Part 49 (1/2)
”No,” replied Pearson, ”I will ensure you against that; but your Excellency strikes so fiercely, you allow no time for an answer. Hark! I hear the baying of a hound, and the voice of a man who is quieting him-Shall we break in at once, or hold parley?”
”I will speak to them first,” said Cromwell.-”Hollo! who is within there?”
”Who is it enquires?” answered Sir Henry Lee from the interior; ”or what want you here at this dead hour?”
”We come by warrant of the Commonwealth of England,” said the General.
”I must see your warrant ere I undo either bolt or latch,” replied the knight; ”we are enough of us to make good the castle: neither I nor my fellows will deliver it up but upon good quarter and conditions; and we will not treat for these save in fair daylight.”
”Since you will not yield to our right, you must try our might,” replied Cromwell. ”Look to yourselves within; the door will be in the midst of you in five minutes.”
”Look to yourselves without,” replied the stout-hearted Sir Henry; ”we will pour our shot upon you, if you attempt the least violence.”
But, alas! while he a.s.sumed this bold language, his whole garrison consisted of two poor terrified women; for his son, in conformity with the plan which they had fixed upon, had withdrawn from the hall into the secret recesses of the palace.
”What can they be doing now, sir?” said Phoebe, hearing a noise as it were of a carpenter turning screw-nails, mixed with a low buzz of men talking.
”They are fixing a petard,” said the knight, with great composure. ”I have noted thee for a clever wench, Phoebe, and I will explain it to thee: 'Tis a metal pot, shaped much like one of the roguish knaves' own sugarloaf hats, supposing it had narrower brims-it is charged with some few pounds of fine gunpowder. Then”-
”Gracious! we shall be all blown up!” exclaimed Phoebe,-the word gunpowder being the only one which she understood in the knight's description.
”Not a bit, foolish girl. Pack old Dame Jellicot into the embrasure of yonder window,” said the knight, ”on that side of the door, and we will ensconce ourselves on this, and we shall have time to finish my explanation, for they have bungling engineers. We had a clever French fellow at Newark would have done the job in the firing of a pistol.”
They had scarce got into the place of security when the knight proceeded with his description.-”The petard being formed, as I tell you, is secured with a thick and strong piece of plank, termed the madrier, and the whole being suspended, or rather secured against the gate to be forced-But thou mindest me not?”
”How can I, Sir Henry,” she said, ”within reach of such a thing as you speak of?-O Lord! I shall go mad with very terror-we shall be crushed-blown up-in a few minutes!”
”We are secure from the explosion,” replied the knight, gravely, ”which will operate chiefly in a forward direction into the middle of the chamber; and from any fragments that may fly laterally, we are sufficiently guarded by this deep embrasure.”
”But they will slay us when they enter,” said Phoebe.
”They will give thee fair quarter, wench,” said Sir Henry; ”and if I do not bestow a brace of b.a.l.l.s on that rogue engineer, it is because I would not incur the penalty inflicted by martial law, which condemns to the edge of the sword all persons who attempt to defend an untenable post. Not that I think the rigour of the law could reach Dame Jellicot or thyself, Phoebe, considering that you carry no arms. If Alice had been here she might indeed have done somewhat, for she can use a birding-piece.”
Phoebe might have appealed to her own deeds of that day, as more allied to feats of melee and battle, than any which her young lady ever acted; but she was in an agony of inexpressible terror, expecting, from the knight's account of the petard, some dreadful catastrophe, of what nature she did not justly understand, notwithstanding his liberal communication on the subject.
”They are strangely awkward at it,” said Sir Henry; ”little Boutirlin would have blown the house up before now.-Ah! he is a fellow would take the earth like a rabbit-if he had been here, never may I stir but he would have countermined them ere now, and
-”Tis sport to have the engineer Hoist with his own petard.'
as our immortal Shakspeare has it.”
”Oh, Lord, the poor mad old gentleman,” thought Phoebe-”Oh, sir, had you not better leave alone playbooks, and think of your end?” uttered she aloud, in sheer terror and vexation of spirit.
”If I had not made up my mind to that many days since,” answered the knight, ”I had not now met this hour with a free bosom-
'As gentle and as jocund as to rest, Go I to death-truth hath a quiet breast.'”
As he spoke, a broad glare of light flashed from without, through the windows of the hall, and betwixt the strong iron stanchions with which they were secured-a broad discoloured light it was, which shed a red and dusky illumination on the old armour and weapons, as if it had been the reflection of a conflagration. Phoebe screamed aloud, and, forgetful of reverence in the moment of pa.s.sion, clung close to the knight's cloak and arm, while Dame Jellicot, from her solitary niche, having the use of her eyes, though bereft of her hearing, yelled like an owl when the moon breaks out suddenly.
”Take care, good Phoebe,” said the knight; ”you will prevent my using my weapon if you hang upon me thus.-The bungling fools cannot fix their petard without the use of torches! Now let me take the advantage of this interval.-Remember what I told thee, and how to put off time.”
”Oh, Lord-ay, sir,” said Phoebe, ”I will say any thing, Oh, Lord, that it were but over!-Ah! ah!”-(two prolonged screams)-”I hear something hissing like a serpent.”