CHAPTER XXI.
"A FRIEND INDEED."
Passing beneath the archway, where Lawrence Lee delivered Stars and Garters into the charge of a groom, who advanced to receive her in obedience to a lofty gesture from Mr. Flippet, the two crossed the courtyard, which was handsomely paved with octagon-shaped black and white marble flags, and decorated with orange-trees set in huge painted china tubs, and statuary emblematic of the amusement which the king came hither to pursue.
Not by the main door, whose low double flight of winding steps was protected by a rail of cast iron, wrought into grotesque shapes of centaurs and winged horses, but by a little side postern, half hidden in one of the irregular angles of the building, Lee and his companion gained a dark vestibule; ascending thence by a narrow break-neck flight of stone stairs to a corridor above. Pursuing its tortuous turns, it brought them in sight of a fair-sized gallery, whose gaily gilded balustrades and painted walls catching the pale yellow rays of the morning sun, presented a garish, confusing picture to the somewhat wearied senses of Lee. It would, indeed, have been a hard matter to find a resting-place for the eyes amidst the ever moving throng of richly dressed figures, conspicuous among which were numbers who were clad like his companion in silver-laced blue livery. These deftly threaded their way to and fro, bearing salvers of burnished silver loaded with cut-glass silver-gilt flagons, and brilliantly painted coffee and chocolate pots of oriental china. Pressing on after Flippet, or to speak with absolute correctness, dragging Flippet onward, Lee soon found himself in the very thick of the chattering, giggling, simpering crowd of fine ladies and gentlemen who were bidding their good-morrows to each other, and exchanging sweet compliments.
[Sidenote: An awkward fix.]
"A nice trim he's in," dismally grumbled Flippet to himself, as he marked the disgustful stares and supercilious smiles of this butterfly bevy, at the stranger's mud-bespattered attire, and the terror and alarm with which they snatched their skirts and ruffles from possibility of contact with it. "A sweet trim truly for an audience! It's all mighty fine for Master Alworth to say, 'Flippet do that,' and 'Flippet do this,' as if I was any fetching and carrying poodle dog; but--" and the gaze of silent despair he was bestowing on the rich blood-red Genoa velvet curtains which now stayed their progress, was more eloquent than words.
No one knew better than himself that the brazen gates of an ogre's castle could more easily be broken through, and a couple of dragons sooner mollified, than that pair of suave-looking six-foot-high personages, habited in blue and silver, and wielding slender white wands in their delicate hands; for did not they guard the sacred way conducting straight to the private apartments of the king?
[Sidenote: An awkward introduction.]
"And what may be your business this morning, Mr. Flippet?" demanded one of these personages, "and who may be your friend?" he added, glaring at Lawrence Lee.
"I--I--" stammered the lackey. "He's no friend of mine. Renounce me if he is, and--and--it's no business of mine, I assure you, Mr. Usher, none whatever."
"Then don't meddle with it," laughed Mr. Usher, as he looked far over Mr. Flippet's head into the gallery's middle distance; "but mind your manners, and stand out of the way. And you too young gentleman," he went on addressing Lee. "Don't you see who's a coming?"
He emphasized these words with such a sudden lunge of his staff of office at the objects nearest to him, which happened to be the unfortunate Flippet's legs, that the lackey shifted aside in blind terror, and fell stumbling against Lee. Unprepared for the shock, Lawrence in his turn must, but for a dexterous twist which regulated his balance, have lain sprawling his length at the very feet of a lady, advancing towards the curtained way, accompanied by a group of some half dozen more ladies, who remained standing a pace or two in the rear of her, as she came to a forced halt.
[Sidenote: The Queen.]
Fortunately these awkward man[oe]uvres brought about no worse mishap than the brushing to the floor of a little book which the foremost lady had held lightly in her hand.
Crimsoning with shame to the roots of his dark curls, Lawrence stooped down, and picking up the book was about to present it to the lady, when he felt the skirts of his coat pulled from behind with such violence, that a second and still more deplorable misadventure must inevitably have occurred, had not the lady averted it with a peremptory, but still gracious gesture of her small ivory-white hand.
