"And it came to pa.s.s on the wedding-day-- So people say, so people say-- That they found her dead in her bridal array, Dead, and her lover beside her lay-- Ah, well-away!

"A sour stave for your sweets," she said, Pressing the blossoms against her lips: Then petal by petal the branch she shred, Snowing the blooms from her finger-tips, Tossing them down for her feet to tread.

What to her was the look I gave Of love despised! though she seemed to start, Seeing, and said, with a quick hand-wave, "Why, one would think that _that_ was your heart,"

While her face with a sudden thought grew grave.

But I answered nothing. And so to her home We came in the twilight; falling clear, With a few first stars and a moon's curved foam, Over the hush of meadow and mere, Whence the boom of the bittern would often come.

Would you think that she loved me?--Who can say?-- What a riddle unread was she to me!-- When I kissed her fingers and turned away I wanted to speak, but--what cared she, Though her eyes looked soft and she begged me stay!

Though she lingered to watch me--that might be A slim moon-beam or the evening haze,-- But never my Lady's drapery Or wistful face!--in the ivy maze....

Leona of Verne--why, what cared she!

So the days went by, and the Summer wore Her hot heart out; and, a mighty slayer, The Autumn harried the land and sh.o.r.e, And the world was red with his wrecks; but grayer That land with the ghosts of the nevermore.

The sheaves of the Summer had long been bound; The harvests of Autumn had long been past; And the snows of the Winter lay deep around, When the dark news came and I knew at last; And the reigning woe of my heart was crowned.

So I sought her here, the young Earl's bride; In the ancient room at the oriel dreaming, Pale as the blooms in her hair; and, wide, Her robe's rich satin, flung stormily, gleaming, Like shimmering silver, twilight-dyed.

I marked as I stole to her side that tears Were vaguely large in her beautiful eyes; That the loops of pearls on her throat, and years Old lace on her bosom were heaved with sighs; So I spoke what I thought--"Then, it appears"--

And stopped with, it seemed, my soul in my gaze-- "That you are not happy, Leona of Verne?

There is that at your heart which--well, betrays These mocking mummeries.--Live and learn!-- And this is the truth that the poet says:--

"'I went to my love and I told with my heart, In words of the soul, that are silent in speech, All of my pa.s.sion, too sacred for art; But she heard me not--for I could not reach Her in that world of which she is part.'--

"That world, where I saw you as one afar Sees palms and waters, and knows that sands, Pitiless sands, before him are; Yet follows ever with helpless hands Till he sinks at last.--You were my star,

"My hope, my heaven!--I loved you!... Life Is less than nothing to me!"... She turned, With a wild look, saying--"Now I am his wife You come and tell me!--Indeed you are learn'd In the language of hearts that's unheard!"... A Knife,

As she ceased and leaned on a cabinet,-- A curve of scintillant steel, keen, cold,-- Fell icily clashing; some curio met Among Asian antiques, bronze and gold, Mystical, curiously graven and set.

A Bactrian dagger, whose slightest p.r.i.c.k Through its ancient poison was death, I knew; If true that she loved me--then!--And quick To the unspoken thought she replied, "'T is true!

I have loved you long, and my soul was sick,

"Sick for the love that has made me weak, Weak to your will even now!"--And more She said, in my arms, that I shall not speak-- And the dagger there on the polished floor Ever her eyes, while she spoke, would seek.

"'And it came to pa.s.s on the wedding-day'"-- Then my lips for a moment were crushed to hers-- "'That they found her dead in her bridal array,'"

She sang; then said, "You finish the verse!

Finish the song, for you know the way."

And I whispered "yes," for my mind had thought Her own thought through--that life were a h.e.l.l To her as to me,--So the blade I caught With a sudden hand; and she leaned, and--well, What a little wound, and the blood it brought

To crimson her bosom!--I set her there In that carven chair; then turned the blade,-- With its glittering haft one savage glare Of gold and jewels, wildly inlaid,-- To my breast, for the poisonous point rent bare.

A stain of blood on her bosom, and one Black red o'er my heart.--You see, 't is good To die so for love!... Does the sinking sun, Through the dull vast west burst banked with blood?-- Or is it that life will at last have done?...

