Runnymede and Lincoln Fair: A Story of the Great Charter

Meanwhile, De Moreville perused the epistle slowly, and as he read, his countenance evinced disappointment. It seemed, indeed, that the letter did not contain the kind of information he expected; and he turned to Oliver, who was again on his feet, almost weeping from rage, and regarding his kinsman with angry glances.

“You will now inform me,” said he, like a man determined on having an answer by fair or foul means, “whither William de Collingham has gone, and with what intent.”

“Dog of a Norman!” exclaimed Oliver, giving way to his fury, “I would not answer such a question to save my body from the bernicles. Villain and oppressor, do your worst; I defy you and your myrmidons.”

“I can waste no more time in bandying words,” said De Moreville, significantly. “Conduct this varlet to the blind chamber of the prison-house,” continued he, addressing Hornmouth, “and give him a taste of the brake. The blind chamber has, in its day, brought still worse madmen than he is to their senses, and the brake has proved too much for the endurance of hardier limbs.”

Oliver Icingla shuddered. He rapidly recalled to memory the stories he had often heard from men of English race of the atrocious cruelties perpetrated by Norman barons in earlier reigns on their unfortunate prisoners; how one victim was starved to death; how a second was flung into a cellar full of reptiles; how a third was hung up by the thumbs; how a fourth was crippled in a frame which was so constructed that he could not move an inch in any direction; and how a fifth was suspended from a sharp collar round his neck, with his toes just resting on the ground. It was natural enough that Oliver should shudder as the recollection of such things flashed through his brain; and as they did so his blood ran cold, and his heart beat fast and loud. But he was game to the backbone; and De Moreville, who watched him narrowly, could not but marvel that there was not, even for a moment, any appearance of the slightest inclination to show the white feather.

“I am in your power,” said he, in a firm voice, as he threw back his head proudly. “You can do with me as you please; but bear in mind that whatever you do will be at your peril.”

“Away with him!” cried De Moreville, with an impatient gesture; and Oliver was led from the chamber.

CHAPTER XX

OLIVER’S CAPTIVITY

WHEN Oliver Icingla was drawn away by Ralph Hornmouth from the presence of Hugh de Moreville, he felt conscious that, for the time being, he was endowed with more than the obstinacy of the mule – with an obstinacy which he felt to be invincible. A strange reaction had taken place after his display of rage and excitement; and he was as calm as contempt could make a human being. As for the blind chamber to which the Norman baron had ordered him to be consigned, he manned himself to face its horrors, be they what they might, without flinching; and he vowed internally, no matter what torments they made him endure, that he would tell them nothing, but that he defied their worst malignity – not even that he was quite unaware of the object of Collingham’s journey northward, which he might have stated with perfect truth, for he only knew that the knight was going, in the first place, to Lincoln.

Much surprised, however, was Oliver when, after being conducted through a long gallery, he found himself led into an apartment which, so far from being a chamber of horrors, neither appeared worse nor more uncomfortable than many it had been his lot to occupy; and still more surprised was he, while gazing round sullenly, that Ralph Hornmouth, after carefully closing the door and ordering his comrade to keep watch outside, undid the bands which fettered his hands, and left him free, as if, instead of being a captive, he was in the chamber as a guest.

“By the rood, young gentleman,” said Hornmouth, in a more kindly tone than he had yet used, “but that I know how loud young game-cocks can crow when they are roused to excitement, I should marvel at your courage. I was in dread that my lord would strike you dead where you stood; and, had you been any other living mortal than you are such must have been your fate. You little know him, or you would be less venturesome. When he swears by his faith, he is safe enough; when he swears by St. Moden, his wrath is only rising; but when he swears by the bones of St. Moden, his temper has reached such a pitch of heat, that it were safer to pull the Devil by the beard than to cross him further – even a hair’s breadth.”

“Sir squire, is this what the Lord Hugh de Moreville calls the blind chamber?” asked Oliver, without noticing the henchman’s observations.

“Nay, by rood and mass, and well for you that it is not,” answered Hornmouth, smiling grimly. “It is no place for birds of your feather, I ween, and so would you were you there till cock-crow. My lord spake in his wrath, but he will think better of it ere another sun shines; and were I simple enough to take a kinsman of his, with the blood of Moreville in his veins, thither to-night, my reward would be the dule tree on the morrow. I have more regard for my neck, Master Icingla, than you seem to have for your limbs. Cog’s wounds! but I cannot think enough of the courage with which you flouted and defied my lord, at whose frown I have seen so many tremble;” and the rude soldier eyed Oliver with the genuine admiration which a display of real courage seldom fails to inspire.

