Stray Pearls

CHAPTER XXXIII. BRIDAL PEARLS

When once over the border, and our passports duly examined, we breathed freely, and at our first resting-place Clement took out a suit of my brother's clothes and appeared once more as a gentleman, except for his short hair. He was able, whenever French would serve, to take the management of our journey.

We finished it as before in a canal boat, and the rest of mind and body, and the sense of approaching Millicent, certainly did Eustace good; the hectic fever lessened, and though he slept little at night, he had much good slumber by day, lying on cloaks on deck as we quietly glided along the water, between the fields full of corn, with harvest beginning, and the tall cocks of hay in the large fields, all plenty and high cultivation, and peaceful industry, in contrast with the places we had left devastated by civil war, and the famished population.

The comparison made Clement groan; and yet that canal journey had a pensive joy about it, as we sat beside our sleeping brother and conversed freely and fearlessly, as we had never been able to do for ten minutes together in all the long years that we had loved one another. There was something very sweet in the knowing that, exile as he was, he and I must be all the world to one another. And so indeed it has been. After our stormy beginning, our life has been well-nigh like our voyage on that smooth Dutch stream.

However, the sorrows were not yet over, although at that time we trusted that there would be healing for my dear brother in the very air of the Hague. We landed on a fine August evening, and were at once recognized by some of the English gentlemen who had little to do but to loiter about the quays and see the barges come in. It rejoiced my heart to hear my brother called Lord Walwyn again, instead of by his French title. Yet therewith, it was a shock to see how changed they thought him since he had left them a year before; but they vied with one another in helping us, and we were soon housed in good lodgings. I knew what Eustace most wished to learn, and asked, with as good an air of indifference as I could assume, whether Vrow van Hunker were in the town. 'Vrow van Hunker, the Providence of the Cavaliers?' asked one. 'No; she is at her country-house, where she hath taken in there or four poor starving ladies and parsons with their families.'

When I heard how she was using old Van Hunker's wealth-in providing for our poor loyal folk, and especially for the clergy, pensioning some, hospitably receiving others in her own house, and seeking employment for others-I had to repent of all the scorn with which I had looked on Millicent Wardour as a poor fickle creature, and now I had to own that my brother's love had been as nearly worthy of him as any creature could be.

Eustace would not, however, go to visit her until he had seen Dr. Dirkius, to whom he repaired early the next day, having caused a hackney coach to be ordered against his return, and bestowed Clement on an English friend who could speak French well. For Eustace held that it would be more fitting, in the sight of the world, for me to go with him to visit Madame van Hunker.

The carriage was at the door when he came back from the physician's. There never was anything to find fault with in his looks, and on this day, with his light brown hair and beard freshly-trimmed and shinning, his clear skin with the red colour in his cheek, and his bright eyes, in their hollow caves, there was something so transparent and sublimated in his aspect, that I thought that he looked more like a spirit than a bridegroom. He was gave and silent by the way, and there was something about him that withheld me from asking what Dirkius had said to him.

Thus we reached the entrance of the great double avenue, along which, as we presently saw, two English clergymen were walking together in conversation, and we saw a little farther on some children at play.

'This is well,' said Eustace, as he looked out. 'I thank God for this! It will be all the better for her that such a good work is begun.'

'Nay,' said I, 'but what will the poor things do when she loses old Hunkers's gold?'

'Sister,' said Eustace, 'I have left this too long, but I thought you understood that I am never like to wed my poor Millicent.'

'Dirkius?' I said.

'Dirkius does but confirm what I have known ever since the spring, and so have you too, Nan, that it would be a miracle should I be here after this winter.'

I had known it by my inner conviction, and heard him say the like often before; it was only a fancied outward hope that had been sustaining me, and I could obey when he bade me look cheerfully on Millicent, and remember the joy it was to him to see her at all, and, above all, employed in such tasks as would bring comfort to her.

The great Dutch house seemed full of English. Gentlewomen were sitting in the tapestried hall, spinning or working with their needle. We had been known to one or two of them in former times, and while they greeted us word was taken to Madame van Hunker that we were there, and a servant brought us word to ask us to come to her in her own parlour. There, up a few shallow steps, in a quiet, cool, wainscoted room, adorned with Eastern porcelain on shelves, we found her with her little daughter at her knee.

