Oddsfish! Part 76

We stared on one another in silence. My mind raced like a mill. Then once more the Duke near ruined the whole design by his diplomacy.

"Gentlemen," he said, "we are too precipitate. His Majesty hath not yet told me that he wishes for a priest--"

"Sir--" I began in desperation.

He looked at me so fiercely that I stopped.

"Listen to me," said he very imperiously. "I will have it my own way. M.

Barillon, do you come with me now to His Majesty. I will bid the company withdraw into the antechamber--Bishops and all--on the pretext that I wish to consult with my brother privately. M. Barillon shall be in the doorway that none may come through. Mr. Mallock shall be with the company and hear what they say. Then, if the King wishes for a priest, we will consult again here, and see if Mr. Mallock's plan is a possible one."

He strode towards the door. There was no more to be said. It was a dreadful risk that we ran in so long delaying; but there was no gainsaying James when he had made up his mind.

The great antechamber was near full of folks of all kinds when we three came to it again. They fell back as they saw the Duke; and he pa.s.sed straight through, as was arranged, with M. Barillon, leaving me behind, near the door. The King's bedchamber was pretty dark, and I could see no more of the bed at the far distant end than its curtains.

Presently I heard the Duke in a low voice saying something to the company that was within: and immediately they began to come out, three or four Bishops, among them, my Lord Halifax, Lord Keeper North, and my Lord Craven; I noticed that M. Barillon was very careful to let all in the antechamber have a clear view of the bed, at which, by now the Duke was kneeling down, having drawn back the curtains a little, yet not so much as to shew us the King lying there.

Round about me they talked very little, though I saw the Bishops whispering together. The two brothers spoke together, very low, for ten minutes or a quarter of an hour; and I could hear the murmur of the Duke's voice. Of His Majesty's I heard nothing except that twice he said, very clear:

"Yes.... Yes, with all my heart."

And I thanked G.o.d when I heard that.

Yet, even so, all was not yet done.

So soon as I saw the Duke stand up again from his kneeling, and coming down the chamber, I slipped away to the door that leads out towards Her Majesty's apartments, that I might be ready for him. I saw him come through, all the people standing and bowing to him, and M. Barillon following him; and I noticed in particular a young gentleman whose name I did not know at that time--(it was the Comte de Castelmelhor, a very good Catholic)--standing out, a little by himself. I noticed this man because I saw that the Duke looked at him as he came and presently signed to him very slightly, with his head, to follow. So all four of us pa.s.sed through the door into the long gallery that unites their Majesties' apartments and found ourselves alone in it. The Count was a little behind.

"He has consented," said the Duke in a low voice, "to my bringing him a priest. We must send for one. But I dare not bring one of the d.u.c.h.ess': they are too well-known."

"Sir," said Monsieur Barillon, "I will do so with pleasure. Why not one of Her Majesty's priests?"

The Duke nodded. We three were all standing together about the middle of the gallery. The Comte de Castelmelhor was halted, uncovered, a little behind us. The Duke turned to him.

"Count," said he, speaking in French, "we are on a very urgent business.

His Majesty hath consented that a priest should come to him. Will you go for us to the Queen and ask for one of her chaplains?"

The young man flushed up with pleasure.

"With all my heart, Sir," he said. "Which priest shall I ask for? Is there one that can speak English?"

The Duke struck his forehead with his open hand.

"Lord!" he said. "I never thought of that. We must have an Englishman.

Where shall we send?"

"Sir," said the Amba.s.sador; "there is one at least at the Venetian Resident's."

Again I broke in. (My impatience drove me near mad. Time was pa.s.sing quickly. I could have fetched a priest myself ten times over if the Duke had but allowed me to go in the beginning.)

"Sir," said I, "for G.o.d's sake let me go first to Her Majesty's apartments. I'll be bound there's one at least there that knows English.

Let this gentleman come with me."

The Duke stared at me as if bewildered. I think he saw that he had done little but hinder the business, so far.

