Part 26 (1/2)
Then she went on more lightly. ”Have you heard, Sir Gervaise, that there is a question of making you a n.o.ble of Genoa?”
”No, indeed,” Gervaise replied, in great surprise; ”such an idea never entered into my thoughts.”
”Nevertheless, I know that it was spoken of last night, and although it has not yet been finally settled, and will not be until the council meet this afternoon, I should not tell you if I did not think that it was as good as agreed upon; and I am pleased to be the first to whisper to you that it is intended to bestow upon you an honour that is jealously guarded and seldom granted, even to crowned heads, unless as a token of grat.i.tude for some signal service done to the Republic.”
”I should feel most honoured and most grateful, Countess, for so extraordinary a favour, did I feel that I had done any extraordinary action to merit it. There can be no doubt that the destruction of the corsairs has saved Genoa and all the maritime towns from immense loss by damage to their trade, and by the raids that would have been made at various points on the coast. But I cannot see that the mere fact that we have destroyed their fleet merits any marked honour. They were caught in a trap, and half of them burned, and this might have been done equally as well by the Sardinian fishermen, unarmed, and without our aid. As to the fighting, it was of small account. The first three craft we captured offered a much stouter resistance, and we lost two of our number; but in the other affair no knight was killed, or even seriously wounded, and believe me, Countess, I feel absolutely ashamed at the fuss that is made over it. It seems to me that I am a sort of impostor, obtaining credit under false pretences.”
”No man is a fair judge of his own actions, Sir Gervaise,” Caretto said.
”A man may believe himself a Solon, or a Roland; others may consider him as a fool, or an empty braggart; and it must be taken that the general opinion of the public is the judgment from which there is no appeal.
It is not the mob of Genoa only who regard the services that you have rendered as extraordinary, but it is the opinion of the councillors and authorities of the Republic, and of those who, like myself, have borne our share in warfare, that not only is the service great, but that it is due to the singular ability with which you, in command of only a single galley, have wholly destroyed or captured the fleet that threatened our commerce. As our councillors, therefore, all competent judges, are unanimous in their opinion that you have deserved the highest honours that Genoa can bestow upon you, it is useless for you to set up your own opinion to the contrary. Take the good things that fall to you, Sir Gervaise, and be thankful. It is seldom that men obtain more honours than they deserve, while it very often happens that they deserve far more than they obtain. Fortune has doubtless some share in every man's career; but when it is not once, but several times, that a knight gains special credit for deeds he has performed, we may be sure that fortune has less to do with the matter than his personal merits. Three times have you earned special credit; upon the first occasion, the grand master--no mean judge of conduct and character--deemed you worthy of secular knighthood, an honour which has not, in my memory, been bestowed at Rhodes upon any young knight; on the second, you were promoted to the command of a galley, though never before has such a command been given to any, save knights of long experience; and now, for the third time, the councillors of one of the greatest of Italian cities are about to do you honour. It is good to be modest, Sir Gervaise, and it is better to underestimate than to overrate one's own merits, but it is not well to carry the feeling to an extreme. I am quite sure that in your case your disclaimer is wholly sincere and unaffected; but take my advice, accept the honours the world may pay you as not undeserved, determining only in your mind that if you deem them excessive, you will at least do all in your power to show that they are not ill bestowed. You will not, I trust, take my counsel amiss.”
”On the contrary, Sir Fabricius,” Gervaise said warmly. ”I am really but a boy yet, though by good fortune pushed strangely forward, and I am glad indeed to receive council from a knight of vastly greater experience than myself and, in future, however much I may be conscious in my own mind that anything I have done is greatly overrated, I will at least abstain from protest. And now, Countess, I must pray you to excuse me. I know that Sir Ralph Harcourt is, before this, down at the dockyard waiting my coming to engage sailors.”
”You will come tomorrow at the same time, I hope, Sir Gervaise. As Claudia's sworn knight we have now a claim upon you, and for the short time that you remain here you must regard this as your home, although you must necessarily remain the guest of the doge.”
”He is a fine young fellow, indeed,” Caretto said, after Gervaise had left. ”There is no affectation about his modesty, and he really considers that this success he has gained is solely a stroke of good fortune. Of course, I have been asking many questions about him of the young knights of his own langue, Harcourt among them. They tell me that he is always in earnest in everything he undertakes. He is without a rival among the younger knights of the convent in his skill in arms, and for strength and activity in all exercises; he seems to care nothing for the ordinary amus.e.m.e.nts in which they join at Rhodes, and for nine months was scarcely ever seen by those in the auberge, save when they gathered for meals, so continuously did he work to acquire a perfect command of Turkish. How thoroughly he succeeded is evident from the fact that he was able to live among the galley slaves without exciting any suspicions in their minds that he was other than he pretended to be, a Syrian captive. That he is brave goes without saying, though perhaps no braver than the majority of his companions. The extraordinary thing about him is that although, as he himself says, little more than a boy, he has the coolness to plan, and the head to carry out, schemes that would do credit to the most experienced captain. He is already a credit to the Order, and, should he live, will a.s.suredly rise to the highest offices in it, and may even die its grand master. In the stormy times that are coming on, there will be ample opportunities for him still further to distinguish himself, and to fulfil the singular promise of his youth. That he possesses great tact, as well as other qualities, is shown by the enthusiasm with which his companions regard him. In no case, among those to whom I have spoken, have I discerned the smallest jealousy of him. The tact that is needed to stand thus among fifty young knights, almost all his seniors in age, will a.s.suredly enable him later on to command the confidence and affection of older men.”
