Cardigan

by Robert W. Chambers

CHAPTER XXVI

It was nearly ten o'clock; a freezing rain still swept the black Boston streets, with now and again a volley of hail, rattling on closed shutters and swinging shop-signs.

In the dark mews behind the "Wild Goose Tavern" had gathered a shadowy company of horsemen, unfortunate patriots who had not been quick enough to leave the city before the troops shut its landward gates.

Caught by the Governor's malignant move, separated from their companies of Minute Men, these half-score gentlemen had met at the "Wild Goose" to consult how best they might leave the city and join their comrades at Lexington and Concord.

Some were for riding to the Neck and making a dash across the causeway; some wanted boats, among the latter, Jack Mount, who naturally desired to rid the town of his person as speedily as might be.

"There's a hempen neck-cloth to fit my pipes in Queen Street," he said, plaintively, "and I desire it not, having no mind for flummery. Let us find a flat-boat, in God's name, and get us to Charlestown with our horses while the rain endures."

"Ay," replied an officer of Roxbury Minute Men, "but what if our horses neigh in mid-stream?"

"The Somerset ran out her deck-guns at sunset," added another. "What if she turned her swivel on us?"

"And how if they swept us off the causeway with a chain-shot?" asked Mount.

"What think you, Mr. Cardigan?" demanded an officer of Sudbury militia, leaning forward in his wet saddle to pat the dripping neck of his roan.

"I only know that I shall ride this night to Lexington," I said, impatiently, "and I am at your service, gentlemen, by land or sea. Pray you, decide quickly while the rain favours us."

"Is there a man among us dare demand a pass of the Governor?" asked the Sudbury officer, abruptly. "By Heaven, gentlemen, it is death by land or by sea if we make to force the lines this night!"

"And it is death to me if I stay here cackling," muttered Mount, as we caught the distant gallop of dragoons through stony Wiltshire Street.

We sat moodily in our saddles, huddled together in the darkness and rain, listening to the sound of the horses' feet on the pavement.

"I'd give a thousand guineas if I were on the Charlestown shore with Revere," muttered an officer.

"The Governor might sell you a pass for ten," observed another, sneeringly. "It will cost him a penny to keep his pretty bird o' paradise in plumes."

"If John Hancock were here he would get us a pass from Mrs. Hamilton," remarked the Sudbury officer.

There was a silence, then one or two men laughed.

"Is Mrs. Hamilton at Province House?" I asked, not understanding the careless handling of her name among these gentlemen.

Again came laughter.

"It is easy to see that you have been in prison," observed the Sudbury officer. "Mrs. Hamilton rules at Province House, and leads Tommy Gage by the nose—"

"By the left hand," interrupted another, maliciously.

"You mean that Mrs. Hamilton is—is—" I began.

"Town scandal," said the officer.

"It may be a lie," observed a young man mounted on a powerful gray.

"It is a lie," I said, with an ugly emphasis.

"Is that remark addressed to me, sir?" demanded the Sudbury officer, sharply.

"And to company, also," I replied.

"Gentlemen!" cried the Roxbury officer, "are we to have quarrels among us at such a time?"

"Certainly," said I, "if you or your company affront me. Tattle is dirty work for a gentleman's tongue, and the sooner that tongue is stopped with honest mud the better."

"I've called a gentleman out for less than that," said an old officer, dryly.

"I am at your service," I replied, disgusted.

"And I'm with you, lad," said Mount, walking up to my stirrup. "I have no stomach for those who wink at a woman's name."

"I also," said the young man on the gray, gravely.

A constrained silence followed, broken by the Sudbury officer.

"Hats off to the beautiful Mrs. Hamilton, gentlemen! Cardigan is right, by God! If we stand not for our women, who will?"

And he stretched out his hand in the rain. I took it; others offered me their hands.

"I ride to Province House," I said, briefly. "Jack, fetch a cloak to hide your buckskins and wait me here. Gentlemen, I wish you fortune in your journey."

As I rode out into Cambridge Street, thunder boomed in the east, and I saw the forked lightning racing through inky heavens, veining the storm with jewelled signs.

"God writes on heaven's wall!" I said, aloud.

A strange exultation stirred me; the dark world lay free and wide before me, and I would ride it, now, from end to end, till Silver Heels was mine and Butler's soul had dropped back into that pit from whence it had crawled to hide within his demon's body.

In Hillier's Lane I put Warlock to a gallop, but drew bridle in muddy Sudbury Street, where, from the darkness, a strident voice called on me to halt.

"Who comes there?" repeated the voice. I heard the trample of horsemen and the clink of sabres striking stirrups.

"Coureur-de-bois for Province House!" I answered, calmly. A chafing temper began to heat my blood; I gathered my bridle and dropped one hand on my hatchet.

"On whose affairs ride you?" demanded the spectral dragoon, laying his horse broadside across mine.

"On my own affairs!" I cried, angrily; "pull out there!—do you hear me, fellow?"

A lanthorn was lifted to my face.

"Let the forest wild-cat go," muttered an officer, riding back to the picket as I crowded my horse against the dragoon who had hailed me.

Without giving them a glance I pushed through the cluster of horsemen, and heard them cursing my insolence as I wheeled into School Street and cantered along Governor's Alley.

There were torches lighted in the mews; an hostler took Warlock; I swung out of the saddle and stepped back to a shelter from the storm.

Through the rain, up Marlborough Street, down School Street, and along Cornhill, drove the coaches and carriages of the Tory quality, all stopping at the brilliantly lighted mansion, where, as an hostler informed me, the Governor was giving a play and a supper to the wealthy Tory families of Boston and to all the officers of the British regiments quartered in the city. I knew the latter statement was false.

I stood for a while in the rain among the throng of poor who had come to wait there, in patience, on the chance of a scrap from the servants' quarters after the servants had picked the bones their surfeited masters would scarcely deign to lick.

