Sir Nigel by Arthur Conan Doyle (good novels to read .TXT) 📕

“Do you speak to them, Edith,” said he.

Her eyes flashed with scorn as she surveyed them each in turn, the woman, the youth and the priest.

“I have but one word to say to them,” said she. “It is that they go hence and trouble us no more. Am I not a free woman? Have I not said that this is the only man I ever loved? I have loved him long. He did not know it, and in despair he turned to another. Now he knows all and never again can doubt come between us. Therefore I will stay here at Shalford and come to Cosford no more save upon the arm of my husband. Am I so weak that I would believe the tales you tell against him? Is it hard for a jealous woman and a wandering priest to agree upon a lie? No, no, Mary, you can go hence and take your cavalier and your priest with you, for here I stay, true to my love and safe in my trust upon his honor!”

“Well spoken, on my faith, my golden bird!” said the little master of Shalford. “Let me add my own word to that which has been said. You would not grant me any virtue in your unkindly speech, good Lady Mary, and yet you must needs confess that at least I have good store of patience, since I have not set my dogs upon your friends who have come between me and my ease. But even to the most virtuous there comes at last a time when poor human frailty may prevail, and so I pray you to remove both yourself, your priest and your valiant knight errant, lest perhaps there be more haste and less dignity when at last you do take your leave. Sit down, my fair love, and let us turn once more to our supper.” He motioned her to her chair, and he filled her wine-cup as well as his own.

Nigel had said no word since he had entered the room, but his look had never lost its set purpose, nor had his brooding eyes ever wandered from the sneering face of the deformed master of Shalford. Now he turned with swift decision to Mary and to the priest.

“That is over,” said he in a low voice. “You have done all that you could, and now it is for me to play my part as well as I am able. I pray you, Mary, and you, good father, that you will await me outside.”

“Nay, Nigel, if there is danger - “

“It is easier for me, Mary, if you are not there. I pray you to go. I can speak to this man more at my ease.”

She looked at him with questioning eyes and then obeyed.

Nigel plucked at the priest’s gown.

“I pray you, father, have you your book of offices with you?”

“Surely, Nigel, it is ever in my breast.”

“Have it ready, father!”

“For what, my son?”

“There are two places you may mark; there is the service of marriage and there is the prayer for the dying. Go with her, father, and be ready at my call.”

He closed the door behind them and was alone with this ill-matched couple. They both turned in their chairs to look at him, Edith with a defiant face, the man with a bitter smile upon his lips and malignant hatred in his eyes.

“What,” said he, “the knight errant still lingers? Have we not heard of his thirst for glory? What new venture does he see that he should tarry here?”

Nigel walked to the table.

“There is no glory and little venture,” said he; “but I have come for a purpose and I must do it. I learn from your own lips, Edith, that you will not leave this man.”

“If you have ears you have heard it.”

“You are, as you have said, a free woman, and who can gainsay you? But I have known you, Edith, since we played as boy and girl on the heather-hills together. I will save you from this man’s cunning and from your own foolish weakness.”

“What would you do?”

“There is a priest without. He will marry you now. I will see you married ere I leave this hall.”

“Or else?” sneered the man.

“Or else you never leave this hall alive. Nay, call not for your servants or your dogs! By Saint Paul! I swear to you that this matter lies between us three, and that if any fourth comes at your call you, at least, shall never live to see what comes of it! Speak then, Paul of Shalford! Will you wed this woman now, or will you not?”

Edith was on her feet with outstretched arms between them. “Stand back, Nigel! He is small and weak. You would not do him a hurt! Did you not say so this very day? For God’s sake, Nigel, do not look at him so! There is death in your eyes.”

“A snake may be small and weak, Edith, yet every honest man would place his heel upon it. Do you stand back yourself, for my purpose is set.”

“Paul!” she turned her eyes to the pale sneering face. “Bethink you, Paul! Why should you not do what he asks? What matter to you whether it be now or on Monday? I pray you, dear Paul, for my sake let him have his way! Your brother can read the service again if it so please him. Let us wed now, Paul, and then all is well.”

He had risen from his chair, and he dashed aside her appealing hands. “You foolish woman,” he snarled, “and you, my savior of fair damsels, who are so bold against a cripple, you have both to learn that if my body be weak there is the soul of my breed within it! To marry because a boasting, ranting, country Squire would have me do so - no, by the soul of God, I will die first! On Monday I will marry, and no day sooner, so let that be your answer.”

