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THREE:This unexpected consummation wrought upon Holgrave so much, that, with the sullen determination which had marked his character on previous occasions, he resolved not to answer any questions whatever. We should have premised, that the galleyman had given Holgrave a solemn promise, that if any ill befel him, Margaret should be cared for like his own wife. This was a solace to him, as he thought over his mother's death, and his own evil destiny. But there was another solace, that, strange as it may appear to some minds, arose from the thought, that whatever might befall him, the baron's heir would share in it. At first, when he had been removed to Sudley, mild measures were resorted to. He was lodged in a comfortable apartment, fed plentifully, and promised his freedom with whatever reward he might claim, if he would but speak satisfactorily as to the lost child. When this failed, he was sent to the keep, and for a week black bread and cold water were the only articles of aliment supplied; and then the peine forte et dure was resorted to. But though his face was swollen, and of a livid, purple hue, and the eyes seemed starting from their sockets at the pressure on his chest, as he lay with his limbs extended on the earth, yet would he not speak the word which would have released him from all this suffering. The extreme punishment, however, of adding weights until nature could sustain no more, was delayed from day to day. The baroness had twice given birth to children who had survived but a few hours; the third had lived, but it was a daughter; and as she dwelt upon the approaching extinction of their noble line, she dared not permit the order to be given that might deprive her of all hope. Day after day were the weights pressing and stifling, and forcing the blood that still crept through his veins to his extremities, and distending the hands and feet with a feeling of agony. But though the pressure was at each time removed when the leech pronounced the prisoner exhausted, yet it appeared repetition, though slow, would effect the work as surely as if the punishment had been in the first instance applied in all its legal rigour.But to return. When the ceremony of enfranchisement was fairly over, there arose the cry for the combat, and great was the general disappointment when, upon the galleyman's standing forth prepared for the encounter, no Oakley could be found. "He has skulked off to the craven Calverley, I'll warrant," said one. "Aye, aye, as sure as the sun shines, they are sworn brothers," said another: "they think more of saving their heads than sparing their heels." "Did ye ever know one who could read and write, who didn't know how to take care of his carcase," said another, with a sagacious nod; but though these good folks were all very shrewd, they did not happen to fall upon the truth, which was simply this, that as Black Jack was watching an opportunity to escape, without observation, he happened to see the cloak and cowl the monk had thrown off when first appearing in the hall, lying in a corner of the court-yard, where it had been carelessly placed by one of those whose business it was to keep the hall in order. It instantly occurred to him that this might be of use, and contriving to remove the cloak, he put it on, and, thus disguised, succeeded in leaving Sudley; but though disguises had so often befriended him, it proved fatal in this instance, for, upon taking a northerly direction, as one where he was least likely to be known, he was recognized as a leader of the commons, and his monkish dress inducing a suspicion of his being John Ball, (the monk's pardon not being known), Oakley, although swearing by every thing sacred that he was no monk, was hanged without form of trial, at St. Albans, as one who had stirred up the bondmen to insurrection.

THREE:But Reuben did not care. He had won his heart's desire, and public opinion could go where everything else he was supposed to value, and didn't, had gone. In a way he was sorry, for he would have liked to discuss his triumph at the Cocks, seasoning it with pints of decadent ale. As things were, he had no one to talk it over with but the farm-men, who grumbled because it meant more work—Maude, who said she'd be sorry when all that pretty gorse was cleared away—and old mad Harry, now something very like a grasshopper, whose conversation since the blaze at Grandturzel had[Pg 456] been limited entirely to the statement that "the house was afire, and the children were burning.""I've had it three months—I can construe a bit of Horace now."

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