"Alas, long-suffering and most patient God!
Thou needst be surelier God to bear with us
Than even to have made us."
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
The conspirators had just concluded their bargain, and decided that the
cellar must be stored with materials in all haste, to be ready for the
meeting of Parliament on the seventh of February, when like a bomb-shell
in their midst fell a royal proclamation, proroguing Parliament again
until the third of October. To go on now, especially in haste, was
plainly a useless proceeding.
A short consultation was held, which ended in the decision that they
should part and scatter themselves in different places. Fawkes
particularly was enjoined to keep out of the way, since he was wanted to
appear as a stranger when the moment arrived for action; he therefore
determined to go abroad.
The rest dispersed in various directions: Percy was left alone at the
house in Westminster, where he beguiled his leisure by having a door
made through the wall, where the mine had been, so as to give him easier
access to the vault under the House, and better opportunities of
carrying in the combustibles unseen. They agreed to meet again, ready
for work, on the second of September; and before parting, one other was
admitted to their fellowship, to whom was confided the task of aiding
Fawkes to accumulate the store of powder. This was Mr Ambrose
Rookwood, of Coldham Hall, Suffolk.
Before Fawkes left England, he accomplished one important piece of
business, by carrying into the vault beneath the House all the wood and
coals hitherto stored in Percy's cellar. Among it was carefully hidden
the gunpowder also in waiting, billets of wood being heaped upon the
barrels. The door was then locked, and Fawkes took the key, marking the
door on the inside in such a manner that its having been opened could be
detected thereafter. The wife of the porter, Gideon Gibbons, the next
door neighbour, was placed in charge of Percy's house, in which no
tell-tale combustibles had now been left. Keyes was made again
custodian of the house at Lambeth.
These arrangements being complete, Percy went to see his wife, whom he
had left in the country, and Fawkes, embarking at Dover, took his
journey to Brussels, where he resumed his own name.
When Aubrey applied next at the door of Winter's lodgings, he was
informed that the gentlemen were gone into the country. He turned back
disappointed--after a little frothy banter with Betty, which it would be
a sad waste of paper and ink to detail--and began to consider what he
should do next. A sensation of extreme relief came to his mind, as the
idea occurred to him that there could be no need at all to make any
inquiries during the absence of his friends. He might visit the fair
Dorothy, and even venture into the jaws of the White Bear, without fear
of any thing unpleasant. Merely to say that his friends had left Town,
and he was not now cultivating their society, would surely satisfy his
grandmother: and as for any thing else,--why, let fate take care of the
future. Being usually the creature of impulse, no sooner was this said,
or rather thought, than it was done. Aubrey turned away from the Duck,
and retraced his steps to Charing Cross, left Whitehall behind him, and
came out into King Street.
Now came the tug of war. Would he meet Aunt Temperance? or would that
formidable and irresistible individual pounce upon him from the door?
But all was still, and he reached the Golden Fish without any mishap.
Another disappointment! He was shown into the parlour, where Gertrude
rose to meet him, and Mrs Rookwood came in a few minutes later. Tom
was spending the evening with friends, and Anne was with him. Aubrey
cared nothing about Anne, whom he mentally dubbed a stupid idiot; for
Tom's absence he was more sorry. But what was Dorothy doing that she
did not shine on her worshipper?
"Had you honoured us with a visit last Tuesday, Mr Louvaine," said
Gertrude, glancing at him, as she was wont to do, out of the corners of
her dark eyes, "we had enjoyed the happiness of bringing you acquainted
with our uncle Rookwood of Coldham Hall. He left us, o' Wednesday in
the morning, for his place in Suffolk."
"Doll is gone with him," placidly added Mrs Rookwood.
The bright colours of Gertrude's embroidery took a sudden tarnish in the
eyes of the visitor.
"Ay, for a month or two," said Gertrude, lightly. "She shall find a
merry house at Coldham, you may be sure. Our cousins, and all the
Burgesses, and the Collinsons--ever so many young gentlemen and
gentlewomen--and," with a slight, significant laugh, "Mr Roland Burgess
in particular."
Aubrey felt as if he should exceedingly have enjoyed despatching Mr
Roland Burgess to the Caucasus, or Cochin-China, or any other
inconceivably remote locality. He did not stay long after that. There
was nothing to keep him. Bows and courtesies were exchanged, and
Aubrey, feeling as if life were flat and unsatisfying, turned into the
White Bear.
It was nearly dusk, and he could not see whom he met by the parlour
door.
"Is that your Lordship?" greeted him, in the voice of Aunt Temperance.
"Blue or yellow this even? Truly, we scarce looked for so much honour
as two visits in the twelvemonth. Why, without I err, 'tis not yet
three months since we had leave to see your Lordship's crimson and
silver. Pray you, walk in--you are as welcome as flowers in May, as
wise as Waltom's calf, and as safe to mend as sour ale in summer."
"You are full of compliments, Aunt Temperance," said Aubrey, half vexed
and half laughing.
"I'm like, with strangers, Gentleman."
Aubrey went past her into the parlour, to receive a warmer and less
sarcastic welcome from the rest of his relatives--his mother excepted,
who reminded him, in her usual plaintive tones, that she was a poor
widow, and it was very hard if she might never see her only child.
"Well, I am here, Mother."
"Ay, but you scarce ever come. 'Tis ever so long that we have not seen
you. 'Tis cruel of my Lord Oxford thus to keep you away from your poor
mother."
"My Lord Oxford has less to do with it, my dear, than Mr Aubrey
Louvaine," said her sister. "Young men don't commonly reckon their
mothers' company the sweetest. They never know on which side their
bread's buttered."
"No butter will stick on my bread, Aunt," said Aubrey, answering one
proverb by another.
Instead of replying, Aunt Temperance lighted a candle and calmly looked
her nephew over.
"Well!" said she, as the result of her inspection, "if I were donned in
grass-green velvet, guarded o' black, with silver tags, and a
silver-bossed girdle, and gloves o' Spanish leather, I should fancy I'd
got a bit o' butter on my bread. Maybe your honour likes it thick?
Promotes effusing of bile, that doth. Pray you, how fare your
Papistical friends this even?"
Lady Louvaine looked up and listened for the answer.
"You set it down they be Papistical somewhat too soon, Aunt," said
Aubrey a little irritably. "Mr Winter and his friends, if they be whom
you hit at, be gone away into the country, and I have not seen them this
some time."
