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+ <title>
+ The Green Flag | Project Gutenberg
+ </title>
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+ <body>
+<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10446 ***</div>
+
+ <div style="height: 8em;">
+ <br><br><br><br><br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h1>
+ THE GREEN FLAG
+ </h1>
+ <h2>
+ By Arthur Conan Doyle
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ <br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <br>
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <b>CONTENTS</b>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> THE GREEN FLAG </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> CAPTAIN SHARKEY. </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> THE CROXLEY MASTER </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> THE LORD OF CHATEAU NOIR </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> THE STRIPED CHEST </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> A SHADOW BEFORE </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> THE KING OF THE FOXES </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> THE THREE CORRESPONDENTS </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> THE NEW CATACOMB </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> THE DEBUT OF BIMBASHI JOYCE </a>
+ </p>
+ <p class="toc">
+ <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> A FOREIGN OFFICE ROMANCE </a>
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE GREEN FLAG
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ When Jack Conolly, of the Irish Shotgun Brigade, the Rory of the Hills
+ Inner Circle, and the extreme left wing of the Land League, was
+ incontinently shot by Sergeant Murdoch of the constabulary, in a little
+ moonlight frolic near Kanturk, his twin-brother Dennis joined the British
+ Army. The countryside had become too hot for him; and, as the seventy-five
+ shillings were wanting which might have carried him to America, he took
+ the only way handy of getting himself out of the way. Seldom has Her
+ Majesty had a less promising recruit, for his hot Celtic blood seethed
+ with hatred against Britain and all things British. The sergeant, however,
+ smiling complacently over his 6 ft. of brawn and his 44 in. chest, whisked
+ him off with a dozen other of the boys to the depot at Fermoy, whence in a
+ few weeks they were sent on, with the spade-work kinks taken out of their
+ backs, to the first battalion of the Royal Mallows, at the top of the
+ roster for foreign service.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Royal Mallows, at about that date, were as strange a lot of men as
+ ever were paid by a great empire to fight its battles. It was the darkest
+ hour of the land struggle, when the one side came out with crow-bar and
+ battering-ram by day, and the other with mask and with shot-gun by night.
+ Men driven from their homes and potato-patches found their way even into
+ the service of the Government, to which it seemed to them that they owed
+ their troubles, and now and then they did wild things before they came.
+ There were recruits in the Irish regiments who would forget to answer to
+ their own names, so short had been their acquaintance with them. Of these
+ the Royal Mallows had their full share; and, while they still retained
+ their fame as being one of the smartest corps in the army, no one knew
+ better than their officers that they were dry-rotted with treason and with
+ bitter hatred of the flag under which they served.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And the centre of all the disaffection was C Company, in which Dennis
+ Conolly found himself enrolled. They were Celts, Catholics, and men of the
+ tenant class to a man; and their whole experience of the British
+ Government had been an inexorable landlord, and a constabulary who seemed
+ to them to be always on the side of the rent-collector. Dennis was not the
+ only moonlighter in the ranks, nor was he alone in having an intolerable
+ family blood-feud to harden his heart. Savagery had begotten savagery in
+ that veiled civil war. A landlord with an iron mortgage weighing down upon
+ him had small bowels for his tenantry. He did but take what the law
+ allowed, and yet, with men like Jim Holan, or Patrick McQuire, or Peter
+ Flynn, who had seen the roofs torn from their cottages and their folk
+ huddled among their pitiable furniture upon the roadside, it was ill to
+ argue about abstract law. What matter that in that long and bitter
+ struggle there was many another outrage on the part of the tenant, and
+ many another grievance on the side of the landowner! A stricken man can
+ only feel his own wound, and the rank and file of the C Company of the
+ Royal Mallows were sore and savage to the soul. There were low whisperings
+ in barrack-rooms and canteens, stealthy meetings in public-house parlours,
+ bandying of passwords from mouth to mouth, and many other signs which made
+ their officers right glad when the order came which sent them to foreign,
+ and better still, to active service.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ For Irish regiments have before now been disaffected, and have at a
+ distance looked upon the foe as though he might, in truth, be the friend;
+ but when they have been put face on to him, and when their officers have
+ dashed to the front with a wave and halloo, those rebel hearts have
+ softened and their gallant Celtic blood has boiled with the mad joy of the
+ fight, until the slower Britons have marvelled that they ever could have
+ doubted the loyalty of their Irish comrades. So it would be again,
+ according to the officers, and so it would not be if Dennis Conolly and a
+ few others could have their way.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a March morning upon the eastern fringe of the Nubian desert. The
+ sun had not yet risen, but a tinge of pink flushed up as far as the
+ cloudless zenith, and the long strip of sea lay like a rosy ribbon across
+ the horizon. From the coast inland stretched dreary sand-plains, dotted
+ over with thick clumps of mimosa scrub and mottled patches of thorny bush.
+ No tree broke the monotony of that vast desert. The dull, dusty hue of the
+ thickets, and the yellow glare of the sand, were the only colours, save at
+ one point, where, from a distance, it seemed that a land-slip of
+ snow-white stones had shot itself across a low foot-hill. But as the
+ traveller approached he saw, with a thrill, that these were no stones, but
+ the bleaching bones of a slaughtered army. With its dull tints, its
+ gnarled, viprous bushes, its arid, barren soil, and this death streak
+ trailed across it, it was indeed a nightmare country.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Some eight or ten miles inland the rolling plain curved upwards with a
+ steeper slope until it ran into a line of red basaltic rock which
+ zigzagged from north to south, heaping itself up at one point into a
+ fantastic knoll. On the summit of this there stood upon that March morning
+ three Arab chieftains&mdash;the Sheik Kadra of the Hadendowas, Moussa Wad
+ Aburhegel, who led the Berber dervishes, and Hamid Wad Hussein, who had
+ come northward with his fighting men from the land of the Baggaras. They
+ had all three just risen from their praying-carpets, and were peering out,
+ with fierce, high-nosed faces thrust forwards, at the stretch of country
+ revealed by the spreading dawn.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The red rim of the sun was pushing itself now above the distant sea, and
+ the whole coast-line stood out brilliantly yellow against the rich deep
+ blue beyond. At one spot lay a huddle of white-walled houses, a mere
+ splotch in the distance; while four tiny cock-boats, which lay beyond,
+ marked the position of three of Her Majesty's 10,000-ton troopers and the
+ admiral's flagship. But it was not upon the distant town, nor upon the
+ great vessels, nor yet upon the sinister white litter which gleamed in the
+ plain beneath them, that the Arab chieftains gazed. Two miles from where
+ they stood, amid the sand-hills and the mimosa scrub, a great
+ parallelogram had been marked by piled-up bushes. From the inside of this
+ dozens of tiny blue smoke-reeks curled up into the still morning air;
+ while there rose from it a confused deep murmur, the voices of men and the
+ gruntings of camels blended into the same insect buzz.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The unbelievers have cooked their morning food," said the Baggara chief,
+ shading his eyes with his tawny, sinewy hand. "Truly their sleep has been
+ scanty; for Hamid and a hundred of his men have fired upon them since the
+ rising of the moon."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So it was with these others," answered the Sheik Kadra, pointing with his
+ sheathed sword towards the old battle-field. "They also had a day of
+ little water and a night of little rest, and the heart was gone out of
+ them ere ever the sons of the Prophet had looked them in the eyes. This
+ blade drank deep that day, and will again before the sun has travelled
+ from the sea to the hill."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And yet these are other men," remarked the Berber dervish. "Well, I know
+ that Allah has placed them in the clutch of our fingers, yet it may be
+ that they with the big hats will stand firmer than the cursed men of
+ Egypt."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Pray Allah that it may be so," cried the fierce Baggara, with a flash of
+ his black eyes. "It was not to chase women that I brought 700 men from the
+ river to the coast. See, my brother, already they are forming their
+ array."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A fanfare of bugle-calls burst from the distant camp. At the same time the
+ bank of bushes at one side had been thrown or trampled down, and the
+ little army within began to move slowly out on to the plain. Once clear of
+ the camp they halted, and the slant rays of the sun struck flashes from
+ bayonet and from gun-barrel as the ranks closed up until the big pith
+ helmets joined into a single long white ribbon. Two streaks of scarlet
+ glowed on either side of the square, but elsewhere the fringe of
+ fighting-men was of the dull yellow khaki tint which hardly shows against
+ the desert sand. Inside their array was a dense mass of camels and mules
+ bearing stores and ambulance needs. Outside a twinkling clump of cavalry
+ was drawn up on each flank, and in front a thin, scattered line of mounted
+ infantry was already slowly advancing over the bush-strewn plain, halting
+ on every eminence, and peering warily round as men might who have to pick
+ their steps among the bones of those who have preceded them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The three chieftains still lingered upon the knoll, looking down with
+ hungry eyes and compressed lips at the dark steel-tipped patch. "They are
+ slower to start than the men of Egypt," the Sheik of the Hadendowas
+ growled in his beard.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Slower also to go back, perchance, my brother," murmured the dervish.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And yet they are not many&mdash;3,000 at the most."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And we 10,000, with the Prophet's grip upon our spear-hafts and his words
+ upon our banner. See to their chieftain, how he rides upon the right and
+ looks up at us with the glass that sees from afar! It may be that he sees
+ this also." The Arab shook his sword at the small clump of horsemen who
+ had spurred out from the square.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Lo! he beckons," cried the dervish; "and see those others at the corner,
+ how they bend and heave. Ha! by the Prophet, I had thought it." As he
+ spoke, a little woolly puff of smoke spurted up at the corner of the
+ square, and a 7 lb. shell burst with a hard metallic smack just over their
+ heads. The splinters knocked chips from the red rocks around them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Bismillah!" cried the Hadendowa; "if the gun can carry thus far, then
+ ours can answer to it. Ride to the left, Moussa, and tell Ben Ali to cut
+ the skin from the Egyptians if they cannot hit yonder mark. And you,
+ Hamid, to the right, and see that 3,000 men lie close in the wady that we
+ have chosen. Let the others beat the drum and show the banner of the
+ Prophet, for by the black stone their spears will have drunk deep ere they
+ look upon the stars again."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A long, straggling, boulder-strewn plateau lay on the summit of the red
+ hills, sloping very precipitously to the plain, save at one point, where a
+ winding gully curved downwards, its mouth choked with sand-mounds and
+ olive-hued scrub. Along the edge of this position lay the Arab host&mdash;a
+ motley crew of shock-headed desert clansmen, fierce predatory slave
+ dealers of the interior, and wild dervishes from the Upper Nile, all blent
+ together by their common fearlessness and fanaticism. Two races were
+ there, as wide as the poles apart&mdash;the thin-lipped, straight-haired
+ Arab and the thick-lipped, curly negro&mdash;yet the faith of Islam had
+ bound them closer than a blood tie. Squatting among the rocks, or lying
+ thickly in the shadow, they peered out at the slow-moving square beneath
+ them, while women with water-skins and bags of dhoora fluttered from group
+ to group, calling out to each other those fighting texts from the Koran
+ which in the hour of battle are maddening as wine to the true believer. A
+ score of banners waved over the ragged, valiant crew, and among them, upon
+ desert horses and white Bishareen camels, were the Emirs and Sheiks who
+ were to lead them against the infidels.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ As the Sheik Kadra sprang into his saddle and drew his sword there was a
+ wild whoop and a clatter of waving spears, while the one-ended war-drums
+ burst into a dull crash like a wave upon shingle. For a moment 10,000 men
+ were up on the rocks with brandished arms and leaping figures; the next
+ they were under cover again, waiting sternly and silently for their
+ chieftain's orders. The square was less than half a mile from the ridge
+ now, and shell after shell from the 7 lb. guns were pitching over it. A
+ deep roar on the right, and then a second one showed that the Egyptian
+ Krupps were in action. Sheik Kadra's hawk eyes saw that the shells burst
+ far beyond the mark, and he spurred his horse along to where a knot of
+ mounted chiefs were gathered round the two guns, which were served by
+ their captured crews.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How is this, Ben Ali?" he cried. "It was not thus that the dogs fired
+ when it was their own brothers in faith at whom they aimed!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A chieftain reined his horse back, and thrust a blood-smeared sword into
+ its sheath. Beside him two Egyptian artillerymen with their throats cut
+ were sobbing out their lives upon the ground. "Who lays the gun this
+ time?" asked the fierce chief, glaring at the frightened gunners." Here,
+ thou black-browed child of Shaitan, aim, and aim for thy life."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It may have been chance, or it may have been skill, but the third and
+ fourth shells burst over the square. Sheik Kadra smiled grimly and
+ galloped back to the left, where his spearmen were streaming down into the
+ gully. As he joined them a deep growling rose from the plain beneath, like
+ the snarling of a sullen wild beast, and a little knot of tribesmen fell
+ into a struggling heap, caught in the blast of lead from a Gardner. Their
+ comrades pressed on over them, and sprang down into the ravine. From all
+ along the crest burst the hard, sharp crackle of Remington fire.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The square had slowly advanced, rippling over the low sandhills, and
+ halting every few minutes to re-arrange its formation. Now, having made
+ sure that there was no force of the enemy in the scrub, it changed its
+ direction, and began to take a line parallel to the Arab position. It was
+ too steep to assail from the front, and if they moved far enough to the
+ right the general hoped that he might turn it. On the top of those ruddy
+ hills lay a baronetcy for him, and a few extra hundreds in his pension,
+ and he meant having them both that day. The Remington fire was annoying,
+ and so were those two Krupp guns; already there were more cacolets full
+ than he cared to see. But on the whole he thought it better to hold his
+ fire until he had more to aim at than a few hundred of fuzzy heads peeping
+ over a razor-back ridge. He was a bulky, red-faced man, a fine
+ whist-player, and a soldier who knew his work. His men believed in him,
+ and he had good reason to believe in them, for he had excellent stuff
+ under him that day. Being an ardent champion of the short-service system,
+ he took particular care to work with veteran first battalions, and his
+ little force was the compressed essence of an army corps.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The left front of the square was formed by four companies of the Royal
+ Wessex, and the right by four of the Royal Mallows. On either side the
+ other halves of the same regiments marched in quarter column of companies.
+ Behind them, on the right was a battalion of Guards, and on the left one
+ of Marines, while the rear was closed in by a Rifle battalion. Two Royal
+ Artillery 7 lb. screw-guns kept pace with the square, and a dozen
+ white-bloused sailors, under their blue-coated, tight-waisted officers,
+ trailed their Gardner in front, turning every now and then to spit up at
+ the draggled banners which waved over the cragged ridge. Hussars and
+ Lancers scouted in the scrub at each side, and within moved the clump of
+ camels, with humorous eyes and supercilious lips, their comic faces a
+ contrast to the blood-stained men who already lay huddled in the cacolets
+ on either side.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The square was now moving slowly on a line parallel with the rocks,
+ stopping every few minutes to pick up wounded, and to allow the screw-guns
+ and Gardner to make themselves felt. The men looked serious, for that
+ spring on to the rocks of the Arab army had given them a vague glimpse of
+ the number and ferocity of their foes; but their faces were set like
+ stone, for they knew to a man that they must win or they must die&mdash;and
+ die, too, in a particularly unlovely fashion. But most serious of all was
+ the general, for he had seen that which brought a flush to his cheeks and
+ a frown to his brow.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I say, Stephen," said he to his galloper, "those Mallows seem a trifle
+ jumpy. The right flank company bulged a bit when the niggers showed on the
+ hill."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Youngest troops in the square, sir," murmured the aide, looking at them
+ critically through his eye-glass.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Tell Colonel Flanagan to see to it, Stephen," said the general; and the
+ galloper sped upon his way. The colonel, a fine old Celtic warrior, was
+ over at C Company in an instant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How are the men, Captain Foley?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Never better, sir," answered the senior captain, in the spirit that makes
+ a Madras officer look murder if you suggest recruiting his regiment from
+ the Punjab.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Stiffen them up!" cried the colonel. As he rode away a colour-sergeant
+ seemed to trip, and fell forward into a mimosa bush. He made no effort to
+ rise, but lay in a heap among the thorns.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sergeant O'Rooke's gone, sorr," cried a voice. "Never mind, lads," said
+ Captain Foley. "He's died like a soldier, fighting for his Queen."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Down with the Queen!" shouted a hoarse voice from the ranks.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the roar of the Gardner and the typewriter-like clicking of the hopper
+ burst in at the tail of the words. Captain Foley heard them, and
+ Subalterns Grice and Murphy heard them; but there are times when a deaf
+ ear is a gift from the gods.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Steady, Mallows!" cried the captain, in a pause of the grunting
+ machine-gun. "We have the honour of Ireland to guard this day."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And well we know how to guard it, captin!" cried the same ominous voice;
+ and there was a buzz from the length of the company.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The captain and the two subs. came together behind the marching line.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They seem a bit out of hand," murmured the captain.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Bedad," said the Galway boy, "they mean to scoot like redshanks."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They nearly broke when the blacks showed on the hill," said Grice.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The first man that turns, my sword is through him," cried Foley, loud
+ enough to be heard by five files on either side of him. Then, in a lower
+ voice, "It's a bitter drop to swallow, but it's my duty to report what you
+ think to the chief, and have a company of Jollies put behind us." He
+ turned away with the safety of the square upon his mind, and before he had
+ reached his goal the square had ceased to exist.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ In their march in front of what looked like a face of cliff, they had come
+ opposite to the mouth of the gully, in which, screened by scrub and
+ boulders, 3,000 chosen dervishes, under Hamid Wad Hussein, of the
+ Baggaras, were crouching. Tat, tat, tat, went the rifles of three mounted
+ infantrymen in front of the left shoulder of the square, and an instant
+ later they were spurring it for their lives, crouching over the manes of
+ their horses, and pelting over the sandhills with thirty or forty
+ galloping chieftains at their heels. Rocks and scrub and mimosa swarmed
+ suddenly into life. Rushing black figures came and went in the gaps of the
+ bushes. A howl that drowned the shouts of the officers, a long quavering
+ yell, burst from the ambuscade. Two rolling volleys from the Royal Wessex,
+ one crash from the screw-gun firing shrapnel, and then before a second
+ cartridge could be rammed in, a living, glistening black wave, tipped with
+ steel, had rolled over the gun, the Royal Wessex had been dashed back
+ among the camels, and 1,000 fanatics were hewing and hacking in the heart
+ of what had been the square.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The camels and mules in the centre, jammed more and more together as their
+ leaders flinched from the rush of the tribesmen, shut out the view of the
+ other three faces, who could only tell that the Arabs had got in by the
+ yells upon Allah, which rose ever nearer and nearer amid the clouds of
+ sand-dust, the struggling animals, and the dense mass of swaying, cursing
+ men. Some of the Wessex fired back at the Arabs who had passed them, as
+ excited Tommies will, and it is whispered among doctors that it was not
+ always a Remington bullet which was cut from a wound that day. Some
+ rallied in little knots, stabbing furiously with their bayonets at the
+ rushing spearmen. Others turned at bay with their backs against the
+ camels, and others round the general and his staff, who, revolver in hand,
+ had flung themselves into the heart of it. But the whole square was
+ sidling slowly away from the gorge, pushed back by the pressure at the
+ shattered corner.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The officers and men at the other faces were glancing nervously to the
+ rear, uncertain what was going on, and unable to take help to their
+ comrades without breaking the formation.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "By Jove, they've got through the Wessex!" cried Grice of the Mallows.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The divils have hurrooshed us, Ted," said his brother subaltern, cocking
+ his revolver.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The ranks were breaking, and crowding towards Private Conolly, all talking
+ together as the officers peered back through the veil of dust. The sailors
+ had run their Gardner out, and she was squirting death out of her five
+ barrels into the flank of the rushing stream of savages. "Oh, this bloody
+ gun!" shouted a voice. "She's jammed again." The fierce metallic grunting
+ had ceased, and her crew were straining and hauling at the breech.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This damned vertical feed!" cried an officer.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The spanner, Wilson!&mdash;the spanner! Stand to your cutlasses, boys, or
+ they're into us." His voice rose into a shriek as he ended, for a
+ shovel-headed spear had been buried in his chest. A second wave of
+ dervishes lapped over the hillocks, and burst upon the machine-gun and the
+ right front of the line. The sailors were overborne in an instant, but the
+ Mallows, with their fighting blood aflame, met the yell of the Moslem with
+ an even wilder, fiercer cry, and dropped two hundred of them with a single
+ point-blank volley. The howling, leaping crew swerved away to the right,
+ and dashed on into the gap which had already been made for them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But C Company had drawn no trigger to stop that fiery rush. The men leaned
+ moodily upon their Martinis. Some had even thrown them upon the ground.
+ Conolly was talking fiercely to those about him. Captain Foley, thrusting
+ his way through the press, rushed up to him with a revolver in his hand.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This is your doing, you villain!" he cried.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If you raise your pistol, Captin, your brains will be over your coat,"
+ said a low voice at his side.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He saw that several rifles were turned on him. The two subs. had pressed
+ forward, and were by his side. "What is it, then?" he cried, looking round
+ from one fierce mutinous face to another. "Are you Irishmen? Are you
+ soldiers? What are you here for but to fight for your country?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "England is no country of ours," cried several.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are not fighting for England. You are fighting for Ireland, and for
+ the Empire of which it as part."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A black curse on the Impire!" shouted Private McQuire, throwing down his
+ rifle. "'Twas the Impire that backed the man that druv me onto the
+ roadside. May me hand stiffen before I draw trigger for it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What's the Impire to us, Captain Foley, and what's the Widdy to us
+ ayther?" cried a voice.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Let the constabulary foight for her."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ay, be God, they'd be better imployed than pullin' a poor man's thatch
+ about his ears."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Or shootin' his brother, as they did mine."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It was the Impire laid my groanin' mother by the wayside. Her son will
+ rot before he upholds it, and ye can put that in the charge-sheet in the
+ next coort-martial."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ In vain the three officers begged, menaced, persuaded. The square was
+ still moving, ever moving, with the same bloody fight raging in its
+ entrails. Even while they had been speaking they had been shuffling
+ backwards, and the useless Gardner, with her slaughtered crew, was already
+ a good hundred yards from them. And the pace was accelerating. The mass of
+ men, tormented and writhing, was trying, by a common instinct, to reach
+ some clearer ground where they could re-form. Three faces were still
+ intact, but the fourth had been caved in, and badly mauled, without its
+ comrades being able to help it. The Guards had met a fresh rush of the
+ Hadendowas, and had blown back the tribesmen with a volley, and the
+ cavalry had ridden over another stream of them, as they welled out of the
+ gully. A litter of hamstrung horses, and haggled men behind them, showed
+ that a spearman on his face among the bushes can show some sport to the
+ man who charges him. But, in spite of all, the square was still reeling
+ swiftly backwards, trying to shake itself clear of this torment which
+ clung to its heart. Would it break or would it re-form? The lives of five
+ regiments and the honour of the flag hung upon the answer.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Some, at least, were breaking. The C Company of the Mallows had lost all
+ military order, and was pushing back in spite of the haggard officers, who
+ cursed, and shoved, and prayed in the vain attempt to hold them. The
+ captain and the subs. were elbowed and jostled, while the men crowded
+ towards Private Conolly for their orders. The confusion had not spread,
+ for the other companies, in the dust and smoke and turmoil, had lost touch
+ with their mutinous comrades. Captain Foley saw that even now there might
+ be time to avert a disaster. "Think what you are doing, man," he yelled,
+ rushing towards the ringleader. "There are a thousand Irish in the square,
+ and they are dead men if we break."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The words alone might have had little effect on the old moonlighter. It is
+ possible that, in his scheming brain, he had already planned how he was to
+ club his Irish together and lead them to the sea. But at that moment the
+ Arabs broke through the screen of camels which had fended them off. There
+ was a struggle, a screaming, a mule rolled over, a wounded man sprang up
+ in a cacolet with a spear through him, and then through the narrow gap
+ surged a stream of naked savages, mad with battle, drunk with slaughter,
+ spotted and splashed with blood&mdash;blood dripping from their spears,
+ their arms, their faces. Their yells, their bounds, their crouching,
+ darting figures, the horrid energy of their spear-thrusts, made them look
+ like a blast of fiends from the pit. And were these the Allies of Ireland?
+ Were these the men who were to strike for her against her enemies?
+ Conolly's soul rose up in loathing at the thought.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He was a man of firm purpose, and yet at the first sight of those howling
+ fiends that purpose faltered, and at the second it was blown to the winds.
+ He saw a huge coal-black negro seize a shrieking camel-driver and saw at
+ his throat with a knife. He saw a shock-headed tribesman plunge his great
+ spear through the back of their own little bugler from Mill-street. He saw
+ a dozen deeds of blood&mdash;the murder of the wounded, the hacking of the
+ unarmed&mdash;and caught, too, in a glance, the good wholesome faces of
+ the faced-about rear rank of the Marines. The Mallows, too, had faced
+ about, and in an instant Conolly had thrown himself into the heart of C
+ Company, striving with the officers to form the men up with their
+ comrades.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the mischief had gone too far. The rank and file had no heart in their
+ work. They had broken before, and this last rush of murderous savages was
+ a hard thing for broken men to stand against. They flinched from the
+ furious faces and dripping forearms. Why should they throw away their
+ lives for a flag for which they cared nothing? Why should their leader
+ urge them to break, and now shriek to them to re-form? They would not
+ re-form. They wanted to get to the sea and to safety. He flung himself
+ among them with outstretched arms, with words of reason, with shouts, with
+ gaspings. It was useless; the tide was beyond his control. They were
+ shredding out into the desert with their faces set for the coast.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Bhoys, will ye stand for this?" screamed a voice. It was so ringing, so
+ strenuous, that the breaking Mallows glanced backwards. They were held by
+ what they saw. Private Conolly had planted his rifle-stock downwards in a
+ mimosa bush. From the fixed bayonet there fluttered a little green flag
+ with the crownless harp. God knows for what black mutiny, for what signal
+ of revolt, that flag had been treasured up within the corporal's tunic!
+ Now its green wisp stood amid the rush, while three proud regimental
+ colours were reeling slowly backwards.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What for the flag?" yelled the private.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My heart's blood for it! and mine! and mine!" cried a score of voices.
