Hawke

“ Casting his eyes around the wide hall gleaming with its superb trophies of priceless arms, with a quick glance at the crowd of sable retainers, Major Hawke realized in all the barren splendors of the first story the absence of any womanly hand. As he followed the obsequious house butler into a vast reception room, he murmured:
“A diplomatic tiffin, I will warrant! The old fox is sly.” He wandered idly about the Commissioner’s sanctum, admiring the precious loot of years, displayed with an artfully artless confusion. ”

“ When the silly Swiss woman is the partner of an innocent secret, she is mine to control! Then the chase for a few lacs of rupees begins!”
Major Hawke was somewhat startled at the little avalanche of welcoming cards and notes. “Bravo! this will throw old Hugh off the track a bit also. The simple duty of piquing local curiosity shall open all hearts, hearths, and homes to me!” And then, Alan Hawke joyously realized how easily the light-headed world can be fooled to the top of its bent by the hollow trick of a bit of mystery play. ”

“ He did not answer Hawke's exclamation at once, for the sudden check had aroused him to the need of wariness. A struggle had to be avoided at all costs, he thought; for it would land them both, locked together, on the screes below. It was very pleasant to him, besides, to watch the shrinking fear visible in his enemy's attitude. The very lanthorn was rattling in his unsteady grasp, and the sound of it was music to Gordon's ears. ”

“ Keeping just within the fringe of the wood, Dennis shouldering the gun, while Hawke and Tiddler carried the field mount and the spare magazines, the adventurous three soon reached the angle in front of the ridge.
The stump of a well-grown beech stood up there, towering above the ground twenty feet or more. Its crest [Pg 166] had been carried away by a shell, but one stout branch jutted out like the arm of a gallows; and Harry Hawke had a brain wave.
"'Arf a mo, sir," he said, laying his wallet down. ”

“ It seemed an age before the other platoons at the hedgerow fired, but the welcome crash of their volley suddenly rang out, followed by a shrill blast on Bob's whistle.
"That's 'Cease fire,'" said Hawke; "and there goes the 'Charge.'"
"A Company, make ready!—go!" yelled their Company Commander, and he might very well have said "Come," for he was the first off the mark, and with a yell of wild delight, out of the crater, through the hedge, and across the half-dozen strides that divided them from the determined enemy, went the eager lads after their leader. ”

“ Hawke snatched it away. "No, no!" he laughed. "You must vary your game if you mean to win."
He reached up and hung it on the mirror over his mantelpiece.
"There!" said he. "You will have to jump for them."
The girl stared at him incredulously; the words seeming to her some trick of her strained senses. But she glanced upwards to the file and sank back with a low moan.
"Will nothing touch you?" she said. ”

“ Hawke died October 16, 1781. On his tomb appear these words, "Wherever he sailed, victory attended him." It is much to say, but it is not all. Victory does not always follow desert. "It is not in mortals to command success,"—a favorite quotation with the successful admirals St. Vincent and Nelson. Hawke's great and distinctive glory is this,—that he, more than any one man, was the source and origin of the new life, the new spirit, of his service. There were many brave men before him, as there were after ”

“ Harry Hawke's bayonet was only half its length from the man's ribs when Dennis put it aside.
"Strewth, Tiddler! I can't see no difference myself between one Boche and another," grumbled Hawke. "It's one more prisoner to feed, and Lloyd George talks about economy."
"I will tell you," said the Saxon, crouching down as half a dozen shells in quick succession hummed overhead. "We were sent out to reconnoitre your trench. You passed us just now, and we hid ourselves here. There is going to be an attack in a few minutes, only you gave the alarm a little sooner." ”

“ Captain the Honorable Anson Anstruther’s reserve soon melted under the skillful bonhomie of the astute Alan Hawke. An easy-going patrician of the staff, he was in the magic circle of the viceroy. The heir to an inevitable fortune, and already vested with substantially stratified deposits at “Coutts” and Glyn, Carr and Glyn’s, he would have been envied by most luckless mortals the heavy balances which he always carried at “Grind-lay’s,” a fortune for any less fortunate man. ”

