Fair Margaret: Chapter 23

Chapter 23

FATHER HENRIQUES AND THE BAKER'S OVEN

A week had gone by. Margaret was in the palace, where Peter had been to
see her twice, and found her broken-hearted. Even the fact that they
were to be wed upon the following Saturday, the day fixed also for the
combat between Peter and Morella, brought her no joy or consolation. For
on the next day, the Sunday, there was to be an "Act of Faith," an
_auto-da-f�_ in Seville, when wicked heretics, such as Jews, Moors, and
persons who had spoken blasphemy, were to suffer for their crimes--some
by fire on the Quemadero, or place of burning, outside the city; some by
making public confession of their grievous sin before they were carried
off to perpetual and solitary imprisonment; some by being garotted
before their bodies were given to the flames, and so forth. In this
ceremony it was known that John Castell had been doomed to play a
leading part.

On her knees, with tears and beseechings, Margaret had prayed the queen
for mercy. But in this matter those tears produced no more effect upon
the heart of Isabella than does water dripping on a diamond. Gentle
enough in other ways, where questions of the Faith were concerned she
had the craft of a fox and the cruelty of a tiger. She was even
indignant with Margaret. Had not enough been done for her? she asked.
Had she not even passed her royal word that no steps should be taken to
deprive the accused of such property as he might own in Spain if he were
found guilty, and that none of those penalties which, according to law
and custom fell upon the children of such infamous persons, should
attach to her, Margaret? Was she not to be publicly married to her
lover, and, should he survive the combat, allowed to depart with him in
honour without even being asked to see her father expiate his iniquity?
Surely, as a good Christian she should rejoice that he was given this
opportunity of reconciling his soul with God and be made an example to
others of his accursed faith. Was she then a heretic also?

So she stormed on, till Margaret crept from her presence wondering
whether this creed could be right that would force the child to inform
against and bring the parent to torment. Where were such things written
in the sayings of the Saviour and His Apostles? And if they were not
written, who had invented them?

"Save him!--save him!" Margaret had gasped to Peter in despair. "Save
him, or I swear to you, however much I may love you, however much we may
seem to be married, never shall you be a husband to me."

"That seems hard," replied Peter, shaking his head mournfully, "since it
was not I who gave him over to these devils, and probably the end of it
would be that I should share his fate. Still, I will do what a man can."

"No, no," she cried in despair; "do nothing that will bring you into
danger." But he had gone without waiting for her answer.

It was night, and Peter sat in a secret room in a certain baker's shop
in Seville. There were present there besides himself the Fray
Henriques--now a secretary to the Holy Inquisition, but disguised as a
layman--the woman Inez, the agent Bernaldez, and the old Jew, Israel
of Granada.

"I have brought him here, never mind how," Inez was saying, pointing to
Henriques. "A risky and disagreeable business enough. And now what is
the use of it?"

"No use at all," answered the Fray coolly, "except to me who pocket my
ten gold pieces."

"A thousand doubloons if our friend escapes safe and sound," put in the
old Jew Israel. "God in Heaven! think of it, a thousand doubloons."

The secretary's eyes gleamed hungrily.

"I could do with them well enough," he answered, "and hell could spare
one filthy Jew for ten years or so, but I see no way. What I do see, is
that probably all of you will join him. It is a great crime to try to
tamper with a servant of the Holy Office."

Bernaldez turned white, and the old Jew bit his nails; but Inez tapped
the priest upon the shoulder.

"Are you thinking of betraying us?" she asked in her gentle voice.
"Look here, friend, I have some knowledge of poisons, and I swear to you
that if you attempt it, you shall die within a week, tied in a double
knot, and never know whence the dose came. Or I can bewitch you, I, who
have not lived a dozen years among the Moors for nothing, so that your
head swells and your body wastes, and you utter blasphemies, not
knowing what you say, until for very shame's sake they toast you among
the faggots also."

"Bewitch me!" answered Henriques with a shiver. "You have done that
already, or I should not be here."

"Then, if you do not wish to be in another place before your time," went
on Inez, still tapping his shoulder gently, "think, think! and find a
way, worthy servant of the Holy Office."

"A thousand doubloons!--a thousand gold doubloons!" croaked old Israel,
"or if you fail, sooner or later, this month or next, this year or next,
death--death as slow and cruel as we can make it. There are two
Inquisitions in Spain, holy Father; but one of them does its business in
the dark, and your name is on its ledger."

Now Henriques was very frightened, as well he might be with all those
eyes glaring at him.

"You need fear nothing," he said, "I know the devilish power of your
league too well, and that, if I kill you all, a hundred others I have
never seen or heard of would dog me to my death, who have taken your
accursed money."

