And in hearing the Knight speak thus, I was more sure, even than when Will Wiseman had been whispering to me, that some unwonted peril was at hand.
I saw that Mistress Mary Mead's eyes had kindled as she heard these words. I read the thought of her heart as well as if it had been spoken in words. The younger Mistress Mary turned and flung her arms about her neck ere she slipped from her palfrey, and I heard her whisper in her friend's ear,—
"It is coming, Mary, it is coming! Heaven send that the cause of right and truth may be victorious! Come what may, nothing shall sever our friendship."
Sir Ralph had already mounted, and after saluting Mistress Mary Mead with courteous good-will, he set spurs to his horse and went clattering down the Fore Street towards North Street with his daughter beside him. I escorted Mistress Mary to her own door and assisted her to alight, and as I did so she said in trembling accents, though it was not fear that made her voice to shake,—
"Go, Dicon, and learn the truth of all this, and bring me word to my balcony to-night. My heart tells me that the deliverer is near. There were fear and anxiety upon the face of Sir Ralph; I am very sure of that. The servants of the tyrant are trembling already. We are thrice armed who know our quarrel just."
With that she turned and went quickly indoors, leaving me with my heart in a flutter of expectation as I led the palfrey to the stable. Will was already there, unable to keep away, and full of the most intense excitement as to what had just transpired.
It seemed that Captain William Speke (the only member of the Speke family who took the contrary side from the master of White Lackington and head of the family) had made a raid on the post-bags at Ilminster—having had notice that suspicious signs had been noted amongst the dissenters of the Western Counties—and had made discoveries which had caused him to send in all haste to the Mayor to counsel him to do likewise. All the Taunton letters, however, had been delivered save eight; but one of these eight, addressed to a certain Mr. Cooke, a good friend of ours, had proved of so incriminating a nature that he was at once summoned before the Mayor and magistrates, and obliged to enter into recognizances for a thousand pounds, and find sureties three in number for five hundred each. Mr. Simpson, Mr. Hucker, and Mr. Herring had willingly come forward for this purpose; and Will told me that they and the Hewlings had gathered in conclave immediately afterwards, and that one of the brothers Hewling had already left the town, though upon what errand he did not know.
"And what was in the letter?" I asked eagerly.
"Marry, that I cannot tell you in full. But this much is in all men's mouths, that it spake of the appearance forthwith in the West of a certain person, and that all the Court party in London are in a most dreadful fear and confusion. It is rumoured, too, that in Scotland the Earl of Argyll is destroying the King's forces right and left. Ah, Dicon, Dicon! With a Monmouth in the south and an Argyll in the north, what may not be done in the cause of liberty and right!"