As Amy shrunk back with terror, which the incensed Queen interpreted as
that of conscious guilt, Elizabeth rapidly advanced, seized on her arm,
and hastened with swift and long steps out of the grotto, and along
the principal alley of the Pleasance, dragging with her the terrified
Countess, whom she still held by the arm, and whose utmost exertions
could but just keep pace with those of the indignant Queen.

Leicester was at this moment the centre of a splendid group of lords and
ladies, assembled together under an arcade, or portico, which closed
the alley. The company had drawn together in that place, to attend the
commands of her Majesty when the hunting-party should go forward, and
their astonishment may be imagined when, instead of seeing Elizabeth
advance towards them with her usual measured dignity of motion, they
beheld her walking so rapidly that she was in the midst of them ere they
were aware; and then observed, with fear and surprise, that her features
were flushed betwixt anger and agitation, that her hair was loosened by
her haste of motion, and that her eyes sparkled as they were wont when
the spirit of Henry VIII. mounted highest in his daughter. Nor were they
less astonished at the appearance of the pale, attenuated, half-dead,
yet still lovely female, whom the Queen upheld by main strength with
one hand, while with the other she waved aside the ladies and nobles
who pressed towards her, under the idea that she was taken suddenly ill.
"Where is my Lord of Leicester?" she said, in a tone that thrilled with
astonishment all the courtiers who stood around. "Stand forth, my Lord
of Leicester!"

If, in the midst of the most serene day of summer, when all is light and
laughing around, a thunderbolt were to fall from the clear blue vault of
heaven, and rend the earth at the very feet of some careless traveller,
he could not gaze upon the smouldering chasm, which so unexpectedly
yawned before him, with half the astonishment and fear which Leicester
felt at the sight that so suddenly presented itself. He had that
instant been receiving, with a political affectation of disavowing
and misunderstanding their meaning, the half-uttered, half-intimated
congratulations of the courtiers upon the favour of the Queen, carried
apparently to its highest pitch during the interview of that morning,
from which most of them seemed to augur that he might soon arise from
their equal in rank to become their master. And now, while the subdued
yet proud smile with which he disclaimed those inferences was yet
curling his cheek, the Queen shot into the circle, her passions excited
to the uttermost; and supporting with one hand, and apparently without
an effort, the pale and sinking form of his almost expiring wife,
and pointing with the finger of the other to her half-dead features,
demanded in a voice that sounded to the ears of the astounded statesman
like the last dread trumpet-call that is to summon body and spirit to
the judgment-seat, "Knowest thou this woman?"

As, at the blast of that last trumpet, the guilty shall call upon the
mountains to cover them, Leicester's inward thoughts invoked the stately
arch which he had built in his pride to burst its strong conjunction,
and overwhelm them in its ruins. But the cemented stones, architrave and
battlement, stood fast; and it was the proud master himself who, as
if some actual pressure had bent him to the earth, kneeled down before
Elizabeth, and prostrated his brow to the marble flag-stones on which
she stood.

"Leicester," said Elizabeth, in a voice which trembled with passion,
"could I think thou hast practised on me--on me thy Sovereign--on me thy
confiding, thy too partial mistress, the base and ungrateful deception
which thy present confusion surmises--by all that is holy, false lord,
that head of thine were in as great peril as ever was thy father's!"

Leicester had not conscious innocence, but he had pride to support him.
He raised slowly his brow and features, which were black and swoln with
contending emotions, and only replied, "My head cannot fall but by the
sentence of my peers. To them I will plead, and not to a princess who
thus requites my faithful service."

"What! my lords," said Elizabeth, looking around, "we are defied, I
think--defied in the Castle we have ourselves bestowed on this proud
man!--My Lord Shrewsbury, you are Marshal of England, attach him of high
treason."

"Whom does your Grace mean?" said Shrewsbury, much surprised, for he had
that instant joined the astonished circle.

"Whom should I mean, but that traitor Dudley, Earl of Leicester!--Cousin
of Hunsdon, order out your band of gentlemen pensioners, and take him
into instant custody. I say, villain, make haste!"

Hunsdon, a rough old noble, who, from his relationship to the Boleyns,
was accustomed to use more freedom with the Queen than almost any other
dared to do, replied bluntly, "And it is like your Grace might order me
to the Tower to-morrow for making too much haste. I do beseech you to be
patient."

"Patient--God's life!" exclaimed the Queen--"name not the word to me;
thou knowest not of what he is guilty!"

Amy, who had by this time in some degree recovered herself, and who saw
her husband, as she conceived, in the utmost danger from the rage of an
offended Sovereign, instantly (and alas! how many women have done the
same) forgot her own wrongs and her own danger in her apprehensions for
him, and throwing herself before the Queen, embraced her knees, while
she exclaimed, "He is guiltless, madam--he is guiltless; no one can lay
aught to the charge of the noble Leicester!"

"Why, minion," answered the Queen, "didst not thou thyself say that the
Earl of Leicester was privy to thy whole history?"

"Did I say so?" repeated the unhappy Amy, laying aside every
consideration of consistency and of self-interest. "Oh, if I did, I
foully belied him. May God so judge me, as I believe he was never privy
to a thought that would harm me!"

"Woman!" said Elizabeth, "I will know who has moved thee to this; or
my wrath--and the wrath of kings is a flaming fire--shall wither and
consume thee like a weed in the furnace!"

As the Queen uttered this threat, Leicester's better angel called
his pride to his aid, and reproached him with the utter extremity
of meanness which would overwhelm him for ever if he stooped to take
shelter under the generous interposition of his wife, and abandoned
her, in return for her kindness, to the resentment of the Queen. He had
already raised his head with the dignity of a man of honour to avow
his marriage, and proclaim himself the protector of his Countess, when
Varney, born, as it appeared, to be his master's evil genius, rushed
into the presence with every mark of disorder on his face and apparel.

