The Bow of Orange Ribbon: A Romance of New York

              “Death asks for no man’s leave,
          But lifts the latch, and enters, and sits down.”

The great events of most lives occur in epochs.  A certain period is marked by a succession of important changes, but that ride of fortune, be it good or ill, culminates, recedes, goes quite out, and leaves life on a level beach of commonplaces.  Then, sooner or later, the current of affairs turns again; sometimes with a calm, irresistible flow, sometimes in a tidal wave of sudden and overwhelming strength.  After Hyde’s and Katherine’s marriage, there was a long era noticeable only for such vicissitudes as were incident to their fortune and position.  But in May, A.D. 1774, the first murmur of the returning tide of destiny was heard.  Not but what there had been for long some vague and general expectation of momentous events which would touch many individual lives; but this May night, a singular prescience of change made Hyde restless and impatient.

It was a dull, drizzling evening; and there was an air of depression in the city, to which he was unusually sensitive.  For the trouble between England and her American Colonies was rapidly culminating; and party feeling ran high, not only among civilians, but throughout the royal regiments.  Recently, also, a petition had been laid before the king from the Americans then resident in London, praying him not to send troops to coerce his subjects in America; and, when Hyde entered his club, some members were engaged in an angry altercation on this subject.

“The petition was flung upon the table, as it ought to have been,” said Lord Paget.

“You are right,” replied Mr. Hervey; “they ought to petition no longer.  They ought now to resist.  Mr. Dunning said in the House last night that the tone of the Government to the Colonies was, ’Resist, and we will cut your throats:  acquiesce, and we will tax you.’”

“A kind of ‘stand and deliver’ government,” remarked Hyde, whistling softly.

Lord Paget turned upon him with hardly concealed anger.  “Captain, you, sir, wear the king’s livery.”

“I give the king my service:  my thoughts are my own.  And, faith, Lord Paget, it is my humour to utter them when and how I please!”

“Patience, gentlemen,” returned Mr. Hervey.  “I think, my lord, we may follow our leaders.  The Duke of Richmond spoke warmly for Boston last night.  ‘The Bostonians are punished without a hearing,’ he said; ’and if they resist punishment, I wish them success.’  Are they not Englishmen, and many of them born on English soil?  When have Englishmen submitted to oppression?  Neither king, lords, nor commons can take away the rights of the people.  It is past a doubt, too, that his Majesty, at the levee last night, laughed when he said he would just as lief fight the Bostonians as the French.  I heard this speech was received with a dead silence, and that great offence was given by it.”

“I think the king was right,” said Paget passionately.  “Rebellious subjects are worse than open enemies like the French.”

“My lord, you must excuse me if I do not agree with your opinions.  Was the king right to give a government to the Canadians at this precise time?  What can his Protestant North-American subjects think, but that he designs the hundred thousand Catholics of Canada against their liberties?  It is intolerable; and the king was mobbed this afternoon in the park, on the matter.  As for the bishops who voted the Canada bill, they ought to be unfrocked.”

“Mr. Hervey, I beg to remind you that my uncle, who is of the see of St. Cuthbert, voted for it.”

“Oh, it is notorious that all the English bishops, excepting only Dr. Shipley, voted for war with America!  I hear that they anticipate an hierarchy there when the country is conquered.  And the fight has begun at home, for Parliament is dissolved on the subject.”

“It died in the Roman-Catholic faith,” laughed Hyde, “and left us a rebellion for a legacy.”

“Captain Hyde, you are a traitor.”

“Lord Paget, I deny it.  My loyalty does not compel me to swear by all the follies and crimes of the Government.  My sword is my country’s; but I would not for twenty kings draw it against my own countrymen,”—­then, with a meaning glance at Lord Paget and an emphatic touch of his weapon,—­“except in my own private quarrel.  And if this be treason, let the king look to it.  He will find such treason in every regiment in England.  They say he is going to hire Hessians:  he will need them for his American business, for he has no prerogative to force Englishmen to murder Englishmen.”

“I would advise you to be more prudent, Captain Hyde, if it is in your power.”

“I would advise you to mind your own affairs, Lord Paget.”

“It is said that you married an American.”

“If you are perfectly in your senses, my lord, leave my affairs alone.”

