By What Authority? Part 35

"I am come to meet Mr. Oldham," he said, "and to give him a message; and this is it, 'Come, for all things are now ready!'"

"My dear boy," said James, stopping short, "you must forgive me; but what in the world do you mean by that?"

"I come from Mr. Roger," said Anthony, "you need not be afraid. He has had an accident and sent for me."

"Mr. Roger?" said James interrogatively.

"Yes," said Anthony, "he hath a patch over one eye; and stutters somewhat."

James gave a sigh of relief.

"My dear boy," he said, "I cannot thank you enough. You know what it means then?"

"Why, yes," said Anthony.

"And you a Protestant, and in the Archbishop's household?"

"Why, yes," said Anthony, "and a Christian and your friend."

"G.o.d bless you, Anthony," said the priest; and took his hand and pressed it.

They were pa.s.sing out now under the west door, and stood together for a moment looking at the lights down Ludgate Hill. The houses about Amen Court stood up against the sky to their right.

"I must not stay," said Anthony, "I must fetch my horse and be back at Lambeth for evening prayers at six. He is stabled at the Palace here."

"Well, well," said the priest, "I thank G.o.d that there are true hearts like yours. G.o.d bless you again my dear boy--and--and make you one of us some day!"

Anthony smiled at him a little tremulously, for the grat.i.tude and the blessing of this man was dear to him; and after another hand grasp, he turned away to the right, leaving the priest still half under the shadow of the door looking after him.

He had done his errand promptly and discreetly.

CHAPTER VIII

THE Ma.s.sING-HOUSE

Newman's Court lay dark and silent under the stars on Sunday morning a little after four o'clock. The gloomy weather of the last three or four days had pa.s.sed off in heavy battalions of sullen sunset clouds on the preceding evening, and the air was full of frost. By midnight thin ice was lying everywhere; pendants of it were beginning to form on the overhanging eaves; and streaks of it between the cobble-stones that paved the court. The great city lay in a frosty stillness as of death.

The patrol pa.s.sed along Cheapside forty yards away from the entrance of the court, a little after three o'clock; and a watchman had cried out half an hour later, that it was a clear night; and then he too had gone his way. The court itself was a little rectangular enclosure with two entrances, one to the north beneath the arch of a stable that gave on to Newman's Pa.s.sage, which in its turn opened on to St. Giles' Lane that led to Cheapside; the other, at the further end of the long right-hand side, led by a labyrinth of pa.s.sages down in the direction of the wharfs to the west of London Bridge. There were three houses to the left of the entrance from Newman's Pa.s.sage; the back of a ware-house faced them on the other long side with the door beyond; and the other two sides were respectively formed by the archway of the stable with a loft over it, and a blank high wall at the opposite end.

A few minutes after four o'clock the figure of a woman suddenly appeared soundlessly in the arch under the stables; and after standing there a moment advanced along the front of the houses till she reached the third door. She stood here a moment in silence, listening and looking towards the doorway opposite, and then rapped gently with her finger-nail eleven or twelve times. Almost immediately the door opened, showing only darkness within; she stepped in, and it closed silently behind her. Then the minutes slipped away again in undisturbed silence. At about twenty minutes to five the figure of a very tall man dressed as a layman slipped in through the door that led towards the river, and advanced to the door where he tapped in the same manner as the woman before him, and was admitted at once. After that people began to come more frequently, some hesitating and looking about them as they entered the court, some slipping straight through without a pause, and going to the door, which opened and shut noiselessly as each tapped and was admitted. Sometimes two or three would come together, sometimes singly; but by five o'clock about twenty or thirty persons had come and been engulfed by the blackness that showed each time the door opened; while no glimmer of light from any of the windows betrayed the presence of any living soul within. At five o'clock the stream stopped. The little court lay as silent under the stars again as an hour before. It was a night of breathless stillness; there was no dripping from the eaves; no sound of wheels or hoofs from the city; only once or twice came the long howl of a dog across the roofs.

Ten minutes pa.s.sed away.

Then without a sound a face appeared like a pale floating patch in the dark door that opened on to the court. It remained hung like a mask in the darkness for at least a minute; and then a man stepped through on to the cobblestones. Something on his head glimmered sharply in the starlight; and there was the same sparkle at the end of a pole that he carried in his hand; he turned and nodded; and three or four men appeared behind him.

Then out of the darkness of the archway at the other end of the court appeared a similar group. Once a man slipped on the frozen stones and cursed under his breath, and the leader turned on him with a fierce indrawing of his breath; but no word was spoken.

Then through both entrances streamed dark figures, each with a steely glitter on head and breast, and with something that shone in their hands; till the little court seemed half full of armed men; but the silence was still formidable in its depth.

The two leaders came together to the door of the third house, and their heads were together; and a few sibilant consonants escaped them. The breath of the men that stood out under the starlight went up like smoke in the air. It was now a quarter-past five.

Three notes of a hand-bell sounded behind the house; and then, without any further attempt at silence, the man who had entered the court first advanced to the door and struck three or four thundering blows on it with a mace, and shouted in a resonant voice:

"Open in the Queen's Name."

