Arthur Quiller-Couch

“ He stood in the middle of the short roadway which led to the drawbridge, and clearly it had within a few moments dawned upon him that he was the point upon which these fatal forces were converging. A low wall fenced him on either hand, and as he braced himself, grasping his Brown Bess—a fine picture of Duty triumphing over Irresolution—into this narrow passage poured the chase, rolled as it were in a flying heap; the hunted man just perceptibly first, the bull and Archibald Plinlimmon cannoning against each other at the entrance. ”

“ From Miss Plinlimmon's window above the eaves I could look over the front wall on to an edge of roadway, a straight dock like a canal— crowded with shipping—and a fort which fired a gun in the early morning and again at sunset. And every morning, too, the drums would sound from the hill at our back; and be answered by a soldier, who came steadily down the roadway beside the dock, halted in front of our gates, and blew a call on his bugle. ”

“ Her eyes were red. Poor soul! she had but an hour before said good-bye to Archibald; and Spain and its battlefields lay before him, and between their latest kiss and their next—if another there might be. Yet she smiled bravely, telling me that all was well, and that her father would be ready for me in the summer-house.
Major Brooks, when I found him there, made no allusion to the events of the night. His face was mild and grave as at our first meeting. At the sound of my footsteps he picked up his Virgil and motioned me to be seated. ”

“ The Colonel I had not seen: the Adjutant had dismissed me to the devil: and Archibald Plinlimmon had treated me as I have told. All this indifference contained much comfort. I began to understand the restfulness of a great army—a characteristic left clean out of account in a boy's imaginings, who thinks of war as a series of combats and brilliant personal efforts at once far more glorious and more terrifying than the reality. ”

“ Mr. Scougall's freshly upholstered chairs had all been wrapped in holland coverings pending his return. "Mr. Trapp, Harry, is a—a chimney-sweep."
"Oh!" said I, somewhat ruefully.
"And if I can answer for your character (as I believe I can) ," she went on with a wan, almost wistful smile, "he is ready to make you his apprentice."
"But I had rather be a soldier, Miss Plinlimmon!"
She still kept her smile, but I could read in it that my pleading was useless; that the decision really lay beyond her.
"Boys will be boys, Mr. Trapp." She turned to him with her air of gentility. ”

“ Leicester laughed again: and with that, Miss Belcher came back to him, slipped out the riding-crop which trussed him, and held it under his nose. Her face was white, but calm. She lifted the stick slowly to bring it across his face, paused, and flung it on the floor.
"You tempt me to be as dirty as yourself," she said. "But one woman has shown you mercy to-night, despising you. Think of that, George Leicester."
The door opened again and Mr. Rogers nodded to us.
"Hallo!" he exclaimed, perceiving the riding-crop on the floor.
"He can't run," said Miss Belcher nonchalantly. ”

“ CHAPTER V. THE SHADOW OF ARCHIBALD.
It is not only children who, having once tasted bliss, suppose fondly that one has only to prepare a time and place for it again and it can be repeated. But he must be a queer child who starts with expecting any less. Certainly no doubts assailed me when the anniversary came round and I made my way to Mr. Tucker's Bun Shop; nor did Miss Plinlimmon's greeting lack anything of tenderness. She began at once to talk away merrily: but children are demons to detect something amiss, and there was a note in her gaiety which somehow did not sound in key. ”

“ How do we stand?"
"We owe three guineas on points," growled a voice which, to judge by its sulkiness, belonged to Mr. Tregaskis.
"I'm a clumsy fool," Mr. Rogers again accused himself. "Here, Whitmore, give me change out of a note."
"With pleasure. It's as good as a gift, though, with the cards you held," said Mr. Whitmore, and I heard the coins jingle in changing hands, when from the shrubbery, where the gravel sweep narrowed, there sounded the low hoot of an owl. Being town-bred and unused to owls, I took it for a human cry in the darkness and shrank closer against my mock-orange bush. ”

