THE LAST MASS.
The north wall of the church at Coton End is only four paces from the
house, the church standing within the moat. Isolated as the sacred
building, therefore, is from the outer world by the wide-spreading
Chase, and close-massed with the homestead, Sir Anthony had some
excuse for considering it as much a part of his demesne as the mill or
the smithy. In words he would have been willing to admit a
distinction; but in thought I fancy he lumped it with the rest of his
possessions.
It was with a lowering eye that on this Sunday morning he watched from
his room over the gateway the unusual stream of people making for the
church. Perchance he had in his mind other Sundays--Sundays when he
had walked out at this hour, light of heart and kind of eye, with his
staff in his fist and his glove dangling, and his dog at his heels;
and, free from care, had taken pleasure in each bonnet doffed and
each old wife's "God bless ye, Sir Anthony!" Well, those days were
gone. Now the rain dripped from the eaves--for a thaw had come in the
night--and the bells, that could on occasion ring so cheerily, sounded
sad and forlorn. His daughter, when she came, according to custom,
bringing his great service-book, could scarcely look him in the face.
I know not whether even then his resolution to dare all might not, at
sound of a word from her, or at sight of her face, have melted like
yesterday's ice. But before the word could be spoken, or the eyes
meet, another step rang on the stone staircase and brother Ferdinand
entered.
"They are here!" he said in a low voice. "Six of them, Anthony, and
sturdy fellows, as all Clopton's men are. If you do not think your
people will stand by you----"
The knight fired at this suggestion. "What!" he burst out, turning
from the window, "if Cludde men cannot meet Clopton men the times are
indeed gone mad! Make way and let me come! Though the mass be never
said again in Coton church, it shall be said to-day!" And he swore a
great oath.
He strode down the stairs and under the gateway, where were arranged,
according to the custom of the house on wet days, all the servants,
with Baldwin and Martin Luther at their head. The knight stalked
through them with a gloomy brow. His brother followed him, a faint
smile flickering about the corners of his mouth. Then came Ferdinand's
wife and Petronilla, the latter with her hood drawn close about her
face, Anne with her chin in the air and her eyes aglow. "It is not a
bit of a bustle will scare her!" Baldwin muttered, as he fell in
behind her, and eyed her back with no great favor.
"No--so long as it does not touch her," Martin replied in a cynical
whisper. "She is well mated! Well mated and ill fated! Ha! ha!"
"Silence, fool," growled his companion angrily. "Is this a time for
antics?"
"Ay, it is!" Martin retorted swiftly, though with the same caution.
"For when wise men turn fools, fools are put to it to act up to their
profession! You see, brother?" And he deliberately cut a caper. His
eyes were glittering, and the nerves on one side of his face twitched
oddly. Baldwin looked at him, and muttered that Martin was going to
have one of his mad fits. What had grown on the fool of late?
The knight reached the church porch and passed through the crowd which
awaited him there. Save for its unusual size and some strange faces to
be seen on its skirts, there was no indication of trouble. He walked,
tapping his stick on the pavement a little more loudly than usual, to
his place in the front pew. The household, the villagers, the
strangers, pressed in behind him until every seat was filled. Even the
table monument of Sir Piers Cludde, which stood lengthwise in the
aisle, was seized upon, and if the two similar monuments which stood
to right and left below the chancel steps had not been under the
knight's eyes, they too would have been invaded. Yet all was done
decently and in order, with a clattering of rustic boots indeed, but
no scrambling or ill words. The Clopton men were there. Baldwin had
marked them well, and so had a dozen stout fellows, sons of Sir
Anthony's tenants. But they behaved, discreetly, and amid such a
silence as Father Carey never remembered to have faced, he began the
Roman service.
