Now he had no fears. He saw himself acclaimed with the
Doctor as the saviour of the nation, and the door of Aldersgate Street open
at his knocking. The man Prance produced a lantern, and lighted them up the
steps and into the tumbledown passage. Fired with a sudden valour, Lovel
drew his sword and led the way to the sinister room. The door was open, and
the place lay empty, save for the dead body.
Oates stood beside it, looking, with his bandy legs great shoulders, and
bull neck, like some forest baboon.
"Oh, maist haunourable and noble victim!" he cried. "England will maarn
you, and the spawn of Raam will maarn you, for by this deed they have
rigged for thaimselves the gallows. Maark ye, Sir Edmund is the
proto-martyr of this new fight for the Praatestant faith. He has died that
the people may live, and by his death Gaad has given England the sign she
required. . . . Ah, Prance, how little Tony Shaston will exult in our
news! 'Twill be to him like a bone to a cur-dog to take his ainemies thus
red-haanded.
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