My first thought, when Muriel had announced to me the coming of the pursuivants in search of Mistress Ward, was to thank God she was beyond their reach, and with so much prudence had left us in ignorance of her abode. Then making haste to dress—for I apprehended these officers should visit every chamber in the house—I quickly repaired to my aunt's room, who was persuaded by Muriel that they had sent for to take an inventory of the furniture, which she said was a very commendable thing to do, but she wished they had waited until such time as she had had her breakfast. By an especial mercy, it so happened that these officers—or, leastways, two out of three of them—were quiet, well-disposed men, who exercised their office with as much mildness as could be hoped for, and rather diminished by their behavior than in any way increased the hardships of this invasion of domestic privacy. We were all in turns questioned touching Mistress Ward's abode except my aunt, whose mental infirmity was pleaded for to exempt her from this ordeal. The one officer who was churlish said, "If the lady's mind be unsound, 'tis most like she will let the cat out of the bag," and would have forced questions on her; but the others forcibly restrained him from it, and likewise from openly insulting us, when we denied all knowledge of the place she had resorted to. Howsoever, he vented his displeasure in scornful looks and cutting speeches. They carried away sundry prayer-books, and notably the "Spiritual Combat," which Mrs. Engerfield had gifted me with, when I slept at her house at Northampton, the loss of which grieved me not a little, but yet not so much as it would have done at another time, for my thoughts were then wholly set on discovering who had betrayed Mistress Ward's intervention, and what had been Mr. Watson's fate, and if Basil also had been implicated. I addressed myself to the most seemly of the three men, and asked him what her offence had been.
"She assisted," he answered, "in the escape of a prisoner from Bridewell."
"In what manner?" I said, with so much of indifferency as I could assume.
"By the smuggling of a rope into his cell," he answered, "which was found yet hanging unto his window, and which none other than that pestilent woman could have furnished him with."
Alas! this was what I feared would happen, when she first formed this project; but she had assured us Mr. Watson would let himself down, holding the two ends of the cord in his hands, and so would be enabled to carry it away with him after he had got down, and so it would never be discovered by what means he had made his escape.
"And this prisoner hath then escaped?" I said, in a careless manner.
"Marry, out of one cage," he answered; "but I'll warrant you he is by this time lodged in a more safe dungeon, and with such bracelets on his hands and feet as shall not suffer him again to cheat the gallows."
I dared not question him further; [{456}] and finding nothing more to their purpose, the pursuivants retired.
When Mr. Congleton, Muriel, and I afterward met in the parlor, none of us seemed disposed to speak. There be times when grief is loquacious, but others when the weight of apprehension doth check speech. At last I broke this silence by such words as "What should now be done?" and "How can we learn what hath occurred?"
Then Mr. Congleton turned toward me, and with much gravity and unusual vehemency,