+ "God bless it! The flag, boys&mdash;the flag!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ C Company were rallying upon it. The stragglers clutched at each other,
+ and pointed. "Here, McQuire, Flynn, O'Hara," ran the shoutings. "Close on
+ the flag! Back to the flag!" The three standards reeled backwards, and the
+ seething square strove for a clearer space where they could form their
+ shattered ranks; but C Company, grim and powder-stained, choked with
+ enemies and falling fast, still closed in on the little rebel ensign that
+ flapped from the mimosa bush.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a good half-hour before the square, having disentangled itself from
+ its difficulties and dressed its ranks, began to slowly move forwards over
+ the ground, across which in its labour and anguish it had been driven. The
+ long trail of Wessex men and Arabs showed but too clearly the path they
+ had come.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How many got into us, Stephen?" asked the general, tapping his snuff-box.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should put them down at a thousand or twelve hundred, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I did not see any get out again. What the devil were the Wessex thinking
+ about? The Guards stood well, though; so did the Mallows."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Colonel Flanagan reports that his front flank company was cut off, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why, that's the company that was out of hand when we advanced!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Colonel Flanagan reports, sir, that the company took the whole brunt of
+ the attack, and gave the square time to re-form."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Tell the Hussars to ride forward, Stephen," said the general, "and try if
+ they can see anything of them. There's no firing, and I fear that the
+ Mallows will want to do some recruiting. Let the square take ground by the
+ right, and then advance!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the Sheik Kadra of the Hadendowas saw from his knoll that the men with
+ the big hats had rallied, and that they were coming back in the quiet
+ business fashion of men whose work was before them. He took counsel with
+ Moussa the Dervish and Hussein the Baggara, and a woestruck man was he
+ when he learned that the third of his men were safe in the Moslem
+ Paradise. So, having still some signs of victory to show, he gave the
+ word, and the desert warriors flitted off unseen and unheard, even as they
+ had come.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A red rock plateau, a few hundred spears and Remingtons, and a plain which
+ for the second time was strewn with slaughtered men, was all that his
+ day's fighting gave to the English general.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a squadron of Hussars which came first to the spot where the rebel
+ flag had waved. A dense litter of Arab dead marked the place. Within, the
+ flag waved no longer, but the rifle stood in the mimosa bush, and round
+ it, with their wounds in front, lay the Fenian private and the silent
+ ranks of the Irishry. Sentiment is not an English failing, but the Hussar
+ captain raised his hilt in a salute as he rode past the blood-soaked ring.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The British general sent home dispatches to his Government, and so did the
+ chief of the Hadendowas, though the style and manner differed somewhat in
+ each.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Sheik Kadra of the Hadendowa people to Mohammed Ahmed, the chosen of
+ Allah, homage and greeting, (began the latter). Know by this that on the
+ fourth day of this moon we gave battle to the Kaffirs who call themselves
+ Inglees, having with us the Chief Hussein with ten thousand of the
+ faithful. By the blessing of Allah we have broken them, and chased them
+ for a mile, though indeed these infidels are different from the dogs of
+ Egypt, and have slain very many of our men. Yet we hope to smite them
+ again ere the new moon be come, to which end I trust that thou wilt send
+ us a thousand Dervishes from Omdurman. In token of our victory I send you
+ by this messenger a flag which we have taken. By the colour it might well
+ seem to have belonged to those of the true faith, but the Kaffirs gave
+ their blood freely to save it, and so we think that, though small, it is
+ very dear to them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ CAPTAIN SHARKEY.
+ </h2>
+<p class="center big">
+ I
+</p>
+ <h3>
+ HOW THE GOVERNOR OF SAINT KITT'S CAME HOME.
+ </h3>
+ <p>
+ When the great wars of the Spanish Succession had been brought to an end
+ by the Treaty of Utrecht, the vast number of privateers which had been
+ fitted out by the contending parties found their occupation gone. Some
+ took to the more peaceful but less lucrative ways of ordinary commerce,
+ others were absorbed into the fishing fleets, and a few of the more
+ reckless hoisted the Jolly Rodger at the mizzen and the bloody flag at
+ the main, declaring a private war upon their own account against the whole
+ human race.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ With mixed crews, recruited from every nation, they scoured the seas,
+ disappearing occasionally to careen in some lonely inlet, or putting in
+ for a debauch at some outlying port, where they dazzled the inhabitants by
+ their lavishness, and horrified them by their brutalities.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ On the Coromandel Coast, at Madagascar, in the African waters, and above
+ all in the West Indian and American seas, the pirates were a constant
+ menace. With an insolent luxury they would regulate their depredations by
+ the comfort of the seasons, harrying New England in the summer, and
+ dropping south again to the tropical islands in the winter.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They were the more to be dreaded because they had none of that discipline
+ and restraint which made their predecessors, the Buccaneers, both
+ formidable and respectable. These Ishmaels of the sea rendered an account
+ to no man, and treated their prisoners according to the drunken whim of
+ the moment. Flashes of grotesque generosity alternated with longer
+ stretches of inconceivable ferocity, and the skipper who fell into their
+ hands might find himself dismissed with his cargo, after serving as boon
+ companion in some hideous debauch, or might sit at his cabin table with
+ his own nose and his lips served up with pepper and salt in front of him.
+ It took a stout seaman in those days to ply his calling in the Caribbean
+ Gulf.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Such a man was Captain John Scarrow, of the ship <i>Morning Star</i>, and
+ yet he breathed a long sigh of relief when he heard the splash of the
+ falling anchor and swung at his moorings within a hundred yards of the
+ guns of the citadel of Basseterre. St. Kitt's was his final port of call,
+ and early next morning his bowsprit would be pointed for Old England. He
+ had had enough of those robber-haunted seas. Ever since he had left
+ Maracaibo upon the Main, with his full lading of sugar and red pepper, he
+ had winced at every topsail which glimmered over the violet edge of the
+ tropical sea. He had coasted up the Windward Islands, touching here and
+ there, and assailed continually by stories of villainy and outrage.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Sharkey, of the twenty-gun pirate barque, <i>Happy Delivery</i>,
+ had passed down the coast, and had littered it with gutted vessels and
+ with murdered men. Dreadful anecdotes were current of his grim
+ pleasantries and of his inflexible ferocity. From the Bahamas to the Main
+ his coal-black barque, with the ambiguous name, had been freighted with
+ death and many things which are worse than death. So nervous was Captain
+ Scarrow, with his new full-rigged ship, and her full and valuable lading,
+ that he struck out to the west as far as Bird's Island to be out of the
+ usual track of commerce. And yet even in those solitary waters he had been
+ unable to shake off sinister traces of Captain Sharkey.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ One morning they had raised a single skiff adrift upon the face of the
+ ocean. Its only occupant was a delirious seaman, who yelled hoarsely as
+ they hoisted him aboard, and showed a dried-up tongue like a black and
+ wrinkled fungus at the back of his mouth. Water and nursing soon
+ transformed him into the strongest and smartest sailor on the ship. He was
+ from Marblehead, in New England, it seemed, and was the sole survivor of a
+ schooner which had been scuttled by the dreadful Sharkey.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ For a week Hiram Evanson, for that was his name, had been adrift beneath a
+ tropical sun. Sharkey had ordered the mangled remains of his late captain
+ to be thrown into the boat, "as provisions for the voyage," but the seaman
+ had at once committed it to the deep, lest the temptation should be more
+ than he could bear. He had lived upon his own huge frame until, at the
+ last moment, the <i>Morning Star</i> had found him in that madness which
+ is the precursor of such a death. It was no bad find for Captain Scarrow,
+ for, with a short-handed crew, such a seaman as this big New Englander was
+ a prize worth having. He vowed that he was the only man whom Captain
+ Sharkey had ever placed under an obligation.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Now that they lay under the guns of Basseterre, all danger from the pirate
+ was at an end, and yet the thought of him lay heavily upon the seaman's
+ mind as he watched the agent's boat shooting out from the Custom-house
+ quay.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll lay you a wager, Morgan," said he to the first mate, "that the agent
+ will speak of Sharkey in the first hundred words that pass his lips."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, captain, I'll have you a silver dollar, and chance it," said the
+ rough old Bristol man beside him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The negro rowers shot the boat alongside, and the linen-clad steersman
+ sprang up the ladder. "Welcome, Captain Scarrow!" he cried. "Have you
+ heard about Sharkey?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The captain grinned at the mate.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What devilry has he been up to now?" he asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Devilry! You've not heard, then? Why, we've got him safe under lock and
+ key at Basseterre. He was tried last Wednesday, and he is to be hanged
+ to-morrow morning."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain and mate gave a shout of joy, which an instant later was taken up
+ by the crew. Discipline was forgotten as they scrambled up through the
+ break of the poop to hear the news. The New Englander was in the front of
+ them with a radiant face turned up to Heaven, for he came of the Puritan
+ stock.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sharkey to be hanged!" he cried. "You don't know, Master Agent, if they
+ lack a hangman, do you?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Stand back!" cried the mate, whose outraged sense of discipline was even
+ stronger than his interest at the news. "I'll pay that dollar, Captain
+ Scarrow, with the lightest heart that ever I paid a wager yet. How came
+ the villain to be taken?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why, as to that, he became more than his own comrades could abide, and
+ they took such a horror of him that they would not have him on the ship.
+ So they marooned him upon the Little Mangles to the south of the
+ Mysteriosa Bank, and there he was found by a Portobello trader, who
+ brought him in. There was talk of sending him to Jamaica to be tried, but
+ our good little Governor, Sir Charles Ewan, would not hear of it. 'He's my
+ meat,' said he, 'and I claim the cooking of it.' If you can stay till
+ to-morrow morning at ten, you'll see the joint swinging."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I wish I could," said the captain, wistfully, "but I am sadly behind time
+ now. I should start with the evening tide."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That you can't do," said the agent with decision. "The Governor is going
+ back with you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The Governor!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes. He's had a dispatch from Government to return without delay. The
+ fly-boat that brought it has gone on to Virginia. So Sir Charles has been
+ waiting for you, as I told him you were due before the rains."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, well!" cried the captain in some perplexity, "I'm a plain seaman,
+ and I don't know much of governors and baronets and their ways. I don't
+ remember that I ever so much as spoke to one. But if it's in King George's
+ service, and he asks a cast in the <i>Morning Star</i> as far as London,
+ I'll do what I can for him. There's my own cabin he can have and welcome.
+ As to the cooking, it's lobscouse and salmagundy six days in the week; but
+ he can bring his own cook aboard with him if he thinks our galley too
+ rough for his taste."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You need not trouble your mind, Captain Scarrow," said the agent. "Sir
+ Charles is in weak health just now, only clear of a quartan ague, and it
+ is likely he will keep his cabin most of the voyage. Dr. Larousse said
+ that he would have sunk had the hanging of Sharkey not put fresh life into
+ him. He has a great spirit in him, though, and you must not blame him if
+ he is somewhat short in his speech."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He may say what he likes, and do what he likes, so long as he does not
+ come athwart my hawse when I am working the ship," said the captain. "He
+ is Governor of St. Kitt's, but I am Governor of the <i>Morning Star</i>,
+ and, by his leave, I must weigh with the first tide, for I owe a duty to
+ my employer, just as he does to King George."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He can scarce be ready to-night, for he has many things to set in order
+ before he leaves."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The early morning tide, then."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Very good. I shall send his things aboard to-night; and he will follow
+ them to-morrow early if I can prevail upon him to leave St. Kitt's without
+ seeing Sharkey do the rogue's hornpipe. His own orders were instant, so it
+ may be that he will come at once. It is likely that Dr. Larousse may
+ attend him upon the journey."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Left to themselves, the captain and mate made the best preparations which
+ they could for their illustrious passenger. The largest cabin was turned
+ out and adorned in his honour, and orders were given by which barrels of
+ fruit and some cases of wine should be brought off to vary the plain food
+ of an ocean-going trader. In the evening the Governor's baggage began to
+ arrive&mdash;great iron-bound ant-proof trunks, and official tin
+ packing-cases, with other strange-shaped packages, which suggested the
+ cocked hat or the sword within. And then there came a note, with a
+ heraldic device upon the big red seal, to say that Sir Charles Ewan made
+ his compliments to Captain Scarrow, and that he hoped to be with him in
+ the morning as early as his duties and his infirmities would permit.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He was as good as his word, for the first grey of dawn had hardly begun to
+ deepen into pink when he was brought alongside, and climbed with some
+ difficulty up the ladder. The captain had heard that the Governor was an
+ eccentric, but he was hardly prepared for the curious figure who came
+ limping feebly down his quarter-deck, his steps supported by a thick
+ bamboo cane. He wore a Ramillies wig, all twisted into little tails like a
+ poodle's coat, and cut so low across the brow that the large green glasses
+ which covered his eyes looked as if they were hung from it. A fierce beak
+ of a nose, very long and very thin, cut the air in front of him. His ague
+ had caused him to swathe his throat and chin with a broad linen cravat,
+ and he wore a loose damask powdering-gown secured by a cord round the
+ waist. As he advanced he carried his masterful nose high in the air, but
+ his head turned slowly from side to side in the helpless manner of the
+ purblind, and he called in a high, querulous voice for the captain.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You have my things?" he asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, Sir Charles."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Have you wine aboard?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have ordered five cases, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And tobacco?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There is a keg of Trinidad."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You play a hand at picquet?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Passably well, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then anchor up, and to sea!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was a fresh westerly wind, so by the time the sun was fairly through
+ the morning haze, the ship was hull down from the islands. The decrepit
+ Governor still limped the deck, with one guiding hand upon the quarter
+ rail.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are on Government service now, captain," said he. "They are counting
+ the days till I come to Westminster, I promise you. Have you all that she
+ will carry?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Every inch, Sir Charles."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Keep her so if you blow the sails out of her. I fear, Captain Scarrow,
+ that you will find a blind and broken man a poor companion for your
+ voyage."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am honoured in enjoying your Excellency's society," said the captain.
+ "But I am sorry that your eyes should be so afflicted."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, indeed. It is the cursed glare of the sun on the white streets of
+ Basseterre which has gone far to burn them out."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I had heard also that you had been plagued by a quartan ague."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes; I have had a pyrexy, which has reduced me much."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We had set aside a cabin for your surgeon."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah, the rascal! There was no budging him, for he has a snug business
+ amongst the merchants. But hark!" He raised his ring-covered band in the
+ air. From far astern there came the low, deep thunder of cannon.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is from the island!" cried the captain in astonishment. "Can it be a
+ signal for us to put back?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Governor laughed. "You have heard that Sharkey, the pirate, is to be
+ hanged this morning. I ordered the batteries to salute when the rascal was
+ kicking his last, so that I might know of it out at sea. There's an end of
+ Sharkey!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There's an end of Sharkey!" cried the captain; and the crew took up the
+ cry as they gathered in little knots upon the deck and stared back at the
+ low, purple line of the vanishing land.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a cheering omen for their start across the Western Ocean, and the
+ invalid Governor found himself a popular man on board, for it was
+ generally understood that but for his insistence upon an immediate trial
+ and sentence, the villain might have played upon some more venal judge and
+ so escaped. At dinner that day Sir Charles gave many anecdotes of the
+ deceased pirate; and so affable was he, and so skilful in adapting his
+ conversation to men of lower degree, that captain, mate, and Governor
+ smoked their long pipes, and drank their claret as three good comrades
+ should.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And what figure did Sharkey cut in the dock?" asked the captain.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He is a man of some presence," said the Governor.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I had always understood that he was an ugly, sneering devil," remarked
+ the mate.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I dare say he could look ugly upon occasions," said the Governor.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have heard a New Bedford whaleman say that he could not forget his
+ eyes," said Captain Scarrow. "They were of the lightest filmy blue, with
+ red-rimmed lids. Was that not so, Sir Charles?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Alas, my own eyes will not permit me to know much of those of others! But
+ I remember now that the adjutant-general said that he had such an eye as
+ you describe, and added that the jury was so foolish as to be visibly
+ discomposed when it was turned upon them. It is well for them that he is
+ dead, for he was a man who would never forget an injury, and if he had
+ laid hands upon any one of them he would have stuffed him with straw and
+ hung him for a figure-head."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The idea seemed to amuse the Governor, for he broke suddenly into a high,
+ neighing laugh, and the two seamen laughed also, but not so heartily, for
+ they remembered that Sharkey was not the last pirate who sailed the
+ western seas, and that as grotesque a fate might come to be their own.
+ Another bottle was broached to drink to a pleasant voyage, and the
+ Governor would drink just one other on the top of it, so that the seamen
+ were glad at last to stagger off&mdash;the one to his watch, and the other
+ to his bunk. But when, after his four hours' spell, the mate came down
+ again, he was amazed to see the Governor, in his Ramillies wig, his
+ glasses, and his powdering-gown, still seated sedately at the lonely table
+ with his reeking pipe and six black bottles by his side.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have drunk with the Governor of St. Kitt's when he was sick," said he,
+ "and God forbid that I should ever try to keep pace with him when he is
+ well."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The voyage of the <i>Morning Star</i> was a successful one, and in about
+ three weeks she was at the mouth of the British Channel. From the first
+ day the infirm Governor had begun to recover his strength, and before they
+ were halfway across the Atlantic, he was, save only for his eyes, as well
+ as any man upon the ship. Those who uphold the nourishing qualities of
+ wine might point to him in triumph, for never a night passed that he did
+ not repeat the performance of his first one. And yet he would be out upon
+ deck in the early morning as fresh and brisk as the best of them, peering
+ about with his weak eyes, and asking questions about the sails and the
+ rigging, for he was anxious to learn the ways of the sea. And he made up
+ for the deficiency of his eyes by obtaining leave from the captain that
+ the New England seaman&mdash;he who had been cast away in the boat&mdash;should
+ lead him about, and, above all, that he should sit beside him when he
+ played cards and count the number of the pips, for unaided he could not
+ tell the king from the knave.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was natural that this Evanson should do the Governor willing service,
+ since the one was the victim of the vile Sharkey and the other was his
+ avenger. One could see that it was a pleasure to the big American to lend
+ his arm to the invalid, and at night he would stand with all respect
+ behind his chair in the cabin and lay his great stub-nailed forefinger
+ upon the card which he should play. Between them there was little in the
+ pockets either of Captain Scarrow or of Morgan, the first mate, by the
+ time they sighted the Lizard.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And it was not long before they found that all they had heard of the high
+ temper of Sir Charles Ewan fell short of the mark. At a sign of opposition
+ or a word of argument his chin would shoot out from his cravat, his
+ masterful nose would be cocked at a higher and more insolent angle, and
+ his bamboo cane would whistle up over his shoulders. He cracked it once
+ over the head of the carpenter when the man had accidentally jostled him
+ upon the deck. Once, too, when there was some grumbling and talk of a
+ mutiny over the state of the provisions, he was of opinion that they
+ should not wait for the dogs to rise, but that they should march forward
+ and set upon them until they had trounced the devilment out of them. "Give
+ me a knife and a bucket!" he cried with an oath, and could hardly be
+ withheld from setting forth alone to deal with the spokesman of the
+ seamen.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Scarrow had to remind him that though he might be only answerable
+ to himself at St. Kitt's, killing became murder upon the high seas. In
+ politics he was, as became his official position, a stout prop of the
+ House of Hanover, and he swore in his cups that he had never met a
+ Jacobite without pistolling him where he stood. Yet for all his vapouring
+ and his violence he was so good a companion, with such a stream of strange
+ anecdote and reminiscence, that Scarrow and Morgan had never known a
+ voyage pass so pleasantly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And then at length came the last day, when, after passing the island, they
+ had struck land again at the high white cliffs at Beachy Head. As evening
+ fell the ship lay rolling in an oily calm, a league off from Winchelsea,
+ with the long, dark snout of Dungeness jutting out in front of her. Next
+ morning they would pick up their pilot at the Foreland, and Sir Charles
+ might meet the King's ministers at Westminster before the evening. The
+ boatswain had the watch, and the three friends were met for a last turn of
+ cards in the cabin, the faithful American still serving as eyes to the
+ Governor. There was a good stake upon the table, for the sailors had tried
+ on this last night to win their losses back from their passenger. Suddenly
+ he threw his cards down, and swept all the money into the pocket of his
+ long-flapped silken waistcoat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The game's mine!" said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Heh, Sir Charles, not so fast!" cried Captain Scarrow; "you have not
+ played out the hand, and we are not the losers."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sink you for a liar!" said the Governor. "I tell you I <i>have</i> played
+ out the hand, and that you <i>are</i> a loser." He whipped off his wig and
+ his glasses as he spoke, and there was a high, bald forehead, and a pair
+ of shifty blue eyes with the red rims of a bull terrier.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good God!" cried the mate. "It's Sharkey!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The two sailors sprang from their seats, but the big American castaway had
+ put his huge back against the cabin door, and he held a pistol in each of
+ his hands. The passenger had also laid a pistol upon the scattered cards
+ in front of him, and he burst into his high, neighing laugh. "Captain
+ Sharkey is the name, gentlemen," said he, "and this is Roaring Ned
+ Galloway, the quartermaster of the <i>Happy Delivery</i>. We made it hot,
+ and so they marooned us: me on a dry Tortuga cay, and him in an oarless
+ boat. You dogs&mdash;you poor, fond, water-hearted dogs&mdash; we hold you
+ at the end of our pistols!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You may shoot, or you may not!" cried Scarrow, striking his hand upon the
+ breast of his frieze jacket. "If it's my last breath, Sharkey, I tell you
+ that you are a bloody rogue and miscreant, with a halter and hell-fire in
+ store for you!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There's a man of spirit, and one of my own kidney, and he's going to make
+ a very pretty death of it!" cried Sharkey. "There's no one aft save the
+ man at the wheel, so you may keep your breath, for you'll need it soon. Is
+ the dinghy astern, Ned?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ay, ay, captain!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And the other boats scuttled?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I bored them all in three places."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then we shall have to leave you, Captain Scarrow. You look as if you
+ hadn't quite got your bearings yet. Is there anything you'd like to ask
+ me?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I believe you're the devil himself!" cried the captain. "Where is the
+ Governor of St. Kitt's?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "When last I saw him his Excellency was in bed with his throat cut. When I
+ broke prison I learnt from my friends&mdash;for Captain Sharkey has those
+ who love him in every port&mdash;that the Governor was starting for Europe
+ under a master who had never seen him. I climbed his verandah, and I paid
+ him the little debt that I owed him. Then I came aboard you with such of
+ his things as I had need of, and a pair of glasses to hide these tell-tale
+ eyes of mine, and I have ruffled it as a governor should. Now, Ned, you
+ can get to work upon them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Help! Help! Watch ahoy!" yelled the mate; but the butt of the pirate's
+ pistol crashed down on his head, and he dropped like a pithed ox. Scarrow
+ rushed for the door, but the sentinel clapped his hand over his mouth, and
+ threw his other arm round his waist.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No use, Master Scarrow," said Sharkey. "Let us see you go down on your
+ knees and beg for your life."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll see you&mdash;" cried Scarrow, shaking his mouth clear.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Twist his arm round, Ned. Now will you?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No; not if you twist it off."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Put an inch of your knife into him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You may put six inches, and then I won't."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sink me, but I like his spirit!" cried Sharkey. "Put your knife in your
+ pocket, Ned. You've saved your skin, Scarrow, and it's a pity so stout a
+ man should not take to the only trade where a pretty fellow can pick up a
+ living. You must be born for no common death, Scarrow, since you have lain
+ at my mercy and lived to tell the story. Tie him up, Ned."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "To the stove, captain?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Tut, tut! there's a fire in the stove. None of your rover tricks, Ned
+ Galloway, unless they are called for, or I'll let you know which of us two
+ is captain and which is quartermaster. Make him fast to the table."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Nay, I thought you meant to roast him!" said the quartermaster. "You
+ surely do not mean to let him go?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If you and I were marooned on a Bahama cay, Ned Galloway, it is still for
+ me to command and for you to obey. Sink you for a villain, do you dare to
+ question my orders?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Nay, nay, Captain Sharkey, not so hot, sir!" said the quartermaster, and,
+ lifting Scarrow like a child, he laid him on the table. With the quick
+ dexterity of a seaman, he tied his spread-eagled hands and feet with a
+ rope which was passed underneath, and gagged him securely with the long
+ cravat which used to adorn the chin of the Governor of St. Kitt's.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Now, Captain Scarrow, we must take our leave of you," said the pirate.
+ "If I had half a dozen of my brisk boys at my heels I should have had your
+ cargo and your ship, but Roaring Ned could not find a foremast hand with
+ the spirit of a mouse. I see there are some small craft about, and we
+ shall get one of them. When Captain Sharkey has a boat he can get a smack,
+ when he has a smack he can get a brig, when he has a brig he can get a
+ barque, and when he has a barque he'll soon have a full-rigged ship of his
+ own&mdash;so make haste into London town, or I may be coming back, after
+ all, for the <i>Morning Star</i>."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Scarrow heard the key turn in the lock as they left the cabin.
+ Then, as he strained at his bonds, he heard their footsteps pass up the
+ companion and along the quarter-deck to where the dinghy hung in the
+ stern. Then, still struggling and writhing, he heard the creak of the
+ falls and the splash of the boat in the water. In a mad fury he tore and
+ dragged at his ropes, until at last, with flayed wrists and ankles, he
+ rolled from the table, sprang over the dead mate, kicked his way through
+ the closed door, and rushed hatless on to the deck.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ahoy! Peterson, Armitage, Wilson!" he screamed. "Cutlasses and pistols!
+ Clear away the long-boat! Clear away the gig! Sharkey, the pirate, is in
+ yonder dinghy. Whistle up the larboard watch, bo'sun, and tumble into the
+ boats, all hands."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Down splashed the long-boat and down splashed the gig, but in an instant
+ the coxswains and crews were swarming up the falls on to the deck once
+ more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The boats are scuttled!" they cried. "They are leaking like a sieve."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The captain gave a bitter curse. He had been beaten and outwitted at every
+ point. Above was a cloudless, starlit sky, with neither wind nor the
+ promise of it. The sails flapped idly in the moonlight. Far away lay a
+ fishing-smack, with the men clustering over their net. Close to them was
+ the little dinghy, dipping and lifting over the shining swell.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They are dead men!" cried the captain. "A shout all together, boys, to
+ warn them of their danger." But it was too late. At that very moment the
+ dinghy shot into the shadow of the fishing-boat. There were two rapid
+ pistol-shots, a scream, and then another pistol-shot, followed by silence.
+ The clustering fishermen had disappeared. And then, suddenly, as the first
+ puffs of a land-breeze came out from the Sussex shore, the boom swung out,
+ the mainsail filled, and the little craft crept out with her nose to the
+ Atlantic.
