We left Will Marks leaning under the gibbet with his face towards the
town, scanning the distance with a keen eye, which sought to pierce the
darkness and catch the earliest glimpse of any person or persons that
might approach towards him. But all was quiet, and, save the howling of
the wind as it swept across the heath in gusts, and the creaking of the
chains that dangled above his head, there was no sound to break the
sullen stillness of the night. After half an hour or so this monotony
became more disconcerting to Will than the most furious uproar would have
been, and he heartily wished for some one antagonist with whom he might
have a fair stand-up fight, if it were only to warm himself.
Truth to tell, it was a bitter wind, and seemed to blow to the very heart
of a man whose blood, heated but now with rapid riding, was the more
sensitive to the chilling blast. Will was a daring fellow, and cared not
a jot for hard knocks or sharp blades; but he could not persuade himself
to move or walk about, having just that vague expectation of a sudden
assault which made it a comfortable thing to have something at his back,
even though that something were a gallows-tree. He had no great faith in
the superstitions of the age, still such of them as occurred to him did
not serve to lighten the time, or to render his situation the more
endurable. He remembered how witches were said to repair at that ghostly
hour to churchyards and gibbets, and such-like dismal spots, to pluck the
bleeding mandrake or scrape the flesh from dead men’s bones, as choice
ingredients for their spells; how, stealing by night to lonely places,
they dug graves with their finger-nails, or anointed themselves before
riding in the air, with a delicate pomatum made of the fat of infants
newly boiled. These, and many other fabled practices of a no less
agreeable nature, and all having some reference to the circumstances in
which he was placed, passed and repassed in quick succession through the
mind of Will Marks, and adding a shadowy dread to that distrust and
watchfulness which his situation inspired, rendered it, upon the whole,
sufficiently uncomfortable. As he had foreseen, too, the rain began to
descend heavily, and driving before the wind in a thick mist, obscured
even those few objects which the darkness of the night had before
imperfectly revealed.
‘Look!’ shrieked a voice. ‘Great Heaven, it has fallen down, and stands
erect as if it lived!’
The speaker was close behind him; the voice was almost at his ear. Will
threw off his cloak, drew his sword, and darting swiftly round, seized a
woman by the wrist, who, recoiling from him with a dreadful shriek, fell
struggling upon her knees. Another woman, clad, like her whom he had
grasped, in mourning garments, stood rooted to the spot on which they
were, gazing upon his face with wild and glaring eyes that quite appalled
him.
‘Say,’ cried Will, when they had confronted each other thus for some
time, ‘what are ye?’
‘Say what are _you_,’ returned the woman, ‘who trouble even this obscene
resting-place of the dead, and strip the gibbet of its honoured burden?
Where is the body?’
He looked in wonder and affright from the woman who questioned him to the
other whose arm he clutched.
‘Where is the body?’ repeated the questioner more firmly than before.
‘You wear no livery which marks you for the hireling of the government.
You are no friend to us, or I should recognise you, for the friends of
such as we are few in number. What are you then, and wherefore are you
here?’
‘I am no foe to the distressed and helpless,’ said Will. ‘Are ye among
that number? ye should be by your looks.’
‘We are!’ was the answer.
‘Is it ye who have been wailing and weeping here under cover of the
night?’ said Will.
‘It is,’ replied the woman sternly; and pointing, as she spoke, towards
her companion, ‘she mourns a husband, and I a brother. Even the bloody
law that wreaks its vengeance on the dead does not make that a crime, and
if it did ’twould be alike to us who are past its fear or favour.’
Will glanced at the two females, and could barely discern that the one
whom he addressed was much the elder, and that the other was young and of
a slight figure. Both were deadly pale, their garments wet and worn,
their hair dishevelled and streaming in the wind, themselves bowed down
with grief and misery; their whole appearance most dejected, wretched,
and forlorn. A sight so different from any he had expected to encounter
touched him to the quick, and all idea of anything but their pitiable
condition vanished before it.
‘I am a rough, blunt yeoman,’ said Will. ‘Why I came here is told in a
word; you have been overheard at a distance in the silence of the night,
and I have undertaken a watch for hags or spirits. I came here expecting
an adventure, and prepared to go through with any. If there be aught
that I can do to help or aid you, name it, and on the faith of a man who
can be secret and trusty, I will stand by you to the death.’
‘How comes this gibbet to be empty?’ asked the elder female.
‘I swear to you,’ replied Will, ‘that I know as little as yourself. But
this I know, that when I came here an hour ago or so, it was as it is
now; and if, as I gather from your question, it was not so last night,
sure I am that it has been secretly disturbed without the knowledge of
the folks in yonder town. Bethink you, therefore, whether you have no
friends in league with you or with him on whom the law has done its
worst, by whom these sad remains have been removed for burial.’
