Mistress of mistresses (23 page)

'What
rede will you take now, my lord Admiral? One mischief never comes alone. Here
you have the Chancellor a day behind time and still no news of him, and we
with our powers thus clipped sit but and look on. If Kutarmish fall, then is
Outer Meszria lost without a stroke, and that the richest land of all in the
south here.'

'Ibian
will hold Kutarmish never doubt it’ said the Admiral.

'Say
he do,' replied Roder. 'Shall then these ram-cats of Mesrria reap all the
honour, whiles we of the Queen's true party sit quittering here? 'Twill breed
discontent i'
 
the army, too, forget not.
I have felt it ere now: ears
 
pricked up
for every air that bloweth a doubt if it be we truly or these of the other
party do truly uphold her interest'

'That',
said Jeronimy, 'is a main uncertainty of currents and shifting sands we needs
must in a manner sleep and eat withal since first he was deputed overseer of
her nonage, whose innocent right doth so justify his wrong.'

'It
lieth upon us, saving your reverence, my lord Admiral,' said Roder, 'not but
eat and sleep only, but stand up and act. Consider: if this intelligence (and
'tis well seconded; be not all out, we be now two to one against him.'

'He
is strong in horse, and of great reputation in that arm,' said Jeronimy.

‘I
redoubt him not,' said Roder, 'in that particular.'

'All
in all,' said Jeronimy, 'his force, be it little, is well strengthed. A little
gold overvalueth much lead or iron.'

Roder
spat on the ground and scowled. 'Were't mine alone to command,' said he, after
a minute, 'I'd down into the flats to-day: with my new broom sweep Mm one swap,
and sweep him out of Meszria.'

The
Admiral softly blew out his cheeks and shook his head. 'Let us wait, my lord,
till to-morrow. The Chancellor will sure become then.'

The
morrow dawned fair. All the morning fog hung over the countryside to the
northwards, so that it showed dull like the bloom on a black grape; above it
the sky was blue and tender, and all the near stretches of the wide vale of the
Zenner lay bright under the' sun, but in a soft brightness, with the dwellings
of men and the paleness here and there of a winding stream, and the winding
empty high-road coming south across the low land till at length it breasted the
slopes of these southern hills and came up to cross the Salimat. At noon came
hot news of the vicarian army marching west again. By the third hour past noon
they were in sight, coming southeast over the brow two leagues away, above
Aptyssa. The camp in the Salimat was pitched a little to the south below the
hause, not to let it be known from the northward how strongly the road was
held. In the hause and upon the northern slope it was jopplety ground of rock
and heather: little knolls and dingles, in which Jeronimy and Roder now
disposed their army on either side of the road, hidden and well posted for
overwhelming of Lessingham should he assay the pass. He came on but slowly.
It was three hours more ere he began to drive in Jeronimy's outposts on the
Hazanat beck. Roder's patience was long since drained away, and he was for
setting upon them then and there while daylight lasted. 'Nay, we must bide
fast,' said Jeronimy. 'Would you throw away the advantage we do hold upon him
and fight on ground of his own choosing; aptest too for cavalry, wherein we are
weakest?'

Roder
drew up his lip. 'Wisdom', he said, 'hath her excesses, and no less need of
moderation, than folly. Take your course, my lord; but for my own part I will
not be held answerable for these delays.'

It
was seen now that Lessingham halted and pitched camp in the meadows west of
Limisba, the hither side of the Hazanat, about a mile short of where the ground
began to rise. And now he arrayed his army before the camp as if for battle.
Jeronimy said, 'He doth now in a manner draw the straw before the cat. But we
shall not play withal.' Roder ground his teeth and went to his quarters. Little
content it brought him to see his own summer palace of Limisba, given him
lately by King Mezentius in payment of his services in peace and war, lie thus
under the claws of Lessingham. When supper was cooked, Jeronimy bade damp out
all fires, so as it should not be known from below whether he lay there still
in the Salimat or whether he was marched away. There was yet no tidings of the
Chancellor, now full two days behind the time appointed. This lay like an
ill-digested meal on their bellies. Jeronimy chose him out a prudent close and
faithful messenger: sent him back by the Zayana road to seek tidings. All night
long Lessingham's camp-fires smoked to the stars from glimmering points of
flame. Roder said, 'Are they girl-children, then, these riffraff of Rerek,
that they must coddle by the fire these summer nights, though we upon the hill
can sleep in the cold?' He was snoring in his tent and so saw not, an hour
before dawn, his own house of Limisba in a lowe, like Antares amid the lesser
fires of night.

