Oddsfish! by Robert Hugh Benson (i am malala young readers edition TXT) 📕

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At last I let him speak.

"Now then," I said, "tell us the names." (I saw as I spoke that Mr. Chiffinch held a note-book below the table to take them down.)

"Sir, these for certain. Rumbald; West; Rumsey--"

"Slowly, man, slowly," I cried.

"Rumsey; Goodenough; Burton; Thompson; Barber--those last three all of Wapping, sir. Then, sir, there is Wade, Nelthrop, West, Walcot--" he hesitated.

"Well, sir," demanded Mr. Chiffinch very fiercely. "That is not all."

"No, sir, no no.... There is Hone, a joiner like myself."

"Man," cried the page, "we want better names than snivelling tradesmen like yourself."

The fellow turned even paler.

"Well, sir; but how can I tell that--"

"Sir," said the page to me sharply, "call the guard!"

"Sir," cried the poor wretch, "I will tell all; indeed I will tell."

"Well?"

"Sir, the Duke of Monmouth was in it--at least we heard so. He was certainly in the former plot!"

"And what was that?" asked the other very quietly.

"Why, sir; the plot to assault Whitehall; it is all one in reality; but--"

"We know all about that," snapped the page sharply. "Well; and what other names?"

"Sir; there was my Lord Russell."

I moved in my chair. Even to this day I cannot believe that that peer was guilty; though indeed he was found so to be. Mr. Chiffinch cast me a look.

"Proceed, sir," he said.

"And there was Mr. Ferguson, a minister; and Mr. Wildman; and my Lord Argyle in Scotland; and my Lord Howard of Escrick; and Mr. Sidney; and my Lord Essex. I do not say, sir, that all those--"

"There! there: go on. We shall test every word you say; you may depend upon it. What other names have you?"

"There was my Lord Grey, sir; and Sir Thomas Armstrong ... Sir; I can remember no more!"

"And a pretty load on any man's conscience!" cried the virtuous Mr. Chiffinch. "And so all this nest of assassins--"

"Sir; I did not say that. I said--"

"That is enough; we want no comments and glosses, but the bare truth. Well, Keeling, if this tale be true, you have saved your own life--that is, if your fellow murderers do not get at you again. You have been in trouble before, I hear, too."

"Sir; it was on the matter of the Lord Mayor--"

"I know that well enough. Well, sir; so this is the tale you will tell to-morrow to Mr. Secretary."

"Yes, sir, if I can remember it all."

"You will remember it, I'll warrant. Well, sir; I think I have no more questions for the present. Sir, have you any questions to ask this man?"

I shook my head. I was near sick at the torture the man was in.

"Well, sir; you may go," said the page. "And I would recommend you and your brother to lie very private to-night. There must be no more evasion."

* * * * *


When he was gone, Mr. Chiffinch turned to me.

"Well?" he said. "What do you think?"

"Oh! I think he speaks the truth, in the main," I said wearily. "Shall I be needed any more; or when may I leave town?"

"You must wait, Mr. Mallock, until we have laid hands on them."

* * * * *


It was not until the middle of July that I was able to leave. On the eighteenth of June a proclamation was issued, with the names of some of the conspirators; and numerous arrests were made. One matter pleased me a little, and that was that Keeling had been man enough after all, to warn some of the humbler folk, who had been led into the affair, of what he had done; and the most of these got clean away. Then Sheppard came forward and betrayed three or four who had met in his house, as I had seen for myself: and West added many details. A second proclamation containing the names, and offering rewards for the arrest of Monmouth, my Lord Grey, Sir Thomas Armstrong and the Reverend Robert Ferguson, was made after my Lord Russell's arrest; but all four of them escaped. My Lords Howard and Essex were taken on the tenth of July; and two days later Walcot, Hone and Rouse were convicted.

As soon as my Lord Russell's trial was begun, and the certainty that he would be convicted was made plain by my Lord Howard turning King's evidence, I left London with my man James. And before we were at Dover the news came to us that my Lord Essex, in despair, had cut his throat in the Tower. As for myself, I was glad enough to leave; for I was both sick and weary of intrigue. It would be of a very different sort in France; and of a kind that a gentleman may undertake without misgivings: so, though I was loth to leave the land where Dolly was, the balance altogether left me refreshed rather than saddened.

