Her game in thy tongue is called Life As ebbs thy daily breath;
When she shall speak, thou'lt learn her tongue
And know she calls it death.
—Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
For the rest, 'tis in the domain of history. Michael could have been tried by his peers had he so desired it. The few friends who rallied round him urged him to demand the right, but when we remember that in pledging his life to his cousin, his one wish was speedy condemnation and summary death, we cannot be astonished that he refused to be tried by those who might have been lenient toward one of themselves.
 
Among his peers, too, the fact would of a surety have come to light that he did not belong to the Catholic branch of the Kestyons, that he himself was a member of the Established Church, which—as all these trials, alas, really amounted to religious persecution—would almost certainly have obtained an acquittal.
 
Parliament—still suffering severely of its no-Popery fit—demanded that the traitor be tried as a common criminal before the King's Bench and required the king to issue a special commission that the day might be fixed as soon as may be.
 
The accused was of course allowed no counsel, and no defence save what he could say on his own behalf. Nor did he know the precise words of the indictment, or what special form the informant's lies had taken.
 
[398]
 
He did not know exactly what he was supposed to have said or done, he could only vaguely guess from what he knew of similar trials that had gone before.
 
The trial of Michael Kestyon, Earl of Stowmaries and Rivaulx, did, we know, take place before the King's Bench on the twenty-first day of November, 1678. Lord Chief Justice Scroggs presided, and the Attorney-General, Sir William Jones, once the friend of Michael, addressed the jury for the Crown.
 
We also know that the court sat in Westminster Hall for the occasion, as it was expected that a very large concourse of ladies and gentlemen would desire to be present. As a matter of fact, the élite of London society did forego on that occasion the pleasures of The Mall, and of the playhouse in order to witness a spectacle which would rouse the jaded senses of these votaries of fashion and whip up their blasé emotions more than any comedy of Mr. Dryden or the late Master Shakespeare could do.
 
This would be a tragedy far more moving, far more emotional than that of Hamlet or of Romeo and Juliet, for the element of romance mingled agreeably with that of crime, and the personality of the accused was one that aroused the most eager interest.
 
Outside, a gloomy November drizzle enveloped London with its clammy shroud. Ladies and gentlemen arrived in their chairs or their glass coaches, wrapped to the eyes in mantles and hoods of fur. There was a goodly array of musketeers guarding the approach to the Hall, and a small company of the trained bands of London lined the way from Whitehall to Westminster, for it was pretty well known that His Majesty would come—in strict incognito—to see the last of his nine days' favourite, who[399] during the last few months had made Mistress Gwynne sigh very significantly, and caused Lady Castlemaine to make invidious comparisons between the gallant bearing of the romantic adventurer and the mincing manners of the gentlemen of the Court.
 
The less exalted spectators of to-day's pageant were being kept outside and pushed well out of the way by the soldiery; nevertheless, they stood about patiently—ankle deep in the mud of the roadway, their sad-coloured doublets getting soaked beneath the persistent drizzle and exhaling a fetid odour which made the street and the open place seem more dismal and humid than usual.
 
The men pressed to the front, leaving the women to shift for themselves, to see as best they could. It was pre-eminently a spectacle for men, since it carried with it its own element of danger. For, look you, the Papists would be mightily rampant on this occasion, and who knows but that a gigantic conspiracy was afoot to blow up the Lord's House of Parliament, which would sit this day to try the arch-conspirator.
 
Recollections of the Gunpowder Plot caused men to curse loudly, and to grasp with firm hand the useful flail safely hid inside the doublet: a good protection against personal attack, but alas, useless if the whole of Westminster was really undermined with powder.
 
The 'prentices, ever to the fore, had taken French leave to-day. At certain risk of castigation to-morrow they deserted work with one accord and were at the best posts of observation, long before the more sober folk had thought to leave their beds. They wriggled their meagre bodies between the very legs of the soldiery, like so many lizards in search of sunshine, until they had conquered their places[400] of vantage in the foreground whence they would presently see the prisoner when he stepped out of the vehicle which would bring him from the Tower.
 
In the meanwhile the crowd wiled away the time by watching the arrival of the grand folk, and noting their names and quality as they descended from coach and chaise.
 
"That's my lord of Rochester."
 
"And this my lady Evelyn."
 
"I vow 'tis Master Pepys himself."
 
"And his lady, too."
 
"'Tis His Grace of Norfolk!"
 
Whereupon since the duke was a well-known Papist, there were hoots and hisses and cries of "The stake for heretics!" in which even the musketeers joined.
 
The informers came together and were vigorously cheered and loudly acclaimed.
 
"An Oates! An Oates! A Bedloe! Hurrah for the saviours of the nation!"
 
Daniel Pye, a little anxious, was being upheld by his friend Tongue, who kept up a running flow of encouraging words which he poured forth into the other man's ear. He not being known to the mob remained unnoticed. As the time drew nigh for making his lying statements more public, the East Anglian peasant felt his courage oozing down into his boots. Bedloe and Oates, who had gone through similar experiences several times now, added their own encouragement to that expressed by Tongue.
 
"No one will worry you," said Bedloe loftily; "they'll believe every word you say. Only stick to your story, man, and never hesitate. They can't contradict you: no one else was there to see."
 
Although the gloom outside had almost changed day[401] into evening, yet on entering the great hall wherein a very few lamps flickered near the centre dais, Daniel Pye could see nothing of his surroundings. He was glad that Oates himself took him by the arm, and piloted him through the great hall toward a side door immediately behind the bench and which gave on the room that had been assigned to the witnesses.
 
A goodly number of ladies and gentlemen wore masks when they arrived, and among these was a man obviously young and of assured position, for his step was firm and his movements like those of one accustomed to have his own way in the world. He was dressed in rough clothes of sad-coloured material, but there was nothing of the menial about his person as he presented his paper of admission to the most exclusive corner of the hall.
 
Here he sat himself down in a dark recess beneath the sill of the great mullioned window, nor did he remove his mask as almost every one else had done. Had not the crowd all round him been deeply engrossed in its own excitement no doubt that some one would have challenged and mayhap recognised the solitary figure.
 
But as it was, no one took notice of him. Rupert Kestyon—like the criminal who cannot resist the impulse of once more revisiting the scene of his crime—had returned to London to see the final act of the great tragedy, wherein he himself was playing such a sorry part.
 
Not that Rupert had any fear that matters would not turn out just as Michael had mapped them out. He knew his kinsman far too well to imagine for a moment that he would lift a finger to save the life which he had bartered for his cousin's loyalty to the tailor's daughter.
 
But in Paris, whilst waiting in seclusion and inactivity, the moment when—the tragedy being over—he could[402] once more resume the more pleasing comedy of life, he felt an irresistible longing to see the fall of that curtain, to be present when Fate dealt him his last trump-card, the final sacrifice of the man who stood in the way of his own advancement.
 
Therefore he sat there in the corner, solitary and watchful, noting the arrival of the spectators, the appearance of the men of law, the whole paraphernalia of justice which was about to crush an innocent man.
 
The hall by now was packed to overflowing; to right and left temporary seats had been erected and cov............