So you are her husband? and--well, you see, You see she is dead ... But your face, how white!

--Is it with hate or with misery?-- What matters it now!--For, at last, the night Falls and the silence covers me.

An Old Tale Re-told

From the terrace here, where the hills indent, You can see the uttermost battlement Of the castle there; the Cliffords' home; Where the seasons go and the seasons come And never a footstep else doth fall Save the prowling fox's; the ancient hall Echoes no voice save the owlet's call: Its turret chambers are homes for the bat; And its courts are tangled and wild to see; And where in the cellar was once the rat, The viper and toad move stealthily.

Long years have pa.s.sed since the place was burned, And he sailed to the wars in France and earned The name that he bears of the bold and true On his tomb. Long years, since my lord, Sir Hugh, Lived; and I was his favorite page, And the thing then happened; and he of an age When a man will love and be loved again, Or hie to the wars or a monastery, Or toil till he conquer his heart's sore pain, Or drink and forget it and finally bury.

I was his page. And often we fared Through the Clare demesnes, in autumn, hawking; If the Baron had known, how they would have glared 'Neath their bushy brows, those eyes of mocking!-- That last of the Strongbows, Richard, I mean-- And growling some six of his henchmen lean To mount and after this Clifford and hang With his crop-eared page to the nearest oak, How he would have cursed us while he spoke!

For Clare and Clifford had ever a fang In the other's side ... And I hear the clang Of his rage in the hall when the hawker told-- If he told!--how we met on the autumn wold His daughter, sweet Clara of Clare, the day Her hooded tiercel its brails did burst, And trailing its jesses, came flying our way-- An untrained haggard the falconer cursed While he tried to secure:--as the eyas flew Slant, low and heavily over us, Hugh,-- Who saw it coming, and had just then cast His peregrine hawk at a heron quarry,-- In his saddle rising, so, as it pa.s.sed, By the jesses caught, and to her did carry, Where she stood near the wood. Her face flushed rose With the glad of the meeting. No two foes Her eyes and my Lord's, I swear, who saw 'Twas love from the start. And I heard him speak Some words; then he knelt; and the sombre shaw, With the rust of the autumn waste and bleak, Grew spring with her smile, as the hawk she took On her lily wrist, where it pruned and shook Its ragged wings. Then I saw him seize The hand, that she reached to him, long and white, As she smilingly bade him rise from his knees--

When he kissed its fingers, her eyes grew bright.

But her cheeks grew pallid when, lashing through The woodland there, with a face a-flare With the sting of the wind, and his gipsy hair Flying, the falconer came, and two Or three of the people of Castle Clare.

And the leaves of the autumn made a frame For the picture there in the morning's flame.

What was said in that moment, I do not know, That moment of meeting, between those lovers; But whatever it was, 't was whispered low, And soft as a leaf that swings and hovers, A twinkling gold, when the leaves are yellow.

And her face with the joy was still aglow, When down through the wood that burly fellow Came with his frown, and made a pause In the pulse of their words. My lord, Sir Hugh, Stood with the soil on his knee. No cause Had he, but his hanger he partly drew, Then clapped it sharp in its sheath again, And bowed to my Lady, and strode away; And mounting his horse, with a swinging rein Rode with a song in his heart all day.

He loved and was loved, I knew; for, look!

All other sports for the chase he forsook.

And strange that he never went to hawk, Or hunt, but Clara would meet him there In the Strongbow forest! I know the rock, With its fern-filled moss, by the bramble lair, Were oft and again he met--by chance, Shall I say?--the daughter of Clare; as fair Of face as a queen in an old romance, Who waits with her sweet face pale; her hair Night-deep; and eyes dove-gray with dreams;-- By the fountain-side where the statue gleams And the moonbeam lolls in the lily white,-- For the knightly lover who comes at night.

Heigho! they ceased, those meetings; I wot, Betrayed to the Baron by some of his crew Of menials who followed and saw and knew.

For she loved too well to have once forgot The time and the place of their trysting true.

"Why and when?" would ask Sir Hugh In the labored letters he used to lock-- The lovers' post--in a coigne of that rock.

She used to answer, but now did not.

