Oddsfish!

ckeridge; the thunder was as if great guns were shot off, or bags of marbles dashed on an oak floor overhead; and the countryside was as light as day under the flashes, so that we could see the tree

ot been armed, for the artillery of heaven

t for me. He had said nothing in his letter, save that His Majesty wished my presence at once; and on the outside of the letter

the morning; and it was half-past eight before we rode up to Whitehall. The last part of the journey was pretty pleasant, for the rain held off; and it was strange to see the white hard light

. Chiffinch was not within, for he had not expected me so early, a servant told me; but he had looked for my coming about eleven or twelve o'clock, and had given orders that

well to come so swiftly; but h

r two more until ten o'clock. I wil

not choose to tell me himself; and he went out again. But he was prese

as to what it was about; or how it could be anything that was at once so sudden and that demanded my presence. We went straight up the stairs, and acr

and he was sitting at the end of the great table, nearest to the King: on the other side of the table, nearer to me as I entered, were two men, upon whom I had never set eyes before-one of them, a little man in the dress of an apothecary or attorney; and th

d; and when I had kissed it, and stood back with the other two, he continued speaking as if I

, my Lord

e encouraged the other, "you tell us that all these papers were

icions," said the minist

se suspicions of yo

d, I ca

they ranged?" asked the King,

e under forty

as if in a droll kind of d

began my Lord; but

the soul, and Mr. Kirby, a very worthy chymist, and a physician of the body-are come to tell me of a plot against my life on the part of some of my faithful lieges, whereby they would thrust me swiftly

his mouth, at the manner in which the King to

hen, it appears, were t

to poi

sks you see, Mr. Mallo

have screwed pistols, with silver bullet

rudent!" cri

ience; and pushed the papers to

these worthy gentlemen go for the pr

. "But not Mr. Mallock. I wish to

an wicked as others thought them afterwards, who themselves partly believed, at any rate, the foolish tale that they told. Mr. Kirby was a litt

d Danby turned to the King,

but your loving subjects cannot. I have permission th

inflict the forty-three heads upon me. I

word, saluted the King at a distance, still without spe

d His Majesty, "sit you

as to why I had been sent for. What h

called Grove?" the K

it just now; but when it was put to me in this way I

ering?"

Grove is known to m

man called Grove-if i

pi

ther of the Society o

held up

d. Pickering is some sort of Religious, too,

door to me, and I saw him a-laying of the tabl

y, as I had seen him do before, and his mocking ma

. Or it may be some discontented fellow who will make his fortune over it; for all know that such a cry as this will be a popular one. But this I know for a verity-that there is not one word of truth in the tale from beginning to end; and it will appear so presently, no doubt. Yet meanwhile a great deal of mischief may be done; and my brother, may be, and even Her Majesty, may suffer for it, if we are not very prudent. Now, Mr. Mallock, I sent for you, for I did not know who else to send for. You are not known in England, or scarcely: you come commended to me by the Holy Father himself; you are neither priest nor Jesuit. What, then, you must do for me is this. First, you must speak not one word of the matter to any living soul-not even your confessor; for if we can quash the whole matter p

e, of England, seemed on the point of fulfilment. His Majesty too had spoken with an extraordinary vehemence, t

ust now and a few minutes ago. You take it very well. And

on it, Si

eaned back again a

or Pickering either. They cannot lay a finger upon them without my consent; and that they shall never have. It is to prevent rather the scandal of the whole ma

y business to listen rat

next was wo

a gentleman. And there is the Church of England, of which I am the head, which numbers many gentlemen, but is no religion for a Christian; and there is the Ca

e tip of my tongue to ask His Majesty why, if he thought so, he did not act upon it. But I did not, thinking it to

r. Mallock. Well; I am not yet a

in at the thought that a man so noble as this, and who knew so much (as his speeches had shewed me), could be so ignoble too-so tied and bound by his sins; and it affec

why you are come; but no one else; and even to him you must not say one word. You will do well and di

and I went out, promising t

*

n the conspiring was said to be done, nor what would be of avail to protect them; and all the way to my lodgings with my man James, I was thinking of what was best to do. My man had ordered that all things should be

*

ndation of my plan. For I had determined, between sleeping and waking, that the best thing to be done, was to shew myself as forward and friendly as I could, so that I might mix with the Fathers freely, in

ll adventure

e my fault than his, that we had come together; and I set my eyes upon the most strange and villainous face that I have ever seen. The fellow was dressed in a dark suit, and wore a crowned hat, and carried a club in his hand, and he appeared to be one of the vagrom-men as they are called, who are at the bottom of all riots and such like things. He was a smallish man in his height, but his face

an against him; by which I

d his

, "'tis nothing, sir. M

upon Mr. Fenwick's door, I saw that he was staring after me,

*

rew more talkative. Mrs. Ireland would be near sixty years old, I would take it, dressed in a brown sac, such as had been fashionable ten years back, and her daughter, I should think about thirty years old. They told me that they had been to supper, and to the play in the Duke's Playhouse, where Mr. Shirley's tragi-comedy

e these innocent folk-with Mr. Grove smiling upon them with the chocolate-talking of the play and what-not, and of which of the actors pleased them and which did not-and I noticed that the ladies, as always, were very severe upon the women-and the good fathers, too, pleased th

had seen in Rome, before that I was a novice, and of the singers that I heard there; and I listened, too, to their own speeches, ga

s about them at the door, and feigned that he was a constable to carry them off to prison-(at which my heart failed me agai

*

nd that perhaps I should go with it thither. They had told me at that, that one of their Fathers was there, named Mr. Bedingfeld (who was of the Oxburgh family, I think), and that he was confessor to the Duke of York, and that they would recommend me to h