House of Torment

Sir John Shelton put down his tankard with a crash.

"My friend," he said, "doth not know that His Grace of London did curse this heretic? I myself was there and heard it."

The ruffian lifted his tankard of wine to his lips, and took a long draught. His face was growing red, his eyes twinkled with half-drunken cunning and suspicion.

"Aye," he cried, "I heard it – 'And by the authority of God the Father Almighty, and of the Blessed Virgin Mary, of St. Peter and Paul, and of the Holy Saints, we excommunicate, we utterly curse and ban, commit and deliver to the Devil of hell, ye that have in spite of God and of St. Peter, whose Church this is, in spite of holy saints, and in spite of our most Holy Father the Pope, God's Vicar here on earth, denied the truths of Holy Church. Accursed may ye be, and give body and soul to the Devil. We give ye over utterly to the power of the Fiend, and thy soul when thou art dead shall lie this night in the pains of hell-fire, as this candle is now quenched and put out.'"

As he finished, Sir John knocked over a tall glass cruet of French vinegar, and stared with increasing drunkenness at his host.

Mr. Lacel, simple gentleman that he was, was obviously disgusted at his guest. He said very little, however, seeing that the man was somewhat gone in liquor, as Johnnie also realised that the stale potations of the night before were wakened by the new drink, and rising up into Shelton's brain.

"Well, well, Sir John," Mr. Lacel replied, "I am no theologian, but I am a good son of the Church, and have always been, as you and those at Court – those in high places, Sir John," he said it with a certain emphasis and spirit – "know very well."

The quiet and emphatic voice had its effect. Shelton dropped his bullying manner. He was aware, and realised that Mr. Lacel probably knew also, that he was but a glorified man-at-arms, a led captain, and not at all in the confidence of great people, nor acquainted with private affairs of State. He had been puffed up by his recent association with the King in his vile pleasures, but a clever ruffian enough, he saw now that he had gone too far.

He saw also that John Commendone was looking at him with a fixed and disdainful expression. He remembered that the young courtier was high in the good graces of the King and Queen.

"I' faith," he cried, with an entire change of manner – "I' faith, old friend Peter, I was but jesting; we all know thou art loyal to Church and State, their law. Mr. Commendone, I ask you, hast seen a more – "

Johnnie's voice cut into the man's babbling.

"Sir John," he said, "if I were you I would go upstairs and see how the Spanish gentleman doeth."

He looked very keenly, and with great meaning, at the knight.

Sir John pushed his chair from the table. "Spine of God," he cried thickly, "and I was near forgetting His Highness. I will to him at once."

He stumbled away from the table, pulled himself together, and, following Mr. Lacel's butler, who had just come into the hall, ascended the broad stairway.

Mr. Lacel looked very curiously at Johnnie.

"Sir," he said in a low voice, looking round the hall to see if any servant were within earshot, "that drunkard hath said more than he meant. I am not quite the country fool I seem to be, but least said is soonest mended. I have known Sir John Shelton for some years – a good man in the chase, a soldier, but a drunken fool withal. I know your name, and I have met your father at the Wool Exchange in London. We are both of Catholic houses, but I think none of us like what is going on now, and like to go on since" – here he dropped his voice almost to a whisper, and glanced upwards to the gallery which ran round the hall – "since Her Grace had wedded out of the kingdom. But we must say nothing. Who that gentleman upstairs is, I do not seek to know, but I tell you this, Mr. Commendone, that, heretic or none, I go to-morrow morning to Father Lacy and give him a rose-angel to say masses for the soul of a good dead friend of mine. I shall not tell him who 'tis, and he's too big a fool to ask, but – "

The old man's voice caught in his throat. He lifted his cup, and instinctively Johnnie did the same.

"Here's to him," Mr. Lacel whispered, "and to his dame, a sweet and gracious lady, and to his little lad Thomas, and the girl Mary; they have oft sat on my knee – for I am an old widower, Mr. Commendone – when I have told them the tale of the babes in the wood."

Tears were in the Sheriff's eyes, and in the eyes of the young man also, as he raised his cup to his lips and drank the sad and furtive toast.

