old oak, by the woodman; to-morrow or next day, by will come the
axe. But what wrote ye in a letter?"

Lord Shoreby snatched the paper from the arrow, read it, crumpled
it between his hands, and, overcoming the reluctance which had
hitherto withheld him from approaching, threw himself on his knees
beside the body and eagerly groped in the wallet.

He rose to his feet with a somewhat unsettled countenance.

"Gossip," he said, "I have indeed lost a letter here that much
imported; and could I lay my hand upon the knave that took it, he
should incontinently grace a halter. But let us, first of all,
secure the issues of the house. Here is enough harm already, by
St. George!"

Sentinels were posted close around the house and garden; a sentinel
on every landing of the stair, a whole troop in the main entrance-
hall; and yet another about the bonfire in the shed. Sir Daniel's
followers were supplemented by Lord Shoreby's; there was thus no
lack of men or weapons to make the house secure, or to entrap a
lurking enemy, should one be there.

Meanwhile, the body of the spy was carried out through the falling
snow and deposited in the abbey church.

It was not until these dispositions had been taken, and all had
returned to a decorous silence, that the two girls drew Richard
Shelton from his place of concealment, and made a full report to
him of what had passed. He, upon his side, recounted the visit of
the spy, his dangerous discovery, and speedy end.

Joanna leaned back very faint against the curtained wall.

"It will avail but little," she said. "I shall be wed to-morrow,
in the morning, after all!"

"What!" cried her friend. "And here is our paladin that driveth
lions like mice! Ye have little faith, of a surety. But come,
friend lion-driver, give us some comfort; speak, and let us hear
bold counsels."

Dick was confounded to be thus outfaced with his own exaggerated
words; but though he coloured, he still spoke stoutly.

"Truly," said he, "we are in straits. Yet, could I but win out of
this house for half an hour, I do honestly tell myself that all
might still go well; and for the marriage, it should be prevented."

"And for the lions," mimicked the girl, "they shall be driven."

"I crave your excuse," said Dick. "I speak not now in any boasting
humour, but rather as one inquiring after help or counsel; for if I
get not forth of this house and through these sentinels, I can do
less than naught. Take me, I pray you, rightly."

"Why said ye he was rustic, Joan?" the girl inquired. "I warrant
he hath a tongue in his head; ready, soft, and bold is his speech
at pleasure. What would ye more?"

"Nay," sighed Joanna, with a smile, "they have changed me my friend
Dick, 'tis sure enough. When I beheld him, he was rough indeed.
But it matters little; there is no help for my hard case, and I
must still be Lady Shoreby!"

"Nay, then," said Dick, "I will even make the adventure. A friar
is not much regarded; and if I found a good fairy to lead me up, I
may find another belike to carry me down. How call they the name
of this spy?"

"Rutter," said the young lady; "and an excellent good name to call
him by. But how mean ye, lion-driver? What is in your mind to
do?"

"To offer boldly to go forth," returned Dick; "and if any stop me,
to keep an unchanged countenance, and say I go to pray for Rutter.
They will be praying over his poor clay even now."

"The device is somewhat simple," replied the girl, "yet it may
hold."

"Nay," said young Shelton, "it is no device, but mere boldness,
which serveth often better in great straits."

"Ye say true," she said. "Well, go, a-Mary's name, and may Heaven
speed you! Ye leave here a poor maid that loves you entirely, and
another that is most heartily your friend. Be wary, for their
sakes, and make not shipwreck of your safety."

"Ay," added Joanna, "go, Dick. Ye run no more peril, whether ye go
or stay. Go; ye take my heart with you; the saints defend you!"

Dick passed the first sentry with so assured a countenance that the
fellow merely figeted and stared; but at the second landing the man
carried his spear across and bade him name his business.

"Pax vobiscum," answered Dick. "I go to pray over the body of this
poor Rutter."

"Like enough," returned the sentry; "but to go alone is not
permitted you." He leaned over the oaken balusters and whistled
shrill. "One cometh!" he cried; and then motioned Dick to pass.

At the foot of the stair he found the guard afoot and awaiting his
arrival; and when he had once more repeated his story, the
commander of the post ordered four men out to accompany him to the
church.

"Let him not slip, my lads," he said. "Bring him to Sir Oliver, on
your lives!"

