+he goeth not like a fly with his feet in the porridge."  With a flippant
+step before the Seigneur, he shook his bells at him.  "Thou shalt stay,
+Nuncio, and staying speak the truth.  So doing you shall be as noted as a
+comet with three tails.  You shall prove that man was made in God's
+image.  So lift thy head and sneeze--sneezing is the fashion here; but
+see that thou sneeze not thy head off as they do in Tartary.  'Tis worth
+remembrance."
+
+Rozel's self-importance and pride had returned.  The blood came back
+to his heart, and he threw out his chest grandly; he even turned to
+Buonespoir, whose great figure might be seen beyond the door, and winked
+at him.  For a moment he had time to note the doings of the Queen and her
+courtiers with wide-eyed curiosity.  He saw the Earl of Leicester,
+exquisite, haughty, gallant, fall upon his knee, and Elizabeth slowly
+pull off her glove and with a none too gracious look give him her hand
+to kiss, the only favour of the kind granted that day.  He saw Cecil, her
+Minister, introduce a foreign noble, who presented his letters.  He heard
+the Queen speak in a half-dozen different languages, to people of various
+lands, and he was smitten with amazement.
+
+But as Elizabeth came slowly down the hall, her white silk gown fronted
+with great pearls flashing back the light, a marchioness bearing the
+train, the crown on her head glittering as she turned from right to left,
+her wonderful collar of jewels sparkling on her uncovered bosom, suddenly
+the mantle of black, silver-shotted silk upon her shoulders became to
+Lempriere's heated senses a judge's robe, and Elizabeth the august judge
+of the world.  His eyes blinded again, for it was as if she was bearing
+down upon him.  Certainly she was looking at him now, scarce heeding the
+courtiers who fell to their knees on either side as she came on.  The red
+doublets of the fifty Gentlemen Pensioners--all men of noble families
+proud to do this humble yet distinguished service--with battle-axes, on
+either side of her, seemed to Lempriere on the instant like an army with
+banners threatening him.  From the ante-chapel behind him came the cry of
+the faithful subjects who, as the gentleman-at-arms fell back from the
+doorway, had but just caught a glimpse of her Majesty--"Long live
+Elizabeth!"
+
+It seemed to Lempriere that the Gentlemen Pensioners must beat him down
+as they passed, yet he stood riveted to the spot; and indeed it was true
+that he was almost in the path of her Majesty.  He was aware that two
+gentlemen touched him on the shoulder and bade him retire; but the Queen
+motioned to them to desist.  So, with the eyes of the whole court on him
+again, and Elizabeth's calm curious gaze fixed, as it were, on his
+forehead, he stood still till the flaming Gentlemen Pensioners were
+within a few feet of him, and the battle-axes were almost over his head.
+
+The great braggart was no better now than a wisp of grass in the wind,
+and it was more than homage that bent him to his knees as the Queen
+looked him full in the eyes.  There was a moment's absolute silence, and
+then she said, with cold condescension:
+
+"By what privilege do you seek our presence?"
+
+"I am Raoul Lempriere, Seigneur of Rozel, your high Majesty," said the
+choking voice of the Jerseyman.  The Queen raised her eyebrows.  "The man
+seems French.  You come from France?"
+
+Lempriere flushed to his hair--the Queen did not know him, then!  "From
+Jersey Isle, your sacred Majesty."
+
+"Jersey Isle is dear to us.  And what is your warrant here?"
+
+"I am butler to your Majesty, by your gracious Majesty's patent, and I
+alone may have dove-cotes in the isle; and I only may have the perquage-
+on your Majesty's patent.  It is not even held by De Carteret of St.
+Ouen's."
+
+The Queen smiled as she had not smiled since she entered the presence-
+chamber.  "God preserve us," she said--"that I should not have recognised
+you!  It is, of course, our faithful Lempriere of Rozel."
+
+The blood came back to the Seigneur's heart, but he did not dare look up
+yet, and he did not see that Elizabeth was in rare mirth at his words;
+and though she had no ken or memory of him, she read his nature and was
+mindful to humour him.  Beckoning Leicester to her side, she said a few
+words in an undertone, to which he replied with a smile more sour than
+sweet.
+
+"Rise, Monsieur of Rozel," she said.
+
+The Seigneur stood up, and met her gaze faintly.  "And so, proud
+Seigneur, you must needs flout e'en our Lord Chamberlain, in the name of
+our butler with three dove-cotes and the perquage.  In sooth thy office
+must not be set at naught lightly--not when it is flanked by the
+perquage.  By my father's doublet, but that frieze jerkin is well cut;
+it suits thy figure well--I would that my Lord Leicester here had such a
+tailor.  But this perquage--I doubt not there are those here at Court who
+are most ignorant of its force and moment.  My Lord Chamberlain, my Lord
+Leicester, Cecil here--confusion sits in their faces.  The perquage,
+which my father's patent approved, has served us well, I doubt not, is a
+comfort to our realm and a dignity befitting the wearer of that frieze
+jerkin.  Speak to their better understanding, Monsieur of Rozel."
