"Nothing of the sort," broke in sensible, fearless little Jane; "I think the Lady Mary was wrong. He could not have known her by inspiration."
"Jane is right," exclaimed Mary, whose temper, if short, was also short-lived, and whose kindly heart always set her right if she but gave it a little time. Her faults were rather those of education than of nature. "Jane is right; it was what I deserved. I did not think when I spoke, and did not really mean it as it sounded. He acted like a man, and looked like one, too, when he defended himself. I warrant the pope at Rome could not run over him with impunity. For once I have found a real live man, full of manliness. I saw him in the lists at Windsor a week ago, but the king said his name was a secret, and I could not learn it. He seemed to know you, Jane. Who is he? Now tell us all you know. The queen can wait."
And her majesty waited on a girl"s curiosity.
I had told Jane all I knew about Brandon, so she was prepared with full information, and gave it. She told the princess who he was; of his terrible duel with Judson; his bravery and adventures in the wars; his generous gift to his brother and sisters, and lastly, "Sir Edwin says he is the best-read man in the court, and the bravest, truest heart in Christendom."
After Jane"s account of Brandon, they all started by a roundabout way for the marble landing. In a few moments whom did they see, coming toward them down the path, but Brandon, who had delivered his message and continued his walk. When he saw whom he was about to meet, he quickly turned in another direction. The Lady Mary had seen him, however, and told Jane to run forward and bring him to her. She soon overtook him and said:
"Master Brandon, the princess wishes to see you." Then, maliciously: "You will suffer this time. I a.s.sure you she is not used to such treatment. It was glorious, though, to see you resent such an affront.
Men usually smirk and smile foolishly and thank her when she smites them."
Brandon was disinclined to return.
"I am not in her highness"s command," he answered, "and do not care to go back for a reprimand when I am in no way to blame."
"Oh, but you must come; perhaps she will not scold this time," and she put her hand upon his arm, and laughingly drew him along. Brandon, of course, had to submit when led by so sweet a captor--anybody would. So fresh, and fair, and lovable was Jane, that I am sure anything masculine _must_ have given way.
Coming up to the princess and her ladies, who were waiting, Jane said: "Lady Mary, let me present Master Brandon, who, if he has offended in any way, humbly sues for pardon." That was the one thing Brandon had no notion on earth of doing, but he let it go as Jane had put it, and this was his reward:
"It is not Master Brandon who should sue for pardon," responded the princess, "it is I who was wrong. I blush for what I did and said.
Forgive me, sir, and let us start anew." At this she stepped up to Brandon and offered him her hand, which he, dropping to his knee, kissed most gallantly.
"Your highness, you can well afford to offend when you have so sweet and gracious a talent for making amends. "A wrong acknowledged," as some one has said, "becomes an obligation."" He looked straight into the girl"s eyes as he said this, and his gaze was altogether too strong for her, so the lashes fell. She flushed and said with a smile that brought the dimples:
"I thank you; that is a real compliment." Then laughingly: "Much better than extravagant comments on one"s skin, and eyes, and hair. We are going to the queen at the marble landing. Will you walk with us, sir?" And they strolled away together, while the other girls followed in a whispering, laughing group.
Was there ever so glorious a calm after such a storm?
"Then those mythological compliments," continued Mary, "don"t you dislike them?"
"I can"t say that I have ever received many--none that I recall,"
replied Brandon, with a perfectly straight face, but with a smile trying its best to break out.
"Oh! you have not? Well! how would you like to have somebody always telling you that Apollo was humpbacked and misshapen compared with you; that Endymion would have covered his face had he but seen yours, and so on?"
"I don"t know, but I think I should like it--from some persons," he replied, looking ever so innocent.
This savored of familiarity after so brief an acquaintance, and caused the princess to glance up in slight surprise; but only for the instant, for his innocent look disarmed her.
"I have a mind to see," she returned, laughing and throwing her head back, as she looked up at him out of the corner of her l.u.s.trous eyes.
"But I will pay you a better compliment. I positively thank you for the rebuke. I do many things like that, for which I am always sorry.
Oh! you don"t know how difficult it is to be a good princess." And she shook her head, with a gathering of little trouble-wrinkles in her forehead, as much as to say, "There is no getting away from it, though." Then she breathed a soft little sigh of tribulation as they walked on.
"I know it must be a task to be good when everybody flatters even one"s shortcomings," said Brandon, and then continued in a way that, I am free to confess, was something priggish: "It is almost impossible for us to see our own faults, even when others are kind enough to point them out, for they are right ugly things and unpleasant to look upon. But lacking those outside monitors, one must all the more cultivate the habit of constant inlooking and self-examination. If we are only brave enough to confront our faults and look them in the face, ugly as they are, we shall be sure to overcome the worst of them. A striving toward good will achieve at least a part of it."
"Oh!" returned the princess, "but what _is_ good and what _is_ wrong?
So often we can not tell them apart until we look back at what we have done, and then it is all too late. I truly wish to be good more than I desire anything else in the world. I am so ignorant and helpless, and have such strong inclinations to do wrong that sometimes I seem to be almost all wrong. The priests say so much, but tell us so little.