The next question put to him was the one that Aubrey was expecting, with
an expectation which caused his irritability.
"What said my Lady Oxford to the matter, Aubrey?"
"Truly, Madam, I have not yet made the inquiration. My Lady is at this
time full of business, and seeing my friends were away, I thought you
should not require haste."
Aubrey's conscience stirred a little uneasily, and he said to it, "Be
quiet! I have not told any falsehood."
"I would not have you to chafe your Lady, if she have no time to
listen," said Lady Louvaine, with a disappointed look: "but indeed,
Aubrey, the matter must be seen to, and not done by halves, moreover."
A rap at the door preceded Charity, who came to announce Mrs Abbott--a
ceremony always used at the White Bear, but entirely unnecessary in the
eyes of the lady of the Angel.
"Well, what think you?" she began, before her greetings were well over;
for Mistress Abbott was a genuine Athenian, who spent all her leisure
hours, and some hours when she should not have been at leisure, in first
gathering information, and then retailing it, not having any special
care to ascertain its accuracy. "Well, what think you? Here be three
of our neighbours to be presented by the street wardens--Lewce, the
baker, for that they cannot keep his pigs out of the King's Street; Joan
Cotton the silkwoman as a sower of strife amongst her neighbours; and
Adrian Sewell for unlawfully following the trade of a tailor."
"Why, that is thy tailor, Aubrey!" exclaimed Aunt Temperance. "I trust
thou art not deep in his books?"
"Never a whit, Aunt; I owe him ne'er a penny," said Aubrey, flushing,
and not adding that Mr William Patrick's books were separate volumes,
nor that those of Nathan Cohen, in Knightriders' Street, were not
entirely guiltless of his name.
"Ay, that's the way," said Mrs Abbott, nodding her head. "Pay as you
go, and keep from small scores. Truly I would, Mr Louvaine, our
Stephen were as wise as you. Such a bill as came in this week past from
a silkman in Paternoster Row! White satin collars at eight and ten
shillings the piece, and a doublet of the same at two pound; curled
feathers, and velvet doublets, and perfumed gloves at twenty pence or
more. His father's in a heavy taking, I can tell you, and saith he
shall be ruined. Look you, we've four lads, and here's Stephen a-going
this path--and if Seth and Caleb and Ben just go along after Stephen,
it'll be a fine kettle o' fish, I can tell you. Oh dear, but you've a
deal to be thankful for, and only one to trouble you! The bicker those
lads do make!"
"We have all something wherefore we may be thankful, friend," said Lady
Louvaine gently, when Mrs Abbott stopped to breathe.
"Well, then, there's the maids--Mall, and Silence, and Prissy, and
Dorcas, and Hester--and I can promise you, they make such a racket
amongst 'em, I'm very nigh worn to a shadow."
Aubrey and Lettice were giving funny glances at each other, and doing
their utmost not to disgrace the family by laughing. If Mrs Abbott
were worn to a shadow, shadows were very portly and substantial
articles.
"I declare, that Prissy! she's such a rattle as never you saw! no
getting a word in for her. I tell her many a time, I wonder her tongue
does not ache, such a chatterbox as she is. I'm no talker, you see;
nobody can say such a thing of me, but as to her--"
A curious sound in Aubrey's direction was rapidly followed by a cough.
"Eh now, don't you say you've a spring cough!" ejaculated Mrs Abbott,
turning her artillery on that young gentleman. "Horehound, and mallow,
and coltsfoot, they're the best herbs; and put honey to 'em, and take it
fasting of a morrow. There be that saith this new stuff of late come
up--tobago, or what they call it--my husband says he never heard of
aught with so many names. Talking o' names, have you seen that young
maid, daughter of the baker new set up at back here? Whatever on earth
possessed him to call her Penelope? Dear heart, but they say there's a
jolly brunt betwixt my Lord Rich and his Lady--she that was my Lady
Penelope Devereux, you know. My Lord he is a great Puritan, and a
favourer of that way; and my Lady, she likes a pretty gown and a gay
dance as well as e'er a one; so the wars have fallen out betwixt 'em--"
"If it like you, Mistress Abbott," said Charity, opening the door
immediately after a knock, "here's your Ben, that says your master wants
you."
"Ay," shouted Ben from the door in no dulcet tones, "and he said if you
didn't come, he'd fetch you. You were safe to be gossiping somewhere,
he said, and says he--"
"Take that for your imperence, Sir!" was his mother's answer, hurrying
to the door, with a gesture suited to the words. "Well, I do vow, if
ever I come forth to have half a word with a neighbour, that man o'
mine's sure for to call it gossiping.--Get away wi' thee! I'm coming in
a wink.--Well, but you do look cheery and peaceful! I would I could ha'
tarried a bit. Mrs Lettice, my dear, you take warning by me, and don't
you marry a man as gives you no liberty. Stand up for your rights, my
dear, and get 'em--that's what I say. Good even! There's no end to the
imperence of lads, and no more to the masterfulness of men. Don't you
have nought to do with 'em! Good-night."
"I could not have stood it another minute!" said Aubrey as soon as she
was out of hearing, while he and Lettice made the walls echo.
On a calm June evening, three men met at a house in Thames Street, where
Garnet lodged. They were Robert Catesby, the Reverend Oswald Greenway,
and the Reverend Henry Garnet. They met to consult and decide on the
last uncertainties, and as it were to finish off the scheme of the plot.
The conclusions ended, Garnet let out his friends, who with hats drawn
low down, and faces muffled in their cloaks, glided softly and darkly
away.
As the month of August ran out, the conspirators gradually returned to
London, with some exceptions, who joined their ghostly father, Garnet,
in a pious pilgrimage to Saint Winifred's Well, better known as
Holywell, in Flintshire. The party numbered about thirty, and comprised
Lady Digby, two daughters of Lord Vaux, Rookwood, and his wife. Thomas
Winter wrote to Grant that "friends" would reach Norbrook on the second
or third of September, begging him to "void his house of Morgan and his
she-mate," as otherwise it "would hardly bear all the company." The
route taken was from Goathurst, the home and inheritance of Lady Digby,
by Daventry, Norbrook, the residence of Grant, Huddington, the house of
Robert Winter, and Shrewsbury, to Holt, in Flintshire. In some uneasy
nightmare during that pilgrimage, did a faint prescience of that which
was to come ever flit before the eyes of Ambrose Rookwood, as to the
circumstances wherein he should journey that road again? From Holt the
ladies walked barefoot to the "holy well," which, according to
tradition, had sprung up on the place where Saint Winifred's head had
rolled on being cut off: they remained at the well for the night. They
returned the same way, mass being said by Garnet at Huddington and
Norbrook. It is difficult to believe that those who went on this
pilgrimage could be wholly innocent of "intention" respecting the plot
so soon to be executed.
