XLIX
IN WHICH A LAWYER HATH HIS FEE
What Richard's most natural resentment would have led to, in what newtangle of the net of bitterness we might have been enmeshed, we werespared the knowing. For when he said, "She is not here," two happeningsintervened to give us both other things to think of.
The first was the advent, at the far end of the oak-lined avenue, of atroop of British light-horse, trotting leisurely; the second was theswinging inward of the door of unwelcome, with old Anthony grinning andbowing behind it.
Now when you have fairly surprised a fox in the open, he asks nothingmore than a hole to hide him in. There were the hunters coming up theavenue; and here was our dodge-hole gaping before us. So, as huntedthings will, we took earth quickly; though, truly, 'twas anostrich-trick rather than a fox's, since we left the horses standingwithout to advertise our presence to all and sundry.
It was Richard who first found the wit to realize the ostrich-play.
"The horses!--we may as well have left the town crier outside to ringhis bell and tell the redcoats we are here," he would say; and before Iknew what he would be at he had snatched the door open and was whistlingsoftly to the big gray.
Hearing his master's call, the gray pricked his ears and cameobediently, with the sorrel tagging at his heels. A moment later, whenthe up-coming troop was hidden by a turn in the avenue, we had the pairof them in the hall with the door shut and barred behind them.
"So far, so good," quoth Dick. Then to the old black, who had stood by,saucer-eyed and speechless, the while: "Anthony, do you be as big anumbskull as you were born to be, and hold these redcoat gentlemen inpalaver till we can win out at the back."
The old majordomo nodded his good-will, but now my slow wit came inplay. "We've done it now," said I. "The horses will go out as they camein, or not at all. Had you forgotten the stair at the back?"
Judge for yourselves, my dears, if this were the time, place or crisisfor a man to fling himself upon the hall settle, grip his ribs and laughlike any lack-wit. Yet this is what Richard Jennifer did.
It was in the very midst of his gust of ill-timed merriment, while thehorses were nosing niftily at their strange surroundings, and thehoof-strokes of the redcoat troop could be plainly heard on the gravelof the avenue, that I chanced to lift my eyes to the stair. There,looking down upon us with speechless astoundment in the blue-gray eyes,stood our dear lady.
Another instant and she was with us, stamping her foot and crying: "_MonDieu!_ what is this? Are you gone mad, both of you?"
Dick's answer was another burst of laughter, loud enough, you wouldthink, to be heard by those beyond the door.
"Behold four witless brute beasts, Mistress Madge--two horses and twoasses," he said. And then to old Anthony: "Open the door, Tony, andinvite the gentlemen in."
But Margery was before him. Ah, my dears, a man's wit is like amatchlock, fizzing and sputtering its way noisily to find the powderwhilst the enemy hath time to ride up and saber the musketeer; but awoman's is like the spark in a tinder-box--a quick snip of flint andsteel and you have your fire. In a flash my lady had torn down the heavycurtains from an inner doorway and was carpeting a horse path for us tothe rear.
"Quick!" she cried; "lead them gently, for the love of heaven!"
She went before us, padding the way with whatever came first to hand,rugs, curtains, table-coverings, and I know not what besides; and by thetime the British troopers were hammering at the outer door, we were deepwithin the old mansion and had made shift to drag the unwilling horsesby one and two-step descents to a room half under and half out ofground, which served as a sort of ante-dungeon to the wine cellar.
Here I thought we might be safe for the moment, but not so my lady.Calling Dick to help her--in all the fierce haste of it I marked thatshe called to Dick and not to me--she unlocked and opened the door tothe wine vault, and in a trice we two and the luckless horses weresafely jailed in pitchy darkness, with the stout oaken door slammedbehind us, the bolt shot in the lock, and the key withdrawn, as we couldsee by the spot of light which came through the keyhole.
Richard was the first to break the grave-like silence of our dungeon.
"Lord!" said he; "did ever you see such sharp-wit work in all youradventures? What a soldier's wife she'd make!"
I smiled at that, being safe to smile in the darkness. For was she not asoldier's wife? I hugged that saying as we cling to the thing that isslipping from us. True, I was here to give her freely over to anotherand a better soldier; but while she was mine I would claim her, in myheart, at least.
