The steward, after thus relieving his mind from all anxiety respecting the dress, proceeded to the sign of the Mitre in Silver Girdle-street, a well known resort for certain useful adjuncts to the courts of law.
Calverley entered the Mitre, and, after calling for some wine, was shown into a little private room by the host. A few minutes after, the door opened, and a man entered and took his seat at the end of the table at which Calverley was sitting. The individual who thus invaded the privacy of the steward was a man not much above the middle height. His face had once been comely, but a close intimacy with the bottle had given to his countenance a bloated and somewhat revolting expression. The latter peculiarity, however, was only to be detected by the few who read the heart in the "human face divine;" and even these might be deceived into a prepossession favourable to the man; for his large, full, blue eyes, beamed with much apparent benevolence, and his nose, though clothed in a fiery mantle and tipped with two large carbuncles, was not a nose that Lavater himself could with conscience have objected to. Large, black, whiskers, and thick, bushy, hair, with a beard of the same hue, had given him the characteristic soubriquet of Black Jack. On the whole his appearance and deportment were those of a respectable burgher of the period. This man was not a stranger to Calverley, and Black Jack was, by some chance, still better acquainted with the person and character of the steward. He had heard every particular relative to the child's death, and consequently divined the motive of the steward's visit to the Mitre, and, as he now and then cast a keen glance at Calverley, he might be likened to the author of evil contemplating a man about to engage in some heinous offence, the commission of which would connect them in still closer affinity.
A flaggon of ale soon followed Black Jack, in which he drank Calverley's health with the familiarity of an old acquaintance, though this was the first time he had interchanged courtesies with the steward, who returned the compliment coldly, though not in that repulsive tone which forbids further intimacy.
A pause of a few minutes ensued, and though each was anxious to introduce some allusion to the intended trial, yet both hesitated to begin;—Calverley, from a prudential fear of committing himself, and Black Jack from an apprehension of hazarding a chance of employment by too ready a proffer of his services.
The latter became tired first of his reserve, and perceiving that Calverley, like a spirit, would only speak when spoken to, resolved, with characteristic modesty, to plunge in medias res.
"Master," said he, "you are here, no doubt, on the business of the witch? For my part, I hold such creatures in religious abhorrence. That's neither here nor there, however—can I do anything to serve you?—That is the short of the matter."
"Master Oakley," replied the steward, with a grim smile which told he knew his man, "you have correctly surmised the business that brings Lord de Boteler's steward to the Mitre—you know the particulars of the affair?"
"I do."
"Well," resumed Calverley, "the evidence is not so good as I could wish. A country jury might acquit her."
"Aye, aye, I see—it shall be done—she returns no more to Winchcombe——"