Emma Marshall - Penshurst Castle in the Time of Sir Philip Sidney

'I know it! I know it!' Humphrey exclaimed. 'End it, Mary – end it for ever, and come and bless me with your love.'

'Nay, Humphrey, do not urge me to do what is impossible. It cannot be.'

Humphrey Ratcliffe turned away with an impatient gesture, saying, —

'I see no glory in self-martyrdom. I offer you a home, and I swear to protect you from all evil, and keep your boy from evil, train him to be a noble gentleman, and, forsooth, you turn away and will have none of me.'

'Dear friend,' Mary began in a low voice, 'trust me so far as to believe that I have a reason – a good reason – for refusing what would be, I doubt not, a haven of calm after the troubled waters of my life. Trust me, kind Master Ratcliffe, nor think ill of me. I pray you.'

'Ill of you! nay, Mary, you know no saint in heaven is ever more devoutly worshipped than I worship you.' But, seeing her distress as he said these words, he went on, – 'I will wait, I will bide my time, and, meanwhile, serve you in all ways I can. Here is this child, your young sister, chafing against the life she leads here. I will do my best to persuade my mother to take her in her company to London for the grand show, and it may be that some great lady may take a fancy for her, and she may win a place as waiting-woman about the person of some Court dame. Do you consent? Do you give me permission to try?'

'But Lucy is not in favour with your mother; she disdains us as beneath her notice.'

'Not you – not Lucy; it is your father's widow whom she mislikes. Her Puritan whims and fancies are a cause of offence, and no aversions are so strong as those begotten by religious difference.'

'That is so, alas!' Mary Gifford said. 'Persecution for diversity of faith, rather for diversity in the form of worship: it is this that tears this country into baleful divisions, and pierces it with wounds which are slow to heal.'

'That is true,' Humphrey said; 'and the law, condemning all Papists to suffer extreme penalty, if found worshipping God after their own manner, has a cruel significance. But we must not forget the fires of Smithfield, nor the horrors to which this country was subjected when Spanish influence was at work with a Papist queen on the throne.'

'No,' Mary said in a low voice. 'Nor can we forget the grey head of that queen's dearest friend, which was brought to the block, and stirred the bitterness of revenge in Queen Mary's heart.'

'Well,' Humphrey said, 'I am vowed to resist, with all possible might, the encroachments of Spain, – which means the plotting of Philip to force the religion of the Pope upon an unwilling people – in the Low Countries first, and then, believe me, he will not stop there. Mr Sidney's protest against the Queen's marriage with the Duc of Anjou was founded on the horror he felt of seeing this realm given over once more to the power of the Pope. Mr Sidney saw, with his own eyes, the Massacre of St Bartholomew; and what security could there be if any of this crafty Medici race should be set on high in this country?'

'Mr Sidney has changed somewhat in his views. Is it not so?' Mary asked.

'He has submitted to the inevitable – that is to say, finding the Queen determined, he, with Lord Burleigh and others in high office, will confer with the ambassadors who come from France for the purpose – praying secretly, however, that the whole matter may fall to pieces. And, indeed, this is likely. The Queen's highness is loth to lose her supremacy, and there are favourites at Court who would ill brook to be displaced by a rival power. My lord the Earl of Leicester is one, though he hides his real feeling from his nephew, my noble master.'

Mary Gifford was silent for a few moments, then she said, —

'If you can aid my poor little sister to get her heart's desire, do so. I consent, for life here is not to be desired for many reasons. Ah! Master Ratcliffe,' Mary said, 'how fair is this world, and is there a fairer spot in it than these our native hills and valleys over which we look every day? See the wooded heights yonder, in all the varied colours of the early spring; see the sloping pastures, where the flowers make a carpet! Often as I look on it, and see the tower of the church rising amongst the red-tiled roofs of the cottages, and beyond, the stately pile of Penshurst Castle, I think if only sin were absent, and truth and righteousness reigned, this village would find no rival save in the Eden before the serpent entered, and the ruin came with sin!'

Humphrey Ratcliffe liked to watch Mary's face as she spoke; but, as he left her, a few minutes later, he felt there was something which divided them and made his suit hopeless. What was it?

He knew but little of the history of her short married life. Her suitor had come in the train of the Earl of Leicester in one of his visits to Penshurst.

That she had been cruelly deceived was known, and that she had come back to her old home of Ford Manor with her child, clad in the weeds of widowhood, but saying nothing of what had really happened. Rumour had been busy, and Ambrose Gifford had been supposed to have been slain in a disgraceful fight; but nothing was absolutely certain; and Humphrey Ratcliffe, who had known Mary from her girlhood, now discovered that he had loved her always, and that he had failed to win her in her early youth because he had never tried to do so, and now that he loved her passionately, he was to find his suit was hopeless.

Perhaps it was the similarity between his own case and that of his master's that made the tie between them stronger than is often the case between an esquire and his chief.

Lucy Forrester soon forgot the vexation and anger which her stepmother's scolding had roused. She kept out of her sight, and entertained little Ambrose with stories of fairies and elfs and imps and hobgoblins till the time came for her to go up the hill to the Ratcliffes' house.

Lucy did not attempt to sit down at the board when dinner was served at eleven o'clock. She had once or twice, when in disgrace, rebelled at the sight of the crust of bread and the mug of water which had been set before her as a token of Mistress Forrester's displeasure.

'I am not a child now,' she thought, 'to be gaped at by serving men and maids. I will take care of myself in the buttery, and then get ready for my walk up the hill. Perhaps, who knows, I may chance to meet Mr Sidney, and I may get a word from him or a rare smile; and then a fig for frowns and the rating and scolding of fifty cross stepmothers! I wish Mary did not look so grave. I hate to grieve her. Well-a-day, if only I can get to London, and see him in the tourney, I shall die of joy.'

Lucy was scarcely sixteen, an enthusiastic child, who had conceived a romantic devotion for Mr Philip Sidney, and worshipped his ideal as maidens of her temperament have worshipped at their idol's shrine since time began.

And who can blame this country maiden if she cherished a passionate admiration for one, who won the hearts of Court ladies and hoary statesmen of a grave scholar like Hubert Languet, and of the Queen herself, who called him the brightest jewel of her Court, and who often excited the jealousy of her older favourites by the marks of favour she bestowed on him.

In the village church on Sundays Lucy would sit with anxious, eager expectation till she saw the Sidney pew filled; if Mr Sidney was present it was an hour or two of bliss; if, as was frequently the case, his place was empty, she would bow her head to hide the tears of vexation and disappointment which started to her eyes.