The excitement of the narrow escape somewhat overpast, we sat long onthe edge of a wine-bin, speculating in whispers as to what would befall,and listening vainly for the footsteps which would forecast our releaseor our capture by the enemy. But when no sounds, threatening orencouraging, came from the upper world, we groped about till we foundthe cellar candle, lighted it with flint and steel and tinder-box, andtook a survey of our jail.
'Twas the same old cavernous wine vault of my youthful remembrance, suchan one as has not its mate in all Carolina to this good day, as I firmlybelieve. My father's hobby was to build for all eternity; and thisstone-arched cellarage was more like a cathedral crypt than a store-roomfor a country gentleman's table-stock of wines.
Dick held the candle aloft and scanned the bottle racks, none so greatlydepleted as they might have been, had any hand but that close-fisted oneof Gilbert Stair's taken the key in charge after my father.
"There is no lack of potables," says my candle-bearer; "but, unhappily,there is never so much as a dry crust to soak in them. And as for thehorses, I'll venture they'd give it all, pint for pint, for a goodfeeding of oats."
"Truly," said I; and then we fell to stripping the straw casings fromthe bottles of madeira to give the poor beasts a feed of rye-stalkswhich had grown and ripened their grain many a year before either thesorrel or the gray was foaled.
Having no time-measure save our own impatience, it seemed a weary whilebefore we heard the key rasping in the lock of our prison door.
"'Tis Madge," said Dick, with a true lover's gift of second sight; and'twas he who went to help her swing the thick-slabbed oak.
What passed between them I did not hear, nor want to hear. But when thedoor was swung to and locked again I knew we were not free to goabroad.
Richard came back to me in the inner vault bearing gifts; the betterpart of a boiled ham with bread to match, a jug of water from the well,and more candles.
"We are not to starve, but that is our best news, thus far," he said."Of all the houses on our side of the river, Lord Cornwallis must needspitch upon this manor of Appleby for his rallying headquarters. Madgecan not guess when he and the army will be gone, and she is frightedstiff for our sakes."
This was sober news, indeed, but we could do naught but make the best ofit. As for me, I was most anxious to know if the good priest were atAppleby, and what of my chance for seeing him; but of this I could sayno word to Richard.
So, when we had done full justice to my lady's bounty, we stowed thehorses in the deepest of the vaults and stripped more of the bottlecoverings for them. But having only the jug of water, we could do nomore than swab their mouths out with a wetted kerchief in lieu of givingthem a drink.
When all was done we sat ourselves down to wait as we must; and when thesilence and solitude had wrought their perfect work, we fell to talkingin low tones to match the place and circumstance; and I do think inthose quiet hours, walled in as we were from all the disturbments of theouter world, we came closer than we had come for many months.
And while we sat and talked the long day wore on to evening and a stormcame on, as we could determine, though no otherwise than by the muffledrolling of the thunder which, since we could not see the lightning norhear the rain, we took at first for the booming of distant cannon.
I can not tell you all we spoke of in that day-long immurement. Therewas some talk of the great struggle for independence,
now, though weknew it not, drawing near to its close; and there was much ofreminiscence, harking back to the exciting and tragic scenes in which wetwo had had our entrances and our exits. Also, there was a tribute paidto the memory of our true old friend and trusted comrade in arms,Ephraim Yeates, so lately gone to his own place. 'Twas at this time Ilearned what of the old man's gifts and peculiarities I havehereinbefore set down; for Richard had known him long and well.
From speaking of old Ephraim and his sudden taking-off we came to thingsmore nearly present; and at length Dick would lay a finger gently uponthe mystery in which he was as yet walking as one blindfolded.
"'Tis not a shameful thing; don't tell me it is that, Jack," he wouldsay; and I gave him speedy assurance upon that head.
"No,'tis never shameful; so much I may lay an oath to."
"Yet you said once--in that black night when I went mad and would havekilled you--that your life lay between Madge and me."
"So it did--and does. And God will bear me witness, dear lad, that Ihave worn that life upon my sleeve."
"Nay," he said, very gently; "you need not go so high for a witness;have I not seen?"
