the great lords and gentlemen sat round the table in the council chamber in the white tower, and out of the summer night came the shouts of the peasants. they had lit bonfires in the square of st. catharine’s and were making merry, there being no lack of meat and drink, for they had taken whatever they desired to lay their hands upon. hundreds of them were drunk before sunset, and the multitude kept up a fuddled uproar, marching to and fro under the walls, hammering on pots and pans, and making every sort of noise that it was possible for tipsy fools to make.
the king was not at the council board. he had gone to his chamber soon after sunset, and ordered all the windows to be closed, for the wild shouts of the mob had terrified him, even as a child is terrified by the howling of wolves on a winter night. salisbury, simon of sudbury, and walworth the mayor had gone to his chamber, to find it lit by a blaze of candles, and the king abed with a great purple quilt, embroidered with golden suns, pulled up over his head. he had turned his face away and refused to speak with them, muttering that one of his uncles had conspired to raise the rage of the people against him.
these three councillors had looked at the room with its tapestries of green and red, its eastern carpet, its mirrors, its hutches packed full of jewels and clothes. it was more the room of a woman, soft, sensuous, with bunches of flowers in bowls, and a lute inlaid with mother-of-pearl lying on a scarlet cushion. the smell of it was like the smell of some rich courtesan’s chamber.
this lad in the bed was not to be counted on. salisbury and his companions stood by the door, whispering.
“he is best left where he is.”
“better still in his mother’s bed. he is the greatest peril we have to fear.”
“if these rebels can but get him into their hands they will make him hop as they please.”
“it would be giving them our heads. now—this bastard!”
they returned to the council chamber, where some of the younger men were standing at the windows looking down at the bonfires and listening to the shouts of the crowd. salisbury drew knollys aside before the council gathered about the board.
“your fellow must serve. they shall change caps to-night. i have planned what to say to these gentlemen.”
they came together round the great table, and the king’s half-brothers and some of the hot-heads were for a night attack. they talked of arming every man they could muster, opening the gates, and sallying out to attack the mob. the peasants were drunk and fuddled, and could be slaughtered like sheep in the shambles.
salisbury put their desperate measures aside with the wise air of a sage captain.
“sirs, we have spoken with the king. he has taken heart of grace, and swears that to-morrow he will speak to these people as their king. brave words will win more from them than blows.”
they were for arguing the point.
“what, treat with these clowns?”
“let the king go into the midst of them!”
“they’ll not stand against gentlemen and men of metal. the whole pack is drunk.”
it was walworth who smothered their adventurous truculence. he had his spies in the crowd. two of them had been let in at the water-gate, and he had spoken with them after leaving the king’s chamber.
“sir, a few thousand tipplers do not make up the whole mob. do you think that the men who have raised this storm against us are mere sots and fools? i tell you i know the truth, and how matters lie out yonder. the tiler and his comrades have thousands of fellows ready in the streets, men who are too savage against us to throw away their chances for a pot of ale. all the pother down yonder is so much froth. those who are sober are on the watch, and would thank us were we to open the gates and fight with them, one man against ten, and in the dark. i tell you they would ask for no easier way of putting your heads upon their pikes.”
the hot-heads were less ready to put on their harness when they had heard what walworth had to promise them.
the council broke up, and the two earls, the archbishop, and the lord mayor passed straight to the chamber of the princess, the king’s mother. though it was past midnight they found her up and dressed, and walking restlessly to and fro between her state bed and the window. she was alone, having just returned from the king’s chamber, and her face looked white and hard.
she turned on them sharply, and spoke as though she were in a fierce haste to have some shameful truth confessed.
“gentlemen, since our case is so desperate, it must be as you please. i have spoken with the king.”
they saw her wince and stiffen her neck and body.
“i have spoken with the king. i had thought that i should strike a new courage into him, that he would be shamed, stung to the quick. well, it is not so. do what your wisdom desires. i have no more to say.”
salisbury stood forward and bowed his head before her.
“madame, trust us. the case must be desperate when we use so desperate a disguise. you yourself have suffered at the hands of these common men, and they have grown more savage since they have grown in strength. let us remember that the king is but a lad.”
she turned away from him and went and stood by the window, her eyes hot with tears.
“do not seek to soften it. what must be must be, and yet was ever a woman’s pride so humbled!”
she grew inarticulate, stood awhile with one hand at her throat, and then swung round and faced them.
“gentlemen, to save a son and a kingdom i pluck my child out of the throne, and like a hen i hide him under my feathers. the secret must be kept, well kept.”
they answered her together:
“madame, it shall be. all our lives depend on it.”
“then let it be done quickly. i have spoken with the two women i have chosen; they are in my closet and can be trusted to the death.”
salisbury looked at her questioningly.
“would it please you to see this young man—to assure yourself?”
her face flushed.
“see him—this—this——! sir, are you blind to what my pride bears in suffering? let me never set eyes on the young man.”
her voice choked in her throat, and feeling like men convicted of some great meanness, they passed out and left her.
a squire was on guard outside the king’s door—a grizzled man, lame of one leg from a wound in the french wars, taciturn, with a mouth that shut like a trap.
salisbury spoke to him, with a hand gripping his arm below the shoulder.