“For my part, I never believed it; and now that Lady Suffolk is a widow, with revenues, possibly you may”—­

“Ah, you are jealous, I perceive!” and Hyde laughed scornfully, and turned on his heel as if to go upstairs.

Lord Paget followed, and laid his hand upon Hyde’s arm.

“Hands off, my lord.  Hands off all that belongs to me.  And I advise you also to cease your impertinent attentions to my cousin, Lady Suffolk.”

“Gentlemen,” said Mr. Hervey, “this is no time for private quarrels; and, Captain, here is a fellow with a note for you.  It is my Lady Capel’s footman, and he says he comes in urgent speed.”

Hyde glanced at the message.  “It is a last command, Mr. Harvey; and I must beg you to say what is proper for my honour to Lord Paget.  Lady Capel is at the death-point, and to her requests I am first bounden.”

It was raining hard when he left the club, a most dreary night in the city.  The coach rattled through the muddy streets, and brought, as it went along, many a bored, heavy countenance to the steaming windows, to watch and to wonder at its pace.  Lady Capel had been death-stricken while at whist, and she had not been removed from the parlour in which she had been playing her last game.  She was stretched upon a sofa in the midst of the deserted tables, yet covered with scattered cards and half-emptied tea-cups.  Only Lady Suffolk and a physician were with her; though the corridor was full of terrified, curious servants, gloating not unkindly over such a bit of sensation in their prosaic lives.

At this hour it was evident that, above everything in the world, the old lady had loved the wild extravagant grandson, whose debts she had paid over and over, and whom she had for years alternately petted and scolded.

“O Dick,” she whispered, “I’ve got to die!  We all have.  I’ve had a good time, Dick.”

“Shall I go for cousin Harold?  I can bring him in an hour.”

“No, no.  I want no priests; no better than we are, Dick.  Harold is a proud sinner; Lord, what a proud sinner he is!” Then, with a glint of her usual temper, “He’d snub the twelve apostles if he met them without mitres.  No priests, Dick.  It is you I want.  I have left you eight thousand pounds—­all I could save, Dick.  Everything goes back to William now; but the eight thousand pounds is yours.  Arabella is witness to it.  Dick, Dick, you will think of me sometimes?”

And Hyde kissed her fondly.  Ugly, heartless, sinful, she might be to others; but to him she had been a double mother.  “I’ll never forget you,” he answered; “never, grandmother.”

“I know what the town will say:  ’Well, well, old Lady Capel has gone to her deserts at last.’  Don’t mind them, Dick.  Let them talk.  They will have to go too; it’s the old round—­meat and mirth, and then to bed—­a—­long—­sleep.”

“Grandmother?”

“I hear you, Dick.  Good-night.”

“Is there anything you want done?  Think, dear grandmother.”

“Don’t let Exmouth come to my funeral.  I don’t want him—­grinning over—­my coffin.”

“Any other thing?”

“Put me beside Jack Capel.  I wonder—­if I shall—­see Jack.”  A shadow, gray and swift, passed over her face.  Her eyes flashed one piteous look into Hyde’s eyes, and then closed forever.

And while in the rainy, dreary London twilight Lady Capel was dying, Katherine was in the garden at Hyde Manor, watching the planting of seeds that were in a few weeks to be living things of beauty and sweetness.  It had ceased raining at noon in Norfolk, and the gravel walks were perfectly dry, and the air full of the fragrance of innumerable violets.  All the level land was wearing buttercups.  Full of secrets, of fluttering wings, and building nests were the trees.  In the apple-blooms the bees were humming, delirious with delight.  From the beehives came the peculiar and exquisite odour of virgin wax.  Somewhere near, also, the gurgle of running water spread an air of freshness all around.