We fell silent upon that, and there, in the candle-yellowed gloom of ourdungeon harbor, I fought the fellest battle of my life; fought it andwon it, too, my dears, once and for all. There was a cold sweat on mybrow when I began in low tones to tell him the story of that fatefulnight in June. At rising forty 'tis no light thing to lose afriend--nay, to turn a friend's love into scorn and loathing and bitterhatred.
He heard me through without a word; and at the end, when I looked to seehim spring up and bid me draw and let him have his one poor chance forsatisfaction, he still sat motionless, winking and staring at theguttering candle. And when he spoke 'twas with a quivering of the lipthat was not of anger.
"Dear God," said he; "'tis I who stand in the way."
"No; for she loves you, Richard, as dearly as she hates me. And 'tis notso hopeless now, else I had never screwed together the courage to tellyou all this. She has at last consented to the Church's undoing of theincomplete marriage--'twas this she wrote me about when we were at theCowpens, and 'twas her letter that set me upon going to Winnsborough tosee the priest. I missed him there, as you know; but I am here now byher own appointment to meet him in her father's house."
He shook his head slowly. "You've killed the hope in me, Jack. I dothink you are all at sea; 'tis you she loves--not me."
I could afford to smile at that.
"If you could see how she has ever gone about to prove that she did notlove me, you would rest easy on that score, dear lad."
But he would only shake his head again.
"'Twas to save your life she rode in on us that morning under the oaksin the glade."
"'Twas a womanly horror of a duel and bloodshed, more belike," said I.
"But she has saved your life thrice since then, as you confess."
"Yes; from a strained sense of wifely duty, as she took good care totell me."
"None the less--ah, Jack, you do not know her as I do; she would neverhave consented to stand before the priest with you had there not beensomething warmer than hatred in her heart."
"'Twas a bitter necessity, fairly forced upon her. Tell me; had therebeen a spark of love for me in her heart, would she have treated me asthe dust beneath her feet on that long infaring from the westernmountains? She never spoke a word to me, Dick, in all those weeks."
"Which may prove no more than that you said or did something to cut herto the quick. 'Twould be well in your way, Jack. She is as sensitive asshe should be, and you are blunter than I--which is the worst I couldsay of you."
"No, no; you are far beside the mark. You forget that the breaking ofthe marriage is of her own proposing--at least, I should say I onlyhinted at it."
"There may be two sides to that, as well. Have you ever told her thatyou love her, Jack?"
"Surely not! I have been all kinds of a poltroon in this matter, as Ihave confessed, but this one thing I have not done."
"Well," said he, speaking slowly, as one who thinks the path out word byword, "what if she believes 'tis you who want your freedom? What if youhave made her that bitterest thing in all the world--a woman scorned?"
I would not listen to him more.
"This is all the merest folly, Richard, as I will prove to you beyondthe question of a doubt. Do you mind that little interval in theCherokees' torture-play when they came to bind us afresh for theburning?"
"I mind no more of that horror-night than I can help."
"Well, in that hour, when death was waiting for all three of us, shewrote a little farewell note to the man she loved. 'Twas for you, Dick,but her Indian messenger blundered and gave it me."
He got upon his feet at that and began to pace slowly back and forthunder the gloomy archings. But ere long he paused to grasp and wring myhand most lovingly, saying, "Who am I, Jack, to buy my happiness at sucha price?"
"Nay, lad; 'tis neither you nor I who should figure greatly in thematter; 'tis our dear lady. She must e'en have what she longs for, ifyou, or I, or both of us, should have to go above stairs and put ournecks into my Lord Cornwallis's noose."
"Now, by heaven, Jack Ireton, 'tis you who are the true lover and thegentleman; and I am naught but a selfish churl with my face in my owntrencher!" he burst out, wringing my hand yet again. "'Tis as you say;yet I will not be driven from this; for aught you have told me to proveit otherwise, Madge has yet to choose between us, and she shall havethat choice, fairly and squarely, and knowing that you love her, beforewe three go apart again."
I smiled, and tried hard to keep the heart-soreness out of my reply.
"As for that, my lad, I have had my stirrup-cup long since, and havedrained it to the dregs with a wry face, as an old man must when a youngman brews for him. But if the priest--"
Jennifer had resumed his pacing sentry beat, and at this juncture a mostsingular thing happened. Though we were sealed in, as I have said, fromall the outer world with no crack nor cranny for a peephole, a blindingflash of lightning, blue and ghastly, came suddenly to fill the wholecellar with its vivid glare.
