Chapter I: The Watchers

“I have seen many terrible sights in my life, Master Chitterley,—none so terrible as this.”

Thus old Martin Bracy, Sergeant-Yeoman of the Tower of London, to the Lord Constable’s body-servant.

His companion flung up trembling hands for all response. As old as the sergeant—whose head had grown white in the King’s service: at home in the civil wars, abroad in Charles’s regiment of Flanders—but of less solid metal, years had stricken him harder, and he had little breath to spare after his grievous ascent to the platform of the Beauchamp Tower. And as the two now stood, side by side, looking down from the great height over the stricken city, they might have served as types, one of green old age, the other of wintry senility.

* * * * *

The scene outspread below them was indeed such as to strike awe to the stoutest heart. It was the fifth of September, third day of the great fire; and nothing, it seemed, was like to arrest the spread of the red desolation until it had embraced the whole of the town.

Under the canopy of black smoke, like some monster of nightmare, the fire crouched, spread, uncoiled itself; now it clapped ragged wings of flame high into the sky, now grasped new, unexpected quarters as with a stealthily outreached claw. The wind ran lightly from the east, so that, in cruel contrast, the sky was fair blue over their heads, while to the westward horizon it spread ensanguined, overhung with lurid clouds.

* * * * *

“If hell itself had broken open,” said Martin Bracy, “and were vomiting yonder, methinks it would scarce show us a more affrighting picture. Often these days, Master Chitterley, I have taken to minding me again of the Crop-Heads’ sayings—and I had a surfeit of them in my days of imprisonment, forever talking of Judgment! Aye, I would have my laugh at them, then. But now it comes back to me:—

“‘_First the scourge of Plague; and thereafter_ (that is now)
_the scourge of Fire_!’”

He mused as the aged will, speaking his thought aloud:—

“There was one Jedediah Groggins—Smite-Them-Hip-and-Thigh was the name he gave himself, but Smit’em-Grogs they used to call him (aye, and a smiter he was!)—who had charge of the jail at York, where I was caged awhile, ye wot, after Marston Moor—”

Chitterley nodded his palsied head; his faded eyes looked out with scarce a flicker of comprehension on the present vision that so impressed the soldier; but his brain was still to be stirred by memories of the past.

“Marston Moor … aye! ’Twas at Marston my Lord Rockhurst took the pike-push in his thigh—and he and I in hiding long days after in a burnt-out farm-house on the wolds. Scarce bite or sup had I for him. And he fretting for the death of his gallant friend, Sir Paul Farrant, killed at his side—Aye, aye, good Sir Paul—”

The sergeant’s gaze was still roaming out to where the great heart of the city throbbed in agony.

“‘_There went up a smoke in his wrath and a fire flamed forth from his face_,’” he went on. “Truly, I mind me, that was one of this Jedediah’s favourite texts. Yes—I had my laugh at it then: little thought I should ever see it come true, as I have done these days!… I was young then, and made mock of such things. But, sure, the sins of this land began with the Crop-Heads themselves, when they took up arms against his sacred Majesty.” He raised his hand to his velvet cap. “But they were right in this, friend Chitterley: the wrath of the Lord is an awful thing.—Hark ye at that!”

A dull explosion had rent the air. A belching column of white smoke, fringed with black, sprang up at the extremity of the fiery picture. The sergeant moved to the corner of the parapet to peer forth:—

“See yonder … our lads at work! Blowing up houses ahead of the fire. Aye, truly, Master Chitterley, I would his lordship had let me take the mining party to-day. But one would think—in all respect—there was a very devil in him, since this outbreak began. ’Tis ever to the hottest with him. And the men must after him, though the flames be as greedy as hell’s.—’Tis hard on a soldier,” added the old campaigner, with a philosophic sigh, “to be driven to burn before his time!”

The other’s clouded perception caught but the hint of danger to a beloved master.

“His lordship?” he cried; “and whither went he to-day, Sergeant?”

“Toward Bishopsgate. See, where I point; there, where ’tis like looking upon a pit of fire.”

Chitterley curved his withered hands over his eyes and strove to fix them in the direction indicated.

“God save him,” he muttered.

“Amen,” echoed Bracy earnestly, “for he carries those white hairs of his whither he would scarce have ventured his raven locks! ’Tis beyond all reason. Aye, and Master Harry with him.… Lord, Lord, how it doth burn!”

Bracy seated himself upon the sill of an embrasure, and drawing a stump of pipe from his pocket, proceeded to strike flint and kindle the _tabaco_, with all the old soldier’s habit of making the most of a spare hour of rest. The other remained standing; forlorn, pathetic figure enough, beaten about by the light wind that flapped the skirts of his coat against the wasted limbs, and set sparse strands of white hair dancing as in mockery about his skull.

