Holgrave and two others then departed from the main body, unloosed a small boat from its moorings, and, in less than five minutes, they were walking, in the twilight of a starry midsummer's night, down the rough stone pathway of Thames-street.
CHAPTER II."We're in a larmentable way up at Grandturzel."
ONE:"'Tis a capital night," said Byles, as he looked up at the sky in a tone of soliloquy; "I could not have wished for a betterjust light enough to see what we are about, and not enough to tell tales. Sam," continued he, closing the door and sitting again at the fire, "bring me the shafts and let me look if the bow is in order."
TWO:"That was all we agreed upon to ask for," replied Black Jack, looking round upon his associates."If you've come to ask me to kip you and your husband on at Grandturzel," said Reuben, "you might have s?aved yourself the trouble, fur I'm shut of you both after last night."
TWO:"And since we talk of hanging," said Turner, "there is one" and he looked significantly at Holgrave"but, never mind; his time will come, Stephen!"Mrs. Backfield arrived in a washed-out bed-gown. A fire was lit and water put on to boil. Fanny's, however, did not seem just an ordinary case of "fits"; she lay limp in her mother's arms, strangely blue round the mouth, her eyes half open.
TWO:The monk hurried to the northern battlements, and stood, for an instant, gazing intently on the confusion which filled the vast area before him. At one point, and towards the centre, he observed a circle formed of some mounted commons, and he perceived a man in the midst in a kneeling posture. His voice now arose deep and startling as he exclaimed, "Wat Tyler, I adjure thee, touch not the prelatetouch not the Lord's anointed! Forbear! forbear!" and then, with an agility which, since his boyhood, he had not probably before exerted, he descended the platform, hurried through the fortress, crossed the moat, and then striding rapidly through the people, who made way as he approached, stood in the centre of that circle towards which his fears had impelled him.
The dance was becoming more of a rout. Hats fell back, even Naomi's heather-coloured bonnet became disorderly. Kerchiefs were crumpled and necks bare. Arms grew tighter, there were few merely clasping hands now. Then a lad kissed his partner on the neck while they danced, and soon another couple were spinning round with lips clinging together. The girls' hair grew rough and blew in their boys' eyesthere were sounds of pantingof kissingNaomi grew giddy, round her was a whirl of colour, hands, faces, the dusk and flaring lights. She clung closer to Reuben, and his arms tightened about her."You talk strange language," replied Calverley in a voice that had lost all its assumed gentleness. "ButrememberI have not sought your sister's love to be thus baffledremember!--" Calverley was here interrupted by a quick knocking at the door.There was now scarcely light to distinguish external objects, when a sudden rush was heard from the town, and, in an instant, a dozen persons surrounded the peddling merchant, and seizing him violently, while uttering threats and imprecations, dragged the dusty-foot to the court of Pie-powder.[1] As they were hauling him along, the crowd increased, the fair was forsaken, all pressing eagerly forward to learn the fate of the unlucky pedlar. The galleyman seemed perfectly to comprehend the nature of his dangernot by the changing colour of his cheek, for that exhibited still the same glowing brownbut by the restless flash of his full black eyes, glancing before and around, as if looking for some chance of escape."Havehave you been here long?" stammered David, feeling he must say something."I don't often come here," she said"this is a bit too classy for me. I go mostly to the coffee stalls down by the harbour. You mustn't think as I'm coining money at this, you know. I work mostly among the[Pg 403] fishermen, and they're a seedy lot. I started up town, but I'm not so young as I was, and sometimes even at the harbour I find it unaccountable hard to git off."
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THREE:Suddenly she realised that Reuben had come into the dairy, and was standing beside her, a little way behind."And if he has," returned the dusty-foot, "he cannot have a greater cause. It is all very well for the great,it looks well upon them; and even the decent chapman and yeomen get little harm by it: but for the poor man to be proud; to have the swelling heart and the burning cheekoh! it is a curse!" He raised his voice as he spoke, and then sinking it to a whisper, added"and if it is a sin, surely it has its punishment."
THREE:
