Devonshire Characters and Strange EventsBaring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
History
Devonshire Characters and Strange Events
Baring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
Devon (England) -- Biography; Devon (England) -- History
“About ten of the clock at night, Mr. Page being in bed slumbering,
could not happen upon a sound sleep, and lay musing to himself, Tom
Stone came softly and knocked at the door, whereupon Priddis, his
companion, did let him in; and by reason that Mistress Page gave them
straight charge to dispatch it that night, whatsoever came of it, they
drew towards the bed, intending immediately to go about it. Mr. Page,
being not asleep, asked who came in, whereat Priddis leaped upon his
master, being in his bed, who roused himself and got upon his feet,
and had been hard enough for his man, but that Stone flew upon him,
and took the kerchief from his head, and knitting the same about his
neck, they immediately stifled him; and, as it appeareth, even in the
anguish of death, Mr. Page greatly laboured to put the kerchief from
about his neck, by reason of the marks and scratches which he had made
with his nails upon his throat, but therewith he could not prevail, for
they would not slip their hold until he was full dead. This done, they
laid him overthwart the bed, and against the bedside broke his neck;
and when they saw he was surely dead, they stretched him and laid him
on his bed again, spreading the clothes in ordinary sort, as though no
such act had been attempted, but that he had died on God’s hand.
“Whereupon Priddis immediately went to Mistress Page’s chamber and
told her that all was dispatched; and about an hour after he came to
his mistress’s chamber door, and called aloud, ‘Mistress, let somebody
look into my master’s chamber, methinks I heard him groan.’ With that
she called her maid, who was not privy to anything, and had her light a
candle, whereupon she slipped on a petticoat and went thither likewise,
sending her maid first into the chamber, when she herself stood at the
door. The maid simply felt on her master’s face and found him cold and
stiff, and told her mistress so; whereat she bade the maid warm a cloth
and wrap it about his feet, which she did; and when she felt his legs,
they were as cold as clay; whereat she cried out, saying her master was
dead.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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