CHAPTER IV.
A KNIGHT'S CHAIN
The following morning Walter put on the sober russet dress which he wore on Sundays and holidays, for gay colors were not allowed to the apprentices, and set out for Westminster. Although he endeavored to assume an air of carelessness and ease as he approached the dwelling of Earl Talbot, he was very far from feeling comfortable, and wished in his heart that his master had accompanied him on his errand. Half a dozen men-at-arms were standing on the steps of the mansion, who looked with haughty surprise at the young apprentice.
'Dame Alice Vernon has sent to express her desire to have speech with me,' he said quietly, 'and I would fain know if she can receive me.'
'Here, Dikon,' one of the men cried to another within the hall. 'This is the lad you were sent to fetch yesterday. I wondered much who the city apprentice was who, with such an assured air, marched up to the door; but if what thou sayest be true, that he saved the life of Dame Vernon and her little daughter, he must be a brave lad, and would be more in place among men and soldiers than in serving wares behind the counter of a fat city tradesman.'
'I serve behind no counter,' Walter said indignantly. 'I am an armorer, and mayhap can use arms as well as make them.'
There was a laugh among the men at the boy's sturdy self-assertion, and then the man named Dikon said:
'Come along, lad. I will take you to Dame Vernon at once. She is expecting you; and, my faith, it would not be safe to leave you standing here long, for I see you would shortly be engaged in splitting the weasands of my comrades.'
There was another roar of laughter from the men, and Walter, somewhat abashed, followed his conductor into the house. Leading him through the hall and along several corridors, whose spaciousness and splendor quite overpowered the young apprentice, he handed him over to a waiting-woman, who ushered him into an apartment where Dame Vernon was reclining on a couch. Her little daughter was sitting upon a low stool beside her, and upon seeing Walter she leaped to her feet, clapping her hands.
'Oh! mother, this is the boy that rescued us out of the river.'
The lady looked with some surprise at the lad. She had but a faint remembrance of the events which occurred between the time when she received a blow from the sword of one of her assailants and that when she found herself on a couch in the abode of her kinsman; and when she had been told that she had been saved by a city apprentice, she had pictured to herself a lad of a very different kind to him who now stood before her.
Walter was now nearly sixteen years old. His frame was very powerful and firmly knit. His dark-brown hair was cut short, but, being somewhat longer than was ordinary with the apprentices, fell with a slight wave back on his forehead. His bearing was respectful, and at the same time independent. There was none of that confusion which might be expected on the part of a lad from the city in the presence of a lady of rank. His dark, heavy eyebrows, resolute mouth, and square chin gave an expression of sternness to his face, which was belied by the merry expression of his eyes and the bright smile when he was spoken to.
'I have to thank you, young sir,' she said, holding out her hand, which Walter, after the custom of the time, raised to his lips, bending upon one knee as he did so, 'for the lives of myself and my daughter, which would surely have been lost had you not jumped over to save us.'
'I am glad that I arrived in time to be of aid,' Walter said frankly; 'but indeed I am rather to be blamed than praised, for had I, when I heard the plotting against the safety of the boat, told my master of it, as I should have done, instead of taking the adventure upon mine own shoulders, doubtless a boat would have been sent up in time to prevent the attack from taking place. Therefore, instead of being praised for having arrived a little too late, I should be rated for not having come there in time.'
Dame Vernon smiled.
'Although you may continue to insist that you are to blame, this does not alter the fact that you have saved our lives. Is there any way in which I can be useful to you? Are you discontented with your state? for, in truth, you look as if Nature had intended you for a gallant soldier rather than a city craftsman. Earl Talbot, who is my uncle, would, I am sure, receive you into his following should you so choose it, and I would gladly pay for the canceling of your indentures.'
'I thank you, indeed, lady, for your kind offices,' Walter said earnestly; 'for the present I am well content to remain at my craft, which is that of an armorer, until, at any rate, I have gained such manly strength and vigor as would fit me for a man-at-arms, and my good master, Geoffrey Ward, will, without payment received, let me go when I ask that grace of him.'
'Edith, go and look from the window at the boats passing along the river; and now,' she went on as the girl had obeyed her orders, 'I would fain ask you more about the interview you overheard in the marshes. Sir William de Hertford told me of the evidence that you had given before the justice. It is passing strange that he who incited the other to the deed should have been by him termed 'Sir Knight.' Maybe it was merely a nickname among his fellows.'
'Before I speak, lady,' Walter said quietly, 'I would fain know whether you wish to be assured of the truth. Sometimes, they say, it is wiser to remain in ignorance; at other times forewarned is forearmed. Frankly, I did not tell all I know before the court, deeming that peradventure you might wish to see me, and that I could then tell the whole to your private ear, should you wish to know it, and you could then bid me either keep silence or proclaim all I knew when the trial of these evil-doers comes on.'
'You seem to me to be wise beyond your years, young sir,' the lady said.
'The wisdom is not mine, lady, but my master's. I took counsel with him, and acted as he advised me.'
'I would fain know all,' the lady said. 'I have already strange suspicions of one from whom assuredly I looked not for such evil designs. It will grieve me to be convinced that the suspicions are well founded; but it will be better to know the truth than to remain in a state of doubt.'
'The person, then, was a knight, for I had seen him before when he came in knightly harness into my master's shop to have two rivets put into his hauberk. I liked not his face then, and should have remembered it anywhere. I knew him at once when I saw him. He was a dark-faced knight, handsome, and yet with features which reminded me of a hawk.'
Dame Vernon gave a little exclamation, which assured the lad that she recognized the description.
'You may partly know, lady, whether it is he whom you suppose, for he said that he would detain your boat so that it should not come along until dark, and, moreover, he told them that they would know the boat since you would be wrapped in a white mantle.'
The lady sat for some time with her face hidden in her hands.
'It is as I feared,' she said at last, 'and it grieves me to the heart to think that one who, although not so nearly related in blood, I regarded as a brother, should have betrayed me to death. My mind is troubled indeed, and I know not what course I shall take, whether to reveal this dreadful secret or to conceal it.'
'I may say, madam,' Walter said earnestly, 'that should you wish the matter to remain a secret, you may rely upon it that I will tell no more at the trial than I revealed yesterday; but I would remind you that there is a danger that the leader of yon ruffians, who is probably alone acquainted with the name of his employer, may, under the influence of the torture, reveal it.'
'That fear is for the present past, since a messenger arrived from Kingston but a few minutes since, saying that yester even, under the threat of torture, the prisoners had pointed out the one among their number who was their chief. This morning, however, it was found that the warder who had charge of them had been bribed; he was missing from his post, and the door of the cell wherein the principal villain had been immured, apart from the others, was opened, and he had escaped.'
'Then,' Walter said, 'it is now open to you to speak or be silent as you will. You will pardon my forwardness if I say that my master, in talking the matter over with me, suggested that this evil knight might be scared from attempting any future enterprise against you were he informed that it was known to several persons that he was the author of this outrage, and that if any further attempts were at any time made against you, the proofs of his crime would be laid before the king.'
'Thanks, good lad,' the lady said, 'for your suggestion. Should I decide to keep the matter secret, I will myself send him a message to that effect, in such guise that he would not know whence it comes. And now, I would fain reward you for what you have done for us; and,' she went on, seeing a flush suddenly mount upon the lad's face as