The December light fell faintly through the east window on the Father
at his ministrations, on his small acolytes, on the four Cludde
brasses before the altar. It fell everywhere--on gray dusty walls
buttressed by gray tombs which left but a narrow space in the middle
of the chancel. The marble crusader to the left matched the canopied
bed of Sir Anthony's parents on the right; the Abbess's tomb in the
next row faced the plainer monument of Sir Anthony's wife, a vacant
place by her side awaiting his own effigy. And there were others. The
chancel was so small--nay, the church too--so small and old and gray
and solid, and the tombs were so massive, that they elbowed one
another. The very dust which rose as men stirred was the dust of
Cluddes. Sir Anthony's brow relaxed. He listened gravely and sadly.
And then the interruption came. "I protest!" a rough voice in rear of
the crowd cried suddenly, ringing harshly and strangely above the
Father's accents and the solemn hush. "I protest against this
service!"
A thrill of astonishment ran through the crowd, and all rose. Every
man in the church turned round, Sir Anthony among the first, and
looked in the direction of the voice. Then it was seen that the
Clopton men had massed themselves about the door in the southwest
corner--a strong position, whence retreat was easy. Father Carey,
after a momentary glance, went on as if he had not heard; but his
voice shook, and all still waited with their faces turned toward the
west end.
"I protest in the name of the Queen!" the same man cried sharply,
while his fellows raised a murmur so that the priest's voice was
drowned.
Sir Anthony stepped into the aisle, his face inflamed with anger. The
interruption taking place there, in that place, seemed to him a double
profanation.
"Who is that brawler?" he said, his hand trembling on his staff; and
all the old dames trembled too. "Let him stand out."
The sheriff's spokesman was so concealed by his fellows that he could
not be seen; but he answered civilly enough.
"I am no brawler," he said. "I only require the law to be observed;
and that you know, sir. I am here on behalf of the sheriff; and I warn
all present that a continuation of this service will expose them to
grievous pains and penalties. If you desire it, I will read the royal
order to prove that I do not speak without warrant."
"Begone, knave, you and your fellows!" Sir Anthony cried. A loyal man
in all else, and the last to deny the queen's right or title, he had
no reasonable answer to give, and could only bluster. "Begone, do you
hear?" he repeated; and he rapped his staff on the pavement, and then,
raising it, pointed to the door.
All Coton thought the men must go; but the men, perhaps, because they
were Clopton, did not go. And Sir Anthony had not so completely lost
his head as to proceed to extremities except in the last resort.
Affecting to consider the incident at an end, he stepped back into his
pew without waiting to see whether the man obeyed him or no, and
resumed his devotions. Father Carey, at a nod from him, went on with
the interrupted service.
But again the priest had barely read a dozen lines before the same man
made the congregation start by crying loudly, "Stop!"
"Go on!" shouted Sir Anthony in a voice of thunder.
"At your peril!" retorted the intervener.
"Go on!" from Sir Anthony again.
Father Carey stood silent, trembling and looking from one to the
other. Many a priest of his faith would have risen on the storm and in
the spirit of Hildebrand hurled his church's curse at the intruder.
But the Father was not of these, and he hesitated, fumbling with his
surplice with his feeble white hands. He feared as much for his patron
as for himself; and it was on the knight that his eyes finally rested.
But Sir Anthony's brow was black; he got no comfort there. So the
Father took courage and a long breath, opened his mouth and read on,
amid the hush of suppressed excitement, and of such anger and stealthy
defiance as surely English church had never seen before. As he read,
however, he gathered courage, and his voice strength. The solemn
words, so ancient, so familiar, fell on the stillness of the church,
and awed even the sheriff's men. To the surprise of nearly every one,
there was no further interruption; the service ended quietly.
So after all Sir Anthony had his way, and stalked out, stiff and
unbending. Nor was there any falling off, but rather an increase in
the respect with which his people rose, according to custom, as he
passed. Yet under that increase of respect lay a something which cut
the old man to the heart. He saw that his dependents pitied him while
they honored him; that they thought him a fool for running his head
against a stone wall--as Martin Luther put it--even while they felt
that there was something grand in it too.
