By What Authority?

by Robert Hugh Benson

  CHAPTER X

  THE PASSAGE TO THE GARDEN-HOUSE

  The two looked at one another with parted lips, but without a word. Thenboth rose simultaneously. Then the bell jangled and ceased; and a crowdof other noises began; there were shouts, tramplings of hoofs in thecourt; shrill voices came over the wall; then a scream or two. Marysprang to the door and opened it, and stood there listening.

  Then from the interior of the house came an indescribable din, tramplingsof feet and shouts of anger; then violent blows on woodwork. It camenearer in a moment of time, as a tide comes in over flat sands,remorselessly swift. Then Mary with one movement was inside again, andhad locked the door and drawn the bolt.

  "Up there," she said, "it is the only way--they are outside," and shepointed to the chimney.

  Anthony began to remonstrate. It was intolerable, he felt, to climb upthe chimney like a hunted cat, and he began a word or two. But Maryseized his arm.

  "You must not be caught," she said, "there are others"; and there came aconfused battering and trampling outside. She pushed him towards thechimney. Then decision came to him, and he bent his head and stepped uponthe logs laid upon the ashes, crushing them down.

  "Ah! go," said Mary's voice behind him, as the door began to bulge andcreak. There was plainly a tremendous struggle in the little passageoutside.

  Anthony threw his hands up and felt a high ledge in the darkness, grippedit with his hands and made a huge effort combined of a tug and a spring;his feet rapped sharply for a moment or two on the iron fire-plate; andthen his knee reached the ledge and he was up. He straightened himself onthe ledge, stood upright and looked down; two white hands with rings onthem were lifting the logs and drawing them out from the ashes, shakingthem and replacing them by others from the wood-basket; and alldeliberately, as if laying a fire. Then her voice came up to him, hushedbut distinct.

  "Go up quickly. I will feign to be burning papers; there will be smoke,but no sparks. It is green wood."

  Anthony again felt above him, and found two iron half-rings in thechimney, one above the other; he was in semi-darkness here, but far abovethere was a patch of pale smoky light; and all the chimney seemed full ofa murmurous sound. He tugged at the rings and found them secure, and drewhimself up steadily by the higher one, until his knee struck the lower;then with a great effort he got his knee upon it, then his left foot, andagain straightened himself. Then, as he felt in the darkness once more,he found a system of rings, one above the other, up the side of thechimney, by which it was not hard to climb. As he went up he began toperceive a sharp acrid smell, his eyes smarted and he closed them, buthis throat burned; he climbed fiercely; and then suddenly saw immediatelybelow him another hearth; he was looking over the fireplate of some otherroom. In a moment more he thrust his head over, and drew a long breath ofclear air; then he listened intently. From below still came a murmur ofconfusion; but in this room all was quiet. He began to think frantically.He could not remain in the chimney, it was hopeless; they would soonlight fires, he knew, in all the chimneys, and bring him down. What roomwas this? He was bewildered and could not remember. But at least he wouldclimb into it and try to escape. In a moment more he had lifted himselfover the fireplate and dropped safely on to the hearth of his ownbedroom.

  The fresh air and the familiarity of the room, as he looked round, sweptthe confusion out of his brain like a breeze. The thundering and shoutingcontinued below. Then he went on tip-toe to the door and opened it. Roundto the right was the head of the stairs which led straight into thelittle passage where the struggle was going on. He could hear Robert'svoice in the din; plainly there was no way down the stairs. To the leftwas the passage that ended in a window, with the chapel door at the leftand the false shelves on the right. He hesitated a moment between the twohiding-places, and then decided for the cupboard; there was a cleandoublet there; his own was one black smear of soot, and as he thought ofit, he drew off his sooty shoes. His hose were fortunately dark. Hestepped straight out of the door, leaving it just ajar. Even as he leftit there was a thunder of footsteps on the stairs, and he was at theshelves in a moment, catching a glimpse through the window on his left ofthe front court crowded with men and horses. He had opened and shut thesecret door three or four times the evening before, and his hands closedalmost instinctively on the two springs that must be workedsimultaneously. He made the necessary movement, and the shelves with thewall behind it softly slid open and he sprang in. But as he closed it heheard one of the two books drop, and an exclamation from the passage hehad just left; then quick steps from the head of the stairs; the stepsclattered past the door and into the chapel opposite and stopped.