“ Neither government was scrupulous in abstaining from the use of force while peace was still nominally unbroken. Hawke was sent to sea to intercept a French squadron which had been cruising near Gibraltar, but a restriction was put on the limits within which he might cruise, and he failed to meet the French. The fleet was much weakened by ill-health. In June 1756 the news of John Byng’s retreat from Minorca reached England and aroused the utmost indignation. Hawke was at once sent out to relieve him in the Mediterranean command, and to send him home for trial. ”

“ While the happy Abercromby dallied with Major Hawke over a claret cup, an official messenger sought him out, at the Club. “There, my boy! You see that I am a man of my word!” cried the would-be lover. Alan Hawke’s lip trembled as he tore open an envelope directed to him and marked: “On Her Majesty’s Service.” The first in many years. The walls spun around before his eyes when he read his provisional appointment, with an order to report forthwith, to the Chief of Staff, for private instructions. “Ah! I congratulate you, my boy!” heartily cried the happy General. “You are a very devil for luck! ”

“ Hawke [q. v.] and join her at Gibraltar. He seems to have brought her to England in the course of 1757 and to have had no more service, though by a confusion with Wittewronge Taylor [q. v.] —aggravated by his connection with Knowles, the Cornwall, and Hawke—he is said to have commanded the Ramillies in 1758. In 1762 he was superannuated with the rank of rear-admiral ‘in the fleet,’ or, as it was then called, ‘yellowed,’ and passed the rest of his life in retirement in Durham, where he died in 1780. ”

“ He had not time to recover his lost ground and reach the sheltering rocks and shoals of Quiberon Bay before the headmost ships of Hawke's irregularly formed line were on him. ‘All the day (in Hawke's own words) we had very fresh gales at N.W. and W.N.W. with heavy squalls. ”

“ You said I was dreaming. I have waked up, that's all. It is not the sleeper's fault if he hits the man who wakes him."
Gordon bent over as he spoke, and shot the words into Hawke's ear with a savage intensity. In a moment, however, he resumed his former composure.
"But we are wasting time, and we have not much time to waste, have we? I want three letters."
Hawke dropped the pole of the axe and instinctively moved his right hand to protect his breast-pocket.
"Thank you," said Gordon. ”

“ There was no doubting the wistful sincerity of his appeal; and yet Hawke came forward but slowly, and took the outstretched hand with a watchful suspicion.
"You are a stranger here," he said.
Gordon answered the implied question.
"Well, I was only in the way at Keswick." He stopped abruptly, mindful that he trod delicate ground.
Hawke shot a rapid glance at him. "Why?" he asked.
"Bridesmaids, you know. I was a flounder in a shoal of mermaids," and Gordon laughed apologetically.
But Hawke joined in the laugh, and said--"Yes; the bridegroom is of no value until the wedding-day;" ”

“ He dispatched his luggage to the Faucon, and sprang lightly in the carriage when the omnibuses had departed for the Lausanne plateau. Alan Hawke was carefully deferential in his greeting and he meekly answered all the rapid queries of his mysterious employer.
“You have closed up your own private affairs?” she briskly queried.
“All is ready for the road in one day more. I have a private social engagement for to-morrow,” he replied. ”

“ Hawke could gain no end by sustaining the feud. There was, in truth, no reason why they should not shake hands over the matter. So he argued to himself, desire pointing the argument and stifling certain uneasy reflections as to the tenacity of Hawke's nature.
He sat down to resume his breakfast. The third member of the trio which for years had made the farmhouse the resort during Easter vacations claimed Mrs. Jackson's attention.
"And Mr. Arkwright?" she asked.
"He's dead," Gordon replied after a pause. "He died last year in Switzerland. It was an accident. ”

“ Major Alan Hawke was now busied in writing upon a few leaves torn from his betting book.
“Listen to me!” he gravely said. “Promise me that you will never let these papers leave you a moment.”
“I will carry them in my passport case, around my neck,” murmured Justine. “My money in notes, and a few articles.”
“Good!” energetically cried Hawke. “I will write the same to Euphrosyne, and send it by ‘registered post’ to-day.”
“Here!” he suddenly cried, “Just pencil a few words to her to say that you are with me, and that we understand each other; that our interests are to be one ”

