Some of his audience began to laugh, but somehow suddenly ceased doing so, as Dalroy strode forward and planted the sign of “The Old Ship” on the desolate sea-shore.
“And now,” he said, “you have charge of the stores we brought, Hump, and we will picnic. As it said in a song I once sang,
“The Saracen’s Head out of Araby came,
King Richard riding in arms like flame,
And where he established his folk to be fed
He set up his spear, and the Saracen’s Head.”
It was nearly dusk before the mob, much swelled by the many discontented on the Ivywood estates, reached the gates of Ivywood House. Strategically, and for the purposes of a night surprise, this might have done credit to the Captain’s military capacity. But the use to which he put it actually was what some might call eccentric. When he had disposed his forces, with strict injunctions of silence for the first few minutes, he turned to Pump, and said,
“And now, before we do anything else, I’m going to make a noise.”
And he produced from under brown paper what appeared to be a musical instrument.
“A summons to parley?” inquired Dorian, with interest, “a trumpet of defiance, or something of that kind?”