"What means this saucy intrusion?" said Elizabeth.

Varney, with the air of a man altogether overwhelmed with grief and
confusion, prostrated himself before her feet, exclaiming, "Pardon, my
Liege, pardon!--or at least let your justice avenge itself on me, where
it is due; but spare my noble, my generous, my innocent patron and
master!"

Amy, who was yet kneeling, started up as she saw the man whom she deemed
most odious place himself so near her, and was about to fly towards
Leicester, when, checked at once by the uncertainty and even timidity
which his looks had reassumed as soon as the appearance of his confidant
seemed to open a new scene, she hung back, and uttering a faint scream,
besought of her Majesty to cause her to be imprisoned in the lowest
dungeon of the Castle--to deal with her as the worst of criminals--"but
spare," she exclaimed, "my sight and hearing what will destroy the
little judgment I have left--the sight of that unutterable and most
shameless villain!"

"And why, sweetheart?" said the Queen, moved by a new impulse; "what
hath he, this false knight, since such thou accountest him, done to
thee?"

"Oh, worse than sorrow, madam, and worse than injury--he has sown
dissension where most there should be peace. I shall go mad if I look
longer on him!"

"Beshrew me, but I think thou art distraught already," answered the
Queen.--"My Lord Hunsdon, look to this poor distressed young woman, and
let her be safely bestowed, and in honest keeping, till we require her
to be forthcoming."

Two or three of the ladies in attendance, either moved by compassion
for a creature so interesting, or by some other motive, offered their
services to look after her; but the Queen briefly answered, "Ladies,
under favour, no. You have all (give God thanks) sharp ears and nimble
tongues; our kinsman Hunsdon has ears of the dullest, and a tongue
somewhat rough, but yet of the slowest.--Hunsdon, look to it that none
have speech of her."

"By Our Lady," said Hunsdon, taking in his strong, sinewy arms the
fading and almost swooning form of Amy, "she is a lovely child! and
though a rough nurse, your Grace hath given her a kind one. She is safe
with me as one of my own ladybirds of daughters."

So saying, he carried her off; unresistingly and almost unconsciously,
his war-worn locks and long, grey beard mingling with her light-brown
tresses, as her head reclined on his strong, square shoulder. The Queen
followed him with her eye. She had already, with that self-command which
forms so necessary a part of a Sovereign's accomplishments, suppressed
every appearance of agitation, and seemed as if she desired to banish
all traces of her burst of passion from the recollection of those who
had witnessed it. "My Lord of Hunsdon says well," she observed, "he is
indeed but a rough nurse for so tender a babe."

"My Lord of Hunsdon," said the Dean of St. Asaph--"I speak it not in
defamation of his more noble qualities--hath a broad license in speech,
and garnishes his discourse somewhat too freely with the cruel and
superstitious oaths which savour both of profaneness and of old
Papistrie."

"It is the fault of his blood, Mr. Dean," said the Queen, turning
sharply round upon the reverend dignitary as she spoke; "and you may
blame mine for the same distemperature. The Boleyns were ever a hot and
plain-spoken race, more hasty to speak their mind than careful to
choose their expressions. And by my word--I hope there is no sin in that
affirmation--I question if it were much cooled by mixing with that of
Tudor."

As she made this last observation she smiled graciously, and stole her
eyes almost insensibly round to seek those of the Earl of Leicester, to
whom she now began to think she had spoken with hasty harshness upon the
unfounded suspicion of a moment.

The Queen's eye found the Earl in no mood to accept the implied offer
of conciliation. His own looks had followed, with late and rueful
repentance, the faded form which Hunsdon had just borne from the
presence. They now reposed gloomily on the ground, but more--so at least
it seemed to Elizabeth--with the expression of one who has received an
unjust affront, than of him who is conscious of guilt. She turned her
face angrily from him, and said to Varney, "Speak, Sir Richard, and
explain these riddles--thou hast sense and the use of speech, at least,
which elsewhere we look for in vain."

As she said this, she darted another resentful glance towards Leicester,
while the wily Varney hastened to tell his own story.

"Your Majesty's piercing eye," he said, "has already detected the cruel
malady of my beloved lady, which, unhappy that I am, I would not suffer
to be expressed in the certificate of her physician, seeking to conceal
what has now broken out with so much the more scandal."

"She is then distraught?" said the Queen. "Indeed we doubted not of
it; her whole demeanour bears it out. I found her moping in a corner of
yonder grotto; and every word she spoke--which indeed I dragged from her
as by the rack--she instantly recalled and forswore. But how came she
hither? Why had you her not in safe-keeping?"

"My gracious Liege," said Varney, "the worthy gentleman under whose
charge I left her, Master Anthony Foster, has come hither but now, as
fast as man and horse can travel, to show me of her escape, which
she managed with the art peculiar to many who are afflicted with this
malady. He is at hand for examination."

"Let it be for another time," said the Queen. "But, Sir Richard, we envy
you not your domestic felicity; your lady railed on you bitterly, and
seemed ready to swoon at beholding you."

"It is the nature of persons in her disorder, so please your Grace,"
answered Varney, "to be ever most inveterate in their spleen against
those whom, in their better moments, they hold nearest and dearest."

"We have heard so, indeed," said Elizabeth, "and give faith to the
saying."

"May your Grace then be pleased," said Varney, "to command my
unfortunate wife to be delivered into the custody of her friends?"

Leicester partly started; but making a strong effort, he subdued his
emotion, while Elizabeth answered sharply, "You are something too hasty,
Master Varney. We will have first a report of the lady's health and
state of mind from Masters, our own physician, and then determine what
shall be thought just. You shall have license, however, to see her, that
if there be any matrimonial quarrel betwixt you--such things we have
heard do occur, even betwixt a loving couple--you may make it up,
without further scandal to our court or trouble to ourselves."

Varney bowed low, and made no other answer.

