Sunderland had given no sign that he had received Wilding's communication. And Wilding drew his own contemptuous conclusions of the Secretary of State's cautious policy. It was a fortnight later--when London was settling down again from the diversion of excitement created by the news of Argyle's defeat in Scotland--before Mr. Wilding attempted to approach Sunderland again. He awaited a favourable opportunity, and this he had when London was thrown into consternation by the alarming news of the Duke of Somerset's urgent demand for reinforcements. Unless he had them, he declared, the whole country was lost, as he could not get the militia to stand, whilst Lord Stawell's regiment were all fled and mostly gone over to the rebels at Bridgwater.
This was grave news, but it was followed in a few days by graver. The affair at Philips Norton was exaggerated by report into a wholesale defeat of the loyal army, and it was reported--on, apparently, such good authority that it received credence in quarters that might have waited for official news--that the Duke of Albemarle had been slain by the militia which had mutinied and deserted to Monmouth.
It was while this news was going round that Sunderland--in a moment of panic--at last vouchsafed an answer to Mr. Wilding's letters, and he vouchsafed it in person, just as Wilding--particularly since Disney's arrest--was beginning to lose all hope. He came one evening to Mr. Wilding's lodgings in Covent Garden, unattended and closely muffled, and he remained closeted with the Duke's ambassador for nigh upon an hour, at the end of which he entrusted Mr. Wilding with a letter for the Duke, very brief but entirely to the point, which expressed him Monmouth's most devoted servant.
"You may well judge, sir," he had said at parting, "that this is not such a letter as I should entrust to any man."
Mr. Wilding had bowed gravely, and gravely he had expressed himself sensible of the exceptional honour his lordship did him by such a trust.
"And I depend upon you, sir, as you are a man of honour, to take such measures as will ensure against its falling into any but the hands for which it is intended."
"As I am a man of honour, you may depend upon me," Mr. Wilding solemnly promised. "Will your lordship give me three lines above your signature that will save me from molestation; thus you will facilitate the preservation of this letter."
"I had already thought of that," was Sunderland's answer, and he placed before Mr. Wilding three lines of writing signed and sealed which enjoined all, straitly, in the King's name to suffer the bearer to pass and repass and to offer him no hindrance.