Whilst he was doing this he knew that the man-at-arms asked Culverhouse a question, to which the latter gave ready reply, and he heard the name of Trevlyn pa.s.s his lips. At the moment he heeded this little, but the remembrance came back to him later.

As he pa.s.sed out he noted that the man still continued to gaze after him, as though wishful to read his face by heart. He was standing beside a companion warder then, pointing out, as it seemed, the visitor to the other fellow. Was it only fancy, or did Cuthbert really hear the name of Father Urban pa.s.s in a whisper between them? Puzzled, and even a shade uneasy, he followed Culverhouse to the outer door, A flash of memory seemed then to recall to him the faces of these two men. Had he not seen them keeping watch at the wharf for Father Urban that day so long ago? He was almost certain it had been so. But what of that? How could they possibly connect him with the fugitive priest?

It would soon be dusk now, so the comrades said adieu to each other and went their several ways. Cuthbert had come as far as the Strand by boat, and had only to drop down and find it there; but somehow he felt more disposed to linger about these solemn old buildings, and try to piece together the things he had seen and heard.

Hardly knowing what he was doing, he wandered round the great pile till he came to the narrow entry he had once traversed, leading up from the river to the door of the house where he had seen Catesby and his companions at their mysterious toil. The house looked dark as night now. Not a single gleam penetrated the gloom. Already the last of the twilight had faded into night, but no ray of any kind shone from any of the cas.e.m.e.nts.

Cuthbert stood looking thoughtfully up at the house, hardly knowing why he did so, his fancy running riot in his excited brain and conjuring up all manner of fantastic visions, when suddenly and silently the door opened. A gleam of light from behind showed in relief the figure of a tall man m.u.f.fled in a cloak, a soft felt hat being drawn over the brow and effectually concealing the features; but one glance sufficed to convince Cuthbert that this cloaked and m.u.f.fled individual was none other than the same tall dark man who had produced the holy water blessed by the Pope and had had it sprinkled around the spot where those mysterious men were at work in Percy's house. Filled with a burning curiosity that rendered him impervious to the thought of personal risk, Cuthbert first shrank into a dark recess, and then with hushed and noiseless footfall followed the tall figure in its walk.

The cloaked man walked quietly, but without any appearance of fear. He skirted round the great block of buildings of which the Houses of Parliament were composed, until he reached a door in the rear of that building, within a deep arch sunk a little way below the level of the ground, and this door he opened, but closed it after him, and locked it on the inside.

Unable to follow further, Cuthbert put his ear to the keyhole, and heard distinctly the sound of footsteps descending stone stairs till the sound changed to the unbarring of a lower door, and then all was silence.

Cuthbert looked keenly around him, and soon made out that these steps must certainly lead down to the cellar beneath the Parliament Houses of which he had recently heard. That other cellar he had visited so many months before was close at hand--close to these great buildings; and this tall dark man seemed to have some mysterious connection with both.

What could it all mean? what did it mean? Cuthbert felt as though he were on the eve of some strange discovery, but what that discovery could be he could not guess.

He was aroused from his reverie by the sound of approaching footfalls along the roadway, and he hastily stood upright and walked onwards to meet the advancing pedestrian. The man carried a light which he flashed in Cuthbert's face, and the youth saw that it was one of the men-at-arms on guard over these buildings.

"What are you doing here?" asked the man civilly, though in slightly peremptory fashion.

"I did not know that this road was anything but public," answered Cuthbert, with careless boldness. "I have walked in London streets before now, no man interfering with me."

"Have a care how and where you walk at night," returned the man, pa.s.sing by without further comment. "There be many perils abroad in the streets--more than perchance you wot of."

Cuthbert thanked him for the hint, and went on his way. He would have liked well enough to linger till the tall man emerged again, but he saw that to do so would only excite suspicion.

Although it was quite dark by this time, it was not really late; for it was the last day of October save one, and ma.s.ses of heavy cloud obscured the sky. Now and again a ray of moonlight glinted through these ragged ma.s.ses, but for the rest it was profoundly dark in the narrow streets, and only a little lighter on the open river.

The tide was running in fast, with a strong cold easterly wind. Cuthbert saw that it would be hard work to row against it.

"Better wait for the ebb; it will not be long in coming now," he said to himself as he noted the height of the tide; and stepping into his boat, he pulled idly out into midstream, as being a safer place of waiting than the dark wharf, to find himself drifting up with the strong current, which he did not care to try to stem.

"Beware of the dark-flowing river!" spoke a voice within him; "beware of the black cellar!"

He started, for it almost seemed as though some one had spoken the words in his ear, and a little thrill of fear ran through him. But all was silent save for the wash of the current as it bore him rapidly onwards, and he knew that the voice was one in his own head.

Upwards and upwards he drifted; was it by his own will, or not? He did not himself know, he could not have said. He only knew that a spell seemed upon him, that an intense desire had seized him to look once again upon that lonely house beside the river bank. He had no wish to try to obtain entrance there. He felt that he was treading the dark mazes of some unhallowed plot. But this very suspicion only increased his burning curiosity; and surely there could no harm come of one look at that dark and lonely place.

