Everett-Green Evelyn
The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn: A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot
Chapter 10: The Hunted Priest
The two friends that Cuthbert had made of his own sex during the first weeks spent beneath his uncle's roof were the same two guests he had seen at the supper table on the evening of his arrival-Walter Cole and Jacob Dyson.
Both these men were several years older than himself, but in a short time he became exceedingly intimate with the pair, and thus obtained insight into the home life of persons belonging to the three leading parties in the realm. The Puritan element was strongly represented in Martin Holt's house, the Romanist in that of the Coles, whilst the Dysons, although springing from a Puritan stock, had been amongst those willing to conform to the laws as laid down in the late Queen's time. Both Rachel and Jacob preferred the Episcopal form of worship to any other, and openly marvelled at the taste of those who still frequented the private conventicles, where unlicensed preachers, at the risk of liberty and even life, held forth by the hour together upon their favourite doctrines and arguments.
But honest Jacob was no theologian. He did not hesitate to assert openly his ignorance of all controversy, and his opinion that it mattered uncommonly little what a man believed, so long as he led an upright life and did his duty in the world. He was "fair sick" of long-drawn arguments, the splitting of hairs, and those questions which the theologians of all parties took such keen joy in discussing-though, as nobody ever moved his opponent one whit, the disputes could only be held for the love the disputants felt for hearing themselves talk. Jacob had long since claimed for himself the right to leave the room when politics and religion came under discussion. As an only son, he had some privileges accorded him, and this was one he used without stint.
Honest Jacob had taken an immediate and great liking for Cuthbert Trevlyn from the first appearance of that youth at his uncle's house. Though himself rough and uncouth of aspect, clumsy of gait and slow of speech, he was quick to see and admire beauty and wit in others. He had picked out Cherry from amongst her sisters for those qualities of brightness and vivacity in which he felt himself so deficient, and it seemed as though he took to Cuthbert for very much the same reason.
Cuthbert was ready enough to accept the advances of this good-natured youth. He was a stranger in this great city, whilst Jacob knew it well. He was eager to hear and see and learn all he could; and though Jacob's ideas were few and his powers of observation limited, he was still able to answer a great many of the eager questions that came crowding to the lips of the stranger as they walked the streets together. And when Cuthbert accompanied Jacob to his home, Abraham Dyson could fill up all the blank in his son's story, and was secretly not a little pleased with Cuthbert's keen intelligence and ready interest.
The Dysons were merchants in a small way of business, but were thriving and thrifty folks. They and the Holts had been in close relations one with the other for more than one generation, and any relative of Martin Holt's would have been welcome at their house. Cuthbert was liked on his own account; and soon he became greatly fascinated by the river-side traffic, took the greatest interest in the vessels that came to the wharves to be unladed, and delighted in going aboard and making friends with the sailors. He quickly came to learn the name of every part of the ship, and to pick up a few ideas on the subject of navigation. Whenever a vessel came in from the New World but recently discovered, he would try to get on board and question the sailors about the wonders they had seen. Afterwards he would discourse to Jacob or to Cherry of the things he had learned, and would win more and more admiration from both by his brilliant powers of imagination and description.
So the river became, as it were, a second home to him. Abraham Dyson had more than one wherry of his own in which Cuthbert was welcome to skim about upon the broad bosom of the great river. He soon became so skillful with the rude oars or the sail, that he was a match for the hardiest waterman on the river, and more than once Cherry had been permitted to accompany Cuthbert and Jacob upon some excursion up or down stream.
And now, after many weeks of pleasant comradeship, Cuthbert found himself in the unenviable position of standing rival to his friend in the affections of Cherry, and the more he thought about it the less he liked the situation. He could not give Cherry up-that was out of the question; besides, had he renounced her twenty times over, that would not improve Jacob's case one whit. Cherry was her father's own daughter, and, with all her kittenish softness, had a very decided will of her own. She was not the sort of daughter to be bought and sold, or calmly made over like a bale of wool. She would certainly insist on having a voice in the matter, and her choice was not likely at any time to fall upon the worthy but unprepossessing Jacob.