During the rest of the day he went about his usual employments, but
probably with little zest. He had done what he had done without any
very clear idea how he was going to proceed. Between his loyalty in
all else and his treason in this, it would not have been easy for a
Solomon to choose a consistent path. And Sir Anthony was no Solomon.
He chose at last to carry himself as if there were no danger--as if
the thing which had happened were unimportant. He ordered no change
and took no precautions. He shut his ears to the whispering which went
on among the servants, and his eyes to the watch which by some secret
order of Baldwin was kept upon the Ridgeway.
It was something of a shock to him, therefore, when his daughter came
to him after breakfast next morning, looking pale and heavy-eyed, and,
breaking through the respect which had hitherto kept her silent,
begged him to go away.
"To go away?" he cried. He rose from his oak chair and glared at her.
Then his feelings found their easiest vent in anger. "What do you
mean, girl?" he blustered, "Go away? Go where?"
But she did not quail. Indeed she had her suggestion ready.
"To the Mere Farm in the Forest, sir," she answered earnestly. "They
will not look for you there; and Martin says----"
"Martin? The fool!"
His face grew redder and redder. This was too much. He loved order and
discipline; and to be advised in such matters by a woman and a fool!
It was intolerable!
"Go to, girl!" he cried, fuming. "I wondered where you had got your
tale so pat. So you and the fool have been putting your heads
together! Go! Go and spin, and leave these maters to men! Do you think
that my brother, after traveling the world over, has not got a head on
his shoulders? Do you think, if there were danger, he and I would not
have foreseen it?"
He waved his hand and turned away expecting her to go. But Petronilla
did not go. She had something else to say and though the task was
painful she was resolved to say it.
"Father, one word," she murmured. "About my uncle."
"Well, well! What about him?"
"I distrust him, sir," she ventured, in a low tone, her color rising.
"The servants do not like him. They fear him, and suspect him of I
know not what."
"The servants!" Sir Anthony answered in an awful tone.
Indeed it was not the wisest thing she could have said; but the
consequences were averted by a sudden alarm and shouting outside. Half
a dozen voices, shrill or threatening, seemed to rise at once. The
knight strode to the window, but the noise appeared to come, not from
the Chase upon which it looked, but from the courtyard or the rear of
the house. Sir Anthony caught up his stick, and, followed by the girl,
ran down the steps. He pushed aside half a dozen women who had
likewise been attracted by the noise, and hastened through the narrow
passage which led to the wooden bridge in the rear of the buildings.
Here, in the close on the far side of the moat, a strange scene was
passing. A dozen horsemen were grouped in the middle of the field
about a couple of prisoners, while round the gate by which they had
entered stood as many stout men on foot, headed by Baldwin and armed
with pikes and staves. These seemed to be taunting the cavaliers and
daring them to come on. On the wooden bridge by which the knight stood
were half a dozen of the servants, also armed. Sir Anthony recognized
in the leading horseman Sir Philip Clopton, and in the prisoners
Father Carey and one of the woodmen; and in a moment he comprehended
what had happened.
The sheriff, in the most unneighborly manner, instead of challenging
his front door, had stolen up to the rear of the house, and, without
saying with your leave or by your leave, had snapped up the poor
priest, who happened to be wandering in that direction. Probably he
had intended to force an entrance; but he had laid aside the plan when
he saw his only retreat menaced by the watchful Baldwin, who was not
to be caught napping. The knight took all this in at a glance, and his
gorge rose as much at the Clopton men's trick as at the danger in
which Father Carey stood. So he lost his head, and made matters worse.
"Who are these villains," he cried in a rage, his face aflame, "who
come attacking men's houses in time of peace? Begone, or I will have
at ye!"
