Oates stood beside it, looking, with his bandy legs great shoulders, and bull neck, like some forest baboon.
"Oh, maist haunourable and noble victim!" he cried."England will maarn you, and the spawn of Raam will maarn you, for by this deed they have rigged for thaimselves the gallows.Maark ye, Sir Edmund is the proto-martyr of this new fight for the Praatestant faith.He has died that the people may live, and by his death Gaad has given England the sign she required....Ah, Prance, how little Tony Shaston will exult in our news! 'Twill be to him like a bone to a cur-dog to take his ainemies thus red-haanded."By your leave, sir," said Lovel, "those same enemies have escaped us.I saw them here five minutes since, but they have gone to earth.What say you to a hue-and-cry--though this Savoy is a snug warrin to hide vermin."Oates seemed to be in no hurry.He took the lantern from Prance and scrutinised Lovel's face with savage intensity.
"Ye saw them, ye say....I think, friend, I have seen ye before, and Idoubt in no good quaarter.There's a Paapist air about you.""If you have seen me, 'twas in the house of my Lord Shaftesbury, whom Ihave the honour to serve," said Lovel stoutly.
"Whoy, that is an haanest house enough.Whaat like were the villains, then?
Jaisuits, I'll warrant? Foxes from St.Omer's airth?""They were two common cutthroats whose names I know.""Tools, belike.Fingers of the Paape's hand....Ye seem to have a good acquaintance among rogues, Mr.Whaat's-you-name."The man Prance had disappeared, and Lovel suddenly saw his prospects less bright.The murderers were being given a chance to escape, and to his surprise he found himself in a fret to get after them.Oates had clearly no desire for their capture, and the reason flashed on his mind.The murder had come most opportunely for him, and he sought to lay it at Jesuit doors.
It would ill suit his plans if only two common rascals were to swing for it.Far better let it remain a mystery open to awful guesses.Omne ignotum pro horrifico....Lovel's temper was getting the better of his prudence, and the sight of this monstrous baboon with his mincing speech stirred in him a strange abhorrence.
"I can bear witness that the men who did the deed were no more Jesuits than you.One is just out of Newgate, and the other is a blackguard Scot late dismissed the Duke of Buckingham's service.""Ye lie," and Oates' rasping voice was close to his ear.
"'Tis an incraidible tale.Will ye outface me, who alone discovered the Plaat, and dispute with me on high poalicy?...Now I come to look at it, ye have a true Jaisuit face.I maind of ye at St.Omer.I judge ye an accoamplice..."At that moment Prance returned and with him another, a man in a dark peruke, wearing a long coat with a cape.Lovel's breath went from him as he recognised Bedloe.
"There is the murderer," he cried in a sudden fury "I saw him handle the body.I charge you to hold him.
Bedloe halted and looked at Oates, who nodded.Then he strode up to Lovel and took him by the throat "Withdraw your words, you dog," he said, "or I will cut your throat.I have but this moment landed at the river stairs and heard of this horrid business.If you say you have ever seen me before you lie most foully.
Quick, you ferret.Will Bedloe suffers no man to charge his honour."The strong hands on his neck, the fierce eyes of the bravo, brought back Lovel's fear and with it his prudence.He saw very plainly the game, and he realised that he must assent to it.His contrition was deep and voluble.
"I withdraw," he stammered, "and humbly crave pardon.I have never seen this honest gentleman before.""But ye saw this foul murder, and though the laight was dim ye saw the murderers, and they had the Jaisuitical air?"Oates' menacing voice had more terror for Lovel than Bedloe's truculence.
"Beyond doubt," he replied.
"Whoy, that is so far good," and the Doctor laughed."Ye will be helped later to remember the names for the benefit of his Maajesty's Court....
'Tis time we set to work.Is the place quiet?""As the grave, doctor," said Prance.
"Then I will unfold to you my pairpose.This noble magistrate is foully murdered by pairsons unknown as yet, but whom this haanest man will swear to have been disguised Jaisuits.Now in the sairvice of Goad and the King 'tis raight to pretermit no aiffort to bring the guilty to justice.The paiple of England are already roused to a holy fairvour, and this haarrid craime will be as the paistol flash to the powder caask.But that the craime may have its full effaict on the paapulace 'tis raight to take some trouble with the staging.'Tis raight so to dispose of the boady that the complaicity of the Paapists will be clear to every doubting fool.I, Taitus Oates, take upon myself this responsibility, seeing that under Goad I am the chosen ainstrument for the paiple's salvation.To Soamersait Haase with it, say I, which is known for a haaunt of the paapistically-minded....
The postern ye know of is open, Mr.Prance?""I have seen to it," said the man, who seemed to conduct himself in this wild business with the decorum of a merchant in his shop.
"Up with him, then," said Oates.
Prance and Bedloe swung the corpse on their shoulders and moved out, while the doctor, gripping Lovel's arm like a vice, followed at a little distance.