They talk about St. Peter and St. Paul, and a host of other saints and holy fathers and what-nots, but fail to tell us what we need every moment of our lives; that is, how to know the right when we see it, and how to do it; and how to know the wrong and how to avoid it. They ask us to believe so much, and insist that faith is the sum of virtue, and the lack of it the sum of sin; that to faith all things are added; but we might believe every syllable of their whole disturbing creed, and then spoil it all through blind ignorance of what is right and what is wrong."
"As to knowing right and wrong," replied Brandon, "I think I can give you a rule which, although it may not cover the whole ground, is excellent for every-day use. It is this: Whatever makes others unhappy is wrong; whatever makes the world happier is good. As to how we are always to do this, I can not tell you. One has to learn that by trying. We can but try, and if we fail altogether, there is still virtue in every futile effort toward the right."
Mary bent her head as she walked along in thought.
"What you have said is the only approach to a rule for knowing and doing the right I have ever heard. Now what do you think of me as a flatterer? But it will do no good; the bad is in me too strong; it always does itself before I can apply any rule, or even realize what is coming." And again she shook her head with a bewitching little look of trouble.
"Pardon me, your highness; but there is no bad _in_ you. It has been put _on_ you by others, and is all on the outside; there is none of it in your heart at all. That evil which you think comes out of you, simply falls from you; your heart is all right, or I have greatly misjudged you." He was treating her almost as if she were a child.
"I fear, Master Brandon, you are the most adroit flatterer of all,"
said Mary, shaking her head and looking up at him with a side glance, "people have deluged me with all kinds of flattery--I have the different sorts listed and labeled--but no one has ever gone to the extravagant length of calling me good. Perhaps they think I do not care for that; but I like it best. I don"t like the others at all. If I am beautiful or not, it is as G.o.d made me, and I have nothing to do with it, and desire no credit, but if I could only be good it might be my own doing, perhaps, and I ought to have praise. I wonder if there is really and truly any good in me, and if you have read me aright."
Then looking up at him with a touch of consternation: "Or are you laughing at me?"
Brandon wisely let the last suggestion pa.s.s unnoticed.
"I am sure that I am right; you have glorious capacities for good, but alas! corresponding possibilities for evil. It will eventually all depend upon the man you marry. He can make out of you a perfect woman, or the reverse." Again there was the surprised expression in Mary"s face, but Brandon"s serious look disarmed her.
"I fear you are right, as to the reverse, at any rate; and the worst of it is, I shall never be able to choose a man to help me, but shall sooner or later be compelled to marry the creature who will pay the greatest price."
"G.o.d forbid!" said Brandon reverently.
They were growing rather serious, so Mary turned the conversation again into the laughing mood, and said, with a half sigh: "Oh! I hope you are right about the possibilities for good, but you do not know.
Wait until you have seen more of me."
"I certainly hope I shall not have long to wait."
The surprised eyes again glanced quickly up to the serious face, but the answer came: "That you shall not:--but here is the queen, and I suppose we must have the benediction." Brandon understood her hint--that the preaching was over,--and taking it for his dismissal, playfully lifted his hands in imitation of the old Bishop of Canterbury, and murmured the first line of the Latin benediction. Then they both laughed and courtesied, and Brandon walked away.
_CHAPTER IV_
_A Lesson in Dancing_
I laughed heartily when Jane told me of the tilt between Brandon and Princess Mary, the latter of whom was in the habit of saying unkind things and being thanked for them.
Brandon was the wrong man to say them to, as Mary learned. He was not hot-tempered; in fact, just the reverse, but he was the last man to brook an affront, and the quickest to resent, in a cool-headed, dangerous way, an intentional offense.
He respected himself and made others do the same, or seem to do so, at least. He had no vanity--which is but an inordinate desire for those qualities that bring self-respect, and often the result of conscious demerit--but he knew himself, and knew that he was ent.i.tled to his own good opinion. He was every inch a man, strong, intelligent and brave to temerity, with a reckless disregard of consequences, which might have been dangerous had it not been tempered by a dash of prudence and caution that gave him ballast.
I was not surprised when I heard of the encounter; for I knew enough of him to be sure that Mary"s high-handedness would meet its counterpart in my cool friend Brandon. It was, however, an unfortunate victory, and what all Mary"s beauty and brightness would have failed to do, her honest, open acknowledgment of wrong, following so quickly upon the heels of her fault, accomplished easily. It drew him within the circle of her fatal attractions, and when Jane told me of it, I knew his fate was sealed, and that, sooner or later, his untouched heart and cool head would fall victim to the shafts that so surely winged all others.
It might, and probably would, be "later," since, as Brandon had said, he was not one of those who wear the heart upon the sleeve. Then he had that strong vein of prudence and caution, which, in view of Mary"s unattainableness, would probably come to his help. But never was man"s heart strong enough to resist Mary Tudor"s smile for long.
There was this difference between Brandon and most others--he would be slow to love, but when love should once fairly take root in his intense nature, he would not do to trifle with.
The night after the meeting, Mary cuddled up to Jane, who slept with her, and whispered, half bashfully: