CHAPTER XI

ALONE IN THE CAVERN

Only once did the moon peep through a rift in the cloud to light up the waters and show the _Marburg_ making her slow way against the stream. It was a fleeting glimpse which the watchers had as they stood on the bank before they turned to find their way back to the house by the cavern way. The shaft of silver, as it fell, revealed the dim form of the vessel which carried such a precious burden with it, and a life which meant so much for the world's weal.

Then darkness fell again.

Herman and Margaret stood hand in hand, gazing into the blackness, hoping that the clouds would drift by, and the sky be cleared to show them the empty river, with the ship gone out of sight, and safely away from the jurisdiction of the authorities of the city. Instead, they came more and more heavily, and the darkness grew denser.

After a while they sat down and began to talk of their own concerns, and the married life they were going to lead within the week. Margaret, with her lover's arm about her, told him what her hopes were; but she spoke as well of her diffidence, lest he might be disappointed in his wife.

"Hush, little sweetheart," whispered Herman, drawing her closer, so that their lips met. "'Twill be the finest bargain any man ever made; the best gift God ever gave to anyone. And when I think of it, 'tis hard to contain myself, that this day week you will be mine."

Margaret was going to answer, but a sound came, and she bent forward to gaze into the darkness towards the harbour from whence the _Marburg_ had come.

"What's the matter?" Herman asked.

"Did you hear the sound of a man's feet? Can you not hear some voices?" she whispered.

The stillness of the night, while they listened, was broken by the sound of voices and the tread of feet. It was no thing of the imagination. At first there was but a distant murmuring, but now it was undeniable that men were coming, swiftly, persistently, and, judging from the tone of their voices, they were greatly incensed.

Before long, while Margaret and her companion sat shadowed from observation by the bush, they began to distinguish the words.

"To think that I should have been duped like that," cried one.

"'Tis Cochlaeus," Margaret whispered, but Herman made no answer. The man was saying more, and he would not miss a word.

"I went through the ship, and through it again, but found no trace of that accursed Englishman; not a sound nor a sign of his presence. Nothing came of my search but the discovery of that mad stowaway, who has left marks on my fingers that will stay for many a day."

The company halted close by, and Herman and Margaret, holding themselves in silence, neither moving hand nor foot, scarcely breathing lest they should betray their presence, peered into the darkness. Accustomed to it by this long night vigil, they saw the indistinct forms of six men, but who they were, or whether armed, it was impossible to tell. What they heard set their hearts palpitating with fear.

"What can you do?" one asked, who had gone closer to the bank, as if to gaze up the broad stream.

"I mean to overtake the _Marburg_, go on board, and search afresh for Tyndale," said Cochlaeus, almost viciously.

"And if you find him?" asked the other, speaking back over his shoulder, but not moving from the bank.

"Make an end both of him and his accursed practices," came the hot answer. "Canst see the ship?"

"No."

Margaret thought she knew the voice of the man on the look out, and presently her suspicion became a certainty. The man who spoke to Cochlaeus on equal terms was the Dean, who had accompanied the search-party in her father's shop.

"Let us start, and we may overtake her!" cried the Deacon. "None will see us walking on the bank, so that for once the darkness is a blessing in disguise."

"And what then?" the Dean asked impatiently.

"What then?"

The response betrayed astonishment at such simplicity.

"What then? I will board her, of course, and search again. What else should I do? What less could I? That fellow on the wharf said that he saw one go on board who answered to Tyndale in every point, and I would give half of all I have to lay hands on him."

The Dean spoke curtly.

"Let us go if we must, since you seem so set on it. But I warn you that it will be a fool's errand."

Cochlaeus was on the move at once, and it seemed to those who were hiding in the bush that the company went forward in a straggling line, not one among them willingly, save the man who led.

It was alarming to Margaret and Herman to find that after all that had been done, when things appeared to be going so well, and when in fancy they saw Tyndale sitting in a quiet room somewhere in the city where Martin Luther lived, absorbed in his holy task, this persistent sleuth-hound was on his track, and shortly, whereas he was imagining himself safe, he might be in the hands of his tormentors, and his dream of a great task completed broken in upon.

"Herman," Margaret whispered, afraid to move lest she might betray her presence, although the sound of the men's footsteps had grown indistinct as they fell on the meadow grass.

"Yes, little one?"

"They will find him, and they will kill him!" she exclaimed, her voice breaking.

Herman was holding her hand, and it felt damp with her sudden fear.

"I will take you home, my dear, and then go after them. I shall do my best to pass them, for I shall go fleetly, and give warning to those on board the _Marburg_."

"You will be too late!" Margaret protested. "It will take you an hour or more to go back with me, and then those men will have gone so far that you will not overtake them, much less pass them."

She buried her face in her hands, for the vision had come to her in those moments of dread, of a godly man in the hands of the tormentors, tortured, and then for a certainty bound to the stake for death. It was a terrible thought that this saintly man should be cut off in the midst of his splendid work, and be counted among the martyrs.

She lifted her face, and because at the moment the clouds drifted by, Herman saw that it was wet with tears.

"Go now, Herman," she cried, springing to her feet, and holding up her lips for him to kiss. "Go now!"