Elizabeth again looked towards Leicester, and said, with a degree of
condescension which could only arise out of the most heartfelt interest,
"Discord, as the Italian poet says, will find her way into peaceful
convents, as well as into the privacy of families; and we fear our
own guards and ushers will hardly exclude her from courts. My Lord of
Leicester, you are offended with us, and we have right to be offended
with you. We will take the lion's part upon us, and be the first to
forgive."

Leicester smoothed his brow, as by an effort; but the trouble was too
deep-seated that its placidity should at once return. He said, however,
that which fitted the occasion, "That he could not have the happiness of
forgiving, because she who commanded him to do so could commit no injury
towards him."

Elizabeth seemed content with this reply, and intimated her pleasure
that the sports of the morning should proceed. The bugles sounded, the
hounds bayed, the horses pranced--but the courtiers and ladies sought
the amusement to which they were summoned with hearts very different
from those which had leaped to the morning's REVIELLE. There was doubt,
and fear, and expectation on every brow, and surmise and intrigue in
every whisper.

Blount took an opportunity to whisper into Raleigh's ear, "This storm
came like a levanter in the Mediterranean."

"VARIUM ET MUTABILE," answered Raleigh, in a similar tone.

"Nay, I know nought of your Latin," said Blount; "but I thank God
Tressilian took not the sea during that hurricane. He could scarce have
missed shipwreck, knowing as he does so little how to trim his sails to
a court gale."

"Thou wouldst have instructed him!" said Raleigh.

"Why, I have profited by my time as well as thou, Sir Walter," replied
honest Blount. "I am knight as well as thou, and of the earlier
creation."

"Now, God further thy wit," said Raleigh. "But for Tressilian, I would I
knew what were the matter with him. He told me this morning he would not
leave his chamber for the space of twelve hours or thereby, being bound
by a promise. This lady's madness, when he shall learn it, will not, I
fear, cure his infirmity. The moon is at the fullest, and men's brains
are working like yeast. But hark! they sound to mount. Let us to horse,
Blount; we young knights must deserve our spurs."



CHAPTER XXXV.

     Sincerity,
     Thou first of virtues!  let no mortal leave
     Thy onward path, although the earth should gape,
     And from the gulf of hell destruction cry,
     To take dissimulation's winding way.    --DOUGLAS.

It was not till after a long and successful morning's sport, and a
prolonged repast which followed the return of the Queen to the Castle,
that Leicester at length found himself alone with Varney, from whom he
now learned the whole particulars of the Countess's escape, as they
had been brought to Kenilworth by Foster, who, in his terror for the
consequences, had himself posted thither with the tidings. As Varney,
in his narrative, took especial care to be silent concerning those
practices on the Countess's health which had driven her to so desperate
a resolution, Leicester, who could only suppose that she had adopted
it out of jealous impatience to attain the avowed state and appearance
belonging to her rank, was not a little offended at the levity with
which his wife had broken his strict commands, and exposed him to the
resentment of Elizabeth.

"I have given," he said, "to this daughter of an obscure Devonshire
gentleman the proudest name in England. I have made her sharer of my bed
and of my fortunes. I ask but of her a little patience, ere she launches
forth upon the full current of her grandeur; and the infatuated woman
will rather hazard her own shipwreck and mine--will rather involve me
in a thousand whirlpools, shoals, and quicksands, and compel me to
a thousand devices which shame me in mine own eyes--than tarry for a
little space longer in the obscurity to which she was born. So lovely,
so delicate, so fond, so faithful, yet to lack in so grave a matter the
prudence which one might hope from the veriest fool--it puts me beyond
my patience."

"We may post it over yet well enough," said Varney, "if my lady will be
but ruled, and take on her the character which the time commands."

"It is but too true, Sir Richard," said Leicester; "there is indeed no
other remedy. I have heard her termed thy wife in my presence,
without contradiction. She must bear the title until she is far from
Kenilworth."

"And long afterwards, I trust," said Varney; then instantly added, "For
I cannot but hope it will be long after ere she bear the title of Lady
Leicester--I fear me it may scarce be with safety during the life of
this Queen. But your lordship is best judge, you alone knowing what
passages have taken place betwixt Elizabeth and you."

"You are right, Varney," said Leicester. "I have this morning been both
fool and villain; and when Elizabeth hears of my unhappy marriage, she
cannot but think herself treated with that premeditated slight which
women never forgive. We have once this day stood upon terms little short
of defiance; and to those, I fear, we must again return."

"Is her resentment, then, so implacable?" said Varney.

"Far from it," replied the Earl; "for, being what she is in spirit and
in station, she has even this day been but too condescending, in giving
me opportunities to repair what she thinks my faulty heat of temper."

"Ay," answered Varney; "the Italians say right--in lovers' quarrels, the
party that loves most is always most willing to acknowledge the greater
fault. So then, my lord, if this union with the lady could be concealed,
you stand with Elizabeth as you did?"

Leicester sighed, and was silent for a moment, ere he replied.

"Varney, I think thou art true to me, and I will tell thee all. I do NOT
stand where I did. I have spoken to Elizabeth--under what mad impulse
I know not--on a theme which cannot be abandoned without touching
every female feeling to the quick, and which yet I dare not and cannot
prosecute. She can never, never forgive me for having caused and
witnessed those yieldings to human passion."

"We must do something, my lord," said Varney, "and that speedily."

"There is nought to be done," answered Leicester, despondingly. "I am
like one that has long toiled up a dangerous precipice, and when he is
within one perilous stride of the top, finds his progress arrested
when retreat has become impossible. I see above me the pinnacle which I
cannot reach--beneath me the abyss into which I must fall, as soon as
my relaxing grasp and dizzy brain join to hurl me from my present
precarious stance."

