A Story of the Revolution.
BY JAMES BARNES.
CHAPTER XVIII.
A CONFUSION OF IDENTITY.
After Abel Norton had left the young man whom he supposed to be his friend George Frothingham, the spy, he hurried over to the westward toward the rocky shore of the Hudson. Abel had never seen the "other half," and did not know that George had a twin brother who might pass for his reflection in a mirror, even to the curve of his little finger-tip.
The scheme for the capture of General Howe or his brother had fallen through completely, and the two gentlemen, for some reason, had been more wary than usual about accepting promiscuous invitations. Abel's only wish now was to assist in relieving George (now that his wound enabled him some freedom) from the danger of being a "mysterious prisoner." He knew that if the latter's identity were disclosed he would get short shrift and no favor.
"Was it not lucky I met him? They must fare well at the sugar-house," Abel said to himself, as he plunged down a steep bank into a rocky hollow.
There was a cluster of huts nestling opposite. Wooden screens from which in the spring and fall the fish-nets were hung to dry surrounded them. A few boats were hauled bottom upward before the door, and the icy water of the Hudson lapped the shore of a small inlet only a stone's throw distant. As he reached the door of one of the larger hovels he was seized with a violent attack of coughing, and in the midst of it the door was opened, and a rough, bearded man stood there holding a flickering candle, which he was shielding with his knotty fingers.
"What in the name of glory have we here?" he asked.
"Jonas, good friend, it is I," spluttered Abel. "There's work for you and Roger to-night, and money in it."
"Well," replied the man, speaking in a deep drawling tone, "come inside."
He held the door open, and Mr. Norton essayed to pass him. A coughing fit more violent than the first struck him like an internal hurricane, and, being close to the candle, the blast from his lips extinguished the light in an instant.
"You must have swallowed the north wind," said the fisherman. "Roger, lad, get a light."
There was a movement in the further corner, and a young man raking together the embers of the fire in the large stone fireplace. A blaze broke out, and the candle was soon relit, throwing dancing shadows over the beams strung with gill and seine nets. Piles of floats were littered about, a sheaf of oars and a few sturgeon lances stood in the corner. The floor was covered with shavings.
"And what is the business on a night like this?" spoke up the younger man, whom the other addressed as "Roger."
"You are to row a silent man across the river."
"It's a bad night to cross," growled the older fisherman, looking out through the little window at the snow-flakes sifting through the ray of light.
"There's gold for you in the venture," coughed Abel Norton, who had regained his composure partly, but was wheezing badly. He shook the water from the shoulders of his great coat, and dove into a capacious pocket. "This will be doubled if you succeed," he said, putting two gold pieces on the edge of a sawhorse.
"What time and where, Mr. Norton?" said the younger man, more respectfully.
"Be at Striker's wharf at eleven o'clock. A tall young man will hail you. Ask no questions, but put him on the other side. He may add something to this himself."
"Will we try it, lad?" put in the older fisherman.
"Aye," was the response; "we have butted the tide at a worse hour for good reason."
A minute more Abel was outside and climbing the bank; he skirted through the vacant fields, and again was amidst the houses. The effect of his illness was apparent, his steps were rather faltering, and it was ten o'clock when he reached Broadway. He turned down the lane, and stopped before the brick house in which Mr. Anderson had once held his school. He knocked on the door, and a lanky servant girl admitted him. "I would see your master at once," said Abel, as he passed on into the study.
Mr. Anderson was seated at the end of the long table, his great horn spectacles giving him an expression of constant surprise. A green shade shielded his eyes from the glare of a bright lamp. "Gadzooks!" he exclaimed. "Are you not taking risks, out on such a night as this?"
"There are larger risks often taken," responded the older man, throwing himself back in a chair and pulling at his neckerchief. "I am going to break a rule, for the matter is urgent. We must talk despite the embargo laid on certain subjects of conversation. Listen. Our young friend has escaped. Number Four has broken out."
"I did not know it was to be to-night," said Mr. Anderson. "Are you sure? I was at the prison this afternoon, and saw no signal. You remember, if everything was ready, he was to place two crusts of bread outside the door of his cell. Only one was there. That meant to-morrow."
"Nevertheless, I saw him and talked with him not two hours agone," answered Abel.
"The boat—" began the schoolmaster, excitedly.
