Dakcombe nodded.
“A little square man you wouldn’t notice in a desert. I mind me he came here by a chance the day you rode here with Robin.”
“Gregory!” cried Cynthia.
“ ’Twas a name like that.”
Cynthia was staring from one to the other, open-mouthed.
“Aye, it does seem odd,” said Dakcombe, nodding his head gloomily. “And here you be both together again. No good came of that other day, though we hoped much from it. Master Robin off God knows where, and you, mistress, we were all reconciled to, vanished over the hills.”
“So Mr Gregory is here, and Mr Robin is expected,” said Cynthia with a sudden throb of the heart. “Oh, more good will come of it this time.”
“He came in the middle of the night, Mistress Cynthia,” the housekeeper added. “Shall I wake him for you now? Sore tired the poor thing was. He could scarcely keep his eyes open, so heavy were his eyelids. He was like a sailor, mistress: he could sleep standing.”
The good housekeeper did not in fact care twopence whether Mr Gregory needed a good night’s rest or whether he did not. She had overpainted his fatigue with a hope that since Cynthia gave no heed to her own, she would take pity on Gregory’s. “Shall I wake him for you now, or will you rest awhile?”
“Wake him now!” cried Cynthia. She was seized with no remorse. Let the lazy fellow get up at once! If she could be waking, why not he? Robin’s life, for all she knew, was in the balance. “Wake him up, good Kate. He has slept too long as it is.”
“Very well, miss, and there’s that lazy slut of a cook bringing your breakfast, so come you in.”
She had ordered the breakfast to be laid in the hall, close to the big fire, and Cynthia, throwing off her cloak, sat down to it. And with that nature began to get the better of her will. She was not discouraged. On the contrary. Had she not come straight from Hilbury Melcombe she would never have found Mr Gregory here, and Mr Gregory was in Walsingham’s confidence. To Mr Gregory she could tell her story, and from him she could seek knowledge of what danger threatened Robin and of how it might best be averted. She had done very well to come. . . . She had done . . . very — and with a jerk she sat up straight and saw Kate standing in front of her.
“I wasn’t asleep,” said Cynthia indignantly.
“Oh no, Mistress Cynthia — oh, no way near it. Many a person nods like that when they’re thinking deeply.”
“Yes,” said Cynthia, “I was thinking deeply, Kate, that you had promised to wake Mr Gregory for me.”
“And is there a thing in this house — may the gentleman pardon me for calling him a thing — that I wouldn’t get for you, Mistress Cynthia?” said Kate, and Mr Gregory came down the stairs as she spoke.
He was gentle and kindly as she had always found him, and plied her with no questions. He let her tell her story as she would, sitting in front of the fire beside her. Cynthia was awake now, and watched his face as she spoke and learnt nothing from it whatever.
“At what hour did this rogue Stafford come to you with his list of names?” he asked when she had done.
“It was late.”
“Midnight?”
“Before. At ten, I fancy.”
“Now think! Did any visitor come to Hilbury Melcombe last night?”
Cynthia started.
“Yes! We were at supper. The butler told Sir Robert that a man had come in a great fret and would not give his name, but he had come once to the house before.”
“And then?” asked Gregory.
“Sir Robert got up and, excusing himself, went out of the room. He was, I think, flustered.”
“And he sent for Stafford and his son?”
“Yes.”
“And they were closeted together until Stafford came to you with his questions?”
“Yes. We thought that they were busy with their arrangements for the festival.”
Mr Gregory laughed savagely.
“A little jousting and tilting! Look to it, good Sir Robert,” he cried, “or you shall do a little jousting on a hurdle and the executioner shall do the tilting.” He turned again to Cynthia.
“When did this visitor go away?”
Cynthia shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
For a moment Gregory was silent. Then he said:
“There were three only who were thought to know that Robin was Carlo Manucci — Sir Francis, Phelippes and myself. But there was a fourth, Sir Robert’s visitor.”
“He knew it — honestly?” Cynthia asked anxiously.
“No, my dear, no!”
“A traitor, then?”
“Yes. Vode.”
