The figure stopped as they advanced, and then darted
forward, crying out piteously:
"Ah! you have come, thank God! thank God! They will not let me see him."
"Hush! hush!" said Alice, as she caught her in her arms.
"Mr. Bassett has been here," moaned the figure, "and he says it is
Topcliffe himself who has come down on the matter.... He says he is the
greatest devil of them all; and Thomas--"
Then she burst out crying again.
* * * * *
It was an hour before they could get the full tale out of her. They took
her upstairs and made her sit down, for already a couple of faces peeped
from the buttery, and the servants would have gathered in another five
minutes; and together they forced her to eat and drink something, for
she had not tasted food since her arrival at the inn yesterday; and so,
little by little, they drew the story out.
Mr. Thomas and his wife were actually on their way from Norbury when the
arrest had been made. Mr. Thomas had intended to pass a couple of nights
in Derby on various matters of the estates; and although, his wife said,
he had been somewhat silent and quiet since the warning had come to him
from Mr. Audrey, even he had thought it no danger to ride through Derby
on his way to Padley. He had sent a servant ahead to order rooms at the
inn for those two nights, and it was through that, it appeared, that the
news of his coming had reached the ears of the authorities.
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