“It is the answer that I wished,” said Nigel, “for indeed I see no happiness in this marriage, and the other may well be the better way. Stand aside, Edith!” He gently forced her to one side and drew his sword.

De la Fosse cried aloud at the sight. “I have no sword. You would not murder me?” said he, leaning back with haggard-face and burning eyes against his chair. The bright steel shone in the lamp-light. Edith shrank back, her hand over her face.

“Take this sword!” said Nigel, and he turned the hilt to the cripple. “Now!” he added, as he drew his hunting knife. “Kill me if you can, Paul de la Fosse, for as God is my help I will do as much for you!”

The woman, half swooning and yet spellbound and fascinated, looked on at that strange combat. For a moment the cripple stood with an air of doubt, the sword grasped in his nerveless fingers. Then as he saw the tiny blade in Nigel’s hand the greatness of the advantage came home to him, and a cruel smile tightened his loose lips. Slowly, step by step he advanced, his chin sunk upon his chest, his eyes glaring from under the thick tangle of his brows like fires through the brushwood. Nigel waited for him, his left hand forward, his knife down by his hip, his face grave, still and watchful.

Nearer and nearer yet, with stealthy step, and then with a bound and a cry of hatred and rage Paul de la Fosse had sped his blow. It was well judged and well swung, but point would have been wiser than edge against that supple body and those active feet. Quick as a flash, Nigel had sprung inside the sweep of the blade, taking a flesh wound on his left forearm, as he pressed it under the hilt. The next instant the cripple was on the ground and Nigel’s dagger was at his throat.

“You dog!” he whispered. “I have you at my mercy! Quick ere I strike, and for the last time! Will you marry or no?”

The crash of the fall and the sharp point upon his throat had cowed the man’s spirit. He looked up with a white face and the sweat gleamed upon his forehead. There was terror in his eyes.

“Nay, take your knife from me!” he cried. “I cannot die like a calf in the shambles.”

“Will you marry?”

“Yes, yes, I will wed her! After all she is a good wench and I might do worse. Let me up! I tell you I will marry her! What more would you have?”

Nigel stood above him with his foot upon his misshapen body. He had picked up his sword, and the point rested upon the cripple’s breast.

“Nay, you will bide where you are! If you are to live - and my conscience cries loud against it - at least your wedding will be such as your sins have deserved. Lie there, like the crushed worm that you are!” Then he raised his voice. “Father Athanasius!” he cried. “What ho! Father Athanasius!”

The old priest ran to the cry, and so did the Lady Mary. A strange sight it was that met them now in the circle of light, the frightened girl, half-unconscious against the table, the prostrate cripple, and Nigel with foot and sword upon his body.

“Your book, father!” cried Nigel. “I know not if what we do is good or ill; but we must wed them, for there is no way out.”

But the girl by the table had given a great cry, and she was clinging and sobbing with her arms round her sister’s neck.

“Oh, Mary, I thank the Virgin that you have come! I thank the Virgin that it is not too late! What did he say? He said that he was a de la Fosse and that he would not be married at the sword-point. My heart went out to him when he said it. But I, am I not a Buttesthorn, and shall it be said that I would marry a man who could be led to the altar with a knife at his throat? No, no, I see him as he is! I know him now, the mean spirit, the lying tongue! Can I not read in his eyes that he has indeed deceived me, that he would have left me as you say that he has left others? Take me home, Mary, my sister, for you have plucked me back this night from the very mouth of Hell!”

And so it was that the master of Shalford, livid and brooding, was left with his wine at his lonely table, while the golden beauty of Cosford, hot with shame and anger, her fair face wet with tears, passed out safe from the house of infamy into the great calm and peace of the starry night.

XIII. HOW THE COMRADES JOURNEYED DOWN THE OLD, OLD ROAD

And now the season of the moonless nights was drawing nigh and the King’s design was ripe. Very secretly his preparations were made. Already the garrison of Calais, which consisted of five hundred archers and two hundred men-at-arms, could, if forewarned, resist any attack made upon it. But it was the King’s design not merely to resist the attack, but to capture the attackers. Above all it was his wish to find the occasion for one of those adventurous passages of arms which had made his name famous throughout Christendom as the very pattern and leader of knight-errant chivalry.

But the affair wanted careful handling. The arrival of any, reinforcements, or even the crossing of any