When the other guests had left, and Caretto only remained, the countess turned to Claudia. ”You went too far, Claudia. I was willing enough, when you asked me, that you should bestow a favour upon him. Most young knights wear such a favour, which may be a sign of devotion, but which far more frequently is a piece of gallantry. In the case of a knight hospitaller it can only be the latter; it is in his case merely a sign that he has so distinguished himself that some maiden feels a pride that her gift should be carried into battle by him, and, on his part, that he too is proud of the gift so bestowed by one whose goodwill he prizes.
In that way I was willing that you should grant him your favour. But the manner in which you gave it was far more serious than the occasion warranted, and your promise to grant no similar favour to another as long as he lived, surprised, and, I may almost say, shocked me. You are, according to our custom here, considered almost a woman, and had not Sir Gervaise belonged to a religious Order, and were he of a presuming disposition, he might well have gathered a meaning from your words far beyond what you intended, and have even entertained a presumptuous hope that you were not indifferent to his merits. In the present case, of course, no harm is done; still, methinks that it would be far better had the words been unspoken. Your cousin here will, I am sure, agree with me.”
Caretto did not speak, but stood playing with his moustache, waiting for Claudia's reply. The girl had stood with downcast eyes while her mother was speaking.
”I only expressed what I felt, mother,” she said, after a pause, ”and I do not think that Sir Gervaise Tresham is likely to misunderstand me.
It seems to me that never among those whom I have met have I seen one so worthy. No praises can be higher than those with which my cousin has spoken of him. He has rescued him, whom we dearly love, from slavery; he has saved Genoa from great disaster, and many towns and villages from plunder and ruin. I do indeed feel proud that such a knight should wear my gage, and, were there no other reason, I should be unwilling that, so long as he carried it, another should possess a similar one from me. I am sure that Sir Gervaise will have felt that this was the meaning of my words; I wished him to see that it was not a favour lightly given by a girl who might, a few weeks hence, bestow a similar one upon another, but was a gage seriously given of the honour in which I held him.”
”Very well said, Claudia,” Caretto broke in, before the countess could reply. ”I warrant me the young knight will not misunderstand your gift, and that he will prize it highly and carry it n.o.bly. He is not one of those who will boast of a favour and display it all times, and, except perhaps to his friend Sir Ralph Harcourt, I will wager he never tells a soul who was its donor.”
When Claudia shortly afterwards left the room, he said to the countess, ”Excuse me for breaking in, Agatha, but I felt that it was much better to agree with her, and not to make overmuch of the matter; she is just of an age to make some one a hero, and she could hardly have chosen a better subject for her wors.h.i.+p. In the first place, he is a knight of St. John; in the second, he is going away in a few days, perhaps tomorrow, and may never cross her path again. The thought of him will prevent her fancy from straying for a time, and keep her heart whole until you decide on a suitor for her hand.”
”Nevertheless, I would rather that it had not been so. Claudia is not given to change, and this may last long enough to cause trouble when I bring forward the suitor you speak of.”
”Well, in any case it might be worse,” Caretto said philosophically.
And then, with a smile in answer to her look of inquiry, ”Knights of the Order have, ere now, obtained release from their vows.”
”Fabricius!” the countess exclaimed, in a shocked voice.
”Yes, I know, Agatha, that the child is one of the richest heiresses in Italy, but for that very reason it needs not that her husband should have wide possessions. In all other respects you could wish for no better. He will a.s.suredly be a famous knight; he is the sort of man to make her perfectly happy; and, lastly, you know I cannot forget that I owe my liberation from slavery to him. At any rate, Agatha, as I said before, he may never cross her path again, and you may, a year or two hence, find her perfectly amenable to your wishes.”
CHAPTER XVII CAPTURED
Upon the following day the doge requested Gervaise to accompany him to a meeting of the council. Upon entering the grand hall he found not only the members of the council a.s.sembled in their robes of office, but a large gathering of the n.o.bles and princ.i.p.al citizens of Genoa, together with the knights of the galley whom, under Ralph Harcourt's orders, Gervaise found, to his surprise, drawn up in order across the Hall.
Here, in the name of the Republic, Battista Fragoso announced to him that, by the unanimous decision of the council, he had been elected a n.o.ble of Genoa; an honour, he added, on only one or two previous occasions in the history of the Republic bestowed upon any but of princely rank, but which he had n.o.bly earned by the great service he had rendered to the State. His name was then inscribed in the book containing the names and t.i.tles of the n.o.bles of Genoa. Next, Battista Fragoso presented him with a superb suit of Milanese armour, as his own personal gift, and then with a casket of very valuable jewels, as the gift of the city of Genoa. Each presentation was accompanied by the plaudits of the a.s.sembly, and by the no less warm acclamations of the knights. Ralph was then called forward, and presented with a suit of armour but little inferior to that given to Gervaise, and each knight received a heavy gold chain of the finest workmans.h.i.+p of Genoa.
Two days later the preparations for departure were complete, and a sufficient number of men were engaged to man the prizes. This charge, also, Genoa took upon itself, and put on board much stronger crews than Gervaise deemed necessary for the navigation of the s.h.i.+ps. The weather was fine and the wind favourable, and a quick pa.s.sage was made to Rhodes. When the harbour was in sight, the s.h.i.+ps were ordered to proceed in single file, the galley leading the way with a huge banner of the Order floating from her stern, and smaller flags on staffs at each side.
It was not until they pa.s.sed by the two forts guarding the entrance that the flags fluttering at the mastheads of the prizes afforded to those on sh.o.r.e an intimation of the event that had taken place, and even then none supposed that this fleet of prizes had been taken by the one galley that headed them.
As the Santa Barbara slowly rowed up the harbour, the State barge of the grand master put off to meet it, and D'Aubusson, with a party of knights, soon stepped on board.