"Good Lord!" says Richard, clapping his hands to his eyes; "where didthat come from?"
I was wholly at a loss for a moment. Then I remembered that there was,or had been in my boyhood days, a narrow, iron-barred window in thefarther end of the wine cellar, opening beneath that other window of thegreat south room where I had climbed to spy upon the conspirators on thenight of Captain John Stuart's visit to Appleby. So it chanced that whenanother flash came I was looking straight over Dick's head at the placein the farther arching of the vault where the little window should be.
The momentary glare showed me the low square of the window opening, andframed for a flitting instant therein a face of most devilish malignitypeering in upon me with foxy-fierce eyes; the face, to wit, of GilbertStair's lawyer-factor.
In a twinkling the vision was gone, and in the space between the flashand the crash there was a sound as of a wooden shutter slamming inplace. Dick heard the noise without knowing the cause of it, being sofar beneath the window as to see nothing but the lighting of the glare.
"What was that?" he demanded, when the thunder gave him leave.
"'Twas our trapper clapping the shutter on the window over your head,"said I. "He was looking in to see if we were ripe for hanging."
"'Tis no time for riddles; what mean you?"
"I mean that we shall have a file of redcoats down upon us as soon asever Mr. Owen Pengarvin can give the alarm."
"Oho!" said Dick; and then he pulled his sword from its scabbard, and Icould see the battle-veins swelling in his forehead. "They can hang mewhen I am too dead to cut and thrust more--not sooner."
I got me up and went to find the sword which I had laid aside in thehorse-baiting. 'Twas a poor blade--one of our captures at the Cowpens;and when I tried its temper it snapped in my hand.
"Never mind," said I; "give me the broadswor
d scabbard and I will playit as a cudgel, 'tis long enough and full heavy enough."
He laughed and clapped me on the shoulder, swearing out his love for meas if I had said something moving. "You are every inch a soldier, Jack;you would put heart into a worse craven than I am ever like to be." Andhe loosed the iron scabbard and gave it me.
Now ensued a most painful time of waiting and listening for the tramp ofour takers. We posted us near the door, a little to the side, so thatits inswing might not catch us; and so, bracing for the onset, we waitedtill the strain of suspense grew so great that we both started likefrighted children, when finally the key was thrust into the lock and thebolt shot back.
But when the heavy door gave inward, as at the pushing of a weak ortimid hand, we saw our dear lady standing in the half gloom of theante-dungeon, breathless and trembling with excitement.
"Come!" she panted; "come quickly--there is not an instant to spare.The factor has betrayed you; he will be here directly with thedragoons!"
I cut in swiftly. "He has not seen Dick; does he know we are both here?"
She had one hand on her heart to still its tumultuous beating, and theother held behind her, and she could scarce speak more for her eagernessto have us out and away.
"No; it was you he saw; and my father heard Colonel Tarleton give theorder. Lieutenant Tybee is to take a file of his troopers and hangwithout grace the man he will find hiding in the wine cellar; those werehis very words. Oh, merciful heaven! will you never stir?"
Richard gave a low whistle.
"So Tybee has come alive in good time to square the old account withus," he would say; but my wonder was greater on the other head. "Yourfather?" I gasped. "And he sent you to save me?"
"Surely," she said. "Are you not once again his guest, Captain Ireton?"Then she stamped her foot, and though the candle-light was of thepoorest, I could see her eyes flash. "Will you squander the last momentin silly questions?" she burst out. "Come, I say!"
I smiled. "Give me that sword you are hiding behind you and I will keepthe door whilst you spirit Dick away. He is not to be in this."
She gave me the weapon, though not, as I made sure, in any consenting tomy proposal. I could have cried out in sheer joy when I found the swordto be my own good blade of proof--the ancient Ferara willed me by myfather.
Sharp as the crisis was, I make no doubt I should have asked her thenand there how she came by the blade I had last seen when my LordCornwallis tried to break it over his knee; but the march of eventssuddenly became too swift for me. There was a sound of cautiousfootsteps in the inclined passage leading from the butler's pantryabove, and our chance for escape that way was gone.