She met us at the door with a few faltering words, excusing herself for having given us the trouble to come to her.

'Best so, Millicent,' said Eustace, and as he spoke she lifted her eyes to his face and I saw a look of consternation pass over her features at sight of his wasted looks; but I only saw it for a moment, for he put an arm round her, and kissed her brow, as she hid her face against him.

The child, not contented with my embrace, ran and pulled his coat, crying, 'My lord, my lord, I can speak English now;' and he stooped to kiss her, while her mother turned to me with swimming eyes of mute inquiry, as of one who saw her long-cherished hope fulfilled only for her sorrow. She was less altered than had been feared. That smooth delicacy of her skin was indeed lost which had made her a distinguished beauty; but she still had a pair of eyes that made her far from insignificant, and there was an innocence, candour, and pleading sweetness in her countenance that-together, perhaps, with my pity-made even me, who had hitherto never liked her, lover her heartily.

I heard little or nothing of what they said to one another, being employed in keeping the child from them. She prattled freely in English, and was pleased to show me her baby-house, a marvel of Dutch neatness of handiwork, like that one which Madame van Hunker brought you, my daughter Peggy, when you were a little one. The doll we had given her had, however, the place of honour. Her sister, little Emilia told me, was married a month ago, and she was proceeding to make the little Dutch puppets in her baby-house enact the wedding, one being dressed in a black gown and stiff ruff, like a Genevan minister, when she caught a tone that made her cry out that mother was weeping, and stump across the floor in her stout little shoes to comfort her, before I could hinder her.

My brother and her mother set her down between them, and I had nought to do but to put in order the baby-house, till a great bell clanged through the house, which was the signal for dinner. Madame van Hunker was calmer by that time, and let Eustace hand her down, and place her at the head of the table, where she had around her no less than four families and two widows of our poor exiled Cavaliers and clergy. We had not found ourselves in so English a world for years past.

The hostess sat as one in a dream, doing her part like one moved by wires, and eating scarce anything, while Eustace showed all his usual courtliness of manner and grace. After dinner, he rested on a couch, as was his wont, before going back, and Millicent drew me into her chamber and wept on my neck, as she made me tell her all she had not been able to learn from him.

He had been very tender with her, and tried to persuade her that it was all for the best, and that there was happiness for them in the having no one between them now. She, poor woman, would fain, as I saw, have thrown aside all her houses and wealth to be his, and to tend him, were it merely for a few weeks, and she felt as if her love was strong enough to be his cure; but he had spoken of the cruel selfishness of giving away her power of aiding all these our fellow-countrymen in order that they two might come together for what he knew would be so brief a time. Yet he had not taken all hope from her, for he had talked of their reconsidering the matter if he were in better health after the winter, and, meantime, they could see each other often.

Poor thing! I believe she expected the miracle that might make him yet recover, and so she bore up, while Eustace was verily happy-having lived, as it were, nearly into spiritual love, and left behind that which had been earthly and corporeal, and thus he was content to rest. He had strained himself very hard to accomplish the journey, bring Clement and me into safety, and see Millicent again, and when the effort ceased, we fully saw, for the first time, how great it had been, and how far he was gone on that other journey. I do not think he crossed the threshold of our lodging half a dozen times after our arrival; but Millicent came into her town-house, and was with him every day. She had fitted the great dining chamber of that town-house as a chapel for our English service, and my brother went thither on two Sundays, on the second of which he saw M. Darpent received into our English Protestant Church. Clement had long inclined that way, having never forgotten the Huguenot training of his childhood, and the studies he had made, when his mother impelled him towards Port Royal, having resulted in farther doubts and yearning towards what Eustace had told him of our doctrine. Conversation with the learned Dr. Elson, one of our exiled divines, had completed the work, though he made his profession with pain and grief, feeling it a full severance from his country and his mother.