+ </p>
+<p class="center big">
+ II
+</p>
+ <h3>
+ THE DEALINGS OF CAPTAIN SHARKEY WITH STEPHEN CRADDOCK
+ </h3>
+ <p>
+ Careening was a very necessary operation for the old pirate. On his
+ superior speed he depended both for overhauling the trader and escaping
+ the man-of-war. But it was impossible to retain his sailing qualities
+ unless he periodically&mdash;once a year, at the least&mdash;cleared his
+ vessel's bottom from the long, trailing plants and crusting barnacles
+ which gather so rapidly in the tropical seas. For this purpose he
+ lightened his vessel, thrust her into some narrow inlet where she would be
+ left high and dry at low water, fastened blocks and tackles to her masts
+ to pull her over on to her bilge, and then scraped her thoroughly from
+ rudder-post to cut-water.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ During the weeks which were thus occupied the ship was, of course,
+ defenceless; but, on the other hand, she was unapproachable by anything
+ heavier than an empty hull, and the place for careening was chosen with an
+ eye to secrecy, so that there was no great danger. So secure did the
+ captains feel, that it was not uncommon for them, at such times, to leave
+ their ships under a sufficient guard, and to start off in the long-boat,
+ either upon a sporting expedition or, more frequently, upon a visit to
+ some outlying town, where they burned the heads of the women by their
+ swaggering gallantry, or broached pipes of wine in the market square, with
+ a threat to pistol all who would not drink with them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Sometimes they would even appear in cities of the size of Charleston, and
+ walk the streets with their clattering side-arms&mdash;an open scandal to
+ the whole law-abiding colony. Such visits were not always paid with
+ impunity. It was one of them, for example, which provoked Lieutenant
+ Maynard to hack off Blackbeard's head, and to spear it upon the end of his
+ bowsprit. But, as a rule, the pirate ruffled and bullied and drabbed
+ without let or hindrance, until it was time for him to go back to his ship
+ once more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was one pirate, however, who never crossed even the skirts of
+ civilisation, and that was the sinister Sharkey, of the barque <i>Happy
+ Delivery</i>. It may have been from his morose and solitary temper, or, as
+ is more probable, that he knew that his name upon the coast was such that
+ outraged humanity would, against all odds, have thrown themselves upon
+ him, but never once did he show his face in a settlement.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ When his ship was laid up he would leave her under the charge of Ned
+ Galloway&mdash;her New England quartermaster&mdash;and would take long
+ voyages in his boat, sometimes, it was said, for the purpose of burying
+ his share of the plunder, and sometimes to shoot the wild oxen of
+ Hispaniola, which, when dressed and barbecued, provided provisions for his
+ next voyage. In the latter case the barque would come round to some
+ pre-arranged spot to pick him up, and take on board what he had shot.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There had always been a hope in the islands that Sharkey might be taken on
+ one of these occasions; and at last there came news to Kingston which
+ seemed to justify an attempt upon him. It was brought by an elderly
+ logwood-cutter who had fallen into the pirate's hands, and in some freak
+ of drunken benevolence had been allowed to get away with nothing worse
+ than a slit nose and a drubbing. His account was recent and definite. The
+ <i>Happy Delivery</i> was careening at Torbec on the south-west of
+ Hispaniola. Sharkey, with four men, was buccaneering on the outlying
+ island of La Vache. The blood of a hundred murdered crews was calling out
+ for vengeance, and now at last it seemed as if it might not call in vain.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Sir Edward Compton, the high-nosed, red-faced Governor, sitting in solemn
+ conclave with the commandant and the head of the council, was sorely
+ puzzled in his mind as to how he should use this chance. There was no
+ man-of-war nearer than Jamestown, and she was a clumsy old fly-boat, which
+ could neither overhaul the pirate on the seas, nor reach her in a shallow
+ inlet. There were forts and artillerymen both at Kingston and Port Royal,
+ but no soldiers available for an expedition.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A private venture might be fitted out&mdash;and there were many who had a
+ blood-feud with Sharkey&mdash;but what could a private venture do? The
+ pirates were numerous and desperate. As to taking Sharkey and his four
+ companions, that, of course, would be easy if they could get at them; but
+ how were they to get at them on a large well-wooded island like La Vache,
+ full of wild hills and impenetrable jungles? A reward was offered to
+ whoever could find a solution, and that brought a man to the front who had
+ a singular plan, and was himself prepared to carry it out.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Stephen Craddock had been that most formidable person, the Puritan gone
+ wrong. Sprung from a decent Salem family, his ill-doing seemed to be a
+ recoil from the austerity of their religion, and he brought to vice all
+ the physical strength and energy with which the virtues of his ancestors
+ had endowed him. He was ingenious, fearless, and exceedingly tenacious of
+ purpose, so that when he was still young, his name became notorious upon
+ the American coast. He was the same Craddock who was tried for his life in
+ Virginia for the slaying of the Seminole Chief, and, though he escaped, it
+ was well known that he had corrupted the witnesses and bribed the judge.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Afterwards, as a slaver, and even, as it was hinted, as a pirate, he had
+ left an evil name behind him in the Bight of Benin. Finally he had
+ returned to Jamaica with a considerable fortune, and had settled down to a
+ life of sombre dissipation. This was the man, gaunt, austere, and
+ dangerous, who now waited upon the Governor with a plan for the
+ extirpation of Sharkey. Sir Edward received him with little enthusiasm,
+ for in spite of some rumours of conversion and reformation, he had always
+ regarded him as an infected sheep who might taint the whole of his little
+ flock. Craddock saw the Governor's mistrust under his thin veil of formal
+ and restrained courtesy.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You've no call to fear me, sir," said he; "I'm a changed man from what
+ you've known. I've seen the light again of late, after losing sight of it
+ for many a black year. It was through the ministration of the Rev. John
+ Simons, of our own people. Sir, if your spirit should be in need of
+ quickening, you would find a very sweet savour in his discourse."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Governor cocked his episcopalian nose at him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You came here to speak of Sharkey, Master Craddock," said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The man Sharkey is a vessel of wrath," said Craddock. "His wicked horn
+ has been exalted over long, and it is borne in upon me that if I can cut
+ him off and utterly destroy him, it will be a goodly deed, and one which
+ may atone for many backslidings in the past. A plan has been given to me
+ whereby I may encompass his destruction."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Governor was keenly interested, for there was a grim and practical air
+ about the man's freckled face which showed that he was in earnest. After
+ all, he was a seaman and a fighter, and, if it were true that he was eager
+ to atone for his past, no better man could be chosen for the business.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This will be a dangerous task, Master Craddock," said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If I meet my death at it, it may be that it will cleanse the memory of an
+ ill-spent life. I have much to atone for."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Governor did not see his way to contradict him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What was your plan?" he asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You have heard that Sharkey's barque, the <i>Happy Delivery</i>, came
+ from this very port of Kingston?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It belonged to Mr. Codrington, and it was taken by Sharkey, who scuttled
+ his own sloop and moved into her because she was faster," said Sir Edward.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes; but it may be that you have lever heard that Mr. Codrington has a
+ sister ship, the <i>White Rose</i>, which lies even now in the harbour,
+ and which is so like the pirate, that, if it were not for a white paint
+ line, none could tell them apart."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah! and what of that?" asked the Governor keenly, with the air of one who
+ is just on the edge of an idea.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "By the help of it this man shall be delivered into our hands."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And how?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I will paint out the streak upon the <i>White Rose</i>, and make it in
+ all things like the <i>Happy Delivery</i>. Then I will set sail for the
+ Island of La Vache, where this man is slaying the wild oxen. When he sees
+ me he will surely mistake me for his own vessel which he is awaiting, and
+ he will come on board to his own undoing."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a simple plan, and yet it seemed to the Governor that it might be
+ effective. Without hesitation he gave Craddock permission to carry it out,
+ and to take any steps he liked in order to further the object which he had
+ in view. Sir Edward was not very sanguine, for many attempts had been made
+ upon Sharkey, and their results had shown that he was as cunning as he was
+ ruthless. But this gaunt Puritan with the evil record was cunning and
+ ruthless also. The contest of wits between two such men as Sharkey and
+ Craddock appealed to the Governor's acute sense of sport, and though he
+ was inwardly convinced that the chances were against him, he backed his
+ man with the same loyalty which he would have shown to his horse or his
+ cock.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Haste was, above all things, necessary, for upon any day the careening
+ might be finished, and the pirates out at sea once more. But there was not
+ very much to do, and there were many willing hands to do it, so the second
+ day saw the <i>White Rose</i> beating out for the open sea. There were
+ many seamen in the port who knew the lines and rig of the pirate barque,
+ and not one of them could see the slightest difference in this
+ counterfeit. Her white side line had been painted out, her masts and yards
+ were smoked, to give them the dingy appearance of the weather-beaten
+ rover, and a large diamond-shaped patch was let into her foretopsail. Her
+ crew were volunteers, many of them being men who had sailed with Stephen
+ Craddock before&mdash;the mate, Joshua Hird, an old slaver, had been his
+ accomplice in many voyages, and came now at the bidding of his chief.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The avenging barque sped across the Caribbean Sea, and, at the sight of
+ that patched topsail, the little craft which they met flew left and right
+ like frightened trout in a pool. On the fourth evening Point Abacou bore
+ five miles to the north and east of them. On the fifth they were at anchor
+ in the Bay of Tortoises at the Island of La Vache, where Sharkey and his
+ four men had been hunting. It was a well-wooded place, with the palms and
+ underwood growing down to the thin crescent of silver sand which skirted
+ the shore. They had hoisted the black flag and the red pennant, but no
+ answer came from the shore. Craddock strained his eyes, hoping every
+ instant to see a boat shoot out to them with Sharkey seated in the sheets.
+ But the night passed away, and a day and yet another night, without any
+ sign of the men whom they were endeavouring to trap. It looked as if they
+ were already gone.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ On the second morning Craddock went ashore in search of some proof whether
+ Sharkey and his men were still upon the island. What he found reassured
+ him greatly. Close to the shore was a boucan of green wood, such as was
+ used for preserving the meat, and a great store of barbecued strips of
+ ox-flesh was hung upon lines all round it. The pirate ship had not taken
+ off her provisions, and therefore the hunters were still upon the island.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Why had they not shown themselves? Was it that they had detected that this
+ was not their own ship? Or was it that they were hunting in the interior
+ of the island, and were not on the look-out for a ship yet? Craddock was
+ still hesitating between the two alternatives, when a Carib Indian came
+ down with information. The pirates were in the island, he said, and their
+ camp was a day's march from the Sea. They had stolen his wife, and the
+ marks of their stripes were still pink upon his brown back. Their enemies
+ were his friends, and he would lead them to where they lay.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Craddock could not have asked for anything better; so early next morning,
+ with a small party armed to the teeth, he set off, under the guidance of
+ the Carib. All day they struggled through brushwood and clambered over
+ rocks, pushing their way further and further into the desolate heart of
+ the island. Here and there they found traces of the hunters, the bones of
+ a slain ox, or the marks of feet in a morass, and once, towards evening,
+ it seemed to some of them that they heard the distant rattle of guns.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ That night they spent under the trees, and pushed on again with the
+ earliest light. About noon they came to the huts of bark, which, the Carib
+ told them, were the camp of the hunters, but they were silent and
+ deserted. No doubt their occupants were away at the hunt and would return
+ in the evening, so Craddock and his men lay in ambush in the brushwood
+ around them. But no one came, and another night was spent in the forest.
+ Nothing more could be done, and it seemed to Craddock that after the two
+ days' absence it was time that he returned to his ship once more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The return journey was less difficult, as they had already blazed a path
+ for themselves. Before evening they found themselves once more at the Bay
+ of Palms, and saw their ship riding at anchor where they had left her.
+ Their boat and oars had been hauled up among the bushes, so they launched
+ it and pulled out to the barque.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No luck, then!" cried Joshua Hird, the mate, looking down with a pale
+ face from the poop.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "His camp was empty, but he may come down to us yet," said Craddock, with
+ his hand on the ladder.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Somebody upon deck began to laugh. "I think," said the mate, "that these
+ men had better stay in the boat."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why so?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If you will come aboard, sir, you will understand it." He spoke in a
+ curious, hesitating fashion.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The blood flushed to Craddock's gaunt face. "How is this, Master Hird?" he
+ cried, springing up the side. "What mean you by giving orders to my boat's
+ crew?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But as he passed over the bulwarks, with one foot upon the deck and one
+ knee upon the rail, a tow-bearded man, whom he had never before observed
+ aboard his vessel, grabbed suddenly at his pistol. Craddock clutched at
+ the fellow's wrist, but at the same instant his mate snatched the cutlass
+ from his side.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What roguery is this?" shouted Craddock, looking furiously around him.
+ But the crew stood in knots about the deck, laughing and whispering
+ amongst themselves without showing any desire to go to his assistance.
+ Even in that hurried glance Craddock noticed that they were dressed in the
+ most singular manner, with long riding-coats, full-skirted velvet gowns
+ and coloured ribands at their knees, more like men of fashion than seamen.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ As he looked at their grotesque figures he struck his brow with his
+ clenched fist to be sure that he was awake. The deck seemed to be much
+ dirtier than when he had left it, and there were strange, sun-blackened
+ faces turned upon him from every side. Not one of them did he know save
+ only Joshua Hird. Had the ship been captured in his absence? Were these
+ Sharkey's men who were around him? At the thought he broke furiously away
+ and tried to climb over to his boat, but a dozen hands were on him in an
+ instant, and he was pushed aft through the open door of his own cabin.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And it was all different to the cabin which he had left. The floor was
+ different, the ceiling was different, the furniture was different. His had
+ been plain and austere. This was sumptuous and yet dirty, hung with rare
+ velvet curtains splashed with wine-stains, and panelled with costly woods
+ which were pocked with pistol-marks.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ On the table was a great chart of the Caribbean Sea, and beside it, with
+ compasses in his hand, sat a clean-shaven, pale-faced man with a fur cap
+ and a claret-coloured coat of damask. Craddock turned white under his
+ freckles as he looked upon the long, thin high-nostrilled nose and the
+ red-rimmed eyes which were turned upon him with the fixed, humorous gaze
+ of the master player who has left his opponent without a move. "Sharkey!"
+ cried Craddock.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Sharkey's thin lips opened, and he broke into his high, sniggering laugh.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You fool!" he cried, and, leaning over, he stabbed Craddock's shoulder
+ again and again with his compasses. "You poor, dull-witted fool, would you
+ match yourself against me?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was not the pain of the wounds, but it was the contempt in Sharkey's
+ voice which turned Craddock into a savage madman. He flew at the pirate,
+ roaring with rage, striking, kicking, writhing, foaming. It took six men
+ to drag him down on to the floor amidst the splintered remains of the
+ table&mdash;and not one of the six who did not bear the prisoner's mark
+ upon him. But Sharkey still surveyed him with the same contemptuous eye.
+ From outside there came the crash of breaking wood and the clamour of
+ startled voices.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What is that?" asked Sharkey.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They have stove the boat with cold shot, and the men are in the water."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Let them stay there," said the pirate. "Now, Craddock, you know where you
+ are. You are aboard my ship, the <i>Happy Delivery</i>, and you lie at my
+ mercy. I knew you for a stout seaman, you rogue, before you took to this
+ long-shore canting. Your hands then were no cleaner than my own. Will you
+ sign articles, as your mate has done, and join us, or shall I heave you
+ over to follow your ship's company?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where is my ship?" asked Craddock.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Scuttled in the bay."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And the hands?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In the bay, too."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then I'm for the bay, also."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Hock him and heave him over," said Sharkey.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Many rough hands had dragged Craddock out upon deck, and Galloway, the
+ quartermaster, had already drawn his hanger to cripple him, when Sharkey
+ came hurrying from his cabin with an eager face. "We can do better with
+ the hound!" he cried. "Sink me if it is not a rare plan. Throw him into
+ the sail-room with the irons on, and do you come here, quartermaster,
+ that I may tell you what I have in my mind."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So Craddock, bruised and wounded in soul and body, was thrown into the
+ dark sail-room, so fettered that he could not stir hand or foot, but his
+ Northern blood was running strong in his veins, and his grim spirit
+ aspired only to make such an ending as might go some way towards atoning
+ for the evil of his life. All night he lay in the curve of the bilge
+ listening to the rush of the water and the straining of the timbers which
+ told him that the ship was at sea and driving fast. In the early morning
+ someone came crawling to him in the darkness over the heap of sails.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Here's rum and biscuits," said the voice of his late mate. "It's at the
+ risk of my life, Master Craddock, that I bring them to you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It was you who trapped me and caught me as in a snare!" cried Craddock.
+ "How shall you answer for what you have done?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What I did I did with the point of a knife betwixt my blade-bones."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "God forgive you for a coward, Joshua Hird. How came you into their
+ hands?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why, Master Craddock, the pirate ship came back from its careening upon
+ the very day that you left us. They laid us aboard, and, short-handed as
+ we were, with the best of the men ashore with you, we could offer but a
+ poor defence. Some were cut down, and they were the happiest. The others
+ were killed afterwards. As to me, I saved my life by signing on with
+ them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And they scuttled my ship?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They scuttled her, and then Sharkey and his men, who had been watching us
+ from the brushwood, came off to the ship. His mainyard had been cracked
+ and fished last voyage, so he had suspicions of us, seeing that ours was
+ whole. Then he thought of laying the same trap for you which you had set
+ for him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Craddock groaned. "How came I not to see that fished mainyard?" he
+ muttered. "But whither are we bound?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We are running north and west."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "North and west! Then we are heading back towards Jamaica."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "With an eight-knot wind."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Have you heard what they mean to do with me?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have not heard. If you would but sign the articles&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Enough, Joshua Hird! I have risked my soul too often."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "As you wish. I have done what I could. Farewell!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ All that night and the next day the <i>Happy Delivery</i> ran before the
+ easterly trades, and Stephen Craddock lay in the dark of the sail-room
+ working patiently at his wrist-irons. One he had slipped off at the cost
+ of a row of broken and bleeding knuckles, but, do what he would, he could
+ not free the other, and his ankles were securely fastened. From hour to
+ hour he heard the swish of the water, and knew that the barque must be
+ driving with all set in front of the trade wind. In that case they must be
+ nearly back again to Jamaica by now. What plan could Sharkey have in his
+ head, and what use did he hope to make of him? Craddock set his teeth, and
+ vowed that if he had once been a villain from choice he would, at least,
+ never be one by compulsion.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ On the second morning Craddock became aware that sail had been reduced in
+ the vessel, and that she was tacking slowly, with a light breeze on her
+ beam. The varying slope of the sail-room and the sounds from the deck told
+ his practised senses exactly what she was doing. The short reaches showed
+ him that she was manoeuvring near shore, and making for some definite
+ point. If so, she must have reached Jamaica. But what could she be doing
+ there?
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And then suddenly there was a burst of hearty cheering from the deck, and
+ then the crash of a gun above his head, and then the answering booming of
+ guns from far over the water. Craddock sat up and strained his ears. Was
+ the ship in action? Only the one gun had been fired, and though many had
+ answered, there were none of the crashings which told of a shot coming
+ home. Then, if it was not an action, it must be a salute. But who would
+ salute Sharkey, the pirate? It could only be another pirate ship which
+ would do so. So Craddock lay back again with a groan, and continued to
+ work at the manacle which still held his right wrist. But suddenly there
+ came the shuffling of steps outside, and he had hardly time to wrap the
+ loose links round his free hand, when the door was unbolted and two
+ pirates came in.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Got your hammer, carpenter?" asked one, whom Craddock recognised as the
+ big quartermaster.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Knock off his leg shackles, then. Better leave the bracelets&mdash;he's
+ safer with them on."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ With hammer and chisel the carpenter loosened the irons.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What are you going to do with me?" asked Craddock.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Come on deck and you'll see."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The sailor seized him by the arm and dragged him roughly to the foot of
+ the companion. Above him was a square of blue sky cut across by the mizzen
+ gaff, with the colours flying at the peak. But it was the sight of those
+ colours which struck the breath from Stephen Craddock's lips. For there
+ were two of them, and the British ensign was flying above the Jolly Rodger&mdash;the
+ honest flag above that of the rogue.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ For an instant Craddock stopped in amazement, but a brutal push from the
+ pirates behind drove him up the companion ladder. As he stepped out upon
+ deck, his eyes turned up to the main, and there again were the British
+ colours flying above the red pennant, and all the shrouds and rigging were
+ garlanded with streamers.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Had the ship been taken, then? But that was impossible, for there were the
+ pirates clustering in swarms along the port bulwarks, and waving their
+ hats joyously in the air. Most prominent of all was the renegade mate,
+ standing on the foc'sle head, and gesticulating wildly. Craddock looked
+ over the side to see what they were cheering at, and then in a flash he
+ saw how critical was the moment.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ On the port bow, and about a mile off, lay the white houses and forts of
+ Port Royal, with flags breaking out everywhere over their roofs. Right
+ ahead was the opening of the palisades leading to the town of Kingston.
+ Not more than a quarter of a mile off was a small sloop working out
+ against the very slight wind. The British ensign was at her peak, and her
+ rigging was all decorated. On her deck could be seen a dense crowd of
+ people cheering and waving their hats, and the gleam of scarlet told that
+ there were officers of the garrison among them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ In an instant, with the quick perception of a man of action, Craddock saw
+ through it all. Sharkey, with that diabolical cunning and audacity which
+ were among his main characteristics, was simulating the part which
+ Craddock would himself have played had he come back victorious. It was in
+ <i>his</i> honour that the salutes were firing and the flags flying. It
+ was to welcome <i>him</i> that this ship with the Governor, the
+ commandant, and the chiefs of the island were approaching. In another ten
+ minutes they would all be under the guns of the <i>Happy Delivery</i>, and
+ Sharkey would have won the greatest stake that ever a pirate played for
+ yet.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Bring him forward," cried the pirate captain, as Craddock appeared
+ between the carpenter and the quartermaster. "Keep the ports closed, but
+ clear away the port guns, and stand by for a broadside. Another two cable
+ lengths and we have them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They are edging away," said the boatswain. "I think they smell us."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's soon set right," said Sharkey, turning his filmy eyes upon
+ Craddock. "Stand there, you&mdash;right there, where they can recognise
+ you, with your hand on the guy, and wave your hat to them. Quick, or your
+ brains will be over your coat. Put an inch of your knife into him, Ned.
+ Now, will you wave your hat? Try him again, then. Hey, shoot him! Stop
+ him!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But it was too late. Relying upon the manacles, the quartermaster had
+ taken his hands for a moment off Craddock's arm. In that instant he had
+ flung off the carpenter, and, amid a spatter of pistol bullets, had sprung
+ the bulwarks and was swimming for his life. He had been hit and hit again,
+ but it takes many pistols to kill a resolute and powerful man who has his
+ mind set upon doing something before he dies. He was a strong swimmer,
+ and, in spite of the red trail which he left in the water behind him, he
+ was rapidly increasing his distance from the pirate. "Give me a musket!"
+ cried Sharkey, with a savage oath.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He was a famous shot, and his iron nerves never failed him in an
+ emergency. The dark head appearing on the crest of a roller, and then
+ swooping down on the other side, was already half-way to the sloop.
+ Sharkey dwelt long upon his aim before he fired. With the crack of the gun
+ the swimmer reared himself up in the water, waved his hands in a gesture
+ of warning, and roared out in a voice which rang over the bay. Then, as
+ the sloop swung round her head-sails, and the pirate fired an impotent
+ broadside, Stephen Craddock, smiling grimly in his death agony, sank
+ slowly down to that golden couch which glimmered far beneath him.
+ </p>
+<p class="center big">
+ III
+</p>
+ <h3>
+ HOW COPLEY BANKS SLEW CAPTAIN SHARKEY
+ </h3>
+ <p>
+ The Buccaneers were something higher than a mere band of marauders. They
+ were a floating republic, with laws, usages, and discipline of their own.
+ In their endless and remorseless quarrel with the Spaniards they had some
+ semblance of right upon their side. Their bloody harryings of the cities
+ of the Main were not more barbarous than the inroads of Spain upon the
+ Netherlands&mdash;or upon the Caribs in these same American lands.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The chief of the Buccaneers, were he English or French, a Morgan or a
+ Granmont, was still a responsible person, whose country might countenance
+ him, or even praise him, so long as he refrained from any deed which might
+ shock the leathery seventeenth-century conscience too outrageously. Some
+ of them were touched with religion, and it is still remembered how Sawkins
+ threw the dice overboard upon the Sabbath, and Daniel pistolled a man
+ before the altar for irreverence.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But there came a day when the fleets of the Buccaneers no longer mustered
+ at the Tortugas, and the solitary and outlawed pirate took their place.
+ Yet even with him the tradition of restraint and of discipline still
+ lingered; and among the early pirates, the Avorys, the Englands, and the
+ Robertses, there remained some respect for human sentiment. They were more
+ dangerous to the merchant than to the seaman. But they in turn were
+ replaced by more savage and desperate men, who frankly recognised that
+ they would get no quarter in their war with the human race, and who swore
+ that they would give as little as they got. Of their histories we know
+ little that is trustworthy. They wrote no memoirs and left no trace, save
+ an occasional blackened and blood-stained derelict adrift upon the face of
+ the Atlantic. Their deeds could only be surmised from the long roll of
+ ships who never made their port.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Searching the records of history, it is only here and there in an
+ old-world trial that the veil that shrouds them seems for an instant to be
+ lifted, and we catch a glimpse of some amazing and grotesque brutality
+ behind. Such was the breed of Ned Low, of Gow the Scotchman, and of the
+ infamous Sharkey, whose coal-black barque, the <i>Happy Delivery</i>, was
+ known from the Newfoundland Banks to the mouths of the Orinoco as the dark
+ forerunner of misery and of death.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There were many men, both among the islands and on the Main, who had a
+ blood feud with Sharkey, but not one who had suffered more bitterly than
+ Copley Banks, of Kingston. Banks had been one of the leading sugar
+ merchants of the West Indies. He was a man of position, a member of the
+ Council, the husband of a Percival, and the cousin of the Governor of
+ Virginia. His two sons had been sent to London to be educated, and their
+ mother had gone over to bring them back. On their return voyage the ship,
+ the <i>Duchess of Cornwall</i>, fell into the hands of Sharkey, and the
+ whole family met with an infamous death.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Copley Banks said little when he heard the news, but he sank into a morose
+ and enduring melancholy. He neglected his business, avoided his friends,
+ and spent much of his time in the low taverns of the fishermen and seamen.
+ There, amidst riot and devilry, he sat silently puffing at his pipe, with
+ a set face and a smouldering eye. It was generally supposed that his
+ misfortunes had shaken his wits, and his old friends looked at him
+ askance, for the company which he kept was enough to bar him from honest
+ men.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ From time to time there came rumours of Sharkey over the sea. Sometimes it
+ was from some schooner which had seen a great flame upon the horizon, and
+ approaching to offer help to the burning ship, had fled away at the sight
+ of the sleek, black barque, lurking like a wolf near a mangled sheep.