  Anthony felt about him in the darkness, found the doublet and lifted itoff the nail; slipped off his own, tearing his ruff as he did so; andthen quickly put on the other. He had no shoes; but that would not be sonoticeable. He had not seriously thought of the possibility of escapingthrough the portrait-door, as he felt sure the house would be overrun bynow; but he put his eyes to the pinholes and looked out; and to hisastonishment saw that the gallery was empty. There it lay, with itsFlemish furniture on the right and its row of windows on the left, andall as tranquil as if there were no fierce tragedy of terror and wrathraging below. Again decision came to him; by a process of thought soswift that it was an intuition, he remembered that the fall of the bookoutside would concentrate attention on that corner; it could not be longbefore the shelves were broken in, and if he did not escape now therewould be no possibility later. Then he unslid the inside bolt, and theportrait swung open; he closed it behind, and sped on silent shoelessfeet down the polished floor of the gallery.

  Of course the great staircase was hopeless. The hall would be seethingwith men. But there was just a chance through the servants' quarters. Hedashed past the head of the stairs, catching a glimpse of heads andsparkles of steel over the banisters, and through the half-opened door atthe end, finding himself in the men's corridor that was a continuation ofthe gallery he had left. On his left rose the head of the back-stairs,that led first with a double flight to the offices, the pantry, thebuttery and the kitchen, and than, lower still, a single third flightdown to the cellar.

  He looked down the stairs; at the bottom of the first double flight werea couple of maids, screaming and white-faced, leaning and pressingagainst the door, immediately below the one he had just come throughhimself. The door was plainly barred as well, for it was now thudding andcracking with blows that were being showered upon it from the other side.The maids, it seemed to him, in a panic had locked the door; but thatpanic might be his salvation. He dashed down the stairs; the maidsscreamed louder than ever when they saw this man, whom they did notrecognise, with blackened face and hands come in noiseless leaps downtowards them; but Anthony put his finger on his lips as he flew pastthem; then he dashed open the little door that shut off thecellar-flight, closed it behind him, and was immediately in the dark.

  Then he groped his way down, feeling the rough brick wall as he went,till he reached the floor of the cellar. The air was cool and damp here,and it refreshed him, for he was pouring with sweat. The noise, too, andconfusion which, during his flight, had been reverberating through thehouse with a formidable din, now only reached him as a far-away murmur.

  As he counted the four steps up, and then lifted the overhanging edge,there came upon him irresistibly the contrast between the serene partyhere last night, with their tapers and their delicate dresses and Mary'scool clear-clipped voice--and his own soot-stained person, his desperateenergy and his quick panting and heart-beating. Then the steps droppedand he slid in; lifted them again as he lay on his back, and heard thespring catch as they closed. Then he was in silence, too, and comparativesafety. But he dared not rest yet, and edged himself along as he had seenMr. Buxton do last night. Which brick was it? "The fourth of the fourth,"he murmured, and counted, and pressed it. Again the door pushed back, andwith a little struggle he was first on his knees, and the
n on his feet.Then he swung the door to again behind him.

  Then for the first time he rested; he leaned against the brick-lined sideof the tunnel and passed his blackened hands over his face. Five minutesago--yes--certainly not five minutes ago he was lounging in the westparlour, at the other end of the house, while Mary played the prelude toan Italian love-song.--What was she doing now? God bless her for herquick courage!--And Isabel and Buxton--where were they all? How deadlysick and tired he felt!--Again he passed his hands over his face in thepitch darkness.--Well, he must push on.

  He turned and began to grope patiently through the blackness--step bystep--feeling the roughness of the bricks beneath with his shoeless feetbefore he set them down; once or twice he stepped into a little icy pool,which had collected through some crack in the vaulting overhead; once,too, he slipped on a lump of something wet and shapeless; and thoughteven then of Mary's suspicions the night before. He pushed on, shiveringnow with cold and excitement, through what seemed the interminabletunnel, until at last his outstretched hands touched wood before him. Hehad not seen this end of the passage for nearly two years, and hewondered if he could remember the method of opening, and gave a gulp ofhorror at the thought that he might not. But there had been no reason tomake a secret of the inside of the door, and he presently found a buttonand drew it; it creaked rustily, but gave, and the door with another pullopened inwards, and there was a faint glimmer of light. Then heremembered that the entrances to the tunnel at either end were exactly onthe same system; and putting out his hands felt the slope of theunderside of the staircase, cutting diagonally across the opening of thepassage. He slid himself on to the boarding sideways, and drew thebrickwork towards him till the spring snapped, and lay there to considerbefore he went farther.

  First he ran over in his mind the construction of the garden-house.

