Patricia at the inn

by J. C. Snaith

In the mad frenzy of her fear she suddenly rose to her feet, with all the blood quivering and sparkling now in her cheeks. The landlord admitted to himself, even as he tortured her, that there never was so perfectly noble, so perfectly magnificent a creature as this wretched lady. But when she flung back her cloak to lend the prayer of her motherhood an additional emphasis, he laughed in her face.

It was more than the woman could endure; the last appeal of her sex had been despised. The shame and the agony overcame her; she sank senseless to the kitchen floor.

The landlord, by a deft use of cordials and cold water, brought her to her senses very soon.

“Mercy, mercy!” she moaned as her eyes came open.

The landlord, deeming that the comedy had gone far enough for that night at least, thought it time he appeared in his true character. He exchanged the formal tone he had used when he spoke of doing his duty, for one more natural to him.

“You shall purchase a day’s respite, madam,” he said, in a brisk voice of business, “on one condition.”

The woman’s heart leapt in her side.

“Take that ring of sapphires off your finger, madam, and place it in my hand. On that condition, I will undertake not to lodge an information against your husband during the next twenty-four hours.”

The woman plucked off the ring eagerly, and, giving it to the landlord, thanked him with eyes that shone far more bravely than the jewels that she gave away. In the security of the short respite she had purchased, she went upstairs to the chamber of her stricken lord. It was almost less than nothing; yet, after all, there was one day more left to her in which she might struggle wildly for her husband’s safety.

The landlord had no desire to return to his couch. He was too excited by the strange events of the night, and too eager to meditate upon what manner they affected him, and the nature of the mystery he had been confronted with, to have any hope of going to sleep. Therefore he rekindled the fire, brewed himself a posset, charged his long pipe with tobacco, and sat down to reflection. He was hugely pleased with his own conduct of the last half-hour. The woman was entirely at his mercy. He would be able to wring her jewels and money from her with ridiculous ease; whilst at the eleventh hour, when all their portable possessions had become his own, he would still be able to save his reputation by giving them over to Cromwell’s men. He gazed tenderly on the bright jewel in his hand. He amused himself by computing the value of the stones within it, and figuring out in his mind what he stood to gain. These were brave times indeed! Why, he had already earned more during that last half-hour than in a year of quiet, jog-trot trading. And this was, doubtless, nothing to the wealth they had upstairs. He only hoped the soldiers would not return and discover their owners, ere he could take them for himself. But Master Gamaliel was not without a certain confidence in his own acquisitiveness; he shrewdly suspected that in any case they were doomed to lodge in his custody. Oh, if the King would only come his way as well!