"Nay, gentlemen, you are unmannerly," she said, in tones of gentle remonstrance, and whose accents sounded strangely in the ears of the Hertfordshire farmer. "What is the meaning of this?" she went on, her dark eyes kindling with indignation and surprise, as they traversed the circle of ladies and gallants whom the disturbance had drawn to the spot "What is the meaning of it?" reiterated she, receiving the book from Lee's hands with a gracious inclination of her head. The onlookers simpered vacuously at each other.
"Your majesty--" began the Usher.
The Queen! In spite of the strange heart-beating sensation which then seized Lawrence, his curiosity, or more correctly interest, was still sufficiently his master, to permit of his bearing away in his memory the enduring picture of Catharine of Braganza, the not too happy wife of the merry careless Charles the Second.
[Sidenote: Court ladies.]
How was it that this middle-aged, olive-complexioned Portuguese lady, whose mouth would have been prettier had not her teeth projected somewhat too far, and whose chief beauty lay in her magnificent dark eyes, though indeed her small figure was slender and graceful enough--brought comely English Ruth Rumbold to his mind? Only so it did. Could it be some association which similarity of dress brings? True enough, Ruth's holiday gown and petticoat were but of tiffany, and her cobweb cambric neckerchief only hem-stitched neat as needle could do it; whereas the queen's petticoat was of finest silver gray taffety, bordered like its tawny brown brocade overskirt, with pinkish silken embroidery, and the broad fine linen collar covering her shoulders, and reaching close round her slender neck, was edged with magnificent Spanish lace. For the rest, Lawrence with his masculine ignorance of women's fallals could not have enlightened you at all; but had he presumed to ask the surrounding court ladies, they would have uttered little scornful shrieks, screwed up their red lips--rosy as salve could make them--tossed back their glossy straying ringlets, and told him that the queen was a starched old frump, who stuck to the odiously dowdy fashions of thirty years ago and more, when melancholy Charles the First was king. Yet perhaps after all, it was not the modest style of her dress, but something in the womanly sweet composure of her speech and bearing, that crowns all women, old and young, plain and beautiful, with a grace of its own; that reminded Lawrence Lee of his little love, won his allegiance to the king's wife, and sealed his determination to save the king, or die in the attempt; let this butterfly swarm sneer and simper as they pleased, and half draw their rapiers, as they were beginning to do, muttering: "Insolence," and "Upstart," and the rest of it; while the ladies giggled hysterically, and cried, "Malapert," and the usher continued to stammer on in dire confusion:--"You see--that is, your Majesty will compre--that is, of course apprehend--that is to say--ahem--understand that here is some plot--"
[Sidenote: "A plot! A plot!"]
"Ay, ay. Quite so," eagerly interrupted Lawrence, and casting grateful looks at the usher. "That is it--a plot. A vile, infamous plot--"
"Sirrah!" frowned the usher. "A plot between this fellow Flippet here," he went on, again addressing the queen. "Your Majesty knows him well,"--and he pointed his wand at the now trembling nurse of Azor and Médor, "and this stranger here, to thrust themselves into the presence of his Majesty."
"Wherefore?" demanded the queen; and the inquiry was caught up and echoed on every side.
"Heaven knows," groaned the usher, turning up his eyes.
"And not heaven only," cried the excited young man. "For 'tis a hellish conspiracy to murder the king--Madam--your Majesty"--he hurriedly continued, in a voice tremulous with agitation; and utterly unconscious of the sneers and uplifted hands of the by-standers, he threw himself at the queen's feet. "'Tis a matter of life and death to the king. I must see him. You who are all potent with him--"
"Listen to that now!" giggled the ladies.
"Entreat--implore him to grant me an audience," and he caught the queen's skirt.
"Come, come. This troublesome fellow is too insufferable," cried a young gentleman springing forward, and seizing Lee roughly by the shoulder.
[Sidenote: The Queen listens.]
"Hands off, my Lord of Grafton," sternly cried the queen, who saw, or thought she saw in all this pretended zeal, the veiled intention she only too frequently experienced, of setting her will at naught. The young nobleman slunk back, looking crestfallen and louring. "Go forward, sir," continued Catherine, waving back the rest, and motioning Lee to precede her along the corridor.
The curtain fell behind them, and Lee found himself alone with the queen and her ladies.