Fawkes arrived from abroad on the first of September, staying the first
night at an inn outside Aldgate. The next day, he went down to the
Tower Wharf, hailed a boat, and was ferried to Westminster, where, under
his alias of John Johnson, and Percy's servant, he relieved Mrs Gibbons
of her charge, took possession of his master's house, and of the cellar
where was stored his master's stock of winter fuel. A careful
examination of the door of the vault showed that it had not been
tampered with during the absence of the conspirators.
Winter now returned to London, taking up his abode in his old quarters
at the Duck, where Keyes, Rookwood, and Christopher Wright, had
apartments also. Catesby and Percy did not return till later. The
latter had gone to Bath, where he found Lord Monteagle; and the two sent
to Catesby, entreating "the dear Robin" to join them. Catesby obeyed,
and came.
The Bath, as it was then usual to call the ancient city of hot springs,
was a very different town from that which we now know. Like all of
Roman origin, its design was cruciform, with four gates, and as usual a
church at every gate. The only one of these churches now standing--and
that has been rebuilt--is Saint James's, at South Gate. The modern
fashionable part of Bath, including Milsom Street, the Circus, and the
Crescent, lies outside the walls of the ancient Aqua Solis.
Mr Catesby found his friends in Cheap Street, which ran from Stawles
Church, in the midst of the city, to East Gate, Here he vegetated for a
week, resting after his toil, and applying himself to the business which
had apparently brought him, by diligent attendance at the King's Bath,
on the site of the present Pump-room. Here, at this time, ladies and
gentlemen, in elaborate costumes and adorned by wonderful hair-dressing,
bathed together under the eyes of the public, which contributed its
quota of amusement and interest by pelting the bathers with dead dogs,
cats, and pigs--a state of things not considered disgusting, but
laughable.
On the morning after the arrival of Catesby, he and Percy went down to
the East Gate, hailed a boat, which ferried them across the Avon, where
Laura Place now stands, and leaving Bathwick Mill on the left hand, they
began to ascend the hill on whose summit once stood the yet older
British city of Caer Badon.
"Mr Percy," said Catesby, as they walked slowly upwards, "since I have
tarried here, I have had some time for thought; and I can tell you, I am
nigh beat out of heart touching our matter."
"You, Mr Catesby! Truly, I never thought to see you struck into your
dumps. But what now, I beseech you?"
Gentlemen did not, at that time, speak to each other without the
respectful prefix of "Mister," though they might now and then speak of
an acquaintance without it. When intimacy was so great as to warrant
laying it aside, the Christian name took its place.
"Well, look you here," said Catesby. "We are all men of birth, but not
one of us is a man of money. You, 'tis true, have my Lord
Northumberland behind you, but how long time may he tarry? Were he to
die, or to take pepper in the nose, where then are we? All is naught
with us at once, being all but mean men of estate."
"My cousin of Northumberland is not like to play that prank, or I err,"
answered Percy, who well knew that Lord Northumberland was not in all
cases cognisant of the use made of his name by this very worthy cousin:
"as to death, of course that may hap,--we are all prone to be tumbled
out of the world at short notice. But what then is your project? for
without you have some motion in your mind, good Mr Catesby, I read you
not aright."
"To be sure I have," said Catesby with a smile. "But first--if I
remember rightly, your friend young Louvaine is not he that can aid us
in this juncture?"
"Hasn't a penny to bless himself with," replied Percy, "save his wage
from my Lord Oxford, and that were but a drop in the sea for us. His
old grandmother can do but little for him--so much have I picked out of
his prattle. But, surely, Mr Catesby, you would not think to take into
our number a green lad such as he, and a simpleton, and a Protestant to
boot?"
"Take into our number!" cried Catesby. "Good Mr Percy, you miss the
cushion [make a mistake]. A good tale, well tinkered, should serve that
companion, and draw silver from his pockets any day. What we lack is
two or three men of good estate, and of fit conditions and discreet
years, that may safely be sworn--and I think I know where to find them."
"I'll lay my crown to pawn you do!" exclaimed Percy admiringly. "Pray
you, who be they?"
"Sir Everard Digby, of Tilton, in Rutland; and my cousin, Frank Tresham
of Rushton."
"Good men and true? Both are strange to me."
"Ay; Digby is a staunch Catholic, but may lack some persuasion to join
us. Tresham--well, I count he may be trusted. His money-bags be heavy,
though his character is but light. I will make certain that he will not
blab nor tattle--that is the thing most to be feared. Know you not
Frank Tresham?--my cousin, and my Lord Monteagle's wife's brother."
"Oh ay! I have met him," said Percy. "I wist not it was he you meant."
"I had hope once that Mr Fawkes should bring grist to our mill," said
Gatesby, thoughtfully: "but I see that is but a Will-o'-the-Wisp."
"Mr Fawkes? Oh no! His father was but a younger son--Mr Edward
Fawkes of Farnley, a notary at York, and Registrar of the Consistory
Court there. He left him but a farm of some thirty pound by the year,
and Guy ran through it like a herring through the water. The only hope
by his means would be the borrowing of money from his step-father, Mr
Foster, and methinks he hath a larger heart than purse."
They walked on for a few minutes in silence, when Percy said, "How will
you get hold of these men?"
"Send Tom Winter to Sir Everard, and I will tackle Tresham. Then, when
I return, will we go forth with the mine."
"Done!" said Percy.
And the pair of conspirators came down the hill.
Instead of returning direct to London, Catesby went to visit Robert
Winter at Huddington, Percy going to his own house at the upper end of
Holborn. Catesby remained for three days with Robert Winter, whom he
induced to send for Stephen Littleton of Holbeach and his cousin
Humphrey Littleton. These gentlemen were not, however, initiated into
the plot, but only desired to lend their assistance to "a matter of
weight, and for the especial good of all Catholics."