The women spoke together, and Will retired a pace or two while they
conversed apart. He could hear them sob and moan, and saw that they
wrung their hands in fruitless agony. He could make out little that they
said, but between whiles he gathered enough to assure him that his
suggestion was not very wide of the mark, and that they not only
suspected by whom the body had been removed, but also whither it had been
conveyed. When they had been in conversation a long time, they turned
towards him once more. This time the younger female spoke.
‘You have offered us your help?’
‘I have.’
‘And given a pledge that you are still willing to redeem?’
‘Yes. So far as I may, keeping all plots and conspiracies at arm’s
length.’
‘Follow us, friend.’
Will, whose self-possession was now quite restored, needed no second
bidding, but with his drawn sword in his hand, and his cloak so muffled
over his left arm as to serve for a kind of shield without offering any
impediment to its free action, suffered them to lead the way. Through
mud and mire, and wind and rain, they walked in silence a full mile. At
length they turned into a dark lane, where, suddenly starting out from
beneath some trees where he had taken shelter, a man appeared, having in
his charge three saddled horses. One of these (his own apparently), in
obedience to a whisper from the women, he consigned to Will, who, seeing
that they mounted, mounted also. Then, without a word spoken, they rode
on together, leaving the attendant behind.
They made no halt nor slackened their pace until they arrived near
Putney. At a large wooden house which stood apart from any other they
alighted, and giving their horses to one who was already waiting, passed
in by a side door, and so up some narrow creaking stairs into a small
panelled chamber, where Will was left alone. He had not been here very
long, when the door was softly opened, and there entered to him a
cavalier whose face was concealed beneath a black mask.
Will stood upon his guard, and scrutinised this figure from head to foot.
The form was that of a man pretty far advanced in life, but of a firm and
stately carriage. His dress was of a rich and costly kind, but so soiled
and disordered that it was scarcely to be recognised for one of those
gorgeous suits which the expensive taste and fashion of the time
prescribed for men of any rank or station.
He was booted and spurred, and bore about him even as many tokens of the
state of the roads as Will himself. All this he noted, while the eyes
behind the mask regarded him with equal attention. This survey over, the
cavalier broke silence.
‘Thou’rt young and bold, and wouldst be richer than thou art?’
‘The two first I am,’ returned Will. ‘The last I have scarcely thought
of. But be it so. Say that I would be richer than I am; what then?’
‘The way lies before thee now,’ replied the Mask.
‘Show it me.’
‘First let me inform thee, that thou wert brought here to-night lest thou
shouldst too soon have told thy tale to those who placed thee on the
watch.’
‘I thought as much when I followed,’ said Will. ‘But I am no blab, not
I.’
‘Good,’ returned the Mask. ‘Now listen. He who was to have executed the
enterprise of burying that body, which, as thou hast suspected, was taken
down to-night, has left us in our need.’
Will nodded, and thought within himself that if the Mask were to attempt
to play any tricks, the first eyelet-hole on the left-hand side of his
doublet, counting from the buttons up the front, would be a very good
place in which to pink him neatly.
‘Thou art here, and the emergency is desperate. I propose his task to
thee. Convey the body (now coffined in this house), by means that I
shall show, to the Church of St. Dunstan in London to-morrow night, and
thy service shall be richly paid. Thou’rt about to ask whose corpse it
is. Seek not to know. I warn thee, seek not to know. Felons hang in
chains on every moor and heath. Believe, as others do, that this was
one, and ask no further. The murders of state policy, its victims or
avengers, had best remain unknown to such as thee.’
‘The mystery of this service,’ said Will, ‘bespeaks its danger. What is
the reward?’
‘One hundred golden unities,’ replied the cavalier. ‘The danger to one
who cannot be recognised as the friend of a fallen cause is not great,
but there is some hazard to be run. Decide between that and the reward.’
‘What if I refuse?’ said Will.
‘Depart in peace, in God’s name,’ returned the Mask in a melancholy tone,
‘and keep our secret, remembering that those who brought thee here were
crushed and stricken women, and that those who bade thee go free could
have had thy life with one word, and no man the wiser.’
Men were readier to undertake desperate adventures in those times than
they are now. In this case the temptation was great, and the punishment,
even in case of detection, was not likely to be very severe, as Will came
of a loyal stock, and his uncle was in good repute, and a passable tale
to account for his possession of the body and his ignorance of the
identity might be easily devised.
