"But will he?" said Master Bertie pointedly, disregarding the threatening looks which were cast at him by more than one. "The late rebellion there was put down very summarily, and I should have thought that countryside would not be prone to rise again. Will Lord Delaware rise?"
"Oh, yes, he will rise fast enough!" Penruddocke replied carelessly. "I will answer for him. And on the same day, while we do the London business, Sir Richard Bray will gather his men in Kent."
"Do not count on him!" said Master Bertie. "A prisoner, muffled and hoodwinked, was taken to the Tower by water this afternoon. And rumor says it was Sir Richard Bray."
There was a pause of consternation, during which one looked at another, and swarthy faces grew pale. Penruddocke was the first to recover himself. "Bah!" he exclaimed, "a fig for rumor! She is ever a lying jade! I will bet a noble Richard Bray is supping in his own house at this minute."
"Then you would lose," Master Bertie rejoined sadly, and with no show of triumph. "On hearing the report I sent a messenger to Sir Richard's house. He brought word back that Sir Richard Bray had been fetched away unexpectedly by four men, and that the house was in confusion."
A murmur of dismay broke out at the lower end of the table. But the Cornishman rose to the situation. "What matter?" he cried boisterously. "What we have lost in Bray we have gained in Master Bertie. He will raise Lincolnshire for us, and the Duchess's tenants. There should be five hundred stout men of the latter, and two-thirds of them Protestants at heart. If Bray has been seized there is the more call for haste that we may release him."
This appeal was answered by an outburst of cries. One or two even rose, and waving their weapons swore a speedy vengeance. But Master Bertie sat silent until the noise had subsided. Then he spoke. "You must not count on them either, Sir Thomas," he said firmly. "I cannot find it in my conscience to bring my wife's tenants into a plan so desperate as this appears to be. To appeal to the people generally is one thing; to call on those who are bound to us and who cannot in honor refuse is another. And I will not risk in a hopeless struggle the lives of men whose fathers looked for guidance to me and mine."
A silence, the silence of utter astonishment, fell upon the plotters round the table. In every face--and they were all turned upon my companion--I read rage and distrust and dismay. They had chafed under his cold criticisms and his calm reasonings. But this went beyond all, and there were hands which stole instinctively to daggers, and eyes which waited scowling for a signal. But Penruddocke, sanguine by nature and rendered reckless by circumstances, had still the feelings of a gentleman, and something in him responded to the appeal which underlay Master Bertie's words. He remained silent, gazing gloomily at the table, his eyes perhaps opened at this late hour to the hopelessness of the attempt he meditated.
It was Walter Kingston who came to the fore, and put into words the thoughts of the coarser and more selfish spirits round him. Leaping from his seat he dashed his slender hand on the table. "What does this mean?" he sneered, a dangerous light in his dark eyes. "Those only are here or should be here who are willing to stake all--all, mind you--on the cause. Let us have no sneaks! Let us have no men with a foot on either bank! Let us have no Courtenays nor cowards! Such men ruined Wyatt and hanged my brother! A curse on them!" he cried, his voice rising almost to a scream.
"Master Kingston! do you refer to me?" Bertie rejoined in haughty surprise.