“Poor cat!” said Robin; yet he laughed.
“Nay, I know not that they killed the cat o’ purpose,” said Dr Thorpe. “They may have taken a dead one.”
“But what say the folk thereto?” asked Isoult.
“Some laugh,” he answered, “and some rail, and some look mighty solemn. Underhill was jolly pleased therewith; it served his turn rightly. I met him on my way home, and he asked me first thing if I had seen Sir Cat.”
“I warrant you,” said John, “’tis a piece of his work, or else of George Ferris. Mind you not how he told us the tale of his (Underhill) stealing the copper pix from the altar at Stratford on the Bow? I will be bound one of those merry twain hath done it.”
“Little unlike,” said Dr Thorpe.
Proclamation was made of a reward of twenty nobles, increased afterward to twenty marks, to find the irreverent hanger up of the cat, but in vain. It was never discovered who did it. On Cantate Sunday—April 22—Mr Rose preached at Mr Sheerson’s house in Bow Churchyard. John and Isoult were there, with Esther, Thekla, and Robin. After service (for they were late, and it was beginning when they entered), Mr Rose came to them, and, after a few minutes’ conversation, asked if they had heard the news from Oxford.
“Nay,” said John, “is there so?”
“The sorest we might well have,” he answered. “My Lord Archbishop, Dr Ridley, and Mr Latimer, be all three cast for death.”
Such a cry broke from Isoult, that some turned to look at her, and Mrs Holland came up and asked if she was ill, or what was the matter.