When Bates arrived at Coughton, he was taken at once to Father Garnet, who was in the hall,[286] and he handed the letter to the priest, who opened it and read it in silence.
I will give Father Garnet’s own description[287] of this letter, which “was subscribed by Sir E. Digby and Catesbye.”“The effect of this letter was to excuse their rashness, and required my assistance in Wales, and persuade me to make a party, saying that if I had scrupulosity or desire to free myself or my Order from blame and let them now perish, I should follow after myselfe and all Catholics.”
While Father Garnet was reading the letter, Father Greenway came in and asked what was the matter. Thereupon Father Garnet read the letter in the hearing of Bates, and said to Greenway, “They would have blown up the Parliament House, and were discovered and we all utterly undone.”Father Greenway replied that in that case “there was no tarrying for himself and Garnet.”Then Bates begged Father Greenway to go with him to Catesby, his master, if he really wished to help him. Father Greenway answered that he “would not forbear to go unto him though it were to suffer a thousand deaths, but that it would overthrow the state of the whole society of the Jesuits’ order.”
When Father Garnet had read the letter to Father Greenway, the latter exclaimed, “All Catholics are undone.”
Father Garnet, in an intercepted letter, gives a pathetic account of the effect of her husband’s letter upon Lady Digby.[288] “My Lady Digby came. What did she? Alas! what, but cry.”
He tells us, too, the answer which he gave to the messenger, Bates. “That I marvelled they would enter into such wicked actions and not be ruled by the advice of friends and order of His Holiness generally given to all, and that I could not meddle but wished them to give over, and if I could do anything in such a matter (as I neither could nor would) it were in vain now to attempt it.”
Then the two fathers drew aside and talked together for half-an-hour, while Bates walked up and down the hall. After this, Father Greenway went to prepare himself for his journey, and presently came out with Bates, mounted a horse, and rode with him to Huddington in order to see his penitent, Catesby.
Father Greenway’s riding companion was not only one of the conspirators, but had helped[289] “in making provision of their powder.” He confessed in prison the whole matter of his having been sent by Catesby, his master, with a letter to Father Garnet at Coughton, and that Father Greenway had accompanied him from that house to Huddington in order to visit Catesby.
We must return to Sir Everard, as he rode from Alcester to Huddington. One of his servants, named Hardy, came up to him, during this part of his journey, and asked him[290] what was to become “of him and the rest of his poore servants,”who, as he pitifully protested, had not been “privy to this bloudy faction.”Such a question, although it did not savour of mutiny, showed an inclination to defection, and must have added considerably to his master’s discouragement. The answer which he gave to it was as follows:—“I believe you were not;”i.e., privy to the plot; “but now there is no remedy.”The servant then let out that it was not solely on his own account that he had asked the question; for he went on to implore his master to yield himself to the king’s mercy; whereupon Sir Everard said sharply that he would permit no servant to utter such words in his presence.
Catesby and his band of warriors, brigands, horse-stealers, professors of physical force, or whatever else the reader may please to call them, reached Huddington about two o’clock on the Wednesday afternoon.[291] The first thing they did was to place sentinels round the house,[292] which was rendered suitable for defence by its moat.[293] Then they proceeded to take their first long rest, that is to say, until early on the following morning, a sorely needed period of refreshment and repose, especially for those who had ridden the whole way from London. Where so large a party can have been entertained and lodged at Huddington, it is difficult to understand, as the house, which is now used as a farm, rich as it is in carved oak, is not, and probably never was, a large one.