Traditions of Lancashire Volume I Part 73

Trembling in every limb, he approached the place of concealment; but he was too wary now to let go his hold of the fallen trunk.

He whistled thrice, and the ground again seemed to give way. A light glared from beneath, and he cautiously descended the pit.

The grim porter was waiting for him below. He fell as though rushing into the very jaws of the monster, who was but whetting his tusks ere he should devour him.

"Here again!" croaked the ugly dwarf; "what brings thy long legs back from Christendom?"

"I know not, master; but if you are i' the humour to read, I've a sc.r.a.p in my pouch at your high mightiness' service."

Gregory paid more deference to him now than aforetime, having conceived a most profound respect for his attributes, both physical and mental, since his former visit.

"He is himself either some wondrous enchanter," thought he, "or, at any rate, minister or familiar to some mighty wizard, who hath his dwelling-place in this subterraneous abode."

"I have a message here to my lord," said he aloud, handing him the billet at arm's length, with a mighty show of deference and respect. The uncourteous dwarf took the writing, and left Gregory in darkness again to await his return. He shook at every joint, while the minutes seemed an age. Again the light flickered on the damp walls, and the mysterious being approached. He addressed the envoy with his usual grin of contempt.

"Tell the lady, my master be glad. He will leap from his prison by to-morrow, as she say, and appear at dinner."

"The d.i.c.kons he will," said Gregory, as he clambered up the ascent, not without imminent jeopardy, so anxious was he to escape.

"This is a fearful message to master," thought he, as he leapt out joyfully into the buoyant air: "but at any rate I'll now be quit o' the job." And the messenger gave his report, for Oliver Tempest was impatiently awaiting his return.

"'Tis well," said he; "and now, hark thee, should one syllable of this night's business bubble through thy lips, thou hadst better have stayed in the paws of the hobgoblin. Away!"

Gregory needed no second invitation, but scampered home with great despatch, leaving his master to grope out the way as he thought proper.

There was more bustle and preparation for dinner than usual on the morrow. Oliver Tempest had sent messengers to Bashall and Waddow; but the guests had not made their appearance. About noon the hall-table was furnished with a few whittles and well-scoured trenchers. Bright pewter cups and ale-flagons were set in rows on a side-table, and on the kitchen hearth lay a savoury chine of pork and pease-pudding. In the great boiling pot, hung on a crook over the fire, bubbled a score of hard dumplings, and in the broth reposed a huge piece of beef--these dainties being usually served in the following order--broth, dumpling, beef, according to the old distich--

"No broth, no ba'; No ba', no meat at a'."

Dame Joan of Waddington was the presiding genius of the feast, the conduit-pipe through which flowed the full stream of daily bounty, dispensing every blessing, even the most minute. In that golden age of domestic discipline it was not beneath the dignity of a careful housewife to attend and take the lead in all culinary arrangements.

The master strode to and fro in the hall, and Elizabeth was humming at her wheel. He looked anxious and ill at ease, often casting a furtive glance towards the entrance, and occasionally a side-look at his daughter. She sometimes watched her father's eye, as though she had caught his restless apprehensions, and would have inquired the cause of his uneasiness. Suddenly a loud bay from a favourite hound that was dozing on the hearth announced the approach of a stranger. Oliver advanced with a quick step into the courtyard, and soon re-entered leading in a middle-sized, middle-aged personage, slightly formed, whose pale and saintly features looked haggard and apprehensive, while his eye wavered to and fro, less perhaps with curiosity than suspicion.

He was wrapped in a grey cloak; and a leathern jerkin, barely meeting in front, displayed a considerable breadth of under garment in the s.p.a.ce between hose and doublet. These were fastened together with tags or points, superseding the use of wooden skewers, with which latter mode of suspension not a few of our country yeomen were in those days supplied.

His legs were protected by boots of fine brown Spanish leather, lined with deer-skin, tanned with the fur on, and b.u.t.toned from the ankle to the knee. He had gloves of the same material, reaching to the elbow when drawn up, but now turned down with the fur outwards. The hands and feet were remarkably small, but well shapen. A low grey cap of coa.r.s.e woollen completed the costume of this singular visitor. There was, at times, in the expression of his eye, an indescribable mixture of imbecility and enthusiasm, as though the spirit of some Eastern fakir had reanimated a living body. A gleam of almost supernatural intelligence was mingled with an expression of fatuity, that in less enlightened ages would have invested him with the dangerous reputation of priest or prophet in the eyes of the mult.i.tude.

Oliver Tempest led the way with great care and formality. To a keen-eyed observer, though, his courtesy would have appeared over acted and fulsome; but the object of his a.s.siduities seemed to pay him little attention, further than by a vacant smile that struggled around the corners of his melancholy and placid mouth.