"And leave you to go through the cavern and home alone? I cannot. I will not!"

"You must, Herman. I can go alone. What is my loneliness compared with that good man's life? Would you have the world irremediably impoverished because a girl like me must needs have an escort? Go, Herman," she ended imploringly, with a hand on either shoulder, as she looked up into her lover's face.

He sought to persuade her, but she was resolute.

"My beloved, go, and God go with you. Save the good man, for he will certainly die if Cochlaeus lays hands on him. And in that case I shall never again know any happiness."

She wound her arms about his neck, and kissed him. But then she waited no more. When she disengaged herself from Herman's arms she turned away and hurried to the cavern's entrance. Before he quite knew what she meant to do she was on her way, and all that he could hear was the sound of light but hurried footsteps. He followed and called after her, but no answer came. He went to the entrance of the cavern and peered in, but saw nothing, nor did he now hear a sound, save the echo of his own voice when he mentioned her name.

He thought she had taken her courage in her hand, doing so in desperation, and knowing the place by this time, she must be making her way towards his home. Perhaps by this time she was close on the chamber where Tyndale had been hiding.

With this conviction he turned away, bent on overtaking and out-distancing the fiery-spirited Inquisitor.

He did not know that when Margaret had gone from him, her courage failed her as she thought of the place where those grim skeletons were lying. She was afraid to venture. She shivered at the thought; for, although she knew of the lantern, ready to be lit with the tinder-box at hand, she felt that she could not go through the cavern by herself. Rather than do that she would stay the long night near the river, taking whatever risks there were; for what men might threaten did not seem so terrible as the confrontation with that solemn silence which spoke so awesomely of a tragedy of bygone years.

At the entrance to the cavern her courage was still less, so that she crouched in the darkness of the bush and waited. She was wanting some sign that Herman was on his way, but instead she heard his feet thud on the grass not far away, as though he was following her. Then she heard his quick breathing, and marked how he halted. Although she could not see him, since, like herself, he was in the black shadows of the bush, she guessed what he was doing--that he was bending down to peer into the cavern.

His call came, but she remained still, scarcely breathing lest he should hear her. Then, when she found it so hard to be silent that she must betray herself, he went away.

She came from behind the bush, but could not see him. She could only hear his footsteps growing less and less distinct. He was going swiftly to make up for lost time, and she was relieved.

Standing farther out in the open, away from the entrance, she heard the faint thud of a man's feet on the sod, and fainter yet, and fainter still. Then silence, with only the sounds of the river, the sigh of the water among the rushes, the occasional hoot of an owl, the slight swish of the wind on the grass and among the trees, and the movement of some belated creature wandering from his lair in search of food.

The sense of loneliness disturbed her. To be here, in the meadow, with the black river on one hand, the stretch of dark country on the other, and, where the watchmen were on the city wall, some challenge coming, making the loneliness seem the greater.

The feeling sent her to her knees, crouching lower and lower; but another thought swept through her mind. A man of God was being hunted. The hunter of heretics was after him. Her lover was on the path, seeking to save him. Could she not pray? Was not that the recourse for anyone in need?

She rose from the crouching posture until she was fairly on her knees, and with her hands clasped, she prayed for the hunted one. She thought it no shame to pray that the hunters should be undone, that they might fall on some stumbling stone and be broken. She prayed that Herman might speed well on his errand of warning.

How long she prayed she did not know. There was no reckoning of time in those moments of pleading, for the thing that mattered was, that the prayer should be heard by Him who sat on the Mercy Seat.

She got up from her knees and moved slowly towards the entrance, for she must go home. But her courage failed, just as it had done before. She crept into the place in something like desperation, lit the lantern, and essayed to go forward.

She went haltingly, her heart beating wildly. She could hear the sound of its throbbing. Then, to her alarm, something came like a cry through the silence--a cry that must be from those still lips away to her left.

She held up her lantern high, so that the light should the better lessen the darkness, but it showed her that grim forbidding heap on the cavern floor.

What was there to fear? she asked; yet she knew it to be the dread of the intangible which was so overwhelming, following on the strain of so much anxiety when Cochlaeus was searching her father's house, and after that the further mental tension of watching for Tyndale's escape when he appeared to be hemmed in with danger. To her excited imagination, after such a day, the cavern was peopled with horrors. Her mind was under compulsion to think of the dead bodies close by her--to conjure up a story of unspeakable suffering, isolation, hunger, deadly fear, and the terror of the coming of the tormentors.

She thought of this while standing in the open space, one hand holding the lantern high, the other on her bosom to still the wild beating of her heart. Then came the sound of voices, and a cry which was like a challenge, all coming as a jar to her being.

She did not know the voices, for they sounded hollow and echoing in the ghostly place, having something of menace in them.

The sounds came again. Once more she heard the challenge, and she could bear the strain no longer. The lantern fell from her hand and crashed on the cavern floor, where the candle spluttered and smoked the horny sides. Her brain reeled. In the diminished light she saw something moving, she knew not what. After that she fell beside the lantern, and lay as one that was dead.

Who they were who came she did not know, nor who they were who, a few moments later, stood and gazed down at her, each one holding a lantern.