The Christmas holidays being over, the mining was resumed, the
conspirators having now added to their number Francis Tresham and Sir
Everard Digby. It was not done without some difficulty. The oath was
administered to both; but when they learned to what they had bound
themselves, they recoiled in horror. Sir Everard was disposed of with
comparative ease. His own good sense led him to demur, but no sooner
was he told that three priests had approved of the scheme than, as in
duty bound, the poor weak creature laid his good sense aside, told his
conscience to be quiet, and united cordially and thoroughly in the
project, finding horses, arms, and money, to the amount of 1500 pounds.
If the Church approved, "the prerogative of the laity was to listen and
to obey." Francis Tresham proved less pliable. He at once inquired if
the Roman Catholic peers were to be warned, so as to keep away from
Parliament on the doomed day.
"Generally, only," said Catesby. "We have let them understand that
strict laws are to be passed against the Catholics, which they cannot
prevent, and therefore they had best tarry away."
"My Lord Arundel, though he be not of age, is very desirous to be
present," said Percy.
"My Lord Montague, on the contrary part, would fain be thence," returned
Catesby, "and I have told him he can do no good there."
"I asked my Lord Mordaunt if he meant to come," said Winter, laughing,
"and quoth he, `Nay, for I was too much disgusted at the former session,
being forced to sit there with my robes on, all the time the King was in
church.'" [Note 1.]
"But surely," cried Tresham, looking from one to another, "you will take
some further means to save our brethren than only these? Mr Percy, you
never will suffer your cousin the Earl of Northumberland to perish?"
"Indeed, Mr Tresham, I should be loth so to do, because I am bounden to
him."
"Gentlemen," said the voice of Fawkes, who had hitherto been silent in
the conclave, "what we must principally respect is our own safety, and
we will pray for the Catholic Lords."
"And how shall we set ourselves right with the Catholic commons?"
demanded Keyes.
"Oh, we will satisfy the Catholics at large that the act is done for the
restitution of religion," answered Catesby; "and the heretics, that it
was to prevent the Union sought to be established at this Parliament."
"Sirs, I cannot brook this!" Tresham broke in eagerly. "My Lords
Monteagle and Stourton, as you know, have wedded my sisters. I implore
you to warn them: at the least, I do beseech you, save my Lord
Monteagle!"
"What, to tell him what shall hap?" cried Catesby. "Never!"
"Impossible, Mr Tresham!" replied Percy. "I regret it as much as you."
"They _shall_ be warned!" cried Tresham vehemently.
"Remember your oath!" answered Catesby sternly.
"I shall not forget it. But something must be done to save my Lord
Monteagle. I am beholden to him, and I love him dear."
"Well, well!" suggested Winter, making an endeavour to cast oil upon the
troubled waters, "can you not be earnest with him to do something on
that day, which shall carry him out of the way?"
"I am afraid not!" said Tresham, shaking his head. "He will reckon it
his duty to be there, or I err."
"Time enough betwixt now and October," said Fawkes.
"Ay, time enough, indeed," echoed Winter. "My Lord Monteagle may be
abroad, or what not, when the Parliament opens. Pray you, Mr Tresham,
trouble not yourself. I doubt not all shall go well."
Tresham murmured something to the effect that things left to drift as
they would did not invariably drift into the right harbour: but he
dropped the topic for the moment.
Hitherto the secret meetings of the conspirators had been in the house
beyond Clement's Inn: but it was now deemed necessary to have a more
secluded and secure retreat.
In the forest depths of Enfield Chase was an old hunting-lodge, named
White Webbs, never used except occasionally by sportsmen. This was
selected as a non-suspicious place of meeting. The conspirators were
now nearly ready: a few days would make them quite so. Satan was also
ready, and probably required no time for preparation. And God was ready
too.
They met at White Webbs on the 21st of September, just a fortnight
before the day appointed for the meeting of Parliament: Catesby, the
Winters, the Wrights, Digby, Keyes, Grant, and Bates. Tresham was not
there; he had ceased to attend the meetings, and said, if Lord Monteagle
at least might not be saved he would neither find the money he had
promised, nor assist any further with the plot.
They had not sat many minutes, when Percy and Fawkes joined them, the
former impetuous person being in an evident state of suppressed
excitement, while the latter very cool individual showed no trace of
emotion.
"Now, what think you?" cried Percy. "The Parliament is prorogued yet
again."
"Sure, they have never wind of our project?" suggested one of the
brothers Wright.
"Till when?" demanded Catesby, knitting his brows.
"For another month--till the fifth of November."
Catesby pondered for a moment in silence.
"Is there any stir thereabouts?--any search made of the house or the
vault?"
"No--no semblance thereof."
"Then I think they have not got wind of it. But if so--Mr Fawkes, is
all the powder now in the cellar?"
"No, Mr Catesby; there are five or six barrels to come, which I meant
to move thither on Monday night next."
"Wait a little. You had best make sure that all is safe. Tarry for
another fortnight, and move them then. Is this not your minds,
gentlemen?"
The rest of the group, as usual, deferred to their leader.
There was now another point requiring discussion, and it was introduced
by Catesby.
"'Tis time, methinks, gentlemen, that we took thought on a question
whereof we have not yet spoken. After the thing you wot of is done,
what then shall follow? If not the King alone be present there, but the
Queen also, and maybe the Prince--"
"If they be, we will not save them," interjected Fawkes.
"We need not," coolly responded Catesby: "but if all be gone, who then
shall be published or elected king?"
"Why, we have never entered into that consideration," said Grant,
dubiously.
"Had we not best enter into it? Our plans must be ready at once, when
the time comes, not all hanging betwixt the eyelids." [i.e. in
uncertainty.]
"The Queen and Prince are safe to be there," said Percy. "And in any
case, the Prince were best away; for if all be true that is said, or the
half thereof, he were like to do us more mischief than his father. He
is not of the King's humour, but more like old Bess--hath a will of his
own, and was bred up strictly Protestant."
"Bad, that!" said Catesby. "Then the Prince must go."
"'Tis pity, though," observed Robert Winter. "A bright little lad."
Catesby laughed scornfully. "Come now, Robin, no sensibility
[susceptibility, sentimentality], I beg! We cannot afford to be
punctual [particular] in this affair. There are bright lads by the
dozen everywhere, as cheap as blackberries. Now, what of the little
Duke?"
The man who spoke thus was himself the father of two boys.
