It was my turn to smile.
"My Lord Ess.e.x is not a fool," I said. "If they know so much of me, would they not know more?"
"Plainly they do not," he said. "Or they would not have tried to get you on their side."
I laughed softly.
"Sir," I said, "you are very sharp: but you are not sharp enough."
Then I related to him the behaviour of them all in the inn; and how Rumbald had shewn no surprise in seeing that I was a gentleman after all; and how my Lord Ess.e.x had talked in what would have been the maddest manner, if his intention had been as Chiffinch had thought it to be; and with every word that I said the page"s face grew longer.
"Well," he cried, "it is beyond me altogether. What then is the explanation?"
"My friend," I said, "you were right. Neither before nor after what has pa.s.sed to-day would I have done the work you designed for me which was to get these men"s confidence, and then betray it again. But it is not their idea to give me their confidence at all. So I will work with you very gladly."
"But then what can you do--" he began in amazement.
"Listen," I said. "It will fall out just as I say. They will give me very few names; they will admit me to none of their real secrets; but yet they will feign to do so."
"But, what a" G.o.d"s name--"
"Oh! man!" I cried, "you are surely slow-witted to-day. They will do all this--" (I leaned forward as I spoke for further emphasis)--"_in order that I may hand it on to His Majesty_; but they will give me no real secret till the climax is come, and their designs perfected. And then they will give me a false one altogether. They think that they will make me a tool to further their true plans by betraying false ones. We may know this for certain then--that whatever they tell me, knowing that I will tell you, is not what they intend, but something else altogether.
And it will not be hard to know the truth, if we are certified of what is false."
There was complete silence in the room when I had finished, except for the wash of the tide outside the windows. The man"s mouth was open, and his eyes set in thought. Then sense came back to his face; and he smiled suddenly and widely.
"G.o.d!" he said, and slapped me suddenly on the thigh. "Good G.o.d! you have hit it, I believe."
CHAPTER VII
From now onwards there began for me such a series of complications that I all but despair of making clear even the course that they ran. My diaries are filled with notes and initials and dates which I dared not at the time set down more explicitly; and my memory is often confused between them. For, indeed, my work in France was but child"s play to this, neither was there any danger in France such as was here.
For consider what, not a double part merely, but a triple, I had to play. The gentlemen, who were beginning at this time to conspire in real earnest against the King and the Const.i.tution, some of whom afterwards, such as my Lord Russell, suffered death for it, and others of whom like my Lord Howard of Escrick escaped by turning King"s evidence--although their guilt was very various--these gentlemen, through my Lord Ess.e.x, had got at me, as they thought, to betray not truth but falsehood to His Majesty, and told me matters, under promise of secrecy, which they intended me to tell to the King and his advisers. To them, therefore, I had to feign feigning: I had to feign, that is, that I was feigning to keep their confidence, but that in reality that I was betraying it; while to Mr. Chiffinch I had to disclose these precious secrets not as true but as false, and conjecture with him what was the truth. (My evidence, later, was never called upon, nor did my name appear in any way, for that the jury would never have understood it.) I had, therefore, a double danger to guard against; first that which came from the conspirators--the fear that they should discover I was tricking them, or rather that I had discovered their trickery; and, on the other side, that I should become involved with them in the fall that was so certain from the beginning, and be myself accused of conspiracy--or of misprision of treason at the least. Against the latter I guarded as well as I could, by revealing to Mr. Chiffinch every least incident so soon as it happened; and on three occasions in the following year having a long discourse with His Majesty. But against the former danger I had only my wits to protect me.
The best thing, therefore, that I can do is to relate a few of the events that happened to me. (I have never, I think, experienced such a strain on my wits; for it went on for a good deal more than a year, since I could for a long time arrive at no certain proofs of the guilt of the conspirators, and His Majesty did not wish to strike until their conviction was a.s.sured.)
The first meeting of the conspirators to which I was admitted was in January. (I had not been able, of course, to go to Hare Street for Christmas; but the letters I had now and again from Dolly, greatly encouraged and comforted me. I had told her that I "was keeping to my resolution," but that "I should be in some peril for a good while to come," and begged her to remember me often in her pure prayers.)
A fellow came to my lodgings about the middle of January, with a letter from my Lord Ess.e.x. It ran as follows:
"SIR,--With regard to some matters of which we spoke together on the occasion of our very pleasant ride to town last month, I am very anxious to see you again. Pray do not write any answer to this; but if you can meet me on Thursday night at the house of my friend Mr. West, in Creed Lane, at nine o"clock, we may have a little conversation with some other friends of ours. I am, sir, your obliged servant,
"Ess.e.x."