Having given warning that any attempt to escape would be certain destruction, and that any attempt to corrupt the gaolers would only lead to a close confinement, Hornmouth took the captive by the hand.

“Beware,” whispered he, “of doing aught to place thee in the power of the governor of the castle. Sir Anthony Waledger detests thy race and thy name, and is marvellous valiant when dealing with enemies who cannot injure him. Good night, and droop not; all will yet be well.”

Oliver was then left to solitude and his own reflections, which were none of the pleasantest. Of all men in England, Hugh de Moreville was the last into whose hands he could have wished to fall; and, though reassured in some measure by the words of the squire, he could not feel certain, after what had passed, that he might not, in some unlucky hour, be exposed to personal violence. However, after worrying himself with gloomy thoughts for hours, he gradually felt sleep stealing over him, and soon exchanged his torturing reflections for dreams of the palace of Savernake and the city of Gloucester. Nor did he awake till he was shaken by the arm; and, as he looked up, one sight of the bronzed face of Hornmouth brought all the events of yesterday to his memory.

“Young gentleman,” said De Moreville’s squire, respectfully, “it is as I foretold. My lord wishes you no harm; but I tell you frankly, that you have no more chance of leaving this castle till the war is over than of going to Fairyland, if such a place there be. Wherefore be ruled by my advice, and content yourself. Make the best of a bad bargain, and make good cheer. I will forthwith send the wherewithal, and give orders for all your wants being supplied, save thy liberty, which is not mine to give. I myself am on the point of undertaking an expedition to the castle of Mount Moreville, and may not return for many months. But fear not. Be quiet. Make no vain attempt to escape; and I swear to you, by mass and rood, that you are as safe in this chamber as if you sat in your mother’s hall.”

“By the Holy Cross!” exclaimed Oliver, “you give me cold comfort. Deem you that it can be otherwise than irksome to an Icingla to lie here like a useless log, while others are pressing on in the race of life, and marking their valour on the crests of foemen? True, I am an Englishman, and I have none of the vague aspirings about conquering kingdoms and principalities with which so many Norman warriors delude their imaginations. Still I want to do my duty and to keep my sword from rusting, and to enjoy freedom and free air. But I see you mean me well, good squire, and I thank you with all my heart; albeit I can hardly in my heart forgive you for having come with such odds at your back, that I had not even a chance of avoiding what I loathe most – I mean captivity.”

Ralph Hornmouth laughed and withdrew; and Oliver, rising from his couch, resolved to his utmost to reconcile himself to his fate, and, moreover, began to indulge in vague hopes.

“Collingham may learn my fate, or the faithful Styr,” soliloquised he as he devoured his morning meal with the appetite of a Saxon thane in the days of King Ethelred; “and if they do, by the Holy Cross, Chas-Chateil, thick as may be its walls, and well guarded as may be its doors and gates, will not long hold me as a captive. Holy Edward be my aid meanwhile!”

But it cannot be very easy for a young warrior, in a fighting age, who has fleshed his maiden sword, and taken part in two fields of fame, especially at the age of eighteen, to force himself to be philosophical in captivity; and Oliver Icingla, being intended by nature for a man of action, soon grew weary of compelling himself to be patient. Indeed, as days and weeks passed, the dulness and monotony of his existence, and the thought of his home and his mother’s grief, depressed him to such a point that he experienced something like intolerable woe. Hugh de Moreville he never saw. Ralph Hornmouth did not reappear to bid him take comfort. The gaoler performed his functions in silence, and, when questioned, replied in monosyllables. During his brief captivity on the continent, Oliver had been in attendance on a great earl, and daily in contact with knights and squires, and he had borne it easily. But he feared that this solitary incarceration would, if prolonged, break his spirit.

One advantage, indeed, he had in his imprisonment; for the window of his chamber commanded a prospect of the vale of the Kennet, and barred as the window was, he could catch glances of the world from a distance, and sometimes even see not only peaceful travellers, but bands of armed men, passing and repassing. Still this only reminded him of his own sad plight, for everybody and everything seemed free but himself. The river flowed on; the trout leaped in the clear water; the heron perched on the stones by the grassy margin; the eagle soared over the castle; the squirrel climbed the trees; and the deer ran free in the chase. Even the serf who toiled in the fields around Chas-Chateil appeared to enjoy a happy lot, in comparison with the only son of the woman to whom Chas-Chateil rightfully belonged. But there was consolation at hand.

