The third member of the group by the fire added no little to the strange picturesqueness of the scene as he leaned with folded arms against the wall, listening eagerly while his elders recounted their past experiences. Stephen Lee was grandson to Sarah’s second child, a daughter, married to a gypsy of the name of Lee. But for some years past Stephen’s lines had fallen in comparatively pleasant places, and in his smart velveteen coat, corduroy breeches, and gaiters, he formed a strong contrast to the ragged and neglected appearance of his uncle, and to the tatters of old Sarah.
“You’ve got good cause to hate the gray wolf,” he said, after a pause. “I’ve been taught to hate him ever since I could speak, and I never set eyes on him without tingling to put a bullet through him. It’s the way he treats Stella as maddens me. You talked of prison just now; well, she’s imprisoned, shut in with two cursed women spies, one or the other, turn and turn about, watching her all the time. Lady Cranstoun was good to her, I will say that, for all she wasn’t her mother. But now she’s gone, that girl’s heart’s wellnigh broken; and when I pass the house at night and see the light up in her turret-window, I’m mad to burn the place down with everything and every one in it except her. But you two don’t know her as I do. You haven’t watched her grow up each day. She’s a regular lady, and looks down on such as me, for all I’m her cousin if she but knew it. Say what you like, mami, she won’t love a fellow like me. And on the tenth of May they’re going to marry her to this lord. I heard the gray wolf tell the other so, coming from the burying. Stella’s sent you that token, and you’ve got to save her. Though how in thunder you’re going to do it, and bring the disgrace upon Philip Cranstoun’s name as you talk so much about, it beats me to imagine.”
Again the old woman laughed the mirthless, rattling laugh of old age, and this time James Carewe raised his head from his arms, exchanged a glance with her, and turned over on his side again to face the fire, with the nearest approach to a laugh he ever made. Their incomprehensible merriment annoyed Stephen greatly, and he muttered an oath or two under his breath as he watched them.
“Chee, chee, lad!” remonstrated the crone. “You will laugh too when we’ve done the trick, and spirited the girl away, and hocused her father and her bridegroom. Your part of the business now is, first, to carry her a letter I mean to write her; and next, to make believe you’ve fallen in love with one of them two women as spy upon her. Have you got paper and pencil about you?”
Stephen took from his pocket a thick leather-covered account-book, and, tearing out a sheet, handed it to her.
“Not me!” she returned, shaking her head. “I leave all that to boys like you. Write down what I say: ‘From Sarah Carewe to Stella Cranstoun—The Romanys have not forgotten. Pretend to agree to the marriage, so that the watch may be relaxed. On your wedding-eve help will come. Hope and trust. Your mother’s friends watch over you, and soon you will be free.’ And now,” old Sarah added, “you must contrive that this shall be given her. Hang about until you see Margaret. She’s timid, but she’s square. If Stella plays her part, and cods them into thinking she’s come round, we’ll cheat the gray wolf yet, and within a month—ay, less than that, Jim, my boy—you and me will have a laugh, a right good laugh together, and even Steve here can join in then!”
Thoroughly mystified, but accustomed from childhood to unquestioningly obey the orders of old Sarah, whose reputation for abnormal sagacity, together with her undoubted magnetic powers, had earned her a great reputation among her own class, as well as among credulous and open-handed members of the public, Stephen presently left the ruins and returned to the Chase. Joining the other servants at supper that night, and listening to their talk about the coming marriage, he contrived by a look to signify to Margaret that he had something to say to her. Greatly surprised, but ready-witted as women of all classes usually prove in an emergency, she presently, as she sat next to him at table, contrived to knock her supper-plate off on to the floor with a great clatter.
Down went her head under the table, and down went Stephen’s. The result was a collision, and under cover of the laughter which ensued, she felt him slip a tiny piece of folded paper into her hand, and heard him whisper:
“For the mistress.”