The door was then opened; one of the men took Dick by either arm,
another marched ahead with a link, and the fourth, with bent bow
and the arrow on the string, brought up the rear. In this order
they proceeded through the garden, under the thick darkness of the
night and the scattering snow, and drew near to the dimly-
illuminated windows of the abbey church.

At the western portal a picket of archers stood, taking what
shelter they could find in the hollow of the arched doorways, and
all powdered with the snow; and it was not until Dick's conductors
had exchanged a word with these, that they were suffered to pass
forth and enter the nave of the sacred edifice.

The church was doubtfully lighted by the tapers upon the great
altar, and by a lamp or two that swung from the arched roof before
the private chapels of illustrious families. In the midst of the
choir the dead spy lay, his limbs piously composed, upon a bier.

A hurried mutter of prayer sounded along the arches; cowled figures
knelt in the stalls of the choir, and on the steps of the high
altar a priest in pontifical vestments celebrated mass.

Upon this fresh entrance, one of the cowled figures arose, and,
coming down the steps which elevated the level of the choir above
that of the nave, demanded from the leader of the four men what
business brought him to the church. Out of respect for the service
and the dead, they spoke in guarded tones; but the echoes of that
huge, empty building caught up their words, and hollowly repeated
and repeated them along the aisles.

"A monk!" returned Sir Oliver (for he it was), when he had heard
the report of the archer. "My brother, I looked not for your
coming," he added, turning to young Shelton. "In all civility, who
are ye? and at whose instance do ye join your supplications to
ours?"

Dick, keeping his cowl about his face, signed to Sir Oliver to move
a pace or two aside from the archers; and, so soon as the priest
had done so, "I cannot hope to deceive you, sir," he said. "My
life is in your hands."

Sir Oliver violently started; his stout cheeks grew pale, and for a
space he was silent.

"Richard," he said, "what brings you here, I know not; but I much
misdoubt it to be evil. Nevertheless, for the kindness that was, I
would not willingly deliver you to harm. Ye shall sit all night
beside me in the stalls: ye shall sit there till my Lord of
Shoreby be married, and the party gone safe home; and if all goeth
well, and ye have planned no evil, in the end ye shall go whither
ye will. But if your purpose be bloody, it shall return upon your
head. Amen!"

And the priest devoutly crossed himself, and turned and louted to
the altar.

With that, he spoke a few words more to the soldiers, and taking
Dick by the hand, led him up to the choir, and placed him in the
stall beside his own, where, for mere decency, the lad had
instantly to kneel and appear to be busy with his devotions.

His mind and his eyes, however, were continually wandering. Three
of the soldiers, he observed, instead of returning to the house,
had got them quietly into a point of vantage in the aisle; and he
could not doubt that they had done so by Sir Oliver's command.
Here, then, he was trapped. Here he must spend the night in the
ghostly glimmer and shadow of the church, and looking on the pale
face of him he slew; and here, in the morning, he must see his
sweetheart married to another man before his eyes.

But, for all that, he obtained a command upon his mind, and built
himself up in patience to await the issue.


CHAPTER IV - IN THE ABBEY CHURCH


In Shoreby Abbey Church the prayers were kept up all night without
cessation, now with the singing of psalms, now with a note or two
upon the bell.

Rutter, the spy, was nobly waked. There he lay, meanwhile, as they
had arranged him, his dead hands crossed upon his bosom, his dead
eyes staring on the roof; and hard by, in the stall, the lad who
had slain him waited, in sore disquietude, the coming of the
morning.

Once only, in the course of the hours, Sir Oliver leaned across to
his captive.

"Richard," he whispered, "my son, if ye mean me evil, I will
certify, on my soul's welfare, ye design upon an innocent man.
Sinful in the eye of Heaven I do declare myself; but sinful as
against you I am not, neither have been ever."

"My father," returned Dick, in the same tone of voice, "trust me, I
design nothing; but as for your innocence, I may not forget that ye
cleared yourself but lamely."

"A man may be innocently guilty," replied the priest. "He may be
set blindfolded upon a mission, ignorant of its true scope. So it
was with me. I did decoy your father to his death; but as Heaven
sees us in this sacred place, I knew not what I did."

"It may be," returned Dick. "But see what a strange web ye have
woven, that I should be, at this hour, at once your prisoner and
your judge; that ye should both threaten my days and deprecate my
anger. Methinks, if ye had been all your life a true man and good
priest, ye would neither thus fear nor thus detest me. And now to
your prayers. I do obey you, since needs must; but I will not be
burthened with your company."

