The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 An Historical Romance

CHAPTER XXVIII.

The Se­cret.

Thrice was the guard re­lieved dur­ing that long night, and as of­ten was the pris­on­er vis­it­ed. On the first oc­ca­sion, he was found to be still en­gaged with his Bible, and he so con­tin­ued dur­ing the whole time the man re­mained in the vault.

The next who came dis­cov­ered him on his knees, pray­ing loud­ly and fer­vent­ly, and, un­will­ing to dis­turb him, left him at his de­vo­tions.

But the third who en­tered was struck with ter­ror at the pris­on­er's ap­pear­ance. He had risen from the ground, and was stand­ing as erect as the fet­ters would per­mit, with his hands out­stretched, and his eyes fixed on va­can­cy. He was mut­ter­ing some­thing, but his words were un­in­tel­li­gi­ble. He looked like one who be­held a vi­sion; and this im­pres­sion was pro­duced up­on the man, who half ex­pect­ed some aw­ful shape to re­veal it­self to him. But what­ev­er it might be, spir­it of good or ill, it was vis­ible to the Pu­ri­tan alone.

Af­ter gaz­ing at him for some min­utes, in mixed won­der­ment and fright, the hal­berdier ven­tured to draw near him. As he touched him, the Pu­ri­tan ut­tered a fear­ful cry, and at­tempt­ed to spring for­ward, as if to grasp some van­ish­ing ob­ject, but be­ing checked in the ef­fort by the chain, he fell heav­ily to the ground, and seemed to sus­tain se­vere in­jury; for when the man raised him, and set him against the pil­lar, though he made no com­plaint, it was ev­ident he suf­fered ex­cru­ci­at­ing pain. The hal­berdier poured out a cup of wine, and of­fered it to him; but, though well-​nigh faint­ing, he peremp­to­ri­ly re­fused it.

From this mo­ment a marked change was per­cep­ti­ble in his looks. The hue of his skin be­came ca­dav­er­ous; his eyes grew dim and glassy; and his res­pi­ra­tion was dif­fi­cult. Ev­ery­thing be­to­kened that his suf­fer­ings would be speed­ily over, and that, how­ev­er he might de­serve it, Hugh Calve­ley would be spared the dis­grace of death by the hands of the ex­ecu­tion­er. The hal­berdier was not un­aware of his con­di­tion, and his first im­pulse was to sum­mon as­sis­tance; but he was de­terred from do­ing so by the earnest en­treaty of the Pu­ri­tan to be left alone; and think­ing this the most mer­ci­ful course he could pur­sue un­der the cir­cum­stances, he yield­ed to the re­quest, scarce­ly ex­pect­ing to be­hold him alive again.

It was by this same man that the door of the vault was opened to Sir Jo­ce­lyn and Ave­line.

The shock ex­pe­ri­enced by the maid­en at the sight of her fa­ther had well-​nigh over­come her. She thought him dead, and such was Sir Jo­ce­lyn's first im­pres­sion. The un­for­tu­nate Pu­ri­tan was still propped against the pil­lar, as the hal­berdier had left him, but his head had fall­en to one side, and his arms hung list­less­ly down. With a pierc­ing shriek his daugh­ter flew to­wards him, and kneel­ing be­side him, raised his head gen­tly, and gaz­ing ea­ger­ly in­to his face, per­ceived that he still lived, though the spir­it seemed ready to wing its flight from its flesh­ly taber­na­cle.

The sit­ua­tion was one to call forth ev­ery la­tent en­er­gy in Ave­line's char­ac­ter. Con­trol­ling her emo­tion, she ut­tered no fur­ther cry, but set her­self, with calm­ness, to ap­ply such restora­tives as were at hand to her fa­ther. Af­ter bathing his tem­ples and chaf­ing his hands, she had the sat­is­fac­tion, ere long, of see­ing him open his eyes. At first, he seemed to have a dif­fi­cul­ty in fix­ing his gaze up­on her, but her voice reached his ears, and the fee­ble pres­sure of his hand told that he knew her.

The pow­er of speech re­turned to him at length, and he faint­ly mur­mured, “My child, I am glad to see you once more. I thought all was over; but it has pleased Heav­en to spare me for a few mo­ments to give you my bless­ing. Bow down your head, O my daugh­ter, and take it; and though giv­en by a sin­ner like my­self, it shall prof­it you! May the mer­ci­ful God, who par­doneth all that re­pent, even at the last hour, and watch­eth over the or­phan, bless you, and pro­tect you!”

“Amen!” ex­claimed Jo­ce­lyn, fer­vent­ly.

“Who was it spoke?” de­mand­ed the Pu­ri­tan. And as no an­swer was re­turned, he re­peat­ed the in­quiry.

“It was I--Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey, the son of your old friend,” replied the young man.

“Come nigh to me, Jo­ce­lyn,” said the dy­ing man. “I have done you wrong, and en­treat your par­don.”

“O, talk not thus!” cried Jo­ce­lyn, spring­ing to­wards him. “I have noth­ing to for­give, but much to be for­giv­en.”

“You have a no­ble heart, Jo­ce­lyn,” re­joined Hugh Calve­ley; “and in that re­spect re­sem­ble your fa­ther. In his name, I con­jure you to lis­ten to me. You will not refuse my dy­ing re­quest. I have a sa­cred trust to com­mit to you.”

“Name it!” cried the young man; “and rest as­sured it shall be ful­filled.”

“Give me some wine,” gasped the Pu­ri­tan, faint­ly. “My strength is fail­ing fast, and it may re­vive me.”

And with, great ef­fort he swal­lowed a few drops from the cup filled for him by Jo­ce­lyn. Still, his ap­pear­ance was so alarm­ing, that the young man could not help urg­ing him not to de­lay.