And the last time my dear brother left the house was to give me to his friend. He was anxious that I should be Clement's wife before he left me, and there was no fear that we should starve, for, through trustworthy merchants, a small amount of the Darpent money had been transmitted to him before the State laid hands on his property as that of a fugitive. He might have bought himself a share in one of the great trading houses, or have-which tempted him most-gone out to the plantations in the new countries of Java or America; but Eustace prayed him to pledge himself to nothing until he should hear from Harry Merrycourt, to whom my brother had sent a letter before quitting Paris.

We would have had a quiet wedding, but Eustace was resolved, as he said, that all the world should know that it was not done in a corner, and Madame van Hunker WOULD give the wedding feast, and came to dress me for my bridal. You know the dress: the white brocade with hyacinth flowers interwoven in the tissue-and when she had curled my hair after her fancy, she kissed me and clasped round my neck the pearls of Ribaumont. I told her I would wear them then to please her and Eustace, and, in truth, I knew in my heart that I was the last true Ribaumont bride that ever would wear them. We were wedded in the chapel in Madame van Hunker's house; and the Princess-Royal was there, and the Duke of York, and my Lord and Lady of Newcastle, and I know not who besides-only remembering that they all knew how to treat Clement as a man of distinction, who had, like them, given up all for conscience sake, and he, in his plain lawyer's suit, with his fine, clear-cut face and grave eyes, looked, even in spite of his close-cropped head, as veritable a gentleman as any of them. The festivities ended the dinner, that being as much as my brother was able for. We went quietly back to our lodgings in Millicent's coach, and Eustace went to rest on his bed, till she should have bidden farewell to her guests and could come and sup with us; but he and Clement forbade me to take off my finery, for it tickled their eyes.

And thus, when tidings came to the door that a gentlemen from England desired to see my Lord Walwyn, Harry Merrycourt, after all these years of seeing nothing but sad-coloured Puritan dames, came in upon this magnificent being in silvered brocade.

He said he thought he had stumbled on the Princess-Royal at least, and it was a descent to hear it was only plain Mistress Darpent! Harry had a good wife of his own by that time, who suited him far better than I should have done. Indeed, I believe he had only thought of wedding me to relieve my family from me. And when he saw how unlike M. Darpent was to all he had ever thought or believed of Frenchmen, and heard how well he spoke English, and how he had borne himself at Paris, he quite forgave me, and only thought how he could serve Eustace, the man whom he had always loved beyond all others.

He was practicing law in London still, but he had had time to repent of having been on the wrong side when he saw what it had come to, and had the Protector at the head of affairs. He said, however, that negotiations for peace with France were like to begin, and that Mr. Secretary Milton was casting about for one learned in French law to assist in drawing the papers, so that he had little doubt that Mr. Darpent would be readily taken into one of the public officers in London.

Moreover, he said that the Walwyn property had been sequestered, but no one had yet purchased it, and he thought that for a fair sum, it might be redeemed for the family.

When Eustace and Millicent found that I would not hear of keeping the pearls, declaring that such things were not fit for a poor exiled lawyer's wife, Millicent said they had always felt like hot lead on her neck. To compound the matter, Eustace persuaded her to have the chaplet valued by a Dutch jeweller, and to ask Margaret and Solivet, the guardians of the young Marquis de Nidemerle, to purchase them for him.

To Margaret was left whatever of the property M. Poligny would spare, and if Gaspard should have sons, one would bear the title of Ribaumont, though the name would be extinct. So it was fitting that the pearls should return to that family, and the fair value, as we hoped, sufficed, in Harry Merrycourt's hands, to redeem, in my husband's name, the inheritance my brother had always destined for me.

This was the last worldly care that occupied our believed brother. He said his work was done, and he was very peaceful and at rest. His strength failed very fast after Harry Merrycourt came. Indeed, I think he had for months lived almost more by force of strong will than anything else, and now he said he had come to his rest. He passed away one month after my wedding, on the 16th of October 1652, very peacefully, and the last look he gave any one here was for Millicent. There was a last eager, brighter look, but that was for nothing here.

The physicians said he died of the old wound in the lungs received at Naseby, so that he gave his life as much for the cause as my father and Berenger had done, though he had had far, far more to suffer in his nine years of banishment.

