For Master Ambrose was simply shaking with laughter; and he did not laugh easily.
“Do the dead bleed?” he was repeating between his guffaws; “why, Nat, it’s the best joke I’ve heard these twenty years!”
And when he had sufficiently recovered he told Master Nathaniel about the red juice oozing out of the coffin, which he had taken for blood, and how he had frightened Endymion Leer out of his wits by asking him about it.
“When, of course, it was a bogus funeral, and what I had seen was the juice of that damned fruit!” and again he was seized with paroxysms of laughter.
But Master Nathaniel merely gave an absent smile; there was something vaguely reminiscent in that idea of the dead bleeding—something he had recently read or heard; but, for the moment, he could not remember where.
In the meantime, Master Ambrose had recovered his gravity. “Come, come,” he cried briskly, “we’ve not a moment to lose. We must be off at once to Mumchance, rouse him and a couple of his men, and be back in a twinkling to that tapestry-room, to take them red-handed.”
“You’re right, Ambrose! You’re right!” cried Master Nathaniel. And off they went at a sharp jog trot, out at the gate, down the hill, and into the sleeping town.
They had no difficulty in rousing Mumchance and in firing him with their own enthusiasm. As they told him in a few hurried words what they had discovered, his respect for the Senate went up in leaps and bounds—though he could scarcely credit his ears when he learned of the part played in the evening’s transactions by Endymion Leer.
“To think of that! To think of that!” he kept repeating, “and me who’s always been so friendly with the Doctor, too!”
As a matter of fact, Endymion Leer had for some months been the recipient of Mumchance’s complaints with regard to the slackness and inefficiency of the Senate; and, in his turn, had succeeded in infecting the good Captain’s mind with sinister suspicions against Master Nathaniel. And there was a twinge of conscience for disloyalty to his master, the Mayor, behind the respectful heartiness of his tones as he cried, “Very good, your Worship. It’s Green and Juniper what are on duty tonight. I’ll go and fetch them from the guardroom, and we should be able to settle the rascals nicely.”
As the clocks in Lud-in-the-Mist were striking midnight the five of them were stepping cautiously along the corridors of the Guildhall. They had no difficulty in finding the hollow panel, and having pressed the spring, they made their way along the secret passage.
“Ambrose!” whispered Master Nathaniel flurriedly, “what was it exactly that I said that turned out to be the password? What with the excitement and all I’ve clean forgotten it.”
Master Ambrose shook his head. “I haven’t the slightest idea,” he whispered back. “To tell you the truth, I couldn’t make out what she meant about your having used a password. All I can remember your saying was ‘Toasted Cheese!’ or ‘Busty Bridget!’—or something equally elegant.”
Now they had got to the door, locked from the inside as before.
“Look here, Mumchance,” said Master Nathaniel, ruefully, “we can’t remember the password, and they won’t open without it.”
Mumchance smiled indulgently, “Your Worship need not worry about the password,” he said. “I expect we’ll be able to find another that will do as well … eh, Green and Juniper? But perhaps first—just to be in order—your Worship would knock and command them to open.”
Master Nathaniel felt absurdly disappointed. For one thing, it shocked his sense of dramatic economy that they should have to resort to violence when the same result could have been obtained by a minimum expenditure of energy. Besides, he had so looked forward to showing off his new little trick!
So it was with a rueful sigh that he gave a loud rat-a-tat-tat on the door, calling out, “Open in the name of the Law!”
These words, of course, produced no response, and Mumchance, with the help of the other four, proceeded to put into effect his own password, which was to shove with all their might against the door, two of the hinges of which he had noticed looked rusty.
It began to creak, and then to crack, and finally they burst into … an empty room. No strange fruit lay heaped on the floor; nothing hung on the walls but a few pieces of faded moth-eaten tapestry. It looked like a room that had not been entered for centuries.
When they had recovered from their first surprise, Master Nathaniel cried fiercely, “They must have got wind that we were after them, and given us the slip, taking their loads of filthy fruits with them, I’ll …”
“There’s been no fruit here, your Worship,” said Mumchance in a voice that he was trying hard to keep respectful; “it always leaves stains, and there ain’t any stains here.”
And he couldn’t resist adding, with a wink to Juniper and Green, “I daresay it’s your Worship’s having forgotten the password that’s done it!” And Juniper and Green grinned from ear to ear.
Master Nathaniel was too chagrined to heed this insolence; but Master Ambrose—ever the champion of dignity in distress—gave Mumchance such a look that he hung his head and humbly hoped that his Worship would forgive his little joke.
XIV
Dead in the Eye of the Law
The following morning Master Nathaniel woke late, and got up on the wrong side of his bed, which, in view of the humiliation and disappointment of the previous night, was, perhaps, pardonable.
His temper was not improved by Dame Marigold’s coming in while he was dressing to complain of his having smoked green shag elsewhere than in the pipe-room: “And you know how it always upsets me, Nat. I’m feeling quite squeamish this morning, the whole house reeks of it … Nat! you know you are an old blackguard!” and she dimpled and shook her finger at him, as
