Part 5 (1/2)

They joined their lord and master in his new home, and from thence one day, not so long after, Elsje van Houwening was married to a faithful servant of the family, who had also shared their captivity in the fortress of Loevenstein; and had been so well taught by his master the rudiments of law and of Latin, that he rose in time to be a thriving advocate.

But of nothing was he ever so proud as of the bravery and address of his wife in her girlhood, when she had been the instrument by which the celebrated escape of Grotius had been effected from the grim fortress of Loevenstein.

GRIZEL COCHRANE

Father and daughter stood facing each other in the gloomy prison of the Tolbooth: the girl's face was tense with emotion, and the man's eyes seemed to devour her with their gaze; for Sir John Cochrane believed that he was looking his last upon his favourite child.

He was not a man of great parts, nor one who can be regarded as in any sort a hero. He was more rash than brave, and his ill-judged support of the claims of the luckless Duke of Monmouth had brought him to his present doleful position--that of a prisoner in the hands of a deeply offended and implacable monarch, expecting each day to hear that his death-warrant had arrived from London.

Sir John had been one of the leaders of the insurrection in Scotland, which had been even more of a fiasco than the one conducted by Lord Grey in the West of England, where a temporary success at the outset had cheered and encouraged the adherents of the champion of Protestantism.

King James II., savage of temper and bitterly angry with all those concerned in this rebellion, had sent the terrible Jeffreys to the Western a.s.sizes, which henceforth were to be known as the b.l.o.o.d.y a.s.sizes; and here, in Edinburgh, lay another ill.u.s.trious victim, awaiting the king's warrant, which would doom him to the scaffold.

Whatever might have been his faults and errors in his public life, Sir John was a tender and loving husband and father. His wife, a delicate invalid, shattered by grief and anxiety, was unable to leave her room; but Grizel had come. Grizel had paid visits before this to her captive father, and each one was more sorrowful than the last, since the end must now be drawing very near.

”Methinks, my child,” said the father hoa.r.s.ely, ”that this will be our last meeting on earth. They told me to-day that the death-warrant would, in all likelihood, be here in three days' time from this.”

A quiver pa.s.sed over Grizel's face; yet her voice was calm.

”Can our grandfather do nothing?” she asked.

Now Sir John's father was Lord Dundonald, a man of wealth and influence, and the question was a natural one to put.

”He is doing his utmost,” answered Sir John, ”I have had tidings of that. He has got the King's Confessor on his side, and they hope to gain the ear of His Majesty. But I fear me it will be all too late. If the warrant could be delayed, pardon might perchance reach in time; but as things now stand I fear to cherish hope. Let the will of G.o.d be done, my child. We must believe that He knows best.”

A sudden light had flashed into Grizel's eyes, it illumined her whole face.

”Thou dost speak truth, my father,” she said. ”G.o.d, indeed, does know best; and let His will be done. But is it His will that one should perish whom even an earthly sovereign has pardoned, and who has never offended against Him?”

Sir John looked at her with a questioning gaze.

”G.o.d's ways, my daughter, are not as our ways, and His thoughts are past finding out. Let us brace our spirits for what may lie before us, and resign ourselves to that which He shall send. Kiss me once again, and bid me good-bye. It will not be for ever. This life is but a span, and we shall meet on the sh.o.r.es of eternity.”

She flung her arms about his neck, and pressed her lips to his.

”Farewell, sweet father, farewell,” she cried, with a little catch in her voice. ”Farewell, but not good-bye. Something within me tells me that we shall meet again--in this life.”

He looked into her strangely s.h.i.+ning eyes, noted the resolute expression of her beautiful mouth, and asked almost anxiously:

”What dost thou mean, my child? What hast thou in that busy head of thine? Thou must run no risk for me; for thou art the stay and prop at home. Thou must be son, daughter, and husband--all to thy poor mother--when I am taken.”

Steps were heard approaching. Grizel drew herself away, and looked once more into her father's face:

”Son and daughter--that will I be in all sooth, dear sir; but husband!--nay that will not be needed, methinks----”

”Grizel, what dost thou mean? What----”

The key was turning in the lock. She put her hands upon her father's shoulders and kissed him once again.

”Fear nothing,” she said, ”I am a Cochrane.” And with those words on her lips she turned and left him, following her grim guide, the gaoler, till she stood outside in the street once more.