But when this talk had mostly died down, and when already twilight had long fallen, the Bishop said—
'Come, let us visit this new tennis place of mine. I think I shall show you somewhat that you have not before seen.'
He bade, however, his gentlemen and priests to stay where they were, for they had all many times seen the court or building. When he led the way, prelatical and black, for the Duke and Wriothesley, into the lower corridors of his house, the priests and young gentlemen bowed behind his back, one at the other.
In the courtyard there were four hounds of a heavy and stocky breed that came bounding and baying all round them, so that it was only by vigilance that Gardiner could save Wriothesley's shins, for he was a man that all dogs and children hated.
'Sirs,' the Bishop said, 'these dogs that ye see and hear will let no man but me—not even my grooms or stablemen—pass this yard. I have bred them to that so I may be secret when I will.'
He set the key in the door that was in the bottom wall of the court.
'There is no other door here save that which goes into the stable where the grille is. There I have a door to enter and fetch out the balls that pass there.'
In the court itself it was absolute blackness.
'I trow we may talk very well without lights,' he said. 'Come into this far corner.'
Yet, though there was no fear of being overheard, each of these three stole almost on tiptoe and held his breath, and in the dark and shadowy place they made a more dark and more shadowy patch with their heads all close together.