But nearing Yule, love got them again A twilight tryst--through frowardness sure!-- They met. And that day was gray with rain, Or snow: and the wind did ever endure A long bleak moaning thorough the wood, That chapped i' the cheek and smarted the blood; And a brook in the forest went throb and throb, And over it all was the wild-beast sob Of the rushing boughs like a thing pursued.

And then it was that he learned how she, (G.o.d's blood! how it makes my old limbs quiver To think what a miserable tyrant he-- The Baron Richard--aye and ever To his daughter was!) forsooth! must wed With an eastern earl, a Lovell: to whom (Would G.o.d o' his mercy had struck him dead!) Clara of Clare when only a child,-- With a face like a flower, that blooms in the wild Of the hills, and a soul like its soft perfume,-- Was given; to seal, or strengthen, some ties Of power and wealth--say bartered, then, Like the merest chattel. With tearful eyes And trembling lips she spoke; and when Her lover, the Clifford, had learned and heard,-- He'd have had her flee with him then, 'sdeath!

In spite of them all! Let her speak the word, They would fly together; the Baron's men Might follow, and if ... and he touched his sword, It should answer! But she, while she seemed to stay, With a hand on her bosom, her heart's quick breath, Replied to his heat, "They would take and slay Thee who art life of me!--No! not thus Shall we fly! there's another way for us; A way that is sure; an only way; I have thought it out this many a day."-- The words that she spoke, how well I remember!

As well as the mood o' that day of December, That bullied and bl.u.s.tered and seemed in league, Like a spiteful shrew, with the wind and snow, To drown the words of their sweet intrigue, With the boom of the boughs tossed to and fro.

Her last words these, "By curfew sure, On Christmas eve, at the postern door."

And we were there; with a led horse too; Armed for a journey I hardly knew Whither, but why, you well can guess.

For often he whispered a certain name, The talisman of his happiness, That warmed his blood like a yule-log's flame.

While we waited there, till its owner came, We saw how the castle's baronial girth, Like a giant's, loosed for reveling more, Shone; and we heard the wa.s.sail and mirth Where the mistletoe hung in the hearth's red roar, And the holly brightened the weaponed wall Of ancient oak in the banqueting hall.

And the spits, I trow, by the scullions turned O'er the snoring logs, rich steamed and burned, While the whole wild-boar and the deer were roasted, And the half of an ox and the roe-buck haunches; While tuns of ale, that the cellars boasted, And casks of sack, were broached for paunches Of va.s.sals who reveled in stable and hall.

The song of the minstrel; the yeomen's quarrel O'er the dice and the drink; and the huntsman's bawl In the baying kennels, its hounds a-snarl O'er the bones of the banquet; now loud, now low, We could hear where we crouched in the drifting snow.

Was she long? did she come?... By the postern we Like shadows waited. My lord, Sir Hugh, Spoke, pointing a tower, "That cas.e.m.e.nt, see?

When a stealthy light in its slit burns blue And signals thrice slowly, thus--'t is she."

And close to his breast his gaberdine drew, For the wind it whipped and the snow beat through.

Did she come?--We had waited an hour or twain, When the taper flashed in the central pane, And flourished three times and vanished so.

And under the arch of the postern's portal, Holding the horses, we stood in the snow, Stiff with the cold. Ah, me! immortal Minutes we waited, breath-bated, and listened Shivering there in the hiss of the gale: The parapets whistled, the angles glistened, And the night around seemed one black wail Of death, whose ominous presence over The stormy battlements seemed to hover.

Said my lord, Sir Hugh,--to himself he spoke,-- "She feels for the spring in the sliding panel 'Neath the arras, hid in the carven oak.

It opens. The stair, like a well's dark channel, Yawns; and the draught makes her taper slope.

Wrapped deep in her mantle she stoops, now puts One foot on the stair; now a listening pause As nearer and nearer the mad search draws Of the thwarted castle. No smallest hope That they find her now that the panel shuts!...

If the wind, that howls like a tortured thing, Would throttle itself with itself, then I Might hear how her hurrying footsteps ring Down the hollow ... there! 't is her fingers try The postern's bolts that the rust makes cling."-- But ever some whim of the storm that shook A clanging ring or a creaking hook In b.u.t.tress or wall. And we waited, numb With the cold, till dawn--but she did not come.