The King's Achievement Part 29

"The words, man, the words!"

"I am not sure, sir; but they were after this fas.h.i.+on: 'See me safe up, Master Lieutenant; I will s.h.i.+ft for myself at the coming down.' So he got up safe, and stamped once or twice merrily to see if all were firm.

Then he made a speech, sir, and begged all there to pray for him. He told them that he was to die for the faith of the Catholic Church, as my Lord of Rochester did."

"Have you heard of my lord's head being taken to Nan Boleyn?" put in Nicholas fiercely.

Sir James looked up.

"Presently, Nick," he said.

The man went on.

"Master More kneeled down presently at his prayers; and all the folk kept very quiet. There was not one that cried against him. Then he stood up again, put off his gown, so that his neck was bare; and pa.s.sed his hand over it smiling. Then he told the headsman that it was but a short one, and bade him be brave and strike straight, lest his good name should suffer. Then he laid himself down to the block, and put his neck on it; but he moved again before he gave the sign, and put his beard out in front--for he had grown one in prison"--

"Give us the words," snarled Nicholas.

"He said, sir, that his beard had done no treason, and need not therefore suffer as he had to do. And then he thrust out his hand for a sign--and 'twas done at a stroke."

"G.o.d d.a.m.n them!" hissed Nicholas again as a kind of Amen, turning swiftly to the fire-place so that his face could not be seen.

There was complete silence for a few seconds. The groom had his eyes cast down, and stood there--then again he spoke.

"As to my Lord of Rochester's head, that was taken off to the--the Queen, they say, in a white bag, and she struck it on the mouth."

Nicholas dropped his head against his hand that rested on the wood-work.

"And the body rested naked all day on the scaffold, with the halberd-men drinking round about; and 'twas tumbled into a hole in Barking Churchyard that night."

"At whose orders?"

"At Master Cromwell's, sir."

Again there was silence; and again the groom broke it.

"There was more said, sir--" and hesitated.

The old man signed to him to go on.

"They say that my lord's head shone with light each night on the bridge," said the man reverently; "there was a great press there, I know, all day, so that the streets were blocked, and none could come or go. And so they tumbled that into the river at last; at least 'tis supposed so--for 'twas gone when I looked."

Nicholas turned round; and his eyes were bright and his face fiery and discoloured.

Sir James stood up, and his voice was broken as he spoke.

"Thank you, my man. You have told your story well."

As the groom turned to go out, Sir Nicholas wheeled round swiftly to the hearth, and buried his face on his arm; and Chris saw a great heaving begin to shake his broad shoulders.

THE KING'S TRIUMPH--BOOK II

PART I--THE SMALLER HOUSES

CHAPTER I

AN ACT OF FAITH

Towards the end of August Beatrice Atherton was walking up the north bank of the river from Charing to Westminster to announce to Ralph her arrival in town on the previous night.

She had gone through horrors since the June day on which she had seen the two brothers together. With Margaret beside her she had watched Master More in court, in his frieze gown, leaning on his stick, bent and grey with imprisonment, had heard his clear answers, his searching questions, and his merry conclusion after sentence had been p.r.o.nounced; she had stayed at home with the stricken family on the morning of the sixth of July, kneeling with them at her prayers in the chapel of the New Building, during the hours until Mr. Roper looked in grey-faced and trembling, and they knew that all was over. She went with them to the burial in St. Peter's Chapel in the Tower; and last, which was the most dreadful ordeal of all, she had stood in the summer darkness by the wicket-gate, had heard the cautious stroke of oars, and the footsteps coming up the path, and had let Margaret in bearing her precious burden robbed from the spike on London Bridge.

Then for a while she had gone down to the country with Mrs. More and her daughters; and now she was back once more, in a kind of psychical convalescence, at her aunt's new house on the river-bank at Charing.

Her face was a little paler than it used to be, but there was a quickening brightness in her eyes as she swept along in her blue mantle, with her maid beside her, in the rear of the liveried servant, who carried a silver-headed wand a few yards in front.

She was rehearsing to herself the scene in which Ralph had asked her to be his wife.

Where Chris had left the room the two had remained perfectly still until the street-door had closed; and then Ralph had turned to her with a question in his steady eyes.

She had told him then that she did not believe one word of what the monk had insinuated; but she had been conscious even at the time that she was making what theologians call an act of faith. It was not that there were not difficulties to her in Ralph's position--there were plenty--but she had determined by a final and swift decision to disregard them and believe in him. It was a last step in a process that continued ever since she had become interested by this strong brusque man; and it had been precipitated by the fanatical attack to which she had just been a witness. The discord, as she thought it, of Ralph's character and actions had not been resolved; yet she had decided in that moment that it need not be; that her data as concerned those actions were insufficient; and that if she could not explain, at least she could trust.

Ralph had been very honest, she told herself now. He had reminded her that he was a servant of Cromwell's whom many believed to be an enemy of Church and State. She had nodded back to him steadily and silently, knowing what would follow from the paleness of his face, and his bright eyes beneath their wide lids. She had felt her own breast rise and fall and a pulse begin to hammer at the spring of her throat. Even now as she thought of it her heart quickened, and her hands clenched themselves.

And then in one swift moment it had come. She had found her hands caught fiercely, and her eyes imprisoned by his; and then all was over, and she had given him an answer in a word.

It had not been easy even after that. Cecily had questioned her more than once. Mrs. More had said a few indiscreet things that had been hard to bear; her own aunt had received the news in silence.

But that was over now. The necessary consent on both sides had been given; and here she was once more walking up the road to Westminster with Ralph's image before her eyes, and Ralph himself a hundred yards away.

She turned the last corner from the alley, pa.s.sed up the little street, and turned again across the little cobbled yard that lay before the house.