House of Torment

Hey ho nonny."

Johnnie jumped up from his bed, strode out of the room, walked a yard or two down the corridor, and entered another and larger room, which he shared with three other members of the suite.

It was the place where they kept their armour, their riding-boots, and some of their swords.

As he came in he saw that Hull was sitting upon an overturned barrel, which had held quarels for cross-bows.

The man had tied a piece of sacking round his waist and over his breeches, and was hard at work.

Johnnie's three or four damascened daggers were rubbed bright with hog's lard and sand. His extra set of holster pistols gleamed fresh and new – the rust had been all removed from flint-locks and hammers; while the stocks shone with porpoise oil.

And now the new servant was polishing a high-peaked Spanish saddle, and all the leather trappings of a charger, with an inside crust of barley bread and a piece of apple rind.

Directly the man saw his new master he stood up and made a saluting motion with his hand.

Johnnie looked at him coldly, though inwardly he felt an extreme pleasure at the sight of his new recruit so lately added to him, so swift to get to work, and withal so blithe about it.

"You must not sing the songs I have heard you singing," he said, shortly. "Don't you know where you are?"

"I had forgotten, sir," the man replied. "I have a plaguey knowledge of rhymes. They do run in my head, and must out."

"They must not, I assure you," Johnnie answered, "but I like this well enough. Hast got thee to work at once, then."

"I love it, sir. To handle such stuff as yours is rare for a man like me. Look you here, sir" – he lifted up a small dagger which he withdrew from its sheath of stag's leather, dyed vermilion – "Hear how it ringeth!"

He twanged the supple blade with his forefinger, and the little shivering noise rang out into the room.

The man's keen, brown face was lit up with simple enjoyment. "I love weapons, master," he said, as if in apology.

Johnnie knew at once that here was the man he had been looking for for weeks. The man who cared, the faithful man; but he knew also, or thought he knew, that it was but poor policy to praise a servant unduly.

"Well, well," he said, "you can get on with your work. To-morrow morning, I will see you fitted out as becometh my body servant. To-night you will go below with the other men. I have spoken to the intendant that I have a new servant, and you will have your evening-meat and a place to lie in."

He turned to go.

With all his soul he was longing to ask this man certain questions. He believed that he had been sent to him to tell him of the whereabouts of the girl to whom, so strangely, at such a dreadful hour, he had vowed his life. But the long control over temperament and emotion which old Father Chilches had imposed upon him – the very qualities which made him, already, a successful courtier – stood him in good stead now. The dominant desire of his heart was to be repressed. He knew very well, he realised perfectly clearly, how intimate a member of Dr. Taylor's household this faithful servant – "the faithfullest servant that ever man had" – must have been. And knowing it, he felt sure that the time was not yet come to ask John Hull any questions. He must arouse no suspicions within the man's mind. Hull had entered his service gladly, and promised to be more than adequate and worthy of any trust that could be reposed in him. But he had seen Johnnie riding away with his beloved master, one of those who had taken him to torture and death. The very shrewdness and cleverness imprinted upon the fellow's face were enough to say that he would at once take alarm at any questioning about Dr. Taylor's family, at this moment.

John Hull scraped with his foot and made a clumsy bow as his new master turned away. Then, suddenly, he seemed to remember something. His face changed in expression.

"God forgive me, sir," he said, "indeed, I had near forgot it. When I went into your chamber and took this harness for cleaning, there was a letter lying there for you. I can read, sir; Dr. Taylor taught me to read somewhat. I took the letter, fearing that it might be overlooked or e'en taken away, for there are a plaguey lot of serving-men in this passage. 'Tis here, sir, and I crave you pardon me for forgetting of it till now."

He handed Johnnie a missive of thick yellow-brown paper – such as was woven from linen rags at Arches Smithfield Factory of that day. The letter was folded four-square and tied round with a cord of green silk, and where the threads intersected at the back was a broad seal of dull red wax, bearing the sign of a lamb in its centre.

Johnnie pulled off the cord, the wax cracked, and the thick yellow paper rustled as he pulled it open.

This was the letter:

"Honoured Sir, – This from my house in Chepe. Thy honoured father who hath lately left the City hath left with me a sum of money which remaineth here at your charges, and for your disposal thereof as you may think fit. This shall be sent to you upon your letter and signature, to-morrow an you so wish.

"Natheless, should you come to my house to-night I will hand it into your keeping in gold coin. I will say that Sir Henry expressed hope that you might care to come to my poor house which has long been the agency for Commendone. For your father's son, sir, there will be very open welcome.

    "Your obt. svt.,
    and good friend,
    Robert Cressemer,
    Alderman of ye City of London."