"I am glad that you understand at last, dear friend," said the soft,
mocking voice of Inez, who stood behind the monk like an evil genius,
and again tapped him affectionately on the shoulder, this time with the
bare blade of a poniard. "Now be quick with that plan of yours. It grows
late, and all holy people should be abed."

"I have none. I defy you," he answered furiously.

"Very well, friend--very well; then I will say good night, or rather
farewell, since I am not likely to meet you again in this world."
"Where are you going?" he asked anxiously.

"Oh! to the palace to meet the Marquis of Morella and a friend of his, a
relation indeed. Look you here. I have had an offer of pardon for my
part in that marriage if I can prove that a certain base priest knew
that he was perpetrating a fraud. Well, I _can_ prove it--you may
remember that you wrote me a note--and, if I do, what happens to such a
priest who chances to have incurred the hatred of a grandee of Spain and
of his noble relation?"

"I am an officer of the Holy Inquisition; no one dare touch me," he
gasped.

"Oh! I think that there are some who would take the risk. For
instance--the king."

Fray Henriques sank back in his chair. Now he understood whom Inez meant
by the noble relative of Morella, understood also that he had been
trapped. "On Sunday morning," he began in a hollow whisper, "the
procession will be formed, and wind through the streets of the city to
the theatre, where the sermon will be preached before those who are
relaxed proceed to the Quemadero. About eight o'clock it turns on to the
quay for a little way only, and here will be but few spectators, since
the view of the pageant is bad, nor is the road guarded there. Now, if a
dozen determined men were waiting disguised as peasants with a boat at
hand, perhaps they might----" and he paused.

Then Peter, who had been watching and listening to all this play, spoke
for the first time, asking:

"In such an event, reverend Sir, how would those determined men know
which was the victim that they sought?"

"The heretic John Castell," he answered, "will be seated on an ass,
clad in a _zamarra_ of sheepskin painted with fiends and a likeness of
his own head burning--very well done, for I, who can draw, had a hand in
it. Also, he alone will have a rope round his neck, by which he may
be known."

"Why will he be seated on an ass?" asked Peter savagely. "Because you
have tortured him so that he cannot walk?"

"Not so--not so," said the Dominican, shrinking from those fierce eyes.
"He has never been questioned at all, not a single turn of the
_mancuerda_, I swear to you, Sir Knight. What was the use, since he
openly avows himself an accursed Jew?"

"Be more gentle in your talk, friend," broke in Inez, with her familiar
tap upon the shoulder. "There are those here who do not think so ill of
Jews as you do in your Holy House, but who understand how to apply the
_mancuerda_, and can make a very serviceable rack out of a plank and a
pulley or two such as lie in the next room. Cultivate courtesy, most
learned priest, lest before you leave this place you should add a cubit
to your stature."

"Go on," growled Peter.

"Moreover," added Fray Henriques shakily, "orders came that it was not
to be done. The Inquisitors thought otherwise, as they believed
--doubtless in error--that he might have accomplices whose names
he would give up; but the orders said that as he had lived so long in
England, and only recently travelled to Spain, he could have none.
Therefore he is sound--sound as a bell; never before, I am told, has an
impenitent Jew gone to the stake in such good case, however worthy and
worshipful he might be."

"So much the better for you, if you do not lie," answered Peter.
"Continue!"

"There is nothing more to say, except that I shall be walking near to
him with the two guards, and, of course, if he were snatched away from
us, and there were no boats handy in which to pursue, we could not help
it, could we? Indeed, we priests, who are men of peace, might even fly
at the sight of cruel violence."

"I should advise you to fly fast and far," said Peter. "But, Inez, what
hold have you on this friend of yours? He will trick everybody."

"A thousand doubloons--a thousand doubloons!" muttered old Israel like a
sleepy parrot.

"He may think to screw more than that out of the carcases of some of us,
old man. Come, Inez, you are quick at this game. How can we best hold
him to his word?"

"Dead, I think," broke in Bernaldez, who knew his danger as the partner
and relative of Castell, and the nominal owner of the ship _Margaret_ in
which it was purposed that he should escape. "We know all that he can
tell, and if we let him go he will betray us soon or late. Kill him out
of the way, I say, and burn his body in the oven."

Now Henriques fell upon his knees, and with groans and tears began to
implore mercy.

"Why do you complain so?" asked Inez, watching him with reflective eyes.
"The end would be much gentler than that which you righteous folk mete
out to many more honest men, yes, and women too. For my part, I think
that the Se�or Bernaldez gives good counsel. Better that you should
die, who are but one, than all of us and others, for you will understand
that we cannot trust you. Has any one got a rope?"