At first, as the coaches dashed up and the chairs jogged into the gateway, a few squalid watchers in the crowd fought to open the carriage-doors, hoping for a coin flung to them for their pains; but the sentinels soon put a finish to this, driving the ragged rabble savagely, with thrusts of their musket-butts, out into Marlborough Street. Under the gate-lanthorn's smeared reflections I saw the poor things huddled in a half-circle, pinched and chattering and white with hunger, soaked to the bone with the icy rain, yet lingering, God knows why, for a brief glimpse of My Lady in pink silk and powder, picking her way from her carriage across the puddles, while My Lord minced at her side and the footman ran behind to cover them both with a glistening umbrella.

The stony street echoed with the clatter of shod horses, the rattle of wheels, the shouts of footmen, and the bawling of chair-bearers.

Once, when the wind sharpened, shifted, and blew the slanting rain from the north, a warm odour of roasted butcher's meats came to us, and I could hear a hollow sound rising from the throng, which was like a groan.

In the Province House fiddlers were fiddling; it was chill enough in the street, but it was doubtless over-hot within, for servants came and threw open the windows and we could hear the fiddles plainly and the sweet confusion of voices and a young girl's laughter.

A hoarse cry broke out, wrung from the very vitals of the wretches around me.

"Silence!" shouted the officer of the gate-guard, striding out in his long rain-cloak and glaring about him, with tasselled stick upraised. The rain powdered his gilded French hat and laced vest, and he stepped back hastily under shelter.

There was perfect quiet for an instant, then a movement near me, a mutter, a quick surging of people, a cry: "Give room! Back there! Bear him up!"

A voice broke out, "He is starving; the smell o' meat sickens him!"

Two men staggered past, supporting a mere lad, whose deathly face hung on his rain-soaked cotton shirt.

"He has the spotted sickness!" muttered a chair-bearer near me; "it's death to take his breath! Let me pass!"

"The pest!" cried another, shrinking back, and stumbling away in a panic.

The officer watched the scene for a moment, then his heavy, inflamed face darkened.

"Back there! Be off, I say!" he bawled. "Ye stinking beggars, d'ye mean to poison us all with the pest? Turn out the gate-guard! Drive those filthy whelps up Cornhill!" he shouted to the corporal of the guard.

The soldiers came tumbling out of the gate-lodge, but before they could move on the throng another officer hurried up, and I heard him sharply recalling the soldiers and rebuking the officer who had given the order.

"No, no, that will not do," he said. "The town would flame if you drive the citizens from their own streets. Let them stand there. What harm are they doing?"

"The lout yonder fell down with the spotted pest," remonstrated the first officer. "Faugh! The rabble's rotten with scurvy or some filthy abomination—"

"They'll harm no one but themselves," replied the other in a sad voice, which sounded strangely familiar to me, so familiar that I involuntarily stepped out into the lighted space under the gate and peered at him through the rain, shielding my eyes with my hands.

The officer was Mr. Bevan.

Should I speak to him? Should I count on his friendship for me to get me an audience with the Governor? Here was a chance; he could vouch for me; so could Mrs. Hamilton.

As I hesitated somebody beside me clutched my elbow, and I swung around instantly, one hand on my hunting-knife.

The next moment Saul Shemuel almost rolled at my feet in an ecstasy of humble delight, sniffling, writhing, breathing hard, and clawing at my sleeve in his transports at sight of me.

I seized his arm, drew him along the wall, and into the dusky mews.

Impatient, yet touched, I suffered his mauling, demanding what news he might have, and he, beside himself with joy and excitement, could scarce find breath to pant out the news which concerned me. "I haf seen Foxcroft," he gasped. "Mr. Foxcroft he hass come to-day on dot Pomona frigate to Scarlet's Wharf, twelve weeks from Queenstown, sir. It wass printed in dot Efening Gazette, all apout Foxcroft how he iss come from Sir Peter Warren to make some troubles for Sir John Johnson mit dot money he took from Miss Warren, sir!"

"Foxcroft! Here?" I stammered.

"Yess, sir; I ran mit my legs to Queen Street, und I told him how you wass in dot prison come, und he run mit his legs to Province House, but too late, for we hear dot bell ring und dose guns shooting. Und I said, 'Gott of Isaac, I bet you Jack Mount he hass run avay!' Und Mr. Foxcroft he sees some dragoon soldiers come into Cornhill, calling out: 'Dose highwaymens is gone! Vatch 'em by dot Mall!' So Mr. Foxcroft he comes to Province House mit me, sir, und he iss gone in to make some troubles mit Governor Gage apout Sir John Johnson und dot money of Miss Warren! Ach, here iss Mr. Foxcroft, now, sir—"

I turned to confront a stout, florid gentleman, swathed in a riding-cloak, whose little, angry eyes snapped as he cried: "Governor Gage is a meddling ass! I care not who listens to me, and, I repeat, he is a meddlesome ass! Sir Peter Warren shall hear of this, damme! Am I a free agent, damme? I take it that I am a free agent, yet I may not leave this town to-night for lack of a pass. But I'll go! They shall not stop me! No, damme if they shall!"

The hostlers were all staring at him; I stepped towards him, eagerly, but the peppery and inflamed barrister waved me off.

"Damme, sir!" he bawled; "who the devil are you, sir? Take your hands from me, sir! I wish to go to my client in Lexington, and this Tory peacock will give me no pass! I will not suffer this outrage; I will appeal to—"

I gave him a jerk that shook the breath from his body, whispering in his ear: "Be silent, in Heaven's name, sir! I am Michael Cardigan!"

At first, in his passion, astonishment, and incredulity, he found no voice to answer me; but as Shemuel eagerly vouched for me, Mr. Foxcroft's fury and suspicion subsided.

"You? Cardigan?" he repeated. "Well, where the devil have you been, sir, and what the devil have you been about, sir? Eh? Answer me that, now!"

"I've been in prison, under sentence of death," I replied. "Where have you been, sir, to leave your client, Miss Warren, at the mercy of Walter Butler?"

At that he took fire, and, with trembling fist quivering towards heaven, he justified his absence in warm terms.

"I've been in England, sir, that's where I've been!" he cried. "I've been there to find out why your blackguard of a kinsman, Sir John Johnson, should rob my client of her property. And I've found out that your blackguard Sir John has not only robbed her of her means, but of the very name she has a right to! That's what I've done, sir. And if it does not please you, you may go to the devil!"