  The basement in which he was lying corresponded to the cellar under thehouse from which he had come, and ran the whole length of the building,about forty feet by twenty. It was a large empty chamber, where nothingof any value was kept. He remembered last time he was here seeing a heapof tiles in one corner, with a pile of disused poles; pieces of rope, andold iron in another. The stairs led up through an ordinary trap-door intowhat was the ground-floor of the house. This, too, was one immense room,with four latticed windows looking on to the garden, and one with opaqueglass on to the lane at the back; and a great door, generally keptlocked, for rather more valuable things were kept here, such as thegarden-roller, flower-pots, and the targets for archery. Then a lightstaircase led straight up from this room to the next floor, which wasdivided into two, both of which, so far as Anthony remembered, wereempty. Mr. Buxton had thought of letting his gardeners sleep there whenhe had at first built this immense useless summer-house; but he hadultimately built a little gardener's cottage adjoining it. The twofantastic towers that flanked the building held nothing but staircases,which could be entered by either of the two floors, and which ascended totiny rooms with windows on all four sides.

  When Anthony had run over these details as he lay on his back, he pushedup the stair over his face and let the front of it with the step of thenext swing inwards; the light was stronger now, and poured in, thoughstill dim, through three half-moon windows, glazed and wired, that justrose above the level of the ground outside. Then he extricated himself,closed the steps behind him, and went up the stairs.

  The trap-door at the top was a little stiff, but he soon raised it, andin a moment more was standing in the ground-floor room of thegarden-house. All round him was much as he remembered it; he first wentto the door and found it securely fastened, as it often was for daystogether; he glanced at the windows to assure himself that they werebottle-glass too, and then went to them to look out. He was fortunateenough to find the corner of one pane broken away; he put his eye tothis, and there lay a little lawn, with a yew-hedge beyond blotting outall of the great house opposite except the chimneys,--the house whicheven across the whole space of garden hummed like a hive. On the lawn wasa chair, and an orange-bound book lay face down on the grass beside it.Anthony stared at it; it was the book that he had seen in Isabel's handnot half an hour ago, as she had gone out into the garden from the hallto wait until he and Mary joined her with the lute.

  And at that the priest knelt down before the window, covered his facewith his hands, and began to stammer and cry to God: "O God! God! God!"he said.

  * * * *

  When Mary Corbet had seen Anthony's feet disappear, she already had theoutline of a plan in her mind. To light a fire and pretend to be burningimportant papers would serve as an excuse for keeping the door fast; itwould also suggest at least that no one was in the chimney. The ordinarywood, however, sent up sparks; but she had noticed before a little greenwood in the basket, and knew that this did not do so to the same extent;so she pulled out the dry wood that Anthony had trodden into the ashesand substituted the other. Then she had looked round for paper;--the lutemusic, that was all. Meantime the door was giving; the noise outside wasterrible; and it was evident that one or two of the servants wereobstructing the passage of the pursuivants.

  When at last the door flew in, there was a fire cracking furiously on thehearth, and a magnificently dressed lady kneeling before it, crushingpaper into the flames. Half a dozen men now streamed in and more began tofollow, and stood irresolute for a moment, staring at her. From theresistance they had met with they had been certain that the priest washere, and this sight perplexed them. A big ruddy man, however, who ledthem, sprang across the room, seized Mary Corbet by the shoulders andwhisked her away against the wall, and then dashed the half-burnt paperout of the grate and began to beat out the flames.

  Mary struggled violently for a moment; but the others were upon her andheld her, and she presently stood quiet. Then she began upon them.

  "You insolent hounds!" she cried, "do you know who I am?" Her cheeks werescarlet and her eyes blazing; she seemed in a superb fury.

  "Burning treasonable papers," growled the big man from his knees on thehearth, "that is enough for me."

  "Who are you, sir, that dare to speak to me like that?"

  The man got up; the flames were out now, and he slipped the papers into apocket. Mary went on immediately.

  "If I may not burn my own lute music, or keep my door locked, without ariotous mob of knaves breaking upon me---- Ah! how dare you?" and shestamped furiously.

  The pursuivant came up close to her, insolently.

  "See here, my lady----" he began.

  The men had fallen back from her a little now that the papers were safe,and she lifted her ringed hand and struck his ruddy face with all hermight. There was a moment of confusion and laughter as he recoiled.

  "Now will you remember that her Grace's ladies are not to be trifledwith?"

  There was a murmur from the crowded room, and a voice near the doorcried:

  "She says truth, Mr. Nichol. It is Mistress Corbet."