"Go," he said suddenly. "Go both of you together--Stay. Bring a priest with you, if you can find one, to the little room behind the King's bed; but bring him up the stairs the other way. Bid him stay till I send Chiffinch to him."

Then we were gone at full speed.

CHAPTER XI

It was eight o'clock at night; and the priest and I were still waiting in the little room; and no word was come through from the Bedchamber, beyond that Mr. Chiffinch had come through once to bid us be ready.

Once again G.o.d had favoured us in spite of all our blunders. The Count and I had run together through to Her Majesty's lodging and there we had found, as I knew we should, a priest that knew English. But I had not thought that G.o.d's Hand should be so visible in the matter as that we should find none other but Mr. Huddleston himself, the Scotsman, that had saved the King's life after the battle of Worcester. There was a very particular seemliness in this--though I had not much time to think of it then. But our difficulties were not all over.

First, Mr. Huddleston declared that he had never reconciled a convert in his life; and did not know how to set about it. Next he said that he was the worst man in the world to do it, as his face was very well known, and that he would surely be suspected if he were seen: and third that the Most Holy Sacrament was not in Whitehall at all, and that therefore he could not give _Viatic.u.m._ He looked very agitated, in spite of his ruddy face.

I was amazed at the man; but I forced myself to treat him with patience, for he was the only priest we could get.

First I told him that nothing was needed but to hear the King's confession, give him absolution and anoint him: next, that we would disguise him in a great periwig and a gown, such as the Protestant Divines wore--(for, as I spoke, I actually spied such a gown hanging on the wall of the chamber in which I was speaking with him). Third, that another priest could go to St. James' and bring the Most Holy Sacrament to him from there.

At that point Father Bento de Lemoz, who was listening to our talk, came forward and interposed. He would get a little Ritual directly, he said (in very poor English)--that had in it all that was necessary: and he would go himself, not to St. James', for that was too far off, but to Somerset House, and get the Holy Sacrament from the royal chapel there.

Mr. Huddleston had nothing to say to that; and in five minutes we had him in his periwig and gown, with the book in his pocket, with the holy oils, and away downstairs, and along the pa.s.sage beneath, and up again by the little winding stair into the chamber beyond the King's bed. I gave him no time to think of any more objections.

That was a very strange vigil that we held for very near, I should think, twenty minutes or half an hour. We both sat there together without speaking. For the most of the time Mr. Huddleston was reading in his Ritual, and I could see his brow furrowed and his lips moving, as be conned over all that he would have to do and say to His Majesty. He was a man, as he had said, completely unaccustomed to such ministrations, though he was a very good man and a good priest too, in other matters.

After a while he laid aside his book, and prayed, I think, for he covered his face with his hands.

A minute or two later I could bear the delay no longer. I rose and went up the three or four steps that led to the King's Bedchamber, and listened. There was a low murmur of voices within; so that it seemed to me that the room was not yet cleared. I put my hand upon the door and pushed it a little; and to my satisfaction it was not latched, but opened an inch or two. But someone was standing immediately on the other side of it. I stepped back, and the door opened again just enough for me to see the face of Mr. Chiffinch. He looked past me quickly to see that the priest was there, I suppose, and then nodded at me two or three times. Then he pushed the door almost to, again. A moment after I heard the Duke's voice within, a little unsteady, but very clear and distinct.

He was standing up, I think, on the far side of the bed.

"Gentlemen," he said, "the King wishes all to retire excepting the Earls of Bath and Feversham."

(Bath and Feversham! thought I. Why those two, in G.o.d's name, that were such a pair of Protestants? But, indeed, it was the one good stroke that the Duke made, for the names rea.s.sured, as I heard afterwards, all that had any suspicions, and even the Bishops themselves.)

There was a rustle of footsteps, very plain, that followed the Duke's words. I turned to the room behind me, again, and saw that Mr.

Huddleston too had heard what had pa.s.sed. He was standing up, very pale and agitated, with the book clasped in his hands. I moved down the steps again so as not to block the way; and again there followed a silence, in the midst of which I heard a door latched somewhere in the Bedchamber.