“I un­der­stand,” replied Hugh Calve­ley, slight­ly press­ing his hand. “You think I have no time to lose; and you are right. My child, then, is the trust I would con­fide to you. Son, be­hold thy sis­ter! Daugh­ter, be­hold thy broth­er!”

“I will be more than a broth­er to her,” cried Sir Jo­ce­lyn, earnest­ly.

“More thou canst not be,” re­joined Hugh Calve­ley; “un­less--”

“Un­less what?” de­mand­ed Sir Jo­ce­lyn.

“I can­not ex­plain,” cried the Pu­ri­tan, with an ex­pres­sion of agony; “there is not time. Suf­fice it, she is al­ready promised in mar­riage.”

“Fa­ther!” ex­claimed Ave­line, in sur­prise, and with some­thing of re­proach. “I nev­er heard of such an en­gage­ment be­fore. It has been made with­out my con­sent.”

“I charge you to ful­fil it, nev­er­the­less, my child, if it be re­quired,” said Hugh Calve­ley, solemn­ly. “Promise me this, or I shall not die con­tent. Speak! Let me hear you.”

And she re­luc­tant­ly gave the re­quired promise.

Sir Jo­ce­lyn ut­tered an ex­cla­ma­tion of an­guish.

“What af­flicts you, my son?” de­mand­ed the Pu­ri­tan.

“To whom have you promised your daugh­ter in mar­riage?” in­quired the young man. “You have con­sti­tut­ed me her broth­er, and I am there­fore en­ti­tled to in­quire.”

“You will learn when the de­mand is made,” said the Pu­ri­tan. “You will then know why I have giv­en the promise, and the na­ture of the obli­ga­tion im­posed up­on my daugh­ter to ful­fil it.”

“But is this obli­ga­tion ev­er to re­main bind­ing?” de­mand­ed Sir Jo­ce­lyn.

“If the claim be not made with­in a year af­ter my death, she is dis­charged from it,” replied Hugh Calve­ley.

“O, thanks, fa­ther, thanks!” ex­claimed Ave­line.

At this mo­ment the door of the vault was thrown open, and two per­sons en­tered, the fore­most of whom Sir Jo­ce­lyn in­stant­ly recog­nised as the King. The oth­er was his Majesty's physi­cian, Doc­tor May­erne Tur­quet. A glance suf­ficed to ex­plain to the lat­ter the state of the Pu­ri­tan.

“Ah! par­bleu! the man is dy­ing, your Majesty,” he ex­claimed.

“Dee­ing! is he?” cried James. “The mair rea­son he suld tell his se­cret, to us with­out pro­cras­ti­na­tion. Harkye, prophet of ill!” he con­tin­ued, as he strode for­ward. “The judg­ment of Heav­en ye pred­icat­ed for us, seems to have fall­en on your ain­sell, and to have laid you low, even afore our arm could touch you. Ye have gude rea­son to be thank­ful you have es­caped the wood­ie; sae e'en make a clean breast of it, con­fess your enor­mi­ties, and re­veal to us the se­cret mat­ter whilk we are tauld ye hae to com­mu­ni­cate!”

“Let all else with­draw a few paces,” said Hugh Calve­ley, “and do thou, O King, ap­proach me. What I have to say is for thine ear alone.”

“There will be no dan­ger in grant­ing his re­quest?” in­quired James of his physi­cian.

“None what­ev­er,” replied Doc­tor May­erne Tur­quet. “The on­ly dan­ger is in de­lay. Your Majesty should lose no time. The man is pass­ing rapid­ly away. A few mo­ments more, and he will have ceased to ex­ist.”

On a sign from the King, Sir Jo­ce­lyn then stepped aside, but Ave­line re­fused to quit her fa­ther, even for a mo­ment.

As James drew near, Hugh Calve­ley raised him­self a lit­tle in or­der to ad­dress him. “I say un­to thee, O King,” he cried, “as Eli­jah said un­to Ahab, 'Be­cause thou hast sold thy­self to work evil in the sight of the Lord--be­hold! I will bring evil up­on thee, and will take away thy pos­ter­ity. And I will make thine house like the house of Jer­oboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahi­jah, for the provo­ca­tion where­with thou hast pro­voked me to anger, and made Is­rael to sin.'”

“Now the muck­le Diel seize thee, vil­lain!” ex­claimed James fu­ri­ous­ly. “Is it to lis­ten to thy texts that thou hast brought me hith­er?” And as Hugh Calve­ley, ex­haust­ed by the ef­fort he had made, fell back with a groan, he bent his head to­wards him, cry­ing, “The se­cret, man, the se­cret! or the tor­menter shall wring it from thee?”

The Pu­ri­tan es­sayed to speak, but his voice was so low that it did not reach the ears of the King.

“What sayest thou?” he de­mand­ed. “Speak loud­er. Saul of our body!” he ex­claimed, af­ter a mo­ment's pause, dur­ing which the sud­den al­ter­ation that took place in the pris­on­er's fea­tures made him sus­pect that all was over. “Our be­lief is he will nev­er speak again. He hath es­caped us, and ta'en his se­cret wi' him.”

A loud shriek burst from Ave­line, as she fell up­on her fa­ther's life­less body.

“Let us forth,” cried the King, stop­ping his ears. “We care­na to be present at scenes like this. We hae had a gude rid­dance o' this traitor, though we wad hae glad­ly heard what he had to tell. Sir Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey, ye will see that this young wom­an be cared for; and when ye have caused her to be re­moved else­where, fol­low us to the ten­nis-​court, to which we shall in­con­ti­nent­ly ad­journ.”

So say­ing, he quit­ted the vault with his physi­cian.