Sir John Constantine | Page 9

Lady's pains be wasted, after all. Is it
possible, sir, you think she sent me to-night to save your life?' 'For what
else?' inquired the youth. 'To save your soul, sir, and your lady's; both
of which (though you guessed not or forgot it) stood in jeopardy just
now, so that the gate open to you was indeed the gate of Hell. Pray
hang me back as you found me," he concluded, 'and go your ways for a
fool.'"
"Now see what happened. The murderers in the house, coming down to
bury the body and finding it not, understood that the young man had
not come alone; from which they reasoned that his servants had carried
him off and would publish the crime. They therefore, with their master,
hurriedly fled out of the country. The lady betook herself to a religious
house, where in solitude questioning herself she found that in will,
albeit not in act, she had been less than faithful. As for the hidalgo, he
rode home and shut himself within doors, whence he came forth in a
few hours as a man from a sepulchre--which, indeed, to his enemies he
evidently was when they heard that he was abroad and unhurt whom
they had certainly stabbed to death; and to his friends almost as great a
marvel when they perceived the alteration of his life; yea, and to
himself the greatest of all, who alone knew what had passed, and, as by
enchantment his life had taken this turn, so spent its remainder like a
man enchanted rather than converted. I am told," my father concluded,
"though the sermon says nothing about it, that he and the lady came in
the end, and as by an accident, to be buried side by side, at a little
distance, in the Chapel of Our Lady of Succour in the Cathedral church
of Valencia, and there lie stretched--two parallels of dust--to meet only
at the Resurrection when the desires of all dust shall be purged away."
With this story my father beguiled the road down into Guildford, and of
his three listeners I was then the least attentive. Years afterwards, as
you shall learn, I had reason to remember it.

At Guildford, where we fed ourselves and hired a relay of horses, I took
Billy aside and questioned him (forgetting the example of Isaac) why
we were going to London and on what business. He shook his head.
"Squire knows," said he. "As for me, a still tongue keeps a wise head,
and moreover I know not. Bain't it enough for 'ee to be quit of school
and drinking good ale in the kingdom o' Guildford? Very well, then."
"Still, one cannot help wondering," said I, half to myself; but Billy
dipped his face stolidly within his pewter.
"The last friend a man should want to take up with is his Future," said
he, sagely. "I knows naught about en but what's to his discredit--as that
I shall die sooner or later, a thing that goes against my stomach; or that
at the best I shall grow old, which runs counter to my will. He's that
uncomfortable, too, you can't please him. Take him hopeful, and you're
counting your chickens; take him doleful, and foreboding is worse than
witchcraft. There was a Mevagissey man I sailed with as a boy--and
your father's tale just now put me in mind of him--paid half a crown to
a conjurer, one time, to have his fortune told; which was, that he would
marry the ugliest maid in the parish. Whereby it preyed on his mind till
he hanged hisself. Whereby along comes the woman in the nick o' time,
cuts him down, an' marries him out o' pity while he's too weak to resist.
That's your Future; and, as I say, I keeps en at arm's length."
With this philosophy of Billy I had to be content and find my own
guesses at the mystery. But as the afternoon wore on I kept no hold on
any speculation for more than a few minutes. I was saddle-weary,
drowsed with sunburn and the moving landscape over which the sun,
when I turned, swam in a haze of dust. The villages crowded closer,
and at the entry of each I thought London was come; but anon the
houses thinned and dwindled and we were between hedgerows again.
So it lasted, village after village, until with the shut of night, when the
long shadows of our horses before us melted into dusk, a faint glow
opened on the sky ahead and grew and brightened. I knew it: but even
as I saluted it my chin dropped forward and I dozed. In a dream I rode
through the lighted streets, and at the door of our lodgings my