For some time this policy succeeded. There was much passing up and down of messages and tokens, and nothing at all was done. Darcy gave Chapuys “a gold pansy, well enamelled” during the autumn. The pansy was the badge of the Poles and was to prove a sign of doom to that unhappy house. At Christmas he presented him with a handsome sword, which Chapuys supposed to indicate indirectly that the times were ripe “pour jouer des couteaulx.” His brother-in-law, the brave Lord Sandes, sent expressions of sympathy; and even the Earl of Northumberland, who was believed to be the most loyal of the nobles, sent his physician to Chapuys to assure him that the King was on the brink of ruin[89]. But time wore on; winter drew to spring and spring to summer—the bloody spring and summer of the executions under the Supremacy Act[90]. The Carthusians fell, Sir Thomas More and the gentle Fisher. Still Darcy was detained in London. Nor was he suspected without good reason, for he had long since told Chapuys that once back in the north he would secretly prepare for a general rising. In May he sent an elderly relative of his[91] to the Imperial ambassador, whom the latter described quaintly as “of more virtue and zeal than appears externally.” This man proposed to go in person to the Emperor to discover whether he really meant to send help, for if he was only deluding the English they were determined to act for themselves. Chapuys warned him that he would bring Darcy into danger, but he replied that once his master was in the north he would not care a button for any suspicions[92]. Hussey, who was still trusted by the government, was at his house in Sleaford about midsummer 1535. A Yorkshire gentleman, Thomas Rycard, came to visit him. He found Hussey walking in his garden, and they talked about the spread of heresy in Yorkshire. Rycard said that as yet there was little of it, “except a few particular persons who carried in their bosoms certain books.” He prayed that the nobles might “put the King’s Grace in rememberance for reformation thereof.” Hussey answered that there was no hope of their suppression unless the two counties, Yorkshire and Lincolnshire acted together, and he himself thought it would be necessary to fight for the Faith[93]. In July (1535) Chapuys reported that he had seen Darcy’s cousin again, and that “the good old lord” (his by-name among the Imperialist party) was about to go home at last[94]. It appears from a letter to Cromwell, dated at Templehurst, that he was at home by 13 Nov. The year date is not given but it must have been 1535[95].