"Too late!" said Dick; and with an arm about Margery he whipped behindthe great oaken door opened back against the cellar wall, whispering meto follow.
We were scarce in hiding, with the door well drawn back to screen us,when the cautious footsteps came slowly into the out-cellar. Peepingthrough the crack behind the door we saw Pengarvin--alone.
What brought him there without his tale of armed men at his back no manwill ever know; but since his ways were always crooked and devious, Iguessed he would not wish to appear in the matter in his own properperson, and yet could not deny himself a 'forehand peep to see if thetrap were still safe shut and secure.
'Twas evident he was much disconcerted at finding the door open and thewine vault apparently empty. At first he would start and dodge as if torun away; then his rage got the better of his caution and he had one ofthose senseless cursing fits I have before told you of, raving andswearing and promising all manner of fiendish recompense to MistressMargery when he should have her in his power.
A little longer dwelling upon this variation of the cursingtheme--ravings in which Dick learned for the first time of the factor'sdesign to marry my widow and the estate--and I do think the lad wouldhave gone out to make him sing another tune. But now the factor left offsuddenly to cock his ear and listen, and afterward to come tiptoeinginto the cellar, all eyes to spy and legs to run if a mouse should butsqueak at him.
He was muttering to himself as he passed our hiding place.
"By all the devils, he must be here, some gait. The little jade wouldhave warned him if she had known; but it is known only to the dodderingold miser and me, and the girl is safe in her bed-room. Happen thisdevil of an Austrian captain has drunken himself sodden; ah, that wouldbe a rare jest--to wake with the rope around his neck! If those cursed,slow-footed dragoons would but come! Damme! I'll have that bull-neckedlieutenant cashiered if his high and mighty loitering balks me in this."
He stopped before the wine cask whereon the flickering candle stood andcraned his neck to look beyond it. The candle was guttering smokily, andhe reached a shaking thumb and finger to pluck the "dead man" from thewick. At that we heard him muttering again.
"'Twas a play to make the very devil envious; and to have it marred bythat pig of a lieutenant! No one knew me in it save the legion colonel,and could we have sprung the trap fair and softly, not even MistressMargery herself could have laid this swashbuckler's death at my door.But now he's gone--vanished like a straw bailee, and all because thatdamned understrapper of Colonel Tarleton's must needs turn up his noseat a bit of sheriff's work. Curse him!"
The candle was burning brightly now, and he crept catlike around thecask to peer into the bin beyond it. Just then the shutter to the littlewindow of espial fell open with a shrill creaking of its rusty hinges,and a blue glare of lightning came to prick out every nook and corner ofthe cellar. Being almost within a blade's length of the factor, I sawhim plainly; saw him start back and put his hands to his face and dropdown all of a tremble on the bin's edge, where I had been sitting whenhe discovered me.
To second the flash a prolonged drum-roll of thunder dinned upon thestill air of the vault, and mingled with the thunder came other flashes,searing the eye and making the candle flame appear as a sickly orangehalo in the blue-white glare. What with the play of the storm artillerywe could neither see nor hear for the moment; but when the candle-lightcame to its own again the scene had changed as if by magic. Under coverof the thunder din a squad of dragoons had come to ring the factor inwhere he sat upon the edge of the wine bin.
"So-ho!" said my good friend Tybee, with a little strident laugh, "'tisyou I am to take out and hang, is it, Master Lawyer? I thought mayhapyou'd double on your track once too often, and so it seems you have. Upwith you and come along."
All in a flash Pengarvin was up and bursting out in a tremblingfrenzy-fit of protestation.
"Oh, 'tis all a mistake, my good sir--a devil's own trap! I--I am notthe man; I pledge you my sacred word! I--hands off, you cursed villains,or I'll have the law on you!" this last when one of the men cast thenoose of a rope over his head whilst a second drew his arms to his sidesin the looping of another cord. "By God! you shall all smart for this;all, I say! Take me to Colonel Tarleton. The king has no stancher friendin all the province than I. Why, damme,'twas I who--"
A trooper came behind and gagged him with the loose end of the rope; andTybee held the candle to light the knotting of it. And so they marchedhim out, with Tybee muttering between his teeth that it wasrat-catcher's work, and no soldier's, this killing of vermin, andbidding his men make haste.
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