But they were all so cluttered with their fears and their excitement that not one of them but believed I spoke the truth.
"Lord, how savage he knocks!" says a wench, with a shiver, and lays hold of a lackey's arm.
I went down to the door, and upon the first lifting of the latch they popped away like rabbits in a warren. There, sure enough, was his lordship, in a mighty trepidation and with an ugly scowl.
"Come in," says I, in a whisper; "the Prince was abed, but will see you at once, my lord."
He came over the threshold, and—clap—I shut the door behind him; and when that was done I breathed more freely, for I knew that I was secure in my game. The Chief Justice, looking very fine and stately, advanced down the solitary hall, emerging under the dim light; and then, all of a sudden a hassock came rustling through the air and took him in the belly. Over he went with a little gasp, and measured his length upon the floor. Upon that leaps out my friend Jenkins with his warming-pan, and bestriding his lordship's back, sets to belabouring for dear life. Immediately after, and encouraged by this, others of the lackeys sprang forth and fell to maltreating the poor cully where he lay.
"Take that, you lousy knave, you?" says one fat wench, and turns over him a kitchen utensil of some kind.
"Let me scratch his eyes!" cries another; and Lord love you, what with their exclamations and the screaming, to say nothing of the noise of Jenkins's warming-pan and his lordship's angry oaths, you would have thought that Bedlam was broke loose.
But in the midst of it all I caught suddenly a sound of horses' hoofs upon the gravel, and on the top of that came a hammering at the door. I am no fool to outstay my welcome and so thinks I that the time is come, and seizing a light that stood near by I made straight through the midst of that uproar and plunged into the nether darkness of the house. Here, by picking my way through divers passages, I presently came forth by a side door and passed out into the night. A shrill whistle in the old way fetched Calypso to me whinnying, and as I put my hand upon her bridle I turned back and listened. There was that pandemonium still within the hall, reaching me faintly through the open doorway, and the escort was still hammering on the hall door. Then I leaped into the saddle and turned the mare's nose down a side track in the park, and the last I heard as I rode off, chuckling to myself, was the noise of the escort pounding on the door.