All this Cuthbert understood with the quick apprehension of a lover; but it was very doubtful if Jacob would so see things, and Cuthbert felt as though there was something of treachery in accepting and returning his many advances of friendship whilst all the time he was secretly affianced to the girl for whose hand Jacob had made formal application, and had been formally accepted, though for the present, on account of the maiden's tender years, the matter was allowed to stand over.
With Walter Cole there was no such hindrance to friendship, and just at this juncture Cuthbert prosecuted and confirmed his intimacy at that house by constant visits there. He was greedy of information and book learning, and in this narrow dim dwelling, literally stacked with books, papers, and pamphlets of all kinds, and partially given over to the mysteries of the printing press, seldom worked save at dead of night, Cuthbert's expanding mind could revel to its full content.
He devoured every book upon which he could lay hands-history, theology, philosophy; nothing came amiss to him. He would sit by the hour watching Anthony Cole at work setting type, asking him innumerable questions about what he had been last reading, and finding the white-headed bookseller a perfect mine of information.
Controversy and the vexed topics of the day were generally avoided by common consent. The Coles had learned through bitter experience the necessity for silence and reticence. Everybody knew them for ardent and devoted sons of Rome, and they were under suspicion of issuing many of the pamphlets against the policy of the King that raised ire in the hearts of the great ones of the land. But none of these "seditious" writings had so far been traced to them, and they still lived in comparative peace, although the tranquillity somewhat resembled that of the peaceful dwellers upon the sides of a volcanic mountain, within whose crater grumblings and mutterings are heard from time to time.
Cuthbert's frequent visits, and the manifest pleasure he took in their society, were a source of pleasure to both father and son; and though they never showed this pleasure too openly, or asked him to continue his visits or help them in their night work, they did not refuse his help when offered, and sometimes would look at each other and say:
"He is drawing nearer; he is drawing nearer. Old traditions, race instincts, are telling upon him. He is too true a Trevlyn not to become a member of the true fold. His vagrant fancy is straying here and there. He is tasting the bitter-sweet fruit of knowledge and restless search after the wisdom of this world. But already he begins to turn with loathing from the cold, lifeless Puritan code. Anon he will find that the Established Church has naught to give him save the husk, from which the precious grain has been carefully extracted."
"Father Urban thinks well of him," Walter once remarked, as they discussed the youth after his departure one evening. "He has met him, I know not where, and believes that there may be work for him to do yet. We want those with us who have the single mind and honest heart, the devotion that counts not the cost. All that is written on the lad's face. If he breaks not away from us, he may become a tool in a practised hand to do a mighty work."
Cuthbert, however, went on his way all unconscious of the notice he was arousing in certain quarters. His mind was filled just now with other matters than those of religious controversy. He had become rather weary of the strife of tongues, and was glad to busy himself with the practical concerns of life that did not always land him in a dilemma or a difficulty.
Abraham Dyson was having a new sloop built for trading purposes, and both Jacob and Cuthbert took the keenest interest in the progress of the work. The sloop was to be called the Cherry Blossom when complete, and it was Abraham Dyson's plan that the christening of the vessel by Cherry herself should be the occasion of her formal betrothal to his son.
This ceremony, however, would not take place for some while yet, as at present the little vessel was only in the earlier stages of construction. Neither Jacob nor Cuthbert had heard anything about this secondary plan, but both took the greater interest in the sloop from the fact that she was to be named after Cherry.
Cuthbert visited her daily, and Jacob as often as his duties at his father's warehouse allowed him. On this particular bright February afternoon the pair had been a great part of their time on the river, skimming about in the wherry, and examining every part of the little vessel under the auspices of the master builder. Dusk had fallen upon the river before they landed, and a heavy fog beginning to rise from the water made them glad to leave it behind. They secured the wherry to the landing stage, leaving the oars in her, as they not unfrequently did when returning late, and were pursuing their way up the dark and unsavoury streets, when the sound of a distant tumult smote upon their ears, and they arrested their steps that they might listen the better.
Cuthbert's quick ears were the first to gather any sort of meaning from the discordant shouts and cries which arose.
"They are chasing some wretched fugitive!" he said in a low voice. "That is the sound of pursuit. Hark! they are coming this way. Who and what are they thus hounding on?"