It happened that the chamber appropriated to Oliver was on a level with a battlement or outer gallery constructed to resemble a terrace, and known as “the ladies’ walk.” Nobody, however, seemed to frequent it; and Oliver, whose knowledge of feudal strongholds enabled him to comprehend its purpose, had concluded that Hugh de Moreville’s daughter was being educated in a convent, or under the roof of some noble matron; for, proud as they were, the feudal dames did not disdain to undertake the tuition of their sex; and he had concluded, moreover, that there were no ladies under the roof of Chas-Chateil, not, perhaps, without speculating whether or not there might be in the event of its becoming his own, when he was unexpectedly convinced that, on this point at least, he was mistaken.

It was the evening of a long, bright, merry summer day, about the close of July, and Oliver was standing at his window looking out on the landscape, now watching the men-at-arms engaged in athletic exercises, and now brooding dismally over his evil fortune, and cursing his cruel captivity, when his ear suddenly caught the sound of soft voices, and his eye was attracted by an apparition which instantly changed the whole current of his thoughts.

And what was this apparition?

A very lovely Norman demoiselle, dressed in a simple robe of white, and attended by two maidens almost as captivating as herself.

CHAPTER XXI

DE MOREVILLE’S DAUGHTER

A GIRL not more than seventeen, with eyes of deep blue, fair face, features slightly aquiline, a soft and somewhat pensive, but still noble expression, her auburn hair not almost entirely concealed, as was the fashion of the court ladies of the period, but flowing free over her shoulders; and her graceful figure not decorated or deformed as theirs were with meretricious ornaments, but arrayed in a simple robe of white, girdled at the slender waist with a belt of blue – such was the Norman demoiselle who suddenly appeared before the eyes of Oliver Icingla and put his melancholy musings to flight. Nor could he doubt who she was, seeing her where he did.

“By the Holy Cross!” he exclaimed to himself, “surely that is no other than the demoiselle who has so often been present to me in my dreams and visions! And yet she can be none other than the daughter of my worst woe – she whom the Lord Neville mentioned as so fascinating and so fair. Verily, my lord was guilty of no exaggeration when he spoke so highly in praise of her grace and comeliness!”

Beatrix de Moreville could not know what eyes were upon her, or possibly she would not have lingered so long that July evening on “the ladies’ walk.” However, if she had known all, her vanity would perhaps have been gratified; for, in spite of his strong antipathy to the father, Oliver was enchanted with the daughter, and, when she vanished with her waiting-women at the sound of the vesper bell, he devoutly prayed that she might return again and again to cheer the solitude which he had begun so much to abhor. In fact, although he knew it not, he was, as old Froissart said on a similar occasion, “stricken to the heart with a sparkle of fine love that endured long after.” All that evening she occupied his thoughts; and, after comparing her to the various heroines of the chivalrous romances then in vogue, always giving her the preference, he finally fell asleep to dream that he was being put by Hugh de Moreville into a frightful instrument of torture, and that he was saved from the threatened infliction by De Moreville’s daughter.

Next day appeared marvellously long to Oliver, so impatiently did he await the coming of evening and the coming of the fair being who had made so strong an impression on his fancy. Again she appeared, and evening after evening during August, when from the ramparts of Chas-Chateil the rustics could be seen gathering in the yellow corn, always remaining until the bat begun to hunt the moth and the vesper bell sounded. Oliver grew more and more interested, and thought of her more highly the oftener he saw her; for, as the old chronicler puts it, “love reminded him of her day and night, and represented her beauty and behaviour in such bewitching points of view, that he could think of nothing else, albeit her father had done him grievous wrong.”

But Oliver Icingla was a youth of mettle, and not the youth to be content to worship Beatrix de Moreville at a distance as an Indian worships his star. Naturally enough, he began to form plans for making this Norman damsel aware of his existence, and not altogether without success. In fact, fortune very highly favoured the captive Englishman in this respect. The Lady Beatrix was frequently in her evening walks accompanied by a very devoted attendant in the shape of a dog, and this dog sometimes found its way to the rampart without its mistress. Oliver from his window very easily made the dog’s acquaintance, and speedily converted the acquaintance into a friendship so close that it would not pass the place of his incarceration without giving audible signs of recognition. This led to important consequences.

One evening late in August, when Oliver’s captivity had lasted for more than ten weeks, he was posted, as usual, at his window, looking through the bars, when Beatrix de Moreville passed close to him with her dog and her maidens. The dog stopped, looked up in his face, wagged his tail, and began to spring up towards him, and the lady naturally enough turned her eyes in the same direction to see what was the cause of her canine favourite’s excitement. Such an opportunity might never, as Oliver thought, occur again, and he was not likely, under the circumstances, to allow it to pass for lack of presence of mind.

“May God and Our Lady bless thee, noble demoiselle!” said he, not without a slight tremulousness in his voice. “I would that, like thee, I had the privilege of walking at freedom; for methinks that freedom, ever sweet, is doubly sweet on such an eve as this.”