“ Thrust out like a beggar without a word of warning.” “Justine on her way home. Passed through Paris last night. Can you not return?” The signature “Euphrosyne” was a guaranty of the unwelcome truth. Major Hawke swore a deep and bitter oath as he penned a telegram to the Swiss preceptress: “Coming to-night. Arrive to-morrow at ten o’clock. Keep all secret.” And he boldly signed the name “Alan Hawke” to that and to a message to Captain Anson Anstruther: “Delayed four days here by private business.” ”

“ Had he been opposed to a commonplace officer, he would probably have succeeded. Hawke was too bold a man to turn his mind to considerations of superfluous prudence in the presence of an enemy who was manifestly seeking to avoid battle. ”

“ But there was one now weaving his webs at Lausanne whose fertile brain was busied with sly schemes of his own. Alan Hawke always first considered “his duty to himself” and so the acute Major decided to spy out the land before he precipitately appeared at London, or dared to risk himself at St. Agnes Road, St. Heliers.
“It is just as well to know all that Justine can tell me before I see this young dandy Anstruther, and to find out what Euphrosyne knows before I interrogate her sister,” he murmured; “I must make no mistake with the Viceroy’s kinsman!” ”

“ When your Hawke, being so seeled, doth feede well, and will abide the Hoode, and to be handled without striking or biting at your hand, then in an evening by candle light you shall unseele her, and when you have hooded her take her on your fist, and holde her so all night untill day appeare againe, doing off her Hoode oftentimes, and handling her gently with your hand, stroking her softly about the wings and the body, hooding and unhooding of her and giving her sometimes to feede, a morsell or twain, or sometimes tyring or plumage. ”

“ Hawke complains of but this one captain, Fox, and towards him he seems not to have evinced the strong feeling that animated his juniors. Each man has his special gift, and to succeed must needs act in accordance with it.
[Pg 152]
There are those who lead and those who drive; Hawke belonged to the one class, Rodney to the other. ”

“ Hawke resumed. "I found rather a good glissade just behind these cliffs running into Eskdale. I spent most of the afternoon on that. You ought to try it."
"I will."
"It lands you out close to Mickledoor and not far below the chimney. So I thought I would go home this way. But if I had known it was going to grow as cold and dark as this I would have seen myself damned first."
"It is cold," Gordon assented, although his senses gave him no knowledge of the fact. He was wondering whether Hawke would ever move. If only he would set the lanthorn down!
"Suppose that we move," he went on. ”

“ Hawke learned of the escape of Conflans from the master of a victualler, which, on its way from the squadron in Quiberon Bay, saw the French fleet making for Belle Isle. It is barely possible that Paulet was the victualler and gave the information. In some way or other he certainly made money, and in his old age was generous to the poor of his neighbourhood. ”

“ When he came sliding down again his eyes were dancing, and his voice was husky.
"If we could only get the gun up there, sir," he whispered excitedly, "the rest's as easy as kiss your hand. You can see the trench and the head of the bloke what's working that tac-tac of theirs. Have a look for yourself, sir." And Dennis made the climb, finding it as Hawke had said. ”

“ A man was running towards them with the news that the body had been found, and he led them up to the cliffs on Scafell. Gordon stood by Hawke's side for a moment, as he lay stretched out in a frozen pool of blood, and then turned away sick ”

“ He was blowing like a grampus, for the pace had been fast.
"When we've got our wind, I reckon there's a little job up there for us, sir," said Hawke, pointing over the top of the fallen beech behind which they crouched.
[Pg 161] "You mean the machine-gun, of course," said Dennis, nodding. "But unfortunately, whilst we're getting our wind, so are the enemy, and there's forty yards of open climb before we reach those sandbags up yonder. ”

“ And so it was noted that Alan Hawke was a devilish pleasant fellow, a rising man, and one who had certainly dropped into an extremely good thing. The tide of Fortune was setting directly in favor of the man who, pacing the floor upstairs, unavailingly tormented himself with the subject of the missing jewels.
“If I could only get a hold on Hugh Johnstone!” mused the adventurer. “Berthe Louison knows nothing of these old matters. She only seeks to approach the child. And she will be here to watch me in a day or so. Ram Lal, the old scoundrel! Does he know? ”