11. CHAPTER XI.
At a very early hour on the following morning, before the household had assembled
to their first meal, the trumpets of a squadron were heard in the park; and very shortly
afterwards the clatter of hoofs mixed with the sharper clash of their accountrements, ringing
and clashing with the speed at which they rode, came nearer yet and nearer on the
soft morning air, and only ceased at length when four or five troops of the Ironsides
halted before the gate of the courtyard. Scarcely, however, had they halted, before
Chaloner came out alone to meet them, and having held brief conference with Colonel
Keating their commander, and seen above a hundred of the men dismounted and drawn
up round the house, each within gunshot of the other, he led the officers through the
parterre into the house itself, the other troopers remaining in the court till further orders.
This time, the visit of the soldiery was orderly and civilly conducted; for Keating, who
had come out at their head in person, was himself a gentleman of old and honorable
family, and had borne arms in Germany and the low countries with good repute, before
the civil war broke out in England; and he had, in compliance with a hint from Chaloner,
selected the more polished of his subalterns for this day's expedition. Just as
they were admitted to the Hall, the breakfast bell rang out and all the household was
assembled, the Ironsides receiving a request that they would partake of the hospitalities
of Woolverton, before proceeding to their duties. Alice had not, as yet, descended from
her bower; though all the rest were seated, when Henry Chaloner with several officers
in full costume, with their long broadswords clanking in their iron scabbards and their
spurs jingling on the oaken floor, joined in the domestic group; but in a few minutes
she too entered, looking a little paler than her wont, and very simply dressed, a few
stray ringlets of her rich sunny hair escaping from a plain lace cap which covered her
whole head, and her form somewhat shrouded in a loose morning-robe of grave sad-colored
satin—but still so lovely, that even the rude officers of the parliamentarian army
were moved by the grace and quiet dignity of her appearance, and rose at once to greet
her. But little conversation passed during the ensuing meal, and even that little was
constrained and uneasy in its nature, and very vague and general in its topics; so that
it was perhaps a relief to all parties, when the company arose from the table, and Chaloner
announced to Selby his intention of proceeding with the search forthwith.
“The quicker things of this nature are brought to a close, the better; so we will
waste no time in empty compliment, but go on straightway to the point. Now, Colonel
Keating, order in, if you please, one troop dismounted with their carbines; the rest
may form an outer cordon in the park, without the ring of sentinels. Now, cousin
Selby,” he continued, “will it please you to designate a chamber where all the household
may be held in ward until our search is ended. Yourself and Mistress Alice will
give us, I doubt not, your company in the book-room above.”
“As you will, cousin,” answered Selby; “but, as I told you yesterday, you are giving
yourselves much needless trouble; for surely you will find no man here, but we,
who are even now assembled. As for the rest, there can no better spot be chosen than
this same dining-hall—you see it has but two doors, and you can place a sentinel at
each, inside or out, as you think best. My daughter and myself will, as you have suggested,
wait your convenience in my study.”
“Be it so,” Chaloner replied. “Now, Colonel Keating, if you will take my counsel,
you will detail a small guard with a lancepesade in the courtyard without, and post
a cornet or lieutenant at either of these doorways, letting none have egress or entrance.
You will then take your men and search the whole house thoroughly; taking especial
care to do no damage, and replacing whatever furniture or hangings you may be forced
to move from their position. Looking especially for sliding panels, false chimney-backs,
moveable pictures and the like, which may give access, and do often in such
old tenements as this, to hidden galleries and chambers wrought in the thickness of
the wall. Be diligent, I pray you, and leave no means untried to find what you suspect
to be the case. Should you want any aid or counsel, I will await you in Master Selby's
library; should you discover aught, pray summon me. Here are the keys of all
the chambers, which my good friend has voluntarily given up to me; you will post a
small party at every corridor and landing place, that the concealed malignants, if there
be any here—which I doubt much—may not dodge to and fro, and so escape you. I
I deem it best you should commence here in this parlor—and now we will be no check
on your movements.”
As he ceased speaking, he offered his hand to Alice and led her, with the old man
following them, to the small cheerful chamber, wherein so many of the events which
it has been our lot to trace, occurred; and there the trio, seated around the fire, conversed
on ordinary topics as calmly and contentedly as though no search, involving life
and death, was going on within the walls—as though two of the three, who sat there,
seemingly so happy, had not their hearts pierced to the very core by strong and passionate
emotions. Such is proverbially, however, the course of all things human!
such the deceitful and false semblance of the world! where hardly aught is real, saving
the sin and sorrow that lurk beneath the specious glitter—the foil and tinsel—of that
thin gorgeous tissue which men think fit to term society! Two hours perhaps passed
thus, or something more, when Keating, with two subalterns came in—a dozen privates
halting at the door—saying that, after a most strict and tedious search, no place had
been discovered wherein a mouse even, could find concealment.