Nearer and nearer came the surging sound of many voices and the hurried trampling of feet.
"Stop him-catch him-hold him!" shouted a score of hoarse voices, rolling along through the fog-laden air long before anything could be seen. "Stop him, good folks, stop him! stop the runaway priest-stop the treacherous Jesuit! He is an enemy to peace-a stirrer up of sedition and conspiracy! Down with him-to prison with him! it is not fit for such a fellow to live. Down with him-stop him!"
"A priest!" exclaimed Cuthbert between his shut teeth, a sudden gleam corning into his eyes. "Jacob, heard you that? A priest-a man of God! one man against a hundred! Canst thou stand by and see such a one hunted to death? that cannot I."
Jacob cared little for priests-indeed, he had no very good opinion of the race, and none of Cuthbert's traditional reverence; but he had all an Englishman's love of fair play, and hated the cruelty and cowardice of an angry mob as he hated anything mean and vile, and he doubled back his wrist bands and clinched his horny fists as he answered:
"I am with thee, good Cuthbert. We will stand for the weaker side. Priest or no, he shall not be hounded to death in the streets without one blow struck in his defence. But how to find him in this fog?"
"We need not fight; that were mere madness," answered Cuthbert in rapid tones. "Ours is to hurry the fugitive into the wherry, loose from shore, and out into the river; and then they may seek as they will, they can never find us. Mist! hark! the cries come nigher. If the quarry is indeed before them, it must be very nigh. Mark! I hear a gliding footfall beside the wall. Keep close to me; I go to the rescue."
Cuthbert sprang swiftly through the darkness, and in a moment he felt the gown of a priest in his hand, and heard the sound of the distressed breathing of one hunted well nigh to the verge of exhaustion. As the hunted man felt the clasp upon his robe he uttered a little short, sharp cry, and made as if he would have stopped short; but Cuthbert had him fast by the arm, and hurried him along the narrow alley towards the river, upholding him over the rough ground, and saying in short phrases: "Fear nothing from us, holy Father; we are friends. We have come to save you. Trust only to us and, believe me, in three more minutes we shall be beyond the reach of these savage pursuers. The river is before us, though we see it not, and our boat awaits us there. Once aboard, they may weary themselves in their vain efforts to catch us; they will never find us in this fog.
"Here is the water side. Have a care how you step-Jacob, hold fast the craft whilst the Father steps in. So. All is well; cast off and I will follow."
There was the sound of a light spring; the boat gave a slight lurch, and then, gliding off into the mysterious darkness of the great river, was lost to sight of shore in the wreaths of foggy vapour.
"Where is the hound? where is the caitiff miscreant? Has he thrown himself into the river? Drowning is too good for such a dog as he!" shouted angry voices on the river's bank, and through the still air the sound of trampling footsteps could be heard up and down the little wharf which formed the landing stage.
"I hear the sound of oars!" shouted one.
"He has escaped us-curse the cunning of that Papist brood!" yelled another.
"Let us get a boat and follow," counselled a third; but this was more easily said than done, as there was no other boat tied up at that landing stage, and the fog rendered navigation too difficult and dangerous to be lightly attempted. With sullen growls and many curses the mob seemed to break up and disperse; but the leaders appeared to stand in discussion for some moments after the rest had gone, and several sentences were distinctly heard by those in the boat, who thought it safer to drift with the tide awhile close to the shore than to use their oars and betray their close proximity to their foes.
"We shall know him again; and if he dares to show his face in the city, we will have him at last, even if we have to search for him in Alsatia with a band of soldiers. He has too long escaped the doom he merits, the plotter and schemer, the vile dog of a seminary priest! Once let us get him into our hands and he shall be hanged, drawn, and quartered, like those six of his fellows. No mercy for the Jesuits; it is not fit that such fellows should camber the earth. There will be no peace for this realm till we have destroyed them root and branch."
The boat had now drifted too far for the conversation to be any longer audible. Jacob gave a long, low whistle, and took to the oars. Cuthbert, who sat beside the priest in the stern, had his hand upon the tiller; and as the fog cloud lifted just a little, so that the darkness about them became hardly more than that of twilight, he looked at the silent, motionless figure beside him, and exclaimed in surprise:
"Father Urban!"