No volition of his own was needed to carry him onwards; wind and tide did all that. He had merely to keep his place and steer his little bark up the wide river. He saw against the sky the great pile of Westminster. He had drifted almost across the river by that time. He was seated in the bow of the boat, just dipping an oar from time to time as it slipped along beneath the trees. And now the moon shone out for a few minutes clear and bright. It did not shine upon his own craft, gliding so stealthily beneath the bare trees that fringed the wall of the very house he had come to see; but it did gleam upon another wherry out in midstream, rowed by a strong man wrapped in a cloak, and directed straight for the same spot. Cuthbert started, and caught hold of a bough of a weeping willow, bringing his boat to a standstill in a place where the shadow was blackest. He had no wish to be found in this strange position. He would remain hidden until this other boat had landed at the steps. He would be hidden well where he was. He had better be perfectly silent, and so remain.

A sound of voices above his head warned him that he was not the only watcher, and for a moment he feared that, silent as had been his movements, his presence had been discovered. But some one spoke in anxious accents, and in that voice he recognized the clear and mellow tones of Robert Catesby. He was speaking in a low voice to some companion.

"If he comes not within a short while, I shall hold that all is lost. I fear me we did wrong to send him. That letter--that letter--that luckless letter! who can have been the writer?"

"Tresham, I fear me without doubt, albeit he denied it with such steadfast boldness. Would to heaven that fickle hound had never been admitted to our counsels! That was thy doing, Catesby."

"Ay, and terribly do I repent me of it, Winter. I upbraid myself as bitterly as any can upbraid me for the folly. But hark--listen! I hear the plash of oars. See, there is a boat! It is he--it is Fawkes! I know him by his height and his strong action. Heaven be praised! All cannot yet be lost! Move upwards yet a few paces, and we will speak to him here alone before we take him within doors to the others.

"Guido Fawkes! Good Guy, is that verily thou?"

"Verily and in truth, my masters. Has the time seemed long?"

"Terribly long. How foundest thou all?"

"All well--all as I left it weeks ago. There has been no soul within. Gunpowder, f.a.ggots, iron bars, and stones--all are as before; and above, the coal and f.a.ggots carefully concealing all. Why this anxiety and fear, Catesby? it was not wont to be so with thee."

"No; but I have something of terrible import to reveal to thee, good Guy. And first I must ask thy pardon for thus exposing thee to peril as this day I did. I sent thee on this mission of inspection; but I ought first to have told thee that we are in fear and trembling lest we have been betrayed!"

"Betrayed!" echoed Fawkes with a fierce oath, "and by whom?"

"That we know not. But some days since, my Lord Mounteagle received a mysterious warning bidding him absent himself from this meeting of Parliament, for that a blow should then be struck, no man seeing who dealt it. Wherefore we fear--"

"Mounteagle!" cried Fawkes, interrupting fiercely; "then the traitor is yon false hound Tresham!"

"So we all thought till we charged him with it, and had he blenched or shrunk our daggers should have been buried in his heart!" answered Winter in low, fierce accents; "but he swore he knew naught of it, and that with so bold a front and so open an air that for very doubt of his guilt we could not smite him. There may be other traitors in the camp. There was that lad thou, or thy fool of a servant, Catesby, once brought amongst us. I liked it not then. He should not have been let go without solemn oath taken on pain of death. Trevlyn, methinks, was the name. I hear he has been seen in London again of late. Why does he haunt us? what does he suspect?"

"Tush! thou art dreaming. Trevlyn! why, that is a good name, and the lad knows nothing, and is, moreover, stanch.

"Guido, thou hast not said that thou dost pardon us for sending thee on so perilous an errand this day."

"Thou needst not repent, Catesby. I should have adventured myself the same had I known all. I have sworn myself to this task, and I go not back to mine own country till all be accomplished."

Chapter 23: Peril For Trevlyn.

Cuthbert stood at the door of the narrow house in Budge Row, seeking speech of the wise woman.

It was a bl.u.s.tering night--the first night in November. The wind howled and shrieked round the corners of the streets; the rain pattered down and splashed the garments of the few pedestrians who had braved the storm. It was but seven of the clock, yet Budge Row was dark and quiet as though midnight had settled down upon the city. Scarce any gleams of light filtered through the cracks in the shutters, and only the sound of a distant watchman's cry broke the silence of the night.

Cuthbert had once before sought this house, but had knocked in vain for admittance. Either the wise woman was from home, or else she had no intention of receiving visitors. Since then his mind had been engrossed by other matters, and he had not thought again of Joanna's charge concerning Esther. But recent mysterious occurrences had made him desirous not only of telling her his own tale, but of seeking information from her; and here he stood in the wind and rain making request for admittance.

Softly and silently the door swung open at last, and he saw before him the dark pa.s.sage he had traversed a year before with Cherry, the dim light from above just guiding his steps as he moved. The same juggleries were repeated as on that occasion. The outer door swung back and bolted itself behind him. The invisible light wavered and flickered and showed him his way. The black cat appeared ready to dispute his entrance into the room till he had dropped his coin into the box; and when he entered the dim place where the wise woman ensconced herself, he saw her as before, seated behind the lamp which shed its light upon him, but left her face in deep shadow. All was precisely as it had been upon a former occasion--all but his reception by the wise woman herself.

That, however, was altogether different; for the moment she saw who her visitor was, she rose suddenly from her chair and exclaimed in excited tones:

"Cuthbert Trevlyn, why hast thou not come hither sooner?"

"I did, but could not find thee."

She made an impatient exclamation.

"And thou wert content not to find me, and came not again and yet again! Foolish boy! Did not Joanna warn thee to seek me out and tell me all? I know well that she did. She is loyal and true. And so, boy, the lost treasure is found, and is safe beneath the roof of that house which shelters the honoured heads of the Wyverns?"

"Yes, it is all there."