Chapter 83: Betrayal
Castle von Bethune, Krakow
Lady Bethune opened the letter from her husband and read:
"They met me in the day of success; and I have learned by the perfectest report they have more in them than mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire to question them further, they made themselves air, into which they vanished. Whiles I stood rapt in the wonder of it, came missives from the king, who all-hailed me, 'Duke of Pomerania'; by which title, before, these weird sisters saluted me, and referred me to the coming on of time, with 'Hail, Kaiser that shalt be!' This have I thought good to deliver thee, my dearest partner of greatness; that thou mightst not lose the dues of rejoicing, by being ignorant of what greatness is promised thee. Lay it to thy heart, and farewell. ~Malcolm Bethune"
She put down the letter and thought.
"Silesia thou art, and Pomerania," she muttered, "and shalt be what thou art promis'd; yet do I fear thy nature; it is too full o' th' milk of human kindness to catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great; art not without ambition; but without the illness should attend it. What thou wouldst highly, that wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false, and yet wouldst wrongly win: thou'dst have, great Silesia, that which cries, "Thus thou must do, if thou have it: and that which rather thou dost fear to do than wishest should be undone." Hie thee hither, that I may pour my spirits in thine ear; and chastise with the valour of my tongue all that impedes thee from the golden round, which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem to have thee crown'd withal."
A servant entered the room, forcing her to snap out of her thoughts. "What is your tidings?"
"The Kaiser comes here tonight," said the attendant.
"Thou'rt mad to say it: is not thy master with him? who, were't so, would have inform'd for preparation."
"So please you, it is true:—our duke is coming: one of my fellows had the speed of him; who, almost dead for breath, had scarcely more than would make up his message."
"Give him tending; he brings great news."
The attendant left the room, allowing Lady Bethune to think again.
"The raven himself is hoarse that croaks the fatal entrance of Martin under my battlements. Come, you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here; and fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full of direst cruelty! make thick my blood, ttop up the access and passage to remorse, that no compunctious visitings of nature shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between the effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts, and take my milk for gall, your murdering ministers, wherever in your sightless substances you wait on nature's mischief! Come, thick night, and pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell that my keen knife see not the wound it makes nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark to cry, 'Hold, hold!'"
There was a knock at the door, and in came her husband, Malcolm Bethune.
"Great Silesia! Worthy Pomerania!" she cried. "Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter! Thy letters have transported me beyond this ignorant present, and I feel now the future in the instant."
"My dearest love," said Malcolm, "Martin comes here tonight."
"And when goes hence?"
"At the end of the month,—as he purposes."
"O, never shall sun that morrow see! Your face, my duke, is as a book where men may read strange matters:—to beguile the time, look like the time; bear welcome in your eye, your hand, your tongue: look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under't. He that's coming must be provided for: and you shall put this night's great business into my despatch; which shall to all our nights and days to come give solely sovereign sway and masterdom."
"We will speak further."
"Only look up clear; to alter favor ever is to fear: leave all the rest to me."
[Exeunt.]
The Next Day
"This castle hath a pleasant seat," said Martin, "the air nimbly and sweetly recommends itself unto our gentle senses."
"This guest of summer, the temple-haunting martlet, does approve by his lov'd mansionry, that the heaven's breath smells wooingly here: no jutty, frieze, buttress, nor coigne of vantage, but this bird hath made his pendant bed and procreant cradle: where they most breed and haunt, I have observ'd the air is delicate," said Kane.
Lady Bethune appeared in front of the imperial entourage, dressed in her finest clothes.
"See, see, our honour'd hostess!" exclaimed Martin. "The love that follows us sometime is our trouble, which still we thank as love. Herein I teach you wow you shall bid God ild us for your pains, and thank us for your trouble."
"All our service in every point twice done, and then done double, were poor and single business to contend against those honours deep and broad wherewith your majesty loads our house: for those of old, and the late dignities heap'd up to them, we rest your hermits," said Lady Bethune.
"Where's the Thane of Cawdor?" asked Martin. "Fair and noble hostess, we are your guest tonight."