His impudence and oaths I scarcely noted, such a fierce happiness was surging through me to the very bones. I could have hugged the choleric barrister as he stood there, affronting me at every breath; I fairly beamed upon him when he bade me go to the devil, and, to his amazement, I seized his fat hands and thanked him so gratefully that the defiance died on his lips and he stared at me open-mouthed.

"My dear sir, my dear, dear friend," I cried, "I will get you your pass to clear the Neck to-night, and we will go together to find my cousin, Miss Warren. Wait me here, sir; I will leave Boston this night or my name is not Cardigan!"

Then bidding Shemuel keep an eye on Warlock, I hurried around to the gate-house, where the rabble still slunk, watching the lighted windows with famished eyes.

The clouds in mid-heaven had caked into snowy jets of fleece, and now the full moon of April flooded the soaked pavements with pools of silver.

The sentry halted me as I entered the court-yard, but when I asked for Mr. Bevan, he called to a comrade to take my message. The next moment Bevan stepped out into the moonlight.

"What is it, my man? Can I serve you?" he said, pleasantly, peering at me.

"Do you not know me, Mr. Bevan?" I asked.

"Cardigan!" he stammered, "is that you, Cardigan—"

He was close to me at a stride, both hands on my shoulders, his kindly, troubled eyes full of wonder and pity. Perhaps I appeared to him somewhat haggard and careworn, and then the rain had chilled and pinched me.

"I am not in want," I said, trying to smile.

"But—but why are you not among the guests at Province House?" he asked, quickly. "The son of Captain Cardigan needs no friend at court, I fancy."

He linked his gilded sleeve in my arm and drew me past the guard-house, and ere I could protest, I found myself inside the cloak-room among a company of old beaux and young fops, all in the hands of footmen and body-servants who were busily dusting the hair-powder from silken shoulders, smoothing out laces, hanging hats and cloaks to dry, and polishing sword-hilts for their languid, insolent-eyed masters.

"Can we not find a quiet corner hereabouts?" I asked. "I came to demand a pass for Lexington. Will you use your privilege with the Governor, Bevan?"

"A pass!" he exclaimed, stopping short in his tracks.

"To Lexington," I repeated.

"To-night?"

"Yes."

He raised his honest, perplexed eyes to me.

"I must have a pass; it concerns the welfare of Miss Warren," I began, then hesitated, remembering that I was also to take Jack Mount in my company, whose business in Lexington was very different from mine.

"Cardigan," he said, with troubled eyes on me, "I cannot lend myself to such a service, even for Miss Warren's sake, unless you first give me your word of honour that your journey concerns only Miss Warren's welfare."

My heart sank; I could not betray the comrade who counted on me. Jack Mount must get free o' Boston as well as I. But how could I lie to Bevan or requite his courtesy with treachery? Yet honour forbade me to leave Jack Mount, even for Silver Heels's sake.

"Pass or no pass, I go this night," I said, sullenly.

"Hush!" he said; "don't talk here."

He led me through the card-rooms, where a score of old bucks and purple-necked officers sat, all playing picquet in owlish silence, then through a partition, where a fountain sprayed beds of tall ferns, out into a lamp-illumined circular alcove, hung with China silks, and bowered deep in flowers and tiny, blossoming trees no higher than one's knee-buckle.

"The Chinese alcove," he observed. "Nobody will disturb us here, I fancy. You have heard of the Chinese alcove, Cardigan? There is the door to the famous golden gallery."

I glanced at the gilded door in the corner, half-hidden by Chinese drapery. I had heard that the Governor's sweetheart dwelt here.

Bevan reached up and pulled a velvet cord. Presently a servant brought us a silver bowl of steaming punch made with tea and fruit in the Regent's fashion.

"I drink no tea," I said, shortly.

"I suppose not," observed Bevan, laughing, and commanded the servant to fetch me a bowl without tea.

"Your courtesy to a rebel is extraordinary," I said, after an interval.

"Oh, I'm half rebel myself," he laughed. "I'd be in my shirt-sleeves out Middlesex way, drilling yokels—Minute Men, I believe—were it not that—that—oh, well, I'll wear the red jacket as long as I live and let the future weed out the goats from the sheep."

"It's different with you," I said. "You are English bred."

"Ay, and the red o' the uniform has dyed my flesh to the bone," he replied.

"You mean that you will fight—us?" I asked.

"Tooth and nail, my dear fellow," he said, gayly; "foot, horse, and dragoons! But what can I do to serve you—first?"

I tasted a glass of punch, then set it down impatiently. "I tell you I must ride to Lexington," I said, firmly, "and I mean to take friends if I choose—"

"Tell me no more, Cardigan," he broke in, "else I must refuse you what little service I may render. You know as well as I why the gates on the Neck are closed to-night. If you do not know, listen to me. The rebels have been storing war materials. Last October we gave their spokesmen full warning that we could no longer tolerate the collecting of arms and ammunition. We sent expeditions into the country to destroy what stores they had gathered."

He hesitated; a perplexed smile passed over his face. "You know perfectly well," he said, "that we have good reasons for closing the city gates to-night. I cannot give you a pass. Yet, for Miss Warren's sake"—he lifted his hat as he spoke—"I have done what I could in honour. Now I must leave you."

"What have you done?" I asked, angrily.

"I have conducted you to the Chinese alcove, my friend."

"The ante-chamber of the Governor's mistress," I retorted. "Am I to find my pass here among these flowers and blossoms?"

He looked down at the glasses on the table beside us, stirred the contents of his own, and nodded.

"What do you mean?" I demanded, hotly.

"I mean, Cardigan, that, except the Governor, there is only one person to-night in Boston who can secure you a pass for Lexington. If she chooses to do so, it is not my affair."

"If who chooses to do so?"

"She."

"Who?"

"Wait and—ask her," he said, gravely.

He was gone, wading waist-deep in flowers, ere I could compose my mind to think or protest, leaving me speechless; standing by the table.

