Colonel Graham was directed to dispose of the contumacious rebel for the present—no words passed between this officer and the prisoner. The elder Boer of the party delivered him to British authority, and claimed the reward, which was to be applied to kindly purposes among the sufferers by the war; and Lyle was conducted to a cell, rudely but strongly built, adjoining the guard-house. It contained a bench, a table, an iron bedstead with a straw pallet, and was but faintly lighted by a narrow slit high up in the thick stone wall. An iron ring in this wall showed that, if necessary, the prisoner could be chained to his desolate abode.
All that could be seen from this narrow chamber was the blue vault of heaven, with sometimes a bird careering freely in the clear ether.
The door swung heavily behind Jasper Lyle as he entered the cell—we must leave him there for the present. No one visited him for some hours—the chained eagle was left to beat its wings against its cage.
It was on the afternoon of this very day that an advance-guard of cavalry emerged from a glen heading the encampment, and announced that Sir Adrian Fairfax was at hand; the little knots of officers, dotted about the ground, canvassing the various reports which had lately floated about concerning the convict so unexpectedly delivered up to British authority, dispersed instantly. The bugles gave warning to fall in, and Sir Adrian, attended by his staff, and followed by a small body of troops, rode at a sharp pace into the square, where all, save Sir John Manvers, were in readiness to receive him.
It may be imagined that rumour’s busy tongue had not been still as regarded Jasper Lyle, for it began to be known that Lee was not the real name of the man who had made himself so notorious beyond the borders of the colony.
It was first ascertained that this rebel had been in South Africa before; then, some one remembered having heard of a so-called nephew, but, in reality, as it was said, a natural son of Sir John Manvers, who had given him an infinity of trouble, but who had been reported lost off the Cape of Good Hope; in short, one link after another was furnished to complete a chain on which to hang something very like the truth.
But the Daveneys were unconscious of the curiosity and interest they excited. Eleanor as yet knew nothing of what had taken place, and Marion, although she felt acutely, was consoled by Ormsby’s generosity.
Mr Daveney parted these two young people, and led Ormsby away to Mr Trail’s cottage.
There, in the presence of the missionary, the Commissioner proposed to release the young man from his engagement with his daughter.
“You see the strait we are in,” said Daveney; “there is no shutting our eyes to the fact that my wretched son-in-law must die the death of a traitor. You must not ally yourself to the sister-in-law of a malefactor.”