"He'll not be much of aught at five years old," said Winter. "Mr
Percy, you were the most like of any of us to win him into your hands."
Percy, as one of the band of gentleman pensioners, whose duty it was to
wait on the King, had opportunities of access to the little Prince,
beyond any of his accomplices.
"I will undertake that," said Percy eagerly.
"Do we concur, then, to elect him King?" asked Catesby.
"Hold, good gentlemen! by your leave, we go something too fast," said
Fawkes. "How if Mr Percy be unable--as may be--to win Duke Charles
into his hands?"
"Why, then comes the Lady Elizabeth," said Winter.
"What say you to the only English-born of the royal issue--the Lady
Mary? She, at least, is uninfect with heresy."
There was a laugh at this suggestion: for the Princess Mary was not
quite five months old.
"Very well, if we could win her," answered Catesby: "but she would be
hard to come by. No--the one easiest had, and as likely as any to serve
our turn, is the young lady at Combe. Let the memory of Elizabeth the
heretic, so dear to the hearts of Englishmen, be extinguished in the
brighter glories of Elizabeth the Catholic. Bring her up in the
Catholic faith, and wed her to a Catholic Prince, and I will lay mine
head to pawn that she shall make a right royal queen, and the star of
England's glory shall suffer no tarnish in her hands. I have seen the
little maid, and a bright, brave, bonnie lass she is."
"How old?" asked Robert Winter.
"Nine years. Just the right age. Old enough to queen it, and take a
pleasure therein; and not old enough to have drunk in much heresy--no
more than Fathers Garnet and Gerard can soon distil out again."
"Nay! Too old, Mr Catesby," said Thomas Winter. "At five years, the
little Duke might be so: but not his sister at nine. She'll have
learned heresy enough by then; and women are more perverse than men.
They ever hold error tighter, and truth likewise."
"Well, have the little Duke, if you can win him," replied Catesby. "I
doubt thereof."
"Trust me for that," cried Percy.
"I'll trust you to break your neck in the attempt," said Catesby with a
grim smile.
"But how look you to secure the Lady Elizabeth? My Lord Harrington's an
old fox, and none so easy to beguile. He shall smell a rat, be sure,
before you have half your words out, and then you may whistle for the
rest of your hopes--and are like enough to do it in the Fleet or
Newgate."
"Kit Wright," said Percy, addressing the last speaker, who was his
wife's brother, "all the wit in the world is sure not in thine head.
Thinkest we shall march up to the door at Combe, and sweetly demand of
my Lord Harrington that he give us up the Lady Elizabeth? Why, man, we
must compass the matter that he shall wit nought till all be done."
"You might make a hunting-party," suggested Fawkes.
"Say you so, Mr Fawkes? You have eyes in your head. We'll send Sir
Everard Digby down to see to that business."
"How went your business, Mr Catesby?" asked Grant.
"Why, right well, Mr Grant. I gathered together a goodly number of
friends to assist the Archduke Albert in Flanders: bought horses, and
laid in powder. All shall be ready when the Archduke hath need of
them."
The laugh went round.
"That was a jolly fantasy of yours, to levy troops for the Archduke,"
said Robert Winter. "Truly, these heretics are easy to beguile. Not
one, methinks, hath the least suspicion."
"It were soon up with us if they had," added his brother.
"Look out for yourself, Tom, and smoke not too many pipes with externs,"
responded Robert. "That young Louvaine that you affect--I scarce trust
him."
"That affects me, you mean. Trust him! I never do. He's only a
simpleton at best."
"Have you never heard of simpletons carrying tidings?" said Fawkes.
"Mind you drop not any chance words, Mr Winter, that might do
mischief."
"Let me alone for that," was the answer.
"Gentlemen," said Catesby, who had been in a brown study for some
minutes, "methinks Mr Fawkes's proposal to seize the Lady Elizabeth
under cover of a hunting-party is good. Sir Everard, will you undertake
this?"
"Willingly. Where must they be gathered?"
"Gather them at Dunchurch," said Catesby, "for a hunt on Dunsmoor Heath,
and for the day of the Parliament's meeting: you shall have notice of
the blow struck, as quick as a horseman can reach you. As soon as you
hear it, then away to Combe, and carry off the young lady to my mother's
at Ashby. Proclaim her Queen, and bring her next day to London,
proclaiming her in all the towns on your way."
"May there not be some awkwardness in the matter, if her brothers be
alive?" suggested the most cautious of the party, Robert Winter.
"Pooh!" ejaculated the impetuous Percy. "`Nothing venture, nothing
have.'"
"`Faint heart never won fair lady' were more pertinent to the occasion,"
said Thomas Winter, raising a general laugh.
"We must see to that," grimly responded Catesby.
The conspirators then separated. Sir Everard Digby set out for
Warwickshire, Percy went to see Lord Northumberland at Syon, Keyes
returned to Lambeth, and Fawkes resumed his duties at the house on the
riverbank. Mr Marshall, on his way to call at the White Bear little
guessed that the apparently respectable, busy man-servant in blue
camlet, who met him as he went down King Street, was engaged in an evil
work which would hand down his name to everlasting infamy.
Mrs Abbott was standing at her door as he went past.
"Well to be sure! so 'tis you, Parson? How's Mrs Agnes this even? I
reckoned I saw her t'other day, a-passing through the Strand, but she
saw not me--in a green perpetuance gown, and a black camlet hood. I
trust it'll wear better than mine, for if ever a camlet was no worth,
'tis that Dear heart, the roguery of wool-drapers, and mercers beside!
I do hope Master Floriszoon 'll not learn none of their tricks. If I
see my Lady Lettice this next day or twain, I'll drop a word to her.
Don't you think she's looking a bit pale and poorly this last week or
so? But mayhap you have not seen her, not of late."
"I have not, but I am now on my way," answered Mr Marshall, turning
into the White Bear, in the hope of escaping Silence's tongue. It was
the first word he had been able to cast into the stream she poured
forth.
"Well, maybe you'll drop a word to her touching Master Floriszoon? Dear
heart, what queer names them foreign folks do get! I never could abide
no foreigners, and if I--Bless us, the man's off--there's no having a
word with him. I say, Charity, I don't believe them eggs you had of
that--"
"You'll excuse me, Mistress Abbott, but I've no time to waste i' talk.
`The talk of the lips tendeth only to penury,'--and if you'll go in and
look for that i' th' Good Book, it'll happen do you a bit o' good--more
than talking. Good even."
