THE ESCAPE
On a certain morning a messenger rode in hot haste up to the prison
gate. He bore the livery of Montague. Turnkey after turnkey admitted
him, until finally he stood before the cell of John Law and delivered
into his hand, as he had been commanded, the message that he bore. That
afternoon this same messenger paused at the gate of the house of
Knollys. Here, too, he was admitted promptly. He delivered into the
hands of the Lady Catharine Knollys a certain message. This was of a
Wednesday. On the following Friday it was decreed that the gallows
should do its work. Two more days and there would be an end of "Jessamy"
Law.
That Wednesday night a covered carriage came to the door of the house of
Knollys. Its driver was muffled in such fashion that he could hardly
have been known. There stepped from the house the cloaked figure of a
woman, who entered the carriage and herself pulled shut the door. The
vehicle was soon lost among the darkling streets.
Catharine Knollys had heard the summons of her fate. She now sat
trembling in the carriage.
When finally the vehicle stopped at the curb of the walk which led to
the prison gate, a second carriage, as mysterious as the first, came
down the street and stopped at a little distance, but close to the curb
on the side nearest to the gate. The driver of the first carriage,
evidently not liking the close neighborhood at the time, edged a trifle
farther down the way. The second carriage thereupon drew up into the
spot just vacated, and the two, not easily distinguishable at the hour
and in the dark and unlighted street, stood so, each apparently watchful
of the other, each seemingly without an occupant.
Lady Catharine had left her carriage before this interchange, and had
passed the prison gate alone. Her steps faltered. It was hardly
consciously that she finally found her way into the court, through the
gate, down the evil-smelling corridors, past the sodden and leering
constables, up to the last gate which separated her from him whom she
had come to see.
She had been admitted without demur as far as this point, and even now
her coming seemed not altogether a matter of surprise. The burly turnkey
at the last door stood ready to meet her. With loud commands, he drove
out of the corridor the crowd of prison attendants. He approached Lady
Catharine, hat in hand and bowing deeply.
"I presume you are the man whom I would see," said she, faintly, almost
unequal to the task imposed upon her.
"Aye, Madam, I doubt not, with my best worship for you."
"I was to come"--said Lady Catharine. "I was to speak to you--"
"Aye," replied the turnkey. "You were to come, and you were to speak.
And now, what were you to say to me? Was there no given word?"
"There was such a word," she said. "You will understand. It is in the
matter of Mr. Law."
"True," said the turnkey. "But I must have the countersign. There are
heads to lose in this, yours and mine, if there be mistake."
Lady Catharine raised her head proudly. "It was for Faith," said she,
"for Love, and for Hope! These were the words."
Saying which, as though she had called to her aid the last atom of her
strength, she staggered back and half fell against the wall near the
inner gate. The rude jailer sprang forward to steady her.
"Yes, yes," he whispered, eagerly. "'Tis all proper. Those be the
words. Pray you, have courage, lady."
There came into the corridor a murmur of voices, and there was audible
also the sound of a man's footfalls approaching along the flags.
Catharine Knollys looked through the bars of the gate which the turnkey
was already beginning to throw open for her. She looked, and there
appeared upon her vision, a sight which caused her heart to stop, which
confounded all her reason. From a side door there advanced John Law,
magnificently clad, walking now as though he trod the floor of some
great hall or banquet room.
The woman waiting without the gate reached out her arms. She would have
cried aloud. Then she fell back against the wall, whereat had she not
grasped she must have sunk down to the floor.
Upon the arm of John Law, and looking up to him as she walked, there
hung the clinging figure of a woman, half-hidden by the flickering
shadows of the torches. A deep cloak fell back from her shoulders. It
might have been the light fabric of the aborigine. Upon the foot of Mary
Connynge, twinkling in and out as she walked, showed the crudely
garnished little shoe of the Indian princess over seas, dainty, bizarre,
singular, covering the smallest foot in all London town.
"By all the saints!" Law was saying, "you might be the very maker of
this little slipper yourself. I have won the forty crowns, I swear!
Perforce, I'll leave them to you in my will."
The shock of the light speech made even Mary Connynge wince. For the
moment she averted her eyes from the handsome face above her. She
looked, and saw what gave her greater shock. Law, too, stared, as her
own startled gaze grew fixed. He advanced close to the gate, only to
start back in a horror of surprise which racked even his steeled
composure.
"Madam!" he cried; and then, "Catharine!"
Catharine Knollys made no answer to him, though she looked straight and
calmly into his face, seeming not in the least to see the woman near
him. Her eyes were wide and shining. "Sir," said she, "keep fast to
Hope! This was for Faith, and for Love!"
The jailer with one quick gesture swung wide the gate. "Haste, haste!"
he cried. "Quick and begone! This night may mean my ruin! Get ye gone,
all of ye, and give me time to think. Out with ye all, for I must lock
the gate!"