"And here," Mr. Lacel continued, lifting his cup once more, and leaning forward over the table close to his, "and here's to Lizzie, whom dear Dr. Taylor adopted to be as his own daughter when she was but a little maid of three. Here's to Elizabeth, the sweetest girl, the most blithe companion, the daintiest, most brave little lady that ever trod the lanes of Suffolk – "

He had hardly finished speaking, and Johnnie's hand was trembling as he lifted the goblet to his lips, when there was a noise in the gallery above, and Sir John Shelton, pale of face, and followed by the butler, came noisily down the oak stairs.

The knight's manner was more than a little excited.

"Mr. Commendone," he said in a quick but conciliatory voice, "His Highness – that is to say, the Spanish gentleman – is very fatigued, and cannot ride to London to-day."

He turned to Mr. Lacel.

"Peter," he said, and his voice was now anxious and suave, the voice of a man of affairs, and with something definite to say, "Peter, I must claim your hospitality for the night for myself and for my Spanish friend. Also, I fear, for my men."

Mr. Lacel bowed. "Sir John," he said, "my poor house is very gladly at your disposal, and you may command me in all ways."

"I thank you," Sir John answered, "I thank you very much. You are doing me a service, and perhaps other people a service which – " He broke off shortly, and turned once more to Commendone. "Mr. Commendone," he said, "it is requisite that you will at once to horse with your own servant and one of my men, and ride to London – Excuse me, Peter, but I have a privy word to say to the Esquire."

He drew Johnnie aside. "You must ride post-haste to the Queen," he said, "and tell her that His Majesty is very weary or eke unwell. He will lie the night here and come to London with me in the morning, and by the Mass, Mr. Commendone, I don't envy you your commission!"

"I will go at once," Johnnie answered, looking at his watch.

"Very good, Mr. Commendone," Sir John answered. "I am not of the Privy Closet, as you know. You are in communion with Her Grace, and have been. But if all we of the guard hear is true, then I am sorry for you. Natheless, you must do it. Tell Her Grace of the burning – oh, tell her anything that commendeth itself to you, but let her not think that His Highness is upon some lover's business. And of Duck Lane not a word, not a single word, as you value your favour!"

"It is very likely, is it not, Sir John," Commendone answered, "that I should say anything of Duck Lane?"

The sneer in his voice was so pronounced that the big bully writhed uneasily.

"Surely," he replied, "you are a very pattern and model of discretion. I know it well enough, Mr. Commendone."

Johnnie made his adieux to his host.

"But what about your horses, sir?" the old gentleman asked. "As I understand it, you ride post-haste to London. Your nag will not take you there very fast after your long ride."

"I must post, that is all," Johnnie answered. "I can get a relay at Chelmsford."

"Nay, Mr. Commendone, it is not to be thought of," said the squire. "Now, look you. I have a plenty horses in my stables. There is a roan mare spoiling for work that will suit you very well. And what servants are you taking?"

Sir John Shelton broke in.

"Hadst better take thy own servant and two of my men," he said. "You will be riding back upon the way we came, and I doubt me the country folk are too friendly."

"That is easy done," said Mr. Lacel. "I can horse your yeomen also. In four days I ride myself to Westminster, where I spend a sennight with my brother, and hope to pay my duties at the Court when it moveth to Whitehall, as I hear it is about to do. The horses I shall lend you, Mr. Commendone, can be sent to my brother's, Sir Frank Lacel, of Lacel House."

"I thank you very much, sir," Johnnie answered, "you are very kind." And with that he said farewell, and in a very few minutes was riding over Aldham Common, on his way back to London.

Right in the centre of the Common there was still a large crowd of people, and he saw a farm cart with two horses standing there.

He made a wide detour, however, to get into the main road for Hadley, shrinking with a sudden horror, more poignant and more physically sickening than anything he had known before, from the last sordid and grisly details of the martyr's obsequies.

… No! Anything would be better than to see this dreadful cleaning up…

The big rawbone mare which he was riding was fresh and playful. Johnnie was a consummate horseman, and he was glad of the distraction of keeping the beast under control. She had a hard mouth, and needed all his skill.