The cavalier explained that a coveted cart had been prepared for the
purpose; that the time of departure could be arranged so that he should
reach London Bridge at dusk, and proceed through the City after the day
had closed in; that people would be ready at his journey’s end to place
the coffin in a vault without a minute’s delay; that officious inquirers
in the streets would be easily repelled by the tale that he was carrying
for interment the corpse of one who had died of the plague; and in short
showed him every reason why he should succeed, and none why he should
fail. After a time they were joined by another gentleman, masked like
the first, who added new arguments to those which had been already urged;
the wretched wife, too, added her tears and prayers to their calmer
representations; and in the end, Will, moved by compassion and
good-nature, by a love of the marvellous, by a mischievous anticipation
of the terrors of the Kingston people when he should be missing next day,
and finally, by the prospect of gain, took upon himself the task, and
devoted all his energies to its successful execution.
The following night, when it was quite dark, the hollow echoes of old
London Bridge responded to the rumbling of the cart which contained the
ghastly load, the object of Will Marks’ care. Sufficiently disguised to
attract no attention by his garb, Will walked at the horse’s head, as
unconcerned as a man could be who was sensible that he had now arrived at
the most dangerous part of his undertaking, but full of boldness and
confidence.
It was now eight o’clock. After nine, none could walk the streets
without danger of their lives, and even at this hour, robberies and
murder were of no uncommon occurrence. The shops upon the bridge were
all closed; the low wooden arches thrown across the way were like so many
black pits, in every one of which ill-favoured fellows lurked in knots of
three or four; some standing upright against the wall, lying in wait;
others skulking in gateways, and thrusting out their uncombed heads and
scowling eyes: others crossing and recrossing, and constantly jostling
both horse and man to provoke a quarrel; others stealing away and
summoning their companions in a low whistle. Once, even in that short
passage, there was the noise of scuffling and the clash of swords behind
him, but Will, who knew the City and its ways, kept straight on and
scarcely turned his head.
The streets being unpaved, the rain of the night before had converted
them into a perfect quagmire, which the splashing water-spouts from the
gables, and the filth and offal cast from the different houses, swelled
in no small degree. These odious matters being left to putrefy in the
close and heavy air, emitted an insupportable stench, to which every
court and passage poured forth a contribution of its own. Many parts,
even of the main streets, with their projecting stories tottering
overhead and nearly shutting out the sky, were more like huge chimneys
than open ways. At the corners of some of these, great bonfires were
burning to prevent infection from the plague, of which it was rumoured
that some citizens had lately died; and few, who availing themselves of
the light thus afforded paused for a moment to look around them, would
have been disposed to doubt the existence of the disease, or wonder at
its dreadful visitations.
But it was not in such scenes as these, or even in the deep and miry
road, that Will Marks found the chief obstacles to his progress. There
were kites and ravens feeding in the streets (the only scavengers the
City kept), who, scenting what he carried, followed the cart or fluttered
on its top, and croaked their knowledge of its burden and their ravenous
appetite for prey. There were distant fires, where the poor wood and
plaster tenements wasted fiercely, and whither crowds made their way,
clamouring eagerly for plunder, beating down all who came within their
reach, and yelling like devils let loose. There were single-handed men
flying from bands of ruffians, who pursued them with naked weapons, and
hunted them savagely; there were drunken, desperate robbers issuing from
their dens and staggering through the open streets where no man dared
molest them; there were vagabond servitors returning from the Bear
Garden, where had been good sport that day, dragging after them their
torn and bleeding dogs, or leaving them to die and rot upon the road.
Nothing was abroad but cruelty, violence, and disorder.
Many were the interruptions which Will Marks encountered from these
stragglers, and many the narrow escapes he made. Now some stout bully
would take his seat upon the cart, insisting to be driven to his own
home, and now two or three men would come down upon him together, and
demand that on peril of his life he showed them what he had inside. Then
a party of the city watch, upon their rounds, would draw across the road,
and not satisfied with his tale, question him closely, and revenge
themselves by a little cuffing and hustling for maltreatment sustained at
other hands that night. All these assailants had to be rebutted, some by
fair words, some by foul, and some by blows. But Will Marks was not the
man to be stopped or turned back now he had penetrated so far, and though
he got on slowly, still he made his way down Fleet-street and reached the
church at last.
As he had been forewarned, all was in readiness. Directly he stopped,
the coffin was removed by four men, who appeared so suddenly that they
seemed to have started from the earth. A fifth mounted the cart, and
scarcely allowing Will time to snatch from it a little bundle containing
such of his own clothes as he had thrown off on assuming his disguise,
drove briskly away. Will never saw cart or man again.
He followed the body into the church, and it was well he lost no time in
doing so, for the door was immediately closed. There was no light in the
building save that which came from a couple of torches borne by two men
in cloaks, who stood upon the brink of a vault. Each supported a female
figure, and all observed a profound silence.
By this dim and solemn glare, which made Will feel as though light itself
were dead, and its tomb the dreary arches that frowned above, they placed
the coffin in the vault, with uncovered heads, and closed it up. One of
the torch-bearers then turned to Will, and stretched forth his hand, in
which was a purse of gold. Something told him directly that those were
the same eyes which he had seen beneath the mask.