"They will meet him at Striker's wharf at eleven o'clock. The last patrol goes down at half past ten."
"You have done good work; but one more question, and then, we will resume the rules. How was he dressed?"
"In the uniform of a British officer," answered Abel.
"Whew!" whistled Mr. Anderson. "There may be some mistake."
"No chance of it," said Abel. "I talked with him."
Mr. Anderson had arisen and taken off his spectacles. He reached down from a hook a fine fur-lined coat, and was stretching it across his shoulders. "You had best home and to bed, good friend," he said. "We'll say no more upon the subject. It's a fine night."
"Aye, for in-doors," coughed Abel Norton; and both conspirators passed out into the cold air. They parted on the door-step. It had stopped snowing.
A wise plan for plotters to follow is that of never referring, even amongst themselves, by word of mouth to the matter they wish kept secret. If each receives his instructions from one source, and acts accordingly, there is a better chance for success and less danger of detection.
The friends of American liberty that had remained banded together in the city for the purpose of supplying Washington with information had adopted this wise plan. Their orders were received from Number One, who was none other than that trusted servant of the King, Rivington, printer by special appointment to his Majesty. This worthy had come to the patriot cause early in the fall. But he was the last man to suspect.
The conspirators were seldom or never seen in one another's company, and some were not even supposed to know the others. The action and discoveries of each, however, were made understood by their system of cipher correspondence. As an instance of the relation, the captain and lieutenant (Rivington and Anderson) were supposed to be on terms of bitter enmity.
The latter was now making all haste to gain the lower part of town. A suspicion had seized him that perhaps everything was not right. When he came to the City Arms he hurried into the coffee-room.
A young officer with a deep bass voice was singing a song full of sighs and apostrophes to some distant fair one.
Mr. Anderson slid into an empty chair and joined in the noise and applause that followed the musical effort. He then turned to his neighbor.
"Ah, Captain Markham," he said, "have you seen our handsome young friend, Lieutenant Frothingham, to-night?"
"I was talking to him less than an hour ago," replied the Captain, who, strange to say, was not in his cups. "He was to return, I take it, from what he said."
Hardly had bespoken the words when the subject of them entered. William's face wore a preoccupied expression, and seeing one of the inn servants, he beckoned him to one side. Mr. Anderson caught the gesture, and noticed that the servant had followed the Lieutenant into the hallway.
If by chance he could have seen what occurred he would have been surprised, for, after a short conversation, the servant departed with three gold pieces clinking in his palm. He had then made his way to the stables and aroused one of the tall young grooms. From the stables he had walked to William's lodgings with a complete suit of the groom's clothing over his arm. It comprised a short jacket and leather gaiters like those worn by the young prisoner at the sugar-house, a good costume for facing the snow.
William entered the room a second time, and seeing Mr. Anderson, dragged a chair across and sat down close to him.
The little schoolmaster drew a secret from a simple nature with as much delight as a keen terrier would draw a badger from his hiding-place.
"What do you think has happened?" he inquired, to see how much the young man knew.
"Concerning what?" answered William, on his guard.
"Concerning the person uppermost in your mind," returned the schoolmaster.
"I hope nothing ill," was William's anxious interruption.
"No, no, perhaps not ill. 'Twas good you warned me."
"It has caused me many sleepless hours," said William. "Let us draw apart, for I must talk freely with you."
They pushed back their chairs, and sought a deserted corner by the open fireplace.
"As a lad," remarked Mr. Anderson, "your brother was not prone to waste words. You are like him. Talk quickly."
"I am betwixt two fires," said the young man—"my duty and my affections, Mr. Anderson. You know me. I love my brother as I love my life, but I serve my—"
"King," suggested the schoolmaster.
"King," repeated William, wondering why he had found it so difficult to say country, as he had intended. "I would die to save my brother's life, I think most honestly," went on the young Lieutenant. "I would that he was free, but I cannot, any more than you, connive at the escape of a prisoner who might bear important news to the enemy. There is nothing wrong in feigning to know naught of his existence, but to aid in his escape I could not. Therefore I told you, and left the matter in your hands, knowing your interest. You think not harshly of me? Pray think how you would feel were you in my position. I feel sometime as if I were not young at all, as if the separation from the brother who is in my heart had aged me far beyond my years, so deeply do I feel it."