Dame Joan Tempest now came forth, bending thrice in a deep and formal acknowledgment. The stranger stayed her speech with a look of great benignity.

"I know thy words are what our kindness would interpret, and I thank thee. Your hospitality shall not lose its savour in my remembrance, when England hath grown weary of her guilt,--when the cry of the widow and the fatherless shall have prevailed. I am hunted like a partridge on the mountains; but, by the help of my G.o.d, I shall yet escape from the noisome pit, and from the snares of the fowler."

Yet the look which accompanied this prediction seemed incredulous of its purport. He heaved a deep sigh, and his eyes were suddenly bent on the ground. Being introduced into the hall, the seat of honour was a.s.signed him at the table.

Elizabeth, when she saw him, uttered an ill-suppressed exclamation of surprise, and her pale countenance grew almost ghastly. Her lips were bloodless, quivering with terror and dismay. Agony was depicted on her brow--that agony which leaves the spirit without support to struggle with unknown, undefined, uncomprehended evil. Not a word escaped her; she hurried out of the hall, as she thought, without observation; but this sudden movement did not escape the eye of her father. Triumph sat on his brow; and his cheek seemed flushed with joy at the result of his stratagem.

The servitors appeared; and the smoking victuals were disposed in their due order. The joints were placed at the upper end of the board, while broth and pottage steamed out their savoury fumes from the lower end of the table. At some distance below the master and his dame sat the male domestics, then the females, who occupied the lower places at the feast, except two, who waited on the rest.

The master blessed the meal, the whole company standing. The broth was served round to the lower forms, and the meat and dainties to the higher; but Elizabeth was still absent.

When she left the hall it was for the purpose of speaking to Gregory, whom she found skulking and peeping about the premises.

"Gregory, why art thou absent from thy nooning?" inquired Elizabeth, with a suspicious and scrutinising glance.

"I'm not o'er careful to bide i' the house just now. Is there aught come that--that"--Here he stammered and looked round, confirming the suspicions of the inquirer.

"Gregory, thou art a traitor; but thou shalt not escape thy reward. I'll have thee hung--ay, villain, beyond the reach of aught but crows and kites."

"Whoy, mistress, I'd leifer be hung nor stifled to death wi' brimstone and bad humours."

"None o' thy quiddities, thou maker of long lies and quick legs.

Confess, or I'll"--

"Whoy, look ye, mistress, you've been kind, and pulled me out of many an ugly ditch."

"Why dost thou hesitate, knave? I'm glad thy memory is not so treacherous as thy tongue."

"Nay, mistress, I've no notion to sup brose wi' t' old one: those that dinner wi' him he may happen ask to supper; and he'd need have a long whittle that cuts crumbs wi' the de'il."

"Art thou at thy riddles again? Speak in sober similitudes, if thou canst, sirrah."

"Your father sent me on a message to the little devilkin last night. I was loth enough to the job; but he catched me as I went wi' the victuals."

"A message!--and to what purport?"

"Nay, that I know not. The invitation was conveyed in a sc.r.a.p of writing, and I'm not gifted in clerkship an' such like matters."

A ray of intelligence now burst upon her. She saw the imminent danger which threatened the fugitive, who had been hitherto concealed princ.i.p.ally by her contrivances. Gregory watched the rapid and changing hues alternating on her cheek. She saw the full extent of the emergency; and, though her father was the traitor, she hesitated not in that trying moment.

No time was to be lost, and measures were immediately taken to countervail these designs.

"What answer sent he?" she hastily inquired.

"The de'il's buckie said his master would be at the hall by dinner-time; and I'll not be one o' the guests where old Clootie has the pick o' the table."

"Thou witless runnion, haste, or we are lost! It is the king! I would I had trusted thee before with the secret. Mayhap thy wit would have been without obscuration. Supernatural terrors have taken thy reason prisoner. Haste, nor look behind thee until thou art under the eaves of Bashall. This to my cousin, Edmund Talbot; he is honest, or my wishes themselves are turned traitors," said the maiden wistfully. She scrawled but one line, with which Gregory departed on his errand.

Oliver Tempest grew uneasy at his daughter's absence. He inquired the cause, but all were alike ignorant. The king inquired too, with some surprise; and a messenger was despatched with a close whisper in his ear.

The meal was nigh finished, when all eyes were turned towards the entrance. A little blackamoor page came waddling in. He made no sign nor obeisance, but took his station, without speaking, behind his master's chair.

"Why, how now, my trusty squire?" said the disguised monarch; "thou wast not bidden to this feast."

The dwarf cast a scowling glance at the master of the house, and he replied, while a hideous grin dilated his thick stubborn features--

"This be goodly wa.s.sail, methinks. I am weary of lurching and torchlight."

"Tempest," said the king, "I would crave grace for this follower of mine. He is somewhat fearsome and forbidding, but of an unwearied fidelity."