“Madam, who shall I summon?” Betty asked, and then added with a slight hesitation, “Master Simon Raby?” The queen smiled archly, bringing a blush to Betty’s cheek. “Ay, my girl,” she said; “Master Raby and my cousin, Sir Francis Bryan.” Despite the anger of Lady Rochford and the evident reluctance of Mrs. Wyatt, the little party was soon organized, Anne Boleyn directing all things with feverish gayety, as if she snatched at any prospect of entertainment in her hour of melancholy. She was masked and muffled until all her splendid dress was hidden and there seemed no possibility of recognition. Then she made each maid of honor assume an equal disguise, and escorted by Raby, Bryan and two of the palace yeomen, she set out in a private barge upon the river. It was yet early in the evening, and the moon was shining with a light that cast a whiteness on the landscape. The voyage up the river was swift and uneventful, although the queen pretended to anticipate an encounter with the royal barge, as the king might be on his way to Greenwich. However, they passed but few craft, and came at last to the water-gate of the strange house upon the Thames. As Mrs. Wyatt had described it, there it stood with its two upper stories in tiers, and its many windows like bandaged eyes, for every shutter was up and not a ray of light shone anywhere; the moon shining upon the opposite side made the face toward the river black as night. The little party found the wicket at the water-stairs unfastened and, after some curious glances at the imperfectly outlined owl above it, the visitors passed on across the garden, Mistress Wyatt showing them the door, which was hard to find in the niches of the wall. Raby struck a resounding summons on it with the hilt of his sword, waking echoes within the house, but there was no response. The wind from the water was keen and the place so forbidding that the queen began to shiver under her mantle. “’Tis cold,” she murmured; “I should have worn my partlet of sable skins and my muffy. Knock louder, Master Raby; the fleshy ears of wizards are ever deaf, I take it.” The summons was repeated with more clamor than before, but still no sound within. “Mary, thy bandy-legged sage is dead, or gone to visit the black man,” said the queen, impatiently. “The place smells like a grave; ’tis an ill-favored house. Bryan, bring the two knaves from the water-gate and force the door; I will not have this rogue bar out the Queen of England.” As she spoke, the door opened suddenly and silently, revealing a dimly lighted, seemingly endless stairway, but there was no human being in sight. CHAPTER XV A CRY OF TREASON THE little party at the wizard’s door stood a moment confounded by this mysterious response to their summons. They looked anxiously up the narrow flight of stairs, expecting to see the strange master of the house, but there was neither sign nor sound of human occupation. The more superstitious of the party drew back in alarm.