A minute passed; through the thickets of sweet-smelling blossoms the candles flamed like those slender witch-lights that dance over nature's gardens, where bergamot and cardinal robe our dim woods in crimson glory under the October stars.

"What does he mean by leaving me here?" I muttered, pacing to and fro through the fragrant, flowering lane. Then, as I stood still, listening, far away I heard a glass door close with a crystalline clash; there came the rustle of brocade sweeping like a breeze along the passage; the door of the golden gallery swung outward; a figure all silk and lace stood poised on the step above me, screened to the knees behind the flowers.

"Where is the forest-runner who desires a pass to Lexington?" she began; then, perceiving my lank, dark form against the candle-light, she laughed a sweet, contented little laugh and bade me approach.

I saw that exquisite, indolent head bending towards me, the smiling eyes seeking my features, the jewels ablaze at her throat.

"Marie Hamilton!" I stammered.

All her neck and face flamed, then whitened to the hue of death as she stepped swiftly towards me, her brocade sweeping through the flowers with a sound like the wind tearing silken petals. Suddenly she stood still, clearing her startled eyes with one jewelled hand; her knees fell a-trembling; she swayed and caught at the stiff, golden curtains, half tearing them from the wall.

Into a carved chair, all glittering with dragon's wings, she fell, a crumpled heap of lace and jewels, and buried her face in her hands, pressing her fingers into the plump skin.

I watched her miserably; she twisted her white hands before her face; her quivering mouth, her delicate body bent and writhing, all these told me what no words could tell, and her agonized silence shouted her shame to the midnight skies of heaven.

In the hush that followed, the door of the golden gallery swung idly back and forth with a deadened, muffled beat like the noise of great wings flapping.

"Michael," she said, at last.

"Yes," I whispered, in hopeless grief.

Presently she sat up, wearily, one hand on her pale, smooth brow. I could not meet her eyes; I bent my head.

"Oh, God, what punishment is mine!" she sobbed.

She dropped her hands, clasped them, and looked wildly at me through her tears.

"If I am what I am, it was because I had lost you," she said. "I had eaten my heart out—you never came—I never thought you cared—I never thought you cared!" she wailed, twisting her interlocked fingers in helpless agony. "I had loved you so long; I tried to make you understand it, but you would not. I was mortally hurt—I said bitter things—but my heart was yours, Michael, yours for the asking, and so was I; you had only to take me; I would have gone with you from the first word you spoke to me in Johnson Hall—I would have followed you—from the first glance you gave me. Wrong? What is wrong? Love? It is never wrong! I would have died for a touch of your lips; I did almost die when you kissed me there, using me so shamelessly with your boyish cruelty! You went away in the night; I searched Johnstown, and I listened and questioned until I believed you had gone to Pittsburg. And I followed you, madly jealous of Felicity, crazed at the thought that she, too, was going to Pitt to be near you. But you were not at Fort Pitt; I waited, and I was calm because I believed that Felicity meant to wed with Dunmore. Then Harrod sent in his list of killed—my husband was among the dead. I went back to Albany. I meant to come to Boston to sell my house: I needed money. You found me there on the road that night; I could have died from happiness, but you would not understand me, Michael!" she ended, piteously.

I kept my eyes on the floor.

"And now, since you have been in Boston, all these long months," she cried, "I have not seen you; I could not find you, nor could I find anybody who had ever seen you. God knows I did not think to see you here since I, destitute, utterly desperate, caring nothing for life, took—this—shameful—step—"

She covered her hot face with her hands.

"Can you believe I love you still?" she sobbed.

I could endure no more; already I had stumbled through the flowery hedge towards the door, blindly forcing a path amid the blossoms which threw out a hundred tendrils to bar my way.

Once I looked back. She lay in the glittering chair, eyes following me. The next step, and a great bunch of roses blotted her face from my sight.

Through the card-room I hurried, aware of people around me, yet seeing nothing; down the stairway, jostled by people who were descending or mounting, and at last into the cloak-room and out through the court-yard, which was now bright with moonlight shining in the puddles of rain.

Shemuel came from the mews to meet me, leading Warlock. Mr. Foxcroft stalked behind him.

"Where is the pass?" he demanded. "Did you procure the pass, sir? What! Empty-handed! Now, by Heaven!" he cried, in a towering fury, "this Tory Governor presumes too far!"

"Be silent!" I said, sharply; "do you wish to have us all arrested? I shall go to Lexington to-night, I tell you, pass or no pass; and, before I go, you shall tell me where I may find Miss Warren."

"A mile out of Lexington on the Bedford Road," he replied. "How can you pass the Neck guard, without the Governor's leave, sir?"

"I will show you," said I, "if you choose to accompany me."

"You mean to ride for it?" he asked, excitedly.

I was silent.

"And risk a chain-shot from their twenty-four-pounders?" he persisted.

"Mr. Foxcroft," I said, "you may do as you please, but there is nothing under the moon, yonder, which can keep me from going to Lexington. Have you a horse stabled here? No? Can you hire one? Then hire him, in Heaven's name, and get into your saddle if you mean to go with me. Shemuel, find a good horse for Mr. Foxcroft, and another for Jack Mount. You must pay for them; I have no money. It is half-past ten o'clock; I will wait ten minutes."

Shemuel scurried back into the mews; Foxcroft followed, and in a moment his portly figure was lost to sight in the dusky alley.

I looked up at the lighted windows of Province House, wondering how on earth I was to go to Lexington. Music was sounding from the ballroom; I looked out across the dark city; the moon hung over the bay; the rigging of a war-ship rose black against the silvery disk. Instinctively I turned my eyes towards the steeple of the Old North Meeting-House. The steeple was dark; the troops had not yet started.

Musing there in the moonlight, hands clasped on the pommel of my saddle, the dull thunder of hoofs from the stable aroused me, and presently Mr. Foxcroft came clattering out of the mews, followed by Shemuel, also mounted, a grotesque lump of a shape, crouched on the saddle, his flat, three-cornered hat crammed over his great ears, his nose buried in his neck-cloth. He led a third horse behind him.

