The Noble Rogue

by Baroness Emmuska Orczy Orczy

Master Daniel Pye had certainly thought it wiser—after that precipitous exit from the master tailor's house—to watch and to await events. He had been wholly taken by surprise at M. Legros' reception of his news, and staggered at the thought that where he had sought a patron, or at least an ally, he had found an active enemy.

He soon learned that preparations were being actively pushed forward in the house of the Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie for the journey of the master and his daughter to England. Pye and his interpreter, therefore, well-disguised and travelling as the poorest of men in the wake of their betters, reached Dover by the same packet boat that had brought the Legros hither. While the latter took rest at a small hostelry in the town, awaiting the day when a stage-coach would take them to London, Pye made his way straight to the great city, using what humble conveyances he contrived to hire for some portions of the road.

The yard of Savage's Bell Inn near Lud Gate was the halting place of the stage-coach from Dover, and thither Pye repaired on those afternoons—three days in the week—when a complement of voyagers from France were expected. It was quite simple, and within forty-eight hours Pye found his patience rewarded and his worst fears justified. The good tailor had obviously come to London in order to warn Lord Stowmaries of the mischief that was brewing against him.

Fortunately Pye had his false information against my lord ready, even before he had set out for Paris. His friend, the Huguenot clerk, had writ out the deposition in a good round hand, and Daniel Pye had sworn to it before a commissioner. All he had to do now was to lodge it with Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey, who had already received the sworn depositions of Titus Oates and of Tongue.

Lord Stowmaries' name also figured on the Oates indictment as one of those who were said to have been present at the famous "consult" whereat the Duke of York was offered the crown of England by the Catholic peers of this realm at the express desire of the Pope of Rome.

Daniel Pye had incontinently sworn to everything that had been asked of him. He pretended a close intimacy with my lord of Stowmaries, and was prepared to take all the solemn oaths that were required to the effect that he had overheard my lord express loudly every kind of treasonable wish—notably that of seeing the king duly poisoned by his physician.

But for all these false accusations, Pye presently discovered that he could only get about £20 as a reward, and that only if the indictment was proved on evidence. The commissioners had already told him that in order to bring his accusations home it were better that another witness came forward to swear to the same story. This is where the help of the French tailor or of the wench would have been so useful for—as luck and his own eagerness would have it—Pye had declared in his original affidavit that he had overheard my lord Stowmaries' treasonable conversations at a hostelry in Paris.

Pye had thought thereby to give more verisimilitude to his story, and even Master Tongue had approved of this plan, when he heard the man declaring emphatically that the tailor's daughter would only be too ready to swear away the life of the man whom she must hate with all the bitter sense of an overwhelming wrong.

Thus therefore did the accusation stand. Master Daniel Pye had sworn that when he was at the hostelry of the "Rat Mort," in Paris, on April 19th of this same year of grace, he had overheard my lord of Stowmaries talking—with one of the ministers of the King of France—of the terms of a treaty whereby the Papist peers of England would acclaim the Duke of York as King of England and vassal of the Pope, and receive a subsidy of five million livres from King Louis for their pains.

It was indeed a splendid story. No wonder that Master Pye was over-pleased with it; he had added the final touch of apparent truth to it by stating that M. Legros—a French subject—and his daughter—the reputed and repudiated wife of the accused—were also present at the "Rat Mort" on that occasion and had also overheard this conversation, and would testify as to the verity thereof.