John Law passed as one stupefied, the slender form of Mary Connynge
still upon his arm. Hands of men hurried them. "Quick! Into the
carriage!" one cried.
And now the sounds of feet and voices approaching along the corridor
were heard. The jailer swiftly swung the heavy gate to and locked it.
Catharine Knollys caught his last gesture, which bade her begone as fast
as might be. Her feet were strangely heavy, in spite of her. She reached
the curb in time to hear only the whir of wheels as a carriage sped away
over the stones of the street. She stood alone, irresolute for half an
instant as the crunch of wheels spun up to the curb again. A hand
reached out and beckoned; involuntarily she obeyed the summons. Her
wrist was seized, and she was half pulled through the door of the
carriage.
"What!" cried a voice. "You, Lady Catharine! Why, how is this?"
It was the voice of Will Law, whom she knew, but who certainly was not
the one who had brought her hither. The Lady Catharine accepted this
last situation as one no longer able to reason. She sank down in the
carriage seat, shivering.
"Is all well?" asked Will Law, eagerly.
"He is safe," said Lady Catharine Knollys. "It is done. It is finished."
"What does this mean?" exclaimed Will.
"His carriage--there it is. It goes to the ship--to the Pool. He and
Mary Connynge are only just ahead of us. You may hear the wheels. Do you
not hear them?" She spoke with leaden voice, and her head sank heavily.
"What! My brother--Mary Connynge--in that carriage--what can you mean?
My God! Lady Catharine, tell me, what do you mean?"
"I do not know," said Catharine Knollys. All things now seemed very far
away from her. Her head sank gently forward, and she heard not the words
of the man who frantically sought to awaken her to speech.
From the prison to London Pool was a journey of some distance across the
streets of London. Will Law called out to the driver with savagery in
his voice. He shouted, cursed, implored, promised, and betimes held one
hand under the soft, heavy tresses of the head now sunk so humbly
forward.
The mad ride ended at the quay on Thames side, where the shadows of the
tall buildings lay rank and thick upon the earth, where tarry smells and
evil odors filled the heavy air, penetrated none the less by the savor
of the keen salt air. More than one giant form was outlined in the broad
stream, vessels tall and ghost-like in the gloom, shadowy, suggestive,
bearing imprint and promise of far lands across the sea.
Here was the initial point of England's greatness. Here on this heavy
stream had her captains taken ship. Thence had sailed her admirals to
encompass all the world. In these dark massed shadows, how much might
there not be of fate and mystery! Whither might not these vessels carry
one! To France, to the far-off Indies, to the new-owned islands, to
America with its little half-grown ports. Whence and whither? What might
not one do, here at this gateway of the world?
"To the brigantine beyond!" cried Will Law to the wherryman who came up.
"We want Captain McMasters, of the Polly Perkins. For God's sake, quick!
There's that afoot must be caught up within the moment, do you hear!"
The wherryman touched his cap and quickly made ready his boat. Will Law,
understanding naught of this swift coil of events, and not daring to
leave Lady Catharine behind him at the carriage, made down the stairway,
half carrying the drooping figure which now leaned weakly upon his
shoulder.
"Pull now, man! Pull as you never did before!" cried he, and the
wherryman bent hard to his oars.
Yet great as was the haste of those who put forth into the foggy
Thames, it was more than equalled by that of one who appeared upon the
dock, even as the creak of the oars grew fainter in the gloom. There
came the rattle of wheels upon the quay, and the sound of a driver
lashing his horses. A carriage rolled up, and there sprang from the box
a muffled figure which resolved itself into the very embodiment of
haste.
"Hold the horses, man!" he cried to the nearest by-stander, and sprang
swiftly to the head of the stairs, where a loiterer or two stood idly
gazing out into the mist which overhung the water.
"Saw you aught of a man," he demanded hastily, "a man and a woman, a
tall young woman--you could not mistake her? 'Twas the Polly Greenway
they should have found. Tell me, for God's sake, has any boat put out
from this stair?"
"Why, sir," replied one of the wherrymen who stood near by, pipe in
mouth and hand in pocket, "since you mention it, there was a boat
started but this instant for midstream. They sought McMaster's
brigantine, the Polly Perkins, that lies waiting for the tide. 'Twas, as
you say, a young gentleman, and with him was a young woman. I misdoubt
the lady was ill."
"Get me a boat!" cried the new-comer. "A sovereign, five sovereigns, ten
sovereigns, a hundred--but that ship must not weigh anchor until I
board her, do you hear!"
The ring of the imperative voice, and moreover the ring of good English
coin, set all the dock astir. Straightway there came up another wherry
with two lusty fellows, who laid her at the stair where stood the
impatient stranger.
"Hurry, men!" he cried. "'Tis life and death--'tis more than life and
death!"
And such fortune attended Sir Arthur Pembroke that forsooth he went over
the side of the Polly Perkins, even as the gray dawn began to break over
the narrow Thames, and even as the anchor-song of the crew struck up.