"Think better of your situation, my lord," said Varney; "let us try the
experiment in which you have but now acquiesced. Keep we your marriage
from Elizabeth's knowledge, and all may yet be well. I will instantly go
to the lady myself. She hates me, because I have been earnest with your
lordship, as she truly suspects, in opposition to what she terms her
rights. I care not for her prejudices--she SHALL listen to me; and I
will show her such reasons for yielding to the pressure of the times
that I doubt not to bring back her consent to whatever measures these
exigencies may require."

"No, Varney," said Leicester; "I have thought upon what is to be done,
and I will myself speak with Amy."

It was now Varney's turn to feel upon his own account the terrors
which he affected to participate solely on account of his patron. "Your
lordship will not yourself speak with the lady?"

"It is my fixed purpose," said Leicester. "Fetch me one of the
livery-cloaks; I will pass the sentinel as thy servant. Thou art to have
free access to her."

"But, my lord--"

"I will have no BUTS," replied Leicester; "it shall be even thus, and
not otherwise. Hunsdon sleeps, I think, in Saintlowe's Tower. We can go
thither from these apartments by the private passage, without risk of
meeting any one. Or what if I do meet Hunsdon? he is more my friend than
enemy, and thick-witted enough to adopt any belief that is thrust on
him. Fetch me the cloak instantly."

Varney had no alternative save obedience. In a few minutes Leicester was
muffled in the mantle, pulled his bonnet over his brows, and followed
Varney along the secret passage of the Castle which communicated with
Hunsdon's apartments, in which there was scarce a chance of meeting
any inquisitive person, and hardly light enough for any such to have
satisfied their curiosity. They emerged at a door where Lord Hunsdon
had, with military precaution, placed a sentinel, one of his own
northern retainers as it fortuned, who readily admitted Sir Richard
Varney and his attendant, saying only, in his northern dialect, "I
would, man, thou couldst make the mad lady be still yonder; for her
moans do sae dirl through my head that I would rather keep watch on a
snowdrift, in the wastes of Catlowdie."

They hastily entered, and shut the door behind them.

"Now, good devil, if there be one," said Varney, within himself,
"for once help a votary at a dead pinch, for my boat is amongst the
breakers!"

The Countess Amy, with her hair and her garments dishevelled, was seated
upon a sort of couch, in an attitude of the deepest affliction, out of
which she was startled by the opening of the door. Size turned hastily
round, and fixing her eye on Varney, exclaimed, "Wretch! art thou come
to frame some new plan of villainy?"

Leicester cut short her reproaches by stepping forward and dropping his
cloak, while he said, in a voice rather of authority than of affection,
"It is with me, madam, you have to commune, not with Sir Richard
Varney."

The change effected on the Countess's look and manner was like magic.
"Dudley!" she exclaimed, "Dudley! and art thou come at last?" And with
the speed of lightning she flew to her husband, clung round his neck,
and unheeding the presence of Varney, overwhelmed him with caresses,
while she bathed his face in a flood of tears, muttering, at the
same time, but in broken and disjointed monosyllables, the fondest
expressions which Love teaches his votaries.

Leicester, as it seemed to him, had reason to be angry with his lady
for transgressing his commands, and thus placing him in the perilous
situation in which he had that morning stood. But what displeasure could
keep its ground before these testimonies of affection from a being so
lovely, that even the negligence of dress, and the withering effects
of fear, grief, and fatigue, which would have impaired the beauty of
others, rendered hers but the more interesting. He received and repaid
her caresses with fondness mingled with melancholy, the last of which
she seemed scarcely to observe, until the first transport of her own joy
was over, when, looking anxiously in his face, she asked if he was ill.

"Not in my body, Amy," was his answer.

"Then I will be well too. O Dudley! I have been ill!--very ill, since
we last met!--for I call not this morning's horrible vision a meeting.
I have been in sickness, in grief, and in danger. But thou art come, and
all is joy, and health, and safety!"

"Alas, Amy," said Leicester, "thou hast undone me!"

"I, my lord?" said Amy, her cheek at once losing its transient flush of
joy--"how could I injure that which I love better than myself?"

"I would not upbraid you, Amy," replied the Earl; "but are you not
here contrary to my express commands--and does not your presence here
endanger both yourself and me?"

"Does it, does it indeed?" she exclaimed eagerly; "then why am I here a
moment longer? Oh, if you knew by what fears I was urged to quit Cumnor
Place! But I will say nothing of myself--only that if it might be
otherwise, I would not willingly return THITHER; yet if it concern your
safety--"

"We will think, Amy, of some other retreat," said Leicester; "and you
shall go to one of my northern castles, under the personage--it will be
but needful, I trust, for a very few days--of Varney's wife."

"How, my Lord of Leicester!" said the lady, disengaging herself from
his embraces; "is it to your wife you give the dishonourable counsel to
acknowledge herself the bride of another--and of all men, the bride of
that Varney?"

"Madam, I speak it in earnest--Varney is my true and faithful servant,
trusted in my deepest secrets. I had better lose my right hand than his
service at this moment. You have no cause to scorn him as you do."

"I could assign one, my lord," replied the Countess; "and I see he
shakes even under that assured look of his. But he that is necessary as
your right hand to your safety is free from any accusation of mine. May
he be true to you; and that he may be true, trust him not too much or
too far. But it is enough to say that I will not go with him unless by
violence, nor would I acknowledge him as my husband were all--"

"It is a temporary deception, madam," said Leicester, irritated by her
opposition, "necessary for both our safeties, endangered by you through
female caprice, or the premature desire to seize on a rank to which
I gave you title only under condition that our marriage, for a time,
should continue secret. If my proposal disgust you, it is yourself has
brought it on both of us. There is no other remedy--you must do what
your own impatient folly hath rendered necessary--I command you."

"I cannot put your commands, my lord," said Amy, "in balance with those
of honour and conscience. I will NOT, in this instance, obey you.
You may achieve your own dishonour, to which these crooked policies
naturally tend, but I will do nought that can blemish mine. How could
you again, my lord, acknowledge me as a pure and chaste matron, worthy
to share your fortunes, when, holding that high character, I had
strolled the country the acknowledged wife of such a profligate fellow
as your servant Varney?"

