Chapter 3 HOW ALIVA RECEIVED A SECOND SUITOR.

So fair and noble a maiden as the Lady Aliva de Pateshulle deserved a better father than she possessed. The Lord of Bletsoe was rather too inclined to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds, to play a double part, waiting to see where his own interests would best be served. But we must bear in mind the condition of affairs in the time in which he lived.

The old and formerly powerful county family of the De Beauchamps were fallen from their high estate; for Sir William, their head, had been ousted from his castle, and in those days a baron without castle and stronghold occupied but an inferior position. On the other hand, the house of De Breauté had come decidedly to the front; for, as the chroniclers of the time tell us, Fulke held not only the castle of Bedford, but also the castles and the shrievalties of Oxford, Northampton, Buckingham, and Cambridge. All these he had received as the reward for his services against the barons on behalf of King John, so there could be no doubt but that the De Breauté family was wealthy, and also, apparently, firmly rooted at Bedford.

It must not be supposed, however, that De Pateshulle could excuse Fulke's outrages, or that he would have gone so far as to give his daughter to one who bore so evil a name, even had he not been already married. The intended son-in-law was another member of the De Breauté family.

As the Lady Margaret de Ripariis, the unhappy wife of Fulke, had born her husband no children, the heir to his wealth was his younger brother William. Now this William de Breauté was not yet as widely known, nor as hated, as his brother, nor was it even asserted that he had taken part in any of the foul deeds committed by the latter. Soldier of fortune like his brother, he had but lately arrived from France, and taken up his residence in Bedfordshire, where perhaps he was not altogether unpopular, for he had even gone so far as to hint that, should Sir Fulke come to a violent end in one of his forays, and he, William, become the lord of Bedford Castle, the neighbourhood should have no reason to mourn the change. With regard to the De Beauchamps, however, he intimated pretty strongly that he considered his family to have sufficient title to the castle from the grant of King John, and no one, naturally, was prepared to say that the young King Henry was in a position to upset his father's arrangements.

Accordingly, when William de Breauté approached De Pateshulle with a proposal that he should give him his daughter Aliva in marriage, it was not altogether unnatural that that gentleman, being of poor estate though of good family, and not even possessing a fortified dwelling--in itself a mark of position in those days--should be willing to listen to a suit which would place his descendants at Bedford Castle, and in the position held in former days by the De Beauchamps.

It was on the afternoon of the same day on which Ralph de Beauchamp had met Aliva de Pateshulle in the garden that William de Breauté presented himself in person at the mansion of Bletsoe. Had he been aware of the stolen interview which had taken place a few hours before by the turret door, he would hardly have selected this day for pressing his suit with Aliva herself. But ignorance is bliss. De Breauté had not been sufficiently long in the neighbourhood to learn that there had been love passages between Ralph and Aliva, so he rode over to Bletsoe in a self-satisfied frame of mind, armed as he was with De Pateshulle's permission, which, in those days when ladies were often given in marriage against their will, was, he flattered himself, of considerable force. But he little knew with what a resolute maiden he had to deal. Moreover, he was still ignorant of the outrages at St. Alban's the previous evening, which were likely to bring fresh discredit on his name. He only knew that Fulke had gone off on some raid, and had not yet returned when he left Bedford.

William de Breauté was several years younger than his brother--not much senior, in fact, to Ralph de Beauchamp himself. French by title and education, he had imported something of Continental grace and manners into the Anglo-Norman society of the time in Bedfordshire. He was more careful of his dress and person than the other young men of the neighbourhood. Instead of the short curling beard and half-long hair which was the fashion in England, he wore only a small, carefully-trimmed moustache, and his dark hair was cut short all over his head. He had first met the Lady Aliva at a hunting-party held in the woods on the other side of the river, by Sir William Wake of Stevington Castle, when the maiden, no mean horsewoman nor inferior shot with the cross-bow, had greatly distinguished herself by her prowess in venery. Since then, upon every occasion, William de Breauté had attempted to ingratiate himself with the daughter of De Pateshulle, by his foreign-cultured manners, and by showing, not altogether unsuccessfully perhaps, that he was more of a lady's man than the young knights and squires of the county who flocked around her. But up till now he had not ventured to make serious love to her. Indeed, with his frothy, shallow nature, an impetuous, earnest wooing such as Ralph's would not have been easy.

There was a twofold motive in the suit De Breauté now sought to press. With his admiration for the stately beauty mingled a desire to establish himself firmly in his position by an alliance with an old family, such as that of a De Pateshulle. He was by no means totally insincere in disclaiming any part in Sir Fulke's malpractices, and was keenly alive to the precarious footing upon which he stood in Bedfordshire, both on account of the sympathy universally felt for the ejected De Beauchamps, and also by reason of his brother's lawless freebooting career.

