“Play!” says I, with sweet surprise; “sir, to what do you refer?”
I gazed at him with perfect innocence, but I thought I heard sounds of hard, deep breathing issue from the straw behind me.
“My Lady Barbara,” the Captain said, and setting the lantern a point the nearer to my face to mark the effect of his words upon it, “your conduct in this matter, I will confess, hath been exceeding creditable to your heart. But in the name of the King I summon one Anthony Dare, lying there behind you, to stand forth from that straw.”
Now there was not a word in this demand beyond what I should have anticipated from the first; but my adversary had fenced and toyed with me so long, that he had almost weaned my mind from thinking that he knew of my attempt and the poor prisoner’s situation. And in the very breath of this avowal he let me see that he had ordered his tactics with so complete a skill that the prisoner’s doom was sealed. Before the final word was uttered a cocked pistol was pointed at the straw. The lad concealed amongst it, feeling that all was over, made an attempt to rise. Perhaps his idea was to throw himself upon his wary foe, but that, I saw, was certain death. He would have been shot down like a dog. Thus by the renewed pressure of my heel upon his breast, I was able to still restrain him. Indeed, I was already ploughing up my wits to find another plan. It is a part of my character never to surrender until I am compelled. Till my adversary wins, I have not lost, and the nearer he be to victory, the greater the danger that besets him.
“Captain,” says I, with a meek, sad smile, “I have played my game, and I have lost it. Victory sits with you. Let me compliment you on your superior skill, sir, and crave your leave to now withdraw.”
I said this as humbly as you please. I hung my head, and the limp dejection of my form betrayed how utterly I was beaten. Every spark of spirit was gone out of me, apparently. The Captain was not ungenerous, and seeing me so badly gravelled and that I took thus sincerely my reverses, was kind enough to say:
“My Lady Barbara, you have played a bold and skilful game, and I tender you my compliments upon it.”
My cunning gentleman I could see had been taken off his guard a little by my lowliness of bearing. He did not discern that ’twas in my mind, despite the fact that both the prisoner and myself were utterly at the mercy of his pistol, to attempt quite the boldest stroke of all.
It was now that I withdrew my slipper from the prisoner’s breast and walked up in the most natural way one could imagine to within a foot of where the Captain stood upon the ladder, smiling with something of the air of Alexander. I took my steps with such discretion and feigned a simple negligence so well that he suspected nothing. My Lady Barbara being my Lady Barbara, he had of course nothing to suspect.
“I wish to descend if you will allow me, sir,” says I, “for I cannot bear to stand by and see my unhappy friend retaken.”