+ Sometimes it was a frightened trader, which had come tearing in with her
+ canvas curved like a lady's bodice, because she had seen a patched
+ foretopsail rising slowly above the violet water-line. Sometimes it was
+ from a coaster, which had found a waterless Bahama cay littered with
+ sun-dried bodies. Once there came a man who had been mate of a Guineaman,
+ and who had escaped from the pirate's hands. He could not speak&mdash;for
+ reasons which Sharkey could best supply&mdash;but he could write, and he
+ did write, to the very great interest of Copley Banks. For hours they sat
+ together over the map, and the dumb man pointed here and there to outlying
+ reefs and tortuous inlets, while his companion sat smoking in silence,
+ with his unvarying face and his fiery eyes.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ One morning, some two years after his misfortunes, Mr. Copley Banks strode
+ into his own office with his old air of energy and alertness. The manager
+ stared at him in surprise, for it was months since he had shown any
+ interest in business.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good morning, Mr. Banks!" said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good morning, Freeman. I see that <i>Ruffling Harry</i> is in the Bay."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir; she clears for the Windward Islands on Wednesday."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have other plans for her, Freeman. I have determined upon a slaving
+ venture to Whydah."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But her cargo is ready, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then it must come out again, Freeman. My mind is made up, and the <i>Ruffling
+ Harry</i> must go slaving to Whydah."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ All argument and persuasion were vain, so the manager had dolefully to
+ clear the ship once more. And then Copley Banks began to make preparations
+ for his African voyage. It appeared that he relied upon force rather than
+ barter for the filling of his hold, for he carried none of those showy
+ trinkets which savages love, but the brig was fitted with eight
+ nine-pounder guns, and racks full of muskets and cutlasses. The
+ after-sailroom next the cabin was transformed into a powder magazine, and
+ she carried as many round shot as a well-found privateer. Water and
+ provisions were shipped for a long voyage.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the preparation of his ship's company was most surprising. It made
+ Freeman, the manager, realise that there was truth in the rumour that his
+ master had taken leave of his senses. For, under one pretext or another,
+ he began to dismiss the old and tried hands, who had served the firm for
+ years, and in their place he embarked the scum of the port&mdash;men whose
+ reputations were so vile that the lowest crimp would have been ashamed to
+ furnish them. There was Birthmark Sweetlocks, who was known to have been
+ present at the killing of the logwood-cutters, so that his hideous scarlet
+ disfigurement was put down by the fanciful as being a red afterglow from
+ that great crime. He was first mate, and under him was Israel Martin, a
+ little sun-wilted fellow who had served with Howell Davies at the taking
+ of Cape Coast Castle.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The crew were chosen from amongst those whom Banks had met and known in
+ their own infamous haunts, and his own table-steward was a haggard-faced
+ man, who gobbled at you when he tried to talk. His beard had been shaved,
+ and it was impossible to recognise him as the same man whom Sharkey had
+ placed under the knife, and who had escaped to tell his experiences to
+ Copley Banks. These doings were not unnoticed, nor yet uncommented upon in
+ the town of Kingston. The Commandant of the troops&mdash;Major Harvey of
+ the Artillery&mdash;made serious representations to the Governor.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "She is not a trader, but a small warship," said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I think it would be as well to arrest Copley Banks and to seize the
+ vessel."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What do you suspect?" asked the Governor, who was a slow-witted man,
+ broken down with fevers and port wine.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I suspect," said the soldier, "that it is Stede Bonnet over again."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Now, Stede Bonnet was a planter of high reputation and religious character
+ who, from some sudden and overpowering freshet of wildness in his blood,
+ had given up everything in order to start off pirating in the Caribbean
+ Sea. The example was a recent one, and it had caused the utmost
+ consternation in the islands. Governors had before now been accused of
+ being in league with pirates, and of receiving commissions upon their
+ plunder, so that any want of vigilance was open to a sinister
+ construction.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, Major Harvey," said he, "I am vastly sorry to do anything which may
+ offend my friend Copley Banks, for many a time have my knees been under
+ his mahogany, but in face of what you say there is no choice for me but to
+ order you to board the vessel and to satisfy yourself as to her character
+ and destination."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So at one in the morning Major Harvey, with a launchful of his soldiers,
+ paid a surprise visit to the <i>Ruffling Harry</i>, with the result that
+ they picked up nothing more solid than a hempen cable floating at the
+ moorings. It had been slipped by the brig, whose owner had scented danger.
+ She had already passed the Palisades, and was beating out against the
+ north-east trades on a course for the Windward Passage.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ When upon the next morning the brig had left Morant Point a mere haze upon
+ the Southern horizon, the men were called aft, and Copley Banks revealed
+ his plans to them. He had chosen them, he said, as brisk boys and lads of
+ spirit, who would rather run some risk upon the sea than starve for a
+ living upon the shore. King's ships were few and weak, and they could
+ master any trader who might come their way. Others had done well at the
+ business, and with a handy, well-found vessel, there was no reason why
+ they should not turn their tarry jackets into velvet coats. If they were
+ prepared to sail under the black flag, he was ready to command them; but
+ if any wished to withdraw, they might have the gig and row back to
+ Jamaica.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Four men out of six-and-forty asked for their discharge, went over the
+ ship's side into the boat, and rowed away amidst the jeers and howlings of
+ the crew. The rest assembled aft, and drew up the articles of their
+ association. A square of black tarpaulin had the white skull painted upon
+ it, and was hoisted amidst cheering at the main.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Officers were elected, and the limits of their authority fixed. Copley
+ Banks was chosen captain, but, as there are no mates upon a pirate craft,
+ Birthmark Sweetlocks became quartermaster, and Israel Martin the
+ boatswain. There was no difficulty in knowing what was the custom of the
+ brotherhood, for half the men at least had served upon pirates before.
+ Food should be the same for all, and no man should interfere with another
+ man's drink! The captain should have a cabin, but all hands should be
+ welcome to enter it when they chose.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ All should share and share alike, save only the captain, quartermaster,
+ boatswain, carpenter, and master-gunner, who had from a quarter to a whole
+ share extra. He who saw a prize first should have the best weapon taken
+ out of her. He who boarded her first should have the richest suit of
+ clothes aboard of her. Every man might treat his own prisoner, be it man
+ or woman, after his own fashion. If a man flinched from his gun, the
+ quartermaster should pistol him. These were some of the rules which the
+ crew of the <i>Ruffling Harry</i> subscribed by putting forty-two crosses
+ at the foot of the paper upon which they had been drawn.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So a new rover was afloat upon the seas, and her name before a year was
+ over became as well known as that of the <i>Happy Delivery</i>. From the
+ Bahamas to the Leewards, and from the Leewards to the Windwards, Copley
+ Banks became the rival of Sharkey and the terror of traders. For a long
+ time the barque and the brig never met, which was the more singular as the
+ <i>Ruffling Harry</i> was for ever looking in at Sharkey's resorts; but at
+ last one day, when she was passing down the inlet of Coxon's Hole, at the
+ east end of Cuba, with the intention of careening, there was the <i>Happy
+ Delivery</i>, with her blocks and tackle-falls already rigged for the same
+ purpose. Copley Banks fired a shotted salute and hoisted the green
+ trumpeter ensign, as the custom was among gentlemen of the sea. Then he
+ dropped his boat and went aboard.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Sharkey was not a man of a genial mood, nor had he any kindly
+ sympathy for those who were of the same trade as himself. Copley Banks
+ found him seated astride upon one of the after guns, with his New England
+ quartermaster, Ned Galloway, and a crowd of roaring ruffians standing
+ about him. Yet none of them roared with quite such assurance when
+ Sharkey's pale face and filmy blue eyes were turned upon him. He was in his
+ shirt-sleeves, with his cambric frills breaking through his open red satin
+ long-flapped vest. The scorching sun seemed to have no power upon his
+ fleshless frame, for he wore a low fur cap, as though it had been winter.
+ A many-coloured band of silk passed across his body and supported a short,
+ murderous sword, while his broad, brass-buckled belt was stuffed with
+ pistols.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sink you for a poacher!" he cried, as Copley Banks passed over the
+ bulwarks. "I will drub you within an inch of your life, and that inch
+ also! What mean you by fishing in my waters?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Copley Banks looked at him, and his eyes were like those of a traveller
+ who sees his home at last. "I am glad that we are of one mind," said he,
+ "for I am myself of opinion that the seas are not large enough for the two
+ of us. But if you will take your sword and pistols and come upon a
+ sand-bank with me, then the world will be rid of a damned villain,
+ whichever way it goes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Now, this is talking!" said Sharkey, jumping off the gun and holding out
+ his hand. "I have not met many who could look John Sharkey in the eyes and
+ speak with a full breath. May the devil seize me if I do not choose you as
+ a consort! But if you play me false, then I will come aboard of you and
+ gut you upon your own poop."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And I pledge you the same!" said Copley Banks, and so the two pirates
+ became sworn comrades to each other.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ That summer they went north as far as the Newfoundland Banks, and harried
+ the New York traders and the whale ships from New England. It was Copley
+ Banks who captured the Liverpool ship, <i>House of Hanover</i>, but it was
+ Sharkey who fastened her master to the windlass and pelted him to death
+ with empty claret-bottles.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Together they engaged the King's ship <i>Royal Fortune</i>, which had been
+ sent in search of them, and beat her off after a night action of five
+ hours, the drunken, raving crews fighting naked in the light of the
+ battle-lanterns, with a bucket of rum and a pannikin laid by the tackles
+ of every gun. They ran to Topsail Inlet in North Carolina to refit, and
+ then in the spring they were at the Grand Caicos, ready for a long cruise
+ down the West Indies.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ By this time Sharkey and Copley Banks had become very excellent friends,
+ for Sharkey loved a whole-hearted villain, and he loved a man of metal,
+ and it seemed to him that the two met in the captain of the <i>Ruffling
+ Harry</i>. It was long before he gave his confidence to him, for cold
+ suspicion lay deep in his character. Never once would he trust himself
+ outside his own ship and away from his own men. But Copley Banks came
+ often on board the <i>Happy Delivery</i>, and joined Sharkey in many of
+ his morose debauches, so that at last any lingering misgivings of the
+ latter were set at rest. He knew nothing of the evil that he had done to
+ his new boon companion, for of his many victims how could he remember the
+ woman and the two boys whom he had slain with such levity so long ago!
+ When, therefore, he received a challenge to himself and to his
+ quartermaster for a carouse upon the last evening of their stay at the
+ Caicos Bank he saw no reason to refuse.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A well-found passenger ship had been rifled the week before, so their fare
+ was of the best, and after supper five of them drank deeply together.
+ There were the two captains, Birthmark Sweetlocks, Ned Galloway, and
+ Israel Martin, the old buccaneers-man. To wait upon them was the dumb
+ steward, whose head Sharkey split with a glass, because he had been too
+ slow in the filling of it. The quartermaster has slipped Sharkey's
+ pistols away from him, for it was an old joke with him to fire them
+ cross-handed under the table and see who was the luckiest man. It was a
+ pleasantry which had cost his boatswain his leg, so now, when the table
+ was cleared, they would coax Sharkey's weapons away from him on the excuse
+ of the heat, and lay them out of his reach.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The captain's cabin of the <i>Ruffling Harry</i> was in a deck-house upon
+ the poop, and a stern-chaser gun was mounted at the back of it. Round shot
+ were racked round the wall, and three great hogsheads of powder made a
+ stand for dishes and for bottles. In this grim room the five pirates sang
+ and roared and drank, while the silent steward still filled up their
+ glasses, and passed the box and the candle round for their tobacco-pipes.
+ Hour after hour the talk became fouler, the voices hoarser, the curses and
+ shoutings more incoherent, until three of the five had closed their
+ blood-shot eyes, and dropped their swimming heads upon the table.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Copley Banks and Sharkey were left face to face, the one because he had
+ drunk the least, the other because no amount of liquor would ever shake
+ his iron nerve or warm his sluggish blood. Behind him stood the watchful
+ steward, for ever filling up his waning glass. From without came the low
+ lapping of the tide, and from over the water a sailor's chanty from the
+ barque. In the windless tropical night the words came clearly to their
+ ears:&mdash;
+ </p>
+<p class="poetry">
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;">A trader sailed from Stepney Town,</span><br>
+ Wake her up! Shake her up! Try her with the mainsail!<br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;">A trader sailed from Stepney Town</span><br>
+ With a keg full of gold and a velvet gown.<br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;">Ho, the bully Rover Jack,</span><br>
+ Waiting with his yard aback<br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;">Out upon the Lowland Sea.</span><br>
+</p>
+ <p>
+ The two boon companions sat listening in silence. Then Copley Banks
+ glanced at the steward, and the man took a coil of rope from the shot-rack
+ behind him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Captain Sharkey," said Copley Banks, "do you remember the <i>Duchess of
+ Cornwall</i>, hailing from London, which you took and sank three years ago
+ off the Statira Shoal?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Curse me if I can bear their names in mind," said Sharkey. "We did as
+ many as ten ships a week about that time."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There were a mother and two sons among the passengers. Maybe that will
+ bring it back to your mind."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Sharkey leant back in thought, with his huge thin beak of a nose
+ jutting upwards. Then he burst suddenly into a high treble, neighing
+ laugh. He remembered it, he said, and he added details to prove it. "But
+ burn me if it had not slipped from my mind!" he cried. "How came you to
+ think of it?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It was of interest to me," said Copley Banks, "for the woman was my wife,
+ and the lads were my only sons."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Sharkey stared across at his companion, and saw that the smouldering fire
+ which lurked always in his eyes had burned up into a lurid flame. He read
+ their menace, and he clapped his hands to his empty belt. Then he turned
+ to seize a weapon, but the bight of a rope was cast round him, and in an
+ instant his arms were bound to his side. He fought like a wild cat, and
+ screamed for help. "Ned!" he yelled. "Ned! Wake up! Here's damned
+ villainy! Help, Ned!&mdash;help!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the three men were far too deeply sunk in their swinish sleep for any
+ voice to wake them. Round and round went the rope, until Sharkey was
+ swathed like a mummy from ankle to neck. They propped him stiff and
+ helpless against a powder barrel, and they gagged him with a handkerchief,
+ but his filmy, red-rimmed eyes still looked curses at them. The dumb man
+ chattered in his exultation, and Sharkey winced for the first time when he
+ saw the empty mouth before him. He understood that vengeance, slow and
+ patient, had dogged him long, and clutched him at last.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The two captors had their plans all arranged, and they were somewhat
+ elaborate. First of all they stove the heads of two of the great powder
+ barrels, and they heaped the contents out upon the table and floor. They
+ piled it round and under the three drunken men, until each sprawled in a
+ heap of it. Then they carried Sharkey to the gun and they triced him
+ sitting over the port-hole, with his body about a foot from the muzzle.
+ Wriggle as he would he could not move an inch either to the right or left,
+ and the dumb man trussed him up with a sailor's cunning, so that there was
+ no chance that he should work free.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Now, you bloody devil," said Copley Banks, softly, "you must listen to
+ what I have to say to you, for they are the last words that you will hear.
+ You are my man now, and I have bought you at a price, for I have given all
+ that a man can give here below, and I have given my soul as well.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "To reach you I have had to sink to your level. For two years I strove
+ against it, hoping that some other way might come, but I learnt that there
+ was no other. I've robbed and I have murdered&mdash;worse still, I have
+ laughed and lived with you&mdash;and all for the one end. And now my time
+ has come, and you will die as I would have you die, seeing the shadow
+ creeping upon you and the devil waiting for you in the shadow."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Sharkey could hear the hoarse voices of his rovers singing their chanty
+ over the water.
+ </p>
+<p class="poetry">
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;"> Where is the trader of Stepney Town?</span><br>
+ Wake her up! Shake her up! Every stick a-bending!<br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;"> Where is the trader of Stepney Town?</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;">His gold's on the capstan, his blood's on his gown,</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 10em;">All for bully Rover Jack,</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 10em;">Reaching on the weather tack</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;"> Right across the Lowland Sea.</span><br>
+</p>
+ <p>
+ The words came clear to his ear, and just outside he could hear two men
+ pacing backwards and forwards upon the deck. And yet he was helpless,
+ staring down the mouth of the nine-pounder, unable to move an inch or to
+ utter so much as a groan. Again there came the burst of voices from the
+ deck of the barque.
+ </p>
+<p class="poetry">
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;"> So it's up and it's over to Stornoway Bay,</span><br>
+ Pack it on! Crack it on! Try her with stunsails!<br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;"> It's off on a bowline to Stornoway Bay,</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;"> Where the liquor is good and the lasses are gay,</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 10em;">Waiting for their bully Jack,</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 10em;">Watching for him sailing back,</span><br>
+ <span style="margin-left: 5em;"> Right across the Lowland Sea.</span><br>
+</p>
+ <p>
+ To the dying pirate the jovial words and rollicking tune made his own fate
+ seem the harsher, but there was no softening in those venomous blue eyes.
+ Copley Banks had brushed away the priming of the gun, and had sprinkled
+ fresh powder over the touch-hole. Then he had taken up the candle and cut
+ it to the length of about an inch. This he placed upon the loose powder at
+ the breach of the gun. Thin he scattered powder thickly over the floor
+ beneath, so that when the candle fell at the recoil it must explode the
+ huge pile in which the three drunkards were wallowing.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You've made others look death in the face, Sharkey," said he; "now it has
+ come to be your own turn. You and these swine here shall go together!" He
+ lit the candle-end as he spoke, and blew out the other lights upon the
+ table. Then he passed out with the dumb man, and locked the cabin door
+ upon the outer side. But before he closed it he took an exultant look
+ backwards, and received one last curse from those unconquerable eyes. In
+ the single dim circle of light that ivory-white face, with the gleam of
+ moisture upon the high, bald forehead, was the last that was ever seen of
+ Sharkey.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was a skiff alongside, and in it Copley Banks and the dumb steward
+ made their way to the beach, and looked back upon the brig riding in the
+ moonlight just outside the shadow of the palm trees. They waited and
+ waited watching that dim light which shone through the stem port. And then
+ at last there came the dull thud of a gun, and an instant later the
+ shattering crash of an explosion. The long, sleek, black barque, the sweep
+ of white sand, and the fringe of nodding feathery palm trees sprang into
+ dazzling light and back into darkness again. Voices screamed and called
+ upon the bay.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Then Copley Banks, his heart singing within him, touched his companion
+ upon the shoulder, and they plunged together into the lonely jungle of the
+ Caicos.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE CROXLEY MASTER
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Robert Montgomery was seated at his desk, his head upon his hands, in
+ a state of the blackest despondency. Before him was the open ledger with
+ the long columns of Dr. Oldacre's prescriptions. At his elbow lay the
+ wooden tray with the labels in various partitions, the cork box, the lumps
+ of twisted sealing-wax, while in front a rank of bottles waited to be
+ filled. But his spirits were too low for work. He sat in silence with his
+ fine shoulders bowed and his head upon his hands.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Outside, through the grimy surgery window over a foreground of blackened
+ brick and slate, a line of enormous chimneys like Cyclopean pillars upheld
+ the lowering, dun-coloured cloud-bank. For six days in the week they
+ spouted smoke, but to-day the furnace fires were banked, for it was
+ Sunday. Sordid and polluting gloom hung over a district blighted and
+ blasted by the greed of man. There was nothing in the surroundings to
+ cheer a desponding soul, but it was more than his dismal environment which
+ weighed upon the medical assistant. His trouble was deeper and more
+ personal. The winter session was approaching. He should be back again at
+ the University completing the last year which would give him his medical
+ degree; but, alas! he had not the money with which to pay his class fees,
+ nor could he imagine how he could procure it. Sixty pounds were wanted to
+ make his career, and it might have been as many thousand for any chance
+ there seemed to be of his obtaining it. He was roused from his black
+ meditation by the entrance of Dr. Oldacre himself, a large, clean-shaven,
+ respectable man, with a prim manner and an austere face. He had prospered
+ exceedingly by the support of the local Church interest, and the rule of
+ his life was never by word or action to run a risk of offending the
+ sentiment which had made him. His standard of respectability and of
+ dignity was exceedingly high, and he expected the same from his
+ assistants. His appearance and words were always vaguely benevolent. A
+ sudden impulse came over the despondent student. He would test the reality
+ of this philanthropy.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I beg your pardon, Dr. Oldacre," said he, rising from his chair; "I have
+ a great favour to ask of you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The doctor's appearance was not encouraging. His mouth suddenly tightened,
+ and his eyes fell.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, Mr. Montgomery?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are aware, sir, that I need only one more session to complete my
+ course."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So you have told me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is very important to me, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Naturally."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The fees, Dr. Oldacre, would amount to about sixty pounds."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am afraid that my duties call me elsewhere, Mr. Montgomery."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "One moment, sir! I had hoped, sir, that perhaps, if I signed a paper
+ promising you interest upon your money, you would advance this sum to me.
+ I will pay you back, sir, I really will. Or, if you like, I will work it
+ off after I am qualified."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The doctor's lips had thinned into a narrow line. His eyes were raised
+ again, and sparkled indignantly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Your request is unreasonable, Mr. Montgomery. I am surprised that you
+ should have made it. Consider, sir, how many thousands of medical students
+ there are in this country. No doubt there are many of them who have a
+ difficulty in finding their fees. Am I to provide for them all? Or why
+ should I make an exception in your favour? I am grieved and disappointed,
+ Mr. Montgomery, that you should have put me into the painful position of
+ having to refuse you." He turned upon his heel, and walked with offended
+ dignity out of the surgery.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The student smiled bitterly, and turned to his work of making up the
+ morning prescriptions. It was poor and unworthy work&mdash;work which any
+ weakling might have done as well, and this was a man of exceptional nerve
+ and sinew. But, such as it was, it brought him his board and one pound a
+ week&mdash;enough to help him during the summer months and let him save a
+ few pounds towards his winter keep. But those class fees! Where were they
+ to come from? He could not save them out of his scanty wage. Dr. Oldacre
+ would not advance them. He saw no way of earning them. His brains were
+ fairly good, but brains of that quality were a drug in the market. He only
+ excelled in his strength, and where was he to find a customer for that?
+ But the ways of Fate are strange, and his customer was at hand.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Look y'ere!" said a voice at the door. Montgomery looked up, for the
+ voice was a loud and rasping one. A young man stood at the entrance&mdash;
+ a stocky, bull-necked young miner, in tweed Sunday clothes and an
+ aggressive neck-tie. He was a sinister-looking figure, with dark, insolent
+ eyes, and the jaw and throat of a bulldog.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Look y'ere!" said he again. "Why hast thou not sent t' medicine oop as
+ thy master ordered?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery had become accustomed to the brutal frankness of the northern
+ worker. At first it had enraged him, but after a time he had grown callous
+ to it, and accepted it as it was meant. But this was something different.
+ It was insolence&mdash;brutal, overbearing insolence, with physical menace
+ behind it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What name?" he asked coldly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Barton. Happen I may give thee cause to mind that name, yoong man. Mak'
+ oop t' wife's medicine this very moment, look ye, or it will be the worse
+ for thee."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery smiled. A pleasant sense of relief thrilled softly through him.
+ What blessed safety-valve was this through which his jangled nerves might
+ find some outlet. The provocation was so gross, the insult so unprovoked,
+ that he could have none of those qualms which take the edge off a man's
+ mettle. He finished sealing the bottle upon which he was occupied, and he
+ addressed it and placed it carefully in the rack. "Look here!" said he,
+ turning round to the miner, "your medicine will be made up in its turn and
+ sent down to you. I don't allow folk in the surgery. Wait outside in the
+ waiting-room if you wish to wait at all."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yoong man," said the miner, "thou's got to mak' t' wife's medicine here,
+ and now, and quick, while I wait and watch thee, or else happen thou might
+ need some medicine thysel' before all is over."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I shouldn't advise you to fasten a quarrel upon me." Montgomery was
+ speaking in the hard, staccato voice of a man who is holding himself in
+ with difficulty. "You'll save trouble if you'll go quietly. If you don't
+ you'll be hurt. Ah, you would? Take it, then!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The blows were almost simultaneous&mdash;a savage swing which whistled
+ past Montgomery's ear, and a straight drive which took the workman on the
+ chin. Luck was with the assistant. That single whizzing uppercut, and the
+ way in which it was delivered, warned him that he had a formidable man to
+ deal with. But if he had underrated his antagonist, his antagonist had
+ also underrated him, and had laid himself open to a fatal blow.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The miner's head had come with a crash against the corner of the surgery
+ shelves, and he had dropped heavily on to the ground. There he lay with
+ his bandy legs drawn up and his hands thrown abroad, the blood trickling
+ over the surgery tiles.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Had enough?" asked the assistant, breathing fiercely through his nose.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But no answer came. The man was insensible. And then the danger of his
+ position came upon Montgomery, and he turned as white as his antagonist. A
+ Sunday, the immaculate Dr. Oldacre with his pious connection, a savage
+ brawl with a patient; he would irretrievably lose his situation if the
+ facts came out. It was not much of a situation, but he could not get
+ another without a reference, and Oldacre might refuse him one. Without
+ money for his classes, and without a situation&mdash;what was to become of
+ him? It was absolute ruin.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But perhaps he could escape exposure after all. He seized his insensible
+ adversary, dragged him out into the centre of he room, loosened his
+ collar, and squeezed the surgery sponge over his face. He sat up at last
+ with a gasp and a scowl. "Domn thee, thou's spoilt my neck-tie," said he,
+ mopping up the water from his breast.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'm sorry I hit you so hard," said Montgomery, apologetically.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thou hit me hard! I could stan' such fly-flappin' all day. 'Twas this
+ here press that cracked my pate for me, and thou art a looky man to be
+ able to boast as thou hast outed me. And now I'd be obliged to thee if
+ thou wilt give me t' wife's medicine."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery gladly made it up and handed it to the miner.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are weak still," said he. "Won't you stay awhile and rest?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "T' wife wants her medicine," said the man, and lurched out at the door.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The assistant, looking after him, saw him rolling, with an uncertain step,
+ down the street, until a friend met him, and they walked on arm in arm.
+ The man seemed in his rough Northern fashion to bear no grudge, and so
+ Montgomery's fears left him. There was no reason why the doctor should
+ know anything about it. He wiped the blood from the floor, put the surgery
+ in order, and went on with his interrupted task, hoping that he had come
+ scathless out of a very dangerous business.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Yet all day he was aware of a sense of vague uneasiness, which sharpened
+ into dismay when, late in the afternoon, he was informed that three
+ gentlemen had called and were waiting for him in the surgery. A coroner's
+ inquest, a descent of detectives, an invasion of angry relatives&mdash;all
+ sorts of possibilities rose to scare him. With tense nerves and a rigid
+ face he went to meet his visitors.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They were a very singular trio. Each was known to him by sight; but what
+ on earth the three could be doing together, and, above all, what they
+ could expect from <i>him</i>, was a most inexplicable problem. The first
+ was Sorley Wilson, the son of the owner of the Nonpareil Coalpit. He was a
+ young blood of twenty, heir to a fortune, a keen sportsman, and down for
+ the Easter Vacation from Magdalene College. He sat now upon the edge of
+ the surgery table, looking in thoughtful silence at Montgomery and
+ twisting the ends of his small, black, waxed moustache. The second was
+ Purvis, the publican, owner of the chief beer-shop, and well known as the
+ local bookmaker. He was a coarse, clean-shaven man, whose fiery face made
+ a singular contrast with his ivory-white bald head. He had shrewd,
+ light-blue eyes with foxy lashes, and he also leaned forward in silence
+ from his chair, a fat, red hand upon either knee, and stared critically at
+ the young assistant. So did the third visitor, Fawcett, the horse-breaker,
+ who leaned back, his long, thin legs, with their boxcloth riding-gaiters,
+ thrust out in front of him, tapping his protruding teeth with his
+ riding-whip, with anxious thought in every line of his rugged, bony face.