The name meant nothing to Cynthia. It was enough for her that there was a traitor free with this knowledge.
“He must be arrested before he talks of Carlo Manucci to others,” she cried. “We waste time, Mr Gregory.”
“It is too late,” said Gregory gently. “Vode took ship to France last night.”
“Oh!”
It was a moan of pain which broke from Cynthia’s lips. There was no stopping the traitor, no catching him up. He had the start of them by a day. There were no telegrams in those days, no cables, no wireless, no telephones. The semaphore was not yet invented. By one way alone could the ship or the mounted courier be outpaced — the beacon, its black column of smoke by day, its tongue of flame by night. But if Mr Gregory had climbed to the great pile of wood and tar on the top of the hill and set it blazing, all loyal England would have rushed to arms. Christopher Vode had the start of them by a day. At Paris he would pass on his news and make a second profit from it. From Paris it would pass to Spain — there were a hundred who would speed it on its way, refugees, Jesuits of the College, officers of the Inquisition. Carlo Manucci! From mouth to mouth the name would pass. Spain would be winnowed, the cell made ready, the stake planted.
“I have betrayed him,” Cynthia cried in despair.
“No. If anyone is to blame,” said Mr Gregory, throwing out his chest like a man making a great determination, “it is not you. It is my master, who kept you in the dark. But it is the way of men who deal in secrecies. They say ‘Hush! Hush!’ always, and five times out of ten are put to it to find a reason for their hushes afterwards. No, you were not to be told. No, you would be unable to hide your grief and fears. No, you must be swaddled and nursed. No, you must think of the plate fleet and the auto-da-fé in the waste of the Atlantic. You must not know of the dangerous, delicate work on which all these months Robin Aubrey has been engaged. Would that he had sent me to tell you!”
“Dangerous,” cried Cynthia with a hand at her heart. “I knew here!”
“But accomplished,” Gregory added hastily. “Accomplished with a skill and a tact beyond his years. Vode is too late, Cynthia. Why am I here, do you think?” And as Cynthia shook her head, Mr Gregory made a great resolution. He would throw over his secretive master. Cynthia should have the story of her lover’s prowess complete.
“But not here,” Cynthia cried suddenly.
The sun was up now and pouring in gold through the big mullioned windows of the oriel. She wanted to hear Gregory’s story on the bowling green between the yew hedge and the red wall. They went out through the dining room. The air had the warmth of summer. At the border of the yew hedge the grass was speckled with daffodils and crocuses. Mr Gregory led Cynthia to the garden seat and told her of Walsingham’s discovery that George Aubrey was still alive, an outcast on the steps of a great church in Madrid; of the inevitable change in Robin’s plans and the requisition of his ships; of his secret departure to Lisbon in Count Figliazzi’s train; and of his year and more of service as the valet of Santa Cruz. He told the story in the glowing imageful language of his day, which was as natural to the rough sea captain writing up his log as to the poet in his study. And whilst Cynthia listened she caught her breath and clasped her hands till the knuckles were white; her lovely face grew pale and red by turns, she shivered now and a moment later cried o
ut in relief, and all the while such a passion of pride and love shone in her eyes that had Robin but been there, he would have felt himself paid for all his toil and peril twenty times over. And with her pride came a great humility — and a deep gratitude that she had ridden through the night to this garden, drawn to it as a pigeon to its cot.
“The work is done,” said Mr Gregory, “greatly done. And when the Armada crosses the Sleeve we shall show them such a play with the iron bowls as will lower their proud stomachs till the end of time. Invincible shall bite the dust of England and find its savour taste of the bitterness of death. Therefore you find me here. A letter reached Sir Francis four days ago; Robin was travelling to Madrid once more in the Tuscan ambassador’s retinue. But the letter was written five weeks ago. Robin may be upon its heels. He may have been a month upon the journey. We shall hear no more of him except by word of mouth. Sir Francis sent me to Abbot’s Gap posthaste to prepare it against his coming, and if God wills it so, his father’s too.”