  Nichol had recovered himself, but was furiously angry.

  "Very good, madam, but I have these papers now," he said, "they can stillbe read."

  "You blind idiot," hissed Mary, "do you not know lute music when you seeit?"

  "I know that ladies do not burn lute music with locked doors," observedNichol bitterly.

  "The more fool you!" screamed Mary, "when you have caught one at it."

  "That will be seen," sneered Mr. Nichol.

  "Not by a damned blind scarlet-faced porpoise!" screamed Mary, apparentlymore in a passion than ever, and a burst of laughter came from the men.

  This was too much for Mr. Nichol. This coarse abuse stung him cruelly.

  "God's blood," he bellowed at the room; "take this vixen out and searchthe place." And a torrent of oaths drove the crowd about the door outinto the passage again.

  A couple of men took Mary by the fierce ringed hands of hers that stilltwitched and clenched, and led her out; she spat insults over hershoulders as she went. But
she had held him in talk as she intended.

  "Now then," roared Nichol again, "search, you dogs!"

  He himself went outside too, and seeing the stairs stamped up them. Hewas just in time to see the Tacitus settle down with crumpled pages;stopped for a moment, bewildered, for it lay in the middle of thepassage; and then rushed at the open door on the left, dashed it open,and found a little empty room, with a chair or two, and a table--but nosign of the priest. It was like magic.

  Then out he came once more, and went into Anthony's own room. The greatbed was on his right, the window opposite, the fireplace to the left, andin the middle lay two sooty shoes. Instinctively he bent and touchedthem, and found them warm; then he sprang to the door, still keeping hisface to the room, and shouted for help.

  "He is here, he is here!" he cried. And a thunder of footsteps on thestairs answered him.

  * * * *

  Meanwhile the men that held Mary followed the others along the passage,but while the leaders went on and round into the lower corridor, the twomen-at-arms with their prisoner turned aside into the parlour that servedas an ante-chamber to the hall beyond, where they released her. Here,though it was empty of people, all was in confusion; the table had beenoverturned in the struggle that had raged along here between Lackington'smen, who had entered from the front door, and the servants of the house,who had rushed in from their quarters at the first alarm and interceptedthem. One chair lay on its side, with its splintered carved arm besideit. As Mary stood a moment looking about her, the door from the hall thathad been closed, again opened, and Isabel came through; and a man's voicesaid:

  "You must wait here, madam"; then the door closed behind her.

  "Isabel," said Mary.

  The two looked at one another a moment, but before either spoke again thedoor again half-opened, and a voice began to speak, as if its owner stillheld the handle.

  "Very well, Lackington, keep him in his room. I will go through here toNichol."

  Isabel had drawn a sharp breath as the voice began, and as the dooropened wider she turned and faced it. Then Hubert came in, and recoiledon the threshold. There fell a complete silence in the room.

  "Hubert," said Isabel after a moment, "what are you doing here?"

  Hubert shut the door abruptly and leaned against it, staring at her; hisface had gone white under the tan. Isabel still looked at him steadily,and her eyes were eloquent. Then she spoke again, and something in hervoice quickened the beating of Mary's heart as she listened.

  "Hubert, have you forgotten us?"

  Still Hubert stared; then he stood upright. The two men-at-arms werewatching in astonishment.

  "I will see to the ladies," he said abruptly, and waved his hand. Theystill hesitated a moment.

  "Go," he said again sharply, and pointed to the door. He was amagistrate, and responsible; and they turned and went.

  Then Hubert looked at Isabel again.

  "Isabel," he said, "if I had known----"

  "Stay," she interrupted, "there is no time for explanations except mine.Anthony is in the house; I do not know where. You must save him."

  There was no entreaty or anxiety in her voice; nothing but a supremedignity and an assurance that she would be obeyed.

  "But----" he began. The door was opened from the hall, and a little partyof searchers appeared, but halted when the magistrate turned round.

  "Come with me," he said to the two women, "you must have a room kept foryou upstairs," and he held back the door for them to pass.

  Isabel put out her hand to Mary, and the two went out together into thehall past the men, who stood back to let them through, and Hubertfollowed. They turned to the left to the stairs, looking as they wentupon the wild confusion. Above them rose the carved ceiling, and in thecentre of the floor, untouched, by a strange chance, stood thedinner-table, still laid with silver and fruit and flowers. But all elsewas in disarray. The leather screen that had stood by the door into theentrance hall had been overthrown, and had carried with it a tallflowering plant that now lay trampled and broken before the hearth. Acouple of chairs lay on their backs between the windows; the rug underthe window was huddled in a heap, and all over the polished boards werescratches and dents; a broken sword-hilt lay on the floor with afeathered cap beside it. There were half a dozen men guarding the fourdoors; but the rest were gone; and from overhead came tramplings andshouts as the hunt swept to and fro in the upper floors.

