Westward Ho! Or, The Voyages and Adventures of Sir Amyas Leigh, Knight, of Burrough, in the County of Devon, in the Reign of Her Most Glorious Majesty Queen ElizabethKingsley, Charles
History
Westward Ho! Or, The Voyages and Adventures of Sir Amyas Leigh, Knight, of Burrough, in the County of Devon, in the Reign of Her Most Glorious Majesty Queen Elizabeth
Kingsley, Charles
Great Britain -- History -- Elizabeth, 1558-1603 -- Fiction
The facts of the case were, that all Rose's trinkets were left behind,
so that she had at least gone off honestly; and nothing seemed to be
missing, but some of her linen, which old Anthony the steward broadly
hinted was likely to be found in other people's boxes. The only trace
was a little footmark under her bedroom window. On that the bloodhound
was laid (of course in leash), and after a premonitory whimper, lifted
up his mighty voice, and started bell-mouthed through the garden gate,
and up the lane, towing behind him the panting keeper, till they reached
the downs above, and went straight away for Marslandmouth, where the
whole posse comitatus pulled up breathless at the door of Lucy Passmore.
Lucy, as perhaps I should have said before, was now a widow, and found
her widowhood not altogether contrary to her interest. Her augury about
her old man had been fulfilled; he had never returned since the night on
which he put to sea with Eustace and the Jesuits.
* “Some natural tears she shed, but dried them soon”
as many of them, at least, as were not required for purposes of
business; and then determined to prevent suspicion by a bold move; she
started off to Stow, and told Lady Grenville a most pathetic tale: how
her husband had gone out to pollock fishing, and never returned: but how
she had heard horsemen gallop past her window in the dead of night, and
was sure they must have been the Jesuits, and that they had carried off
her old man by main force, and probably, after making use of his
services, had killed and salted him down for provision on their voyage
back to the Pope at Rome; after which she ended by entreating protection
against those “Popish skulkers up to Chapel,” who were sworn to do her a
mischief; and by an appeal to Lady Grenville's sense of justice, as to
whether the queen ought not to allow her a pension, for having had her
heart's love turned into a sainted martyr by the hands of idolatrous
traitors.
Lady Grenville (who had a great opinion of Lucy's medical skill, and
always sent for her if one of the children had a “housty,” i. e. sore
throat) went forth and pleaded the case before Sir Richard with such
effect, that Lucy was on the whole better off than ever for the next two
or three years. But now--what had she to do with Rose's disappearance?
and, indeed, where was she herself? Her door was fast; and round it her
flock of goats stood, crying in vain for her to come and milk them;
while from the down above, her donkeys, wandering at their own sweet
will, answered the bay of the bloodhound with a burst of harmony.
“They'm laughing at us, keper, they neddies; sure enough, we'm lost our
labor here.”
But the bloodhound, after working about the door a while, turned down
the glen, and never stopped till he reached the margin of the sea.
“They'm taken water. Let's go back, and rout out the old witch's
house.”
“'Tis just like that old Lucy, to lock a poor maid into shame.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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