Now Henriques grovelled on the ground before her, kissing the hem of her
robe, and praying her in the name of all the saints to show pity on one
who had been betrayed into this danger by love of her.

"Of money you mean, Toad," she answered, kicking him with her slippered
foot. "I had to listen to your talk of love while we journeyed together,
and before, but here I need not, and if you speak of it again you shall
go living into that baker's oven. Oh! you have forgotten it, but I have
a long score to settle with you. You were a familiar of the Holy Office
here at Seville--were you not?--before Morella promoted you to Motril
for your zeal, and made you one of his chaplains? Well, I had a sister,"
And she knelt down and whispered a name into his ear.

He uttered a sound--it was more of a scream than a gasp.

"I had nothing to do with her death," he protested. "She was brought
within the walls of the Holy House by some one who had a grudge against
her and bore false witness."

"Yes, I know. It was you who had the grudge, you snake-souled rogue, and
it was you who gave the false witness. It was you, also, who but the
other day volunteered the corroborative evidence that was necessary
against Castell, saying that he had passed the Rood at your house in
Motril without doing it reverence, and other things. It was you, too,
who urged your superiors to put him to the question, because you said he
was rich and had rich friends, and much money could be wrung out of him
and them, whereof you were to get your share. Oh! yes, my information is
good, is it not? Even what passes in the dungeons of the Holy House
comes to the ears of the woman Inez. Well, do you still think that
baker's oven too hot for you?"

By this time Henriques was speechless with terror. There he knelt upon
the floor, glaring at this soft-voiced, remorseless woman who had made a
tool and a fool of him; who had beguiled him there that night, and who
hated him so bitterly and with so just a cause. Peter was speaking now.

"It would be better not to stain our hands with the creature's blood,"
he said. "Caged rats give little sport, and he might be tracked. For my
part, I would leave his judgment to God. Have you no other way, Inez?"

She thought a while, then prodded the Fray Henriques with her foot,
saying:

"Get up, sainted secretary to the Holy Office, and do a little writing,
which will be easy to you. See, here are pens and paper. Now
I'll dictate:

"'Most Adorable Inez,

"'Your dear message has reached me safely here in this accursed Holy
House, where we lighten heretics of their sins to the benefit of their
souls, and of their goods to the benefit of our own bodies----'"

"I cannot write it," groaned Henriques; "it is rank heresy."

"No, only the truth," answered Inez.

"Heresy and the truth--well, they are often the same thing. They would
burn me for it."

"That is just what many heretics have urged. They have died gloriously
for what they hold to be the truth, why should not you? Listen," she
went on more sternly. "Will you take your chance of burning on the
Quemadero, which you will not do unless you betray us, or will you
certainly burn more privately, but better, in a baker's oven, and within
half an hour? Ah! I thought you would not hesitate. Continue your
letter, most learned scribe. Are those words down? Yes. Now add these:

"'I note all you tell me about the trial at the Alcazar before their
Majesties. I believe that the Englishwoman will win her case. That was a
very pretty trick that I played on the most noble marquis at Granada.
Nothing neater was ever done, even in this place. Well, I owed him a
long score, and I have paid him off in full. I should like to have seen
his exalted countenance when he surveyed the features of his bride, the
waiting-woman, and knew that the mistress was safe away with another
man. The nephew of the king, who would like himself to be king some day,
married to an English waiting-woman! Good, very good, dear Inez.

"'Now, as regards the Jew, John Castell. I think that the matter may
possibly be managed, provided that the money is all right, for, as you
know, I do not work for nothing. Thus----'" And Inez dictated with
admirable lucidity those suggestions as to the rescue of Castell, with
which the reader is already acquainted, ending the letter as follows:

"'These Inquisitors here are cruel beasts, though fonder of money than
of blood; for all their talk about zeal for the Faith is so much wind
behind the mountains. They care as much for the Faith as the mountain
cares for the wind, or, let us say, as I do. They wanted to torture the
poor devil, thinking that he would rain maravedis; but I gave a hint in
the right quarter, and their fun was stopped. Carissima, I must stop
also; it is my hour for duty, but I hope to meet you as arranged, and we
will have a merry evening. Love to the newly married marquis, if you
meet him, and to yourself you know how much.

"'Your

"'HENRIQUES.

"'POSTSCRIPTUM.--This position will scarcely be as remunerative as I
hoped, so I am glad to be able to earn a little outside, enough to buy
you a present that will make your pretty eyes shine.'