“ That was all: and Miss Plinlimmon, good soul, if at times she awoke in the night and shuddered and listened for the yells of Frenchmen in the town, heroically kept her fears to herself. This was as near as she ever came to imparting them.)
"I have often thought of you, Harry," she went on, "as embracing a military career. Mr. Scougall very kindly allows me to choose surnames for you boys when you—when you leave us. He says (but I fear in flattery) that I have more invention than he." And here, though bound on my word of honour not to look, I felt sure she was smiling to herself in the glass. ”

“ There were two figures now on the balcony. A woman had run after Leicester. She leaned for a moment with both hands on the balcony rail, and turned as if to run back. Leicester caught her around the waist and held her so while she screamed—shrilly, again and again.
The man dangled for a moment, dropped with a horrible thud, and answered with one scream only—but it was worse even than hers to hear. Then the soldiers ran forward and flung themselves upon him.
"Hold the lantern higher, you fools!" shouted Leicester, straining the woman to him, as she struggled and fought to get away. ”

“ They had traversed the heavy shingle, reached the harder stones at the cove's head and were sailing away at stretched gallop when a volley rang out from the shadow of the cliff there, and the scream of more than one mingled with fresh shouting. At that moment, and just before the flame above me sank and died almost as swiftly as it had first shot up, a soldier—not a dragoon, but a man in red coat and white breeches—ran forward and sprang at the girth of the wounded horse, which had stumbled again. ”

“ I managed to drag Miss Plinlimmon off the bench, thrust her like a bundle beneath it, and scrambled after her into shelter but a second or two before the pair came thundering by; for the bull's hooves shook the ground; and so small a space—ten or twelve yards at the most—divided him from the man, that they passed in one rush, and with them half a dozen bulldogs hanging at the brute's heels as if trailed along by an invisible cord. Next after these pelted Master Archibald, shouting and tugging at his side-arm ”

“ Rogers, and would have leapt on him again had not the Rector, with wonderful agility for his years, flung himself between. "You dare to stand there and tell me that, to aid this devilry, you pushed a woman into shame—and that woman Isabel Brooks?"
"Mr. Rogers," the Rector implored, "control yourself! I know better than you—every man knows who has been a parish priest—what vileness a man can be guilty of to save his skin. Reserve your wrath for Leicester, but let this poor creature be—he has an awful expiation before him—and consider with me if the worst of this evil cannot be remedied." ”

“ Softly sir, for now we come to it. That boy—Randall Leicester's son—was George Leicester—the man who calls himself Letcher. Randall Leicester lived long enough to have his heart broken by him. He started in the Navy, with plenty of pocket-money, and better prospects; for Sir Charles turned all his affection over to him and meant to make him his heir. But—if you knew George Leicester, gentlemen, as I do! That man has a devil in him; and the devil showed himself early. ”

“ The butcher swore furiously. "Murdered by folly if ever man was! Ye bitter fool," he shouted, "it's pricked him on, ye've done!"
The black-faced man, having gained maybe a dozen yards by his manoeuvre, was now heading for the Citadel gate; beside which—so far away that we saw them as toys—stood a sentry-box and the figure of a sentry beside it. Could he reach this gate? His altered course had taken him a little downhill, to the left of the ridge, and to regain it by the Citadel he must fetch a slight loop. Luckily the bull could not reason: he followed his enemy. ”

“ Night had fallen before Mr. Rogers rose from table and gave the word for departure, and after exchanging some formal farewells with Major Brooks, and some very tender ones with Isabel, I was packed in the tilbury and driven off into darkness in which the world seemed uncomfortably large and vague and my prospects disconcertingly ill lit.
"D'ye know what that is?" asked Mr. Rogers at the end of five minutes, pulling up his mare and jerking his whip towards a splash of white beside the road.
"No, sir." ”

“ Rogers's voice uplifted and shouting for Hodgson!
But Hodgson, it seemed, had found out a way of his own. For a fresh sound of hoofs smote on our ears—this time in the lane—a tune pounded out to the accompaniment of loose stones volleyed and dropping between the beats.
"Drat the man's impidence," said Miss Belcher coolly; "he's taken my mare!"
"What's that you say?" demanded Mr. Rogers's angry voice from the yard.
"You won't find another horse, Jack, unless you brought him. Whitmore keeps but one."
"Confound it all, Lydia!" He came sullenly back towards the window. ”