+ Publican, exquisite, and horse-breaker were all three equally silent,
+ equally earnest, and equally critical. Montgomery seated in the midst of
+ them, looked from one to the other.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, gentlemen?" he observed, but no answer came.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The position was embarrassing.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No," said the horse-breaker, at last. "No. It's off. It's nowt."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Stand oop, lad; let's see thee standin'." It was the publican who spoke.
+ Montgomery obeyed. He would learn all about it, no doubt, if he were
+ patient. He stood up and turned slowly round, as if in front of his
+ tailor.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's off! It's off!" cried the horse-breaker. "Why, mon, the Master would
+ break him over his knee."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, that be hanged for a yarn!" said the young Cantab. "You can drop out
+ if you like, Fawcett, but I'll see this thing through, if I have to do it
+ alone. I don't hedge a penny. I like the cut of him a great deal better
+ than I liked Ted Barton."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Look at Barton's shoulders, Mr. Wilson."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Lumpiness isn't always strength. Give me nerve and fire and breed. That's
+ what wins."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ay, sir, you have it theer&mdash;you have it theer!" said the fat,
+ red-faced publican, in a thick suety voice. "It's the same wi' poops. Get
+ 'em clean-bred an' fine, an' they'll yark the thick 'uns&mdash;yark 'em
+ out o' their skins."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He's ten good pund on the light side," growled the horse-breaker.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He's a welter weight, anyhow."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A hundred and thirty."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A hundred and fifty, if he's an ounce."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, the Master doesn't scale much more than that."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A hundred and seventy-five."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That was when he was hog-fat and living high. Work the grease out of him
+ and I lay there's no great difference between them. Have you been weighed
+ lately, Mr. Montgomery?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was the first direct question which had been asked him. He had stood in
+ the midst of them like a horse at a fair, and he was just beginning to
+ wonder whether he was more angry or amused.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am just eleven stone," said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I said that he was a welter weight."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But suppose you was trained?" said the publican. "Wot then?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am always in training."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In a manner of speakin', no doubt, he <i>is</i> always in trainin',"
+ remarked the horse-breaker. "But trainin' for everyday work ain't the same
+ as trainin' with a trainer; and I dare bet, with all respec' to your
+ opinion, Mr. Wilson, that there's half a stone of tallow on him at this
+ minute."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The young Cantab put his fingers on the assistant's upper arm, then with
+ his other hand on his wrist, he bent the forearm sharply, and felt the
+ biceps, as round and hard as a cricket-ball, spring up under his fingers.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Feel that!" said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The publican and horse-breaker felt it with an air of reverence. "Good
+ lad! He'll do yet!" cried Purvis.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Gentlemen," said Montgomery, "I think that you will acknowledge that I
+ have been very patient with you. I have listened to all that you have to
+ say about my personal appearance, and now I must really beg that you will
+ have the goodness to tell me what is the matter."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They all sat down in their serious, business-like way.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's easy done, Mr. Montgomery," said the fat-voiced publican. "But
+ before sayin' anything we had to wait and see whether, in a way of
+ speakin', there was any need for us to say anything at all. Mr. Wilson
+ thinks there is. Mr. Fawcett, who has the same right to his opinion, bein'
+ also a backer and one o' the committee, thinks the other way."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I thought him too light built, and I think so now," said the
+ horse-breaker, still tapping his prominent teeth with the metal head of
+ his riding-whip. "But happen he may pull through, and he's a fine-made,
+ buirdly young chap, so if you mean to back him, Mr. Wilson&mdash;&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Which I do."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And you, Purvis?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I ain't one to go back, Fawcett."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I'll stan' to my share of the purse."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And well I knew you would," said Purvis, "for it would be somethin' new
+ to find Isaac Fawcett as a spoil-sport. Well, then, we will make up the
+ hundred for the stake among us, and the fight stands&mdash;always
+ supposin' the young man is willin'."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Excuse all this rot, Mr. Montgomery," said the University man, in a
+ genial voice. "We've begun at the wrong end, I know, but we'll soon
+ straighten it out, and I hope that you will see your way to falling in
+ with our views. In the first place, you remember the man whom you knocked
+ out this morning? He is Barton&mdash;the famous Ted Barton."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'm sure, sir, you may well be proud to have outed him in one round,"
+ said the publican. "Why, it took Morris, the ten-stone-six champion, a
+ deal more trouble than that before he put Barton to sleep. You've done a
+ fine performance, sir, and happen you'll do a finer, if you give yourself
+ the chance."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I never heard of Ted Barton, beyond seeing the name on a medicine label,"
+ said the assistant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, you may take it from me that he's a slaughterer," said the
+ horse-breaker. "You've taught him a lesson that he needed, for it was
+ always a word and a blow with him, and the word alone was worth five
+ shillin' in a public court. He won't be so ready now to shake his nief in
+ the face of everyone he meets. However, that's neither here nor there."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery looked at them in bewilderment.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "For goodness' sake, gentlemen, tell me what it is you want me to do!" he
+ cried.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We want you to fight Silas Craggs, better known as the Master of
+ Croxley."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But why?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Because Ted Barton was to have fought him next Saturday. He was the
+ champion of the Wilson coal-pits, and the other was the Master of the
+ iron-folk down at the Croxley smelters. We'd matched our man for a purse
+ of a hundred against the Master. But you've queered our man, and he can't
+ face such a battle with a two-inch cut at the back of his head. There's
+ only one thing to be done, sir, and that is for you to take his place. If
+ you can lick Ted Barton you may lick the Master of Croxley, but if you
+ don't we're done, for there's no one else who is in the same street with
+ him in this district. It's twenty rounds, two-ounce gloves, Queensberry
+ rules, and a decision on points if you fight to the finish."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ For a moment the absurdity of the thing drove every other thought out of
+ Montgomery's head. But then there came a sudden revulsion. A hundred
+ pounds!&mdash;all he wanted to complete his education was lying there
+ ready to his hand, if only that hand were strong enough to pick it up. He
+ had thought bitterly that morning that there was no market for his
+ strength, but here was one where his muscle might earn more in an hour
+ than his brains in a year. But a chill of doubt came over him. "How can I
+ fight for the coal-pits?" said he. "I am not connected with them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Eh, lad, but thou art!" cried old Purvis. "We've got it down in writin',
+ and it's clear enough 'Anyone connected with the coal-pits.' Doctor
+ Oldacre is the coal-pit club doctor; thou art his assistant. What more can
+ they want?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, that's right enough," said the Cantab. "It would be a very sporting
+ thing of you, Mr. Montgomery, if you would come to our help when we are in
+ such a hole. Of course, you might not like to take the hundred pounds; but
+ I have no doubt that, in the case of your winning, we could arrange that
+ it should take the form of a watch or piece of plate, or any other shape
+ which might suggest itself to you. You see, you are responsible for our
+ having lost our champion, so we really feel that we have a claim upon
+ you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Give me a moment, gentlemen. It is very unexpected. I am afraid the
+ doctor would never consent to my going&mdash;in fact, I am sure that he
+ would not."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But he need never know&mdash;not before the fight, at any rate. We are
+ not bound to give the name of our man. So long as he is within the weight
+ limits on the day of the fight, that is all that concerns anyone."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The adventure and the profit would either of them have attracted
+ Montgomery. The two combined were irresistible. "Gentlemen," said he,
+ "I'll do it!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The three sprang from their seats. The publican had seized his right hand,
+ the horse-dealer his left, and the Cantab slapped him on the back.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good lad! good lad!" croaked the publican. "Eh, mon, but if thou yark
+ him, thou'll rise in one day from being just a common doctor to the
+ best-known mon 'twixt here and Bradford. Thou art a witherin' tyke, thou
+ art, and no mistake; and if thou beat the Master of Croxley, thou'll find
+ all the beer thou want for the rest of thy life waiting for thee at the
+ 'Four Sacks.'"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is the most sporting thing I ever heard of in my life," said young
+ Wilson. "By George, sir, if you pull it off, you've got the constituency
+ in your pocket, if you care to stand. You know the out-house in my
+ garden?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Next the road?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Exactly. I turned it into a gymnasium for Ted Barton. You'll find all you
+ want there: clubs, punching ball, bars, dumb-bells, everything. Then
+ you'll want a sparring partner. Ogilvy has been acting for Barton, but we
+ don't think that he is class enough. Barton bears you no grudge. He's a
+ good-hearted fellow, though cross-grained with strangers. He looked upon
+ you as a stranger this morning, but he says he knows you now. He is quite
+ ready to spar with you for practice, and he will come any hour you will
+ name."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thank you; I will let you know the hour," said Montgomery; and so the
+ committee departed jubilant upon their way.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The medical assistant sat for a time in the surgery turning it over a
+ little in his mind. He had been trained originally at the University by
+ the man who had been middle-weight champion in his day. It was true that
+ his teacher was long past his prime, slow upon his feet, and stiff in his
+ joints, but even so he was still a tough antagonist; but Montgomery had
+ found at last that he could more than hold his own with him. He had won
+ the University medal, and his teacher, who had trained so many students,
+ was emphatic in his opinion that he had never had one who was in the same
+ class with him. He had been exhorted to go in for the Amateur
+ Championships, but he had no particular ambition in that direction. Once
+ he had put on the gloves with Hammer Tunstall in a booth at a fair and had
+ fought three rattling rounds, in which he had the worst of it, but had
+ made the prize fighter stretch himself to the uttermost. There was his
+ whole record, and was it enough to encourage him to stand up to the Master
+ of Croxley? He had never heard of the Master before, but then he had lost
+ touch of the ring during the last few years of hard work. After all, what
+ did it matter? If he won, there was the money, which meant so much to him.
+ If he lost, it would only mean a thrashing. He could take punishment
+ without flinching, of that he was certain. If there were only one chance
+ in a hundred of pulling it off, then it was worth his while to attempt it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Dr. Oldacre, new come from church, with an ostentatious Prayer-book in his
+ kid-gloved hand, broke in upon his meditation.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You don't go to service, I observe, Mr. Montgomery" said he, coldly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir; I have had some business to detain me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is very near to my heart that my household should set a good example.
+ There are so few educated people in this district that a great
+ responsibility devolves upon us. If we do not live up to the highest, how
+ can we expect these poor workers to do so? It is a dreadful thing to
+ reflect that the parish takes a great deal more interest in an approaching
+ glove fight than in their religious duties."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A glove fight, sir?" said Montgomery, guiltily.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I believe that to be the correct term. One of my patients tells me that
+ it is the talk of the district. A local ruffian, a patient of ours, by the
+ way, matched against a pugilist over at Croxley. I cannot understand why
+ the law does not step in and stop so degrading an exhibition. It is really
+ a prize fight."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A glove fight, you said."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am informed that a 2oz. glove is an evasion by which they dodge the
+ law, and make it difficult for the police to interfere. They contend for a
+ sum of money. It seems dreadful and almost incredible&mdash;does it not?&mdash;to
+ think that such scenes can be enacted within a few miles of our peaceful
+ home. But you will realise, Mr. Montgomery, that while there are such
+ influences for us to counteract, it is very necessary that we should live
+ up to our highest."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The doctor's sermon would have had more effect if the assistant had not
+ once or twice had occasion to test his highest, and come upon it at
+ unexpectedly humble elevations. It is always so particularly easy to
+ "compound for sins we're most inclined to by damning those we have no mind
+ to." In any case, Montgomery felt that of all the men concerned in such a
+ fight&mdash;promoters, backers, spectators&mdash;it is the actual fighter
+ who holds the strongest and most honourable position. His conscience gave
+ him no concern upon the subject. Endurance and courage are virtues, not
+ vices, and brutality is, at least, better than effeminacy.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was a little tobacco-shop at the corner of the street, where
+ Montgomery got his bird's-eye and also his local information, for the
+ shopman was a garrulous soul, who knew everything about the affairs of the
+ district. The assistant strolled down there after tea and asked, in a
+ casual way, whether the tobacconist had ever heard of the Master of
+ Croxley.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Heard of him! Heard of him!" the little man could hardly articulate in
+ his astonishment. "Why, sir, he's the first mon o' the district, an' his
+ name's as well known in the West Riding as the winner o' t' Derby. But
+ Lor,' sir,"&mdash;here he stopped and rummaged among a heap of papers.
+ "They are makin' a fuss about him on account o' his fight wi' Ted Barton,
+ and so the <i>Croxley Herald</i> has his life an' record, an' here it is,
+ an' thou canst read it for thysel'."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The sheet of the paper which he held up was a lake of print around an
+ islet of illustration. The latter was a coarse wood-cut of a pugilist's
+ head and neck set in a cross-barred jersey. It was a sinister but powerful
+ face, the face of a debauched hero, clean-shaven, strongly eye-browed,
+ keen-eyed, with huge, aggressive jaw, and an animal dewlap beneath it. The
+ long, obstinate cheeks ran flush up to the narrow, sinister eyes. The
+ mighty neck came down square from the ears and curved outwards into
+ shoulders, which had lost nothing at the hands of the local artist. Above
+ was written "Silas Craggs," and beneath, "The Master of Croxley."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thou'll find all about him there, sir," said the tobacconist. "He's a
+ witherin' tyke, he is, and we're proud to have him in the county. If he
+ hadn't broke his leg he'd have been champion of England."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Broke his leg, has he?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, and it set badly. They ca' him owd K, behind his back, for that is
+ how his two legs look. But his arms&mdash;well, if they was both stropped
+ to a bench, as the sayin' is, I wonder where the champion of England would
+ be then."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll take this with me," said Montgomery; and putting the paper into his
+ pocket he returned home.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was not a cheering record which he read there. The whole history of the
+ Croxley Master was given in full, his many victories, his few defeats.
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ Born in 1857 (said the provincial biographer), Silas Craggs, better
+ known in sporting circles as the Master of Croxley, is now in his
+ fortieth year.
+</p>
+ <p>
+ "Hang it, I'm only twenty-three!" said Montgomery to himself, and read on
+ more cheerfully.
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ Having in his youth shown a surprising aptitude for the game, he
+ fought his way up among his comrades, until he became the
+ recognised champion of the district and won the proud title which
+ he still holds. Ambitious of a more than local fame, he secured a
+ patron, and fought his first fight against Jack Barton, of
+ Birmingham, in May 1880, at the old Loiterers' Club. Craggs,
+ who fought at ten stone-two at the time, had the better of fifteen
+ rattling rounds, and gained an award on points against the Midlander.
+ Having disposed of James Dunn, of Rotherhithe, Cameron, of Glasgow,
+ and a youth named Fernie, he was thought so highly of by the fancy
+ that he was matched against Ernest Willox, at that time
+ middle-weight champion of the North of England, and defeated him in a
+ hard-fought battle, knocking him out in the tenth round after a
+ punishing contest. At this period it looked as if the very highest
+ honours of the ring were within the reach of the young Yorkshireman,
+ but he was laid upon the shelf by a most unfortunate accident. The
+ kick of a horse broke his thigh, and for a year he was compelled to
+ rest himself. When he returned to his work the fracture had set
+ badly, and his activity was much impaired. It was owing to this
+ that he was defeated in seven rounds by Willox, the man whom he had
+ previously beaten, and afterwards by James Shaw, of London, though
+ the latter acknowledged that he had found the toughest customer of
+ his career. Undismayed by his reverses, the Master adapted the
+ style of his fighting to his physical disabilities and resumed his
+ career of victory&mdash;defeating Norton (the black), Hobby Wilson, and
+ Levi Cohen, the latter a heavy-weight. Conceding two stone, he
+ fought a draw with the famous Billy McQuire, and afterwards, for
+ a purse of fifty pounds, he defeated Sam Hare at the Pelican Club,
+ London. In 1891 a decision was given against him upon a foul when
+ fighting a winning fight against Jim Taylor, the Australian middle
+ weight, and so mortified was he by the decision, that he withdrew
+ from the ring. Since then he has hardly fought at all save to
+ accommodate any local aspirant who may wish to learn the difference
+ between a bar-room scramble and a scientific contest. The latest
+ of these ambitious souls comes from the Wilson coal-pits, which have
+ undertaken to put up a stake of 100 pounds and back their local
+ champion. There are various rumours afloat as to who their
+ representative is to be, the name of Ted Barton being freely
+ mentioned; but the betting, which is seven to one on the Master
+ against any untried man, is a fair reflection of the feeling of
+ the community.
+</p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery read it over twice, and it left him with a very serious face.
+ No light matter this which he had undertaken; no battle with a
+ rough-and-tumble fighter who presumed upon a local reputation. The man's
+ record showed that he was first-class&mdash;or nearly so. There were a few
+ points in his favour, and he must make the most of them. There was age&mdash;twenty-three
+ against forty. There was an old ring proverb that "Youth will be served,"
+ but the annals of the ring offer a great number of exceptions. A hard
+ veteran full of cool valour and ring-craft, could give ten or fifteen
+ years and a beating to most striplings. He could not rely too much upon
+ his advantage in age. But then there was the lameness; that must surely
+ count for a great deal. And, lastly, there was the chance that the Master
+ might underrate his opponent, that he might be remiss in his training, and
+ refuse to abandon his usual way of life, if he thought that he had an easy
+ task before him. In a man of his age and habits this seemed very possible.
+ Montgomery prayed that it might be so. Meanwhile, if his opponent were the
+ best man who ever jumped the ropes into a ring, his own duty was clear. He
+ must prepare himself carefully, throw away no chance, and do the very best
+ that he could. But he knew enough to appreciate the difference which
+ exists in boxing, as in every sport, between the amateur and the
+ professional. The coolness, the power of hitting, above all the capability
+ of taking punishment, count for so much. Those specially developed,
+ gutta-percha-like abdominal muscles of the hardened pugilist will take
+ without flinching a blow which would leave another man writhing on the
+ ground. Such things are not to be acquired in a week, but all that could
+ be done in a week should be done.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The medical assistant had a good basis to start from. He was 5ft. 11 ins.&mdash;tall
+ enough for anything on two legs, as the old ring men used to say&mdash;lithe
+ and spare, with the activity of a panther, and a strength which had hardly
+ yet ever found its limitations. His muscular development was finely hard,
+ but his power came rather from that higher nerve-energy which counts for
+ nothing upon a measuring tape. He had the well-curved nose and the widely
+ opened eye which never yet were seen upon the face of a craven, and behind
+ everything he had the driving force, which came from the knowledge that
+ his whole career was at stake upon the contest. The three backers rubbed
+ their hands when they saw him at work punching the ball in the gymnasium
+ next morning; and Fawcett, the horse-breaker, who had written to Leeds to
+ hedge his bets, sent a wire to cancel the letter, and to lay another fifty
+ at the market price of seven to one.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery's chief difficulty was to find time for his training without
+ any interference from the doctor. His work took him a large part of the
+ day, but as the visiting was done on foot, and considerable distances had
+ to be traversed, it was a training in itself. For the rest, he punched the
+ swinging ball and worked with the dumb-bells for an hour every morning and
+ evening, and boxed twice a day with Ted Barton in the gymnasium, gaining
+ as much profit as could be got from a rushing, two-handed slogger. Barton
+ was full of admiration for his cleverness and quickness, but doubtful
+ about his strength. Hard hitting was the feature of his own style, and he
+ exacted it from others.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Lord, sir, that's a turble poor poonch for an eleven-stone man!" he would
+ cry. "Thou wilt have to hit harder than that afore t' Master will know
+ that thou art theer. All, thot's better, mon, thot's fine!" he would add,
+ as his opponent lifted him across the room on the end of a right counter.
+ "Thot's how I likes to feel 'em. Happen thou'lt pull through yet." He
+ chuckled with joy when Montgomery knocked him into a corner. "Eh, mon,
+ thou art coming along grand. Thou hast fair yarked me off my legs. Do it
+ again, lad, do it again!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The only part of Montgomery's training which came within the doctor's
+ observation was his diet, and that puzzled him considerably.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You will excuse my remarking, Mr. Montgomery, that you are becoming
+ rather particular in your tastes. Such fads are not to be encouraged in
+ one's youth. Why do you eat toast with every meal?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I find that it suits me better than bread, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It entails unnecessary work upon the cook. I observe, also, that you have
+ turned against potatoes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir; I think that I am better without them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And you no longer drink your beer?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "These causeless whims and fancies are very much to be deprecated, Mr.
+ Montgomery. Consider how many there are to whom these very potatoes and
+ this very beer would be most acceptable."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No doubt, sir, but at present I prefer to do without them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They were sitting alone at lunch, and the assistant thought that it would
+ be a good opportunity of asking leave for the day of the fight.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should be glad if you could let me have leave for Saturday, Dr.
+ Oldacre."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is very inconvenient upon so busy a day."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should do a double day's work on Friday so as to leave everything in
+ order. I should hope to be back in the evening."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am afraid I cannot spare you, Mr. Montgomery."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ This was a facer. If he could not get leave he would go without it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You will remember, Dr. Oldacre, that when I came to you it was understood
+ that I should have a clear day every month. I have never claimed one. But
+ now there are reasons why I wish to have a holiday upon Saturday."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Dr. Oldacre gave in with a very bad grace. "Of course, if you insist upon
+ your formal rights, there is no more to be said, Mr. Montgomery, though I
+ feel that it shows a certain indifference to my comfort and the welfare of
+ the practice. Do you still insist?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Very good. Have your way."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The doctor was boiling over with anger, but Montgomery was a valuable
+ assistant&mdash;steady, capable, and hardworking&mdash;and he could not
+ afford to lose him. Even if he had been prompted to advance those class
+ fees, for which his assistant had appealed, it would have been against his
+ interests to do so, for he did not wish him to qualify, and he desired him
+ to remain in his subordinate position, in which he worked so hard for so
+ small a wage. There was something in the cool insistence of the young man,
+ a quiet resolution in his voice as he claimed his Saturday, which aroused
+ his curiosity.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have no desire to interfere unduly with your affairs, Mr. Montgomery,
+ but were you thinking of having a day in Leeds upon Saturday?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In the country?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are very wise. You will find a quiet day among the wild flowers a
+ very valuable restorative. Have you thought of any particular direction?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am going over Croxley way."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, there is no prettier country when once you are past the iron-works.
+ What could be more delightful than to lie upon the Fells, basking in the
+ sunshine, with perhaps some instructive and elevating book as your
+ companion? I should recommend a visit to the ruins of St. Bridget's
+ Church, a very interesting relic of the early Norman era. By the way,
+ there is one objection which I see to your going to Croxley on Saturday.
+ It is upon that date, as I am informed, that that ruffianly glove fight
+ takes place. You may find yourself molested by the blackguards whom it
+ will attract."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I will take my chance of that, sir," said the assistant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ On the Friday night, which was the last night before the fight,
+ Montgomery's three backers assembled in the gymnasium and inspected their
+ man as he went through some light exercises to keep his muscles supple. He
+ was certainly in splendid condition, his skin shining with health, and his
+ eyes with energy and confidence. The three walked round him and exulted.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He's simply ripping!" said the undergraduate.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "By gad, you've come out of it splendidly. You're as hard as a pebble, and
+ fit to fight for your life."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Happen he's a trifle on the fine side," said the publican. "Runs a bit
+ light at the loins, to my way of thinkin'."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What weight to-day?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ten stone eleven," the assistant answered.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's only three pund off in a week's trainin'," said the horse-breaker.
+ "He said right when he said that he was in condition. Well, it's fine
+ stuff all there is of it, but I'm none so sure as there is enough." He
+ kept poking his finger into Montgomery as if he were one of his horses. "I
+ hear that the Master will scale a hundred and sixty odd at the ring-side."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But there's some of that which he'd like well to pull off and leave
+ behind wi' his shirt," said Purvis. "I hear they've had a rare job to get
+ him to drop his beer, and if it had not been for that great red-headed
+ wench of his they'd never ha' done it. She fair scratted the face off a
+ potman that had brought him a gallon from t' 'Chequers.' They say the
+ hussy is his sparrin' partner, as well as his sweetheart, and that his
+ poor wife is just breakin' her heart over it. Hullo, young 'un, what do
+ you want?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The door of the gymnasium had opened and a lad, about sixteen, grimy and
+ black with soot and iron, stepped into the yellow glare of the oil lamp.
+ Ted Barton seized him by the collar.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "See here, thou yoong whelp, this is private, and we want noan o' thy
+ spyin'!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But I maun speak to Mr. Wilson."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The young Cantab stepped forward.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, my lad, what is it?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's aboot t' fight, Mr. Wilson, sir. I wanted to tell your mon somethin'
+ aboot t' Maister."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We've no time to listen to gossip, my boy. We know all about the Master."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But thou doan't, sir. Nobody knows but me and mother, and we thought as
+ we'd like thy mon to know, sir, for we want him to fair bray him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, you want the Master fair brayed, do you? So do we. Well, what have
+ you to say?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Is this your mon, sir?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, suppose it is?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then it's him I want to tell aboot it. T' Maister is blind o' the left
+ eye."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Nonsense!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's true, sir. Not stone blind, but rarely fogged. He keeps it secret,
+ but mother knows, and so do I. If thou slip him on the left side he can't
+ cop thee. Thou'll find it right as I tell thee. And mark him when he sinks
+ his right. 'Tis his best blow, his right upper-cut. T' Maister's finisher,
+ they ca' it at t' works. It's a turble blow when it do come home."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thank you, my boy. This is information worth having about his sight,"
+ said Wilson. "How came you to know so much? Who are you?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'm his son, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Wilson whistled.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And who sent you to us?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My mother. I maun get back to her again."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Take this half-crown."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir, I don't seek money in comin' here. I do it&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "For love?" suggested the publican.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "For hate!" said the boy, and darted off into the darkness.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Seems to me t' red-headed wench may do him more harm than good, after
+ all," remarked the publican. "And now, Mr. Montgomery, sir, you've done
+ enough for this evenin', an' a nine-hours' sleep is the best trainin'
+ before a battle. Happen this time to-morrow night you'll be safe back
+ again with your 100 pound in your pocket."
+ </p>
+<p class="center big">
+ II
+</p>
+ <p>
+ Work was struck at one o'clock at the coal-pits and the iron-works, and
+ the fight was arranged for three. From the Croxley Furnaces, from Wilson's
+ Coal-pits, from the Heartsease Mine, from the Dodd Mills, from the
+ Leverworth Smelters the workmen came trooping, each with his fox-terrier
+ or his lurcher at his heels. Warped with labour and twisted by toil, bent
+ double by week-long work in the cramped coal galleries or half-blinded
+ with years spent in front of white-hot fluid metal, these men still gilded
+ their harsh and hopeless lives by their devotion to sport. It was their
+ one relief, the only thing which could distract their minds from sordid
+ surroundings, and give them an interest beyond the blackened circle which
+ enclosed them. Literature, art, science, all these things were beyond
+ their horizon; but the race, the football match, the cricket, the fight,
+ these were things which they could understand, which they could speculate
+ upon in advance and comment upon afterwards. Sometimes brutal, sometimes
+ grotesque, the love of sport is still one of the great agencies which make
+ for the happiness of our people. It lies very deeply in the springs of our
+ nature, and when it has been educated out, a higher, more refined nature
+ may be left, but it will not be of that robust British type which has left
+ its mark so deeply on the world. Every one of these raddled workers,
+ slouching with his dog at his heels to see something of the fight, was a
+ true unit of his race.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a squally May day, with bright sunbursts and driving showers.
