Jane Seton; or, The King's Advocate: A Scottish Historical Romance
thrusts by one which pierced the shoulder-blade of his adversary, and
hurled him to the earth, breaking his sword like a crystal wand as he
fell.
In the sequel it will be seen how fortunate this thrust was for Jane
Seton.
"Now, hold thee, Vipont!" cried Leslie, through his barred helmet, as
he ran up at that moment, "by all the powers, thou hast slain the
king's advocate!"
"Be easy," said Roland, smiling, as he carefully sheathed his sword;
"dost think the devil dies so readily?"
"'S death! art thou not mad, to be fencing here like a French
sword-player when our trumpets are sounding?" said Leslie, as he
assisted Redhall to rise. "You are not wounded, my lord, I hope?"
"'Tis only a stab like a button-hole--pshaw! I will make a sure
account of it," said Redhall, wrapping his cloak about him, and
striking the hilt of his sword into the top of the empty sheath.
"A good day to thee, thou hypocrite and assassin in black taffeta,"
said Roland, leaping on his caparisoned horse, which Lintstock led up
at that moment.
"Farewell, thou ruffian and cut-throat in plate and cloth-of-gold,"
replied Redhall, in the same tone of fierce irony.
"I will remember thy politeness, Sir Adam."
"I will not forget thine, Sir Roland;--adieu."
And thus they separated, with bent brows, and eyes and hearts full of
fire and hatred.
CHAPTER XX.
THE BLACK PAGE.
"Ha! there was a fatal evidence.
All's over now, indeed!
The morning tide shall sweep his corpse to sea,
And hide all memory of this stern night's work."--SCOTT.
Leaning on the arm of Sybil, and attended by Sir James Hamilton of
Barncleugh, the Albany herald and their followers, we left the
countess ascending the little valley which lies in the centre of
Inchkeith. They proceeded in silence, for the path was somewhat
perilous; the early morning was yet grey, though the eastern sky and
ocean were fast brightening with the coming day. A cold wind swept
over the bosom of the waters that girdled in the isle. About the
middle of the valley a cleft in the rocks was reached, through which
the pathway passed at direct right angles with that they had hitherto
pursued; and from thence they continued to ascend, until they reached
the summit of those precipices which, from the water, seemed to be
inaccessible, and where the iron gate of the barbican stood, with a
moss-grown Scottish lion carved in stone above it.
The light had been rapidly increasing as they ascended, and now
behind bars of golden cloud the broad round morning sun rose red and
gloriously from his bed in the German Ocean; and then indeed did the
beautiful river, that from Highland hills rolls down on yellow sands,
seem one vast tide of molten gold flowing to the dark blue sea; and
beautifully in the warm sunshine were that bright blue and brighter
gold mingling afar off in the estuary.
The morning smoke and the humid vapours of the past night yet veiled
the close dense masses of the capital; but the spire of St. Giles's,
and the embattled tower of King David, the loftiest summit of the
castle, whereon the St. Andrew's cross was waving, were visible above
the gauzy mist that veiled the glens below.
Clad in the brightest hues of summer, on one side lay Fife, its long
expanse of sand studded by busy towns and red-tiled villages,
baronial towers and ancient churches, its bold promontories jutting
into the majestic river, and its beautiful mountains rising behind.
On the other lay the three Lothians, with all their ripening fields
and dark-green woods, the lonely cone of Soltra, the lonelier
Lammermuirs, and the undulating sweep of the far-stretching
Pentlands, a long blue waving chain of heath-clad mountain, that
dwarfed the lesser hills, and threw the wooded cliffs of
Corstorphine, the Calton, the castled rock, and even proud Arthur's
basaltic brow, into comparative obscurity. So deceiving is distance,
that this chain of peaks seemed to start abruptly from the very
margin of the river; and Leith, with all its dense old Flemish wynds
and closes, its marts and shipping, St. Mary's spire and old St.
Anthony's tower, seemed to nestle at their feet.
Westward of the isle lay that armed fleet which had so recently
arrived from France, under the pennon of Admiral Sir Robert Barton,
brother of that other gallant Admiral Sir Andrew Barton, who, when
returning from fighting the Portuguese, with two solitary ships, was
waylaid by Lord Howard and the whole English fleet in the Downs,
where he was slain by a cannon-ball.
The dawn of day, which had displayed this magnificent panorama to the
countess and Lady Sybil, had also revealed the sable visage of
Sabrino to Sir James Hamilton of Barncleugh, who had never seen or
heard of a black man before; so he preceded the party, in some
perturbation, signing the cross as fast as if all St. Anthony's imps
were behind him, and marvelling at so hideous a masque.
"Welcome to the tower of Inchkeith, ladies," said he, turning round,
and raising his bonnet at the barbican gate.
The countess replied, "Heaven grant I may soon return the welcome in
my own house, Sir James."
"Though I _am_ a Hamilton?" replied the knight, with a smile.
"Oh, yes; for these dire feuds begin to weary me."
"Ah! old fox," muttered the castellan under his beard; "because thy
nose is below the water now. Had we lost, and the Douglases won the
battle of Linlithgow," said he, with a smile, "I doubt much if the
feud had been tiresome to the Lady Ashkirk."
"She had not been _here_ to-day," replied the countess; "but
how--what does this mean?" she added, with some asperity, on seeing
that two soldiers, in obedience to a sign from Barncleugh, crossed
their pikes before Sabrino, to prevent his entering the tower.
