Sam Atkins, an engaging young clerk on the staff of Mr. Samuel Pepys during the time that the famous diarist first served as secretary to the Lord High Admiral of England, rose from obscurity to fame on one memorable, terrifying occasion. At the age of twenty-one, Sam was accused of complicity in the Popish Plot, that ingenious fabrication of the infamous Titus Oates, which brought a hysterical nation to the verge of panic, and profoundly influenced the literature and history of Restoration England. Summoned without warning on Friday, November 1, 1678, to the office in Whitehall of the...