+ Montgomery worked all morning in the surgery getting his medicine made up.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The weather seems so very unsettled, Mr. Montgomery," remarked the
+ doctor, "that I am inclined to think that you had better postpone your
+ little country excursion until a later date."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am afraid that I must go to-day, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have just had an intimation that Mrs. Potter, at the other side of
+ Angleton, wishes to see me. It is probable that I shall be there all day.
+ It will be extremely inconvenient to leave the house empty so long."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am very sorry, sir, but I must go," said the assistant, doggedly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The doctor saw that it would be useless to argue, and departed in the
+ worst of bad tempers upon mission. Montgomery felt easier now that he was
+ gone. He went up to his room, and packed his running-shoes, his
+ fighting-drawers, and his cricket sash into a hand-bag. When he came down,
+ Mr. Wilson was waiting for him in the surgery. "I hear the doctor has
+ gone."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes; he is likely to be away all day."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I don't see that it matters much. It's bound to come to his ears by
+ to-night."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes; it's serious with me, Mr. Wilson. If I win, it's all right. I don't
+ mind telling you that the hundred pounds will make all the difference to
+ me. But if I lose, I shall lose my situation, for, as you say, I can't
+ keep it secret."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Never mind. We'll see you through among us. I only wonder the doctor has
+ not heard, for it's all over the country that you are to fight the Croxley
+ Champion. We've had Armitage up about it already. He's the Master's
+ backer, you know. He wasn't sure that you were eligible. The Master said
+ he wanted you whether you were eligible or not. Armitage has money on, and
+ would have made trouble if he could. But I showed him that you came within
+ the conditions of the challenge, and he agreed that it was all right. They
+ think they have a soft thing on."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I can only do my best," said Montgomery.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They lunched together; a silent and rather nervous repast, for
+ Montgomery's mind was full of what was before him, and Wilson had himself
+ more money at stake than he cared to lose.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Wilson's carriage and pair were at the door, the horses with blue and
+ white rosettes at their ears, which were the colours of the Wilson
+ Coal-pits, well known, on many a football field. At the avenue gate a
+ crowd of some hundred pit-men and their wives gave a cheer as the carriage
+ passed. To the assistant it all seemed dream-like and extraordinary&mdash;the
+ strangest experience of his life, but with a thrill of human action and
+ interest in it which made it passionately absorbing. He lay back in the
+ open carriage and saw the fluttering handkerchiefs from the doors and
+ windows of the miners' cottages. Wilson had pinned a blue and white
+ rosette upon his coat, and everybody knew him as their champion. "Good
+ luck, sir! good luck to thee!" they shouted from the roadside. He felt
+ that it was like some unromantic knight riding down to sordid lists, but
+ there was something of chivalry in it all the same. He fought for others
+ as well as for himself. He might fail from want of skill or strength, but
+ deep in his sombre soul he vowed that it should never be for want of
+ heart.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Fawcett was just mounting into his high-wheeled, spidery dogcart, with
+ his little bit of blood between the shafts. He waved his whip and fell in
+ behind the carriage. They overtook Purvis, the tomato-faced publican, upon
+ the road, with his wife in her Sunday bonnet. They also dropped into the
+ procession, and then, as they traversed the seven miles of the high road
+ to Croxley, their two-horsed, rosetted carriage became gradually the
+ nucleus of a comet with a loosely radiating tail. From every side-road
+ came the miners' carts, the humble, ramshackle traps, black and bulging,
+ with their loads of noisy, foul-tongued, open-hearted partisans. They
+ trailed for a long quarter of a mile behind them&mdash;cracking, whipping,
+ shouting, galloping, swearing. Horsemen and runners were mixed with the
+ vehicles. And then suddenly a squad of the Sheffield Yeomanry, who were
+ having their annual training in those parts, clattered and jingled out of
+ a field, and rode as an escort to the carriage. Through the dust-clouds
+ round him Montgomery saw the gleaming brass helmets, the bright coats, and
+ the tossing heads of the chargers, the delighted brown faces of the
+ troopers. It was more dream-like than ever.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And then, as they approached the monstrous, uncouth line of bottle-shaped
+ buildings which marked the smelting-works of Croxley, their long, writhing
+ snake of dust was headed off by another but longer one which wound across
+ their path. The main road into which their own opened was filled by the
+ rushing current of traps. The Wilson contingent halted until the others
+ should get past. The iron-men cheered and groaned, according to their
+ humour, as they whirled past their antagonist. Rough chaff flew back and
+ forwards like iron nuts and splinters of coal. "Brought him up, then!"
+ "Got t' hearse for to fetch him back?" "Where's t' owd K-legs?" "Mon, mon,
+ have thy photograph took&mdash;'twill mind thee of what thou used to
+ look!" "He fight?&mdash;he's nowt but a half-baked doctor!" "Happen he'll
+ doctor thy Croxley Champion afore he's through wi't."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So they flashed at each other as the one side waited and the other passed.
+ Then there came a rolling murmur swelling into a shout, and a great brake
+ with four horses came clattering along, all streaming with salmon-pink
+ ribbons. The driver wore a white hat with pink rosette, and beside him, on
+ the high seat, were a man and a woman-she with her arm round his waist.
+ Montgomery had one glimpse of them as they flashed past; he with a furry
+ cap drawn low over his brow, a great frieze coat and a pink comforter
+ round his throat; she brazen, red-headed, bright-coloured, laughing
+ excitedly. The Master, for it was he, turned as he passed, gazed hard at
+ Montgomery, and gave him a menacing, gap-toothed grin. It was a hard,
+ wicked face, blue-jowled and craggy, with long, obstinate cheeks and
+ inexorable eyes. The brake behind was full of patrons of the sport-flushed
+ iron-foremen, heads of departments, managers. One was drinking from a
+ metal flask, and raised it to Montgomery as he passed; and then the crowd
+ thinned, and the Wilson cortege with their dragoons swept in at the rear
+ of the others.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The road led away from Croxley, between curving green hills, gashed and
+ polluted by the searchers for coal and iron. The whole country had been
+ gutted, and vast piles of refuse and mountains of slag suggested the
+ mighty chambers which the labour of man had burrowed beneath. On the left
+ the road curved up to where a huge building, roofless and dismantled,
+ stood crumbling and forlorn, with the light shining through the windowless
+ squares.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's the old Arrowsmith's factory. That's where the fight is to be,"
+ said Wilson. "How are you feeling now?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thank you, I was never better in my life," Montgomery answered.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "By Gad, I like your nerve!" said Wilson, who was himself flushed and
+ uneasy. "You'll give us a fight for our money, come what may. That place
+ on the right is the office, and that has been set aside as the dressing
+ and weighing room."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The carriage drove up to it amidst the shouts of the folk upon the
+ hillside. Lines of empty carriages and traps curved down upon the winding
+ road, and a black crowd surged round the door of the ruined factory. The
+ seats, as a huge placard announced, were five shillings, three shillings,
+ and a shilling, with half-price for dogs. The takings, deducting expenses,
+ were to go to the winner, and it was already evident that a larger stake
+ than a hundred pounds was in question. A babel of voices rose from the
+ door. The workers wished to bring their dogs in free. The men scuffled.
+ The dogs barked. The crowd was a whirling, eddying pool surging with a
+ roar up to the narrow cleft which was its only outlet.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The brake, with its salmon-coloured streamers and four reeking horses,
+ stood empty before the door of the office; Wilson, Purvis, Fawcett and
+ Montgomery passed in.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was a large, bare room inside with square, clean patches upon the
+ grimy walls, where pictures and almanacs had once hung. Worn linoleum
+ covered the floor, but there was no furniture save some benches and a deal
+ table with an ewer and a basin upon it. Two of the corners were curtained
+ off. In the middle of the room was a weighing-chair. A hugely fat man,
+ with a salmon tie and a blue waistcoat with bird's-eye spots, came
+ bustling up to them. It was Armitage, the butcher and grazier, well known
+ for miles round as a warm man, and the most liberal patron of sport in the
+ Riding. "Well, well," he grunted, in a thick, fussy, wheezy voice, "you
+ have come, then. Got your man? Got your man?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Here he is, fit and well. Mr. Montgomery, let me present you to Mr.
+ Armitage."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Glad to meet you, sir. Happy to make your acquaintance. I make bold to
+ say, sir, that we of Croxley admire your courage, Mr. Montgomery, and that
+ our only hope is a fair fight and no favour, and the best man win. That's
+ our sentiments at Croxley."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And it is my sentiment, also," said the assistant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, you can't say fairer than that, Mr. Montgomery. You've taken a
+ large contrac' in hand, but a large contrac' may be carried through, sir,
+ as anyone that knows my dealings could testify. The Master is ready to
+ weigh in!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So am I."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You must weigh in the buff." Montgomery looked askance at the tall,
+ red-headed woman who was standing gazing out of the window.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's all right," said Wilson. "Get behind the curtain and put on your
+ fighting kit."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He did so, and came out the picture of an athlete, in white, loose
+ drawers, canvas shoes, and the sash of a well-known cricket club round his
+ waist. He was trained to a hair, his skin gleaming like silk, and every
+ muscle rippling down his broad shoulders and along his beautiful arms as
+ he moved them. They bunched into ivory knobs, or slid into long, sinuous
+ curves, as he raised or lowered his hands.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What thinkest thou o' that?" asked Ted Barton, his second, of the woman
+ in the window.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ She glanced contemptuously at the young athlete. "It's but a poor kindness
+ thou dost him to put a thread-paper yoong gentleman like yon against a mon
+ as is a mon. Why, my Jock would throttle him wi' one hond lashed behind
+ him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Happen he may&mdash;happen not," said Barton. "I have but twa pund in the
+ world, but it's on him, every penny, and no hedgin'. But here's t'
+ Maister, and rarely fine he do look."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The prize-fighter had come out from his curtain, a squat, formidable
+ figure, monstrous in chest and arms, limping slightly on his distorted
+ leg. His skin had none of the freshness and clearness of Montgomery's, but
+ was dusky and mottled, with one huge mole amid the mat of tangled black
+ hair which thatched his mighty breast. His weight bore no relation to his
+ strength, for those huge shoulders and great arms, with brown,
+ sledge-hammer fists, would have fitted the heaviest man that ever threw
+ his cap into a ring. But his loins and legs were slight in proportion.
+ Montgomery, on the other hand, was as symmetrical as a Greek statue. It
+ would be an encounter between a man who was specially fitted for one
+ sport, and one who was equally capable of any. The two looked curiously at
+ each other: a bulldog, and a high-bred clean-limbed terrier, each full of
+ spirit.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How do you do?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How do?" The Master grinned again, and his three jagged front teeth
+ gleamed for an instant. The rest had been beaten out of him in twenty
+ years of battle. He spat upon the floor. "We have a rare fine day for't."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Capital," said Montgomery.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's the good feelin' I like," wheezed the fat butcher. "Good lads,
+ both of them!&mdash;prime lads!&mdash;hard meat an' good bone. There's no
+ ill-feelin'."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If he downs me, Gawd bless him!" said the Master.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "An' if we down him, Gawd help him!" interrupted the woman.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Haud thy tongue, wench!" said the Master, impatiently. "Who art thou to
+ put in thy word? Happen I might draw my hand across thy face."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The woman did not take the threat amiss. "Wilt have enough for thy hand to
+ do, Jock," said she. "Get quit o' this gradely man afore thou turn on me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The lovers' quarrel was interrupted by the entrance of a newcomer, a
+ gentleman with a fur-collared overcoat and a very shiny top-hat&mdash; a
+ top-hat of a degree of glossiness which is seldom seen five miles from
+ Hyde Park. This hat he wore at the extreme back of his head, so that the
+ lower surface of the brim made a kind of frame for his high, bald
+ forehead, his, keen eyes, his rugged and yet kindly face. He bustled in
+ with the quiet air of possession with which the ring master enters the
+ circus.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's Mr. Stapleton, the referee from London," said Wilson.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How do you do, Mr. Stapleton? I was introduced to you at the big fight at
+ the Corinthian Club in Piccadilly."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah! I dare say," said the other, shaking hands. "Fact is, I'm introduced
+ to so many that I can't undertake to carry their names. Wilson, is it?
+ Well, Mr. Wilson, glad to see you. Couldn't get a fly at the station, and
+ that's why I'm late."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'm sure, sir," said Armitage, "we should be proud that anyone so well
+ known in the boxing world should come down to our little exhibition."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Not at all. Not at all. Anything in the interests of boxin'. All ready?
+ Men weighed?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Weighing now, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah! Just as well that I should see it done. Seen you before, Craggs. Saw
+ you fight your second battle against Willox. You had beaten him once, but
+ he came back on you. What does the indicator say&mdash;163lbs.&mdash; two
+ off for the kit&mdash;161lbs. Now, my lad, you jump. My goodness, what
+ colours are you wearing?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The Anonymi Cricket Club."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What right have you to wear them? I belong to the club myself."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So do I."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You an amateur?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And you are fighting for a money prize?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I suppose you know what you are doing? You realise that you're a
+ professional pug from this onwards, and that if ever you fight again&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll never fight again."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Happen you won't," said the woman, and the Master turned a terrible eye
+ upon her.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I suppose you know your own business best. Up you jump. One hundred
+ and fifty-one, minus two, 149&mdash;12lbs. difference, but youth and
+ condition on the other scale. Well, the sooner we get to work the better,
+ for I wish to catch the seven o'clock express at Hellifield. Twenty
+ three-minute rounds, with one-minute intervals, and Queensberry rules.
+ Those are the conditions, are they not?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Very good, then&mdash;we may go across."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The two combatants had overcoats thrown over their shoulders, and the
+ whole party, backers, fighters, seconds, and the referee filed out of the
+ room. A police inspector was waiting for them in the road. He had a
+ note-book in his hand&mdash;that terrible weapon which awes even the
+ London cabman.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I must take your names, gentlemen, in case it should be necessary to
+ proceed for breach of peace."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You don't mean to stop the fight?" cried Armitage, in a passion of
+ indignation. "I'm Mr. Armitage, of Croxley, and this is Mr. Wilson, and
+ we'll be responsible that all is fair and as it should be."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll take the names in case it should be necessary to proceed," said the
+ inspector, impassively.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But you know me well."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If you was a dook or even a judge it would be all the same," said the
+ inspector. "It's the law, and there's an end. I'll not take upon myself to
+ stop the fight, seeing that gloves are to be used, but I'll take the names
+ of all concerned. Silas Craggs, Robert Montgomery, Edward Barton, James
+ Stapleton, of London. Who seconds Silas Craggs?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I do," said the woman. "Yes, you can stare, but it's my job, and no one
+ else's. Anastasia's the name&mdash;four a's."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Craggs?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Johnson&mdash;Anastasia Johnson. If you jug him you can jug me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Who talked of juggin', ye fool?" growled the Master. "Coom on, Mr.
+ Armitage, for I'm fair sick o' this loiterin'."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The inspector fell in with the procession, and proceeded, as they walked
+ up the hill, to bargain in his official capacity for a front seat, where
+ he could safeguard the interests of the law, and in his private capacity
+ to lay out thirty shillings at seven to one with Mr. Armitage. Through the
+ door they passed, down a narrow lane walled with a dense bank of humanity,
+ up a wooden ladder to a platform, over a rope which was slung waist-high
+ from four corner-stakes, and then Montgomery realised that he was in that
+ ring in which his immediate destiny was to be worked out. On the stake at
+ one corner there hung a blue-and-white streamer. Barton led him across,
+ the overcoat dangling loosely from his shoulders, and he sat down on a
+ wooden stool. Barton and another man, both wearing white sweaters, stood
+ beside him. The so-called ring was a square, twenty feet each way. At the
+ opposite angle was the sinister figure of the Master, with his red-headed
+ woman and a rough-faced friend to look after him. At each corner were
+ metal basins, pitchers of water, and sponges.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ During the hubbub and uproar of the entrance Montgomery was too bewildered
+ to take things in. But now there was a few minutes' delay, for the referee
+ had lingered behind, and so he looked quietly about him. It was a sight to
+ haunt him for a lifetime. Wooden seats had been built in, sloping upwards
+ to the tops of the walls. Above, instead of a ceiling, a great flight of
+ crows passed slowly across a square of grey cloud. Right up to the topmost
+ benches the folk were banked&mdash;broadcloth in front, corduroys and
+ fustian behind; faces turned everywhere upon him. The grey reek of the
+ pipes filled the building, and the air was pungent with the acrid smell of
+ cheap, strong tobacco. Everywhere among the human faces were to be seen
+ the heads of the dogs. They growled and yapped from the back benches. In
+ that dense mass of humanity, one could hardly pick out individuals, but
+ Montgomery's eyes caught the brazen gleam of the helmets held upon the
+ knees of the ten yeomen of his escort. At the very edge of the platform
+ sat the reporters, five of them&mdash;three locals and two all the way
+ from London. But where was the all-important referee? There was no sign of
+ him, unless he were in the centre of that angry swirl of men near the
+ door.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Stapleton had stopped to examine the gloves which were to be used, and
+ entered the building after the combatants. He had started to come down
+ that narrow lane with the human walls which led to the ring. But already
+ it had gone abroad that the Wilson champion was a gentleman, and that
+ another gentleman had been appointed as referee. A wave of suspicion
+ passed through the Croxley folk. They would have one of their own people
+ for a referee. They would not have a stranger. His path was stopped as he
+ made for the ring. Excited men flung themselves in front of him; they
+ waved their fists in his face and cursed him. A woman howled vile names in
+ his ear. Somebody struck at him with an umbrella. "Go thou back to Lunnon.
+ We want noan o' thee. Go thou back!" they yelled.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Stapleton, with his shiny hat cocked backwards, and his large, bulging
+ forehead swelling from under it, looked round him from beneath his bushy
+ brows. He was in the centre of a savage and dangerous mob. Then he drew
+ his watch from his pocket and held it dial upwards in his palm.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In three minutes," said he, "I will declare the fight off."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They raged round him. His cool face and that aggressive top-hat irritated
+ them. Grimy hands were raised. But it was difficult, somehow, to strike a
+ man who was so absolutely indifferent.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In two minutes I declare the fight off."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They exploded into blasphemy. The breath of angry men smoked into his
+ placid face. A gnarled, grimy fist vibrated at the end of his nose. "We
+ tell thee we want noan o' thee. Get thou back where thou com'st from."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In one minute I declare the fight off."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Then the calm persistence of the man conquered the swaying, mutable,
+ passionate crowd.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Let him through, mon. Happen there'll be no fight after a'."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Let him through."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Bill, thou loomp, let him pass. Dost want the fight declared off?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Make room for the referee!&mdash;room for the Lunnon referee!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And half pushed, half carried, he was swept up to the ring. There were two
+ chairs by the side of it, one for him and one for the timekeeper. He sat
+ down, his hands on his knees, his hat at a more wonderful angle than ever,
+ impassive but solemn, with the aspect of one who appreciates his
+ responsibilities.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Armitage, the portly butcher, made his way into the ring and held up
+ two fat hands, sparkling with rings, as a signal for silence.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Gentlemen!" he yelled. And then in a crescendo shriek, "Gentlemen!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And ladies!" cried somebody, for, indeed, there was a fair sprinkling of
+ women among the crowd. "Speak up, owd man!" shouted another. "What price
+ pork chops?" cried somebody at the back. Everybody laughed, and the dogs
+ began to bark. Armitage waved his hands amidst the uproar as if he were
+ conducting an orchestra. At last the babel thinned into silence.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Gentlemen," he yelled, "the match is between Silas Craggs, whom we call
+ the Master of Croxley, and Robert Montgomery, of the Wilson Coal-pits. The
+ match was to be under eleven-eight. When they were weighed just now,
+ Craggs weighed eleven-seven, and Montgomery ten-nine. The conditions of
+ the contest are&mdash;the best of twenty three-minute rounds with
+ two-ounce gloves. Should the fight run to its full length, it will, of
+ course, be decided upon points. Mr. Stapleton, the well-known London
+ referee, has kindly consented to see fair play. I wish to say that Mr.
+ Wilson and I, the chief backers of the two men, have every confidence in
+ Mr. Stapleton, and that we beg that you will accept his rulings without
+ dispute."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He then turned from one combatant to the other, with a wave of his hand.
+ </p>
+<p class="center big">
+ III
+</p>
+ <p>
+ "Montgomery&mdash;Craggs!" said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A great hush fell over the huge assembly. Even the dogs stopped yapping;
+ one might have thought that the monstrous room was empty. The two men had
+ stood up, the small white gloves over their hands. They advanced from their
+ corners and shook hands, Montgomery gravely, Craggs with a smile. Then
+ they fell into position. The crowd gave a long sigh&mdash;the intake of a
+ thousand excited breaths. The referee tilted his chair on to its back
+ legs, and looked moodily critical from the one to the other.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was strength against activity&mdash;that was evident from the first.
+ The Master stood stolidly upon his K leg. It gave him a tremendous
+ pedestal; one could hardly imagine his being knocked down. And he could
+ pivot round upon it with extraordinary quickness; but his advance or
+ retreat was ungainly. His frame, however, was so much larger and broader
+ than that of the student, and his brown, massive face looked so resolute
+ and menacing that the hearts of the Wilson party sank within them. There
+ was one heart, however, which had not done so. It was that of Robert
+ Montgomery.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Any nervousness which he may have had completely passed away now that he
+ had his work before him. Here was something definite&mdash;this
+ hard-faced, deformed Hercules to beat, with a career as the price of
+ beating him. He glowed with the joy of action; it thrilled through his
+ nerves. He faced his man with little in-and-out steps, breaking to the
+ left, breaking to the right, feeling his way, while Craggs, with a dull,
+ malignant eye, pivoted slowly upon his weak leg, his left arm half
+ extended, his right sunk low across the mark. Montgomery led with his
+ left, and then led again, getting lightly home each time. He tried again,
+ but the Master had his counter ready, and Montgomery reeled back from a
+ harder blow than he had given. Anastasia, the woman, gave a shrill cry of
+ encouragement, and her man let fly his right. Montgomery ducked under it,
+ and in an instant the two were in each other's arms.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Break away! Break away!" said the referee.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Master struck upwards on the break, and shook Montgomery with the
+ blow. Then it was "time." It had been a spirited opening round. The people
+ buzzed into comment and applause. Montgomery was quite fresh, but the
+ hairy chest of the Master was rising and falling. The man passed a sponge
+ over his head while Anastasia flapped the towel before him. "Good lass!
+ good lass!" cried the crowd, and cheered her.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The men were up again, the Master grimly watchful, Montgomery as alert as
+ a kitten. The Master tried a sudden rush, squattering along with his
+ awkward gait, but coming faster than one would think. The student slipped
+ aside and avoided him. The Master stopped, grinned, and shook his head.
+ Then he motioned with his hand as an invitation to Montgomery to come to
+ him. The student did so and led with his left, but got a swinging right
+ counter in the ribs in exchange. The heavy blow staggered him, and the
+ Master came scrambling in to complete his advantage; but Montgomery, with
+ his greater activity, kept out of danger until the call of "time." A tame
+ round, and the advantage with the Master.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "T' Maister's too strong for him," said a smelter to his neighbour.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ay; but t'other's a likely lad. Happen we'll see some sport yet. He can
+ joomp rarely."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But t' Maister can stop and hit rarely. Happen he'll mak' him joomp when
+ he gets his nief upon him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They were up again, the water glistening upon their faces. Montgomery led
+ instantly, and got his right home with a sounding smack upon the master's
+ forehead. There was a shout from the colliers, and "Silence! Order!" from
+ the referee. Montgomery avoided the counter, and scored with his left.
+ Fresh applause, and the referee upon his feet in indignation.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No comments, gentlemen, if <i>you</i> please, during the rounds."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Just bide a bit!" growled the Master.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Don't talk&mdash;fight!" said the referee, angrily.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery rubbed in the point by a flush hit upon the mouth, and the
+ Master shambled back to his corner like an angry bear, having had all the
+ worst of the round.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where's thot seven to one?" shouted Purvis, the publican. "I'll take six
+ to one!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There were no answers.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Five to one!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There were givers at that. Purvis booked them in a tattered notebook.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery began to feel happy. He lay back with his legs outstretched,
+ his back against the corner-post, and one gloved hand upon each rope. What
+ a delicious minute it was between each round. If he could only keep out of
+ harm's way, he must surely wear this man out before the end of twenty
+ rounds. He was so slow that all his strength went for nothing.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You're fightin' a winnin' fight&mdash;a winnin' fight," Ted Barton
+ whispered in his ear. "Go canny; tak' no chances; you have him proper."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the Master was crafty. He had fought so many battles with his maimed
+ limb that he knew how to make the best of it. Warily and slowly he
+ manoeuvred round Montgomery, stepping forward and yet again forward until
+ he had imperceptibly backed him into his corner. The student suddenly saw
+ a flash of triumph upon the grim face, and a gleam in the dull, malignant
+ eyes. The Master was upon him. He sprang aside and was on the ropes. The
+ Master smashed in one of his terrible upper-cuts, and Montgomery half
+ broke it with his guard. The student sprang the other way and was against
+ the other converging rope. He was trapped in the angle. The Master sent in
+ another with a hoggish grunt which spoke of the energy behind it.
+ Montgomery ducked, but got a jab from the left upon the mark. He closed
+ with his man.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Break away! Break away!" cried the referee. Montgomery disengaged, and
+ got a swinging blow on the ear as he did so. It had been a damaging round
+ for him, and the Croxley people were shouting their delight. "Gentlemen, I
+ will <i>not</i> have this noise!" Stapleton roared. "I have been
+ accustomed to preside at a well-conducted club, and not at a bear-garden."
+ This little man, with the tilted hat and the bulging forehead, dominated
+ the whole assembly. He was like a head-master among his boys. He glared
+ round him, and nobody cared to meet his eye. Anastasia had kissed the
+ Master when he resumed his seat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good lass. Do't again!" cried the laughing crowd, and the angry Master
+ shook his glove at her, as she flapped her towel in front of him.
+ Montgomery was weary and a little sore, but not depressed. He had learned
+ something. He would not again be tempted into danger.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ For three rounds the honours were fairly equal. The student's hitting was
+ the quicker, the Master's the harder. Profiting by his lesson, Montgomery
+ kept himself in the open, and refused to be herded into a corner.