"Now, sir," panted Foxcroft, "I am prepared to ride to the devil with you and put this Tory Governor's nose out o' joint!"

"Do you also ride with us, Shemuel?" I asked.

He replied faintly in the affirmative. The little creature was frightened. His devotion touched me very deeply.

Walking our horses along Common Street, we were almost immediately accosted by dragoons, who, on learning that our destination was the "Wild Goose Tavern," cursed us roundly, promising to clean out that nest of rebels at no distant date. Their officer also began to harangue us, but I pushed my horse past him and cantered on into the Mall and out through Green Lane, wheeling into the alley behind the "Wild Goose."

Of the half-score gentlemen whom I had left there, sitting their rain-drenched horses, none remained. However, Mount was in the tavern, and he came at my whistle, explaining that the balance of the company had chosen to risk crossing the bay under the guns of the Somerset, rather than attempt to force the Neck.

"God go with them!" said I; "here's Shemuel with a horse for you. We'll ride to the shore and see what can be done."

Mount, who had been busily embracing Shemuel, gave the little Jew a mighty slap of affection, vaulted into his saddle, passed my rifle to me, and fell back beside the peddler, while Mr. Foxcroft and I rode through the Mall once more, down towards the shore, where, in the darkness, faint flashes through the trees came and went as the waves of the bay caught the moonlight.

"Is it too far to swim?" I asked Mr. Foxcroft.

"Too far," he replied, with a shiver. "All is marsh beyond; the mud would smother us ere we landed. That shoal yonder is dry at low-water."

"Mr. Foxcroft," said I, "we must swim for it somewhere. Could we not make the Charles River at a pinch?"

"No, nor Stony Brook," he said. "A good swimmer might circle the floating battery and make his way outside the Neck, but he could not last, Mr. Cardigan."

We had been slowly approaching the shore while we spoke. For some time I had fancied I heard sounds in the darkness like the stirring and movement of a body of men assembling. At first I fancied the swelling murmur of the tide deceived me, yet at moments it seemed as though I could distinguish a trampling sound which could not have been the beat of the ocean's steady squadrons on the beach.

Then, as we came out through the fringe of trees from which the land fell away to the water's edge, a stirring sight lay spread before us: below, in the dazzling moonlight, the shore swarmed with soldiers, teamsters, and boatmen, moving hither and thither along the water's edge. Companies of grenadiers were marching towards the wooden wharf at the end of Hollis Street; companies of light infantry and marines were embarking in the boats which lay rocking along the shore; horses snorted, gathered in groups, while boatmen poled flat-boats towards a cove from which already a scow, freighted with horses, was being pushed out into the bay.

Although there was no talking, save the half-whispered commands of the officers, the movement of so many boats, the tread of a thousand men, the stamping and noises of horses, all swelled into a heavy, ceaseless sound, which mingled with and intensified the murmur of the mounting tide, stirred to its flood by the silver magic of the rising moon.

Hundreds of soldiers had already embarked; we could distinguish the dark line of their boats, all strung out as though fastened together, stem and stern, rising and falling on the glittering surface of the bay, ever lengthening, as new boats, loaded deep with soldiers, put out to fall into line and sail bobbing away into the darkness, only to reappear again under the flood of moonlight.

"Suppose," whispered Mount, "we lead our horses aboard that scow yonder!"

In another moment, scarcely aware of what I was actually about, I had dismounted, and was leading Warlock straight down to the shore towards a cove, where half a dozen boatmen were standing in a scow, resting on their long sea-poles.

"If they ask questions, knock them into the water!" said Mount, calmly.

He repeated the instructions to Foxcroft and Shemuel as we filed along the dim shore past a throng of boatmen, grooms, officers' servants, and teamsters, and made straight towards the scow that lay a few yards off shore in the little, shadowy cove.

It was a desperate attempt; had I given myself one minute's reflection, I should rather have risked a dash across the Neck and a chain-shot on the causeway. Yet its very audacity was in our favour; the boatmen, when they saw us leading our horses down to their cove, hastily lowered a plank bridge from their heavy scow, and Mount coolly waded out into the water, guiding his horse aboard as calmly as though it were his own stable, and these Tory boatmen his paid grooms.

I followed with Warlock, who snorted and pawed when the salt water rose to his fetlocks, but he danced up the plank incline and entered the boat without coaxing. Shemuel's horse, a sleek, weasel-bellied animal, with a wicked eye and a bunch o' hackle for a tail, swung round in the water, slinging the little Jew on his face in the mud, and then, with a vicious squeal, flung up his heels and cantered off, scattering a company of marines drawn up a hundred yards down the shore.

Draggled and dripping, Shemuel, standing knee-deep in salt water, watched the flight of his horse, but I bade him come aboard at once, and he did so, casting sidelong glances at the boatmen, who regarded him with astonishment.

Mr. Foxcroft, meanwhile, had dragged his horse aboard, and Mount ordered the boatmen to push off at once.

As the men took up their heavy sea-poles, I heard them whispering to each other that Mount and I must be scouts sent ahead to spy for the soldiers, and I caught them eying our buckskins curiously as they lay on their poles, pushing out towards the broad belt of moonlight which glistened beyond.

The wind whipped our cheeks as we swung clear of the land; the boatmen presently took to their oars, which I noticed were muffled midway between blade and handle. The row-locks, also, had been padded with bunches of wheat-straw and rags.

Now that we were safely afloat, misgivings seized me. I had never before been on salt water; the black waves which came slapping on our craft disturbed me; the shadowy hulk of the war-ship which lay athwart our course loomed up like doom, seeming to watch us with its wicked little green and red eyes, marking us for destruction.

The wind freshened furiously in my face; the waves came rolling in out of the darkness, rap! rap! slap! rap! crushing into stinging gusts of spray, soaking us to the skin.

Far to our left the line of boats floated, undulating across the bay; the beacon in Boston flared out red as we rounded Fox Hill; the light on Mount Wh-d-m twinkled.

Presently Mount touched my arm and pointed. High up in the dark haze above the city two bright lights hung. So we knew that Rolfe was watching from the belfry of the Old North Meeting-House, and that Paul had read the twin lamps' message and was now galloping west through the Middlesex farms.