“there is great trust placed in you, cavendish. has sir robert knollys made it plain?”
the squire nodded.
“i would have listened to no other man.”
“thunder, think you we play such a game as this for the joy of it? by my soul, cavendish, we are like to lose our king, and our heads, unless we have a king with some blood in him. you have eyes and a shrewd head, and the devil’s own courage. play the game through. is sir robert knollys within?”
“he has been there this half-hour.”
“open, and let us pass.”
they found knollys standing with his back to the window, arms folded, teeth biting at his moustache, his eyes watching the king, who sat half-dressed in a gilded chair, his hair over his face, his whole body shaking. the lad might have had st. vitus’s dance by the way he twitched and fidgeted. his eyes had a scared and empty look. there was no shadow of kingliness upon him, nothing but the terror of an animal that seeks to slink into a corner.
“sire, will you come with us to madame, your mother?”
he stood up, fingers twitching, staring at them stupidly.
“put a cloak about him.”
knollys took a red cloak from a stool, threw it over the king’s shoulders, and wrapped it round him.
“you must cover your face, sire. friend walworth, will you go before us, to see the way is clear?”
the lad stood pulling his lower lip with thumb and forefinger, his eyes looking vacantly at salisbury’s shoes. a hood was found, and put on back to front so that it served as a mask. he said nothing, but let them do with him what they pleased. simon of sudbury took him by the hand. cold and moist, it clasped his with a spasmodic twitching of the fingers.
salisbury glanced meaningly at knollys.
“you shall see us anon, sir. cavendish knows all that can be known.”
when the king had gone to his mother’s chamber to lie hidden in her bed, knollys took a candle from a sconce, traversed a gallery, and made his way up a newel stair. the door at the top was barred on the inside. he knocked thrice, and the door was opened.
knollys wasted no words.
“come.”
fulk followed him, and they passed down the stairway and back to the king’s chamber. cavendish was waiting outside the door. he stared at fulk with the air of a watch-dog half loath to let a stranger into his master’s room. but one clear look at fulk’s face made him stand back with a growl of astonishment.
“s’death!”
knollys smiled grimly.
“it was what i said, cavendish, when i first set eyes on our man. come in with us, for you are the councillor we need. you have seen the king in the flesh, naked and dressed, day in day out.”
they went in and barred the door on the inside.
“now for the play. out with the clothes, cavendish. sit you down, fulk ferrers, well in the light here. have a good look at him, cavendish. hum! what about a razor?”
cavendish scanned fulk’s face, feeling his chin, and looking him in the eyes as though challenging his courage.
“a little cropping of the hair and a scrape with a razor. too much on the upper lip, too, for a lad of fifteen. let’s hear your voice, brother.”
fulk smiled at him.
“like you, sir, i serve the king.”
“too much trumpet in it! softly, more softly, and it will do.”
“good cavendish, to-morrow he has to play the hero, and heroes speak like clarions! we shall put it about the king has dreamed a most marvellous dream and come to his kingliness thereby. now for the toilet.”
cavendish turned to and served as barber, robeman, and player. he knew all the tricks of the king’s person, how he looked, spoke, wore his clothes, carried his head, and sat in a chair. he prompted fulk all the time he was busy with him, acting the tricks and mannerisms himself, and making fulk act them after him.
the result delighted knollys.
“thunder! you have quick wits and a sharp eye. the king’s rings—you must wear the rings.”
the business was nearly ended when they heard footsteps without and the sound of voices. someone knocked, and knollys went to the door.
“who’s there?”
“all’s well, knollys.”
“tarry one moment.”
he let cavendish finish with fulk before he opened the door and suffered the two earls, walworth, and the archbishop to enter. they paused on the threshold, and stood looking at a young man seated in the king’s chair, wearing the king’s clothes with an air of fine serenity.
they were astonished, and, drawing near, stood about fulk, staring at him.
cavendish gave a short laugh.
“sire, here are your good councillors.”
“gentlemen, you are very welcome. what commands shall i lay upon you?”
salisbury’s eyes flashed under a frowning forehead.
“young man, know you what you carry on your shoulders?”
“your heads, sir—and my own.”
“aye—and more than that. here’s my sword. swear on the cross thereof that you will keep troth with us.”
fulk swore, looking straight in salisbury’s eyes.
“good, you are in our hands, and we in yours. now, let us get ready for to-morrow’s hazard. none of us will get much sleep to-night.”
cavendish went to stand on guard outside the door, while fulk sat in the king’s chair with five pedagogues to put him through his part. it was a long lesson that they gave him, and a merciless catechising followed the lesson, lest some small thing might betray them.
salisbury spoke last.
“hold aloof, proudly. we will stand about you, and keep meddlers at a distance. remember, a king may please himself, but when you meet with these peasants, ride high in the saddle, and yet with a kind of valiant frankness. a mob should be treated as you would treat a strange dog. never flinch, and yet be not too familiar.”
they watched fulk’s face as though trying to forecast the issue of the morrow. he sat erect in the chair, mouth firm, eyes steady.
“sirs,” he said very quietly; “if i am my father’s son i have the blood of mastery in me. it will be served.”
