that?"

"I come from Mr. Roger," said Anthony, "you need not be afraid. He has
had an accident and sent for me."

"Mr. Roger?" said James interrogatively.

"Yes," said Anthony, "he hath a patch over one eye; and stutters
somewhat."

James gave a sigh of relief.

"My dear boy," he said, "I cannot thank you enough. You know what it
means then?"

"Why, yes," said Anthony.

"And you a Protestant, and in the Archbishop's household?"

"Why, yes," said Anthony, "and a Christian and your friend."

"God bless you, Anthony," said the priest; and took his hand and pressed
it.

They were passing out now under the west door, and stood together for a
moment looking at the lights down Ludgate Hill. The houses about Amen
Court stood up against the sky to their right.

"I must not stay," said Anthony, "I must fetch my horse and be back at
Lambeth for evening prayers at six. He is stabled at the Palace here."

"Well, well," said the priest, "I thank God that there are true hearts
like yours. God bless you again my dear boy--and--and make you one of us
some day!"

Anthony smiled at him a little tremulously, for the gratitude and the
blessing of this man was dear to him; and after another hand grasp, he
turned away to the right, leaving the priest still half under the shadow
of the door looking after him.

He had done his errand promptly and discreetly.

CHAPTER VIII

THE MASSING-HOUSE

Newman's Court lay dark and silent under the stars on Sunday morning a
little after four o'clock. The gloomy weather of the last three or four
days had passed off in heavy battalions of sullen sunset clouds on the
preceding evening, and the air was full of frost. By midnight thin ice
was lying everywhere; pendants of it were beginning to form on the
overhanging eaves; and streaks of it between the cobble-stones that paved
the court. The great city lay in a frosty stillness as of death.

The patrol passed along Cheapside forty yards away from the entrance of
the court, a little after three o'clock; and a watchman had cried out
half an hour later, that it was a clear night; and then he too had gone
his way. The court itself was a little rectangular enclosure with two
entrances, one to the north beneath the arch of a stable that gave on to
Newman's Passage, which in its turn opened on to St. Giles' Lane that led
to Cheapside; the other, at the further end of the long right-ha