By What Authority? by Robert Hugh Benson (large ebook reader txt) 📖

the agent. "And now, my boy, tell me this. How did you know what it meant?"

"Please, sir," said the lad, a little encouraged by the kinder tone, "I have noticed that twice before when Mr. Roger could not go, and I was sent with the same message, all the folks and the priest came on the next Sunday; and I think that it means that all is safe, and that they can come."

"You are a sharp lad," said the spy approvingly. "I am satisfied with you."

"Then, sir, may I go home?" asked the boy with hopeful entreaty in his voice.

"Nay, nay," said the other, "I have not done with you yet. Answer me some more questions. Why did you not go to the priest first?"

"Because I was bidden to go to him last," said the boy. "If I had been to all the other houses by five o'clock last night, then I was to meet the priest at Papists' Corner in Paul's Church. But if I had not done them--as I had not,--then I was to see the priest to-night at the same place."

Lackington mused a moment.

"What is the priest's name?" he asked.

"Please, sir, Mr. Arthur Oldham."

The agent gave a sudden start and a keen glance at the boy, and then smiled to himself; then he meditated, and bit his nails once or twice.

"And when was Mr. Roger taken ill?"

"He slipped down at the door of his lodging and hurt his foot, at dinner-time yesterday; and he could not walk."

"His lodging? Then he does not sleep in the house?"

"No sir; he sleeps in Stafford Alley, round the corner."

"And where do you live?"

"Please, sir, I go home to my mother nearly every night; but not always."

"And where does your mother live?"

"Please, sir, at 4 Bell's Lane."

Lackington remained deep in thought, and looked at the boy steadily for a minute or two.

"Now, sir; may I go?" he asked eagerly.

Lackington paid no attention, and he repeated his question. The agent still did not seem to hear him, but turned to Sir Francis, who was still at his letters.

"That is all, sir, for the present," he said. "May the boy be kept here till Monday?"

The lad broke out into wailing; but Lackington turned on him a face so savage that his whimpers died away into horror-stricken silence.

"As you will," said Sir Francis, pausing for a moment in his writing, and striking the bell again; and, on the servant's appearance, gave orders that John Belton should be taken again to the steward's parlour until further directions were received. The boy went sobbing out and down the passage again under the servant's charge, and the door closed.

"And the mother?" asked Walsingham abruptly, pausing with pen upraised.

"With your permission, sir, I will tell her that her boy is in trouble, and that if his master sends to inquire for him, she is to say he is sick upstairs."

"And you will report to me on Monday?"

"Yes, sir; by then I shall hope to have taken the crew."

Sir Francis nodded his head sharply, and the pen began to fly over the paper again; as Lackington slipped out.

* * * *


Anthony Norris was passing through the court of Lambeth House in the afternoon of the same day, when the porter came to him and said there was a child waiting in the Lodge with a note for him; and would Master Norris kindly come to see her. He found a little girl on the bench by the gate, who stood up and curtseyed as the grand gentleman came striding in; and handed him a note which he opened at once and read.

"For the love of God," the note ran, "come and aid one who can be of service to a friend: follow the little maid Master Norris, and she will bring you to me. If you have any friends at Great Keynes, for the love you bear to them, come quickly."

Anthony turned the note over; it was unsigned, and undated. On his inquiry further from the little girl, she said she knew nothing about the writer; but that a gentleman had given her the note and told her to bring it to Master Anthony Norris at Lambeth House; and that she was to take him to a house that she knew in the city; she did not know the name of the house, she said.

It was all very strange, thought Anthony, but evidently here was some one who knew about him; the reference to Great Keynes made him think uneasily of Isabel and wonder whether any harm had happened to her, or whether any danger threatened. He stood musing with the note between his fingers, and then told the child to go straight down to Paul's Cross and await him there, and he would follow immediately. The child ran off, and Anthony went round to the stables to get his horse. He rode straight down to the city and put up his horse in the Bishop's stables, and then went round with his riding-whip in his hand to Paul's Cross.

It was a dull miserable afternoon, beginning to close in with a fine rain falling, and very few people were about; and he found the child crouched up against the pulpit in an attempt to keep dry.

"Come," he said kindly, "I am ready; show me the way."

