Chapter 43

MISGIVINGS

Dost thou hear, lady?
If from the field I shall return once more
To kiss these lips, I will appear in blood;
I and my sword will earn our chronicle;
There is hope in it yet.

SHAKSPEARE.

Richard was obliged to plead his cause yet once again. Katherine had watched all his movements; she had eyed curiously the army he mustered to the field: she talked to its leaders, and while they vaunted her affability, she was diving with earnest mind, into the truth of things. No fear that it could be hid from her; love for Richard was the bright light that dispelled every deceptive shadow from the scene. She saw the bare reality; some three thousand poor peasants and mechanics, whose swords were more apt to cut themselves than strike the enemy, were arrayed against the whole power and majesty of England. On the morrow they were to set forward. That night, while at the casement of his rude chamber, Richard gazed upon the congregated stars, trying to decipher in their intricate bright tracery the sure omen of the good he was told they charactered for him, Katherine, after a moment’s hesitation, with a quivering voice, and hand that shook as it pressed his, knelt on a cushion at his feet, saying, “My sweet Richard, hear me; hear your faithful friend—your true wife; call not my councils weak and feminine, but weigh them sagely ere you resolve. May I speak?”

“Lady of my heart, arise,” said Richard; “I speak, my soft-voiced Katherine—my White Rose of beauty—fair flower, crowning York’s withered tree. Has not God done all in giving you to me? yet we must part, love, for a while. Your soldier is for the wars, Kate, while you sit in your bower, weaving victorious garlands for his return.”

“My ever dear lord,” said Katherine, “I speak with fear, because I feel that I shall not address myself to your concealed thought. I do not wish to penetrate your secrets, and yet I tremble at their event. You have not so far deceived yourself as to imagine, that with these unfortunate men you can ride over the pride and the power of this island; did I see on what else you founded the lofty hope, that has, since we came here, beamed in your eyes, I would resign myself to your better wisdom. But, wherever I turn my view, there is a blank. You do not dream of conquest, though you feel secure of victory. What can this mean, save that you see glory in death?”

“You are too quick-sighted, sweet Kate,” said Richard, “and see beyond the mark. I do not set my cast upon falling in this fray; though it may well happen that I should: but I have another aim.”

“Without guessing at what that may be,” replied the lady, “since you seem desirous to withhold the knowledge, permit me to present another object to your choice; decide between them, and I submit: but do not carelessly turn from mine. There is all to lose, nought to win, in what you now do. Death may blot the future page, so that we read neither disgrace nor prison in its sad lines; but wherefore risk to die. While yet, dear love, we are young, life has a thousand charms, and one may be the miserable survivor, whose heart now bleeds at the mere surmise.”

She faltered; he kissed her soft cheek, and pressed her to his heart. “Why may we not—why should we not live?” continued Katherine; “what is there in the name or state of king that should so take captive our thoughts, that we can imagine no life but on a throne? Believe me, careful nights and thorny days are the portion of a monarch: he is lifted to that awful height only to view more clearly destruction beneath; around, fear, hate, disloyalty, all yelling at him. The cold, heartless Tudor may well desire the prize, for he has nothing save the gilt crown to ennoble him; nothing but the supple knees of courtiers to present to him the show of love. But—ah! could I put fire into my weak words—my heart’s zeal into my supplicatory voice—persuasion would attend upon me, and you would feel that to the young, to two united as we are, our best kingdom is each other’s hearts; our dearest power that which each, without let or envy, exercises over the other. Though our palace-roof be the rafters of a lowly cot, our state, the dear affection we bear each other, our attendants the duty and observance of one to the other—I, so served by King Edward’s son—you, by the rightful queen of this fair island—were better waited on than Henry and Elizabeth, by their less noble servitors. I almost think that, with words like these, I might draw you from the uneasy throne to the downy paradise of love; and can I not from this hard struggle, while death yet guards the palace-gate, and you will be pierced through and through long ere you can enter.”