The MS. in a Red Box

by John A. Hamilton

CHAPTER VIII

The task of answering the hundred and one questions of our rescuers fell upon Mistress Goel, for I could not speak distinctly, my cheek and lips being so swollen. Two of my friends hoisted me upon their shoulders, in spite of my growling resistance, while other two made "a chair" for her with their arms and sticks, and we were carried with shouting to the vicarage, terrifying the good folk there no little by the noise. When my aunt saw Mistress Goel's blood-stained face and my puffed cheek, she fell to laughing and crying in a breath, and cried out that I was the most reckless fellow in the world, and not to be trusted with the care of a lady. The doctor clasped his daughter to his breast, and then held her off to examine her hurt, and turned to glare at me fiercely, as if I had done the mischief. Oddly enough it was the vicar who called for sponge and water, bandages, plaister, and the like; recommended the doctor to lose no time in attending to our wounds; imposed silence on the dozen who were babbling all at once, and, in short, put us into order.

Luke told how he had followed us, being in some fear that we might be attacked, but he had been astonished by the number of the crowd, which had gathered so quickly, and appeared to be under the direction of a man, who was a stranger to him. He saw us take refuge in the old mill, and then thought it better to call a party to our aid than to come single-handed. Accordingly, he had set off to give the alarm to the young fellows who had worked with us on the day after the flood, and, by great good luck, found the chief constable of the wapentake at supper in one of the houses at which he called. The rest of the story may be understood without the tedium of further words by me. During Luke's recital, Doctor Goel had attended to his daughter's hurt, and now gave me his care. My cut in the shoulder he pronounced unimportant, but shook his head over the injury to my jaw. At present, he could do little but bind a wet rag about my face, and give me a wash for the mouth, with a caution to swallow none of it. Meanwhile, my friends, on Mistress Goel's report, were making me out to be a hero, and there I sat with a swelled face, rolling a liquid in my mouth which made me wince, and unable to say a word. It struck me as so queer a fix for a hero to be in that I laughed, spurting out some of the doctor's stuff, and gulping some of it down, but the coughing fit and the pain which followed effectually cured me of inclination to further laughter.

The chief constable deemed it advisable to set a watch over the vicarage for the night, himself remaining in command.

"There is no telling to what lengths the rabble may go, when they have got suspicion of witchcraft into their heads," said he; "and, in my judgment, it would be wise for Doctor and Mistress Goel to take shelter among their own people at Sandtoft as soon as may be."

We were not disturbed during the night, and that happened on the morrow which, for a time at least, put our affairs into the shade. We received a visit from a Royal Commissioner, who caused public proclamation, with beat of drum, that all well-disposed persons and good subjects were to wait on him in the course of the next three days in the Court-room at the White Hart, where the Manor Court was usually held, there to prove their loyalty to the throne by loans, benevolences, free gifts of money, and tender of service to his Majesty. This personage appeared at the vicarage early in the day, attended by a file of musketeers, I happened to be with the vicar in a room where he transacted such parish business as he could not depute to my aunt, when a pot-bellied man swaggered in, with what he meant for an air of dignity, but which in reality was a consciousness of the musketeers outside. After curt salutation, he took a seat, and opened by saying—

"You received instructions from the archbishop to preach to your flock on the duty of contributing to the royal exchequer, so preparing them for my visit. You thought it sufficient to read the letter from the pulpit. Explain your disobedience."

Something of the old Adam still lived in the clergyman, and flashed from his eyes.

"By what authority do you——" he began.

But the other broke out—

"Authority! authority, quotha! Authority enough to send a bishop to jail, if he gave me occasion."

At this point I did an exceedingly prudent action. The commissioner held his neck awry, and my hands itched to give it a twist right round, so I walked out of the room and a temptation which might become too strong for me. From prudence to policy is but one step. The next thing I did was to send Luke out to the musketeers with strong ale, bidding him stay to learn how they liked the brew, and anything else they chose to tell him. They told him a good deal. The commissioner had a list of the gentry and farmers in the neighbourhood, and against each name the amount to be demanded. He had another list of poorer folk, including the names of young men who might be impressed for service in the army or navy, unless they, or their relatives, were ready to buy a discharge. There did not appear to be any limit to the powers of this bashaw. Before his entry into the Isle he had sent several gentlemen to prison for refusing to pay his demand in full. Some reputed misers of low degree, who had pleaded poverty, he had tied up by the thumbs. Incredible sums had been extorted from poor old women by threatening to take away their sons.

Fellows who had been "insolent" to his Majesty's representative, had been shipped off to the plantations. The corporal had favoured Luke with the opinion that the King would get so much money by this collection as to put him above the need to ask Parliament for another shilling.

The pot-bellied man left the vicarage soon after I received this account, taking with him fifty pounds, and the vicar retired to his study, perhaps for prayer.