* * * * *


It was a clear day as the packet put out from Dover; and, as I stood on deck, watching the cliffs recede as we went, there came on me again that same mood that had fallen on me as I went up the river so long ago from Wapping. Once more it appeared to me as if I were in somewhat of a dream. Those men I had left behind, awaiting trial and death; Mr. Chiffinch; the King, the Court, even Dolly herself, appeared to have something phantom-like about them. Once more the realities seemed to close about me and envelop me--or rather that great Reality whom we name God; and all else seemed but very little and trifling.



PART IV

CHAPTER I

Once more it was high summer, a year afterwards, as I rode in, still with James, thank God! and three other men, over London Bridge.

* * * * *


My life abroad once more must remain undescribed. There is plenty of reason against the telling of it; and nothing at all for it. One thing only may I say, that I came last from Rome, having stayed over for the Feast of the Apostles, and carried with me, though verbally only, some very particular instructions for His Royal Highness the Duke of York from personages whom he should respect, if he did not. And what those counsels were will appear in the proper place. By those same personages I had been complimented very considerably, and urged to yet greater efforts. Briefly with regard to the two Royal Brothers, I was urged to press on the one, and to restrain the other; for I heard in Rome that it was said that they would listen to me, if I observed discretion.

As to what had passed in England, a very short account will suffice.

First, with regard to the conspirators, a number had been executed, among whom I suppose must be reckoned my Lord Russell--an upright man, I think; yet one who had at least played with very hot fire. Frankly, I do not believe that he aimed ever at the King's life, but that my Lord Howard witnessed that he did, in order to save himself. Of the others that were executed, I think all deserved it; and the principal, I suppose, was Mr. Sidney, that ancient Republican and Commonwealth man, who was undoubtedly guilty. Besides him, my Lord Essex had killed himself in prison--for I never believed the ugly story of the bloody razor having been thrown out of his window--and Sir Thomas Armstrong was executed--and richly he had earned it by a thousand crimes and debaucheries--and old Colonel Rumbald; whose fate, I must allow, caused me a little sorrow (even though he had flung a sharp cleaver at my head), for he was very much more of a man than that puling treacherous hound my Lord Howard, who was taken hiding in his shirt, up his own chimney, and turned traitor to his friends. Holloway too--a merchant of Bristol, and a friend of Mr. Ferguson--was executed, and several in Edinburgh, of the Scottish plotters under Argyle, among whom the principal was Baillie of Jerviswood. The torture of the boot and the thumbscrews was used there, I am sorry to say; for they had plenty of evidence without it. Of the others some evaded altogether, of whom a good number went to Holland, which was their great refuge at this time, and others again saved their lives by turning King's evidence. The Reverend Mr. Ferguson proved himself a clever fellow, as indeed I had thought him, and a courageous one too, for after attending my Lord Shaftesbury upon his deathbed, he returned again to Edinburgh, and there, upon search being made for him, hid himself in the very prison to which they wished to consign him, and so escaped the death he had earned.

With regard to the Duke of Monmouth, affairs had taken a very strange course; and His Majesty, as I think, had behaved with less than his usual wisdom. Before even Mr. Sidney's death, the Duke had made his peace, both with the King and the Duke of York, and had, after expressing extraordinary contrition, and yet denying that he had been in any way privy to any attempt on the King's life, received a pardon. But he had not been content with that; and so soon as the _Gazette_ announced that it was so, and had given men to understand that Monmouth had made his peace by turning King's evidence, what must His Grace do, but deny it again, and cause it to be denied too in all the coffee-houses in town? The King was thrown into a passion by this; and once again His Grace had to sign and read aloud a paper, in the presence of witnesses and of the King, in the private parlour of the Duchess of Portsmouth's lodgings--(where, it must be confessed, His Majesty did much of his business at this time). But the paper was not explicit enough, and must be re-written: and so the foolish shilly-shally went on--and he guilty all the time--and at last he evaded them all, and went back again to Holland.

There was another piece of news that had come to me lately that pleased me better; and that was of the trial of Oates, for treasonous speaking, and his condemnation in one hundred thousand pounds, which caused him to be shut up in prison without more ado, where he could do no more mischief. Indeed his credit was all gone now, thank God! and all that he had to do in prison was to prepare himself for his whippings which he got a year later. A few months earlier too, the four Popish lords that had been left in the Tower were released again, which