The solitary one of the four men barred his way, and said:
“No further! You go back with us!”
Poins swung his cape back and touched his sword-hilt.
“You will have your neck stretched if you stay me,” he said.
The other loosened his cloak which had covered him up to the nose. He showed a mocking mouth, a long red beard that blew aside in a wild gust of the weather, and displayed on his breast the lion badge of the Lord Privy Seal.
“An you will not come you shall be carried!” he said.
“Nick Throckmorton,” Poins answered, “I will slit thy weazand! I am on a greater errand than thine.”
It was strong in his mind that he was bearing a letter for the King’s Highness. The other three laid hands swiftly upon him, and a wet cloak flapped over his head. They had his elbows bound together behind his back before his eyes again had the river and the muddy path to look upon. Throckmorton grinned sardonically, and they forced him along in the mud. The rain fell down; his cloak was gone. And then a great dread entered into his simple mind. It kept running through his head:
“I was carrying a letter for the King—I was carrying a letter for the King!” but his addled brains would bear his thoughts no further until he was cast loose in the very room of Privy Seal himself. They had used him very roughly, and he staggered back against the wall, gasping for breath and weeping with rage and fear.
Privy Seal stood before the fire; his eyes lifted a little but he said nothing at all. Throckmorton took a dagger from the chain round his neck, and cut the bag from the boy’s girdle. Still smiling sardonically, he placed it in Privy Seal’s fat hands.
“Here is the great secret,” he said. “I took it even in the gates of Chapuys.”
Privy Seal started a little and cried, “Ah!” The boy would have spoken, but he feared even to cry out; his eyes were starting from his head, and his breath came in great gusts that shook him. Privy Seal sat down in a large chair by the fire and considered for a moment. Then he slowly drew out the crumpled ball of paper. Here at last he held the Lady Mary utterly in his power; here at last, at the eleventh hour, he had a new opportunity to show to the King his vigilance, his power, and how necessary he was to the safety of the realm. He had been beginning to despair; Winchester was to confess the King that night. Now he held them. …
“I have been diligent,” Throckmorton said. “I had had the Lady Mary set in the room that has a spyhole beside a rose in the ceiling. So I saw the writing of this letter.”
Cromwell said, “Ah!” He had pulled the paper apart, smoothed it across his knee, and looked at it attentively. Then he held it close to the fire, for no blank paper could trouble the Privy Seal. This was a child’s trick at best.
In the warmth faint lines became visible on the paper; they darkened and darkened beneath his intent eyes. Behind his back Throckmorton, with his immense beard and sardonic eyes, rubbed his hands and smiled. Privy Seal’s fingers trembled, but he gave no further sign.
Suddenly he cried, “What!” and then, “Both women! both. …”
He fell back in the chair, and the sudden quaver of his face, the deep breath that he drew, showed his immense joy.
“God of my heart! Both women!” he said again.
The rain hurled itself with a great rustling against the casement. Though it was so early, it was already nearly dark. Cromwell sat up suddenly and pointed at the boy.
“Take that rat away!” he said. “Set him in irons, and come back here.”
Throckmorton caught the quivering boy by the ear and led him out at the door. He took him down a small stair that opened behind a curtain. At the stair-foot he pulled open a small, heavy door. He still held his dagger, and he cut the ropes that tied Poins’ elbows. With a sudden alacrity and a grin of malice he kicked him violently.
“Get you gone to your mistress,” he said.
Poins stood for a moment, wavering on his feet. He slipped miserably in the mud of the park, and suddenly he ran. His grey, straining form disappeared round the end of the dark buildings, and then Throckmorton waved a hand at the grey sky and laughed noiselessly. Thomas Cromwell was making notes in his tablets when his spy re-entered the room, with the raindrops glistening in his beard.
“Here are some notes for you,” Cromwell said. He rose to his feet with a swift and intense energy. “I have given you five farms. Now I go to the King.”
Throckmorton spoke gently.
“You are overeager,” he said. “It is early to go to the King’s Highness. We may find much more yet.”
“It is already late,” Cromwell said.
“Sir,” Throckmorton urged, “consider that the King is much affected to this lady. Consider that this letter contains nothing that is treasonable; rather it urges peace upon the King’s enemies.”
“Aye,” said Cromwell; “but it is written covertly to the King’s enemies.”
“That, it is true, is a treason,” Throckmorton said; “but it is very certain that the Lady Mary hath written letters very much more hateful. By questioning this boy that we have in gaol, by gaoling this Lady Katharine—why, we shall put her to