Cynthia’s hand went to the pouch at the waist of her doublet. She took from it the half of a gold sovereign and, laying it in the palm of her small hand, gazed at it and shut her fingers over it and opened them again. Robin was safe now, she thought, and Gregory would not for the world gainsay her. For so it might be. It was well for the peace of mind of both of them that they had no inkling of the fantastic horrors which at this hour awaited Robin at Madrid.
CHAPTER XXV. Gregory Becomes Noticeable
“I THANK YOU, Mr Gregory,” and Cynthia rose from the seat. “I never expected to find you here. I thought that if I sat for a little while here in Robin’s garden I might hit upon some way to lessen the harm that I had done. But that such joy and pride should come of it, I could never have dreamed.”
Kate the housekeeper must have been watching the pair of them through the glass door of the dining room. For as Cynthia rose she came bustling towards them.
Cynthia clung for a moment to the back of the seat. Now that she imagined her anxieties at an end, she was seized again by such weariness of body that she could hardly stand.
“There was God’s hand in it, I think,” she said faintly.
“I pray that it may be so,” said Gregory, and, though there was none of her assurance in his tone, Cynthia was too tired to take note of the difference. She was chilled through and through, and shivered.
“I must go,” she said, and as she turned she staggered.
But Kate was close beside her now, and held her up.
“Nay, Mistress Cynthia, you can’t go till you are rested. You would topple off your horse and lie on the down with a broken neck. And what would Master Robin say to us?”
“But there’s my father and mother. They’ll be anxious,” said Cynthia. “I must go,” and her eyes were closing as she spoke.
“There’s no need,” said Gregory. “For I must be on my way. I have slept, Cynthia. I shall ride round by Winterborne Hyde and set their anxieties at rest. Dakcombe will ride home with you in the afternoon.”
“But they may still be at Hilbury Melcombe,” said she.
Mr Gregory laughed grimly.
“I have a word to say at Hilbury Melcombe myself,” he remarked.
And whilst Cynthia still was undecided, Kate added:
“At this moment, mistress, there’s a bright fire burning in a bedroom and you chilled to the bone. There are the finest sheets of Holland linen spread that ever you slept in, and the bed turned down, and so it has been all the night since Mr Gregory came — just waiting for someone to sleep in it.”
Cynthia looked up swiftly and as swiftly down again.
“Not waiting for me,” she said softly.
“But since he’s not come . . .”
A little smile dimpled the corners of Cynthia’s mouth. She was tempted. Her young limbs cried for sleep — sleep with a bright fire in the hearth and in Robin’s room, in Robin’s bed. Oh, adorable!
“He might come whilst I slept,” she tried to object rather than objected. The colour was bright again in her cheeks, and it was not the sunlight which set it there or brought the light into her eyes or the little sigh of delight to her lips.
“And would he be grieved do you think, mistress, if he did?” said the housekeeper, and Cynthia looked at her, and she looked so roguishly at Cynthia, that both of them and the staid Mr Gregory broke into a laugh. “Would he leap into oaths and capers, do you think, if I ran down to the gatehouse and said to him as he got off his horse, ‘There’s Mistress Cynthia in your bed, and unless you’ve brought Parson along wi’ you, I don’t see how you can get into it yourself.’ ”
Cynthia laughed and blushed and laughed again.
“I’ll stay, Kate,” and she held out her hand to Mr Gregory. “What will you say to my father?”
“I shall say that Robin is on his way home to England and that you will be on your way to Winterborne Hyde this afternoon. I shall tell him that he is a very lucky man to have such a daughter and such a son-to-be. I shall not mention the name of Carlo Manucci nor will you. But I shall certainly say that Robin is a servant — the servant of Elizabeth.”
With something of a flourish Mr Gregory made his bow and went off to the gatehouse. Cynthia walked with Kate into the hall, her feet dragging as she walked and her head nodding between her shoulders.
“Ah, but we want Master Robin back,” said Kate with a sigh as she looked about the hall.
“Robin — and the parson,” said Cynthia with a smile, and then she too breathed a sigh.
She was asleep before Kate had gathered up her clothes to take them away and clean.