"My lord," said Varney interposing, "my lady is too much prejudiced
against me, unhappily, to listen to what I can offer, yet it may please
her better than what she proposes. She has good interest with Master
Edmund Tressilian, and could doubtless prevail on him to consent to
be her companion to Lidcote Hall, and there she might remain in safety
until time permitted the development of this mystery."

Leicester was silent, but stood looking eagerly on Amy, with eyes which
seemed suddenly to glow as much with suspicion as displeasure.

The Countess only said, "Would to God I were in my father's house!
When I left it, I little thought I was leaving peace of mind and honour
behind me."

Varney proceeded with a tone of deliberation. "Doubtless this will make
it necessary to take strangers into my lord's counsels; but surely the
Countess will be warrant for the honour of Master Tressilian, and such
of her father's family--"

"Peace, Varney," said Leicester; "by Heaven I will strike my dagger into
thee if again thou namest Tressilian as a partner of my counsels!"

"And wherefore not!" said the Countess; "unless they be counsels fitter
for such as Varney, than for a man of stainless honour and integrity. My
lord, my lord, bend no angry brows on me; it is the truth, and it is I
who speak it. I once did Tressilian wrong for your sake; I will not do
him the further injustice of being silent when his honour is brought in
question. I can forbear," she said, looking at Varney, "to pull the
mask off hypocrisy, but I will not permit virtue to be slandered in my
hearing."

There was a dead pause. Leicester stood displeased, yet undetermined,
and too conscious of the weakness of his cause; while Varney, with a
deep and hypocritical affectation of sorrow, mingled with humility, bent
his eyes on the ground.

It was then that the Countess Amy displayed, in the midst of distress
and difficulty, the natural energy of character which would have
rendered her, had fate allowed, a distinguished ornament of the rank
which she held. She walked up to Leicester with a composed step, a
dignified air, and looks in which strong affection essayed in vain to
shake the firmness of conscious, truth and rectitude of principle. "You
have spoken your mind, my lord," she said, "in these difficulties,
with which, unhappily, I have found myself unable to comply. This
gentleman--this person I would say--has hinted at another scheme, to
which I object not but as it displeases you. Will your lordship be
pleased to hear what a young and timid woman, but your most affectionate
wife, can suggest in the present extremity?"

Leicester was silent, but bent his head towards the Countess, as an
intimation that she was at liberty to proceed.

"There hath been but one cause for all these evils, my lord," she
proceeded, "and it resolves itself into the mysterious duplicity with
which you, have been induced to surround yourself. Extricate yourself at
once, my lord, from the tyranny of these disgraceful trammels. Be like
a true English gentleman, knight, and earl, who holds that truth is the
foundation of honour, and that honour is dear to him as the breath of
his nostrils. Take your ill-fated wife by the hand, lead her to the
footstool of Elizabeth's throne--say that in a moment of infatuation,
moved by supposed beauty, of which none perhaps can now trace even the
remains, I gave my hand to this Amy Robsart. You will then have done
justice to me, my lord, and to your own honour and should law or power
require you to part from me, I will oppose no objection, since I may
then with honour hide a grieved and broken heart in those shades from
which your love withdrew me. Then--have but a little patience, and Amy's
life will not long darken your brighter prospects."

There was so much of dignity, so much of tenderness, in the Countess's
remonstrance, that it moved all that was noble and generous in the
soul of her husband. The scales seemed to fall from his eyes, and the
duplicity and tergiversation of which he had been guilty stung him at
once with remorse and shame.

"I am not worthy of you, Amy," he said, "that could weigh aught which
ambition has to give against such a heart as thine. I have a bitter
penance to perform, in disentangling, before sneering foes and astounded
friends, all the meshes of my own deceitful policy. And the Queen--but
let her take my head, as she has threatened."

"Take your head, my lord!" said the Countess, "because you used the
freedom and liberty of an English subject in choosing a wife? For shame!
it is this distrust of the Queen's justice, this apprehension of danger,
which cannot but be imaginary, that, like scarecrows, have induced you
to forsake the straightforward path, which, as it is the best, is also
the safest."

"Ah, Amy, thou little knowest!" said Dudley but instantly checking
himself, he added, "Yet she shall not find in me a safe or easy victim
of arbitrary vengeance. I have friends--I have allies--I will not, like
Norfolk, be dragged to the block as a victim to sacrifice. Fear not,
Amy; thou shalt see Dudley bear himself worthy of his name. I must
instantly communicate with some of those friends on whom I can best
rely; for, as things stand, I may be made prisoner in my own Castle."

"Oh, my good lord," said Amy, "make no faction in a peaceful state!
There is no friend can help us so well as our own candid truth and
honour. Bring but these to our assistance, and you are safe amidst a
whole army of the envious and malignant. Leave these behind you, and all
other defence will be fruitless. Truth, my noble lord, is well painted
unarmed."

"But Wisdom, Amy," answered Leicester, "is arrayed in panoply of
proof. Argue not with me on the means I shall use to render my
confession--since it must be called so--as safe as may be; it will
be fraught with enough of danger, do what we will.--Varney, we must
hence.--Farewell, Amy, whom I am to vindicate as mine own, at an expense
and risk of which thou alone couldst be worthy. You shall soon hear
further from me."

He embraced her fervently, muffled himself as before, and accompanied
Varney from the apartment. The latter, as he left the room, bowed low,
and as he raised his body, regarded Amy with a peculiar expression,
as if he desired to know how far his own pardon was included in the
reconciliation which had taken place betwixt her and her lord. The
Countess looked upon him with a fixed eye, but seemed no more conscious
of his presence than if there had been nothing but vacant air on the
spot where he stood.

"She has brought me to the crisis," he muttered--"she or I am lost.
There was something--I wot not if it was fear or pity--that prompted me
to avoid this fatal crisis. It is now decided--she or I must PERISH."

