But still I could hear cries and shouts following us, and that word of evil omen, "The spies! the spies!" and I wondered whether we should be able to escape them after all, when we suddenly dived down a dark entry, and were brought up short by a house that stood at the end, blocking all egress, and as it were enclosing us in a trap.
"Heaven help us, we are lost!" I cried in despair, realizing that to return the way we had come would probably throw us into the very arms of our pursuers, who had scattered hither and thither, and could be heard coming nearer and nearer. My lord spoke no word, being indeed past speech, but I saw his hand go to the hilt of his sword, which he still wore, and I knew that he at least would sell his life dearly. But then all of a sudden a door behind us opened cautiously, and a woman looked out.
"Come in, come in quick!" she said. "This way! along this passage—mind the holes in the floor—and up yon stair. Go up and up and up to the top, and out upon the leads. There's an open trap; but ye can shut and bolt it, and give yourselves a few moments' grace. There's a mile of leads up there, and spouts and gutters leading from place to place. I'll keep them here in parley as long as I can. Hide yourselves somewhere in the holes or behind the chimney-stacks. Men have hidden away there before now and escaped. If ye be from Monmouth's army, ye shall not die in Bristol town if Jenny can save you."
"Heaven reward you!" I cried, as I darted along the passage and up the stairs, my lord after me; but he paused to ask the woman if she ran no risk herself ere he would go (which shows the difference there is between gentle blood and blood like mine; for I thought only of my own skin, whilst he had thought to spare for her), and I heard her words come clear and mocking,—
"They shan't hurt me—nay, not a bit of it! I'm too well known for that. Not a man of them would lay a hand on old Jenny; and I'll say I was knocked down by a pair of insolent, swaggering fellows, who have made their way out of yon window at the back. Some will go up to the leads for all that, but some will stay below and search the courts behind. I know the ways of them; and if there be but two or three to follow you, slay them one by one as they slip and scramble over the roofs. Oh, it is rare sport, it is rare sport! I have seen the likes of it before."
The woman's uncouth speech and mocking laugh baffle description. I almost shuddered at her words whilst hurrying up the rotten stairs and pushing open the trap-door at the top. The next minute we were both out in the free air upon the leads, with the fading glow of the fire very near at hand; and we bolted down the trap and made it as firm as we could before we spoke a word.
"At least we have a chance of our lives now, Dicon," said my lord; "and if we have to lay them down, we will at least sell them as dearly as may be."
He drew his sword half out of its sheath, and his eyes glittered in the glow of the fire. I felt a curious thrill run through me as I heard and saw him, and I felt that to-night I was to receive my baptism of blood.