For four or five miles, followed by his attendants at a distance of two or three hundred yards, he rode at a fast canter, now and then letting the mare stretch her legs upon the turf which bordered the rough country road. After this, when the horse began to settle down to steady work, he went on at a fast trot, but more mechanically, and thought began to be born within him again.

Until now he had seemed to be walking and moving in a dream. Even the horrors he had seen had been hardly real. Inexperienced as he was in many aspects of life, he yet knew well that the man with an imagination and sensitive nerves suffers far more in the memory of a dreadful thing than he does at the actual witnessing of it. The very violence of what he had seen done that day had deadened all the nerves, forbidding full sensation – as a man wounded in battle, or with a limb lopped off by sword or shot, is often seen looking with an amazed incredulity at himself, feeling no pain whatever for the moment.

It was now that John Commendone began to suffer. Every detail of Dr. Taylor's death etched themselves in upon his brain in a succession of pictures which burnt like fire.

As this or that detail – in colour, movement, and sound – came back to him so vividly, his heart began to drum, his eyes to fill with tears, or grow dry with horror, the palms of his hands to become wet. He lived the whole thing over again. And once more his present surroundings became dream-like, as he cantered through the lanes, and what was past became hideously, dreadfully real.

Yet, as the gallant mare bore him swiftly onwards, he realised that the horror and disgust he felt were in reality subservient to something else within him. His whole being seemed quickened, infinitely more alert, ready for action, than it had ever been before. He was like a man who had all his life been looking out upon the world through smoked or tinted glasses – very pleased and delighted with all he saw, unable to realise that there could be anything more true, more vivid.

Then, suddenly, the glass is removed. The neutral greyness which he has taken for the natural, commendable view of things, changes and falls away. The whole world is seen in an infinity of light and colour undreamed of, unexpected, wonderfully, passionately new.

It was thus with Johnnie, and the fact for some time was stunning and paralysing.

Then, as the brain adjusted itself slowly to fresh and marvellous conditions, he began to question himself.

What did it mean? What did it mean to him? What lay before?

Quite suddenly the explanation came, and he knew.

It was the face of a tall girl, who stood by St. Botolph's tower in the ghostly dawn that had done this thing. It was her voice that had rent aside the veil; it was her eyes of agony which lit up the world so differently.

With that knowledge, with the quick hammering of love at a virgin heart, there came also an enormous expectation. Till now life had been pleasant and happy. All the excitements of the past seemed but incidents in a long tranquillity.

The orchestra had finished the prelude to the play. Now the traverse was drawn aside, and action began.

As the young man realised this, and the white splendour of the full summer sun was answered by the inexpressible glow within, he realised, physically, that he was galloping madly along the road, pressing his spurs to his horse's flanks, riding with loose rein, the stirrups behind him, crouching forward upon the peaked saddle. He pulled his horse up within two or three hundred yards, though with considerable difficulty, the animal seeming, in some subtle way, to share and be part of that which was rioting within his brain.

He pulled her up, however, and she stood trembling and breathing hard, with great clots of white foam covering the rings of the bit. He soothed her, patting the strong veined neck with his hand, bringing it away from the darkening hide covered with sweat. Then, when she was a little more at ease, he slipped from the saddle and led her a few paces along the road to where in the hedge a stile was set, upon which he sat himself.

He held hold of the rein for a minute until he saw the mare begin to crop the roadside grass quietly enough, when he released her.

For a mile or more the road by which he had come stretched white and empty in the sun. There was no trace of his men. He waited there till they could come up to him.

He began to talk to himself in slow, measured terms, his own voice sounding strange in his ears, coming to them with a certain comfort. It was as though once more he had regained full command and captaincy of his own soul. There were great things to be done, he was commander of his own legions, and, like a general before a battle, he was issuing measured orders to his staff.

"So that it must be; it must be just that; I must find Elizabeth" – his subconscious brain heard with a certain surprise and wonder how the slow voice trembled at the word – "I must find Elizabeth. And then, when I have found her, I must tell her that she, and she alone, is to be my wife, and my lady ever more. I must sue and woo her, and then she must be my wife. It is that which I have to do. The Court is nothing; my service is nothing; it is Elizabeth!"