"It means, madam, that this black thing, quhilk in visage so closely
resembles the promoter of all evil, cannot enter here."
"Sir James of Barncleugh," said the Albany herald, interposing, "he
is the countess's page."
"Page! ugh! I like not to look upon him. I would do much for thee,
John of Darnagaber, who art mine own natural-born clansman, and more
for the widow of gallant Earl John of Ashkirk (a Seton and Douglas
man though he was), but, by my holy dame! this black devil, whom I
have no order to receive, shall not enter the tower of Inchkeith,
that is flat!"
"Sir James Hamilton," said the countess, with dignity, "do be
merciful, and spare us the humiliation of entreaty. This poor black
boy is faithful and gentle, kind and attached to me as a spaniel, and
assuredly he will die if separated from me; for he is, I know, an
object of abhorrence to the ignorant and the vulgar."
At this remark, which was unintentional, the commander of the island
gave her a furious look, and cocked his bonnet over his right eye.
"Madame," said he, coldly, "you will excuse me; I am but a blunt
knight of James III., yet I would never forgive myself if anything
evil occurred."
"Kiss the hand of this gentleman, Sabrino," said Sybil, "and he will
admit you."
Sabrino was a mute, or nearly so; by some law of his barbarous native
land, his tongue had been cut out near the root; thus he could only
utter certain terrible and apparently unintelligible sounds, and when
doing so opened his wide mouth to its utmost extent, revealing two
rows of sharp teeth, and the black remains of his mutilated tongue,
which he lolled about within the cavity in a manner which, to say the
least, of it, was very appalling. The poor terrified black was
beginning to mutter his thanks in this extraordinary fashion, and
gradually approached the Lord of Barncleugh, when the latter sprang
back, with alarm in his eyes, and his hand on his sword.
"Get thee behind me, Satan!" he exclaimed. "Away! I will not be
touched by thee. My hand? nay, I will hew it off first. Hence, imp
of darkness! for may I never see God, if thou abidest in this castle
for a moment, or in this island for an hour!"
To overcome his prejudices, even if the countess had stooped to
flatter them, seemed impossible; therefore, she gave the herald her
hand to kiss, thanked him for his kind courtesy, entrusted him with
messages for her daughter concerning certain necessaries they
required, for she doubted not her residence on the isle would be a
protracted one; and then begging that he would see the poor black
page delivered safely to the care of Sir Roland Vipont, of the
captain of the guard, or any other of his friends, she entered the
tower with Sybil and Janet, their last solitary attendant.
Then the iron gate was closed and barred until the herald's boat
should have withdrawn from the island.
A sign from the countess had been sufficient for Sabrino, and with
tears and the utterance of many a strange and unearthly lamentation,
he followed the herald and Hamilton of Barncleugh, who, after taking
each a quaighful from a little keg of whisky that stood in the
warder's lodge, descended to the boat; the disobliging castellan
going thither partly from fear, and partly from courtesy, to see his
friend and the page off together.
"I like this black creature as little as thee," said the herald; "but
I have heard Father St. Bernard, when preaching of St. Frumentius of
Ethiopia, tell us of a land, a hundred times the size of broad
Scotland, where all the tribes were of this sable hue."
"True--and I have seen such a visage on a banner, ere this."
"Morrison of the Ilk carrieth three," replied the herald; "I saw them
beaten down by the Stewarts of Lennox on that day, by Linlithgow
brig. But, remember thee, that my lord advocate wished a strict
watch to be kept over this creature."
"Then he should have inserted his name in the warrant of committal to
ward. 'Slife! there is an old draw-well in the barbican, where I
could have lodged it very well. Though a dour carle, I know Sir Adam
Otterburn to be an upright man, an abhorrer of sorcery; and there is
in this Seton family much that smelleth sorely of it. Earl John
found a book of the black art once when on an English foray, as I
have heard, but Redhall----"
"Ah, _he_ is a very good man," said the herald, ironically;
"descended, indeed, from one of the apostles, by the father's side."
"Which?"
"Judas."
"Beware of thy waggery--he is a severe dispenser of the laws."
"What the devil care I for him, or for the cardinal either if it
cometh to that?"
"My friend, my friend!" said Barncleugh, giving a furtive glance
behind; "assuredly this black thing hath infected thee, for this
discourse savoureth fearfully of the new heresy; but I forget that
thou art a near kinsman of Patrick Hamilton, the umquhile abbot of
Fearn, and so-called martyr."
"Nay, I remember only that I am speaking to a gentleman, Hamilton,
and say what I choose."
"Not always a wise proceeding. But here is the boat, cousin."
The mariners, who had been in no way pleased at having Sabrino as a
passenger to the isle, and had been mutually feeding each other's
fears and prejudices during the herald's absence, were very much
discomposed by his returning with the same sable attendant; and on
hearing from the cardinal's pikemen that Sir James Hamilton had
declined to admit him within the tower, their murmurs became loud and
undisguised.
The herald shook hands with the knight, and attended by his
pursuivant, sprang on board; but when Sabrino attempted to follow,
the coxswain, a square-visaged and sturdily-built old fellow, with a
long grey beard and shaggy eyebrows, snatched up a boat-hook, and
attempted to push off the pinnace; then Sabrino, with one hand on the
gunnel, and the other on his poniard, gave him a dark and terrible
scowl.
"Awa, awa! thou imp of Satan--hands off, or I will ribroast thee!"
cried the coxswain, somewhat alarmed at his own temerity.