And Charity shut the door uncompromisingly.
Mr Marshall was too much at home in the White Bear to need
announcement. He tapped softly at the parlour door, and opened it.
"Mrs Gertrude, I don't care who saith it! it's a wicked heresy!" were
the first words he heard, in the blunt tones of Temperance Murthwaite.
"And it's not true to say we Puritans teach any such thing. It's a
calumny and a heresy both.--Mr Marshall, I'm fain to see you. Do, pray
you, tell this young gentlewoman we hold not that if a man but believe
in the merits of Christ, he may live as he list, and look for Heaven in
the end. 'Tis a calumny, I say--a wicked calumny!"
"A calumny as old as the Apostle James, Mrs Murthwaite," answered Mr
Marshall, as he turned from greeting Lady Louvaine. "Some in those days
had, it should seem, been abusing Paul's doctrine of justification by
faith, and said that a man need but believe, and not live according
thereto."
"Why, Mr Marshall, I have heard you to say a man may believe and be
saved!" cried Gertrude, who sat on a velvet-covered stool beside Lady
Louvaine, having run in from the next door without hood or scarf.
"That I doubt not, Mrs Gertrude, and yet may, since you have heard
Paul, and John, and the Lord Himself, to say it in the Word. But,
believe what? Believe that a man once lived whose name was Jesus, and
who was marvellous good, and wrought many great works? That faith shall
not save you,--no more than believing in King James's Majesty should.
It is a living faith you must have, and that is a dead."
"Mr Marshall, I thought Puritans made much of the doctrine of imputed
righteousness?"
"You thought truth, Mrs Gertrude."
"Well, but what is that save believing that Christ hath wrought all
goodness for me, and I need not work any goodness for mine own
salvation? Look you, there is no need, if all be done."
"No need of what? No need that you should attempt to do what you never
can do, or no need that you should show your love to Him that did it for
you at the cost of His own life?"
"Well!" said Gertrude in a slow, deprecating tone, "but--"
"Mrs Gertrude, you mix up two things which be utterly separate, and
which cannot mix, no more than oil and water. The man whom Christ hath
saved, it is most true, hath no need to save himself. But hath he no
need to save others? hath he no need to honour Christ? hath he no need
to show forth to angels and to men his unity with Christ, the oneness of
his will with His, the love wherewith Christ's love constraineth him?
You mix up justification and sanctification, as though they were but
one. Justification is the washing of the soul from sin; sanctification
is the dressing of the soul for Heaven. Sanctification is not a thing
you do for God; 'tis a thing God doth in you. There is need for it, not
that it should justify you before His tribunal, but that it should make
you meet for His presence-chamber. It were not fit that you should
enter the King's presence, though cleansed, yet dressed in your old
soiled clothes. But you make a third minglement of things separate,
when you bring in imputed righteousness. The righteousness of Christ
imputed unto us justifieth us before the bar of God. It payeth our
debt, it washeth our stains, it unlocketh our fetters. But this is not
sanctification. Justification was wrought by Christ for us;
sanctification is wrought by the Holy Ghost in us. Justification was
completed on Calvary; sanctification is not finished so long as we be in
this life, Justification is quick and lively; the moment my faith
toucheth the work of Christ for me, that moment am I fully justified,
and for ever. Sanctification is slow, and groweth like a plant. I am
as entirely justified as I ever shall be, but I am not as sanctified as
I ever shall be. I look to be more and more sanctified--`to grow up
unto Him in all things,' to be like Him, to be purified even as He is
pure. I pray you make no mingle-mangle of things that do so differ in
themselves, though 'tis true they come all of one source--the union and
the unity of Christ and the believer."
Gertrude was yawning behind her hand before the clergyman was half
through his explanation.
"I thank you, Mr Marshall," said Temperance, who had listened
attentively. "Methinks I had some apprehension of the difference in
myself, but I could not have expounded it thus clearly."
"To know it in yourself, my sister, is a far greater thing, and a
better, than being able to expound it.--And how is it with you, Lady
Lettice?"
"Well, Mr Marshall," she said with her soft smile. "At times I think
that a few more pins of the tabernacle are taken down, and then the
passing wind causeth the curtains to shake. But at worst it shall be
only the moving of the pillar of cloud--the `Come up higher' into the
very presence of the King."
"And in the interim `the Lord sitteth between the cherubim, be the
people never so unquiet.' And how is it, dear Sister, with your two
young men?"
Lady Louvaine paused to accept Gertrude's offered hand and bid her
good-night. That young woman did not enjoy Mr Marshall's conversation,
and suddenly discovered that it was time for her return home.
"Hans is all I could desire," said the old lady, returning to the
subject: "he is a dear, good, sober-minded lad as need be. But I will
not disguise from you, Mr Marshall, that I am in some disease of mind
touching Aubrey."
"May I ask wherefore?"
"You may ask, indeed, yet can I scarce tell. That is no wise-sounding
thing to say: yet one may have cause for fear where he hath no evidence
for demonstration."
"He may so, indeed. Then you reckon there is good cause for fear?"
"Mr Marshall, you told us some time back that our neighbour Mr
Rookwood was brother to a Papist. Know you aught of a friend of his,
one Mr Winter, that is in London at times, and hath his lodging in the
Strand?"
"A friend of this Mr Rookwood, your neighbour?"
"I reckon so. At least, a friend of his son."
"Sons do at times make friends apart from their fathers," said Mr
Marshall with a smile. "I cannot say, Lady Lettice, that the name is
quite unknown to me; yet cannot I, like you, lay a finger on any special
thing I may have heard thereabout."
"What were the other names, Edith? I cannot call them to mind."
"Mr Catesby, Mother, and Mr Percy, and Mr Darcy: those, I think, were
what Aubrey told us."
"Mr Percy!--what Percy is he?"
"I know not: some kin to my Lord Northumberland."
"Where dwells he?"
"That know I not."
"At the Green Dragon in Upper Holborn, in Saint Giles's parish," said
another voice.
"Ha!" echoed Mr Marshall, turning to his new informant. "A recusant,
Madam, and a dangerous fellow. And if this Mr Catesby you name be Mr
Robert Catesby of Ashby Ledgers, he also is a recusant, and if I know
him, a worser man than the other."
"Hans, art thou sure of this Mr Percy?--that he whom Aubrey wist is the
same man of whom Mr Marshall speaks?"