[Illustration:  She was stretched upon a sofa]

And Katherine, with a little basket full of flower-seeds, was going with the gardener from bed to bed, watching him plant them.  No one who had seen her in the childlike loveliness of her early girlhood could have imagined the splendour of her matured beauty.  She had grown “divinely tall,” and the exercise of undisputed authority had added a gracious stateliness of manner.  Her complexion was wonderful, her large blue eyes shining with tender lights, her face full of sympathetic revelations.  Above all, she had that nameless charm which comes from a freedom from all anxious thought for the morrow; that charm of which the sweet secret is generally lost after the twentieth summer.  Her basket of seeds was clasped to her side within the hollow of her left arm, and with her right hand she lifted a long petticoat of quilted blue satin.  Above this garment she wore a gown of wood-coloured taffeta, sprigged with rose-buds, and a stomacher of fine lace to match the deep rufflings on her elbow-sleeves.

Little Joris was with his mother, running hither and thither, as his eager spirits led him:  now pausing to watch her drop from her white fingers the precious seed into its prepared bed, anon darting after some fancied joy among the pyramidal yews, and dusky treillages, and cradle walks of holly and privet.  For, as Sir Thomas Swaffham said, “Hyde garden looked just as if brought from Holland;” and especially so in the spring, when it was ablaze with gorgeous tulips and hyacinths.

She had heard much of Lady Capel, and she had a certain tenderness for the old woman who loved her husband so truly; but no thought of her entered into Katherine’s mind that calm evening hour.  Neither had she any presentiment of sorrow.  Her soul was happy and untroubled, and she lingered in the sweet place until the tender touch of gray twilight was over fen and field.  Then her maid, with a manner full of pleasant excitement, came to her, and said,—­

“Here be a London pedler, madam; and he do have all the latest fashions, and the news of the king and the Americans.”

Now, for many reasons, the advent of a London pedler was a great and pleasant event at the Manor House.  Katherine had that delightful and excusable womanly foible, a love of fine clothing; and shops for its sale were very rare, even in towns of considerable size.  It was from packmen and hawkers that fine ladies bought their laces and ribbons and gloves; their precious toilet and hair pins, their paints and powders, and India scarfs and fans, and even jewellery.  These hawkers were also the great news-bearers to the lonely halls and granges and farmhouses; and they were everywhere sure of a welcome, and of such entertainment as they required.  Generally each pedler had his recognized route and regular customers; but occasionally a strange dealer called, and such, having unfamiliar wares, was doubly welcome.  “Is it Parkins, Lettice?” asked Katherine, as she turned with interest toward the house.

“No, ma’am, it isn’t Parkins; and I do think as the man never showed a face in Hyde before; but he do say that he has a miracle of fine things.”

In a few minutes he was exhibiting them to Katherine, and she was too much interested in the wares to notice their merchant particularly.

Indeed, he had one of those faces which reveal nothing; a face flat, hard, secret as a wall, wrinkled as an old banner.  He was a hale, thick-set man, dressed in breeches of corduroy, and a sleeved waistcoat down to his knees of the same material.  His fur cap was on the carpet beside his pack; and he had a fluent tongue in praise of his wares, as he hung his silks over Lettice’s outstretched arm, or arranged the scarfs across her shoulders.

There was a slow but mutually satisfactory exchange of goods and money; and then the pedler began to repack his treasures, and Lettice to carry away the pretty trifles and the piece of satin her mistress had bought.  Then, also, he found time to talk, to take out the last newspapers, and to describe the popular dissatisfaction at the stupid tyranny of the Government toward the Colonies.  For either from information, or by some process rapid as instinct, he understood to which side Katherine’s sympathies went.

“Here be the ‘Flying Postman,’ madam, with the great speech of Mr. Burke in it about the port of Boston; but it won’t do a mossel o’ good, madam, though he do tell ’em to keep their hands out o’ the Americans’ pockets.”

“The port of Boston?”

“See you, madam, they are a-going to shut the port o’ Boston, and make Salem the place of entry; that’s to punish the Bostonians; and Mr. Burke, he says, ’The House has been told that Salem is only seventeen miles from Boston but justice is not an idea of geography, and the Americans are condemned without being heard.  Yet the universal custom, on any alteration of charters, is to hear the parties at the bar of the House.  Now, the question is, Are the Americans to be heard, or not, before the charter is broken for our convenience?...  The Boston bill is a diabolical bill.’”

He read aloud this bit of Mr. Burke’s fiery eloquence, in a high, droning voice, and would, according to his custom, have continued the entertainment; but Katherine, preferring to use her own intelligence, borrowed the paper and was about to leave the room with it, when he suddenly remembered a scarf of great beauty which he had not shown.