"There!" said Inez mildly, "I think that covers everything, and would
burn you three or four times over. Let me read it to see that it is
plainly written and properly signed, for in such matters a good deal
turns on handwriting. Yes, that will do. Now you understand, don't you,
if anything goes wrong about the matter we have been talking of--that
is, if the worthy John Castell is not rescued, or a smell of our little
plot should get into the wind--this letter goes at once to the right
quarter, and a certain secretary will wish that he had never been born.
Man!" she added in a hissing whisper, "you shall die by inches as my
sister did."

"A thousand doubloons if the thing succeeds, and you live to claim
them," croaked old Israel. "I do not go back upon my word. Death and
shame and torture or a thousand doubloons. Now he knows our terms,
blindfold him again, Se�or Bernaldez, and away with him, for he poisons
the air. But first you, Inez, be gone and lodge that letter where
you know."

* * * * *

That same night two cloaked figures, Peter and Bernaldez, were rowed in
a little boat out to where the _Margaret_ lay in the river, and, making
her fast, slipped up the ship's side into the cabin. Here the stout
English captain, Smith, was waiting for them, and so glad was the honest
fellow to see Peter that he cast his arms about him and hugged him, for
they had not met since that desperate adventure of the boarding of the
_San Antonio_.

"Is your ship fit for sea, Captain?" asked Peter.

"She will never be fitter," he answered. "When shall I get sailing
orders?"

"When the owner comes aboard," answered Peter.

"Then we shall stop here until we rot; they have trapped him in their
Inquisition. What is in your mind, Peter Brome?--what is in your mind?
Is there a chance?"

"Aye, Captain, I think so, if you have a dozen fellows of the right
English stuff between decks."

"We have got that number, and one or two more. But what's the plan?"

Peter told him.

"Not so bad," said Smith, slapping his heavy hand upon his knee; "but
risky--very risky. That Inez must be a good girl. I should like to marry
her, notwithstanding her bygones."

Peter laughed, thinking what an odd couple they would make. "Hear the
rest, then talk," he said. "See now! On Saturday next Mistress Margaret
and I are to be married in the cathedral; then, towards sunset, the
Marquis of Morella and I run our course in the great bull-ring yonder,
and you and half a dozen of your men will be present. Now, I may conquer
or I may fail----"

"Never!--never!" said the captain. "I wouldn't give a pair of old boots
for that fine Spaniard's chance when you get at him. Why, you will crimp
him like a cod-fish!"

"God knows!" answered Peter. "If I win, my wife and I make our adieux to
their Majesties, and ride away to the quay, where the boat will be
waiting, and you will row us on board the _Margaret_. If I fail, you
will take up my body, and, accompanied by my widow, bring it in the same
fashion on board the _Margaret_, for I shall give it out that in this
case I wish to be embalmed in wine and taken back to England for burial.
In either event, you will drop your ship a little way down the river
round the bend, so that folk may think that you have sailed. In the
darkness you must work her back with the tide and lay her behind those
old hulks, and if any ask you why, say that three of your men have not
yet come aboard, and that you have dropped back for them, and whatever
else you like. Then, in case I should not be alive to guide you, you and
ten or twelve of the best sailors will land at the spot that this
gentleman will show you to-morrow, wearing Spanish cloaks so as not to
attract attention, but being well armed underneath them, like idlers
from some ship who had come ashore to see the show. I have told you how
you may know Master Castell. When you see him make a rush for him, cut
down any that try to stop you, tumble him into the boat, and row for
your lives to the ship, which will slip her moorings and get up her
canvas as soon as she sees you coming, and begin to drop down the river
with the tide and wind, if there is one. That is the plot, but God alone
knows the end of it! which depends upon Him and the sailors. Will you
play this game for the love of a good man and the rest of us? If you
succeed, you shall be rich for life, all of you."

"Aye," answered the captain, "and there's my hand on it. So sure as my
name is Smith, we will hook him out of that hell if men can do it, and
not for the money either. Why, Peter, we have sat here idle so long,
waiting for you and our lady, that we shall be glad of the fun. At any
rate, there will be some dead Spaniards before they have done with us,
and, if we are worsted, I'll leave the mate and enough hands upon the
ship to bring her safe to Tilbury. But we won't be--we won't be. By this
day week we will all be rolling homewards across the Bay with never a
Spaniard within three hundred miles, you and your lady and Master
Castell, too. I know it! I tell you, lad, I know it!"

"How do you know it?" asked Peter curiously.

"Because I dreamed it last night. I saw you and Mistress Margaret
sitting sweet as sugar, with your arms around each other's middles,
while I talked to the master, and the sun went down with the wind
blowing stiff from sou-sou-west, and a gale threatening. I tell you that
I dreamed it--I who am not given to dreams."

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