"I have seen Aubrey leave his house, Madam."
Lady Louvaine looked very uneasy.
"And Mr Darcy?" said Edith.
"Him I know not," answered Mr Marshall: which was not surprising, since
he knew him only as Mr Walley.
"Hans, how much dost thou know?"
Hans knelt down by the large cushioned chair, and kissed the thin,
blue-veined hand.
"Dear Lady Lettice, I know very little: and Aubrey would account me a
sneak and a spy, were I to tell you what I do know. But I would not
care for that if it might save him."
"I do hope Mr Louvaine is not drawn in among them," said Mr Marshall,
thoughtfully.
"They have been away of late," replied Hans, "and he hath not been there
so often."
"Are they away now?"
"No, lately returned."
"I would I could win Aubrey for a talk," said Edith.
"Shall I call at my Lord Oxford's and leave a message that you would
have him call here?"
"Truly, Mr Marshall, you should do me a great kindness."
"Then I so will. Good-night."
Aubrey was playing billiards with his young master and several of the
younger gentlemen of his household, when he was told that Mr Marshall
requested a word with him. The information alarmed him, for he thought
it meant bad news. Having obtained the young Earl's leave to go and
ascertain why he was wanted, Aubrey ran hastily down the stairs, and
found Mr Marshall awaiting him in the hall.
"Good even, Mr Louvaine," said he, rising: "I had the honour this
evening to wait on my Lady your grandmother, and was desired to drop a
word to you as I went home, to the effect that your friends have a mind
to speak with you on some matter of import. Her Ladyship bids you, the
first opportunity you can make, to visit the White Bear."
"I will do so," said Aubrey, recovering from his alarm. "I cry you
mercy for my short greeting, but truly I was afraid, not knowing if you
had ill news for me."
"That I have not at this time, God be thanked! Yet if I may, I would
fain ask you, Mr Louvaine, whether some time hath not run since you saw
your friends in King Street?"
"Oh no! not very long--at least not more than common--only about--"
Aubrey hesitated and flushed, as he realised that it was now the middle
of October, and his last visit had been paid early in June. "You see,
Sir, I am close tied by my duties here," he added in haste.
"So close tied that you may not even be away for an hour? Well, you
know your own duty; do it, and all shall be well. But I would beseech
you not to neglect this call any longer than till your earliest
opportunity shall give leave."
Mr Marshall bowed, and with an official "May God bless you!" passed out
of the hall door. Aubrey returned to his urgent duties in the
billiard-room.
"Who is your visitor, Louvaine?" asked the youthful Earl.
"If it please your Lordship, 'tis but a messenger from my grandmother."
"What would the ancient dame?" inquired one of the irreverent young
gentlemen-in-waiting.
"She would have me go and wait on her: what else I know not. I shall
find out, I reckon, when I go."
"When saw you her Ladyship, Mr Louvaine?" said an unexpected voice
behind him, and Aubrey turned to meet the Countess.
"Madam, in June last, under your Ladyship's pleasure."
"It scarcely is to my pleasure. Son Henry, cannot you allow this young
gentlemen to visit his friends more often?"
"Under your leave, Madam, he can visit them every day if he will. I
tarry him not."
"Then how comes it, Mr Louvaine, that you have not waited on my Lady
Lettice for four months?"
Aubrey mentally wished Mr Marshall in America, and himself anywhere but
in Oxford House. There was no escape. The wise Countess added no
unnecessary words to help him out, but having put her question in plain
terms, quietly awaited his reply. He muttered something not very
intelligible, in which "business" was the chiefly audible word.
"Methinks your duty to your mother and Lady Lettice should be your first
business after God," said the Countess gravely. "I pray you, Mr
Louvaine, that you wait on her Ladyship to-morrow even. The Earl will
give you leave."
Aubrey bowed, and as the Countess took her departure, for she had merely
paused in passing through the room, gave a vicious blow to the nearest
billiard ball.
"You are in for it now, Louvaine!" said his next neighbour.
"Poor lad! will his gra'mmer beat him?" suggested another in mock
compassion.
"He's been stealing apples, and the parson has told of him," added a
third.
"Will you hold your stupid tongues?" said Aubrey, stung beyond
endurance.
"Take a pinch of sneezing tobago," said one of his companions, holding
out his snuff-box. "Never mind it, lad! put on a bold face, and use
ruffling language, and you'll get over this brunt."
Aubrey flung down his cue and escaped, pursued by his companions'
laughter.
"We were somewhere near the truth," said the young Earl.
"He looks for a scolding, take my word for it."
Very like it Aubrey felt, as he went down King Street on the following
evening. He, too, met a man, not in blue camlet, but in a porter's
frock, trundling a truck with two or three barrels on it, in whom he did
not in the least recognise the dark, tall stranger to whom he had not
been introduced in Catesby's rooms. He received a warm welcome at the
White Bear.
"Aubrey, hast thou of late seen thine acquaintance Mr Percy?"
"Not since his return out of the country, Madam."
He had seen Winter, but he did not think it necessary to mention it.
"Nor Mr Catesby?"
"Nay, save to meet him in the street, Madam."
"My son, should it give thee great compunction [grief, annoyance] if I
bade thee have no more ado with either of these gentlemen?"
"What mean you, Madam?"
"I mean not that if thou meet them in the street thou shalt not give
them greeting; but no more to visit them in their lodgings. My boy, Mr
Percy is a Popish recusant, and there is much fear of Mr Catesby
likewise."
"Not all recusants are bad men, I hope," answered Aubrey evasively, as
if he were unwilling to respond by a direct promise to that effect.
"I hope likewise: but some are, as we know. And when innocent men be
drawn in with bad men, 'tis often found that the bad slip forth unhurt,
and leave the innocent to abide the hazard. Promise me, Aubrey, that
thou wilt haunt [visit] these men's company no longer."
"Truly, Madam, I know not what I should say to my friends. Bethink you
also, I pray, that I am of age."
"Of what age?" demanded his Aunt Temperance in her usual style. "Not of
the age of discretion, I being witness."
"Of the age at which a man commonly takes care of himself," answered
Aubrey, loftily.
"`Bate me an ace, quoth Bolton.' At the age at which a man commonly
takes no care of himself, nor of any other belike. Nor you are not the
wisest man of your age in this world, my master: don't go for to think
it. You don't need to look at me in that way, my fine young gentleman:
you'll not get sugar-plums from Temperance Murthwaite when you need
rhubarb."