  At the top of the stairs was Mary's room; the two ladies, who had gonesilently upstairs with Hubert behind them, stopped at the door of it.

  "Here, if you please," said Mary.

  Before Hubert could answer, Lackington came down the passage, hurryingwith a drawn sword, and his hat on his head. Isabel did not recognise himas he stopped and tapped Hubert on the arm familiarly.

  "The prisoners must not be together," he said.

  Hubert drew back his arm and looked the man in the face.

  "They are not prisoners; and they shall be together. Take off your hat,sir."

  Then, as Lackington drew back astonished, he opened the door.

  "You shall not be disturbed here," he said, and the two went in, and thedoor closed behind them. There was a murmur of voices outside the door,and they heard a name called once or twice, and the sound of footsteps.Then came a tap, and Hubert stepped in quietly and closed the door.

  "I have placed my own man outside," he said, "and none shall troubleyou--and--Mistress Isabel--I will do my best." Then he bowed and wentout.

  * * * *

  The long miserable afternoon began. They watched through the windows thesentries going up and down the broad paths between the glowingflower-beds; and out, over the high iron fence that separated the gardenfrom the meadows, the crowd of villagers and children watching.

  But the real terror for them both lay in the sounds that came from theinterior of the house. There was a continual tramp of the sentries placedin every corridor and lobby, and of the messengers that went to and fro.Then from room after room came the sounds of blows, the rending ofwoodwork, and once or twice the crash of glass, as the searchers wentabout their work; and at every shout the women shuddered or drew theirbreath sharply, for any one of the noises might be the sign of Anthony'sarrest.

  The two had soon talked out every theory in low voices, but they bothagreed that he was still in the house somewhere, and on the upper floor.It was impossible, they thought, for him to have made his way down. Therewere four possibilities, therefore: either he might still be in thechimney--in that case it was no use hoping; or he was in the chapel-hole;or in that behind the portrait; or in one last one, in the room next totheir own. The searchers had been there early in the afternoon, butperhaps had not found it; its entrance was behind the window shutter, andwas contrived in the thickness of the wall. So they talked, these two,and conjectured and prayed, as the evening drew on; and the sun began tosink behind the church, and the garden to lie in cool shadow.

  About eight there was a tap at the door, and Hubert came in with a trayof food in his hands, which he set down.

  "All is in confusion," he said, "but this is the best I can do."--Hebroke off.

  "Mistress Isabel," he said, coming nearer to the two as they sat togetherin the window-seat, "I can do little; they have found three hiding-holes;but so far he has escaped. I do what I can to draw them off, but they aretoo clever and zealous. If you can tell me more, perhaps I can do more."

  The two were looking at him with startled eyes.

  "Three?" Mary said.

  "Yes, three--and indeed----" He stopped as Isabel got up and came towardshim.

  "Hubert," she said resolutely, "I must tell you. He must be still in thechimney of the little west parlour. Do what you can."

  "The west parlour!" he said. "That was where Mistress Corbet was burningthe papers?"

  "Yes," said Mary.

  "He is not there," said Hubert; "we have sent a boy
up and down italready."

  "Ah! dear God!" said Mary from the window-seat, "then he has escaped."

  Isabel looked from one to the other and shook her head.

  "It cannot be," she said. "The guards were all round the house before thealarm rang."

  Hubert nodded, and Mary's face fell.

  "Then is there no way out?" he asked.

  Mary sprang up with shining eyes.

  "He has done it," she said, and threw her arms round Isabel and kissedher.

  "Well," said Hubert, "what can I do?"

  "You must leave us," said Isabel; "come back later."

  "Then when we have searched the garden-house--why, what is it?"

  A look of such anguish had come into their faces that he stopped amazed.

  "The garden-house!" cried Mary; "no, no, no!"

  "No, no, Hubert, Hubert!" cried Isabel, "you must not go there."

  "Why," he said, "it was I that proposed it; to draw them from the house."

  There came from beneath the windows a sudden tramp of footsteps, and thenNichol's voice, distinctly heard through the open panes.

  "We cannot wait for him. Come, men."

  "They are going without me," said Hubert; and turned and ran through thedoor.