“The Seigneur of St. Ouen’s,” was the reply.
“My compliments to the Seigneur of St. Ouen’s, and tell him that Buonespoir is my guest,” he bellowed, and strode on, the halberdiers following. Suddenly the seigneur swerved towards the chapel and quickened his footsteps, the others but a step behind. The sergeant of the halberdiers was in a quandary. He longed to shoot, but dared not, and while he was making up his mind what to do the seigneur had reached the chapel door. Opening it, he quickly pushed Buonespoir and Abednego inside, whispering to them, then slammed the door and put his back against it.
There was another moment’s hesitation on the sergeant’s part, then a door at the other end of the chapel was heard to open and shut, and the seigneur laughed loudly. The halberdiers ran round the chapel. There stood Buonespoir and Abednego in a narrow road-way, motionless and unconcerned. The halberdiers rushed forward.
“Perquage! Perquage! Perquage!” shouted Buonespoir, and the bright moonlight showed him grinning.
For an instant there was deadly stillness, in which the approaching footsteps of the seigneur sounded loud.
“Perquage!” Buonespoir repeated.
“Perquage! Fall back!” said the seigneur, and waved off the pikes of the halberdiers. “He has sanctuary to the sea.”
This narrow road in which the pirates stood was the last of three in the Isle of Jersey, running from churches to the sea, in which a criminal was safe from arrest by virtue of an old statute. The other perquages had been taken away, but this one of Rozel remained, a concession made by Henry VIII. to the father of this Raoul Lemprière. The privilege had been used but once in the present seigneur’s day, because the criminal must be put upon the road from the chapel by the seigneur himself, and he had used his privilege modestly.
No man in Jersey but knew the sacredness of this perquage, though it was ten years since it had been used; and no man, not even the governor himself, dare lift his hand to one upon that road.