Shemuel, shivering in his wet and muddy garments, crept up beside me to ask where we were to be landed.

I did not know, nor dared I ask, fearing to awake suspicion. Besides, we were close under the sprit of a tall, black frigate, so close that I could see the candles flaring in the battle lanthorns and the dead bay-weeds hanging from the chains, and I could even read her name, the Falcon.

Then, suddenly, out of the shadow under the black frigate's hulk, a cockle-shell came dancing towards us, with an officer in the stern, who played his lanthorn on us and waved his arm.

"Move into line with the ship's boats!" he called out, with many a strange sea-oath; and our brawny oarsmen pulled northeast once more towards the long line of boats which now stretched almost across the bay.

"You land at Phipps's Farm, sir?" inquired a sweating boatman of Mount.

"Phipps's Farm!" broke in Mr. Foxcroft. "It's in the marshes o' Lechemere! I'm damned if I'll be landed at Phipps's!"

"Isn't that where the troops land, sir?" asked the boatman, resting his oar.

Mount shook his head mysteriously.

"We are on special service, lads," he said. "Ask no questions, but put us ashore at Willis Creek, and tell the colonel to give you a guinea apiece for me."

At this impudent remark the boatmen began to row with renewed vigour; the salt spray drove aboard in showers, the wind roared in our ears, the horses huddled together.

Once more we swung across the line of boats; in the craft just ahead of us I could see the marines sitting with their muskets on their knees, right hands covering the flints and pans.

As the distance slowly increased between us and the troop-boats, I began to breathe more freely. Mount stood by his horse, coolly chewing a straw from the wadded oar-locks, his fox-skin cap pushed back on his head, the fluffy tail blowing wildly in the wind.

Slowly the dark shore took shape before us; already I could smell the land smell, and hear the wind among the reeds.

Oh, the happiness to be free from that prison city, lying there in the gloom across the water!—the joy to tread free ground once more, to scent free winds, to move unrestrained across the world again!

Mount, too, was sniffing restlessly at the marsh, wreathed in sea-mist; I fancied his eyes glowed in the moonlight like the eyes of a waiting hound.

Something touched my hand; Shemuel came cowering to my side.

"Courage," I whispered.

"I haf done all I could," he said, in a shaking voice.

"I know that, lad," I muttered.

His wet fingers sought mine.

"I shall nefer be safe no more," he whispered.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I don't know. I shall nefer set foot on shore no more. I don't live long now, Mr. Cardigan."

He was trembling from head to foot as I laid my hand on his shoulder.

The boatmen had dropped their oars and taken to their poles once more; the tall reeds rustled as our scow drove its square nose into the shallows and grounded with a grating jar. Startled curlews, round about us, uttered their querulous cries.

"There's a road swings northwest through the marshes," said Mount, wading out into the water and leading his horse up through the rushes. "Follow me, lad. I should know this country from Cobble Hill to Canada."

Foxcroft had mounted; Jack climbed stiffly into his saddle; I threw Warlock around in the reeds, prepared to set foot to stirrup, when Shemuel seized my arm convulsively. A patrol of British light horse, riding in single file, came picking their way down the shore in the moonlight.

Mount and Foxcroft saw them and drew bridles; I slung my legs across Warlock, just as they hailed us.

"Get up behind! Quick!" I whispered to Shemuel, watching the horsemen riding towards Mount, who was ahead of Foxcroft.

Shemuel's strength appeared to have left his limbs; he struggled to mount behind me; Warlock, alarmed at his contortions, began to dance restlessly.

Impatient, I stooped to grasp Shemuel, and I already had him by the collar when an exclamation and a sudden trampling of horses made me turn my head just in time to see a British officer seize Jack Mount and attempt to drag him from his saddle.

Before I could straighten up, the cavalry were upon us; I saw Foxcroft snap his pistol, wheel, and gallop into the reeds; I saw Jack Mount fling the officer off and fetch him a cracking blow with the barrel of his rifle. Two men rode at me; I raised my rifle with one hand, calling to Shemuel to mount behind me, but the frightened peddler squirmed out of my clutch and rushed off headlong into the marsh.

A horseman followed him, cursing; the other trooper, mired in the rushes, struggled to get at me.

I swung my rifle to my cheek; it flashed in the pan; the brute set his horse at a gallop, and, leaning forward, deliberately shot at the unarmed peddler. Shemuel dodged, ran a few yards, doubled on the horseman, and came rushing back towards Mount. He gained a little hillock of rising ground; he could have escaped into the fringing willows, but, to my horror, he turned and waved his arms to me, shouting:

"Ride! Ride! Mr. Cardigan! For Miss Warren's sake, ride, sir!"

"Touch that man and I'll brain you!" I roared at the horseman who had now drawn his sabre.

Again I tried to shoot the trooper, but the flint sparks died out in the damp pan. With a groan I rode after him, calling out to Shemuel to seek cover in the brush, but he only ran about on his hillock, dodging the infuriated trooper, and calling frantically to me that I must save myself for Miss Warren's sake.

Then, while my horse was floundering in the marsh, slowly drawing his mired limbs to firm ground, I saw Shemuel dart towards me with a shriek, and, ere I could reach him, I saw the trooper bend down from his saddle and slash the poor, frightened creature's head with one terrible blow of his heavy sabre.

Down into the mud plunged Shemuel; the trooper's horse trampled and passed over his body, then swung in a rushing circle and bore down on me, just as the other rider came splashing at me from the right.

My rifle a third time flashed in the pan; the priming had been wet with spray. I struck Warlock on the flanks, whirled him head on against Shemuel's murderer, and, whipping out my war-hatchet, aimed a furious blow at the fellow's head. The keen hatchet blade sank into the trooper's shoulder; he tumbled out of his stirrups and landed heavily among the cat-tails.

Instantly I checked Warlock, poised myself in my stirrups, and launched the hatchet straight at the other horseman, striking him full in the chest, but whether with blade-edge, handle, or flat, I know not, for, as his horse swerved wide, passing me at a tearing gallop, Mount and Foxcroft flew past, calling out that Shemuel was dead and that I must follow them for my life.