A slight smile hovered for a moment over the wan face of the priest. He lifted his thin hand and said solemnly:
"Peace be with thee, my son."
Cuthbert bent his head in reverence, and then turned again towards the Father.
"What hast thou done that they should rail at thee thus-thou the friend of the poor, the friend even of the leper? What has come to them that they turn thus against thee? Sure, but a few short weeks ago and thou didst hold back an angry crowd by the glance of thine eye."
"My son, trust not in the temper of the crowd, in the goodwill of the multitude. Was it not the same crowd who on the Sabbath shouted, 'Hosanna to the Son of David!' that on the Friday yelled, 'Crucify Him! crucify Him!' Never put faith in man, still less in the multitude that is ever swayed like a reed, and may be driven like a wave of the sea hither and thither as the wind listeth.
"And then I was not amongst mine own flock. I had-rashly, perchance-adventured myself further than I ought, for I had a message of consequence to execute, and I have not been wont to hide myself from my fellow men. But there is no knowing in these fearful times of lawlessness and savage hate what will be the temper either of rulers or people. It seems that I am known-that there is some warrant out against me. So be it. If I must flee from this city to another, holier men have done the like ere now. I would mine errand had been completed. I would I had accomplished my task. But-"
The priest's voice had been growing fainter for some moments. Cuthbert supposed it to be a natural caution on his part, lest even Jacob should hear him as he plied his oars; but as he came to this sudden stop, he felt that the slight frame collapsed in some way, and leaned heavily against him as he sat. Turning his eyes from the dim, rippling water, so little of which could be seen in the darkness and the fog, to the face of the priest, he saw that it had turned ghastly pale, and that the eyes were glazing over as if with the approach of death. Plainly the fugitive had received some bodily hurt of which he had not spoken, and the question what to do with their helpless burden became a difficult one to answer.
"My father will not receive him," said Jacob, shaking his head, as he leaned upon his oars and let the boat drift along with the tide that was carrying them towards the bridge. "He hates the priests worse than your good uncle and mine, who has something of a fellow feeling for them in these days of common persecution; and you know well what sort of a welcome we should receive from him did we arrive with a seminary priest in our arms."
"And I trow the mob would be upon us ere we had got him safe housed, and for aught we could do to stop it might tear him limb from limb in our very sight."
"Ay, there is always some rumour afoot of a new Papist plot; and whether it be true or no, the people set on to harry the priests as dogs harry the hunted hare. I know not what to do. To land with him will do neither good to him nor to us. A fine coil there would be at home if my father heard of me mixing myself up with Jesuit traitors; and Martin Holt would not be much better pleased neither."
"Martin Holt is not my father," answered Cuthbert, with a touch of haughtiness; "and let him say what he will, I must save this man's life, even if it cost me mine own. Thou knowest how he saved me that day in the dens of Whitefriars. To leave him to the mercy of the howling mob would be an act of blackest treachery; it would disgrace my manhood for ever."
"Tush, man, who asked that of thee?" answered Jacob, with something of a smile at the lad's impetuosity. "I love not a black cassock nor a tonsured head so passing well; but a man is a man, even though he be a priest, and I call shame upon those who would thus maltreat a brother man, and the more so when he is one who has visited the sick and tended the leper, and been the friend of those who have no friends in this great city. I would no sooner than thou give him up to the will of the mob; but we must bethink ourselves where he may be in safety stowed, else the mob will have him whether we will or no. All I was meaning by my words was that neither my home nor thine could be the place for him."
"I ask thy pardon, good Jacob, for my heat," answered Cuthbert humbly. "I should have known better thy good heart than to have thought such a thing of thee."
"Nay, nay; I am no hero."
"Thou art a kindly hearted and an honest man, which I misdoubt me if all the world's heroes are," answered Cuthbert quickly. "And now, Jacob, it behoves us to think. Yes, I have it. We must ask counsel of Master Anthony Cole. He would be the one to hide Father Urban if it could be done. Let me land nigh to the bridge, and go to them and tell them all; and do thou push out once more and anchor the craft beneath the pier on which their house rests. Methinks when I have taken counsel with them I can make shift to slip down the wooden shaft of that pier, and so hold parley with thee. Walter has done the like before now, and I am more agile in such feats than he; moreover, I can swim like a duck if I should chance to miss my hold, and so reach the water unawares. That will be the best, for the boat may not linger at the wharf side. We know not what news may be afoot in the city, nor that there may not be searchers bent on finding Father Urban, let him land where he may."