The priest uttered a sigh so heavy that it had almost touched the
lad into some sentiment of pity, and he bowed his head upon his
hands like a man borne down below a weight of care. He joined no
longer in the psalms; but Dick could hear the beads rattle through
his fingers and the prayers a-pattering between his teeth.

Yet a little, and the grey of the morning began to struggle through
the painted casements of the church, and to put to shame the
glimmer of the tapers. The light slowly broadened and brightened,
and presently through the south-eastern clerestories a flush of
rosy sunlight flickered on the walls. The storm was over; the
great clouds had disburdened their snow and fled farther on, and
the new day was breaking on a merry winter landscape sheathed in
white.

A bustle of church officers followed; the bier was carried forth to
the deadhouse, and the stains of blood were cleansed from off the
tiles, that no such ill-omened spectacle should disgrace the
marriage of Lord Shoreby. At the same time, the very ecclesiastics
who had been so dismally engaged all night began to put on morning
faces, to do honour to the merrier ceremony which was about to
follow. And further to announce the coming of the day, the pious
of the town began to assemble and fall to prayer before their
favourite shrines, or wait their turn at the confessionals.

Favoured by this stir, it was of course easily possible for any man
to avoid the vigilance of Sir Daniel's sentries at the door; and
presently Dick, looking about him wearily, caught the eye of no
less a person than Will Lawless, still in his monk's habit.

The outlaw, at the same moment, recognised his leader, and privily
signed to him with hand and eye.

Now, Dick was far from having forgiven the old rogue his most
untimely drunkenness, but he had no desire to involve him in his
own predicament; and he signalled back to him, as plain as he was
able, to begone.

Lawless, as though he had understood, disappeared at once behind a
pillar, and Dick breathed again.

What, then, was his dismay to feel himself plucked by the sleeve
and to find the old robber installed beside him, upon the next
seat, and, to all appearance, plunged in his devotions!

Instantly Sir Oliver arose from his place, and, gliding behind the
stalls, made for the soldiers in the aisle. If the priest's
suspicions had been so lightly wakened, the harm was already done,
and Lawless a prisoner in the church.

"Move not," whispered Dick. "We are in the plaguiest pass, thanks,
before all things, to thy swinishness of yestereven. When ye saw
me here, so strangely seated where I have neither right nor
interest, what a murrain I could ye not smell harm and get ye gone
from evil?"

"Nay," returned Lawless, "I thought ye had heard from Ellis, and
were here on duty."

"Ellis!" echoed Dick. "Is Ellis, then, returned?

"For sure," replied the outlaw. "He came last night, and belted me
sore for being in wine - so there ye are avenged, my master. A
furious man is Ellis Duckworth! He hath ridden me hot-spur from
Craven to prevent this marriage; and, Master Dick, ye know the way
of him - do so he will!"

"Nay, then," returned Dick, with composure, "you and I, my poor
brother, are dead men; for I sit here a prisoner upon suspicion,
and my neck was to answer for this very marriage that he purposeth
to mar. I had a fair choice, by the rood! to lose my sweetheart or
else lose my life! Well, the cast is thrown - it is to be my life."

"By the mass," cried Lawless, half arising, "I am gone!"

But Dick had his hand at once upon his shoulder.

"Friend Lawless, sit ye still," he said. "An ye have eyes, look
yonder at the corner by the chancel arch; see ye not that, even
upon the motion of your rising, yon armed men are up and ready to
intercept you? Yield ye, friend. Ye were bold aboard ship, when
ye thought to die a sea-death; be bold again, now that y' are to
die presently upon the gallows."

"Master Dick," gasped Lawless, "the thing hath come upon me
somewhat of the suddenest. But give me a moment till I fetch my
breath again; and, by the mass, I will be as stout-hearted as
yourself."

"Here is my bold fellow!" returned Dick. "And yet, Lawless, it
goes hard against the grain with me to die; but where whining
mendeth nothing, wherefore whine?"

"Nay, that indeed!" chimed Lawless. "And a fig for death, at
worst! It has to be done, my master, soon or late. And hanging in
a good quarrel is an easy death, they say, though I could never
hear of any that came back to say so."

And so saying, the stout old rascal leaned back in his stall,
folded his arms, and began to look about him with the greatest air
of insolence and unconcern.