"Sir Anthony!" Clopton cried, interrupting him, "in Heaven's name do
not carry the thing farther! Give me way in the Queen's name, and I
will----"
What he would do was never known, for at that last word, away at the
house, behind Sir Anthony, there was a puff of smoke, and down went
the sheriff headlong, horse and man, while the report of an arquebuse
rang dully round the buildings. The knight gazed horrified; but the
damage was done and could not be undone. Nay, more, the Coton men took
the sound for a signal. With a shout, before Sir Anthony could
interfere, they made a dash for the group of horsemen. The latter,
uncertain and hampered by the fall of their leader, who was not hit,
but was stunned beyond giving orders, did the best they could. They
let their prisoners go with a curse, and then, raising Sir Philip and
forming a rough line, they charged toward the gate by which they had
entered.
The footmen stood the brunt gallantly, and for a moment the sharp
ringing of quarter-staves and the shivering of steel told of as pretty
a combat as ever took place on level sward in full view of an English
home. The spectators could see Baldwin doing wonders. His men backed
him up bravely. But in the end the impetus of the horses told, the
footmen gave way and fled aside, and the strangers passed them. A
little more skirmishing took place at the gateway, Sir Anthony's men
being deaf to all his attempts to call them off; and then the Clopton
horse got clear, and, shaking their fists and vowing vengeance, rode
off toward the forest. They left two of their men on the field,
however, one with a broken arm and one with a shattered knee-cap;
while the house party, on their side, beside sundry knocks and
bruises, could show one deep sword-cut, a broken wrist, and half a
dozen nasty wounds.
"My poor little girl!" Sir Anthony whispered to himself, as he gazed
with scared eyes at the prostrate men and the dead horse, and
comprehended what had happened. "This is a hanging business! In arms
against the Queen! What am I to do?" And as he went back to the house
in a kind of stupor, he muttered again, "My little girl! my poor
little girl!"
I fancy that in this terrible crisis he looked to get support and
comfort from his brother--that old campaigner, who had seen so many
vicissitudes and knew by heart so many shifts. But Ferdinand, though
he thought the event unlucky, had little to say and less to suggest;
and seemed, indeed, to have become on a sudden flaccid and lukewarm.
Sir Anthony felt himself thrown on his own resources. "Who fired the
shot?" he asked, looking about the room in a dazed fashion. "It was
that which did the mischief," he continued, forgetting his own hasty
challenge.
"I think it must have been Martin Luther," Ferdinand answered.
But Martin Luther, when he was accused, denied this stoutly. He had
been so far along the Ridgeway, he said, that though he had returned
at once on hearing the shot fired, he had arrived too late for the
fight. The fool's stomach for a fight was so well known that this
seemed probable enough, and though some still suspected him, the
origin of the unfortunate signal was never clearly determined, though
in after days shrewd guesses were made by some.
For a few hours it seemed as if Sir Anthony had sunk into his former
state of indecision. But when Petronilla came again to him soon after
noon to beg him to go into hiding, she found his mood had altered. "Go
to the Mere Farm?" he said, not angrily now, but firmly and quietly.
"No, girl, I cannot. I have been in fault, and I must stay and pay for
it. If I left these poor fellows to bear the brunt, I could never hold
up my head again. But do you go now and tell Baldwin to come to me."
She went and told the stern, down-looking steward, and he came up.
"Baldwin," said the knight when the door was shut, and the two were
alone, "you are to dismiss to their homes all the tenants--who have
indeed been called out without my orders. Bid them go and keep the
peace, and I hope they will not be molested. For you and Father Carey,
you must go into hiding. The Mere Farm will be best."
"And what of you, Sir Anthony?" the steward asked, amazed at this act
of folly.
"I shall remain here," the knight replied with dignity.
"You will be taken," said Baldwin, after a pause.
"Very well," said the knight.
The man shrugged his shoulders, and was silent.
"What do you mean?" asked Sir Anthony in anger.
"Why, just that I cannot do it," Baldwin answered, glowering at him
with a flush on his dark cheek. "That is what I mean. Let the priest
go. I cannot go, and will not."
"Then you will be hanged!" quoth the knight warmly. "You have been in
arms against the Queen, you fool! You will be hanged as sure as you
stay here!"