At
daybreak Limisba sparkled merrily, so as even here in the Salimat a man might
doubt he heard not the crackle, throwing up vast eddying clouds of smoke that
were yet but as a wreath from a snuffed-out candle facing the clouds of the
dawn. The camp-fires burned yet, but the camp was struck. Along the winding
waters towards the Zenner new fires beaconed to the sky, as if Lessingham,
having done with his feint against the Salimat, would say, 'Come down then and
deal with me, or I will burn up all Meszria under your noses.' Word was brought
hastily to the generals: Roder rushed out in his shirt, sputtering a stream of
blasphemies: called up the guard to summon the captains to council: gave order
to strike camp and make all ready to march in posture for battle upon short
warning. In the midst of which haste and fury he was met with the Lord Jeronimy
with letters in his hand. 'From the Chancellor: put in my hands this instant
by's messenger ridden day and night,' said the Admiral: 'these commends express
he hath had delays for cause we spoke on: doubtful allegiance 'mongst his men:
but all ended now and their minds well satisfied. Doubted not to set forth from
Zayana on Thursday (that's four days late)'—'Damnation of hell! what good's in
that?' said Roder.—'And by forced marches should be here ere to-morrow night.'

'Then
is our way clear,' said Roder: 'we wait no longer;' and he flung off to his
tent to clothe himself. The lord Admiral looked after him with pursed lips and
an anxious brow.

Ten
minutes later was their council called in the Admiral's tent. Earl Roder came
in in full battle-gear. He said, 'There is first the point of policy, my lord,
and that's for you and I. Pray you let's be private.'

'As
shall please you,' said Jeronimy.

When
they were private the Lord Jeronimy took him by the arm and said, ‘I would have
you in a manner overview the thing serenely. I am no jot less eager than
yourself to strike; but remember, 'tis his plain game to make us put our finger
in a hole. There is hazard in't today. To-morrow, with the Chancellor and near
another two thousand men, no hazard at all. Hasty fruits, my lord, be a
pleasure for the time; but their time is but a cherry-fair.'

Roder
said, in a strained quietness, 'Your lordship must forgive me if I speak my
mind, and 'tis, of this that you have spoke now, that a lewder and feebler
skill or argument can no man make: if in sober sadness you would wait till
to-morrow and suffer this Lessingham slip through our fingers.'

'Nay,
pray you, my lord,' said Jeronimy, 'you must not wrest my words. Wait till
to-morrow, and I will securely promise you there shall not one tail of them return
again into Rerek.'

'Were
it speak my thought,' said Roder, and grew crimson, ‘I should a said you did
seek an argument to cloak your—nay, but I know 'tis not chicken-hearted-ness: I
mean your pig-headedness,—like a filthy fly that seeketh all over the body for
a sore.'

'Rude
incivilities, my Lord Roder,' said the Admiral, taking his hand away, 'shall
stand us in little stead in our search for wise counsel. In a manner, 'tis a
main need for us to be of one mind in this pass we are come to: to fail of that
were a ruin worth all men's pity.'

'My
good lord Admiral,' said Roder, 'give me your hand. I'm sorry my cursed words
should so outrun my meaning. Only, a shame have we with so much strength at our
back, when that a pawn saith to the king checkmate. Well, let him go his ways
then. I reck not. And when his grace shall see, from his high vantage point of
Rumala, this Lessingham fare like a king through Outer Meszria, and none to
nay-say him, and we by just presumption lost or gone to sleep, he will soon
down on him from Rumala, and himself do the thing we boggled at.'