In the course of the morning Mr. Butharwick came over to see me, bringing a summons from the commissioner, requiring my father's attendance at the White Hart, so about one o'clock I joined the company assembled there. The commissioner, Tunstall by name, as we learned from the reading of his warrant under the Great Seal, which he allowed some of the gentlemen to inspect, sat at a table, with a scribe on his left hand, four or five of his musketeers standing behind him. There were seats for the men of rank and condition, but two-thirds of the floor were filled by a standing crowd. After the reading of the warrant, Tunstall made a long pompous speech, setting forth the necessities of the King, the duty of his subjects, and the trouble caused in the realm by factious and treasonable persons, who had abused their privileges and his Majesty's leniency by contriving to delay the voting of supplies, urgently required for the defence of the kingdom, and the dignity of the Crown. The short of it was the king wanted money badly, and we were to find it, or the consequences would be disagreeable. The commissioner looked at his papers, and then said that the first name on his list was that of George Stovin of Totlets, assessed at five hundred pounds. Squire Stovin rose, and spoke—

"It is not for me to judge of his Majesty's requirements, or to give an opinion as to the propriety of this unwonted way of meeting them, but only to say that the demand made on the gentry and farmers of Crowle—and on the gentry and farmers of Axholme generally—is to the last degree ill-timed. Hundreds of acres in various parts of the Isle, which last year bore heavy crops, are reduced to swamp by the action of foreign invaders, who are under his Majesty's protection. In this part of the Isle, many of us have been brought within a little of beggary. I myself have had the cottages in which my labourers lived swept away, and most of my barns and outbuildings. Scores of my sheep have been drowned—my crops are lost. It is monstrous to ask me to give money to the King. I want compensation from the King."

There followed a loud rumble of assent to Squire Stovin's speech. As soon as it ceased, the commissioner gave some order in a low voice to the corporal, and then said—

"That treasonable talk will cost thee more than five hundred pounds, thou impudent rebel. I allow thee one hour to send and get what may be wanted for a sojourn in Lincoln castle."

At the word, a musketeer seized the squire, and tied his hands behind him. A growl of angry voices was heard all over the room, and, a tumult might have happened, but, at some signal which I did not perceive, a score musketeers entered by the door behind the assemblage.

Squire Stovin called out: "Will some friend be kind enough to go to tell Mrs. Stovin I am going a journey, and want my portmanteau?"

"No man quits the room except by my permission," bawled the commissioner, as a number of gentlemen turned to do the squire's errand.

Daft Jack, the town idiot, shambled forward from the rear to the table.

"May be your worship's honour will give me leave to go," he said; "but I should like to give the poor King ninepence." And with that the fool laid the coin on the table.

The commissioner, mindful of the chuckling sound of laughter, threw the piece back to poor Jack, bidding him begone about his business.

The fellow made a gesture of amazement, and then repocketed his money, and shambled off to the other end of the room, talking to himself in his high falsetto voice the while—

"'Tis a long way to Lincoln, and ferries to cross, and nasty bits of road, and footpads and highwaymen about. I wish the squire may get there safely, poor man."

A faint smile at Daft Jack's concern for the prisoner's safe arrival, crossed the commissioner's face. He evidently did not suspect Daft Jack's real intent. Then he called out—

"See you bring the prisoner's portmanteau straight to me, d'ye hear, fool?"

"Yes, yes, your honour," answered Jack.

"James Tankersley, wheelwright," the clerk read out, and the wheelwright stepped forward, well known as a poor, but industrious man, the sole support of an aged mother and his sisters, two sickly women.

"Hast the honour to be chosen to serve his Majesty, Tankersley," grinned the commissioner.

"Would ask nothing better, your worship, but my poor old mother and my misters depend on me for their bread."

"That's no affair of mine, man. The day after to-morrow you march with me. If you skulk, you'll be shot as a deserter, that's all."

The big fellow trembled like a leaf in the wind.

"Oh! your honour," he cried, in a choking voice, "have pity on us. 'Twill kill my mother."

"Stop your snivelling!" shouted the commissioner, "or I'll have you strapped up and flogged. If you're a damned coward, pay me ten pounds for a discharge."

"Ten pounds!" cried the poor fellow; "I haven't a pound in the world, and half the wood in the yard isn't paid for."

Farmer Brewer came to the front, and said: "I will buy his discharge."

"God bless you, Mr. Brewer," said the wheelwright.

"Brewer? Have we that name on the list?" asked the commissioner of his clerk.

Then the two of them rummaged among their papers, but seemed to have no record of the farmer's existence. At length the commissioner looked up and said—

"A man who has ten pounds to spare for another must be well to pass, Mr. Brewer. Fifty pounds for the King will be no burdensome demand."

A murmur went round the room, for the farmer had lost heavily in the flood, and everybody knew that he had never prospered greatly. Something to this effect, Brewer began to plead, but was cut short.

"I am not here to argue, my man, but to collect money. If you are obstinate, I have the means at hand to persuade you feelingly. Bring the sixty pounds by three o'clock, or you will learn what they are. Corporal, pass this man out."