It was twelve o’clock before Cynthia awoke and wondered at the strange room in which she found herself. When she remembered, with a blush and a laugh she smoothed and fingered those fine sheets of which Kate was so proud. She liked them, she liked the thought that Robin too was delicate and particular in these niceties of life. She loved him for his sheets, but “for what don’t I love him?” she cried, stretching out her arms. And with that her dreams faded away and the scene of last night rose stark and clear in her thoughts: Stafford reading out his names — Luigi Savona, Tommaso Visentini, Carlo Manucci — with his eyes on the paper in his hands, and she blurting out like the fool she was, “It’s not a man, it’s a character in a play!”
She rang the bell over her head and Kate bustled in, prepared for her a hot bath, and arranged the clothes which she had dried and brushed. Whilst she dressed Cynthia suggested diffidently:
“Kate, it may be tomorrow that Mr Robin will come. It may be in a month. I should like to come over one day in each week, so that if he is delayed the garden may look its best. I have charge of the garden at Winterborne Hyde and know each season’s flowers.”
It was the merest excuse for returning to Abbot’s Gap and wandering about the house and amongst the roses, as Kate very well understood.
“It’ll be a blessing, Mistress Cynthia, if you will,” she exclaimed eagerly, and proceeded to asperse a very good gardener without a qualm of self-reproach.
“We have the idlest old rogue of a gardener that ever you saw. It’s taken him a day, and more pints of ale than you’d drink in a year, to plant a geranium. Aye, he wants a lady with a sharp tongue at his heels. You come, mistress, and very welcome you’ll be.”
“I’ll come each Thursday, Kate,” said Cynthia.
So it was arranged, and after dinner, with Dakcombe mounted on one of Robin’s horses, she rode home to Winterborne Hyde.
Mr Gregory rode thither in the morning, and finding the colonel and his wife in a great distress and anxiety, set them again at their ease. They listened open-mouthed to his story of the Bannets’ treachery, and were a little hurt at Cynthia’s secrecy. “She might have told us,” said Mrs Norris, lifting up her hand. “But in this age of excitements and strange doings, the young people are so masterful that we hardly dare to ask them where they are going,” and she sighed for the quiet, old-fashioned times, when girls were obedient and
didn’t ride astride.
“I knew that something had happened to Cynthia,” said Colonel Norris sagely.
The good man had never noticed any change in his daughter at all, but he was not going to pass for a numskull. “But a certain delicacy kept me silent.”
“And the necessities of the realm kept your daughter silent,” said Mr Gregory.
The necessities of the realm made a good high-sounding, impressive phrase, and under the cover of it Mr Gregory got himself away. He rode on to Hilbury Melcombe with a good deal more enjoyment than he had felt on the earlier part of his journey. Here, at all events, no diplomacies were going to be practised. He threw his reins to a groom, strode into the great hall and called loudly for Sir Robert Bannet.
Mr Stafford came through a doorway, fluttering with anxiety and wreathed in deprecatory smiles.
“Sir Robert will see you in the library, Mr Gregory,” he said, waving towards the door.
Mr Gregory did not budge.
“He will not,” he said loudly. “He will see me here.”
Mr Stafford was pained. With a gesture he dismissed the footman.
“I don’t understand,” he began.
“Stand you there and you will,” said Mr Gregory.
From the doorway of the library Sir Robert Bannet emerged. He had aged during this night, so that he seemed physically to have shrunk to a lesser height and a smaller compass.
“Yes,” he said in a quavering sort of voice, and behind him showed the sullen, dogged features of Humphrey. “In what can I serve you, Mr Gregory?”
“In nothing. It may be that you can serve yourselves, but God knows you’ll be hard put to it.”
Humphrey Bannet pushed himself forward with a hand upon his hip.
“Oh?” he said with a laugh which, not unsuccessfully, counterfeited some disdain. “And is it so?”
“It is so,” said Mr Gregory, very stubbornly.
“And how, if you please, may we serve ourselves, Mr Gregory?”
“By praying God night and day that Robin Aubrey may return to Abbot’s Gap as whole and sound as when he left it,” said Mr Gregory. “For if he does not, it would be better for all of you in this house that you had never been born.”
Complete Works of a E W Mason Page 681