The
Admiral listened with hands clasping and unclasping behind his back, his head
bent, as if studying his own feet. At mention of the Duke he gave a little
start: a deep flush overspread his countenance. 'Nay, but I had forgot that,'
he said, after a pause. 'And yet 'tis present danger, Lessingham heading east.
In the mad-brain violence of his valour, to come down: cope Lessingham in the
plains.' Still avoiding Roder's eye, he walked slowly to the tent door and
stood looking out. 'Whereupon should most assuredly his too little force be
incontinently overthrown and eaten up.'

Roder
pricked his ears. Jeronimy abode there, silent and thoughtful, twirling his
gold perspective-glass on the end of its slender chain. Roder spoke: 'Which ift
befall, you and I should have but one shift left, my lord Admiral: that's
straight go hang ourselves.'

The
Admiral said nothing: only ceased from twirling of his glass. Roder waited a
little. Then he said. 'There is yet good time to head him off, bring him to
battle. After a few hours, not so easy; yet even that were better, follow at
his heels through Meszria: better than sit here.'

There
was a long silence. Roder breathed thickly through his nose; his jowl, under
the bristles of his cropped black beard, swoll above the collar of his gorget.
At last, without looking round, Jeronimy spoke. 'The considerations are too
much different. Time: 'tis that spoils all. No time to bring word to the Duke
in Rumala. And so, impulsive necessity: not your other reasons, my lord he said,
turning and coming in; ' 'tis this persuadeth me to that which were else great
folly. You shall have your way, my lord. Call in the rest.'

'Ha!
then 'tis day!' said Roder, and took him by both hands. 'Now have I the bloody
man upon the anvil: shall be pulp ere sundown.'

Lessingham,
from a rise of ground beside the Zenner where he had now halted his army,
beheld at four miles' distance how Roder came down in force from the Salimat.
'The Gods be praised,' he said: 'here's an end of bonfires. Yet with such
sluggish foxen, no way but smoke 'em out. And now we must not seem too eager,
while they have yet the choice to run to earth again.'

'You
have roused a bed of bears, not foxen,' said Amaury.

'When
the bear was met with the tiger cat, then was there fur a-flying,' said
Lessingham. 'Time is of our side. They outnumber us, but not past coping with.
Give 'em time to gather all their power, we durst not stand them; but now 'tis
not beyond adventure.'

He
issued command now, and they fell back slowly south-eastwards. The Earl turned
east on this, as if to intercept them in the lava at the skirts of the hills
above Nephory. After an hour's march the armies were drawn within two miles of
one another. Lessingham altered his course and headed due north, hugging at
last the eastern edge of the wood of Orasbieh as if he would make for the
bridge at Lorkan, where the Kutarmish road running in from the north crosses
the shallow and muddy river Ailyman a little above its falling into the Zenner.
Here betwixt wood and river was a stretch of meadow land, firm and level: and
here, resting his left upon the river a few hundred paces above the bridge and
his right upon the border of Orasbieh wood, Lessingham halted and made ready
for battle. Of his main battle, of footmen, he made a crescent, centre
advanced, horns curving back toward the road. A great part of these were raw
levies, raised, some hundreds, within the week from the countryside inland
about Argyanna and seaward about Kessarey, others raised by the Vicar two
months since, when he drew power to him in Owldale because of King Styllis. But
nine hundred, of all the sixteen hundred foot, were veterans of the Vicar's
old army, hard as bears and inured to war: these had seen service under
Lessingham too ere now, seven or eight years ago when, not without discreet
countenance from the princes and (as was commonly said) from Barganax, the
great rebellion had shaken all Rerek nearly to the unseating of the Vicar and
the conquering might of Fingiswold. With some of these veteran troops
Lessingham stiffened his centre, but posted them in the^ain upon the wings,
held well back as aforesaid: ten score he kept in reserve under his own hand
for more security in the dangerous purpose he did intend. Four hundred of his
own horse, under command of Amaury, made his left battle, resting on the river.
Three hundred more, under Brandre-mart, along with the squadrons lent from
Argyanna, went on the right beside the wood.