Commendone read the letter through with care.

His father had been most generous since Johnnie had arrived at Court, and the young man was in no need of money. Sir Henry had, indeed, hinted that further supplies would be sent shortly, and he must have arranged it with the Alderman ere he left the City.

Johnnie sighed. His father had always been good to him. No desire of his had ever been left ungratified. Many sons of noblemen at Court had neither such a generous allowance nor perfect equipment as he had. He never thought of his father and the old house in Kent without a little pang of regret. Was it worth it all? Were not the silent woods of Commendone, with their shy forest creatures, better far than this stately citadel and home of kings?

His life had been so tranquil in the past. The happy days had gone by with the regularity of some slow-turning wheel. Now all was stress and turmoil. Dark and dreadful doings encompassed him. He was afloat upon strange waters, and there was no pilot aboard, nor did he know what port he should make, what unknown coast-line should greet his troubled eyes when dawn should come.

These thoughts were but fleeting, as he sat in his bedroom, where he had taken the letter from Mr. Cressemer. He sent them away with an effort of will. The past life was definitely over; now he must gather himself together and consider the immediate future without vain regrets.

As he mounted the stairs from the Common Room he had it in mind to change from his riding costume and sleep. He needed sleep. He wanted to enter that mysterious country so close to the frontiers of death, to be alone that he might think of Elizabeth. He knew now how men dreamed and meditated of their loves, why lovers loved to be alone.

He held the letter in his hand, looking down at the firm, clear writing with lack-lustre eyes. What should he do? sleep, lose himself in happy fancies, or go to the house of the Alderman? He had no Court duties that night.

He knew Robert Cressemer's name well. Every one knew it in London, but Commendone had heard it mentioned at home for many years. Mr. Cressemer, who would be the next Lord Mayor, was one of those merchant princes who, ever since the time of that great commercial genius, Henry VII, had become such an important factor in the national life.

For many years the Alderman, the foundation of whose fortune had been the export of English wool, had been in intimate relations, both of business and friendship, with Sir Henry Commendone. The knight's wool all went to the warehouses in Chepe. He had shares in the fleet of trading vessels belonging to Cressemer, which supplied the wool-fairs of Holland and the Netherlands. The childlike and absolutely uneconomic act of Edward VI which endeavoured to make all interest illegal, and enacted that "whoever shall henceforth lend any sum of money for any manner of usury, increase, lucre, gain or interest to be had, received, or hoped for, over and above the sum so lent," should suffer serious penalties, had been repealed.

Banking had received a tremendous impetus, Robert Cressemer had adventured largely in it, and Sir Henry Commendone was a partner with him in more than one enterprise.

Of all this Johnnie knew nothing. He had not the slightest idea how rich his father was, and knew nothing of the fortune that would one day be his.

He did know, however, that Mr. Cressemer was a very important person indeed, the admired and trusted confidant of Sir Henry, and a man of enormous influence. Such a letter, coming from such a man, was hardly to be neglected by a young courtier. Johnnie knew how, if one of his colleagues had received it, it would have been shown about in the Common Room, what rosy visions of fortune and paid bills it would invoke!

He read the letter again. There was no need to go to Mr. Cressemer's house that night if he did not wish to do so. He was weary, he wanted to be alone to taste and savour this new thing within him that was called love. Yet something kept urging him to go, nevertheless. He could not quite have said what it was, though again the sense that he stood very much alone and friends were good – especially such a powerful one as this – crossed his mind. And, as an instance of the quite unconscious but very real revolution that had taken place in his thoughts during the last forty hours, it is to be noted that he did feel the need of friends and supporters.

Yet he was high in favour with the King and Queen, envied by every one, certain of rapid advancement.

But he no longer thought anything of this. Those great ones were on one side of a great something which he would not or could not define. He was on the other, he and the girl with eyes of crushed sapphire and a red mouth of sorrow.

It would be politic to go… "I'll put it to chance," he said to himself at length. "How doth Ovid have it?..

"'Casus ubique valet; semper tibi pendeat hamus:
Quo minime credas gurgite, piscis erit.'

I remember Father Chilches' translation:

"'There's always room for chance, so drop thy hook,
A fish there'll be when least for it you look.'

Here goes!"

He opened his purse to find a coin with which to settle the matter, and poured out the contents into his palm. There were eight or nine gold sovereigns of Henry VIII, beautiful coins with "Hiberniæ Rex" among the other titles, which were still known as "double ryals," three gold ducats, coined in that year, with the Queen and King Consort vis-à-vis and one crown above the heads of both, and one little silver half testoon.