+
+"Speak, Nuncio, and you shall have comforts, and be given in marriage,
+multiple or singular, even as I," said the fool, and touched him on the
+breast with his bells.
+
+Lempriere had recovered his heart, and now was set full sail in the
+course he had charted for himself in Jersey.  In large words and larger
+manner he explained most innocently the sacred privilege of perquage.
+"And how often have you used the right, friend?" asked Elizabeth.
+
+"But once in ten years, your noble Majesty."  "When last?"
+
+"But yesterday a week, your universal Majesty."  Elizabeth raised her
+eyebrows.  "Who was the criminal, what the occasion?"
+
+"The criminal was one Buonespoir, the occasion our coming hither to wait
+upon the Queen of England and our Lady of Normandy, for such is your
+well-born Majesty to your loyal Jersiais."  And thereupon he plunged into
+an impeachment of De Carteret of St. Ouen's, and stumbled through a blunt
+broken story of the wrongs and the sorrows of Michel and Angele and the
+doings of Buonespoir in their behalf.
+
+Elizabeth frowned and interrupted him.  "I have heard of this Buonespoir,
+Monsieur, through others than the Seigneur of St. Ouen's.  He is an
+unlikely squire of dames.  There's a hill in my kingdom has long bided
+his coming.  Where waits the rascal now?"
+
+"In the ante-chapel, your Majesty."
+
+"By the rood!" said Elizabeth in sudden amazement.  "In my ante-chapel,
+forsooth!"
+
+She looked beyond the doorway and saw the great red-topped figure of
+Buonespoir, his good-natured, fearless fare, his shock of hair, his clear
+blue eye--he was not thirty feet away.
+
+"He comes to crave pardon for his rank offences, your benignant Majesty,"
+said Lempriere.
+
+The humour of the thing rushed upon the Queen.  Never before were two
+such naive folk at court.  There was not a hair of duplicity in the heads
+of the two, and she judged them well in her mind.
+
+"I will see you stand together--you and your henchman," she said to
+Rozel, and moved on to the antechapel, the Court following.  Standing
+still just inside the doorway, she motioned Buonespoir to come near.  The
+pirate, unconfused, undismayed, with his wide blue asking eyes, came
+forward and dropped upon his knees.  Elizabeth motioned Lempriere to
+stand a little apart.
+
+Thereupon she set a few questions to Buonespoir, whose replies,
+truthfully given, showed that he had no real estimate of his crimes, and
+was indifferent to what might be their penalties.  He had no moral sense
+on the one hand, on the other, no fear.
+
+Suddenly she turned to Lempriere again.  "You came, then, to speak for
+this Michel de la Foret, the exile--?"
+
+"And for the demoiselle Angele Aubert, who loves him, your Majesty."
+
+"I sent for this gentleman exile a fortnight ago--" She turned towards
+Leicester inquiringly.
+
+"I have the papers here, your Majesty," said Leicester, and gave a packet
+over.
+
+"And where have you De la Foret?" said Elizabeth.  "In durance, your
+Majesty."
+
+"When came he hither?"
+
+"Three days gone," answered Leicester, a little gloomily, for there was
+acerbity in Elizabeth's voice.  Elizabeth seemed about to speak, then
+dropped her eyes upon the papers, and glanced hastily at their contents.
+
+"You will have this Michel de la Foret brought to my presence as fast as
+horse can bring him, my Lord," she said to Leicester.  "This rascal of
+the sea--Buonespoir--you will have safe bestowed till I recall his
+existence again," she said to a captain of men-at-arms; "and you,
+Monsieur of Rozel, since you are my butler, will get you to my dining-
+room, and do your duty--the office is not all perquisites," she added
+smoothly.  She was about to move on, when a thought seemed to strike her,
+and she added, "This Mademoiselle and her father whom you brought hither-
+where are they?"
+
+"They are even within the palace grounds, your imperial Majesty,"
+answered Lempriere.
+
+"You will summon them when I bid you," she said to the Seigneur; "and you
+shall see that they have comforts and housing as befits their station,"
+she added to the Lord Chamberlain.
+
+So did Elizabeth, out of a whimsical humour, set the highest in the land
+to attend upon unknown, unconsidered exiles.
+
+
+
+
+
+ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
+
+Boldness without rashness, and hope without vain thinking
+Nothing is futile that is right
+Religion to him was a dull recreation invented chiefly for women
+
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MICHEL AND ANGELE, PARKER, V1 ***
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