CHAPTER XIII
HOW THE UNEXPECTED HAPPENED ON CHRISTMAS EVE
At Christmas time, in the year 1780, the British had no very great occasion for rejoicing, so far as their affairs of government were concerned, at least. They were at war with three European nations—France, Holland and Spain; their colonies in North America were waging a desperate war for independence that seemed as though it would never end, and their attempt to gain possession of West Point, on the Hudson, through the treachery of the infamous Benedict Arnold, had just failed.
However, the army under Cornwallis, or at least the officers, did not seem to take their country’s misfortunes very much to heart. The winter season was long remembered for its many gaieties; the loyalists of the town had thrown open their houses and vied with each other as to who could do the most for the king’s scarlet-coated dandies. And among them all not one entertained upon the scale of Jasper Harwood; he seemed determined to prove his loyalty to the crown by his lavish expenditures; but in reality, as the reader knows, he had another reason.
The Harwood place was a large one. Hundreds of acres of land were planted with cotton and tobacco; scores of slaves toiled upon the plantation to enrich their master; his mules, oxen and horses were very many. Then, too, he had the Deering place under cultivation; the slaves upon it already addressed him as master; the revenues that came in he appropriated to his own use, which little piece of knavery the authorities overlooked in so good a citizen.
His plan to marry his ward Laura to Lieutenant Cheyne, of Tarleton’s regiment of horse, had long been in his mind; but now he was to carry it into effect. All preparations had been made; the Deering mansion, which Harwood now occupied, it being nearer to the city than his own, was brilliantly lighted; the grounds, for the South Carolina December is not severe, were also brightly illuminated, and were thronged by large crowds of guests, all en masque, laughing, chattering and getting all the enjoyment out of the situation possible.
The sounds of music, softly played, came from the mansion; splendidly attired officers and gorgeously dressed maskers now and then passed the windows or thronged down the steps. Here and there was gathered a knot of the young blades of the army, both foot and horse, masked, but wearing their uniforms. They talked and laughed loudly; the campaign was largely the subject of their conversation, and they recounted their personal deeds vaingloriously.
“If the louts would only stand and fight,” said one youthful, but strapping dragoon. “How is a fellow to do anything satisfactory when the beggars do nothing but dart in and out among the swamps like a lot of gnats.”
“You are right,” said another; “it is quite disappointing when one has a body of them almost in one’s hand, and then, in a moment—presto, they are gone.”
“And this rascal Marion is the most elusive of the lot,” said the first speaker. “He positively will not stand up and fight fairly. It’s most distressing, when one is going at the head of a party, along a dark path through the swamps, to have this fellow, the Swamp-Fox, as Tarleton has named him, suddenly spring out from ambush and pour a fire into one.”
A laugh greeted this complaint; it was well known to all that the speaker had suffered in this way not long before.