"I know that, Aunt Temperance," said Aubrey, trying to laugh.
"And you may as well open your mouth and take your physic with a good
grace. If not, there'll be another dose to follow."
"What?" demanded Aubrey with drawn brows, and a flash in his eyes.
"`Three can keep a secret if twain be away,'" was the enigmatical
answer. "Now then, answer Lady Lettice."
"He has no mind to promise--that can I see," said Lady Louvaine,
sorrowfully.
"He shall, afore he go," was the cool reply of Temperance.
"Aunt Temperance, I am not a babe!" exclaimed Aubrey rather angrily.
"That you are, and in sore need of leading-strings."
"Aubrey here?" asked his mother, coming in. "Well now, I do think one
of you might have told me. But you never think of me. Why, Aubrey, it
must be six months since we saw you!"
"Four, Mother, under your pleasure."
"I am sure 'tis six. Why come you no oftener?"
"I have my duties," said Aubrey in a rather constrained voice.
"Closer than to thy mother, my boy?" asked Edith softly.
"Prithee harry not him," retorted Aunt Temperance. "Hast thou not
heard, he hath his duties? To hold skeins of silk whilst my Lady winds
them, maybe, and to ride the great horse, and play tennis and
shuttlecock with his Lord, and to make up his mind to which of all his
Lady's damsels he'll make love o' the lightest make."
"Aubrey, I do hope you are ne'er thinking of marriage!" said his
mother's querulous voice. "Thou shouldst be put out of thine office,
most like, and not a penny to keep her, and she saddled upon us that--"
"That'll kick and throw her, as like as not," said Aunt Temperance by
way of interjection.
"I ensure you, Mother, I have no expectations of the kind. 'Tis but
Aunt Temperance that--that--"
"That sometimes hits the white, Sir, if she do now and then shoot aside
o' the mark. Howbeit, hold thou there. And if thou want leave to carry
on thine acquaintance with these gentlemen, bring them to see us. I'll
lay mine head to an orange I see in ten minutes if they be true men or
no."
"What business have they?" asked Edith.
Aubrey hesitated. He knew of none except Garnet's pretended profession
of horse-dealing.
"Is there any woman amongst them?" said Temperance.
"I never saw one."
"Not even at Mr Percy's house?"
"I went there but once, to ask for him. I have heard that he hath a
wife, but she lives very privately, and teaches children. He dwelleth
not with her, but hath his lodging at my Lord Northumberland's. I never
saw her."
"That's an ill hearing. 'Tis meet for men to come together by
themselves for business: but to dwell in their own homes, and never a
woman with them, wife, mother, sister, nor daughter,--that means
mischief, lad. It means some business of an evil sort, that they don't
want a woman to see through. If there had been one, I went about to
say, take me with thee some even to visit her. I'd have known all about
it under an hour, trust me."
"You should have seen nought, Aunt."
"Tell that to the cowcumbers. You see nought, very like."
Lady Louvaine laid her hand on her grandson's.
"Aubrey, promise me at least this: that for a month to come thou wilt
not visit any of these gentlemen."
After an instant's pause, Aubrey replied, "Very well, Madam; I am ready
to promise that."
"That's not much to promise," commented Temperance.
"It is enough," said Lady Louvaine, quietly.
An hour later, when Aubrey was gone, Faith asked rather complainingly
what had induced Lady Louvaine to limit the promise to a month.
"I cannot tell thee, Faith," was the answer. "Something seemed to
whisper within me that if the lad would promise that, he would be safe.
It may be no more than an old woman's fantasy; and even so, no harm is
done. Or it might be that God spake to me--and if thus, let us obey His
voice. He knows what He will do, and what men will do."
"I've as great a mind as ever I had to eat--"
"What to do, Temperance?"
"Get to see those fellows, somehow."
"Wait the month, Temperance," suggested Edith, quietly.
"Wait! you're always for waiting. I want to work."
"Waiting is often the hardest work," said Edith.
The middle of the month was nearly come. The six last barrels of powder
were in the vault; the whole thirty-six were covered with stones and
iron bars: Gideon Gibbons, the porter, was delivering at the door three
thousand billets and five hundred faggots of wood and another man in a
porter's frock was stacking the wood in the vault.
"There, that's the last lot!" said Gibbons, throwing in a packet of
tied-up billets. "Count right, Johnson?"
"All right, Gibbons."
"Your master likes a good fire, I should say," observed Gibbons, with a
grin of amusement, as he looked into the vault. "There's fuel there to
last most folks a couple of winters."
"Ay, he doth so: he's a northern man, you see--comes from where
sea-coal's cheaper than here, and they are wont to pile their fires
big."
"Shouldn't ha' thought them billets wouldn't hardly ha' taken all that
there room," said Gibbons, looking into the vault, while he scratched
his head with one hand, and hitched up his porter's frock to put the
other in his pocket.
"Oh, I didn't stack 'em so tight," said Mr Percy's man, carelessly,
tying up a bit of string which he picked from the floor.
"Ah! well, but tight or loose, shouldn't hardly ha' thought it. Master
coming soon, eh?"
"Haven't heard what day. Afore long, very like."
"Has he e'er a wife that he'll bring?"
"She's in the country," said the disguised man-servant, who knew that
she was then at the Green Dragon, teaching sundry little girls the
mysteries of felling and whipping cambric.
"Well, 'tis dry work. Come and have a pint at the Maid's Head."
"No, thank you, I don't care for it. There's a penny for yours."
As this was the price of a quart of the best ale, Mr Gibbons pocketed
the penny with satisfaction, and forbore to remark censoriously on what
he deemed the very singular taste of Mr Percy's man. He shambled
awkwardly off with his waggon, meaning first to put up his horses, and
then go and expend his penny in the beverage wherein his soul delighted.
His companion gave a low laugh as he turned the key in the door of the
cellar.
"No, thank you, Gideon Gibbons," said he to himself. "It may suit you
to sit boozing at the Maid's Head, telling all you know and guessing
much that you don't: here's wishing your early muddlement before you get
on the subject of this wood! But it won't do for Guy Fawkes, my fine
fellow!"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. Lord Mordaunt was a trimmer, afraid of being known to be a
Papist, and, like most half-hearted people, a great sufferer from the
struggle between the conscience and the flesh.