While he thus spoke, he observed, with surprise, that a boy, repulsed by
the sentinel, made up to Leicester, and spoke with him. Varney was one
of those politicians whom not the slightest appearances escape without
inquiry. He asked the sentinel what the lad wanted with him, and
received for answer that the boy had wished him to transmit a parcel
to the mad lady; but that he cared not to take charge of it, such
communication being beyond his commission, His curiosity satisfied in
that particular, he approached his patron, and heard him say, "Well,
boy, the packet shall be delivered."

"Thanks, good Master Serving-man," said the boy, and was out of sight in
an instant.

Leicester and Varney returned with hasty steps to the Earl's private
apartment, by the same passage which had conducted them to Saintlowe's
Tower.



CHAPTER XXXVI.

     I have said
     This is an adulteress--I have said with whom:
     More, she's a traitor, and Camillo is
     A federary with her, and one that knows
     What she should shame to know herself.   --WINTER'S TALE.

They were no sooner in the Earl's cabinet than, taking his tablets from
his pocket, he began to write, speaking partly to Varney, and partly
to himself--"There are many of them close bounden to me, and especially
those in good estate and high office--many who, if they look back
towards my benefits, or forward towards the perils which may
befall themselves, will not, I think, be disposed to see me stagger
unsupported. Let me see--Knollis is sure, and through his means Guernsey
and Jersey. Horsey commands in the Isle of Wight. My brother-in-law,
Huntingdon, and Pembroke, have authority in Wales. Through Bedford I
lead the Puritans, with their interest, so powerful in all the boroughs.
My brother of Warwick is equal, well-nigh, to myself, in wealth,
followers, and dependencies. Sir Owen Hopton is at my devotion; he
commands the Tower of London, and the national treasure deposited there.
My father and grand-father needed never to have stooped their heads to
the block had they thus forecast their enterprises.--Why look you so
sad, Varney? I tell thee, a tree so deep-rooted is not so easily to be
torn up by the tempest."

"Alas! my lord," said Varney, with well-acted passion, and then resumed
the same look of despondency which Leicester had before noted.

"Alas!" repeated Leicester; "and wherefore alas, Sir Richard? Doth your
new spirit of chivalry supply no more vigorous ejaculation when a noble
struggle is impending? Or, if ALAS means thou wilt flinch from the
conflict, thou mayest leave the Castle, or go join mine enemies,
whichever thou thinkest best."

"Not so, my lord," answered his confidant; "Varney will be found
fighting or dying by your side. Forgive me, if, in love to you, I see
more fully than your noble heart permits you to do, the inextricable
difficulties with which you are surrounded. You are strong, my lord,
and powerful; yet, let me say it without offence, you are so only by
the reflected light of the Queen's favour. While you are Elizabeth's
favourite, you are all, save in name, like an actual sovereign. But let
her call back the honours she has bestowed, and the prophet's gourd did
not wither more suddenly. Declare against the Queen, and I do not say
that in the wide nation, or in this province alone, you would find
yourself instantly deserted and outnumbered; but I will say, that even
in this very Castle, and in the midst of your vassals, kinsmen, and
dependants, you would be a captive, nay, a sentenced captive, should she
please to say the word. Think upon Norfolk, my lord--upon the powerful
Northumberland--the splendid Westmoreland;--think on all who have made
head against this sage Princess. They are dead, captive, or fugitive.
This is not like other thrones, which can be overturned by a combination
of powerful nobles; the broad foundations which support it are in the
extended love and affections of the people. You might share it with
Elizabeth if you would; but neither yours, nor any other power, foreign
or domestic, will avail to overthrow, or even to shake it."

He paused, and Leicester threw his tablets from him with an air of
reckless despite. "It may be as thou sayest," he said? "and, in sooth,
I care not whether truth or cowardice dictate thy forebodings. But it
shall not be said I fell without a struggle. Give orders that those of
my retainers who served under me in Ireland be gradually drawn into the
main Keep, and let our gentlemen and friends stand on their guard, and
go armed, as if they expected arm onset from the followers of Sussex.
Possess the townspeople with some apprehension; let them take arms, and
be ready, at a given signal, to overpower the Pensioners and Yeomen of
the Guard."

"Let me remind you, my lord," said Varney, with the same appearance of
deep and melancholy interest, "that you have given me orders to prepare
for disarming the Queen's guard. It is an act of high treason, but you
shall nevertheless be obeyed."

"I care not," said Leicester desperately--"I care not. Shame is behind
me, ruin before me; I must on."

Here there was another pause, which Varney at length broke with the
following words: "It is come to the point I have long dreaded. I must
either witness, like an ungrateful beast, the downfall of the best and
kindest of masters, or I must speak what I would have buried in the
deepest oblivion, or told by any other mouth than mine."

"What is that thou sayest, or wouldst say?" replied the Earl; "we have
no time to waste on words when the times call us to action."

"My speech is soon made, my lord--would to God it were as soon answered!
Your marriage is the sole cause of the threatened breach with your
Sovereign, my lord, is it not?"

"Thou knowest it is!" replied Leicester. "What needs so fruitless a
question?"

"Pardon me, my lord," said Varney; "the use lies here. Men will wager
their lands and lives in defence of a rich diamond, my lord; but were it
not first prudent to look if there is no flaw in it?"

"What means this?" said Leicester, with eyes sternly fixed on his
dependant; "of whom dost thou dare to speak?"

"It is--of the Countess Amy, my lord, of whom I am unhappily bound to
speak; and of whom I WILL speak, were your lordship to kill me for my
zeal."

"Thou mayest happen to deserve it at my hand," said the Earl; "but speak
on, I will hear thee."

