Part 19 (1/2)

”When was it that we last sat to see men bowl, lady?” he said. ”I remember a gay match when I bowled against my Lord of Buckingham, and fair ladies sat and smiled upon us. The fairest laughed, and tied her colors around my arm.”

The lady whom he addressed sat quietly, with hands folded in her silken lap and an untroubled face. ”I did not know you then, my lord,” she answered him, quite softly and sweetly. ”Had I done so, be sure I would have cut my hand off ere it gave color of mine to”--”To whom?” he demanded, as she paused.

”To a coward, my lord,” she said clearly.

As if she had been a man, his hand went to his sword hilt. As for her, she leaned back in her chair and looked at him with a smile.

He spoke at last, slowly and with deliberate emphasis. ”I won then,” he said. ”I shall win again, my lady,--my Lady Jocelyn Leigh.”

I dropped my hand from her chair and stepped forward. ”It is my wife to whom you speak, my Lord Carnal,” I said sternly. ”I wait to hear you name her rightly.”

Rolfe rose from the gra.s.s and stood beside me, and Jeremy Sparrow, shouldering aside with scant ceremony Burgess and Councilor, came also.

The Governor leaned forward out of his chair, and the crowd became suddenly very still.

”I am waiting, my lord,” I repeated.

In an instant, from what he had been he became the frank and guileless n.o.bleman. ”A slip of the tongue, Captain Percy!” he cried, his white teeth showing and his hand raised in a gesture of deprecation. ”A natural thing, seeing how often, how very often, I have so addressed this lady in the days when we had not the pleasure of your acquaintance.” He turned to her and bowed, until the feather in his hat swept the ground. ”I won then,” he said. ”I shall win again--Mistress Percy,” and pa.s.sed on to the seat that had been reserved for him.

The game began. I was to lead one side, and young Clement the other. At the last moment he came over to me. ”I am out of it, Captain Percy,”

he announced with a rueful face. ”My lord there asks me to give him my place. When we were hunting yesterday, and the stag turned upon me, he came between and thrust his knife into the brute, which else might have put an end to my hunting forever and a day: so you see I can't refuse him. Plague take it all! and Dorothy Gookin sitting there watching!”

My lord and I stood forward, each with a bowl in his hand. We looked toward the Governor. ”My lord first, as becometh his rank,” he said.

My lord stooped and threw, and his bowl went swiftly over the gra.s.s, turned, and rested not a hands'-breadth from the jack. I threw. ”One is as near as the other!” cried Master Mac.o.c.ke for the judges. A murmur arose from the crowd, and my lord swore beneath his breath. He and I retreated to our several sides, and Rolfe and West took our places.

While they and those that followed bowled, the crowd, attentive though it was, still talked and laughed, and laid wagers upon its favorites; but when my lord and I again stood forth, the noise was hushed, and men and women stared with all their eyes. He delivered, and his bowl touched the jack. He straightened himself, with a smile, and I heard Jeremy Sparrow behind me groan; but my bowl too kissed the jack. The crowd began to laugh with sheer delight, but my lord turned red and his brows drew together. We had but one turn more. While we waited, I marked his black eyes studying every inch of the ground between him and that small white ball, to strike which, at that moment, I verily believe he would have given the King's favor. All men pray, though they pray not to the same G.o.d. As he stood there, when his time had come, weighing the bowl in his hand, I knew that he prayed to his daemon, fate, star, whatever thing he raised an altar to and bent before. He threw, and I followed, while the throng held its breath. Master Mac.o.c.ke rose to his feet. ”It's a tie, my masters!” he exclaimed.

The excited crowd surged forward, and a babel of voices arose. ”Silence, all!” cried the Governor. ”Let them play it out!”

My lord threw, and his bowl stopped perilously near the s.h.i.+ning mark. As I stepped to my place a low and supplicating ”O Lord!” came to my ears from the lips and the heart of the preacher, who had that morning thundered against the toys of this world. I drew back my arm and threw with all my force. A cry arose from the throng, and my lord ground his heel into the earth. The bowl, spurning the jack before it, rushed on, until both buried themselves in the red and yellow leaves that filled the trench.

I turned and bowed to my antagonist. ”You bowl well, my lord,” I said.

”Had you had the forest training of eye and arm, our fortunes might have been reversed.”

He looked me up and down. ”You are kind, sir,” he said thickly.

”'To-day to thee, to-morrow to me.' I give you joy of your petty victory.”

He turned squarely from me, and stood with his face downstream. I was speaking to Rolfe and to the few--not even all of that side for which I had won--who pressed around me, when he wheeled.

”Your Honor,” he cried to the Governor, who had paused beside Mistress Percy, ”is not the Due Return high-p.o.o.ped? Doth she not carry a blue pennant, and hath she not a gilt siren for figurehead?”

”Ay,” answered the Governor, lifting his head from the hand he had kissed with ponderous gallantry. ”What then, my lord?”

”Then to-morrow has dawned, sir captain,” said my lord to me. ”Sure, Dame Venus and her blind son have begged for me favorable winds; for the Due Return has come again.”

The game that had been played was forgotten for that day. The hogshead of sweet scented, lying to one side, wreathed with bright vines, was unclaimed of either party; the servants who brought forward the keg of canary dropped their burden, and stared with the rest. All looked down the river, and all saw the Due Return coming up the broad, ruffled stream, the wind from the sea filling her sails, the tide with her, the gilt mermaid on her prow just rising from the rus.h.i.+ng foam. She came as swiftly as a bird to its nest. None had thought to see her for at least ten days.

Upon all there fell a sudden realization that it was the word of the King, feathered by the command of the Company, that was hurrying, arrow-like, toward us. All knew what the Company's orders would be,--must needs be,--and the Tudor sovereigns were not so long in the grave that men had forgot to fear the wrath of kings. The crowd drew back from me as from a man plague-spotted. Only Rolfe, Sparrow, and the Indian stood their ground.

The Governor turned from staring downstream. ”The game is played, gentlemen,” he announced abruptly. ”The wind grows colder, too, and clouds are gathering. This fair company will pardon me if I dismiss them somewhat sooner than is our wont. The next sunny day we will play again.