was ready, my lady was
still attiring herself. And just as the Viscountess stepped forth from
her room, ready for departure, young John Lockwood comes running up
from the village with news that a lawyer, three officers, and twenty or
four-and-twenty soldiers, were marching thence upon the house. John had
but two minutes the start of them, and, ere he had well told his story,
the troop rode into our court-yard.

CHAPTER VI.

THE ISSUE OF THE PLOTS.--THE DEATH OF THOMAS, THIRD VISCOUNT OF
CASTLEWOOD; AND THE IMPRISONMENT OF HIS VISCOUNTESS.

At first my lady was for dying like Mary, Queen of Scots (to whom she
fancied she bore a resemblance in beauty), and, stroking her scraggy
neck, said, "They will find Isabel of Castlewood is equal to her fate."
Her gentlewoman, Victoire, persuaded her that her prudent course was,
as she could not fly, to receive the troops as though she suspected
nothing, and that her chamber was the best place wherein to await them.
So her black Japan casket, which Harry was to carry to the coach, was
taken back to her ladyship's chamber, whither the maid and mistress
retired. Victoire came out presently, bidding the page to say her
ladyship was ill, confined to her bed with the rheumatism.

By this time the soldiers had reached Castlewood. Harry Esmond saw
them from the window of the tapestry parlor; a couple of sentinels were
posted at the gate--a half-dozen more walked towards the stable; and
some others, preceded by their commander, and a man in black, a lawyer
probably, were conducted by one of the servants to the stair leading up
to the part of the house which my lord and lady inhabited.

So the Captain, a handsome kind man, and the lawyer, came through the
ante-room to the tapestry parlor, and where now was nobody but young
Harry Esmond, the page.

"Tell your mistress, little man," says the Captain, kindly, "that we
must speak to her."

"My mistress is ill a-bed," said the page.

"What complaint has she?" asked the Captain.

The boy said, "The rheumatism!"

"Rheumatism! that's a sad complaint," continues the good-natured
Captain; "and the coach is in the yard to fetch the Doctor, I suppose?"

"I don't know," says the boy.

"And how long has her ladyship been ill?"

"I don't know," says the boy.

"When did my lord go away?"

"Yesterday night."

"With Father Holt?"

"With Mr. Holt."

"And which way did they travel?" asks the lawyer.

"They travelled without me,