“ Moreover, to reach Cattewater I must either fetch a circuit through purlieus where every householder knew me and every urchin was a nodding acquaintance, or make a straight dash close by the spot where by this time Mr. Trapp would be getting anxious—if indeed Southside Street and the Barbican were not already resounding with the hue and cry. No: if friendly vessel were to receive and hide me, she lay far off, across the heart of the town, amid the shipping of the Dock. Yonder, too, Miss Plinlimmon resided. ”

“ Yes, and away on the edge of Spain, the army I served is planting fresh laurels—my old regiment too, the King's Own, though James Brooks is by this time scarcely a name to it. Here I sit, hale in wind and limb, and old age creeps on me kindly, telling me that no man is necessary. And yet, if God should come and lay a command on me—some task that a blind man might undertake—I am at God's service. I sit with my loins girt and my soul, I hope, shriven. That is my sermon to you, young sir: a clean breast and no baggage. I bid you welcome to Minden Cottage! ”

“ By the blessing of Heaven, not so much as the faintest breeze played about the spire, or cooled the copper rod burning my hand (and, again, it may have been this that woke me) . I sat astride the topmost crocket, and glancing down between my boot heels, spied the carriage with its pair of greys flattened upon the roadway just beyond the verge of the battlements, and Mr. Scougall himself dancing and waving his arms like a small but very lively beetle. ”

“ Rogers regained his cheerfulness as he eyed his knuckles—"we've let a deal of villainy loose on the world: but I got in once with the left, and that must be my consolation. What are we to do with this boy?"
"Hide him."
"Easier said than done."
"Not a bit." Miss Belcher turned to me. "Have you any friends, boy, who will be worrying if we keep you a few days?"
"None, ma'am," said I, and thereby in my haste did much injustice to the excellent Mr. and Mrs. Trapp.
"Eh? You have the world before you? Then maybe you're luckier than you think, my lad. What would you like to be? A sailor, now? ”

“ Hurt badly, does it? Never mind—we'll get you to hospital in ten minutes. But what on earth brought you crawling back here?"
"Mr. Archibald!" I gasped, "I saw him!"
"Him?"
"Whitmore!"
He stared at me. "You're off your head a bit, boy. You'll be all right when we get you to hospital."
"But I saw him, sir! They shot him—against the wall. He was a deserter, and they hunted him out."
"Well, and what is that to me, if they did?" He turned his face away. "Isabel, my wife, is dead," he said slowly.
"Dead?"
"She is dead—and the child." ”

“ As the dawn widened, one of the men opened his lantern and blew out the candle within it. The young officer—it was Archibald Plinlimmon—paused in his search and scanned the sky and the ramparts above. I sent down a feeble hail.
He heard. His eyes searched along the heaped ruins of gabions, fascines, and dead bodies; and, recognising me, he came slowly up the slope.
"Hallo!" said he. "Not badly hurt, I hope? I thought we'd cleared all the wounded. Where on earth have you come from?"
"From the town, sir." ”

“ A clean breast? Isabel too, poor girl, was aching to make confession to her father. For weeks her secret had been a sword within her, wearing the flesh, and it eased her somewhat (as I saw) even to have made confession to me. But she would not speak to her father without first consulting Archibald. It was he, I gathered, who had enjoined silence. Major Brooks (and small blame to him) would assuredly have imposed a probation: old men with lovely daughters do not surrender them at call to penniless youths, even when the penniless youth happens to be the son of an old friend. ”

“ Whitmore have come in Ciudad Rodrigo? Leicester read the question in my eyes, and answered it, pushing his face close to mine in the fog.
"He's a deserter. If the river don't come down in flood, we'll have him sure enough. And it won't, you mark my words! Two or three days of flood would let up Marmont upon us and spoil everything. But this weather's going to hold, and—it's a bad death for deserters," he wound up, with a snarling laugh.
"Mr. Whitmore a deserter? But how?"
"Ah, you've come to the right man to ask. I bear you no grudge, boy; and as for Plinlimmon—how's he doing, by the way?" ”