"Busy. Now let me show you to the dining hall..."
Nighttime.
Malcolm wandered through the castle, a candle and knife in his hand.
"If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well iIt were done quickly," he said to himself, "Why must I do this? Besides, this Martin hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been so clear in his great office, that his virtues will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against the deep damnation of his taking-off..."
Lady Bethune appeared in front of him. "He has almost supp'd: why have you left the chamber?"
His feet cold, Malcolm stammered out, "We will proceed no further in this business: he hath honour'd me of late; and I have bought golden opinions from all sorts of people, which would be worn now in their newest gloss, not cast aside so soon."
His wife was not convinced. "Was the hope drunk wherein you dress'd yourself? hath it slept since? And wakes it now, to look so green and pale at what it did so freely? From this time such I account thy love. Art thou afeard to be the same in thine own act and valour as thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that which thou esteem'st the ornament of life, and live a coward in thine own esteem; letting "I dare not" wait upon "I would," like the poor cat i' the adage?"
"Pr'ythee, peace! I dare do all that may become a man; who dares do more is none."
"What beast was't, then, that made you break this enterprise to me? When you durst do it, then you were a man; and, to be more than what you were, you would be so much more the man. Nor time nor place did then adhere, and yet you would make both: they have made themselves, and that their fitness now does unmake you. I have given suck, and know how tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me: I would, while it was smiling in my face, have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums and dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you have done to this."
"If we should fail?"
"We fail! But screw your courage to the sticking-place, And we'll not fail. When Martin is asleep,—whereto the rather shall his day's hard journey soundly invite him, his two chamberlains will I with wine and wassail so convince that memory, the warder of the brain, shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason a limbec only: when in swinish sleep their drenched natures lie as in a death, what cannot you and I perform upon the unguarded Martin? what not put upon his spongy officers; who shall bear the guilt of our great quell?"
"I am settled," said Malcolm, "and bend up each corporal agent to this terrible feat. Away, and mock the time with fairest show: false face must hide what the false heart doth know."
Lady Bethune left the hallway, leaving Malcolm alone to his fate.
"Is this a dagger which I see before me," he muttered, starting to hallucinate, "The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee:—I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible to feeling as to sight? or art thou but a dagger of the mind, a false creation, proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain? I see thee yet, in form as palpable as this which now I draw. Thou marshall'st me the way that I was going; and such an instrument I was to use. Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses, or else worth all the rest: I see thee still; and on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood, which was not so before."
Up ahead, a bell rang--his wife's signal that the guards were dispatched.
"I go, and it is done," he whispered, "the bell invites me. Hear it not, Martin, for it is a knell that summons thee to heaven or to hell."
He heard a soft knock on the door. "Who's there?—what, ho!"
"Alack!" said Lady Bethune. "I am afraid they have awak'd, and 'tis not done: the attempt, and not the deed, confounds us.—Hark!—I laid their daggers ready; he could not miss 'em.—You were too slow, you fool, with all of your monologues! I have done the deed.—Didst thou not hear a noise?"
"I heard the owl scream and the crickets cry."
"Did not you speak?"
"When?"
"Now."
"As I descended?"
"Ay."
"Hark!—Who lies i' the second chamber?"
"Frederica Augusta, Sophia's sister. I dispatched her too."
"This is a sorry sight."
"You do unbend your noble strength to think so brainsickly of things.—Go get some water, and wash this filthy witness from your hand.—why did you bring these daggers from the place? They must lie there: go carry them; and smear the sleepy grooms with blood."
"I'll go no more: I am afraid to think what I have done; look on't again I dare not."
"Infirm of purpose! Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood that fears a painted devil. If he do bleed, I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal, for it must seem their guilt."
And Lady Bethune vanished into the darkness of the hallway. Presently Malcolm heard a knocking.
"Whence is that knocking? How is't with me, when every noise appals me? What hands are here? Ha, they pluck out mine eyes! Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand? No; this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine, making the green one red."
Lady Bethune returned, not amused by her husband's frequent monologues.