"And for the matter of that," Dick added, "it is yet our best
chance to keep quiet. We wot not yet what Duckworth purposes; and
when all is said, and if the worst befall, we may yet clear our
feet of it."

Now that they ceased talking, they were aware of a very distant and
thin strain of mirthful music which steadily drew nearer, louder,
and merrier. The bells in the tower began to break forth into a
doubling peal, and a greater and greater concourse of people to
crowd into the church, shuffling the snow from off their feet, and
clapping and blowing in their hands. The western door was flung
wide open, showing a glimpse of sunlit, snowy street, and admitting
in a great gust the shrewd air of the morning; and in short, it
became plain by every sign that Lord Shoreby desired to be married
very early in the day, and that the wedding-train was drawing near.

Some of Lord Shoreby's men now cleared a passage down the middle
aisle, forcing the people back with lance-stocks; and just then,
outside the portal, the secular musicians could be descried drawing
near over the frozen snow, the fifers and trumpeters scarlet in the
face with lusty blowing, the drummers and the cymbalists beating as
for a wager.

These, as they drew near the door of the sacred building, filed off
on either side, and, marking time to their own vigorous music,
stood stamping in the snow. As they thus opened their ranks, the
leaders of this noble bridal train appeared behind and between
them; and such was the variety and gaiety of their attire, such the
display of silks and velvet, fur and satin, embroidery and lace,
that the procession showed forth upon the snow like a flower-bed in
a path or a painted window in a wall.

First came the bride, a sorry sight, as pale as winter, clinging to
Sir Daniel's arm, and attended, as brides-maid, by the short young
lady who had befriended Dick the night before. Close behind, in
the most radiant toilet, followed the bridegroom, halting on a
gouty foot; and as he passed the threshold of the sacred building
and doffed his hat, his bald head was seen to be rosy with emotion.

And now came the hour of Ellis Duckworth.

Dick, who sat stunned among contrary emotions, grasping the desk in
front of him, beheld a movement in the crowd, people jostling
backward, and eyes and arms uplifted. Following these signs, he
beheld three or four men with bent bows leaning from the clerestory
gallery. At the same instant they delivered their discharge, and
before the clamour and cries of the astounded populace had time to
swell fully upon the ear, they had flitted from their perch and
disappeared.

The nave was full of swaying heads and voices screaming; the
ecclesiastics thronged in terror from their places; the music
ceased, and though the bells overhead continued for some seconds to
clang upon the air, some wind of the disaster seemed to find its
way at last even to the chamber where the ringers were leaping on
their ropes, and they also desisted from their merry labours.

Right in the midst of the nave the bridegroom lay stone-dead,
pierced by two black arrows. The bride had fainted. Sir Daniel
stood, towering above the crowd in his surprise and anger, a
clothyard shaft quivering in his left forearm, and his face
streaming blood from another which had grazed his brow.

Long before any search could be made for them, the authors of this
tragic interruption had clattered down a turnpike stair and
decamped by a postern door.

But Dick and Lawless still remained in pawn; they had, indeed,
arisen on the first alarm, and pushed manfully to gain the door;
but what with the narrowness of the stalls and the crowding of
terrified priests and choristers, the attempt had been in vain, and
they had stoically resumed their places.

And now, pale with horror, Sir Oliver rose to his feet and called
upon Sir Daniel, pointing with one hand to Dick.

"Here," he cried, "is Richard Shelton - alas the hour! - blood
guilty! Seize him! - bid him be seized! For all our lives' sakes,
take him and bind him surely! He hath sworn our fall."

Sir Daniel was blinded by anger - blinded by the hot blood that
still streamed across his face.

"Where?" he bellowed. "Hale him forth! By the cross of Holywood,
but he shall rue this hour!"

The crowd fell back, and a party of archers invaded the choir, laid
rough hands on Dick, dragged him head-foremost from the stall, and
thrust him by the shoulders down the chancel steps. Lawless, on
his part, sat as still as a mouse.

Sir Daniel, brushing the blood out of his eyes, stared blinkingly
upon his captive.

"Ay," he said, "treacherous and insolent, I have thee fast; and by
all potent oaths, for every drop of blood that now trickles in mine
eyes, I will wring a groan out of thy carcase. Away with him!" he
added. "Here is no place! Off with him to my house. I will
number every joint of thy body with a torture."

But Dick, putting off his captors, uplifted his voice.