"You said that you could trust me with his welfare. Now, prithee, what has brought the subject up in this new light?" asked Schoolmaster Anderson. "Remember that should it be known who he was, and the authorities should find out what a dangerous person had been amongst them, his life would not be worth the dregs in that wine-glass."
William shuddered. "There's a plot to aid in his escape."
"That I know well," returned the schoolmaster. "If it were frustrated and he kept safe, you would rejoice—hey?"
"'Twould be my duty," returned William.
"Have you aught against the calling of a spy?" inquired Schoolmaster Anderson.
William reflected. "If it were base to be one," he replied, "my brother George would have been far from it, that I promise you. A spy risks his life to serve his king—"
"Or country," put in Mr. Anderson. "Ay, he is usually a brave, fearless man, and should not be condemned. He can harm no one but his enemy."
"The stake he plays for is his life," continued William.
"Now the one who spoke to you to-night—" said Mr. Anderson, as if carrying on a train of thought of his own.
"Spoke to me, sir? I said naught concerning that," answered the young man, hastily.
"If he had knowledge who you were—"
"But he mistook me," again interrupted William. "What are you driving at? To whom do you refer?"
"His name has slipped me," replied the schoolmaster. "You may be able to jog my memory. I saw you talking with him a short while ago. I can find out easily."
"No; listen," said William. And then he told of his meeting with Abel Norton, and the conversation in the doorway, omitting, however, entirely the reference to the boat.
When he had finished Mr. Anderson replied. "This is interesting news to me," he said; "but it was not to this strange person that I referred. It was to your neighbor at the table, Captain—what's his name?—over there, who had been talking to you before you left. So that was an adventure on the street? What are you going to do?"
William saw that he had been trapped into telling what he had better, perhaps, have kept quiet. "I have been ordered to the forces at the north," he said, confused.
"Indeed?" replied Schoolmaster Anderson. "Success to you. I judged that you were not a kind to idle in tavern parlors, or your regiment one to grow stale in barracks."
"But I am going alone," said William, entrapped again.
"Ah!" said the schoolmaster; "much better, mayhap; changes are oft for the best." A roar of laughter from the table attracted his attention. "Come, we are missing all the gayety," he said. And slipping his arm through William's, he strolled up and joined the group, who were listening to a red-faced adjutant relating a story of being lost in an Irish bog.
When William looked around a moment or so later the schoolmaster had disappeared.
He had slipped away unnoticed, and his nimble feet were flying up the road. He swung about the corner into Vine Street. The sentry at the door of the prison was fast asleep, his heavy head resting on his folded arms. The schoolmaster ducked adroitly underneath him and opened the door; he crossed the court-yard to the prison entrance, and pulled the bell. There was a stirring within, and the jailer stood there unsteadily, half asleep, with a blanket thrown about his shoulders.
"What want you now?" he asked.
"The prisoner on the second floor," said Schoolmaster Anderson. "His Lordship would have him examined. Know you whether he has a birth-mark on his cheek?"
"I don't know or care," answered the jailer.
"'Tis to decide a wager," said the little man, clicking his heels together, "and if he has not one, half of it is for yourself. You remember the inspection the other day?"
"Ay," said the jailer. "Is the bet for a large amount?"
"Wait until you hear," laughed the schoolmaster. "I saw it plainly. Come, let us up, I say."
But now the jailer took a sudden turn. "I would not have him disturbed. I have a kindly feeling for the lad."
"What, turning soft-hearted?" answered the schoolmaster, who had already pushed half up the stairway. He picked up a lantern from the wall.
"Leave the poor lad alone," said the jailer, gruffly.
By this time the sound of Mr. Anderson's heels was echoing down the corridor. He held the lantern above his head, and a look of astonishment spread over his features.
He retraced his steps to where the jailer stood, leaning against the wall, his hands outstretched for support.
"You may save your pity and your solicitude," said Mr. Anderson, banging up the lantern. "There will be some reckoning made for this condition of affairs to-night."
"What? What?" stammered the jailer.
"Mark what I say," went on the schoolmaster, looking the other squarely in the face with his twinkling ferretlike eyes. "Your prisoner has escaped. You careless sluggard!"
Of course all this requires an explanation.
