Weyman Stanley John - The Story of Francis Cludde стр 12.

They proved to be more substantial than I had expected, for, as I was on my way upstairs to bed, the landlord preceding me with a light, a man accosted me, and beckoned me aside mysteriously.

"The Bailiff is very much annoyed," he said, speaking in a muffled voice behind his hand, while his eyes peered into mine.

"Well, what is that to me?" I replied, looking sternly at him. I was tired and sleepy after my meal. "He should not make such a fool of himself."

"Tut, tut, tut, tut! You misunderstood me, young sir," the man answered, plucking my sleeve as I turned away. "He regrets the annoyance he has caused you. A mistake, he says, a pure mistake, and he hopes you will have forgotten it by morning." Then, with a skillful hand, which seemed not unused to the task, he slid two coins into my palm. I looked at them, for a moment not perceiving his drift. Then I found they were two gold angels, and I began to understand. "Ahem!" I said, fingering them uneasily. "Yes. Well, well, I will look over it, I will look over it! Tell him from me," I continued, gaining confidence as I proceeded with my new rôle, "that he shall hear no more about it. He is zealous-perhaps over zealous!"

"That is it!" muttered the envoy eagerly; "that is it, my dear sir! You see perfectly how it is. He is zealous. Zealous in the Queen's service!"

"To be sure; and so I will report him. Tell him that so I will report him. And here, my good friend, take one of these for yourself," I added, magnificently giving him back half my fortune-young donkey that I was. "Drink to the Queen's health; and so good-night to you."

He went away, bowing to the very ground, and, when the landlord likewise had left me, I was very merry over this, being in no mood for weighing words. The world seemed-to be sure, the ale was humming in my head, and I was in the landlord's best room-easy enough to conquer, provided one possessed a white staff. The fact that I had no right to mine only added-be it remembered I was young and foolish-to my enjoyment of its power. I went to bed in all comfort with it under my pillow, and slept soundly, untroubled by any dream of a mischance. But when did a lie ever help a man in the end?

When I awoke, which I seemed to do on a sudden, it was still dark. I wondered for a moment where I was, and what was the meaning of the shouting and knocking I heard. Then, discerning the faint outline of the window, I remembered the place in which I had gone to bed, and I sat up and listened. Some one-nay, several people-were drumming and kicking against the wooden doors of the inn-yard, and shouting besides, loud enough to raise the dead. In the next room to mine I caught the grumbling voices of persons disturbed, like myself, from sleep. And by and by a window was opened, and I heard the landlord ask what was the matter.

"In the Queen's name!" came the loud, impatient answer, given in a voice that rose above the ring of bridles and the stamping of iron hoofs, "open! and that quickly, Master Host. The watch are here, and we must search."

I waited to hear no more. I was out of bed, and huddling on my clothes, and thrusting my feet into my boots, like one possessed. My heart was beating as fast as if I had been running in a race, and my hands were shaking with the shock of the alarm. The impatient voice without was Master Pritchard's, and it rang with all the vengeful passion which I should have expected that gentleman, duped, ducked, and robbed, to be feeling. There would be little mercy to be had at his hands. Moreover, my ears, grown as keen for the moment as the hunted hare's, distinguished the tramping of at least half-a-dozen horses, so that it was clear that he had come with a force at his back. Resistance would be useless. My sole chance lay in flight-if flight should still be possible.

Even in my haste I did not forsake the talisman which had served me so well, but stayed an instant to thrust it into my pocket. The Cluddes have, I fancy, a knack of keeping cool in emergencies, getting, indeed, the cooler the greater the stress.

By this time the inn was thoroughly aroused. Doors were opening and shutting on all sides of me, and questions were being shouted in different tones from room to room. In the midst of the hubbub I heard the landlord come out muttering, and go downstairs to open the door. Instantly I unlatched mine, slipped through it stealthily, sneaked a step or two down the passage, and then came plump in the dark against some one who was moving as softly as myself. The surprise was complete, and I should have cried out at the unexpected collision, had not the unknown laid a cold hand on my mouth, and gently pushed me back into my room.

Here there was now a faint glimmer of dawn, and by this I saw that my companion was the serving-maid. "Hist!" she said, speaking under her breath, "Is it you they want?"

I nodded.

"I thought so," she muttered. "Then you must get out through your window. You cannot pass them. They are a dozen or more, and armed. Quick! knot this about the bars. It is no great depth to the bottom, and the ground is soft from the rain."

She tore, as she spoke, the coverlet from the bed, and, twisting it into a kind of rope, helped me to secure one corner of it about the window-bar. "When you are down," she whispered, "keep along the wall to the right until you come to a haystack. Turn to the left there-you will have to ford the water-and you will soon be clear of the town. Look about you then, and you will see a horse-track, which leads to Elstree, running in a line with the London Road, but a mile from it and through woods. At Elstree any path to the left will take you to Barnet, and not two miles lost."

"Heaven bless you!" I said, turning from the gloom, the dark sky, and driving scud without to peer gratefully at her. "Heaven bless you for a good woman!"

"And God keep you for a bonny boy," she whispered.

I kissed her, forcing into her hands-a thing the remembrance of which is very pleasant to me to this day-my last piece of gold.

A moment more, and I stood unhurt, but almost up to my knees in mud, in an alley bounded on both sides, as far as I could see, by blind walls. Stopping only to indicate by a low whistle that I was safe, I turned and sped away as fast as I could run in the direction which she had pointed out. There was no one abroad, and in a shorter time than I had expected I found myself outside the town, traveling over a kind of moorland tract bounded in the distance by woods.

Here I picked up the horse-track easily enough, and without stopping, save for a short breathing space, hurried along it, to gain the shelter of the trees. So far so good! I had reason to be thankful. But my case was still an indifferent one. More than once in getting out of the town I had slipped and fallen. I was wet through, and plastered with dirt owing to these mishaps; and my clothes were in a woeful plight. For a time excitement kept me up, however, and I made good way, warmed by the thought that I had again baffled the great Bishop. It was only when the day had come, and grown on to noon, and I saw no sign of any pursuers, that thought got the upper hand. Then I began to compare, with some bitterness of feeling, my present condition-wet, dirty, and homeless-with that which I had enjoyed only a week before; and it needed all my courage to support me. Skulking, half famished, between Barnet and Tottenham, often compelled to crouch in ditches or behind walls while travelers went by, and liable each instant to have to leave the highway and take to my heels, I had leisure to feel; and I did feel, more keenly, I think, that afternoon than at any later time, the bitterness of fortune. I cursed Stephen Gardiner a dozen times, and dared not let my thoughts wander to my father. I had said that I would build my house afresh. Well, truly I was building it from the foundation.