The mare raised her head, her mouth full of long sweet grass, and she looked at him with mild, brown eyes.

He rose from the stile, put his hand within his doublet, and pulled out a little crucifix of ebony, with a Christ of gold nailed to it.

He kissed it, and then, singularly heartened and resolute in mind, he mounted again, seeing, as he did so, that his men were coming up behind. He waited till they were near and then trotted off, and in an hour came to the outskirts of Chelmsford town.

It was now more than two hours after noon, and he halted with his men at the "Tun," the principal inn of the place, and adjacent to a brewery of red brick, where the famous Chelmsford ale – no less celebrated then than now – was brewed.

He rode into the courtyard of the inn, and the ostlers came hurrying up and took his horse away, while he went into the ordinary and sat down before a great round of beef.

The landlord, seeing a gentleman of quality, bustled in and carved for him – a pottle-bellied, voluble man, with something eminently kindly and human in his eye.

"From the Court, sir, I do not doubt?" he said.

Johnnie nodded.

"If I mistake not, you are one of the gentlemen who rode with the Sheriff and Dr. Rowland Taylor this morning?"

"That was I," Johnnie answered, looking keenly at the man.

"I would have wagered it was, sir. We saw the party go by early. Is the Doctor dead, sir?"

Johnnie nodded once more.

"And a very right and proper thing it is," the landlord continued, "that such should die the death."

"And why think you that, landlord?" Johnnie asked.

The landlord scratched his head, looking doubtfully at his guest.

"It is not for me to say, sir," he replied, after a moment's hesitation. "I am but a tradesman, and have no concern with affairs of State. I am a child in these things, but doubtless what was done was done very well."

Johnnie pushed away the pewter plate in front of him. "My man," he said, "you can speak freely to me. What think you in truth?"

The landlord stared at him for a moment, and then suddenly sat down at the table.

"I don't know, sir," he said, "who or what you may be. As thou art from the Court, thou art a good Catholic doubtless, or wouldst not be there, but you have an honest face, and I will tell you what I think. Under King Hal I gat me to church, and profited well thereby in that reign, for the abbey being broke up, and the friars dispersed, there was no more free beer for any rogue or masterless man to get from the buttery, aye, and others of this town with property, and well-liked men, who would drink the monks' brew free rather than pay for mine own. So, God bless King Henry, I say, who brought much custom to mine inn, being a wise prince. And now, look you, I go to Mass, and custom diminisheth not at all. I have had this inn for thirty years, my father before me for fifty; and in this inn, sir, I mean to die. It is nothing to me whether bread and wine are but bread and wine, or whether they be That which all must now believe. I am but a simple man, and let wiser than I decide, keeping always with those who must certainly know better than I. Meanwhile I shall sell my beer and bring up my family as an honest man should do – God's death! What is that?"

He started from his chair as Johnnie did likewise, for even as the man spoke a most horrid and untoward noise filled all the air.

Both men rushed to the bulging window of leaded glass, which looked out into the High Street.

There was a huge shouting, a frightful stamp and clatter as of feet and horses' hooves upon the stones, but above all there came a shrill, snarling, neighing noise, ululating with a ferocity that was not human, a vibration of rage, which was like nothing Commendone had ever heard before.

"Jesus! But what is this?" Johnnie cried, flinging open the casement, his face suddenly white with fear – so utterly outside all experience was the dreadful screeching, which now seemed a thousand times louder.

He peered out into the street and saw people rushing to the doors and windows of all the houses opposite, with faces as white and startled as his own. He looked to the right, for it was from there the pealing horror of sound was coming, but he could see nothing, because less than twenty yards away the High Street made a sudden turn at right angles towards the Market Place.

"It is some devil, certes," the landlord panted. "Apollyon must have just such a voice. What – "

The words died away upon his lips, and in a moment the two men and all the other watchers in the street knew what had happened.

With a furious stamping of hooves, round the corner of an old timbered house, leaping from the ground in ungovernable fury, and in that leaping advancing but very slowly, came a huge stallion, black as a coal, its eyes red with malice, its ears laid back over its head, the huge bull-like neck erect, and smeared with foam and blood.