"Sanctuary!" he shouted. "Sanctuary! Ho, there, my fathers! They
would drag me from the church!"

"From the church thou hast defiled with murder, boy," added a tall
man, magnificently dressed.

"On what probation?" cried Dick. "They do accuse me, indeed, of
some complicity, but have not proved one tittle. I was, in truth,
a suitor for this damsel's hand; and she, I will be bold to say it,
repaid my suit with favour. But what then? To love a maid is no
offence, I trow - nay, nor to gain her love. In all else, I stand
here free from guiltiness."

There was a murmur of approval among the bystanders, so boldly Dick
declared his innocence; but at the same time a throng of accusers
arose upon the other side, crying how he had been found last night
in Sir Daniel's house, how he wore a sacrilegious disguise; and in
the midst of the babel, Sir Oliver indicated Lawless, both by voice
and gesture, as accomplice to the fact. He, in his turn, was
dragged from his seat and set beside his leader. The feelings of
the crowd rose high on either side, and while some dragged the
prisoners to and fro to favour their escape, others cursed and
struck them with their fists. Dick's ears rang and his brain swam
dizzily, like a man struggling in the eddies of a furious river.

But the tall man who had already answered Dick, by a prodigious
exercise of voice restored silence and order in the mob.

"Search them," he said, "for arms. We may so judge of their
intentions."

Upon Dick they found no weapon but his poniard, and this told in
his favour, until one man officiously drew it from its sheath, and
found it still uncleansed of the blood of Rutter. At this there
was a great shout among Sir Daniel's followers, which the tall man
suppressed by a gesture and an imperious glance. But when it came
to the turn of Lawless, there was found under his gown a sheaf of
arrows identical with those that had been shot.

"How say ye now?" asked the tall man, frowningly, of Dick.

"Sir," replied Dick, "I am here in sanctuary, is it not so? Well,
sir, I see by your bearing that ye are high in station, and I read
in your countenance the marks of piety and justice. To you, then,
I will yield me prisoner, and that blithely, foregoing the
advantage of this holy place. But rather than to be yielded into
the discretion of that man - whom I do here accuse with a loud voice
to be the murderer of my natural father and the unjust retainer of
my lands and revenues - rather than that, I would beseech you, under
favour, with your own gentle hand, to despatch me on the spot.
Your own ears have heard him, how before that I was proven guilty
he did threaten me with torments. It standeth not with your own
honour to deliver me to my sworn enemy and old oppressor, but to
try me fairly by the way of law, and, if that I be guilty indeed,
to slay me mercifully."

"My lord," cried Sir Daniel, "ye will not hearken to this wolf?
His bloody dagger reeks him the lie into his face."

"Nay, but suffer me, good knight," returned the tall stranger;
"your own vehemence doth somewhat tell against yourself."

And here the bride, who had come to herself some minutes past and
looked wildly on upon this scene, broke loose from those that held
her, and fell upon her knees before the last speaker.

"My Lord of Risingham," she cried, "hear me, in justice. I am here
in this man's custody by mere force, reft from mine own people.
Since that day I had never pity, countenance, nor comfort from the
face of man - but from him only - Richard Shelton - whom they now
accuse and labour to undo. My lord, if he was yesternight in Sir
Daniel's mansion, it was I that brought him there; he came but at
my prayer, and thought to do no hurt. While yet Sir Daniel was a
good lord to him, he fought with them of the Black Arrow loyally;
but when his foul guardian sought his life by practices, and he
fled by night, for his soul's sake, out of that bloody house,
whither was he to turn - he, helpless and penniless? Or if he be
fallen among ill company, whom should ye blame - the lad that was
unjustly handled, or the guardian that did abuse his trust?"

And then the short young lady fell on her knees by Joanna's side.

"And I, my good lord and natural uncle," she added, "I can bear
testimony, on my conscience and before the face of all, that what
this maiden saith is true. It was I, unworthy, that did lead the
young man in."

Earl Risingham had heard in silence, and when the voices ceased, he
still stood silent for a space. Then he gave Joanna his hand to
arise, though it was to be observed that he did not offer the like
courtesy to her who had called herself his niece.

"Sir Daniel," he said, "here is a right intricate affair, the
which, with your good leave, it shall be mine to examine and
adjust. Content ye, then; your business is in careful hands;
justice shall be done you; and in the meanwhile, get ye
incontinently home, and have your hurts attended. The air is