"Nay, then, my lord, I will be bold. I speak for my own life as well as
for your lordship's. I like not this lady's tampering and trickstering
with this same Edmund Tressilian. You know him, my lord. You know he had
formerly an interest in her, which it cost your lordship some pains to
supersede. You know the eagerness with which he has pressed on the suit
against me in behalf of this lady, the open object of which is to drive
your lordship to an avowal of what I must ever call your most unhappy
marriage, the point to which my lady also is willing, at any risk, to
urge you."

Leicester smiled constrainedly. "Thou meanest well, good Sir Richard,
and wouldst, I think, sacrifice thine own honour, as well as that of any
other person, to save me from what thou thinkest a step so terrible. But
remember"--he spoke these words with the most stern decision--"you speak
of the Countess of Leicester."

"I do, my lord," said Varney; "but it is for the welfare of the Earl of
Leicester. My tale is but begun. I do most strongly believe that this
Tressilian has, from the beginning of his moving in her cause, been in
connivance with her ladyship the Countess."

"Thou speakest wild madness, Varney, with the sober face of a preacher.
Where, or how, could they communicate together?"

"My lord," said Varney, "unfortunately I can show that but too well.
It was just before the supplication was presented to the Queen, in
Tressilian's name, that I met him, to my utter astonishment, at the
postern gate which leads from the demesne at Cumnor Place."

"Thou met'st him, villain! and why didst thou not strike him dead?"
exclaimed Leicester.

"I drew on him, my lord, and he on me; and had not my foot slipped, he
would not, perhaps, have been again a stumbling-block in your lordship's
path."

Leicester seemed struck dumb with surprise. At length he answered,
"What other evidence hast thou of this, Varney, save thine own
assertion?--for, as I will punish deeply, I will examine coolly and
warily. Sacred Heaven!--but no--I will examine coldly and warily--coldly
and warily." He repeated these words more than once to himself, as if in
the very sound there was a sedative quality; and again compressing his
lips, as if he feared some violent expression might escape from them, he
asked again, "What further proof?"

"Enough, my lord," said Varney, "and to spare. I would it rested with me
alone, for with me it might have been silenced for ever. But my servant,
Michael Lambourne, witnessed the whole, and was, indeed, the means of
first introducing Tressilian into Cumnor Place; and therefore I took him
into my service, and retained him in it, though something of a debauched
fellow, that I might have his tongue always under my own command." He
then acquainted Lord Leicester how easy it was to prove the circumstance
of their interview true, by evidence of Anthony Foster, with the
corroborative testimonies of the various persons at Cumnor, who had
heard the wager laid, and had seen Lambourne and Tressilian set off
together. In the whole narrative, Varney hazarded nothing fabulous,
excepting that, not indeed by direct assertion, but by inference, he led
his patron to suppose that the interview betwixt Amy and Tressilian at
Cumnor Place had been longer than the few minutes to which it was in
reality limited.

"And wherefore was I not told of all this?" said Leicester sternly. "Why
did all of ye--and in particular thou, Varney--keep back from me such
material information?"

"Because, my lord," replied Varney, "the Countess pretended to Foster
and to me that Tressilian had intruded himself upon her; and I concluded
their interview had been in all honour, and that she would at her own
time tell it to your lordship. Your lordship knows with what unwilling
ears we listen to evil surmises against those whom we love; and I thank
Heaven I am no makebate or informer, to be the first to sow them."

"You are but too ready to receive them, however, Sir Richard," replied
his patron. "How knowest thou that this interview was not in all honour,
as thou hast said? Methinks the wife of the Earl of Leicester might
speak for a short time with such a person as Tressilian without injury
to me or suspicion to herself."

"Questionless, my lord," answered Varney, "Had I thought otherwise,
I had been no keeper of the secret. But here lies the rub--Tressilian
leaves not the place without establishing a correspondence with a poor
man, the landlord of an inn in Cumnor, for the purpose of carrying off
the lady. He sent down an emissary of his, whom I trust soon to have
in right sure keeping under Mervyn's Tower--Killigrew and Lambsbey are
scouring the country in quest of him. The host is rewarded with a ring
for keeping counsel--your lordship may have noted it on Tressilian's
hand--here it is. This fellow, this agent, makes his way to the place
as a pedlar; holds conferences with the lady, and they make their escape
together by night; rob a poor fellow of a horse by the way, such was
their guilty haste, and at length reach this Castle, where the Countess
of Leicester finds refuge--I dare not say in what place."

"Speak, I command thee," said Leicester--"speak, while I retain sense
enough to hear thee."

"Since it must be so," answered Varney, "the lady resorted immediately
to the apartment of Tressilian, where she remained many hours, partly in
company with him, and partly alone. I told you Tressilian had a paramour
in his chamber; I little dreamed that paramour was--"

"Amy, thou wouldst say," answered Leicester; "but it is false, false as
the smoke of hell! Ambitious she may be--fickle and impatient--'tis a
woman's fault; but false to me!--never, never. The proof--the proof of
this!" he exclaimed hastily.

"Carrol, the Deputy Marshal, ushered her thither by her own desire, on
yesterday afternoon; Lambourne and the Warder both found her there at an
early hour this morning."

"Was Tressilian there with her?" said Leicester, in the same hurried
tone.

"No, my lord. You may remember," answered Varney, "that he was that
night placed with Sir Nicholas Blount, under a species of arrest."

"Did Carrol, or the other fellows, know who she was?" demanded
Leicester.

"No, my lord," replied Varney; "Carrol and the Warder had never seen the
Countess, and Lambourne knew her not in her disguise. But in seeking
to prevent her leaving the cell, he obtained possession of one of her
gloves, which, I think, your lordship may know."

He gave the glove, which had the Bear and Ragged Staff, the Earl's
impress, embroidered upon it in seed-pearls.

"I do--I do recognize it," said Leicester. "They were my own gift. The
fellow of it was on the arm which she threw this very day around my
neck!" He spoke this with violent agitation.

"Your lordship," said Varney, "might yet further inquire of the lady
herself respecting the truth of these passages."