+ Sometimes the Master succeeded in rushing him to the side-ropes, but the
+ younger man slipped away, or closed and then disengaged. The monotonous
+ "Break away! Break away!" of the referee broke in upon the quick, low
+ patter of rubber-soled shoes, the dull thud of the blows, and the sharp,
+ hissing breath of two tired men.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The ninth round found both of them in fairly good condition. Montgomery's
+ head was still singing from the blow that he had in the corner, and one of
+ his thumbs pained him acutely and seemed to be dislocated. The Master
+ showed no sign of a touch, but his breathing was the more laboured, and a
+ long line of ticks upon the referee's paper showed that the student had a
+ good show of points. But one of this iron-man's blows was worth three of
+ his, and he knew that without the gloves he could not have stood for three
+ rounds against him. All the amateur work that he had done was the merest
+ tapping and flapping when compared to those frightful blows, from arms
+ toughened by the shovel and the crowbar.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was the tenth round, and the fight was half over. The betting now was
+ only three to one, for the Wilson champion had held his own much better
+ than had been expected. But those who knew the ring-craft as well as the
+ staying power of the old prize-fighter knew that the odds were still a
+ long way in his favour.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Have a care of him!" whispered Barton, as he sent his man up to the
+ scratch. "Have a care! He'll play thee a trick, if he can."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But Montgomery saw, or imagined he saw, that his antagonist was tiring. He
+ looked jaded and listless, and his hands drooped a little from their
+ position. His own youth and condition were beginning to tell. He sprang in
+ and brought off a fine left-handed lead. The Master's return lacked his
+ usual fire. Again Montgomery led, and again he got home. Then he tried his
+ right upon the mark, and the Master guarded it downwards.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Too low! Too low! A foul! A foul!" yelled a thousand voices.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The referee rolled his sardonic eyes slowly round. "Seems to me this
+ buildin' is chock-full of referees," said he. The people laughed and
+ applauded, but their favour was as immaterial to him as their anger. "No
+ applause, please! This is not a theatre!" he yelled.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery was very pleased with himself. His adversary was evidently in a
+ bad way. He was piling on his points and establishing a lead. He might as
+ well make hay while the sun shone. The Master was looking all abroad.
+ Montgomery popped one upon his blue jowl and got away without a return.
+ And then the Master suddenly dropped both his hands and began rubbing his
+ thigh. Ah! that was it, was it? He had muscular cramp.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Go in! Go in!" cried Teddy Barton.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery sprang wildly forward, and the next instant was lying half
+ senseless, with his neck nearly broken, in the middle of the ring.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The whole round had been a long conspiracy to tempt him within reach of
+ one of those terrible right-hand upper-cuts for which the Master was
+ famous. For this the listless, weary bearing, for this the cramp in the
+ thigh. When Montgomery had sprung in so hotly he had exposed himself to
+ such a blow as neither flesh nor blood could stand. Whizzing up from below
+ with a rigid arm, which put the Master's eleven stone into its force, it
+ struck him under the jaw; he whirled half round, and fell a helpless and
+ half-paralysed mass. A vague groan and murmur, inarticulate, too excited
+ for words, rose from the great audience. With open mouths and staring eyes
+ they gazed at the twitching and quivering figure.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Stand back! Stand right back!" shrieked the referee, for the Master was
+ standing over his man ready to give him the <i>coup-de-grace</i> as he
+ rose.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Stand back, Craggs, this instant!" Stapleton repeated.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Master sank his hands sulkily and walked backwards to the rope with
+ his ferocious eyes fixed upon his fallen antagonist. The timekeeper called
+ the seconds. If ten of them passed before Montgomery rose to his feet, the
+ fight was ended. Ted Barton wrung his hands and danced about in an agony
+ in his corner.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ As if in a dream&mdash;a terrible nightmare&mdash;the student could hear
+ the voice of the timekeeper&mdash;three&mdash;four&mdash;five&mdash;he got
+ up on his hand&mdash;six&mdash; seven&mdash;he was on his knee, sick,
+ swimming, faint, but resolute to rise. Eight&mdash;he was up, and the
+ Master was on him like a tiger, lashing savagely at him with both hands.
+ Folk held their breath as they watched those terrible blows, and
+ anticipated the pitiful end&mdash;so much more pitiful where a game but
+ helpless man refuses to accept defeat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Strangely automatic is the human brain. Without volition, without effort,
+ there shot into the memory of this bewildered, staggering, half-stupefied
+ man the one thing which could have saved him&mdash;that blind eye of which
+ the Master's son had spoken. It was the same as the other to look at, but
+ Montgomery remembered that he had said that it was the left. He reeled to
+ the left side, half felled by a drive which lit upon his shoulder. The
+ Master pivoted round upon his leg and was at him in an instant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yark him, lad! Yark him!" screamed the woman.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Hold your tongue!" said the referee.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery slipped to the left again and yet again, but the Master was too
+ quick and clever for him. He struck round and got him full on the face as
+ he tried once more to break away. Montgomery's knees weakened under him,
+ and he fell with a groan on the floor. This time he knew that he was done.
+ With bitter agony he realised, as he groped blindly with his hands, that
+ he could not possibly raise himself. Far away and muffled he heard, amid
+ the murmurs of the multitude, the fateful voice of the timekeeper counting
+ off the seconds.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "One&mdash;two&mdash;three&mdash;four&mdash;five&mdash;six&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Time!" said the referee.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Then the pent-up passion of the great assembly broke loose. Croxley gave a
+ deep groan of disappointment. The Wilsons were on their feet, yelling with
+ delight. There was still a chance for them. In four more seconds their man
+ would have been solemnly counted out. But now he had a minute in which to
+ recover. The referee looked round with relaxed features and laughing eyes.
+ He loved this rough game, this school for humble heroes, and it was
+ pleasant to him to intervene as a <i>Deus ex machina</i> at so dramatic a
+ moment. His chair and his hat were both tilted at an extreme angle; he and
+ the timekeeper smiled at each other. Ted Barton and the other second had
+ rushed out and thrust an arm each under Montgomery's knee, the other
+ behind his loins, and so carried him back to his stool. His head lolled
+ upon his shoulder, but a douche of cold water sent a shiver through him,
+ and he started and looked round him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He's a' right!" cried the people round. "He's a rare brave lad. Good lad!
+ Good lad!" Barton poured some brandy into his mouth. The mists cleared a
+ little, and he realised where he was and what he had to do. But he was
+ still very weak, and he hardly dared to hope that he could survive another
+ round.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Seconds out of the ring!" cried the referee. "Time!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Croxley Master sprang eagerly off his stool.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Keep clear of him! Go easy for a bit," said Barton, and Montgomery walked
+ out to meet his man once more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He had had two lessons&mdash;the one when the Master got him into his
+ corner, the other when he had been lured into mixing it up with so
+ powerful an antagonist. Now he would be wary. Another blow would finish
+ him; he could afford to run no risks. The Master was determined to follow
+ up his advantage, and rushed at him, slogging furiously right and left.
+ But Montgomery was too young and active to be caught. He was strong upon
+ his legs once more, and his wits had all come back to him. It was a
+ gallant sight&mdash;the line-of-battleship trying to pour its overwhelming
+ broadside into the frigate, and the frigate manoeuvring always so as to
+ avoid it. The Master tried all his ring-craft. He coaxed the student up by
+ pretended inactivity; he rushed at him with furious rushes towards the
+ ropes. For three rounds he exhausted every wile in trying to get at him.
+ Montgomery during all this time was conscious that his strength was minute
+ by minute coming back to him. The spinal jar from an upper-cut is
+ overwhelming, but evanescent. He was losing all sense of it beyond a great
+ stiffness of the neck. For the first round after his downfall he had been
+ content to be entirely on the defensive, only too happy if he could stall
+ off the furious attacks of the Master. In the second he occasionally
+ ventured upon a light counter. In the third he was smacking back merrily
+ where he saw an opening. His people yelled their approval of him at the
+ end of every round. Even the iron-workers cheered him with that fine
+ unselfishness which true sport engenders. To most of them, unspiritual and
+ unimaginative, the sight of this clean-limbed young Apollo, rising above
+ disaster and holding on while consciousness was in him to his appointed
+ task, was the greatest thing their experience had ever known.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the Master's naturally morose temper became more and more murderous at
+ this postponement of his hopes. Three rounds ago the battle had been in
+ his hands; now it was all to do over again. Round by round his man was
+ recovering his strength. By the fifteenth he was strong again in wind and
+ limb. But the vigilant Anastasia saw something which encouraged her.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That bash in t' ribs is telling on him, Jock," she whispered. "Why else
+ should he be gulping t' brandy? Go in, lad, and thou hast him yet."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery had suddenly taken the flask from Barton's hand, and had a deep
+ pull at the contents. Then, with his face a little flushed, and with a
+ curious look of purpose, which made the referee stare hard at him, in his
+ eyes, he rose for the sixteenth round.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Game as a pairtridge!" cried the publican, as he looked at the hard-set
+ face.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Mix it oop, lad! Mix it oop!" cried the iron-men to their Master. And
+ then a hum of exultation ran through their ranks as they realised that
+ their tougher, harder, stronger man held the vantage, after all. Neither
+ of the men showed much sign of punishment. Small gloves crush and numb,
+ but they do not cut. One of the Master's eyes was even more flush with his
+ cheek than Nature had made it. Montgomery had two or three livid marks
+ upon his body, and his face was haggard, save for that pink spot which the
+ brandy had brought into either cheek. He rocked a little as he stood
+ opposite his man, and his hands drooped as if he felt the gloves to be an
+ unutterable weight. It was evident that he was spent and desperately
+ weary. If he received one other blow it must surely be fatal to him. If he
+ brought one home, what power could there be behind it, and what chance was
+ there of its harming the colossus in front of him? It was the crisis of
+ the fight. This round must decide it. "Mix it oop, lad! Mix it oop!" the
+ iron-men whooped. Even the savage eyes of the referee were unable to
+ restrain the excited crowd.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Now, at last, the chance had come for Montgomery. He had learned a lesson
+ from his more experienced rival. Why should he not play his own game upon
+ him? He was spent, but not nearly so spent as he pretended. That brandy
+ was to call up his reserves, to let him have strength to take full
+ advantage of the opening when it came. It was thrilling and tingling
+ through his veins at the very moment when he was lurching and rocking like
+ a beaten man. He acted his part admirably. The Master felt that there was
+ an easy task before him, and rushed in with ungainly activity to finish it
+ once for all. He slap-banged away left and right, boring Montgomery up
+ against the ropes, swinging in his ferocious blows with those animal
+ grunts which told of the vicious energy behind them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But Montgomery was too cool to fall a victim to any of those murderous
+ upper-cuts. He kept out of harm's way with a rigid guard, an active foot,
+ and a head which was swift to duck. And yet he contrived to present the
+ same appearance of a man who is hopelessly done. The Master, weary from
+ his own shower of blows, and fearing nothing from so weak a man, dropped
+ his hand for an instant, and at that instant Montgomery's right came home.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a magnificent blow, straight, clean, crisp, with the force of the
+ loins and the back behind it. And it landed where he had meant it to&mdash;
+ upon the exact point of that blue-grained chin. Flesh and blood could not
+ stand such a blow in such a place. Neither valour nor hardihood can save
+ the man to whom it comes. The Master fell backwards, flat, prostrate,
+ striking the ground with so simultaneous a clap that it was like a shutter
+ falling from a wall. A yell, which no referee could control, broke from
+ the crowded benches as the giant went down. He lay upon his back, his
+ knees a little drawn up, his huge chest panting. He twitched and shook,
+ but could not move. His feet pawed convulsively once or twice. It was no
+ use. He was done. "Eight&mdash;nine&mdash;ten!" said the timekeeper, and
+ the roar of a thousand voices, with a deafening clap like the broadside
+ of a ship, told that the Master of Croxley was the Master no more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery stood half dazed, looking down at the huge, prostrate figure.
+ He could hardly realise that it was indeed all over. He saw the referee
+ motion towards him with his hand. He heard his name bellowed in triumph
+ from every side. And then he was aware of someone rushing towards him; he
+ caught a glimpse of a flushed face and an aureole of flying red hair, a
+ gloveless fist struck him between the eyes, and he was on his back in the
+ ring beside his antagonist, while a dozen of his supporters were
+ endeavouring to secure the frantic Anastasia. He heard the angry shouting
+ of the referee, the screaming of the furious woman, and the cries of the
+ mob. Then something seemed to break like an over-stretched banjo string,
+ and he sank into the deep, deep, mist-girt abyss of unconsciousness.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The dressing was like a thing in a dream, and so was a vision of the
+ Master with the grin of a bulldog upon his face, and his three teeth
+ amiably protruded. He shook Montgomery heartily by the hand.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I would have been rare pleased to shake thee by the throttle, lad, a
+ short while syne," said he. "But I bear no ill-feeling again' thee. It was
+ a rare poonch that brought me down&mdash;I have not had a better since my
+ second fight wi' Billy Edwards in '89. Happen thou might think o' goin'
+ further wi' this business. If thou dost, and want a trainer, there's not
+ much inside t' ropes as I don't know. Or happen thou might like to try it
+ wi' me old style and bare knuckles. Thou hast but to write to t' iron-works
+ to find me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But Montgomery disclaimed any such ambition. A canvas bag with his share&mdash;190
+ sovereigns&mdash;was handed to him, of which he gave ten to the Master,
+ who also received some share of the gate-money. Then, with young Wilson
+ escorting him on one side, Purvis on the other, and Fawcett carrying his
+ bag behind, he went in triumph to his carriage, and drove amid a long
+ roar, which lined the highway like a hedge for the seven miles, back to
+ his starting-point.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's the greatest thing I ever saw in my life. By George, it's ripping!"
+ cried Wilson, who had been left in a kind of ecstasy by the events of the
+ day. "There's a chap over Barnsley way who fancies himself a bit. Let us
+ spring you on him, and let him see what he can make of you. We'll put up a
+ purse&mdash;won't we, Purvis? You shall never want a backer."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "At his weight," said the publican, "I'm behind him, I am, for twenty
+ rounds, and no age, country, or colour barred."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So am I," cried Fawcett; "middle-weight champion of the world, that's
+ what he is&mdash;here, in the same carriage with us."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But Montgomery was not to be beguiled.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No; I have my own work to do now."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And what may that be?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll use this money to get my medical degree."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, we've plenty of doctors, but you're the only man in the Riding that
+ could smack the Croxley Master off his legs. However, I suppose you know
+ your own business best. When you're a doctor, you'd best come down into
+ these parts, and you'll always find a job waiting for you at the Wilson
+ Coal-pits."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Montgomery had returned by devious ways to the surgery. The horses were
+ smoking at the door, and the doctor was just back from his long journey.
+ Several patients had called in his absence, and he was in the worst of
+ tempers.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I suppose I should be glad that you have come back at all, Mr.
+ Montgomery!" he snarled. "When next you elect to take a holiday, I trust
+ it will not be at so busy a time."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am sorry, sir, that you should have been inconvenienced."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir, I have been exceedingly inconvenienced." Here, for the first
+ time, he looked hard at the assistant. "Good Heavens, Mr. Montgomery, what
+ have you been doing with your left eye?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was where Anastasia had lodged her protest. Montgomery laughed.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is nothing, sir," said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And you have a livid mark under your jaw. It is, indeed, terrible that my
+ representative should be going about in so disreputable a condition. How
+ did you receive these injuries?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, sir, as you know, there was a little glove-fight to-day over at
+ Croxley."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And you got mixed up with that brutal crowd?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I <i>was</i> rather mixed up with them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And who assaulted you?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "One of the fighters."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Which of them?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The Master of Croxley."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good Heavens! Perhaps you interfered with him?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, to tell the truth, I did a little."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Mr. Montgomery, in such a practice as mine, intimately associated as it
+ is with the highest and most progressive elements of our small community,
+ it is impossible&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But just then the tentative bray of a cornet-player searching for his
+ key-note jarred upon their ears, and an instant later the Wilson Colliery
+ brass band was in full cry with, "See the Conquering Hero Comes," outside
+ the surgery window. There was a banner waving, and a shouting crowd of
+ miners.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What is it? What does it mean?" cried the angry doctor.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It means, sir, that I have, in the only way which was open to me, earned
+ the money which is necessary for my education. It is my duty, Dr. Oldacre,
+ to warn you that I am about to return to the University, and that you
+ should lose no time in appointing my successor."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE LORD OF CHATEAU NOIR
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ It was in the days when the German armies had broken their way across
+ France, and when the shattered forces of the young Republic had been swept
+ away to the north of the Aisne and to the south of the Loire. Three broad
+ streams of armed men had rolled slowly but irresistibly from the Rhine,
+ now meandering to the north, now to the south, dividing, coalescing, but
+ all uniting to form one great lake round Paris. And from this lake there
+ welled out smaller streams&mdash;one to the north, one southward, to
+ Orleans, and a third westward to Normandy. Many a German trooper saw the
+ sea for the first time when he rode his horse girth-deep into the waves at
+ Dieppe.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Black and bitter were the thoughts of Frenchmen when they saw this weal of
+ dishonour slashed across the fair face of their country. They had fought
+ and they had been overborne. That swarming cavalry, those countless
+ footmen, the masterful guns&mdash;they had tried and tried to make head
+ against them. In battalions their invaders were not to be beaten, but man
+ to man, or ten to ten, they were their equals. A brave Frenchman might
+ still make a single German rue the day that he had left his own bank of
+ the Rhine. Thus, unchronicled amid the battles and the sieges, there broke
+ out another war, a war of individuals, with foul murder upon the one side
+ and brutal reprisal on the other.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Colonel von Gramm, of the 24th Posen Infantry, had suffered severely
+ during this new development. He commanded in the little Norman town of Les
+ Andelys, and his outposts stretched amid the hamlets and farmhouses of the
+ district round. No French force was within fifty miles of him, and yet
+ morning after morning he had to listen to a black report of sentries found
+ dead at their posts, or of foraging parties which had never returned. Then
+ the colonel would go forth in his wrath, and farmsteadings would blaze and
+ villages tremble; but next morning there was still that same dismal tale
+ to be told. Do what he might, he could not shake off his invisible
+ enemies. And yet it should not have been so hard, for, from certain signs
+ in common, in the plan and in the deed, it was certain that all these
+ outrages came from a single source.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Colonel von Gramm had tried violence, and it had failed. Gold might be
+ more successful. He published it abroad over the countryside that 500frs.
+ would be paid for information. There was no response. Then 800frs. The
+ peasants were incorruptible. Then, goaded on by a murdered corporal, he
+ rose to a thousand, and so bought the soul of Francois Rejane, farm
+ labourer, whose Norman avarice was a stronger passion than his French
+ hatred.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You say that you know who did these crimes?" asked the Prussian colonel,
+ eyeing with loathing the blue-bloused, rat-faced creature before him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, colonel."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And it was&mdash;?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Those thousand francs, colonel&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Not a sou until your story has been tested. Come! Who is it who has
+ murdered my men?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is Count Eustace of Chateau Noir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You lie!" cried the colonel, angrily. "A gentleman and a nobleman could
+ not have done such crimes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The peasant shrugged his shoulders. "It is evident to me that you do not
+ know the count. It is this way, colonel. What I tell you is the truth, and
+ I am not afraid that you should test it. The Count of Chateau Noir is a
+ hard man, even at the best time he was a hard man. But of late he has been
+ terrible. It was his son's death, you know. His son was under Douay, and
+ he was taken, and then in escaping from Germany he met his death. It was
+ the count's only child, and indeed we all think that it has driven him
+ mad. With his peasants he follows the German armies. I do not know how
+ many he has killed, but it is he who cut the cross upon the foreheads, for
+ it is the badge of his house."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was true. The murdered sentries had each had a saltire cross slashed
+ across their brows, as by a hunting-knife. The colonel bent his stiff back
+ and ran his forefinger over the map which lay upon the table.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The Chateau Noir is not more than four leagues," he said.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Three and a kilometre, colonel."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You know the place?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I used to work there."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Colonel von Gramm rang the bell.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Give this man food and detain him," said he to the sergeant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why detain me, colonel? I can tell you no more."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We shall need you as guide."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "As guide? But the count? If I were to fall into his hands? Ah, colonel&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Prussian commander waved him away. "Send Captain Baumgarten to me at
+ once," said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The officer who answered the summons was a man of middle-age, heavy-jawed,
+ blue-eyed, with a curving yellow moustache, and a brick-red face which
+ turned to an ivory white where his helmet had sheltered it. He was bald,
+ with a shining, tightly stretched scalp, at the back of which, as in a
+ mirror, it was a favourite mess-joke of the subalterns to trim their
+ moustaches. As a soldier he was slow, but reliable and brave. The colonel
+ could trust him where a more dashing officer might be in danger.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You will proceed to Chateau Noir to-night, captain," said he. "A guide
+ has been provided. You will arrest the count and bring him back. If there
+ is an attempt at rescue, shoot him at once."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How many men shall I take, colonel?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, we are surrounded by spies, and our only chance is to pounce upon
+ him before he knows that we are on the way. A large force will attract
+ attention. On the other hand, you must not risk being cut off."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I might march north, colonel, as if to join General Goeben. Then I could
+ turn down this road which I see upon your map, and get to Chateau Noir
+ before they could hear of us. In that case, with twenty men&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Very good, captain. I hope to see you with your prisoner to-morrow
+ morning."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a cold December night when Captain Baumgarten marched out of Les
+ Andelys with his twenty Poseners, and took the main road to the north
+ west. Two miles out he turned suddenly down a narrow, deeply rutted track,
+ and made swiftly for his man. A thin, cold rain was falling, swishing
+ among the tall poplar trees and rustling in the fields on either side. The
+ captain walked first with Moser, a veteran sergeant, beside him. The
+ sergeant's wrist was fastened to that of the French peasant, and it had
+ been whispered in his ear that in case of an ambush the first bullet fired
+ would be through his head. Behind them the twenty infantrymen plodded
+ along through the darkness with their faces sunk to the rain, and their
+ boots squeaking in the soft, wet clay. They knew where they were going,
+ and why, and the thought upheld them, for they were bitter at the loss of
+ their comrades. It was a cavalry job, they knew, but the cavalry were all
+ on with the advance, and, besides, it was more fitting that the regiment
+ should avenge its own dead men.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was nearly eight when they left Les Andelys. At half-past eleven their
+ guide stopped at a place where two high pillars, crowned with some
+ heraldic stonework, flanked a huge iron gate. The wall in which it had
+ been the opening had crumbled away, but the great gate still towered above
+ the brambles and weeds which had overgrown its base. The Prussians made
+ their way round it and advanced stealthily, under the shadow of a tunnel
+ of oak branches, up the long avenue, which was still cumbered by the
+ leaves of last autumn. At the top they halted and reconnoitred.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The black chateau lay in front of them. The moon had shone out between two
+ rain-clouds, and threw the old house into silver and shadow. It was shaped
+ like an L, with a low arched door in front, and lines of small windows
+ like the open ports of a man-of-war. Above was a dark roof, breaking at
+ the corners into little round overhanging turrets, the whole lying silent
+ in the moonshine, with a drift of ragged clouds blackening the heavens
+ behind it. A single light gleamed in one of the lower windows.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The captain whispered his orders to his men. Some were to creep to the
+ front door, some to the back. Some were to watch the east, and some the
+ west. He and the sergeant stole on tiptoe to the lighted window.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a small room into which they looked, very meanly furnished. An
+ elderly man, in the dress of a menial, was reading a tattered paper by the
+ light of a guttering candle. He leaned back in his wooden chair with his
+ feet upon a box, while a bottle of white wine stood with a half-filled
+ tumbler upon a stool beside him. The sergeant thrust his needle-gun
+ through the glass, and the man sprang to his feet with a shriek.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Silence, for your life! The house is surrounded, and you cannot escape.
+ Come round and open the door, or we will show you no mercy when we come
+ in."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "For God's sake, don't shoot! I will open it! I will open it!" He rushed
+ from the room with his paper still crumpled up in his hand. An instant
+ later, with a groaning of old locks and a rasping of bars, the low door
+ swung open, and the Prussians poured into the stone-flagged passage.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where is Count Eustace de Chateau Noir?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My master! He is out, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Out at this time of night? Your life for a lie!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is true, sir. He is out!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I do not know."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Doing what?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I cannot tell. No, it is no use your cocking your pistol, sir. You may
+ kill me, but you cannot make me tell you that which I do not know."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Is he often out at this hour?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Frequently."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And when does he come home?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Before daybreak."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Baumgarten rasped out a German oath. He had had his journey for
+ nothing, then. The man's answers were only too likely to be true. It was
+ what he might have expected. But at least he would search the house and
+ make sure. Leaving a picket at the front door and another at the back, the
+ sergeant and he drove the trembling butler in front of them&mdash; his
+ shaking candle sending strange, flickering shadows over the old tapestries
+ and the low, oak-raftered ceilings. They searched the whole house, from
+ the huge stone-flagged kitchen below to the dining-hall on the second
+ floor, with its gallery for musicians, and its panelling black with age,
+ but nowhere was there a living creature. Up above, in an attic, they found
+ Marie, the elderly wife of the butler; but the owner kept no other
+ servants, and of his own presence there was no trace.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was long, however, before Captain Baumgarten had satisfied himself upon
+ the point. It was a difficult house to search. Thin stairs, which only one
+ man could ascend at a time, connected lines of tortuous corridors. The
+ walls were so thick that each room was cut off from its neighbour. Huge
+ fireplaces yawned in each, while the windows were 6ft. deep in the wall.
+ Captain Baumgarten stamped with his feet, tore down curtains, and struck
+ with the pommel of his sword. If there were secret hiding-places, he was
+ not fortunate enough to find them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have an idea," said he, at last, speaking in German to the sergeant.
+ "You will place a guard over this fellow, and make sure that he
+ communicates with no one."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, captain."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And you will place four men in ambush at the front and at the back. It is
+ likely enough that about daybreak our bird may return to the nest."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And the others, captain?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Let them have their suppers in the kitchen. The fellow will serve you
+ with meat and wine. It is a wild night, and we shall be better here than
+ on the country road."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And yourself, captain?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I will take my supper up here in the dining-hall. The logs are laid and
+ we can light the fire. You will call me if there is any alarm. What can
+ you give me for supper&mdash;you?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Alas, monsieur, there was a time when I might have answered, 'What you
+ wish!' but now it is all that we can do to find a bottle of new claret and
+ a cold pullet."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That will do very well. Let a guard go about with him, sergeant, and let
+ him feel the end of a bayonet if he plays us any tricks."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Baumgarten was an old campaigner. In the Eastern provinces, and
+ before that in Bohemia, he had learned the art of quartering himself upon
+ the enemy. While the butler brought his supper he occupied himself in
+ making his preparations for a comfortable night. He lit the candelabrum of
+ ten candles upon the centre table. The fire was already burning up,
+ crackling merrily, and sending spurts of blue, pungent smoke into the
+ room. The captain walked to the window and looked out. The moon had gone
+ in again, and it was raining heavily. He could hear the deep sough of the
+ wind, and see the dark loom of the trees, all swaying in the one
+ direction. It was a sight which gave a zest to his comfortable quarters,
+ and to the cold fowl and the bottle of wine which the butler had brought
+ up for him. He was tired and hungry after his long tramp, so he threw his
+ sword, his helmet, and his revolver-belt down upon a chair, and fell to
+ eagerly upon his supper. Then, with his glass of wine before him and his
+ cigar between his lips, he tilted his chair back and looked about him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He sat within a small circle of brilliant light which gleamed upon his
+ silver shoulder-straps, and threw out his terra-cotta face, his heavy
+ eyebrows, and his yellow moustache. But outside that circle things were
+ vague and shadowy in the old dining-hall. Two sides were oak-panelled and
+ two were hung with faded tapestry, across which huntsmen and dogs and
+ stags were still dimly streaming. Above the fireplace were rows of
+ heraldic shields with the blazonings of the family and of its alliances,
+ the fatal saltire cross breaking out on each of them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Four paintings of old seigneurs of Chateau Noir faced the fireplace, all
+ men with hawk noses and bold, high features, so like each other that only
+ the dress could distinguish the Crusader from the Cavalier of the Fronde.