Oliver sighed as he spoke. The lady appeared startled, and looked embarrassed; but influenced, doubtless, by courtesy, she stayed her steps and gazed timidly through the iron bars on the face of the speaker, so young, so fair, and yet so melancholy.

“Pardon my boldness, noble demoiselle,” continued Oliver, “and fear not. I am no wild beast, though thus caged, but an English squire who was taught from childhood by a widowed mother to serve God and the ladies; and I comprehended my duties in both respects even before I was apprenticed to chivalry in the castle of my kinsman, the noble Earl of Salisbury. But I am well-nigh beside myself with this captivity. Credit me, that hardly have I heard the sound of any one’s voice for weeks, save when visited by the holy man who is the chaplain in this castle; for my gaoler is the most churlish of churls, and answers only with a sullen scowl when I address him. To all men, I doubt not, captivity is irksome; but to me it is not only irksome but horrible; for I am English by birth and lineage, and of all nations it is well known that the English most thoroughly abhor the thought of being deprived of liberty.”

“Gentle sir,” said the Lady Beatrix, speaking with an effort and not without agitation, “I know not what you would have me to do. Is it that you wish me to speak to my lord and father on your behalf? If such be your object, say so, I pray you, and it shall be done forthwith.”

“Nay, noble demoiselle,” replied Oliver, shaking his head; “that were vain as to appeal to the wolf of the forest to abstain from preying on the deer in the chase. He would not listen.”

“But he ever listens to me – he shall listen!”

“By the Holy Cross!” exclaimed Oliver, giving way to the enthusiasm which the presence of Beatrix de Moreville created, “I marvel who could refuse to listen to a being so gentle and beautiful. However,” added he, checking himself as he perceived that she was startled by the warmth of his speech, “I will not so far trespass on your generosity as to accept your intercession: nor, in truth, could it avail ought. Between the Lord Hugh de Moreville and myself there has never been much love, and we have twice parted of late not just the best of friends. Moreover, I chance to be of kin through my mother to the house of Moreville, and the Lord Hugh dislikes me more on that account than mayhap he would otherwise do. Wherefore accept my thanks and leave me to my fate. Events have ere this opened stronger doors than keep me here; and credit me, that when I do leave this castle where I have passed so many weary, weary hours, I shall at least carry with me one pleasant memory – the memory of the fairest face that I have seen in England, France, or Spain. Adieu, noble demoiselle; may the saints – especially Our Lady – ever watch over thy welfare and safety!”

Beatrix de Moreville moved on pensively, and not without indulging in pity for the young warrior whose language was so earnest and whose plight was so sad. Nor did the knowledge that he was there prevent her returning to the battlements to breathe the evening air; nor, so far as can be ascertained, did she make a point of avoiding further conversation. In fact, she became inspired with a very dangerous interest in her father’s captive, and contrived not only to learn who and what he was, but how he had fought at Muradel and Bovines, and much more about his parentage and his history than was likely to add to her peace of mind. In short, the daughter of De Moreville, the Norman of Anglo-Normans, passed the winter of 1215 dreaming of her English kinsman and picturing him as a hero. Ere the spring of 1216 came he was costing her many a sigh and many a tear.

As for Oliver Icingla, he almost felt that he was content with his condition. It would be too much to say that if his prison doors had been opened he would have said with the heroine of the ballad of “The Spanish Lady’s Love” —

“Full woe is me:
Oh, let me still sustain this kind captivity!” —

but certainly he did find his prison infinitely less intolerable than it had been when he first entered it, cursing the fate that had sent him thither. At times, however, the old spirit seized him, and he stamped about like a caged lion, and startled the sullen gaoler by his explosions of rage.

“On my faith,” said he to himself one day in April, after having worn himself out by the intensity of his ravings, “never did the hart pant for the water-brook more than I pant for freedom and air and exercise, and yet the chance seems as far away from me as ever. I marvel how long I have been here. Ha! I have lost count. By St. Edward, I fear me that ere long I shall lose my senses!”

As Oliver thus soliloquised he went to the window, and, seating himself on the broad sill of stone, looked out on meadows and woodlands which spring, “that great painter of the earth,” had once more robed in green, and on the ploughed fields to which, in spite of war and rumours of war, the husbandmen were committing the seeds, with every hope of reaping in due season. Almost as he did so, his ear caught the sound of a musical instrument and of a voice singing a Castilian ballad in very indifferent Spanish, but in accents which were so familiar that his heart leaped within him. Oliver listened, and as he listened the singer sang —

“They have carried afar into Navarre the great Count of Castile,
And they have bound him sorely, they have bound him hand and heel;
The tidings up the mountains go, and down among the valleys —