At that moment he felt his right hand strongly grasped and seemingly fettered, as a chain was thrown round his wrist. He attempted to withdraw, but was firmly held.
"Murielle!" he exclaimed, in astonishment. There was a mocking laugh, and as the hood fell off, his eyes met those of James Achanna, glittering far apart like those of a huge bird.
"Pray to St. Simon that he may lend you his saw, or to St. Jude for his club, to break this fetter," said Achanna, as he secured the chain to an iron staple in the window-sill; "but the flames will be here, hot and red, before either of them," he added, suddenly brandishing a lighted torch, in the bright glare of which his flushed face and protruding green eyes now resembled those of a devil. Astonishment and rage trebled the great natural strength of Gray. He grasped Achanna by the throat with his left hand, and though the would-be assassin strove to free himself, by savagely thrusting the blazing torch in the face of his victim, the latter dragged him over the window: down they came, battling together—the chain and staple parted, and the two enemies fell crash through the frail arbour, upon the heap of combustibles below. These, by their previous preparation, the torch ignited in a moment. A fiery blaze at once lit all the garden, while Sir Patrick Gray and Achanna rolled over each over, struggling to get at their daggers, each to despatch his antagonist.
Achanna was below and Gray above, and as the dagger was worn far back on the right side in those days, the first could by no means get at his weapon, as it was completely under him. Gray's strong left hand clutched his throat with deadly tenacity, and his chest was also crushed; but Gray searched in vain for his dagger. It had dropped from his belt in their fall, and his sword was broken in three places by the same circumstance, but with the heavy hilt and a fragment of the blade which adhered to it, he rained a torrent of blows upon the head and face of his adversary, whom he resolved to despatch as he would have done a snake, or a viper, for it was now a combat to the death between them.
All this terrible episode occurred in a few moments, and Gray in his fury, would inevitably have destroyed Achanna, had there not rushed from the house, the earl of Douglas, the lairds of Pompherston, Glendoning, and Cairnglas, with Sir Alan Lauder, and several other persons, some of whom were in their breeches and shirts, others in helmets and cuirasses; but all with torches or candles, and drawn swords.
Fortunately for Gray, twelve soldiers of the burgher guard, whom the uproar had alarmed, came up at the same moment, with their ponderous Flemish partizans, or our story and his life had ended there together, for the Douglases would infallibly have cut him to pieces.
Intent now on escaping, and preserving both his life and his incognito, Gray fought with the vigour of despair. Wrenching a partizan from a Waloon soldier, he struck right and left to hew a passage through his assailants. He knocked down Douglas of Pompherston, and severely wounded two of the night watch, by piercing their cuirasses of boiled bull-hide; but being pressed furiously by their comrades, he was soon beaten to the ground, disarmed, dragged away through the streets, and carried to the castle of Bommel, where he was thrust into a common dungeon and left to his own reflections, which were neither very lucid nor lively.
His horses, his leathern mail or portmanteau, and papers became the spoil of the Douglases; his rich cassock coat, the gift of Duke Arnold, and the ring which he was commissioned by Katharine, the duchess of Gueldres, to convey to the young king, her future son-in-law, became the prey of James Achanna, who openly appropriated and wore both, and whom the earl sent to Messire Jacques de Lalain, the Dyck Graf, to request that Gray, "as a notorious outlaw and consorter with Ludwig of Endhoven, should be broken alive upon the wheel, by noon next day."
All his papers were gone; thus he could afford no written or satisfactory account of himself, and obstinately refused to say what object brought him into conflict with Achanna, as he was determined that the name of Murielle—his wife—should not be compromised, even in a foreign country.
It was soon known and proved by the evidence of the officious and now terrified keeper of the hostelry, at which he lately lodged, that he had assumed at times, if not constantly, the dress and character of a Muscovite merchant.