Indeed, he understood that he who was named de Noyon and Cattrina, having friends among the cardinals, had already obtained some provisional ratification of his marriage with the lady Eve Clavering.

This ratification it would now be costly and difficult to set aside.
Hugh answered that if only he could be granted an audience with his Holiness, he had evidence which would make the justice of his cause plain.

What he sought was an audience.
The notary scratched his lantern jaws and asked how that could be brought about when every gate of the palace was shut because of the plague.

Still, perhaps, it might be managed, he added, if a certain sum were forthcoming to bribe various janitors and persons in authority.
Hugh gave him the sum out of the store of gold they had taken from the robbers in the mountains, with something over for himself.

So Basil departed, saying that he would return at the same hour on the morrow, if the plague spared him and them, his patrons, as he prayed the Saints that it might do.
Hugh watched him go, then turned to Dick and said: "I mistrust me of that hungry wolf in sheep's clothing who talks so large and yet does nothing.