So things went on, man after man being bullied and threatened, and sent off to scrape money according to the commissioner's assessment. The proceedings were exciting enough at the time, but they would be wearisome to narrate. They were interrupted by Daft Jack's return, in less than the hour allotted, with the squire's portmanteau, which he dumped down with a bang just inside the room, saying as he sat down on the floor with his back against the door, mopping his face, "I can't carry it a step furder; take it to his honour, one of you." At a nod from the corporal, one of his men went forward with it, and placed it on the table. The clerk opened it for the inspection of his chief, when with a humming and buzzing noise which filled the room, a swarm of angry wasps rushed out. What happened then I cannot describe. I saw the commissioner and his clerk striking, dancing, in a frenzy, through a darting haze of furious insects.

Looking the other way, I saw a mass of hunched backs and bent heads, helter skelter to the door. Exit thus was too slow for my fancy, with a cloud of wasps round my head, so I jumped from the only window which opened door-wise. It was a good long drop to the ground, but several active men followed me. We found Squire Stovin in saddle in front of the inn, his feet tied under the horse's belly, his guards mounted on each side, and a big crowd gathered round them, hustling and jostling one another in a manner that boded no good to the troopers, most of the men having their poles in their hands. Mischief would have begun before now, but for Mr. Stovin's authority with the fellows. Shortly, the corporal came out to say that the commissioner being unable to give the instructions for which the men were waiting, he would take the responsibility of setting the squire free on parole. Mr. Stovin readily gave it; his bonds were removed, and a mob escorted him home, huzzaing until they were hoarse. Host Hind told me that Tunstall and his clerk were fearfully stung, and in no small danger. "His head's near as big as his belly," said Hind of the commissioner. About him I had no concern, but much about poor Jack, who would be horribly punished, doubtless, if he were caught. And, besides, I felt some curiosity. I found Jack in his one-roomed hovel at the south end of the town, with a quantity of articles spread out on the clay floor: a pair of cleat boards, a leather bottle, a whittle, coils of wire and band, a ball of worsted string, fish-hooks, corks, cross-bow, a few cakes of black bread, and other things, some of which he was in process of transferring to his many and capacious pockets.

"I'm going to my hunting-lodge on Thorne moors," said he, with perfect gravity.

"A little money may be of use," I said, tendering some.

"No, thank you, Mester Frank," he replied. "I'm not likely to want any. There's a plenty of hares, rabbits, moor-fowl, fish, eggs on my estate."

Jack's confidence was well grounded, I knew, as he had the utmost skill in placing a snare for a rabbit, snickling a pike, or luring a bird within shot.

"Do you mind telling me how you came to put a wasp's nest into the squire's portmanteau, Jack?"

"All a mistake through being deep in thought, Mester Frank."

"How so?"

"Coming down the drive, I see a wasp-hole in the bank. And I wanted wasp-grub for bait. So I clodded the hole, and pulled the nest out, you see."

"But you didn't want live wasps, Jack."

"Live wasps are very good for dibbing, Mester Frank, if you know how to handle 'em. But, being deep in thought, I put the nest into Squire's porkmankle instead of into my handkerchief. And I forgot the nest when I put the porkmankle down, and give it a shake, through being so deep in thought."

"But what were you thinking about so deeply?"

"Tryin to puzzle it out why the pot-bellied man called me a fool."

And Jack looked as if the question still perplexed him.

"Fool, or no fool, Jack, you have done what none of the rest of us had the wit or pluck to do. But he will kill you, if ever he gets well enough to do it."

"If I live till he kills me, I shall be a very old man," Jack replied, with immense scornfulness.

He had now stowed away his properties, some in his pockets, and some in a sack, which he slung over his shoulder, and stood ready for flight. We shook hands, and he said—

"Luke Barnby knows the way to my lodge."

Desirous as I was to return to the vicarage, it took me a long time to do so, for everybody was in the main street, talking and laughing over the sudden break-up of the meeting summoned by the commissioner. Here I met one who had not been present, and wished to hear my account of the affair; there another, who had been present, and wanted to go over it again. A knot of young fellows dragged me into the White Hart, where they drank Daft Jack's health, and the health of the man who had "put him up to the trick." For no reason they had given me the credit of the device, nor did my plain denial quite remove their belief that I had a hand in the business. At last I got away from them, and found all quiet at the vicarage.

It had been agreed to act on the suggestion of the chief constable the following day, and he had engaged to protect the house during the night. Anna, as I had come to name her to myself, had recovered from the shock of the previous evening, and looked charming even with a cross of plaister on her brow. After I had told the true and full story of Daft Jack's achievement, the doctor and the parson prosed alternately, the one describing all the venomous insects known to man, I should think; the other giving instances from history, sacred and profane, of their intervention in human affairs, and seeming to have pleasure in recounting the torture inflicted on an unlucky wight, whose name I forget, by an enemy who had him smeared with honey, and exposed to the stings of bees and wasps. The vicar was too good a Christian to rejoice in the sufferings of the commissioner, but I am sure he got some kind of consolation in the very particular description which he made of the torments of the other man.

Anna was unusually silent, which I hoped might be due to the same thought as kept me so, that of the parting to come on the morrow. I noted with secret delight that the songs she chose, when she went to the spinet at my request, were tinged with a sweet melancholy, which might be that of love.