“I bought it for my Lady Suffolk,” he said; “but Lord Suffolk died sudden, and black my lady had to wear.  It’s forrin, madam; and here it is—­the very colour of affradiles.  But mayhap, as it is candle-teening, you’d like to wait till the day comes again.”

A singular look of speculation came into Katherine’s face.  She examined the scarf without delay; and, as she fingered the delicate silk, she led the man on to talk of Lady Suffolk, though, indeed, he scarcely needed the stimulus of questioning.  Without regard as to whether Katherine was taking any interest or not in his information, he detailed with hurried avidity the town talk that had clung to her reputation for so many years; and he so fully described the handsome cavalry officer that was her devoted attendant that Katherine had no difficulty in recognizing her husband, even without the clews which her own knowledge of the parties gave her.

She stood in the gray light by the window, fingering the delicate satin, and listening.  The pedler glanced from his goods to her face, and talked rapidly, interloping bits of news about the court and the fashions; but going always back to Lady Suffolk and her lover, and what was likely to take place now that Lord Suffolk was out of the way.  “Though there’s them that do say the captain has a comely wife hid up in the country.”

Suddenly she turned and faced the stooping man:  “Your scarf take:  I will not have it.  No, and I will not have anything that I have bought from you.  All of the goods you shall receive back; and my money, give it to me.  You are no honest hawker:  you are a bad man, who have come here for a bad woman.  You know that of my husband you have been talking—­I mean lying.  You know that this is his house, and that his true wife am I. Not one more word shall you speak.—­Lettice, bring here all the goods I bought from this man; poisoned may be the unguents and scents and gloves.  Of such things I have heard.”

She had spoken with an angry rapidity that for the moment confounded the stranger; but at this point he lifted himself with an insolent air, and said, “The goods be bought and paid for, madam; and, in faith, I will not buy them back again.”

“In faith, then, I will send for Sir Thomas Swaffham.  A magistrate is he, and Captain Hyde’s friend.  Not one penny of my money shall you have; for, indeed, your goods I will not wear.”

She pointed then to the various articles which Lettice had brought back; and, with the shrug of a man who accepts the inevitable, he replaced them in his pack, and then ostentatiously counted back the money Katherine had given him.  She examined every coin, and returned a crown.  “My piece this is not.  It may be false.  I will have the one I gave to you.—­Lettice, bring here water in a bowl; let the silver and gold lay in it until morning.”

[Illustration:  She stood in the gray light by the window]

And, turning to the pedler, “Your cap take from the floor, and go.”

“Of a truth, madam, you be not so cruel as to turn me on the fens, and it a dark night.  There be bogs all about; and how the road do lay for the next house, I know not.”

“The road to my house was easy to find; well, then, you can find the road back to whoever it was sent you here.  With my servants you shall not sit; under my roof you shall not stay.”

“I have no mind to go.”

“See you the mastiff at my feet?  I advise you stir him not up, for death is in his jaw.  To the gate, and with good haste!  In one half-hour the kennels I will have opened.  If then within my boundaries you are, it is at your life’s peril.”

She spoke without passion and without hurry or alarm; but there was no mistaking the purpose in her white, resolute face and fearless attitude.  And the pedler took in the situation very quickly; for the dog was already watching him with eyes of fiery suspicion, and an occasional deep growl was either a note of warning to his mistress, or of defiance to the intruder.  With an evil glance at the beautiful, disdainful woman standing over him, the pedler rose and left the house; Katherine and the dog so closely following that the man, stooping under his heavy burden, heard her light footsteps and the mastiff’s heavy breathing close at his heels, until he passed the large gates and found himself on the dark fen, with just half an hour to get clear of a precinct he had made so dangerous to himself.

For, when he remembered Katherine’s face, he muttered, “There isn’t a mossel o’ doubt but what she’ll hev the brutes turned loose.  Dash it! women do beat all.  But I do hev one bit o’ comfort—­high-to-instep as she is, she’s heving a bad time of it now by herself.  I do think that, for sure.”  And the reflection gave him some gratification, as he cautiously felt his steps forward with his strong staff.

[Illustration:  Chapter heading]