Humphrey Bold: A Story of the Times of Benbow

by Herbert Strang

"Well, wash it then," he said, and went off grinning to tell his comrades of this latest whimsy.

I fetched the drum from the corner of the room where it lay, and carried it to the well within the keep. The members of the band were in the secret, and I had asked them to hold the attention of the other prisoners while I set about my task. The well was situated in a somewhat gloomy corner, and, there being none of the garrison at hand, I was able to accomplish my purpose unobserved and without interference. Having drawn up a bucketful of water, I unhooked the bucket, unwound the rope until there were but a few feet still left upon the windlass, then cut it, made a gash in the side of the drum, and coiled the lower and longer portion of the rope in the interior of the instrument. Then I tied the bucket to what remained of the rope, and lowered it into the well, where it hung only a few feet from the surface, but quite out of sight in the darkness. This done, I carried the drum across the yard, turning its broken side away from the soldiers, who stood smoking against the wall, and who laughed when they saw the water dripping from the instrument upon the flagstones.

The prisoners were all grouped in a ring about Joe Punchard, who was amusing them with a strange dance of his own invention. He bent his knees till he was almost sitting on the ground, and in that position danced a sort of hornpipe--a feat that must have imposed a terrible strain upon his inwards, but which he seemed to perform with consummate ease. The men were so intent upon his antics that I passed them by unnoticed, and gained the lower room of the shed, where I whipped the rope out of the drum and ran with it up into the dormitory, hiding it under one of the beds. I was down again in a minute, and then, tearing the membrane jaggedly to disguise the fact that it had been cut, I went out into the yard, and when Joe had finished announced with an air of vexation that I had unluckily made a hole in the drum. At this my fellow bandsmen abused me with a fine show of anger, the bosun in particular storming at me with a violence at which I had much ado not to smile.

The other men laughed, and made fun of our mishap, which boded ill for the success of our concert. But when we had eaten our evening meal, we got our instruments and played until the sun went down, with a gusto which certainly we had never shown before. For the nonce I gave up the castanets to the bosun, and beat the drum myself, thumping it on its sound side joyously. The soldiers gathered round and gave us very hearty applause; and when Runnles, to conclude the program, played them on his flute the air of Au clair de lune, which he had picked up from one of them, they cheered him to the echo.

I hoped that there was nothing ominous in the choice of this old song to end our concert. Moonlight would be fatal to our enterprise; and I was quite ignorant whether the moon rose early or late. But we had gone so far that our attempt must be made this very night, for with the morning the cutting of the rope would without doubt be discovered; the alarm would be given, and the ensuing search would bring to light not merely the severed rope, but our operations upon the wall.

We went up into our dormitory, taking with us our instruments as usual, among them the bass viol of our invention. This was to serve as our raft. We waited for several hours with feelings painfully tense. None of us was inclined to talk; my nine comrades were, I doubt not, wondering as anxiously as I myself what the issue of our attempt would be.

When all was quiet, the strongest of them removed the stone at the inner end of the tunnel, and set it down with many precautions on the floor. Then Runnles, being a little man, crawled to the other end and looped the rope about the loosened stone there. This we hauled inwards an inch at a time, stopping after every pull to listen. It seemed endless work to drag it into the room, but at last it was done, and we set the stone alongside the other.

Our way was now clear. I had insisted on being the first to descend, though Joe Punchard and two other men volunteered for that office, pleading that they were mariners of longer standing than I, and therefore fitter for the climbing work. But this I would by no means agree to--the suggestion and the plan being mine, it was meet that I should be the first to face what perils it might involve. Accordingly, I first crawled through the tunnel to see whether the aspect of the sky favored an immediate descent, and, being reassured on that point, I went back into the room to make the final preparations.

We stripped a plank from one of the truckle beds and placed it across the opening, one end of the rope being knotted about its middle; the knots were firm, you may be sure, as none but sailors can make them. Then, taking the other end of the rope, I went to the outward end and lowered it very gently towards the moat, knowing that it would not be seen in the darkness by the sentry on the battlements above even if he chanced to look over, and to that he would have no temptation.

There was a good deal of doubt among us as to whether the rope was long enough for our purpose. The bosun, who had crawled after me, whispered he was sure it was too short. And when I had let it down to its full length and drawn it up again, as yard after yard it came dry through my fingers I began to fear that the bosun was right. But at last the rope left a slimy wetness upon my hands, and I rejoiced to find that two or three yards of it had fallen into the water.