Sergeant Bracy rolled another text upon his tongue as two or three fresh explosions, closely following each other, shocked even the mighty masonry of the Tower:—

“‘_The earth shook and trembled, because He was angry with them._’ Aye, ’twould seem to fit in singularly!—Yet, as you and I know, ’tis but our men at work of salvage. They must even destroy to save!—There went the last house in Shoreditch!” He made a gesture with his pipe-stem. “Ha, now the Hall falls upon itself like a house of cards!… Pray Heaven none of our boys be caught beneath the dropping masonry, as was honest Corporal Tulip yester-eve! ’Tis no marvel to me, Master Chitterley,” he went on, settling himself more comfortably on his narrow seat, “that the men like not the work. Nay, were it with other than my Lord Constable, or young Harry—or one such as I am, Master Chitterley—we might well expect a show of rebellion among them. To see death, you may say, be soldier’s life,—aye, give death, lay siege, waste, burn and slay,—all in the way of glorious war, friend Chitterley, and service of King—wholesome heat of blood to keep the horrors off—But this business, there is neither glory nor plunder in it. No—no, I’ve seen sour looks and lagging feet, as much as dare be, at least, under my lord’s eye or Master Harry’s.”

“My lord—Master Harry—” repeated Chitterley, as in a kind of dream. “Do not mock me, sergeant, but there be days now when I scarce know them apart … remembering.… Or rather—”

“Aye,” interrupted the soldier, good-humoured, yet impatient of the other’s maundering, “I catch your meaning. Young Master Harry that was a boy has grown marvellous quick a man these troublous times. ’Tis his gallant father all over again as you and I knew him. And, on the other hand, my Lord Constable is changed—oh, damnably changed! An old man in one year!—Hark in your ear! ’Tis never plague horrors, nor fire horrors, that have worked on him so sorely; ’tis the mind, Master Chitterley. Trouble of the mind!”

He tapped his forehead with the pipe-stem, nodded his head, and thereafter puffed awhile in sagacious meditation.

“In faith,” said Chitterley, with piteous trembling of the lip, “my dear lord’s hair has grown as white as mine own.”

“Ah, it is trouble changes a man,” pursued the sergeant, presently. He cast a look of kindly pity at Chitterley. “And in sooth, poor soul,” muttered he under his breath, “who should prove it better than yourself, who have been a doddering poor wight ever since yon fearful morning when Master Harry was like to die of his reopened wound and my lord to go mad—and plague in the very house?—Aye, aye,” his voice waxed loud again, “shall I ever forget the hour when you all came back to the Tower, and none knew if the lad was not dead already? ’Twas then the Lord Constable’s hair began to turn white.” He gave a kind of sniff, his teeth clenched on the pipe, and touched Chitterley on the arm to call back his wandering attention. “I was on guard, man, the day his Majesty returned to the city (upon the subsidence of the great sickness), and I was present at the first meeting between him and the Lord Constable. _His Majesty did not know him!_”

He emphasised each word of this last remarkable statement by a separate tap of the pipe-bowl upon his open palm.

Chitterley turned troubled eyes upon him.

“His Majesty hath ever had great love for my lord,” he protested.

“He—did—not—know—him,” repeated Sergeant Bracy, scanning his words. “I was as near his Majesty as I am to you.—‘What,’ says the King, staring, ‘this is never my merry Rockhurst?’—‘Always your Majesty’s devoted servant,’ says my lord, bowing that white head, ‘but your merry Rockhurst never again.’ ‘Oh, damn!’ says his Majesty.—Ho, ho, ho! I heard him with these ears!”

There was no smile on old Chitterley’s lips. It was a question whether he followed his more sturdy comrade’s gossip or whether, in the dimness of his mind, he was only aware of the pity of many things.

“Aye, in truth, and as you say,” the yeoman went on after a while, “Master Harry hath changed even as much as his father. Faith, ’twas but a lad when we laid him on his bed here; he rose from it a man. Sooth, Death’s a grim teacher! I’ve seen many a boy soldier turned to a man by a single battle.—But there’s secret trouble there, too.… Pity that so gallant a youth should ever wear so sober a brow! Again a word in your ear, Master Chitterley: They say a lady was lost in the plague days, none knowing where or how she died—is it true?”

Chitterley drew back and flung a cunning glance at the genial, inquisitive countenance. Old? None so old yet, nor so foolish, that he would betray his master’s secret!

“Aye, the plague! the plague!” he mumbled. “As you say, good sergeant—those were terrible times.”

“Sho!” said the sergeant; knocked the ashes of his pipe with an irritable tap and turned his keen blue eyes out once more to the red westward glare. Even at that instant there rose from the gateway tower the blare of a trumpet, the roll of drums. The sounds caught up and repeated from different quarters.

“God be praised,” said he; “’tis the party home again from the work!”

Back went the pipe into Sergeant Bracy’s pocket. He drew himself from his seat; fell, unconsciously, once more into military bearing, and made for the stairs to seek his officer. Chitterley followed, stirred into a fleeting return of energy.