"It needs not--it needs not," said the tortured Earl; "it is written
in characters of burning light, as if they were branded on my very
eyeballs! I see her infamy-I can see nought else; and--gracious
Heaven!--for this vile woman was I about to commit to danger the lives
of so many noble friends, shake the foundation of a lawful throne, carry
the sword and torch through the bosom of a peaceful land, wrong the
kind mistress who made me what I am, and would, but for that hell-framed
marriage, have made me all that man can be! All this I was ready to do
for a woman who trinkets and traffics with my worst foes!--And thou,
villain, why didst thou not speak sooner?"

"My lord," said Varney, "a tear from my lady would have blotted out
all I could have said. Besides, I had not these proofs until this very
morning, when Anthony Foster's sudden arrival with the examinations
and declarations, which he had extorted from the innkeeper Gosling and
others, explained the manner of her flight from Cumnor Place, and my own
researches discovered the steps which she had taken here."

"Now, may God be praised for the light He has given! so full, so
satisfactory, that there breathes not a man in England who shall call
my proceeding rash, or my revenge unjust.--And yet, Varney, so young,
so fair, so fawning, and so false! Hence, then, her hatred to thee, my
trusty, my well-beloved servant, because you withstood her plots, and
endangered her paramour's life!"

"I never gave her any other cause of dislike, my lord," replied Varney.
"But she knew that my counsels went directly to diminish her influence
with your lordship; and that I was, and have been, ever ready to peril
my life against your enemies."

"It is too, too apparent," replied Leicester "yet with what an air of
magnanimity she exhorted me to commit my head to the Queen's mercy,
rather than wear the veil of falsehood a moment longer! Methinks the
angel of truth himself can have no such tones of high-souled impulse.
Can it be so, Varney?--can falsehood use thus boldly the language of
truth?--can infamy thus assume the guise of purity? Varney, thou hast
been my servant from a child. I have raised thee high--can raise
thee higher. Think, think for me!--thy brain was ever shrewd and
piercing--may she not be innocent? Prove her so, and all I have yet done
for thee shall be as nothing--nothing, in comparison of thy recompense!"

The agony with which his master spoke had some effect even on the
hardened Varney, who, in the midst of his own wicked and ambitious
designs, really loved his patron as well as such a wretch was capable
of loving anything. But he comforted himself, and subdued his
self-reproaches, with the reflection that if he inflicted upon the Earl
some immediate and transitory pain, it was in order to pave his way to
the throne, which, were this marriage dissolved by death or otherwise,
he deemed Elizabeth would willingly share with his benefactor. He
therefore persevered in his diabolical policy; and after a moment's
consideration, answered the anxious queries of the Earl with a
melancholy look, as if he had in vain sought some exculpation for the
Countess; then suddenly raising his head, he said, with an expression
of hope, which instantly communicated itself to the countenance of his
patron--"Yet wherefore, if guilty, should she have perilled herself
by coming hither? Why not rather have fled to her father's, or
elsewhere?--though that, indeed, might have interfered with her desire
to be acknowledged as Countess of Leicester."

"True, true, true!" exclaimed Leicester, his transient gleam of hope
giving way to the utmost bitterness of feeling and expression; "thou
art not fit to fathom a woman's depth of wit, Varney. I see it all. She
would not quit the estate and title of the wittol who had wedded her.
Ay, and if in my madness I had started into rebellion, or if the angry
Queen had taken my head, as she this morning threatened, the wealthy
dower which law would have assigned to the Countess Dowager of Leicester
had been no bad windfall to the beggarly Tressilian. Well might she
goad me on to danger, which could not end otherwise than profitably to
her,--Speak not for her, Varney! I will have her blood!"

"My lord," replied Varney, "the wildness of your distress breaks forth
in the wildness of your language."

"I say, speak not for her!" replied Leicester; "she has dishonoured
me--she would have murdered me--all ties are burst between us. She shall
die the death of a traitress and adulteress, well merited both by the
laws of God and man! And--what is this casket," he said, "which was even
now thrust into my hand by a boy, with the desire I would convey it
to Tressilian, as he could not give it to the Countess? By Heaven! the
words surprised me as he spoke them, though other matters chased them
from my brain; but now they return with double force. It is her casket
of jewels!--Force it open, Varney--force the hinges open with thy
poniard!"

"She refused the aid of my dagger once," thought Varney, as he
unsheathed the weapon, "to cut the string which bound a letter, but now
it shall work a mightier ministry in her fortunes."

With this reflection, by using the three-cornered stiletto-blade as a
wedge, he forced open the slender silver hinges of the casket. The
Earl no sooner saw them give way than he snatched the casket from Sir
Richard's hand, wrenched off the cover, and tearing out the splendid
contents, flung them on the floor in a transport of rage, while he
eagerly searched for some letter or billet which should make the
fancied guilt of his innocent Countess yet more apparent. Then stamping
furiously on the gems, he exclaimed, "Thus I annihilate the miserable
toys for which thou hast sold thyself, body and soul--consigned thyself
to an early and timeless death, and me to misery and remorse for
ever!--Tell me not of forgiveness, Varney--she is doomed!"

So saying, he left the room, and rushed into an adjacent closet, the
door of which he locked and bolted.

Varney looked after him, while something of a more human feeling seemed
to contend with his habitual sneer. "I am sorry for his weakness," he
said, "but love has made him a child. He throws down and treads on
these costly toys-with the same vehemence would he dash to pieces this
frailest toy of all, of which he used to rave so fondly. But that taste
also will be forgotten when its object is no more. Well, he has no eye
to value things as they deserve, and that nature has given to Varney.
When Leicester shall be a sovereign, he will think as little of the
gales of passion through which he gained that royal port, as ever
did sailor in harbour of the perils of a voyage. But these tell-tale
articles must not remain here--they are rather too rich vails for the
drudges who dress the chamber."