In anything but an enviable state of mind Aliva sat at the little window of her chamber, her hands clasped convulsively round her knees, and watched the watery rays of the sunshine of a winter's afternoon piercing the fog, which slowly mounted from the river over the low-lying country around. The scene seemed to her typical of her unhappy position.

"The sunshine of my life is past and gone," she exclaimed to herself, with the acute bitterness of sorrowing youth. "My sun has vanished, and the mists creep on apace! They threaten to enshroud me. I know not which way to turn!" she added, with the reaction of despair common to all proud, high-spirited natures. "O my father, my father! the burden you have laid upon me is too heavy to bear! Since you first told of your wishes--nay, your commands--I have been torn hither and thither. Had I a mother, had that dear parent not been taken so early from me, she would have known, have felt, that this is no idle fancy, no passing friendship for Ralph! O be merciful! do not force me to take another!"

Those were the days when a dutiful and reverential spirit of obedience to parents, of which we find now, unhappily, not so much trace, was looked upon as a sacred duty. Daughters were given in marriage by their parents with but little regard for their own wishes, and rich heiresses--though indeed poor Aliva was not one of these latter--were even disposed of by royal authority for political purposes. In the hapless Margaret de Ripariis, the wife of Fulke, Aliva had herself seen an instance of such a forced marriage. No wonder that she was in despair, and had torn herself away from Ralph in confusion and distress, when her miserable position was suddenly recalled to her.

Even as she thus moaned to herself, the sun sank behind a bank of mist, and a raw, gray gloom fell over the landscape, while home-coming rooks settled in the tall elms round the house, cawing mournfully.

"My father said he might come this very day," Aliva thought to herself. "But surely the vesper-bell will soon be ringing from the church, and then, thanks to our blessed St. Margaret, I shall be safe for yet another day!"

But even as she spoke she heard the sound of a horseman riding in under the gateway, and of Dicky Dumpling's voice bawling to a serving-man; for after his visit to the lay-brother's cottage, and the news he had there heard, the fat porter felt in no mood to hold the bridle of a De Breauté.

But Aliva did not peep from her window as she had done when Ralph rode off, for she guessed who had come, and her heart sank within her.

Quickly there came a knock at the door, and the old serving-woman entered.

"My lady, my lord thy father desires you attend him in the great hall."

"Tell him I come," answered Aliva, and she rose.

A daughter's obedience she owed, and she would indeed obey an order to confront this unwelcome suitor. But even as she smoothed her flowing hair, and, with the natural vanity of a girl about to meet an admirer, arranged it beneath the fillet, and settled the sweeping lines of her tight-fitting robe, the exigency of the crisis raised the maiden's spirit. For she was of Anglo-Norman blood. Her sires had fought at Hastings, and from each line of ancestors she inherited totally distinct qualities of bravery, dogged resolution, intrepid pride, and tenacity of purpose, which, blended together, have produced the finest race the world has ever seen.

As she entered the hall door opening into the dais or upper end, her father and William de Breauté, standing together in the oriel, thought they had never seen her look so "divinely tall, and most divinely fair."

With one glance at the latter she swept straight up to her parent, and spoke slowly and clearly, though it needed all her strong self-will to suppress her agitation.

"Father," she said, "I saw Sir Ralph de Beauchamp here this morning."

A complete silence followed as she ceased and stepped quietly to the deep oriel window, passing her father on the other side to that on which De Breauté stood. There was silence as she gazed fixedly out into the distant winter landscape, over which the dusk was already gathering, her teeth set, her lips firmly closed, and her clasped hands so tightly clinched that the nails cut into her flesh. She moved not a muscle, but stood rigid as a statue.

De Pateshulle shifted uneasily on his feet, and sought his guest's face with restless eyes and troubled expression, giving an apologetic cough.

The large log burning in the open fireplace half-way down the hall fell with a sudden crash from the fire-dogs, as one charred end gave way.

De Breauté started. He had been cowed for a moment by the flashing glance Aliva had given him as she entered the hall. He had been stabbed by a maddening pang of jealousy at the few words she had spoken. But in the silence which followed he regained courage, and plunged vehemently into the set speech he had prepared,--

"Most beauteous Lady Aliva, fairest daisy of an English meadow, witching Diana of the woods, behold in me a poor suppliant from outre mer, falling at your fair feet, wounded to death by the glance of your bright een, the victim of Venus venerie! I pray thee, proud damoiselle, to deign to look upon me with favour, and to fan with words of comfort the fire ardent your beauty hath enkindled!"

He paused for lack of breath, and then launched out again into Continental flowers of compliment and gallantry.

As he spoke he advanced gradually towards Aliva, bowing, his hand upon his heart.

The two were only about six paces apart. Slowly and deliberately Aliva took those six paces, with an expression of indignation and scorn. Her right fist was tightly clinched. She raised her arm, and (we must remember this was the thirteenth and not the nineteenth century) she struck the dark little Frenchman full in the face.