“Will you repeat the expressions used by Mr. Westmacott?” Sir Edward begged.
“I will repeat the one that, to my mind, matters most.” Mr. Westmacott, getting to his feet and in a loud voice, exclaimed, “God save the Protestant Duke!”
“Do you admit it, sir?” thundered Albemarle, his eyes glowering upon Richard hesitated a moment, pale and trembling.
“You will waste breath in denying it,” said Trenchard suavely, “for I have a drawer from the Bell Inn, and two gentlemen who overheard you waiting outside.”
“I’faith, sir,” cried Blake, “what treason was therein that? If he…”
“Silence!” thundered Albemarle. “Let Mr. Westmacott speak for himself.”
Richard, inspired by the defence Blake had begun, took the same line of argument. “I admit that in the heat of wine I may have used such words,” said he. “But I deny their intent to be treasonable. There are many men who drink to the prosperity of the late Kings’s son…”
“Natural son, sir; natural son,” Albemarle amended. “It is treason to speak of him otherwise.”
“It will be a treason presently to draw breath,” sneered Blake.
“If it be,” said Trenchard, “it is a treason you’ll not be long committing.”
“Faith, you are right, Mr. Trenchard,” said the Duke with a laugh. Indeed, he found Mr. Trenchard a most pleasant and facetious gentleman.
“Still,” insisted Richard, endeavouring in spite of these irrelevancies to make good his point, “there be many men who drink daily to the prosperity of the late King’s natural son.”
“Aye, sir,” answered Albemarle; “but not his prosperity in horrid plots against the life of our beloved sovereign.”
“True, Your Grace; very true,” purred Sir Edward. “It was not so I meant to toast him,” cried Richard. Albemarle made an impatient gesture, and took up a sheet of paper. “How, then,” he asked, “comes this letter—this letter which makes plain the treason upon which the Duke of Monmouth is embarked, just as it makes plain your participation in it—how comes this letter to be found in your possession?” And he waved the letter in the air.
Richard went the colour of ashes. He faltered a moment, then took refuge in the truth, for all that he knew beforehand that the truth was bound to ring more false than any lie he could invent.
“That letter was not addressed to me,” he stammered.
Albemarle read the subscription, “To my good friend W., at Bridgwater.” He looked up, a heavy sneer thrusting his heavy lip still further out. “What do you say to that? Does not ‘W’ stand for Westmacott?”
“It does not.”
“Of course not,” said Albemarle with heavy sarcasm. “It stands for Wilkins, or Williams, or…or… What-not.”
“Indeed, I can bear witness that it does not,” exclaimed Sir Rowland.
“Be silent, sir, I tell you!” bawled the Duke at him again. “You shall bear witness soon enough, I promise you. To whom, then,” he resumed, turning again to Richard, “do you say that this letter was addressed?”
“To Mr. Wilding—Mr. Anthony Wilding,” Richard answered.
“I would have Your Grace to observe,” put in Trench ard quietly, “that Mr. Wilding, properly speaking, does not reside in Bridgwater.”
“Tush!” cried Albemarle; “the rogue but mentions the first name with a ‘W’ that occurs to him. He’s not even an ingenious liar. And how, sir,” he asked Richard, “does it come to be in your possession, having been addressed, as you say, to Mr. Wilding?”
“Aye, sir,” said Sir Edward, blinking his weak eyes. “Tell us that.”
Richard hesitated again, and looked at Blake. Blake, who by now had come to realize that his friend’s affairs were not mended by his interruptions, moodily shrugged his shoulders, scowling.
“Come, sir,” said Colonel Luttrell, engagingly, “answer the question.”
“Aye,” roared Albemarle; “let your invention have free rein.”
Again poor Richard sought refuge in the truth. “We—Sir Rowland here and I—had reason to suspect that he was awaiting such a letter.”
“Tell us your reasons, sir, if we are to credit you,” said the Duke, and it was plain he mocked the prisoner. It was, moreover, a request that staggered Richard. Still, he sought to find a reason that should sound plausible.
“We inferred it from certain remarks that Mr. Wilding let fall in our presence.”
“Tell us the remarks, sir,” the Duke insisted.
“Indeed, I do not call his precise words to mind, Your Grace. But they were such that we suspicioned him.”
“And you would have me believe that hearing words which awoke in you such grave suspicions, you kept your suspicions and straightway forgot the words. You’re but an indifferent liar.”
Trenchard, who was standing by the long table, leaned forward now.
“It might be well, an it please Your Grace,” said he, “to waive the point, and let us come to those matters which are of greater moment. Let him tell Your Grace how he came by the letter.”
“Aye,” said Albemarle. “We do but waste time. Tell us, then, how came the letter into your hands?”
“With Sir Rowland, here, I robbed the courier as he was riding from Taunton to Bridgwater.”
Albemarle laughed, and Sir Edward smiled. “You robbed him, eh?” said His Grace. “Very well. But how did it happen that you knew he had the letter upon him, or was it that you were playing the hightobymen, and that in robbing him you hoped to find other matters?”
“Not so, sir,” answered Richard. “I sought but the letter.”
“And how knew you that he carried it? Did you learn that, too, from Mr. Wilding’s indiscretion?”
“Your Grace has said it.”
“’Slife! What an impudent rogue have we here!” cried the angry Duke, who conceived that Richard was purposely dealing in effrontery. “Mr. Trenchard, I do think we are wasting time. Be so good as to confound them both with the truth of this matter.”
“That letter,” said Trenchard, “was delivered to them at the Hare and Hounds, here at Taunton, by a gentleman who put up at the inn, and was there joined by Mr. Westmacott and Sir Rowland Blake. They opened the conversation with certain cant phrases very clearly intended as passwords. Thus: the prisoners said to the messenger, as they seated themselves at the table he occupied, ‘You have the air, sir, of being from overseas,’ to which the courier answered, ‘Indeed, yes. I am from Holland. ‘From the land of Orange,’ says one of the prisoners. ‘Aye, and other things,’ replies the messenger. ‘There is a fair wind blowing,’ he adds; to which one of the prisoners, I believe it was Sir Rowland, makes answer, ‘Mayit prosper the Protestant Duke and blow Popery to hell.’ Thereupon the landlord caught some mention of a letter, but these plotters, perceiving that they were perhaps being overheard, sent him away to fetch them wine. A half-hour later the messenger took his leave, and the prisoners followed a very few minutes afterwards.”
Albemarle turned to the prisoners. “You have heard Mr. Trenchard’s story. How do you say—is it true or untrue?”
“You