It had been a momentous day for the prisoner in the little cell. The signal, as agreed upon in another cipher letter which had been smuggled in to him, was this: If the bars were ready to be misplaced he would put two crusts of bread outside the doorway of his cell; if for any reason the time should be postponed, only one would be placed on the flagging. Some one on an ostensible visit to another part of the jail would be on the lookout for this simple sign. It happened that just before this visit was paid, the under jailer, unseen, swept away one of the crusts of bread, so the signal appeared to read for the following night.
The bars, however, were ready to be removed. It would take but a slight exertion to make a hole large enough for him to draw his body through. But how to escape from the door below or to pass the sentry at the gateway?
When the second jailer appeared early in the evening, George stopped him and handed him five golden guineas. "Have a feast at my expense," he said. "Share it with the people here who have been so good to me; to-day is my birthday." (This was a fact, and, for that reason, William's as well.) "Listen, also; go you to Fraunce's Tavern and buy four bottles of the best Lone Star Madeira. Present them to the head prison-keeper with the compliments of an officer. Pretend you do not know from whom they come. He might not accept them from a prisoner in his care."
Probably the man had never held so much gold in the grasp of his dirty fingers before. He fairly grovelled. "Lord bless you, sir, leave me to do the lying," he said.
George's last generous offer had almost proved his undoing, for shortly after dark he had heard the sounds of carousing and some merriment from the jailer's quarters. The sentry at the head of the stairs had disappeared, and the sound of the file biting away the last remaining bits of steel would have been audible were it not for the clamor below. He was about to push the loosened iron out when a wheezy voice humming a snatch of a song was heard coming down the corridor. It was the head jailer.
"Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage,"
he chanted thickly. "I can be generous as well as other folk. I am not a hard man. My guest of honor must drink with me." In an instant he was before the doorway. "Here's a good health to you, my unknown friend. Long live the King!" With that the jailer wavered unsteadily and tossed off a glass of Madeira.
George feared that he was about to be discovered, and pretended sleep; but this was all the visit amounted to, for soon he heard the heavy footsteps lumber down the stairway, still protesting that it was not "a flint heart."
Now was the time. George pushed the bars gently, and they came off without much trouble. He laid them on the quilt, and drew himself through the aperture, then he tiptoed carefully down the steps.
A ray of light from a room to the right showed that the door was partly ajar. He looked inside. The jailer was fast asleep. Before him on the table wore three empty bottles of Madeira. A heavy military cloak hung from a peg at one side, and a huge three-cornered hat above it. George throw the cloak about his shoulders and placed the hat upon his head. It came down over his ears. He drew the bolt of the big front door and stepped out under the stars—for it had ceased snowing—and into the court-yard. The only entrance was guarded by a man leaning on his musket.
How to pass him was the question. But as the young fugitive drew nearer he perceived that the tall soldier was fast asleep. He was leaning on one side of the door with his foot propped against a post on the other. His leg made a barrier.
Making his body as small as possible, George essayed to stoop under the outstretched leg; but his shoulder jostled the sentry, and he awoke. George recognized the ex-corporal.
"Well, well, McCune," he said, shaking the man roughly; "asleep at your post, man! It will never do!"
The sentry drew himself up as best he could, and his musket snapped to a present. "Pardon me, Lieutenant," he said. "Do not report me, or I will get the lash." The poor fellow trembled as he spoke.
"Let it not occur again," said George, "and I will see."
"May the saints bless you, sir!" said the sentry thickly, as he watched the figure of his supposed officer disappearing about the corner. It was at this moment that Anderson and William were holding their talk at the tavern.
At eleven o'clock a small boat jumped about under the rafters at the end of Striker's wharf. A man with a boat-hook held it securely against the pier head.
"'Tis time he were coming," he said to another behind.
IN AN INSTANT THE BOAT SWEPT OUT INTO THE SWIRLING TIDE.
At that moment a soft hail was heard, and a young man bent over the edge of the timbers. In an instant he had lowered himself into the boat, the oars were manned, and it had swept out into the swirling tide of the river.
Hardly had it disappeared when another figure of the same size and general appearance came on a quick walk to the water's edge. He hailed softly, looking under the pier.
There was no answer, or no boat in sight. The cloaked figure then turned about and hurried back to the eastward.
Had something gone amiss?