"Sire," answered my lord, "I met your messengers on the road. I had already left York and was hastening to London to meet this accusation mine enemies do prepare to spring on me."
Charles seized his hand and grasped it warmly.
"I do approve thine action, and here confirm all expressions of favour I have ever given thee."
"Thy lady," added the Queen, smiling, "was, poor soul, fearful for thee, but thou art not, I think, seeing thou hast our protection and friendship."
"Madame," answered the Earl, fixing on her the powerful glance of his tired dark eyes, "I am fearful of nothing, I do thank my God, save only of some smirch on my honour, and that is surely safe while my gracious master holdeth me by the hand."
There was energy and purpose in his look, his carriage, his speech, his bearing had the unshakable composure of the fine man finely prepared for any fate.
"Sire," he said, speaking with great sincerity and emotion, "my own aim hath been to make thee and England great, and if His Majesty is satisfied, I hold myself acquitted of any wrong to any man, nor do I take any such on my conscience."
The King, much moved, clasped my lord's firm right hand closer in his own, and stood close beside him in intimate affection.
"What weapon hast thou prepared to fight these rascals with?" asked Henriette Marie.
"Madame," replied the Earl grimly, "I shall go down to the House to-morrow and impeach John Pym of high treason on the ground of his sympathy with, and negotiating with, the rebel Scots." He smiled fiercely as if to himself, and added, "My head or thine, and no time to lose!"
A sudden tremor shook the Queen, a silence fell on her vivacity.
"Come to us to-morrow," said Charles, "before going to Westminster—and now to thy waiting wife and a good night, dear lord."
"Truly this evening I am a weary man," smiled Strafford, and with that kissed the hands of his lieges and left them.
They stood silent after his going, not looking at each other.
They could hear the distant angry clamour of London at their gates.
CHAPTER V
THE FALL OF THE GREAT MINISTER
The moon's circle was half-filled with light, a mist rose and hung above the river, a sullen rain was falling through the windless air, as the gentlemen left the House and dispersed among the excited crowd to their dwellings. Along the river the people were dense, they surged and gathered along the banks from Westminster to St. Katherine's wharf, shouting, singing, flinging up their hats, and wringing each other's hands for joy.
They had just been regaled with a sight many of them had never dared to hope to see. The mist and the rain had not obscured from their hungry eyes the barge in which my Lord Strafford, that morning the greatest subject in two kingdoms, had gone by, a prisoner, to the Tower.
He stood for an absolute monarchy, a dominant priesthood, taxation without law, the Star Chamber, the Court of High Commission, even as the Queen stood for Papistry and the possible employment of foreign force, and the two between them represented all that was most hateful to the English.
Therefore it was neither the usual levity of crowds nor the usual vulgar rejoicing in fallen greatness that animated these dense throngs of Londoners, but a deep, almost awful sense that a definite and tremendous struggle had begun between King and people, and had begun with a great victory on the popular side.
It had been a day of smouldering excitement that frequently burst into riotings between Westminster and Whitehall. In the morning my lord, with a guard of halberdiers, had gone down as usual to the House; after a little while he had returned to the palace, accompanied each time by the furious shouting and groans of the people. The truth was that his charges against Pym were not yet ready, and he wished to consult his master.
The crowd, however, waited, fed by rumours that came from time to time by means of those who had the entry into the House; by the afternoon it was definitely known that Mr. Pym had cleared the Lobby and locked the door of the House, while a discussion of grave importance took place.
So the people waited, patient but insistent, trusting Mr. Pym and those gentlemen shut up with him, yet watchful lest they should cheat them.
Nor were they disappointed; at five o'clock out came Mr. Pym at the head of some three hundred Members, and, passing through the frantically applauding crowd, went to the House of Lords.
Here, at the Bar, he told the Peers, that by the command of the Commons in Parliament and in the name of all the Commons of England, he accused the Earl of Strafford of high treason, and demanded that he be put in custody while they produced the grounds of their accusation.
Then came my lord again, hastening back from Whitehall (where the news had reached him), with an assured and proud demeanour, and so into the House, with a gloomy and unseeing countenance for the hostile throng; then more suspense, while excitement increased to a point where it could not be any longer contained, and vented itself in fierce rattlings on the very doorsteps of Westminster Hall and rebellious tumults at the very gates of Whitehall, where the guards were doubled and stood with drawn swords, for there had been some ugly shouting of the Queen's name, and some hoarse demand that John Pym should accuse her also of high treason against the realm of England, and haul her forth with her black Papist brood of priests to answer the charges against her, even as my lord was answering, or must answer them. Before the misty evening was far advanced, and while the moon hung yet sickly pale in a scarcely dark sky, the prologue to this tragedy was accomplished, and my lord left the House where he had so long ruled supreme, and was conveyed down the sullen tide to the Tower.
And when he had at last gone, and his guarded barge was absorbed into the shadows of the Traitor's Gate, a kind of awe and silence fell over London. The great minister, the King's favourite, the man who was both his master's brain and conscience, had fallen so swiftly, so irrecoverably, as London knew in her heart, that there was almost a terror mingled with the triumph; for all knew that Strafford was not one like Somerset or Buckingham, but a man of the utmost capacity for courage, intelligence, and all the arts of government.
The Commons of Parliament, who had done this thing, scattered, weary and quiet, to their various homes and lodgings, and Mr. Cromwell and Mr. Hampden walked through the falling rain, communing with their hearts.
As they neared the palace which stood brilliant with flambeaux lights flashing on the drawn swords at the gates, Mr. Hampden turned his gentle face towards his companion and said, "What will the King do?"
"The King?" repeated Mr. Cromwell, lifting earnest eyes to the silent palace. "I would I could come face to face with the King—surely he is a man who might be persuaded of the truth of things if he were not so surrounded by frivolous, wrong, and wanton counsellors."
"I believe," answered John Hampden, "that His Majesty rooteth his pretences so firmly in Divine Right—(being besides upheld in this by all the clergy), that he would consider it blasphemy to abate one jot of his claims. See this pass we are come to, Mr. Cromwell; we deal with a man with whom no compromise is possible—ask Mr. Pym, who tried to serve him—he will excuse himself, he will shift and turn, but he will never give way, and when he is most quiet he will always break his tranquillity with some monstrous imprudence, as this late forcing of the Archbishop's prayer book on the Scots, thereby provoking a peaceable nation into rebellion."
Mr. Cromwell turned up the collar of his cloak, for the cold dampness of the night was increasing, and he was liable to rheumatism. He made no answer, and Mr. Hampden, glancing expectantly at his thoughtful face, repeated his query—
"What will the King do now?"