I told the fellow that the answer was Yes. My Lord had been to see me in Covent Garden twice, but had said very little that was at all explicit; but Mr. Chiffinch had bid me hold myself in readiness, and put aside all else for the further invitations that would surely come. And so it had.
I found the house without difficulty; and was shewn into a little parlour near the door; where presently my Lord came to me alone, all smiles.
"I am very glad you are come, Mr. Mallock," he said. "I was sure that you would. I have a few friends here who meet to talk politics; and they would greatly like to hear your views on the points. I think I may now venture to say that we know who you are, Mr. Mallock, and that you have done a good deal for His Majesty in France. Your opinion then would be of the greatest interest to us all."
(I understood why he put so much emphasis on France; it was to quiet me as to any suspicions they thought I might have as to my being the King"s servant in England too.)
I answered him very civilly, smiling as if I was at my ease; and after a word or two more he took me in. It was a long low room, with a beamed ceiling and shuttered windows, in which the men were sitting. There were six of them there; and I knew two of them, immediately. He that sat at the head of the table, a very grim-looking man, with pointed features, in an iron-grey peruke, was no other than my Lord Shaftesbury himself; and the one on his left, with a highish colour in his cheeks, was my Lord Grey. Of the rest I knew nothing; but those two were enough to shew me that I must make no mistakes. There were candles on the table.
My Lord Ess.e.x smiled as he turned to me.
"Mr. Mallock," he said, "I see you know some of these gentlemen by sight."
"I know my Lord Shaftesbury, and my Lord Grey by sight," I said, bowing to each. They each inclined a little in return.
"And this is Mr. West," said my Lord.
This was a very busy-looking active little fellow, with bright dark eyes. (He had the name of being an atheist, I learned afterwards.)
"Sit down, Mr. Mallock," said my Lord, pointing to a chair on my Lord Shaftesbury"s right. I did so. There was no servant in the room. The two other men were presently made known to me as a Mr. Sheppard and a Mr.
Goodenough. I knew nothing of either of these two at this time.
Now it may seem that it was extraordinary bold of all these persons to admit me, believing as they did, that I was on His Majesty"s side, and would reveal all to him; and it was, in one way, bold of them; yet it was the more clever. For, as will appear, they said nothing to me at present that could be taken hold of in any way; and yet they sent, or rather thought they sent, to the King, false news that would help their cause.
When he had discoursed for a little while on general matters, yet drawing nearer ever to the point, my Lord Ess.e.x opened the engagement.
"That Mr. Rumbald," he said. "Do you know who he is, Mr. Mallock?"
"Why, he is a maltster, is he not?" I said.
"Well: he married a maltster"s widow, who is dead now. But he is an honest old Cromwellian--loyal enough to His Majesty--" (the gentlemen all solemnly put hands to their hats)--"yet very greatly distressed at the course things are taking."
"An old soldier?" I asked.
"Yes: he was a Colonel under Oliver."
Such was the opening; and after that we talked more freely, though not so freely as, I doubt not, they had talked for an hour before I came. My Lord Shaftesbury did not say a great deal; he had a quick discontented look; but I think I satisfied him. He was in a very low condition at this time--all but desperate--so strongly had the tide set against him since my Lord Stafford"s death and the reaction that followed it; and I think he would have grasped at anything to further his fortunes: for that was what he chiefly cared about. My Lord Ess.e.x did most of the talking, and Mr. West; and I could see that they were shewing me off, as a new capture, and one on whose treachery to them their hopes might turn.
Now there were three or four matters on which they were very emphatic.
First, that no injury was intended to the King or the Duke of York; but this they did not disclaim for themselves so much as for the disaffected persons generally; as regards themselves they said little or nothing: and from this I deduced that the King"s life would certainly be aimed at; and the more so, as they said what a pity it was that His Majesty"s guards were still doubled.
"It shews a lack of confidence in the people," said my Lord Ess.e.x.
(From that, then, I argued that an attempt was contemplated upon Whitehall.)
The second thing that Mr. West was very emphatic upon was the need of proceeding, if any reform were to be brought about, in a legal and Parliamentary manner.
"Why does not His Majesty call another Parliament?" he added, "that at least we may air our grievances? It is true enough that my Lord Shaftesbury--" (here he bowed to my Lord who blinked in return)--"that my Lord Shaftesbury found Parliament against him in the event; but he does not complain of that. He hath at least been heard."