[Picture: Will Marks arrives at the Church]
‘Take it,’ said the cavalier in a low voice, ‘and be happy. Though these
have been hasty obsequies, and no priest has blessed the work, there will
not be the less peace with thee thereafter, for having laid his bones
beside those of his little children. Keep thy own counsel, for thy sake
no less than ours, and God be with thee!’
‘The blessing of a widowed mother on thy head, good friend!’ cried the
younger lady through her tears; ‘the blessing of one who has now no hope
or rest but in this grave!’
Will stood with the purse in his hand, and involuntarily made a gesture
as though he would return it, for though a thoughtless fellow, he was of
a frank and generous nature. But the two gentlemen, extinguishing their
torches, cautioned him to be gone, as their common safety would be
endangered by a longer delay; and at the same time their retreating
footsteps sounded through the church. He turned, therefore, towards the
point at which he had entered, and seeing by a faint gleam in the
distance that the door was again partially open, groped his way towards
it and so passed into the street.
Meantime the local authorities of Kingston had kept watch and ward all
the previous night, fancying every now and then that dismal shrieks were
borne towards them on the wind, and frequently winking to each other, and
drawing closer to the fire as they drank the health of the lonely
sentinel, upon whom a clerical gentleman present was especially severe by
reason of his levity and youthful folly. Two or three of the gravest in
company, who were of a theological turn, propounded to him the question,
whether such a character was not but poorly armed for single combat with
the Devil, and whether he himself would not have been a stronger
opponent; but the clerical gentleman, sharply reproving them for their
presumption in discussing such questions, clearly showed that a fitter
champion than Will could scarcely have been selected, not only for that
being a child of Satan, he was the less likely to be alarmed by the
appearance of his own father, but because Satan himself would be at his
ease in such company, and would not scruple to kick up his heels to an
extent which it was quite certain he would never venture before clerical
eyes, under whose influence (as was notorious) he became quite a tame and
milk-and-water character.
But when next morning arrived, and with it no Will Marks, and when a
strong party repairing to the spot, as a strong party ventured to do in
broad day, found Will gone and the gibbet empty, matters grew serious
indeed. The day passing away and no news arriving, and the night going
on also without any intelligence, the thing grew more tremendous still;
in short, the neighbourhood worked itself up to such a comfortable pitch
of mystery and horror, that it is a great question whether the general
feeling was not one of excessive disappointment, when, on the second
morning, Will Marks returned.
However this may be, back Will came in a very cool and collected state,
and appearing not to trouble himself much about anybody except old John
Podgers, who, having been sent for, was sitting in the Town Hall crying
slowly, and dozing between whiles. Having embraced his uncle and assured
him of his safety, Will mounted on a table and told his story to the
crowd.
And surely they would have been the most unreasonable crowd that ever
assembled together, if they had been in the least respect disappointed
with the tale he told them; for besides describing the Witches’ Dance to
the minutest motion of their legs, and performing it in character on the
table, with the assistance of a broomstick, he related how they had
carried off the body in a copper caldron, and so bewitched him, that he
lost his senses until he found himself lying under a hedge at least ten
miles off, whence he had straightway returned as they then beheld. The
story gained such universal applause that it soon afterwards brought down
express from London the great witch-finder of the age, the Heaven-born
Hopkins, who having examined Will closely on several points, pronounced
it the most extraordinary and the best accredited witch-story ever known,
under which title it was published at the Three Bibles on London Bridge,
in small quarto, with a view of the caldron from an original drawing, and
a portrait of the clerical gentleman as he sat by the fire.
On one point Will was particularly careful: and that was to describe for
the witches he had seen, three impossible old females, whose likenesses
never were or will be. Thus he saved the lives of the suspected parties,
and of all other old women who were dragged before him to be identified.
This circumstance occasioned John Podgers much grief and sorrow, until
happening one day to cast his eyes upon his housekeeper, and observing
her to be plainly afflicted with rheumatism, he procured her to be burnt
as an undoubted witch. For this service to the state he was immediately
knighted, and became from that time Sir John Podgers.
Will Marks never gained any clue to the mystery in which he had been an
actor, nor did any inscription in the church, which he often visited
afterwards, nor any of the limited inquiries that he dared to make, yield
him the least assistance. As he kept his own secret, he was compelled to
spend the gold discreetly and sparingly. In the course of time he
married the young lady of whom I have already told you, whose maiden name
is not recorded, with whom he led a prosperous and happy life. Years and
years after this adventure, it was his wont to tell her upon a stormy
night that it was a great comfort to him to think those bones, to
whomsoever they might have once belonged, were not bleaching in the
troubled air, but were mouldering away with the dust of their own kith
and kindred in a quiet grave.