child a while ago, and so I was; yet have I risen to be ruler of England, Master Cludde! But you-I will tell you which of us is base-born. I will tell you who and what your father, Ferdinand Cludde, was. He was, nay, he is, my tool, spy, jackal! Do you understand, boy? Your father is one of the band of foul creatures to whom such as I, base-born though I be, fling the scraps from their table! He is the vilest of the vile men who do my dirty work, my lad."
He had raised his voice and hand in passion, real or assumed. He dropped them as I sprang forward. "You lie!" I cried, trembling all over.
"Easy! easy!" he said. He stopped me where I was by a gesture of stern command. "Think!" he continued, calmly and weightily. "Has any one ever spoken to you of your father since the day seven years ago, when you came here, a child, brought by a servant? Has Sir Anthony talked of him? Has any servant named his name to you. Think, boy. If Ferdinand Cludde be a father to be proud of, why does his brother make naught of him?"
"He is a Protestant," I said faintly. Faintly, because I had asked myself this very question not once but often. Sir Anthony so seldom mentioned my father that I had thought it strange myself. I had thought it strange, too, that the servants, who must well remember Ferdinand Cludde, never talked to me about him. Hitherto I had always been satisfied to answer, "He is a Protestant"; but face to face with this terrible old man and his pitiless charge, the words came but faintly from my lips.
"A Protestant," he replied solemnly. "Yes, this comes of schism, that villains cloak themselves in it, and parade for true men. A Protestant you call him, boy? He has been that, ay, and all things to all men; and he has betrayed all things and all men. He was in the great Cardinal's confidence, and forsook him, when he fell, for Cromwell. Thomas Cromwell, although they were of the same persuasion, he betrayed to me. I have here, here" – and he struck the letters in his hand a scornful blow-"the offer he made to me, and his terms. Then eight years back, when the late King Edward came to the throne, I too fell on evil days, and Master Cludde abandoned me for my Lord Hertford, but did me no great harm. But he did something which blasted him-blasted him at last."
He paused. Had the fire died down, or was it only my imagination that the shadows thickened round the bed behind him, and closed in more nearly on us, leaving his pale grim face to confront me-his face, which seemed the paler and grimmer, the more saturnine and all-mastering, for the dark frame which set it off?
"He did this," he continued slowly, "which came to light and blasted him. He asked, as the price of his service in betraying me, his brother's estate."
"Impossible!" I stammered. "Why, Sir Anthony-"
"What of Sir Anthony, you would ask?" the Chancellor replied, interrupting me with savage irony. "Oh, he was a Papist! an obstinate Papist! He might go hang-or to Warwick Jail!"
"Nay, but this at least, my lord, is false!" I cried. "Palpably false! If my father had so betrayed his own flesh and blood, should I be here? Should I be at Coton End? You say this happened eight years ago. Seven years ago I came here. Would Sir Anthony-"
"There are fools everywhere," the old man sneered. "When my Lord Hertford refused your father's suit, Ferdinand began-it is his nature-to plot against him. He was found out, and execrated by all-for he had been false to all-he fled for his life. He left you behind, and a servant brought you to Coton End, where Sir Anthony took you in."
I covered my face. Alas! I believed him; I, who had always been so proud of my lineage, so proud of the brave traditions of the house and its honor, so proud of Coton End and all that belonged to it! Now, if this were true, I could never again take pleasure in one or the other. I was the son of a man branded as a turncoat and an informer, of one who was the worst of traitors! I sank down on the settle behind me and hid my face. Another might have thought less of the blow, or, with greater knowledge of the world, might have made light of it as a thing not touching himself. But on me, young as I was, and proud, and as yet tender, and having done nothing myself, it fell with crushing force.
It was years since I had seen my father, and I could not stand forth loyally and fight his battle, as a son his father's friend and familiar for years might have fought it. On the contrary, there was so much which seemed mysterious in my past life, so much that bore out the Chancellor's accusation, that I felt a dread of its truth even before I had proof. Yet I would have proof. "Show me the letters!" I said harshly; "show me the letters, my lord!"
"You know your father's handwriting?"
"I do."
I knew it, not from any correspondence my father had held with me, but because I had more than once examined with natural curiosity the wrappers of the dispatches which at intervals of many months, sometimes of a year, came from him to Sir Anthony. I had never known anything of the contents of the letters, all that fell to my share being certain formal messages, which Sir Anthony would give me, generally with a clouded brow and a testy manner that grew genial again only with the lapse of time.
Gardiner handed me the letters, and I took them and read one. One was enough. That my father! Alas! alas! No wonder that I turned my face to the wall, shivering as with the ague, and that all about me-except the red glow of the fire, which burned into my brain-seemed darkness! I had lost the thing I valued most. I had lost at a blow everything of which I was proud. The treachery that could flush that worn face opposite to me, lined as it was with statecraft, and betray the wily tongue into passion, seemed to me, young and impulsive, a thing so vile as to brand a man's children through generations.
Therefore I hid my face in the corner of the settle, while the Chancellor gazed at me a while in silence, as one who had made an experiment might watch the result.
"You see now, my friend," he said at last, almost gently, "that you may be base-born in more ways than one. But be of good cheer; you are young, and what I have done you may do. Think of Thomas Cromwell-his father was naught. Think of the old Cardinal-my master. Think of the Duke of Suffolk-Charles Brandon, I mean. He was a plain gentleman, yet he married a queen. More, the door which they had to open for themselves I will open for you-only, when you are inside, play the man, and be faithful."
"What would you have me do?" I whispered hoarsely.
"I would have you do this," he answered. "There are great things brewing in the Netherlands, boy-great changes, unless I am mistaken. I have need of an agent there, a man, stout, trusty, and, in particular, unknown, who will keep me informed of events. If you will be that agent, I can procure for you-and not appear in the matter myself-a post of pay and honor in the Regent's Guards. What say you to that, Master Cludde? A few weeks and you will be making history, and Coton End will seem a mean place to you. Now, what do you say?"
I was longing to be away and alone with my misery, but I forced myself to reply patiently.
"With your leave I will give you my answer to-morrow, my lord," I said, as steadily as I could; and I rose, still keeping my face turned from him.
"Very well," he replied, with apparent confidence. But he watched me keenly, as I fancied. "I know already what your answer will be. Yet before you go I will give you a piece of advice which in the new life you begin to-night will avail you more than silver, more than gold-ay, more than steel, Master Francis. It is this: Be prompt to think, be prompt to strike, be slow to speak! Mark it well! It is a simple recipe, yet it has made me what I am, and may make you greater. Now go!"
He pointed to the little door opening on the staircase, and I bowed and went out, closing it carefully behind me. On the stairs, moving blindly in the dark, I fell over some one who lay sleeping there, and who clutched at my leg. I shook him off, however, with an exclamation of rage, and, stumbling down the rest of the steps, gained the open air. Excited and feverish, I shrank with aversion from the confinement of my room, and, hurrying over the drawbridge, sought at random the long terrace by the fish-pools, on which the moonlight