We left him in a green churchyard by the waterside, and Millicent saying through her tears that he had taught her to find comfort in her married life, and that he had calmed her and left her peace and blessing now in the work before her. And then we sailed with sore hearts for England, which was England still to me, though sadly changed from what I had once known it. We had come to think that there was no hope of the right cause ever prevailing, and that all that could be done was to save our own conscience, and do our best to serve God and man. 'The foundations are cast down, and what hath the righteous done?'

We were met by Harry Merrycourt, who had obtained the employment for Clement that he had hoped for. It was well, for, when Walwyn was repurchased, all our money had been sunk in it, and enough borrowed to consume the rents for some years to come, and thus we had to live very frugally in a little house in Westminster; but as for that, I was far happier marketing in the morning with my basket on my arm, cooking my husband's supper, making his shirts, and by and by nursing my babe, than ever I had been in all the stiff state and splendour of poor Margaret's fine salons. Camlet suits me better than brocade, and a basket of fresh eggs better than a gold-enamelled snuff-box. While, though I did long to see the old home again, I knew it would be bare of those who had made it dear, and, besides, it would be as well that M. Darpent should rub off as much as might be of his French breeding before showing him among the Thistlewoods and Merrycourts, and all the rest of our country-folk. Moreover, after the stir of Paris he might have found himself dull, and he had the opportunity of studying English law; ay, and I saw him yearly winning more and more trust and confidence among those who had to do with him, and forming friendships with Mr. John Evelyn and other good men.

So, when better times came round, and we had our King and Court back, on the very day of my Harry's birth, M. Darpent was recommended to my Lord Clarendon as too useful a secretary to be parted with, and therewith the great folk remembered that I came of an old Cavalier family. Indeed Queen Henrietta had promised my mother and sister to seek me out, though may be she would never have recollected it. After all it was the Duke of Gloucester who actually came and found me, riding up to our door with only one gentleman, and he no other than good old Sir Francis Ommaney.

Prince Henry was a fine youth, far handsomer and more like his blessed father than his brothers, and with as bright a wit and as winning and gracious as the King. He reproached me for not having come to see his mother, and asked merrily if I had turned Roundhead as well Frondeuse. I told him I had a good excuse, and showed him my three children, the youngest not yet a month old, and the other two staring open-mouthed to see a Prince so like other gentlemen.

Whereupon he asked if the little one was yet christened, and did him the honour to offer to be his godfather; and he noted that little Eustace promised to be like his uncle, and spake, with tears in his eyes, of the blessing my brother had been to him in his earlier stay at Paris, and how the remembrance of that example had helped him through the days when he had to undergo the same persuasions to forsake his father's Church.

So whereas the two first christenings had been done privately, as among those under persecution, Master Harry was baptized in state and splendour in St. Margaret's Church in full and open day, with all the neighbours gaping to see the Duke come forth, leading Mistress Darpent by the hand.

Thus I had to turn out my fine gowns (grown all too tight for me) and betake me to the Queen, who had become a little old woman, but was as gay and kind as ever, and told me much about my mother and sister. The King himself came and spoke to me, and said he supposed I wished to have the old title revived; but I told him, with all thanks, that I liked my husband better by his own name than by that which I had rather leave sacred to my brother; whereat he laughed, and said he must make a low bow to me, as being the first person he had met who had nothing to ask from him.

That was all I saw of the Court. Before many weeks had passed the cruel smallpox had carried off the young Duke of Gloucester in his twentieth year, taking him, mayhap, from the evil to come, in his bright youth and innocence, for had he lived, and kept himself unsoiled even to these days, he might have been sorely tempted to break that last promise made when he sat on his father's knee.

Soon after Madame van Hunker came to England. There was Wardour property, which had descended to her, and she was glad to have a good cause for bringing her daughter Emilia to England. My children all knew and loved the fair and saint-like lady full of alms-deeds, and with the calm face that always was ready with comfort and soothing. The very sight of it would rest the fretful, hasty spirit; and I was thankful indeed that when Emilia married, her mother still abode near to us-I felt her like my guardian spirit.

My husband kept his post till my Lord Clarendon went out and the Cabal came in, and then, not liking those he had to work with, he gave up his office, and we retired into the country, while our children were still young enough to grow up in the love to Walwyn that I had always felt.