Whether or not Jacob relished this adventure, he was too stanch and too honest hearted to turn back now. The priest lay insensible at the bottom of the boat, his head pillowed upon the cloaks the youths had sacrificed for his better comfort. It was plainly a matter of consequence that he should soon be housed in some friendly shelter. His gray face looked ghastly in the dim moonlight which began to struggle through the fog wreaths. When Cuthbert leaped lightly ashore hard by the bridge, and Jacob sheered off again in the darkness, he felt as though he were out alone on the black river, with only a corpse for company.
"If it were but for Cherry's sake, I would do ten-fold more," he murmured, as he glanced up in the direction of the wool stapler's shop, and pictured pretty Cherry stepping backwards and forwards at her spinning wheel. "But I trow she will hear naught of it; or if she does, she will think only of Cuthbert's share. Alack! I fear me she will never think of me now. Why should she, when so proper a youth is nigh? If he should go away and leave her, perchance her heart might turn to me for comfort; but I fear me he looks every day more tenderly into her bright eyes. How could he live beneath the roof and not learn to love her? He would be scarce human, scarce flesh and blood, were he to fail in loving her; and what is my chance beside his? I might, almost as well yield her at once, and take good Kezzie instead. Kezzie would make a better housewife-my mother has told me so a hundred times; and I am fond of her, and methinks she-"
But there Jacob stopped short, blushing even in the darkness at the thought of what he had nearly said. Anchoring against the wooden piles of the bridge, and letting his fancy run riot as it would, he indulged in a shifting daydream, in which pain and a vague sense of consolation were oddly blended. He sighed a good many times, but he smiled once or twice likewise, and at last he gave himself a shake and spoke out aloud.
"At least it shall make no cloud and no bitterness betwixt us twain. He is a fine lad and a noble one, and he deserves more at Dame Fortune's hands than such a clown as I. Shall I grudge him his luck if he gets her? never a whit! There may not be more than one Cherry in the world, but there are plenty of good wives and honest maidens who will brighten a man's home for him."
Musing thus, Jacob kept his watch, and was not long in hearing strange and cautious sounds above his head. Looking up, he beheld a lithe form slipping, in something of a snake fashion, down the woodwork of the bridge, and the next moment Cuthbert sprang softly down, so deftly that the wherry only rolled a little at the shock.
"Hast thought me long? Hast been frozen with cold? I have made all the haste I could. All is planned. This is not strange work to them. See, I have brought with me this cradle of cord. We can place Father Urban within, and they will draw him up from above, that no man shall see him enter their house. All the windows be shuttered and barred by now. None will see or hear. They have harboured many a fugitive before, I take it. They had all the ropes and needful gear ready beneath their hand at a moment's notice."
Whilst he was speaking, Cuthbert was wrapping the inanimate figure in the cloaks, and placing it gently in the hammock, as we should call it, that, suspended by strong cords from above, had assisted him in his descent to the boat. Then at a given signal this hammock, with its human load, was slowly and steadily drawn upwards, with a cautious, silent skill that betokened use and experience; and as the eager watchers pushed out their boat a little further into the river, they saw the bulky object vanish at last within the dimly-lighted window of the tall, narrow house. A light was flashed for a moment from the window, and then all was wrapped in darkness.
"All is well," exclaimed Cuthbert, with an accent of relief; "and I trow that not a living soul but our two selves knows whither the priest has fled. He is safe from that savage, howling mob. Methinks I hear their cries still! It was just so they yelled and hooted round me when Father Urban came so timely to my rescue."
Mistress Susan chid Cuthbert somewhat roundly for being late for supper that night. But when he said he had been belated by the fog on the river with Jacob, the excuse was allowed to stand. Cherry was eager to know the progress making with her namesake, and no inconvenient questions were asked of Cuthbert when once her chattering tongue had been unloosed.