"My hands are of your colour," she said, "but I shame To wear a heart so white. Let us return to our chambers."
And they did.
Morning.
"Is our host stirring?" asked Sophia. "Our knocking has awak'd him; here he comes."
"Good morrow, my princess!" said Malcolm, still dressed in his nightgown.
"Is my father stirring, worthy duke?" she asked.
"Not yet."
"He did command me to call timely on him: I have almost slipp'd the hour. I'll go wake him up now."
Sophia left for the Kaiser's quarters.
Malcolm only had to wait a whole minute before Sophia burst back into the room, screaming, "O horror, horror, horror! Tongue nor heart cannot conceive nor name thee!"
"What's the matter?" said Malcolm.
"Confusion now hath made his masterpiece! Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope the Lord's anointed temple, and stole thence the life o' the building," said Sophia.
"What is't you say? the life?" demanded Malcolm. "Mean you his majesty?"
"Approach the chamber, and destroy your sight with a new Gorgon:—do not bid me speak; see, and then speak yourselves," said Sophia.
Malcolm left for the bedchambers.
"Awake, awake!" screamed Sophia. "Ring the alarum bell:—murder and treason! Kane and Frederica Augusta! awake! Shake off this downy sleep, death's counterfeit, and look on death itself! up, up, and see the great doom's image! Kane! As from your graves rise up, and walk like sprites to countenance this horror!"
The alarm bells began to ring, and Lady Bethune entered the hall, obviously annoyed by the bells.
"What's the business, that such a hideous trumpet calls to parley the sleepers of the house? speak, speak!"
"O gentle lady," said Sophia, "'Tis not for you to hear what I can speak: the repetition, in a woman's ear, would murder as it fell."
Kane arrived in the room.
"Kane! Our imperial master's murder'd! My father is dead!"
"Woe, alas! What, in our house?" demanded Lady Bethune.
Malcolm returned and said, "Your imperial father's murder'd."
"O, by whom?" asked Sophia.
"Those of his chamber, as it seem'd, had done't: their hands and faces were all badg'd with blood; so were their daggers, which, unwip'd, we found upon their pillows: they star'd, and were distracted; no man's life was to be trusted with them. O, yet I do repent me of my fury, that I did kill them."
Lady Bethune fainted.
"Quick!" said Malcolm. "We must get the body in order for the funeral! And find anymore conspirators!"
Everybody left, except for Sophia and her cousin, Friedrich.
"What will you do?" asked Friedrich. "Let's not consort with them: to show an unfelt sorrow is an office which the false man does easy. I'll to Scandinavia."
"To Russia, I," said Sophia, "Our separated fortune shall keep us both the safer: where we are, there's daggers in men's smiles: the near in blood, the nearer bloody. Malcolm has the loyalty of the legions and probably the Diet. He will order us killed and then take the throne."
"This murderous shaft that's shot hath not yet lighted; and our safest way is to avoid the aim. Therefore to horse; and let us not be dainty of leave-taking, but shift away: there's warrant in that theft which steals itself, when there's no mercy left."
They quietly left the castle, got on their horses, and left Krakow.
Later
"How goes the world, sir, now?"
"Why, see you not?"
"Is't known who did this more than bloody deed?"
"Those that Malcolm hath slain."
"Alas, the day! What good could they pretend?"
"They were suborn'd: Sophia and Friedrich, the Kaiser's daughter and nephew, are stol'n away and fled; which puts upon them suspicion of the deed."
"'Gainst nature still: thriftless ambition, that wilt ravin up thine own life's means!—Then 'tis most like, the sovereignty will fall upon Malcolm."
:He is already nam'd; and gone to Berlin to be invested."
"Where is Martin's body?"
"Carried to Potsdam, the sacred storehouse of his predecessors, and guardian of their bones."
"Will you to Berlin?"
"No, cousin, I'll to Vienna."
"Well, I will thither."
"Well, may you see things well done there,—adieu!—est our old robes sit easier than our new!"
"Farewell."
"God's benison go with you; and with those that would make good of bad, and friends of foes!"