The men relaxed their cautious att.i.tudes, and some grounded their weapons; others began to talk in low voices; a small party advanced nearer their leaders with weapons, axes and halberds, uplifted.

By now the blows were thundering on the door; and the same shattering voice cried again and again:

"Open in the Queen's name; open in the Queen's name!"

The middle house of the three was unoccupied; but the windows of the house next the stable, and the windows in the loft over the archway, where the stable-boys slept, suddenly were illuminated; latches were lifted, the windows thrust open and heads out of them.

Then one or two more pursuivants came up the dark pa.s.sage bearing flaming torches with them. A figure appeared on the top of the blank wall at the end, and pointed and shouted. The stable-boys in a moment more appeared in their archway, and one or two persons came out of the house next the stable, queerly habited in cloaks and hats over their night-attire.

The din was now tremendous; the questions and answers shouted to and fro were scarcely audible under the thunder that pealed from the battered door; a party had advanced to it and were raining blows upon the lock and hinges. The court was full of a ruddy glare that blazed on the half-armour and pikes of the men, and the bellowing and the crashes and the smoke together went up into the night air as from the infernal pit.

It was a h.e.l.lish transformation from the deathly stillness of a few minutes--a ma.s.sacre of the sweet night silence. And yet the house where the little silent stream of dark figures had been swallowed up rose up high above the smoky cauldron, black, dark, and irresponsive.

There rose a shrill howling from behind the house, and the figure on the top of the wall capered and gesticulated again. Then footsteps came running up the pa.s.sage, and a pursuivant thrust his way through to the leaders; and, in a moment or two, above the din a sharp word was given, and three or four men hurried out through the doorway by which the man had come. Almost at the same moment the hinges of the door gave way, the whole crashed inwards, and the attacking party poured into the dark entrance hall beyond. By this time the noise had wakened many in the houses round, and lights were beginning to shine from the high windows invisible before, and a concourse of people to press in from all sides.

The approaches had all been guarded, but at the crash of the door some of the sentries round the nearer corners hurried into the court, and the crowd poured after them; and by the time that the officers and men had disappeared into the house, their places had been filled by the spectators, and the little court was again full of a swaying, seething, shouting ma.s.s of men, with a few women with hoods and cloaks among them--inquiries and information were yelled to and fro.

"It was a nest of papists--a wasp's nest was being smoked out--what harm had they done?--It was a murder; two women had had their throats cut.--No, no; it was a papists' den--a ma.s.sing-house.--Well, G.o.d save her Grace and rid her of her enemies. With these d.a.m.ned Spaniards everywhere, England was going to ruin.--They had escaped at the back. No; they tried that way, but it was guarded.--There were over fifty papists, some said, in that house.--It was a plot. Mary was mixed up in it. The Queen was to be blown up with powder, like poor Darnley. The barrels were all stored there.--No, no, no! it was nothing but a ma.s.sing-house.--Who was the priest?--Well, they would see him at Tyburn on a hurdle; and serve him right with his treasonable mummery.--No, no! they had had enough of blood.--Campion had died like a man; and an Englishman too--praying for his Queen."--The incessant battle and roar went up.

Meanwhile lights were beginning to shine everywhere in the dark house. A man with a torch was standing in a smoky glare half way up the stairs seen through the door, and the interior of the plain hall was illuminated. Then the leaded panes overhead were beginning to shine out.

Steel caps moved to and fro; gigantic shadows wavered; the shadow of a halberd head went across a curtain at one of the lower windows.

A crimson-faced man threw open a window and shouted instructions to the sentry left at the door, who in answer shook his head and pointed to the bellowing crowd; the man at the window made a furious gesture and disappeared. The illumination began to climb higher and higher as the searchers mounted from floor to floor; thin smoke began to go up from one or two of the chimneys in the frosty air;--they were lighting straw to bring down any fugitives concealed in the chimneys. Then the sound of heavy blows began to ring out; they were testing the walls everywhere for hiding-holes; there was a sound of rending wood as the flooring was torn up. Then over the parapet against the stairs looked a steel-crowned face of a pursuivant. The crowd below yelled and pointed at first, thinking he was a fugitive; but he grinned down at them and disappeared.

Then at last came an exultant shout; then a breathless silence; then the crowd began to question and answer again.

"They had caught the priest!--No, the priest had escaped,--d.a.m.n him!--It was half a dozen women. No, no! they had had the women ten minutes ago in a room at the back.--What fools these pursuivants were!--They had found the chapel and the altar.--What a show it would all make at the trial!--Ah! ah! it was the priest after all."

Those nearest the door saw the man with the torch on the stairs stand back a little; and then a dismal little procession began to appear round the turn.

First came a couple of armed men, looking behind them every now and then; then a group of half a dozen women, whom they had found almost immediately, but had been keeping for the last few minutes in a room upstairs; then a couple more men. Then there was a little s.p.a.ce; and then more constables and more prisoners. Each male prisoner was guarded by two men; the women were in groups. All these came out to the court. The crowd began to sway back against the walls, pointing and crying out; and a lane with living walls was formed towards the archway that opened into Newman's Pa.s.sage.