Cuthbert's dreams were a little troubled and uneasy that night; but he woke in good spirits, and was anxious to know the state of Father Urban. He made an early excuse for visiting the Coles' abode, and found the elder man busy over his type.
He looked up with a smile as Cuthbert appeared, but laid his fingers on his lips.
"Be cautious; he has but just sunk to sleep after a night of wakeful pain. He is anxious to see thee. He asked for thee a score of times in the night; but he must not be wakened now. Thou hast done a good deed, boy. Had Father Urban fallen a victim to yon hooting mob last eve, a deadly blow would have been dealt to the faith of this land."
"And is his sickness very sore? has he any grievous hurt?"
"He was sore knocked about and bruised ere he first wrenched himself from the officer of the law who sprang upon him with an order of arrest. Two of his ribs be broke; and that long and fearful race for his life did cause him sore pain and greater injury, so that a fever has been set up, and he has had to lose much blood to allay it. But he is quiet and at rest just now. Thou hadst better come again at sundown; he will doubtless be awake then. He has somewhat to say to thee, I know. I believe that he has some mission to entrust to thee. Thou hast a kindly heart and a strong arm. I trow thou wilt not fail him now."
Anthony Cole looked fixedly into the boy's face, and Cuthbert returned the glance unflinchingly. He was possessed by the generous feeling all young and ardent natures know of keen desire to assist further any person already indebted to them for past grace. The fact that already he had run some risk on account of Father Urban only made Cuthbert the more anxious to help him in whatever manner might best conduce to his well being and comfort. He looked full at his interlocutor, and said:
"Whatever I may with honour and right do for Father Urban shall not be lacking. I owe him my life. I can never grudge any service for him, be it great or small."
"Well spoken, my boy," answered the bookseller, with his calm, penetrating smile. "May the blessed saints long preserve untainted that true nobility of soul."
Cuthbert spent a restless day, wondering what mission the priest had for him, and whether his uncle would be angry at him for meddling in any such matters. But Martin Holt was friendly with several of the Papist families about him, notably with the Coles themselves; and Cuthbert had a growing sense of his own independence and the right to choose his own associates and his own path in life.
It was growing dusk when he stood beside the narrow bed on which Father Urban lay. The light filtered in scantily through the narrow window pane, and illumined a face lined by pain and white with exhaustion. Upon the bed lay a packet which looked like papers, and one of the priest's wasted hands lay upon it as if to guard it. As Cuthbert bent over him and spoke his name, Father Urban looked up, and a dim light crept into his eyes.
"Is it thou, my son, come at last?"
"Yes, Father. What may I do for thee?"
"Wilt thou do one small service more for me, my son?"
"Willingly, Father, if it lies within my power."
"It is well within thy power, boy. It is not the power I question, but the will. We live in dangerous days. Art willing to partake of the peril which compasses the steps of those who tread in the old ways wherein the fathers trod?"
"Try me and see," was the quiet reply.
Perhaps none could better have suited the astute reader of character. The hollow eyes lighted, and the old man bent upon Cuthbert a searching glance whilst he seemed to pause to gather strength.
"I would have thee take this packet," he said, speaking slowly and with some pain and difficulty. "There is no superscription; and sooner than let them be found by others on thy person, fling them into the river, or cut them to fragments with thy dagger; and plunge thy dagger into thine own heart sooner than be taken with them upon thee. But with caution and courage and strength (and I know that thou hast all of these) thou canst avoid this peril. What thy part is, is but this: Deliver this packet into the hand of Master Robert Catesby himself. Thou knowest him. Thou wilt make no error. Seek him not at any tavern or public place. Go to a lone house at Lambeth, with moss-grown steps down to the water's edge. Go by thine own wherry thither, and go alone. Thou canst not mistake the house. There is none like it besides. It stands upon the water, and none other building is nigh at hand; but a giant elm overshadows it, and there is a door scarce above high water level and steps that lead from it. Knock three times, thus, upon that door" – and the priest gave a curious tap, which Cuthbert repeated by imitation; "and when thou art admitted, ask for Robert Catesby, and give him the packet. That is all. Thy mission will then be done. Wilt thou do as much for me?"