"Then I shall be hanged," replied the steward sullenly. "There never
was a Cludde hanged yet without one to keep him company. To hear of it
would make my grandsire turn in his grave out there. I dare not do it,
Sir Anthony, and that is the fact. But for the rest I will do as you
bid me."
And he had his way. But never had evening fallen more strangely and
sadly at Coton before. The rain pattered drearily in the courtyard.
The drawbridge, by Baldwin's order, had been pulled up, and the planks
over the moat in the rear removed.
"They shall not steal upon us again!" he muttered. "And if we must
surrender, they shall see we do it willingly."
The tenants had gone to their homes and their wives. Only the servants
remained. They clustered, solemn and sorrowful, about the hearth in
the great hall, starting if a dog howled without or a coal flew from
the fire within. Sir Anthony remained brooding in his own room,
Petronilla sitting beside him silent and fearful, while Ferdinand and
his wife moved restlessly about, listening to the wind. But the
evening and the night wore peacefully away, and so, to the surprise of
everybody, did the next day and the next. Could the sheriff be going
to overlook the matter? Alas! on the third day the doubt was resolved.
Two or three boys, who had been sent out as scouts, came in with news
that there was a strong watch set on the Ridgeway, that the paths
through the forest were guarded, that bodies of armed men were
arriving in the neighboring villages, and that soldiers had been
demanded--or so it was said--from Warwick and Worcester, and even from
a place as far away as Oxford. Probably it was only the sheriff's
prudence which had postponed the crisis; and now it had come. The net
was drawn all round. As the day closed in on Coton and the sun set
angrily among the forest trees, the boys' tale, which grew no doubt in
the telling, passed from one to another, and men swore and looked out
of window, and women wept in corners. In the Tower-room Sir Anthony
sat awaiting the summons, and wondered what he could to save his
daughter from possible rudeness, or even hurt, at the hands of these
strangers.
There was one man missing from hall and kitchen, but few in the
suspense noticed his absence. The fool had heard the boys' story, and,
unable to remain inactive under such excitement, he presently stole
off in the dusk to the rear of the house. Here he managed to cross the
moat by means of a plank, which he then drew over and hid in the
grass. This quietly managed--Baldwin, be it said, had strictly
forbidden any one to leave the house--Martin made off with a grim
chuckle toward the forest, and following the main track leading toward
Wootton Wawen, presently came among the trees upon a couple of
sentinels. They heard him, saw him indistinctly, and made a rush for
him. But this was just the sport Martin liked, and the fun he had come
for. His quick ear apprised him of the danger, and in a second he was
lost in the underwood, his mocking laugh and shrill taunts keeping the
poor men on the shudder for the next ten minutes. Then the uncanny
accents died away, and, satisfied with his sport and the knowledge he
had gained, the fool made for home. As he sped quickly across the last
field, however, he was astonished by the sight of a dark figure in the
very act of launching his--Martin's--plank across the moat.
"Ho, ho!" the fool muttered in a fierce undertone. "That is it, is it?
And only one! If they will come one by one, like the plums in the
kitchen porridge, I shall make a fine meal!"
He stood back, crouching down on the grass, and watched the unknown,
his eyes glittering. The stranger was a tall, big fellow, a formidable
antagonist. But Martin cared nothing for that. Had he not his long
knife, as keen as his wits--when they were at home, which was not
always. He drew it out now, and under cover of the darkness crept
nearer and nearer, his blood glowing pleasantly, though the night was
cold. How lucky it was he had come out! He could hardly restrain the
"Ho, ho!" which rose to his lips. He meant to leap upon the man on
this side of the water, that there might be no tell-tale traces on the
farther bank.
But the stranger was too quick for him in this. He got his bridge
fixed, and began to cross before Martin could crawl near enough. As he
crossed, however, his feet made a slight noise on the plank, and under
cover of it the fool rose and ran forward, then followed him over with
the stealthiness of a cat. And like a cat too, the moment the
stranger's foot touched the bank, Martin sprang on him with his knife
raised--sprang on him silently, with his teeth grinning and his eyes
aflame.