The Colonel was on the point of setting out for Langton Hall in order to meet Alice should she have left it, when she arrived, having ridden hard the whole distance. She had been detained in discussing plans with Mr Battiscombe, as also while a package of clothes, of which she had observed they stood in need, was preparing. She had brought it secured to her saddle.
“We need not let the soldiers see the package delivered,” she observed; “Tobias Platt can carry it in as part of their bedding. The clothes will enable them to present an appearance very different from what they do now.”
Tobias, with whom Stephen was a favourite, took good care to carry in the clothes as proposed, without being observed by the soldier on guard. The windows were barred with iron, intended rather to prevent ingress than egress, but answering both purposes. The sergeant, on examining them, considered that his prisoners were perfectly secure in the rooms. Both he and his comrades were kept generously supplied with food and good cider, together with somewhat potent beer; as they had been out all the day in the hot sun, they were well inclined to keep up their carouse.
“It is tiring work, Master,” said Tobias Platt, bringing a comfortable chair to where the sentry was pacing up and down. “You can watch as well seated as walking, I suppose, and I will get you a pipe of tobacco, if you have a mind for it.”
“Ay, that I have, and I say, Master, a glass of something to keep the throat moist won’t come amiss.”
“You shall have it,” said Tobias Platt, and he quickly returned with a small table, a jug of ale, and a pipe with some tobacco.
“Mind you don’t go to sleep, though,” said Tobias, as the sentry, seating himself in the chair and placing his musket by his side, stretched out his legs, when, taking a pull at the jug, he began to puff away from the pipe which Tobias Platt had lighted for him. Tobias then, having placed a lantern with the dark side turned away from the sentry, quietly retired; he came back, however, before long, to find the beer jug empty, while the man was snoring loudly.
“You will do,” said Tobias, nodding as he passed. In a short time he came back accompanied by a light figure in a dark cloak, and turning a key, and noiselessly drawing back some bolts, glided into the room. Both the prisoners were sleeping. She was loth to awake them, yet it must be done. She turned the lantern on Stephen’s face and uttered his name. He started up in a moment. “Can you forgive me?” he whispered in a low voice. “And yet you come as an angel of light to console me in my sore trouble.”
“I come not to blame you, Stephen, but to comfort you if I can. I would inform you the means for your and your brother’s escape have been provided; you have simply to walk out of this room while the sentry is sleeping. Your father is aware that you have been made prisoner, and he has arranged for your concealment, or will endeavour to have you conveyed northward where search is not likely to be made for you.”
“Thanks, dearest, thanks a thousandfold,” said Stephen. “For your sake I would use every exertion to escape, but I cannot desert my companions. I have already brought too many into trouble in endeavouring to get clear of my foes. I have induced several to join our unhappy cause who have lost their lives. I cannot run the risk of bringing the Colonel and his family into trouble, which I should do were I to escape from his house.”