Up the shore we crashed through the rushes, driving straight out into the marsh, our horses floundering, and the light horsemen firing their pistols at us from the firmer ground above.

A ball grazed Warlock; his neck was wet with blood.

"They'll murder us all here!" cried Foxcroft; "charge them, in God's name!"

Mount heard him and bore to the left; I followed; knee to knee we lifted our crazed horses out of the marsh and hurled them into the little patrol of light horse, bursting upon them ere they could wheel to meet us.

In the moonlight their sabres flashed before our eyes, but no lunging point found its billet of flesh, though their blades rang out on our rifle-barrels; then we were on them, among them, plunging through them, and pounding away northward over a hard gravel road.

They discharged their pistols at us; a few of them followed us, but all pursuit ceased below Prospect Hill; we galloped, unmolested, into the old Charlestown and West Cambridge Road, and flew onward through the night.

In lonely stretches of road, which ran rivers of moonlight, I could see Mount riding, head on his breast, square jaw set, and I knew he was brooding on Shemuel's dismal end.

The swift murder of the little peddler shocked me terribly; Shemuel's strange premonition of his own approaching death fairly made me shiver in my stirrups as I rode. Like a doomed man the Jew had gone to his end, with what courage God had lent him. He had been a friend to me. For all his squalid weakness of limb, his natural fear of pain, his physical cowardice, he had not swerved from the service of his country, nor had he faltered or betrayed the confidence of men whose peril imperilled himself. Nothing save his fidelity to us had forced him to leave the city with us; nothing save the innate love of liberty in his grotesque and dirty body had lured this errant child of Israel to risk his life in bearing messages for those who watched the weighted hours creep on towards that bloody dawn already gathering under the edges of the sleeping world.

Now, as we rode, from behind us the sound of bells came quavering across dim meadows; out of the blue night bells answered; we heard the reports of guns, the distant clamour of a horn blowing persistently from some hidden hamlet.

"The alarm!" panted Foxcroft, at my elbow, as we pounded on. "Hurrah! Hurrah! The country lives!"

"Jack!" I called, through the rushing wind, "the whole land is awaking behind us! Do you hear? Our country lives!"

"And England dies!" cried Mount, passionately. With both hands uplifted, and bridle flung across his horse's neck, he galloped in the lead. On his huge horse, towering up in the saddle, he swept on through the night, a gigantic incarnation of our people militant, a colossal shape embodying all that we had striven for and suffered for from the hour when the first pioneer died at the stake.

On he swept astride his rushing horse, the fox-tail on his cap streaming, the thrums on his sleeves blowing like ripe grain; and ever he tossed his arms towards the sky and shook his glittering rifle above his head, till the moonshine played on it like lightning.

"Ring! Ring out your bells!" we shouted, as we tore through a sleeping village; and behind us we could see candle-light break out from the dark houses, and, ere the volleying echoes of our horses' hoofs struck the last spark from the village streets, the meeting-house bell began swinging, warning the distant farms that the splendid hour had come.

And now, unexpectedly, we encountered a check in our course. Full in the yellow moonlight, on a little hill over which our road lay, we caught sight of a body of horsemen drawn up, and we knew, by the moon shining on their gorgets, that we had before us a company of dragoons with their officers.

At a word from Jack I dismounted and pulled the rails from the road fence on our right. Through the aperture we filed, out into a field of young winter wheat well sprouted, and then west, as quietly as we might, with watchful eyes on the dragoons.

But the British horsemen had also turned, and were now trotting along parallel to our course, which manœuvre drove us off eastward again across the meadows, deep starred with dandelions. For us to alarm Lexington was now impossible. We could already see the liberty-pole on the hill and make out where the village lay, by a gilt weather-vane shining in the moonlight above the trees. But there were no lights to be seen in Lexington, and we dared not ride through the dark town, not knowing but that it might be swarming with dragoons.

Still, if it were impossible for us to alarm Lexington, we could ride on across the fields and gain the Bedford Road.

Mr. Foxcroft undertook to pilot us. As I rode by his side I could scarce believe that, yonder, close at hand in the darkness, Silver Heels slept, nor doubted that I was near. My heart began a-drumming.

"You are sure she is there?" I asked, plucking Foxcroft's sleeve.

"Unless Captain Butler has prevailed," he said, grimly.

I choked and trembled in my saddle.

"Do you—do you believe she would listen to him?" I muttered.

"Do you?" he asked, turning on me.

We forced our horses through a belt of tasselled willows fringing a little thread of a meadow stream. The dew showered our faces like a flurry of rain. My cheeks were burning.

"How far is it? Are we near her house?" I asked again and again. I strove to realize that I was nearing Silver Heels; I could not, nor was I able to understand that I should ever again see her.

In moments of my imprisonment I had believed devoutly that I should live to see her; yet since my deliverance from that cage of stones I had not dared assure myself that I should find her; I had not given myself time to think of the chances that might favour me or of the possibilities of failure. Dormant among my bitter memories lay that vile threat of Walter Butler; I dared not stir it up to examine it; I let it lie quiet, afraid to rouse it. By what hellish art could he, my mortal enemy, inspire aught but hatred in the woman who had loved me and who must have known how I had suffered at his hands?

Yet, if he had not lied to me, she had at least given him an audience. But his boast that she had consented to fix a day to wed with him I believed not, deeming it but a foolish attempt at cruelty on a man who, truly enough, at that time, seemed doomed to die upon the gibbet behind Queen Street court-house.

We now came to a stony pasture in which cattle lay, turning their heavy heads in the dim light to watch us. I dismounted to let down the bars. In vain I looked for a house; there were no lights to be seen.

Foxcroft moved slowly; I nearly rode him down in my rising anxiety, now almost beyond control.

At length, however, he discovered a narrow, overgrown lane, lined with hazel, and we turned into it, single file, leading our horses. The lane conducted us to an orchard, all silvery in the moonbeams, and now, through the long rows of trees, I saw the moon shining on the portico of a white mansion.