Commendone had never seen such a monster; indeed, there were but few of them in England at that time – the product of Lanarkshire mares crossed with the fierce Flanders stallions, only just then introduced into England by that Earl of Arran who had been a suitor for the hand of the Princess Elizabeth.

The thing seemed hardly horse, but malignant demon rather, and with a cold chill at their hearts the landlord and his guest saw that the stallion gripped a man by one arm and shoulder, a man that was no more a man, but a limp bundle of clothes, and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat.

The bloody and evil eyes glared round on every side as the great creature heaved itself into the air, the long "feather" of silky hair about its fetlocks waving like the pennons of lances. There was a dreadful sense of display. The stallion was consciously and wickedly performing, showing what it could do in its strength of hatred – evil, sentient, malign.

It tossed the wretched man up into the air, and flung him lifeless and broken at its fore feet. And then, horror upon horror, it began to pound him, smashing, breaking, and treading out what little life remained, with an action the more dreadful and alarming in that it was one absolutely alien to the usual habits of the horse.

It stopped at last, stiffened all over, its long, wicked head stretched out like that of a pointing dog, while its eyes roved round as if in search of a new victim.

There was a dead silence in the street.

Then Johnnie saw a short, thick-set man, with a big head and a brown face, come out from the archway opposite, where he had been standing in amazement, into the full street, facing the silent, waiting beast.

Something stabbed the young man's heart strangely. It was not fear for the man; it was quite distinct from the breathless excitement and sickening wonder of the moment.

Johnnie had seen this man before.

With slow, very slow, but resolute and determined steps, the man drew nearer to the stallion.

He was within four yards of it, when it threw up its head and opened its mouth wide, showing the great glistening yellow teeth, the purple lips curling away from them, in a rictus of malignity. From the open mouth, covered with blood and foam, once more came the frightful cry, the mad challenge.

Even as that happened, the man, who carried a stout stick of ash such as drovers used, leapt at the beast and struck it full and fair upon the muzzle, a blow so swift, and so hefty withal, that the ash-plant snapped in twain and flew up into the air.

The next thing happened very swiftly. The man, who had a short cloak upon his arm, threw it over the stallion's head with a sudden movement. There was a white flash in the sunshine, as his short knife left his belt, and with one fierce blow plunged deep into the lower portion of the stallion's neck just above the great roll of fat and muscle which arched down towards the chest.

Then, with both hands at the handle of the knife, the man pulled it upwards, leaning back as he did so, and putting all his strength into what he did, cutting through the living veins and trachea as a butcher cuts meat.

There was a dreadful scream, which changed upon an instant to a cough, a fountain of dark blood, and the monster staggered and fell over upon its side with a crash.

A minute afterwards Commendone was out in the High Street mingling with the excited crowd of townspeople.

He touched the sturdy brown-faced man upon the shoulder.

"Come into the inn," he said. "I have somewhat to say to you, John Hull."

CHAPTER IV

PART TAKEN IN AFFAIRS BY THE HALF TESTOON

It was seven o'clock in the evening when John Commendone arrived at the Tower. He went to the Queen's Gallery, and found that Her Majesty had just come back from Vespers in St. John's Chapel, and was in the Privy Garden with some of her ladies.

Mr. Ambrose Cholmondely was lieutenant of the guard at this hour, and Johnnie went to him, explaining that he must see the Queen at once.

"She won't see any one, Commendone," young Mr. Cholmondely answered. "I really cannot send your name to Her Grace."

"But I must see Her Grace. It is highly important."

Cholmondely looked at Commendone.

"You have ridden far and fast," he said. "You might even be the bearer of despatches, my friend John. But I cannot send in your name to the Queen. Even if I could, I certainly would not do so when you are like this, in such disorder of dress. You've come from no battle-field with news of victory. If the matter urgeth, as you say, then you have your own remedy. The King Consort lies ill in his own lodging; he hath not been seen of any one since supper last night. I don't know where you have been or what you have been doing, and it is no concern of mine, i' faith, but you can very well go to the King's quarters, where, if your business is as you say, one of the dons or Spanish priests will speedily arrange an audience for you with Her Grace."