“This chamber searched then, all our work is ended,” Chaloner answered; “but
now my task commences. Now, my good cousin, may I request you to remove the
panel, which hides the secret passage. Let your men fetch some torches, if they have
got none with them, and look well to their weapons, Colonel Keating, and to the
priming of their carbines. So, you will not disclose it? Well, it was only to spare time,
I asked you! Here lancepesade, jump on those steps, and take out all the volumes,
which fill that third compartment—the third there from the window! I saw you open
it once, Master Selby, many long years ago, when you thought no one marked you.
There, that is it; now tarry”—and stepping up to the identical place, where the nail
heads and screws which worked the springs within were all made clearly visible by
the removal of the books, he began to tamper with them, and after some considerable
time, succeeded; so that the portion of the wall revolved, and the mouth of the low
passage was disclosed to the greedy gaze of the fierce Ironsides
“Now we will soon see what is hidden! Give me a torch, and light a dozen more;
leave three men at the entrance, Colonel Keating; you and the others follow!” and with
these words Chaloner drew his rapier, and entered the dim vault, the soldiers rushing
after him, with brandished swords, and blazing flambeaus, rejoicing, as it seemed,
already in contemplation of some valuable capture. Far stretched those long and
devious corridors, through many a nook and labyrinthine angle, up steep long flights of
stairs, down long and gradual descents, with many, a false turn leading their steps astray
and ending in dead walls, or guiding them back to the spot whence they came—far
from the light of day—full of garnered dust, cobwebs, and filth of ages—the atmosphere
so dense with foul and noxious vapors that the lights waned, and some went out; and
all burned blue and ghastly. Yet still with stanch indomitable perseverance the soldiers
struggled onward. Guards had been posted here and there at all the points of
intersection, so that, when at the last they reached the chamber, having been upwards
of an hour in traversing a distance which Alice, knowing the real clue, would have accomplished
easily within ten minutes, there were but four of the privates left with
Henry and the three officers.
“Ha! we have reached the citadel at length,” said Chaloner—“and lo! the key on
the outside, suspended to the staple; I doubt we have but lost our time and labor.”
He unlocked the door, as he spoke, and entered the little cell, which had the night
before been Wyvil's hiding-place; but now it was all vacant and deserted—no food, or
raiment—no light, or other token of any human visitant was to be found in its narrow
precincts—the bed, the board, the stools, the shelves against the wall, and the few
articles that were piled on them, were covered with the thick white dust—as it appeared—of
ages; feathers, and bits of flock, and clots of matted cobwebs were scattered
over all the floor and walls—and in the brazier were a pile of cold white ashes, which,
as the disappointed soldiers swore, had not been lit these ten years. The other doors
stood open; and for form's sake alone—for all were now convinced that no one was
concealed at all within the building—those passages were likewise searched; but this
was speedily accomplished; and when they found that the first staircase ended abruptly
in the wall, which has been heretofore described; and that the doors at the end of the
others were locked and bolted in the inside, with all their bars and chains so matted
over with the network of five hundred spiders, that they had evidently not been removed
for many months at least—then they gave up the search as useless; and making their
way back to the library with far more ease than they had come in the first instance,
after a few apologies to Master Selby, and an assurance that his house should be no
further troubled, the Ironsides departed. Then, after a little while, Chaloner, resisting
all Mark's efforts to detain him, took his leave also; convinced as fully as the rest, that
his kinsman did indeed know nothing of the young cavalier, and that his fears on his
behalf had all been overstrained and needless.
Within two hours, the same cell which had been so strictly searched, and found so
sordid and neglected, was neatly swept and garnished—the board was spread with a
clean damask cloth, two bright wax-lights were burning in tall candlesticks of silver, a
cheerful fire of wood was crackling in the brazier, and by the board sat Wyvil, with his
long hair all curled and arranged carefully, and his rich dress in accurate order, sipping
a glass of rich and fragrant Bordeaux wine, and reading, so to deceive the time, a huge
romance of Calprenede or Scudery; while on the table at his elbow stood several plates
and trenchers, with the remains of a fat roasted capon, and the long flask from which
he ever and anon replenished his Venetian beaker—so little had the search availed to
find the real secrets of that old rambling manor.