"Is that the house?" I whispered.

Foxcroft nodded.

We led our horses through a weedy garden up to the pillared portico. Even in the moonlight I could see the neglect and decay that lay over house and grounds. In the pale light clusters of yellow jonquils peeped from the tangle about the doorsteps; an owl left a hemlock tree with a whistle of broad wings and wheeled upward, squealing fiercely.

And now, as I leaped to the porch, I became aware of a light in the house. It streamed from a chink in the wooden shutters which were closed over the window to the right of the door.

Foxcroft saw it; so did Mount; we tied our hard-blown horses to the fluted wooden pillars, and, stepping to the door, rapped heavily.

The hard beating of my heart echoed the rapping; intense silence followed.

After a long time, pattering, uncertain steps sounded inside the hallway; a light, dim at first, grew brighter above the fanlight over the door.

The door opened to its full width; the candle flared in the draught of night wind, smoked, flickered, then burned steadily. A little, old man stood in the hallway; his huge shadow wavered beside him on the wall.

It was the Weasel!

The cuffs of his coat, guiltless of lace, were too large for his shrunken arms; his faded flowered waistcoat hung on his thin body like a sack; yet his hair was curled and powdered over his sunken forehead. On his colourless, wasted face a senile smile flickered; he laid his withered hand on his breast and bowed to us, advancing to the threshold.

With a gesture he welcomed us; he did not speak, but stood there smiling his aged smile, expectant, silent, the pattern of threadbare courtesy, the living spectre of hospitality.

"Cade!" whispered Mount, with ashy lips; "Cade, old friend! How came you here?"

The Weasel's meaningless eyes turned on Mount; there was no light of recognition in them.

"You are welcome, sir," said Renard, in the ghost of his old voice. "I pray you enter, gentlemen; we keep open house, ah yes!—an old custom in our family, gentlemen—you are welcome to Cambridge Hall, believe me, most welcome."

The thin, garrulous chatter awoke petulant echoes through the silent hall; he raised his childish voice and called out the names of servants, long dead. The hollow house replied in echoes; the candle-flame burned steadily.

"My servants are doubtless in their hall," he said, without embarrassment; "that the office of hospitality devolves on me I must count most fortunate. Pray, gentlemen, follow. The grooms will take your horses to the stables."

Leading us into a room, where were a few chairs set close to a small, shabby card-table, he begged us to be seated with a kindly smile, then seated himself, and fell a-babbling of ancient days, and of people long since in their graves, of his kennels and stables, of the days when the world was younger, and hearts simpler, and true men loved their King.

Nor could we check him, for he would smile and talk of the fleet in the downs, and the fête to be given in Boston town when Sir Peter Warren and his old sea-dogs landed to dine at Province House. And all the while Jack Mount sat staring with tear-smeared eyes, and lips a-quiver, and great fists clasped convulsively; and Foxcroft leaned, elbow on knee, keen eyes watching the little madman who sat serenely babbling of a household and a wife and a life that existed only in his stricken brain.

His wines he brought us in cracked glasses—clear water from a spring that was older than human woe, but, like his hospitality, unfailing.

At intervals he spoke to empty space, as though servants waited at his back; and it was the "Blue Room" for Mr. Foxcroft, and the "South Chamber" for "you, sir, Captain Mount, I believe, of his Majesty's Grenadiers?" Oh, it was heart-breaking to see the agony in Mount's eyes and the ghastly by-play of the little, withered man, the light of whose mind had gone out, leaving a stricken body to be directed by the spirit of a child.

Never shall I forget that candle-lit scene as I saw it: Mount, dumb with grief, sitting there in his buckskins, rifle on knee and fox-skin cap twisted in his great brown hands; Foxcroft, his black smalls splashed with clay, his heavy, red face set in careworn lines; and the little, shabby Weasel, in his mended finery, shrunken fingers interlocked on his knee, smiling vacantly at us over a cracked glass of spring-water, and dispensing hospitality with a mild benevolence which was truly ghastly in its unconscious irony.

"What in God's name is he doing here?" I whispered to Foxcroft.

"Quiet," motioned Foxcroft, turning his head to listen. I, too, had caught the sound of a light footfall on the stair. Instinctively we all rose; the Weasel, muttering and smiling, ambled to the dark entry.

Then, out of the wavering shadows, into the candle-light, stepped a young girl, whose clear hazel eyes met ours with perfect composure. Her face was deadly white; her fingers rested in the Weasel's withered palm; she saluted us with a slow, deep reverence, then raised her steady eyes to mine.

"Silver Heels! Silver Heels!" I whispered.

Her eyes closed for a moment and she quivered from head to foot.

"My daughter, gentlemen," said the Weasel, tenderly; bending, he touched her fingers with his shrivelled lips, smiling to himself.

Her gray eyes never left mine; I stepped forward; she gave a little gasp as I took her hand.

"Who is this young man?" said the Weasel, mildly. "He is not Captain Butler, dear—or my memory fails—ay," he babbled on, "it fails me strangely now, and I had best sit quiet while younger heads think for me. Yet, this young man is not Captain Butler, dear?"

"No, father."

In the silence I heard my heart beat heavily. A minute passed; the Weasel peered at me with his dim eyes and clasped his daughter's hand closely.

"Silver Heels! Silver Heels!" I cried, with a sob.

"Do you want me—now?" she whispered.

I caught her fiercely in my arms; she hung to me with closed eyes and every limb a-tremble.

And, as I stood there, with my arms around her, and her face against mine, far away I heard the measured gallop of a horse on the highway, nearer, nearer, turning now close outside the house, and now thundering up to the porch.

Instantly Jack Mount glided from the room; Foxcroft, listening, silently drew his pistol; I reached out for my rifle which leaned against the chair, and, striking the butt heavily against the floor, glanced at the pan. The rifle had primed itself.

Then I turned smiling to Silver Heels.

"Do you know who is coming?" I asked.

"Yes."

I stepped to the centre of the room; the door opened gently; a motionless shape stood there in the moonlight, the shape of my enemy, Walter Butler.