Page:A history of the gunpowder plot-The conspiracy and its agents (1904).djvu/303

Rh so great a service, in which case he would have had to divulge the source wherefrom he obtained the letter. It is more probable, therefore, that even this mysterious messenger was a member of Lord Mounteagle's talented company of players. The more, indeed, that one examines into the way in which this comedy at Hoxton was staged, the more one is amazed at the skill with which every item in the programme was carried out, down to the last detail. Tresham, Mounteagle, and Warde were no ordinary actors!

Some general idea that a Plot was being concocted seems to have been known to a good many Romanists besides those (like Mounteagle and Garnet) immediately in touch with the active conspirators themselves. Amongst those who must have had some inkling of what was going on was Garnet's too faithful friend, the infatuated Anne Vaux. Before the middle of October, 1605, she grew very anxious and uneasy as to the curious behaviour of some of her relatives and intimate friends. In the Tower, even Garnet went so far as to make the following admission in relation to her fears:—

'Mrs. Vaux came to him (Garnet), either to Harrowden, or to Sir Everard Digby's at Gothurst, and told this examinant that she feared that some trouble or disorder was towards, that some of the gentlewomen had demanded of her where they should bestow themselves till the "burst" was past in the beginning of the