The child led him along by the Cathedral through the churchyard, and then by winding passages, where Anthony kept a good look-out at the corners; for a stab in the back was no uncommon thing for a well-dressed gentleman off his guard. The houses overhead leaned so nearly together that the darkening sky disappeared altogether now and then; at one spot Anthony caught a glimpse high up of Bow Church spire; and after a corner or two the child stopped before a doorway in a little flagged court.

"It is here," she said; and before Anthony could stop her she had slipped away and disappeared through a passage. He looked at the house. It was a tumble-down place; the door was heavily studded with nails, and gave a most respectable air to the house: the leaded windows were just over his head, and tightly closed. There was an air of mute discretion and silence about the place that roused a vague discomfort in Anthony's mind; he slipped his right hand into his belt and satisfied himself that the hilt of his knife was within reach. Overhead the hanging windows and eaves bulged out on all sides; but there was no one to be seen; it seemed a place that had slipped into a backwater of the humming stream of the city. The fine rain still falling added to the dismal aspect of the little court. He looked round once more; and then rapped sharply at the door to which the child had pointed.

There was silence for at least a minute; then as he was about to knock again there was a faint sound overhead, and he looked up in time to see a face swiftly withdrawn from one of the windows. Evidently an occupant of the house had been examining the visitor. Then shuffling footsteps came along a passage within, and a light shone under the door. There was a noise of bolts being withdrawn, and the rattle of a chain; and then the handle turned and the door opened slowly inwards, and an old woman stood there holding an oil lamp over her head. This was not very formidable at any rate.

"I have been bidden to come here," he said, "by a letter delivered to me an hour ago."

"Ah," said the old woman, and looked at him peeringly, "then you are for Mr. Roger?"

"I daresay," said Anthony, a little sharply. He was not accustomed to be treated like this. The old woman still looked at him suspiciously; and then, as Anthony made a movement of impatience, she stepped back.

"Come in, sir," she said.

He stepped in, and she closed and fastened the door again behind him; and then, holding the oil-lamp high over her head, she advanced in her slippers towards the staircase, and Anthony followed. On the stairs she turned once to see if he was coming, and beckoned him on with a movement of her head. Anthony looked about him as he went up: there was nothing remarkable or suspicious about the house in any way. It was cleaner than he had been led to expect by its outside aspect; wainscoted to the ceiling with oak; and the stairs were strong and well made. It was plainly a very tolerably respectable place; and Anthony began to think from its appearance that he had been admitted at the back door of some well-to-do house off Cheapside. The banisters were carved with some distinction; and there were the rudimentary elements of linen-pattern design on the panels that lined the opposite walls up to the height of the banisters. The woman went up and up, slowly, panting a little; at each landing she turned and glanced back to see that her companion was following: all the doors that they passed were discreetly shut; and the house was perfectly dark except for the flickering light of the woman's lamp, and silent except for the noise of the footsteps and the rush of a mouse now and then behind the woodwork.

At the third landing she stopped, and came close up to Anthony.

"That is the door," she whispered hoarsely; and pointed with her thumb towards a doorway that was opposite the staircase. "Ask for Master Roger."

And then without saying any more, she set the lamp down on the flat head of the top banister and herself began to shuffle downstairs again into the dark house.

Anthony stood still a moment, his heart beating a little. What was this strange errand? and Isabel! what had she to do with this house buried away in the courts of the great city? As he waited he heard a door close somewhere behind him, and the shuffling footsteps had ceased. He touched the hilt of his knife once again to give himself courage; and then walked slowly across and rapped on the door. Instantly a voice full of trembling expectancy, cried to him to come in; he turned the handle and stepped into the fire-lit room.

It was extremely poorly furnished; a rickety table stood in the centre with a book or two and a basin with a plate, a saucepan hissed and bubbled on the fire; in the corner near the window stood a poor bed; and to this Anthony's attention was immediately directed by a voice that called out hoarsely:

"Thank God, sir, thank God, sir, you have come! I feared you would not."

Anthony stepped towards it wondering and expectant, but reassured. Lying in the bed, with clothes drawn up to the chin was the figure of a man. There was no light in the room, save that given by the leaping flames on the hearth; and Anthony could only make out the face of a man with a patch over one eye; the man stretched a hand over the bed clothes as he came near, and Anthony