+ Captain Baumgarten, heavy with his repast, lay back in his chair looking
+ up at them through the clouds of his tobacco smoke, and pondering over the
+ strange chance which had sent him, a man from the Baltic coast, to eat his
+ supper in the ancestral hall of these proud Norman chieftains. But the
+ fire was hot, and the captain's eyes were heavy. His chin sank slowly upon
+ his chest, and the ten candles gleamed upon the broad, white scalp.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Suddenly a slight noise brought him to his feet. For an instant it seemed
+ to his dazed senses that one of the pictures opposite had walked from its
+ frame. There, beside the table, and almost within arm's length of him, was
+ standing a huge man, silent, motionless, with no sign of life save his
+ fierce-glinting eyes. He was black-haired, olive-skinned, with a pointed
+ tuft of black beard, and a great, fierce nose, towards which all his
+ features seemed to run. His cheeks were wrinkled like a last year's apple,
+ but his sweep of shoulder, and bony, corded hands, told of a strength
+ which was unsapped by age. His arms were folded across his arching chest,
+ and his mouth was set in a fixed smile.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Pray do not trouble yourself to look for your weapons," he said, as the
+ Prussian cast a swift glance at the empty chair in which they had been
+ laid. "You have been, if you will allow me to say so, a little indiscreet
+ to make yourself so much at home in a house every wall of which is
+ honeycombed with secret passages. You will be amused to hear that forty
+ men were watching you at your supper. Ah! what then?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Baumgarten had taken a step forward with clenched fists. The
+ Frenchman held up the revolver which he grasped in his right hand, while
+ with the left he hurled the German back into his chair.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Pray keep your seat," said he. "You have no cause to trouble about your
+ men. They have already been provided for. It is astonishing with these
+ stone floors how little one can hear what goes on beneath. You have been
+ relieved of your command, and have now only to think of yourself. May I
+ ask what your name is?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am Captain Baumgarten of the 24th Posen Regiment."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Your French is excellent, though you incline, like most of your
+ countrymen, to turn the 'p' into a 'b.' I have been amused to hear them
+ cry '<i>Avez bitie sur moi!</i>' You know, doubtless, who it is who
+ addresses you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The Count of Chateau Noir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Precisely. It would have been a misfortune if you had visited my chateau
+ and I had been unable to have a word with you. I have had to do with many
+ German soldiers, but never with an officer before. I have much to talk to
+ you about."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Captain Baumgarten sat still in his chair. Brave as he was, there was
+ something in this man's manner which made his skin creep with
+ apprehension. His eyes glanced to right and to left, but his weapons were
+ gone, and in a struggle he saw that he was but a child to this gigantic
+ adversary. The count had picked up the claret bottle and held it to the
+ light.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Tut! tut!" said he. "And was this the best that Pierre could do for you?
+ I am ashamed to look you in the face, Captain Baumgarten. We must improve
+ upon this."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He blew a call upon a whistle which hung from his shooting-jacket. The old
+ manservant was in the room in an instant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Chambertin from bin 15!" he cried, and a minute later a grey bottle,
+ streaked with cobwebs, was carried in as a nurse bears an infant. The
+ count filled two glasses to the brim.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Drink!" said he. "It is the very best in my cellars, and not to be
+ matched between Rouen and Paris. Drink, sir, and be happy! There are cold
+ joints below. There are two lobsters, fresh from Honfleur. Will you not
+ venture upon a second and more savoury supper?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The German officer shook his head. He drained the glass, however, and his
+ host filled it once more, pressing him to give an order for this or that
+ dainty.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There is nothing in my house which is not at your disposal. You have but
+ to say the word. Well, then, you will allow me to tell you a story while
+ you drink your wine. I have so longed to tell it to some German officer.
+ It is about my son, my only child, Eustace, who was taken and died in
+ escaping. It is a curious little story, and I think that I can promise you
+ that you will never forget it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You must know, then, that my boy was in the artillery&mdash;a fine young
+ fellow, Captain Baumgarten, and the pride of his mother. She died within a
+ week of the news of his death reaching us. It was brought by a brother
+ officer who was at his side throughout, and who escaped while my lad died.
+ I want to tell you all that he told me.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Eustace was taken at Weissenburg on the 4th of August. The prisoners were
+ broken up into parties, and sent back into Germany by different routes.
+ Eustace was taken upon the 5th to a village called Lauterburg, where he
+ met with kindness from the German officer in command. This good colonel
+ had the hungry lad to supper, offered him the best he had, opened a bottle
+ of good wine, as I have tried to do for you, and gave him a cigar from his
+ own case. Might I entreat you to take one from mine?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The German again shook his head. His horror of his companion had increased
+ as he sat watching the lips that smiled and the eyes that glared.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The colonel, as I say, was good to my boy. But, unluckily, the prisoners
+ were moved next day across the Rhine into Ettlingen. They were not equally
+ fortunate there. The officer who guarded them was a ruffian and a villain,
+ Captain Baumgarten. He took a pleasure in humiliating and ill-treating the
+ brave men who had fallen into his power. That night, upon my son answering
+ fiercely back to some taunt of his, he struck him in the eye, like this!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The crash of the blow rang through the hall. The German's face fell
+ forward, his hand up, and blood oozing through his fingers. The count
+ settled down in his chair once more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My boy was disfigured by the blow, and this villain made his appearance
+ the object of his jeers. By the way, you look a little comical yourself at
+ the present moment, captain, and your colonel would certainly say that you
+ had been getting into mischief. To continue, however, my boy's youth and
+ his destitution&mdash;for his pockets were empty&mdash;moved the pity of a
+ kind-hearted major, and he advanced him ten Napoleons from his own pocket
+ without security of any kind. Into your hands, Captain Baumgarten, I
+ return these ten gold pieces, since I cannot learn the name of the lender.
+ I am grateful from my heart for this kindness shown to my boy.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The vile tyrant who commanded the escort accompanied the prisoners to
+ Durlack, and from there to Carlsruhe. He heaped every outrage upon my lad,
+ because the spirit of the Chateau Noirs would not stoop to turn away his
+ wrath by a feigned submission. Ay, this cowardly villain, whose heart's
+ blood shall yet clot upon this hand, dared to strike my son with his open
+ hand, to kick him, to tear hairs from his moustache&mdash; to use him thus&mdash;and
+ thus&mdash;and thus!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The German writhed and struggled. He was helpless in the hands of this
+ huge giant whose blows were raining upon him. When at last, blinded and
+ half-senseless, he staggered to his feet, it was only to be hurled back
+ again into the great oaken chair. He sobbed in his impotent anger and
+ shame.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My boy was frequently moved to tears by the humiliation of his position,"
+ continued the count. "You will understand me when I say that it is a
+ bitter thing to be helpless in the hands of an insolent and remorseless
+ enemy. On arriving at Carlsruhe, however, his face, which had been wounded
+ by the brutality of his guard, was bound up by a young Bavarian subaltern
+ who was touched by his appearance. I regret to see that your eye is
+ bleeding so. Will you permit me to bind it with my silk handkerchief?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He leaned forward, but the German dashed his hand aside.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am in your power, you monster!" he cried; "I can endure your
+ brutalities, but not your hypocrisy."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The count shrugged his shoulders.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am taking things in their order, just as they occurred," said he. "I
+ was under vow to tell it to the first German officer with whom I could
+ talk <i>tete-a-tete</i>. Let me see, I had got as far as the young
+ Bavarian at Carlsruhe. I regret extremely that you will not permit me to
+ use such slight skill in surgery as I possess. At Carlsruhe, my lad was
+ shut up in the old caserne, where he remained for a fortnight. The worst
+ pang of his captivity was that some unmannerly curs in the garrison would
+ taunt him with his position as he sat by his window in the evening. That
+ reminds me, captain, that you are not quite situated upon a bed of roses
+ yourself, are you now? You came to trap a wolf, my man, and now the beast
+ has you down with his fangs in your throat. A family man, too, I should
+ judge, by that well-filled tunic. Well, a widow the more will make little
+ matter, and they do not usually remain widows long. Get back into the
+ chair, you dog!
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, to continue my story&mdash;at the end of a fortnight my son and his
+ friend escaped. I need not trouble you with the dangers which they ran, or
+ with the privations which they endured. Suffice it that to disguise
+ themselves they had to take the clothes of two peasants, whom they waylaid
+ in a wood. Hiding by day and travelling by night, they had got as far into
+ France as Remilly, and were within a mile&mdash;a single mile, captain&mdash;of
+ crossing the German lines when a patrol of Uhlans came right upon them.
+ Ah! it was hard, was it not, when they had come so far and were so near to
+ safety?" The count blew a double call upon his whistle, and three
+ hard-faced peasants entered the room.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "These must represent my Uhlans," said he. "Well, then, the captain in
+ command, finding that these men were French soldiers in civilian dress
+ within the German lines, proceeded to hang them without trial or ceremony.
+ I think, Jean, that the centre beam is the strongest."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The unfortunate soldier was dragged from his chair to where a noosed rope
+ had been flung over one of the huge oaken rafters which spanned the room.
+ The cord was slipped over his head, and he felt its harsh grip round his
+ throat. The three peasants seized the other end, and looked to the count
+ for his orders. The officer, pale, but firm, folded his arms and stared
+ defiantly at the man who tortured him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are now face to face with death, and I perceive from your lips that
+ you are praying. My son was also face to face with death, and he prayed,
+ also. It happened that a general officer came up, and he heard the lad
+ praying for his mother, and it moved him so&mdash;he being himself a
+ father&mdash;that he ordered his Uhlans away, and he remained with his
+ aide-de-camp only, beside the condemned men. And when he heard all the lad
+ had to tell&mdash;that he was the only child of an old family, and that
+ his mother was in failing health&mdash;he threw off the rope as I throw
+ off this, and he kissed him on either cheek, as I kiss you, and he bade
+ him go, as I bid you go, and may every kind wish of that noble general,
+ though it could not stave off the fever which slew my son, descend now
+ upon your head."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And so it was that Captain Baumgarten, disfigured, blinded, and bleeding,
+ staggered out into the wind and the rain of that wild December dawn.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE STRIPED CHEST
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ "What do you make of her, Allardyce?" I asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ My second mate was standing beside me upon the poop, with his short, thick
+ legs astretch, for the gale had left a considerable swell behind it, and
+ our two quarter-boats nearly touched the water with every roll. He
+ steadied his glass against the mizzen-shrouds, and he looked long and hard
+ at this disconsolate stranger every time she came reeling up on to the
+ crest of a roller and hung balanced for a few seconds before swooping down
+ upon the other side. She lay so low in the water that I could only catch
+ an occasional glimpse of a pea-green line of bulwark. She was a brig, but
+ her mainmast had been snapped short off some 10ft. above the deck, and no
+ effort seemed to have been made to cut away the wreckage, which floated,
+ sails and yards, like the broken wing of a wounded gull upon the water
+ beside her. The foremast was still standing, but the foretopsail was
+ flying loose, and the headsails were streaming out in long, white pennons
+ in front of her. Never have I seen a vessel which appeared to have gone
+ through rougher handling. But we could not be surprised at that, for there
+ had been times during the last three days when it was a question whether
+ our own barque would ever see land again. For thirty-six hours we had kept
+ her nose to it, and if the <i>Mary Sinclair</i> had not been as good a
+ seaboat as ever left the Clyde, we could not have gone through. And yet
+ here we were at the end of it with the loss only of our gig and of part of
+ the starboard bulwark. It did not astonish us, however, when the smother
+ had cleared away, to find that others had been less lucky, and that this
+ mutilated brig staggering about upon a blue sea and under a cloudless sky,
+ had been left, like a blinded man after a lightning flash, to tell of the
+ terror which is past. Allardyce, who was a slow and methodical Scotchman,
+ stared long and hard at the little craft, while our seamen lined the
+ bulwark or clustered upon the fore shrouds to have a view of the stranger.
+ In latitude 20 degrees and longitude 10 degrees, which were about our
+ bearings, one becomes a little curious as to whom one meets, for one has
+ left the main lines of Atlantic commerce to the north. For ten days we had
+ been sailing over a solitary sea.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "She's derelict, I'm thinking," said the second mate.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ I had come to the same conclusion, for I could see no signs of life upon
+ her deck, and there was no answer to the friendly wavings from our seamen.
+ The crew had probably deserted her under the impression that she was about
+ to founder.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "She can't last long," continued Allardyce, in his measured way. "She may
+ put her nose down and her tail up any minute. The water's lipping up to
+ the edge of her rail."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What's her flag?" I asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'm trying to make out. It's got all twisted and tangled with the
+ halyards. Yes, I've got it now, clear enough. It's the Brazilian flag, but
+ it's wrong side up."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ She had hoisted a signal of distress, then, before her people had
+ abandoned her. Perhaps they had only just gone. I took the mate's glass
+ and looked round over the tumultuous face of the deep blue Atlantic, still
+ veined and starred with white lines and spoutings of foam. But nowhere
+ could I see anything human beyond ourselves.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There may be living men aboard," said I.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There may be salvage," muttered the second mate.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then we will run down upon her lee side, and lie to." We were not more
+ than a hundred yards from her when we swung our foreyard aback, and there
+ we were, the barque and the brig, ducking and bowing like two clowns in a
+ dance.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Drop one of the quarter-boats," said I. "Take four men, Mr. Allardyce,
+ and see what you can learn of her."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But just at that moment my first officer, Mr. Armstrong, came on deck, for
+ seven bells had struck, and it was but a few minutes off his watch. It
+ would interest me to go myself to this abandoned vessel and to see what
+ there might be aboard of her. So, with a word to Armstrong, I swung myself
+ over the side, slipped down the falls, and took my place in the sheets of
+ the boat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was but a little distance, but it took some time to traverse, and so
+ heavy was the roll that often when we were in the trough of the sea, we
+ could not see either the barque which we had left or the brig which we
+ were approaching. The sinking sun did not penetrate down there, and it was
+ cold and dark in the hollows of the waves, but each passing billow heaved
+ us up into the warmth and the sunshine once more. At each of these
+ moments, as we hung upon a white-capped ridge between the two dark
+ valleys, I caught a glimpse of the long, pea-green line, and the nodding
+ foremast of the brig, and I steered so as to come round by her stern, so
+ that we might determine which was the best way of boarding her. As we
+ passed her we saw the name <i>Nossa Sehnora da Vittoria</i> painted across
+ her dripping counter.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The weather side, sir," said the second mate. "Stand by with the
+ boat-hook, carpenter!" An instant later we had jumped over the bulwarks,
+ which were hardly higher than our boat, and found ourselves upon the deck
+ of the abandoned vessel. Our first thought was to provide for our own
+ safety in case&mdash;as seemed very probable&mdash;the vessel should
+ settle down beneath our feet. With this object two of our men held on to
+ the painter of the boat, and fended her off from the vessel's side, so
+ that she might be ready in case we had to make a hurried retreat. The
+ carpenter was sent to find out how much water there was, and whether it
+ was still gaming, while the other seaman, Allardyce and myself, made a
+ rapid inspection of the vessel and her cargo.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The deck was littered with wreckage and with hen-coops, in which the dead
+ birds were washing about. The boats were gone, with the exception of one,
+ the bottom of which had been stove, and it was certain that the crew had
+ abandoned the vessel. The cabin was in a deck-house, one side of which had
+ been beaten in by a heavy sea. Allardyce and I entered it, and found the
+ captain's table as he had left it, his books and papers&mdash; all Spanish
+ or Portuguese&mdash;scattered over it, with piles of cigarette ash
+ everywhere. I looked about for the log, but could not find it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "As likely as not he never kept one," said Allardyce. "Things are pretty
+ slack aboard a South American trader, and they don't do more than they can
+ help. If there was one it must have been taken away with him in the boat."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should like to take all these books and papers," said I. "Ask the
+ carpenter how much time we have."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ His report was reassuring. The vessel was full of water, but some of the
+ cargo was buoyant, and there was no immediate danger of her sinking.
+ Probably she would never sink, but would drift about as one of those
+ terrible unmarked reefs which have sent so many stout vessels to the
+ bottom.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In that case there is no danger in your going below, Mr. Allardyce," said
+ I. "See what you can make of her and find out how much of her cargo may be
+ saved. I'll look through these papers while you are gone."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The bills of lading, and some notes and letters which lay upon the desk,
+ sufficed to inform me that the Brazilian brig <i>Nossa Sehnora da Vittoria</i>
+ had cleared from Bahia a month before. The name of the captain was
+ Texeira, but there was no record as to the number of the crew. She was
+ bound for London, and a glance at the bills of lading was sufficient to
+ show me that we were not likely to profit much in the way of salvage. Her
+ cargo consisted of nuts, ginger, and wood, the latter in the shape of
+ great logs of valuable tropical growths. It was these, no doubt, which had
+ prevented the ill-fated vessel from going to the bottom, but they were of
+ such a size as to make it impossible for us to extract them. Besides
+ these, there were a few fancy goods, such as a number of ornamental birds
+ for millinery purposes, and a hundred cases of preserved fruits. And then,
+ as I turned over the papers, I came upon a short note in English, which
+ arrested my attention.
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ It is requested (said the note) that the various old Spanish
+ and Indian curiosities, which came out of the Santarem
+ collection, and which are consigned to Prontfoot &amp; Neuman
+ of Oxford Street, London, should be put in some place where
+ there may be no danger of these very valuable and unique articles
+ being injured or tampered with. This applies most particularly
+ to the treasure-chest of Don Ramirez di Leyra, which must on
+ no account be placed where anyone can get at it.
+</p>
+ <p>
+ The treasure-chest of Don Ramirez! Unique and valuable articles! Here was
+ a chance of salvage after all. I had risen to my feet with the paper in my
+ hand when my Scotch mate appeared in the doorway.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'm thinking all isn't quite as it should be aboard of this ship, sir,"
+ said he. He was a hard-faced man, and yet I could see that he had been
+ startled.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What's the matter?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Murder's the matter, sir. There's a man here with his brains beaten out."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Killed in the storm?" said I.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "May be so, sir, but I'll be surprised if you think so after you have seen
+ him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where is he, then?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This way, sir; here in the maindeck house."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There appeared to have been no accommodation below in the brig, for there
+ was the after-house for the captain, another by the main hatchway, with
+ the cook's galley attached to it, and a third in the forecastle for the
+ men. It was to this middle one that the mate led me. As you entered, the
+ galley, with its litter of tumbled pots and dishes, was upon the right,
+ and upon the left was a small room with two bunks for the officers. Then
+ beyond there was a place about 12ft. square, which was littered with flags
+ and spare canvas. All round the walls were a number of packets done up in
+ coarse cloth and carefully lashed to the woodwork. At the other end was a
+ great box, striped red and white, though the red was so faded and the
+ white so dirty that it was only where the light fell directly upon it that
+ one could see the colouring. The box was, by subsequent measurement, 4ft.
+ 3ins. in length, 3ft. 2ins. in height, and 3ft. across&mdash;considerably
+ larger than a seaman's chest. But it was not to the box that my eyes or my
+ thoughts were turned as I entered the store-room. On the floor, lying
+ across the litter of bunting, there was stretched a small, dark man with a
+ short, curling beard. He lay as far as it was possible from the box, with
+ his feet towards it and his head away. A crimson patch was printed upon
+ the white canvas on which his head was resting, and little red ribbons
+ wreathed themselves round his swarthy neck and trailed away on to the
+ floor, but there was no sign of a wound that I could see, and his face was
+ as placid as that of a sleeping child. It was only when I stooped that I
+ could perceive his injury, and then I turned away with an exclamation of
+ horror. He had been pole-axed; apparently by some person standing behind
+ him. A frightful blow had smashed in the top of his head and penetrated
+ deeply into his brains. His face might well be placid, for death must have
+ been absolutely instantaneous, and the position of the wound showed that
+ he could never have seen the person who had inflicted it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Is that foul play or accident, Captain Barclay?" asked my second mate,
+ demurely.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are quite right, Mr. Allardyce. The man has been murdered&mdash;struck
+ down from above by a sharp and heavy weapon. But who was he, and why did
+ they murder him?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He was a common seaman, sir," said the mate. "You can see that if you
+ look at his fingers." He turned out his pockets as he spoke and brought to
+ light a pack of cards, some tarred string, and a bundle of Brazilian
+ tobacco.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Hello, look at this!" said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a large, open knife with a stiff spring blade which he had picked
+ up from the floor. The steel was shining and bright, so that we could not
+ associate it with the crime, and yet the dead man had apparently held it
+ in his hand when he was struck down, for it still lay within his grasp.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It looks to me, sir, as if he knew he was in danger and kept his knife
+ handy," said the mate. "However, we can't help the poor beggar now. I
+ can't make out these things that are lashed to the wall. They seem to be
+ idols and weapons and curios of all sorts done up in old sacking."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's right," said I. "They are the only things of value that we are
+ likely to get from the cargo. Hail the barque and tell them to send the
+ other quarter-boat to help us to get the stuff aboard."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ While he was away I examined this curious plunder which had come into our
+ possession. The curiosities were so wrapped up that I could only form a
+ general idea as to their nature, but the striped box stood in a good light
+ where I could thoroughly examine it. On the lid, which was clamped and
+ cornered with metal-work, there was engraved a complex coat of arms, and
+ beneath it was a line of Spanish which I was able to decipher as meaning,
+ "The treasure-chest of Don Ramirez di Leyra, Knight of the Order of Saint
+ James, Governor and Captain-General of Terra Firma and of the Province of
+ Veraquas." In one corner was the date, 1606, and on the other a large
+ white label, upon which was written in English, "You are earnestly
+ requested, upon no account, to open this box." The same warning was
+ repeated underneath in Spanish. As to the lock, it was a very complex and
+ heavy one of engraved steel, with a Latin motto, which was above a
+ seaman's comprehension. By the time I had finished this examination of the
+ peculiar box, the other quarter-boat with Mr. Armstrong, the first
+ officer, had come alongside, and we began to carry out and place in her
+ the various curiosities which appeared to be the only objects worth moving
+ from the derelict ship. When she was full I sent her back to the barque,
+ and then Allardyce and I, with the carpenter and one seaman, shifted the
+ striped box, which was the only thing left, to our boat, and lowered it
+ over, balancing it upon the two middle thwarts, for it was so heavy that
+ it would have given the boat a dangerous tilt had we placed it at either
+ end. As to the dead man, we left him where we had found him. The mate had
+ a theory that, at the moment of the desertion of the ship, this fellow had
+ started plundering, and that the captain, in an attempt to preserve
+ discipline, had struck him down with a hatchet or some other heavy weapon.
+ It seemed more probable than any other explanation, and yet it did not
+ entirely satisfy me either. But the ocean is full of mysteries, and we
+ were content to leave the fate of the dead seaman of the Brazilian brig to
+ be added to that long list which every sailor can recall.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The heavy box was slung up by ropes on to the deck of the <i>Mary Sinclair</i>,
+ and was carried by four seamen into the cabin, where, between the table
+ and the after-lockers, there was just space for it to stand. There it
+ remained during supper, and after that meal the mates remained with me,
+ and discussed over a glass of grog the event of the day. Mr. Armstrong was
+ a long, thin, vulture-like man, an excellent seaman, but famous for his
+ nearness and cupidity. Our treasure-trove had excited him greatly, and
+ already he had begun with glistening eyes to reckon up how much it might
+ be worth to each of us when the shares of the salvage came to be divided.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If the paper said that they were unique, Mr. Barclay, then they may be
+ worth anything that you like to name. You wouldn't believe the sums that
+ the rich collectors give. A thousand pounds is nothing to them. We'll have
+ something to show for our voyage, or I am mistaken."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I don't think that," said I. "As far as I can see, they are not very
+ different from any other South American curios."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, sir, I've traded there for fourteen voyages, and I have never seen
+ anything like that chest before. That's worth a pile of money, just as it
+ stands. But it's so heavy that surely there must be something valuable
+ inside it. Don't you think that we ought to open it and see?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If you break it open you will spoil it, as likely as not," said the
+ second mate.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Armstrong squatted down in front of it, with his head on one side, and his
+ long, thin nose within a few inches of the lock.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The wood is oak," said he, "and it has shrunk a little with age. If I had
+ a chisel or a strong-bladed knife I could force the lock back without
+ doing any damage at all."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The mention of a strong-bladed knife made me think of the dead seaman upon
+ the brig.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I wonder if he could have been on the job when someone came to interfere
+ with him," said I.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I don't know about that, sir, but I am perfectly certain that I could
+ open the box. There's a screwdriver here in the locker. Just hold the
+ lamp, Allardyce, and I'll have it done in a brace of shakes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Wait a bit," said I, for already, with eyes which gleamed with curiosity
+ and with avarice, he was stooping over the lid. "I don't see that there is
+ any hurry over this matter. You've read that card which warns us not to
+ open it. It may mean anything or it may mean nothing, but somehow I feel
+ inclined to obey it. After all, whatever is in it will keep, and if it is
+ valuable it will be worth as much if it is opened in the owner's offices
+ as in the cabin of the <i>Mary Sinclair</i>."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The first officer seemed bitterly disappointed at my decision.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Surely, sir, you are not superstitious about it," said he, with a slight
+ sneer upon his thin lips. "If it gets out of our own hands, and we don't
+ see for ourselves what is inside it, we may be done out of our rights;
+ besides&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's enough, Mr. Armstrong," said I, abruptly. "You may have every
+ confidence that you will get your rights, but I will not have that box
+ opened to-night."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why, the label itself shows that the box has been examined by Europeans,"
+ Allardyce added. "Because a box is a treasure-box is no reason that it has
+ treasures inside it now. A good many folk have had a peep into it since
+ the days of the old Governor of Terra Firma."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Armstrong threw the screwdriver down upon the table and shrugged his
+ shoulders.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Just as you like," said he; but for the rest of the evening, although we
+ spoke upon many subjects, I noticed that his eyes were continually coming
+ round, with the same expression of curiosity and greed, to the old striped
+ box.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And now I come to that portion of my story which fills me even now with a
+ shuddering horror when I think of it. The main cabin had the rooms of the
+ officers round it, but mine was the farthest away from it at the end of
+ the little passage which led to the companion. No regular watch was kept
+ by me, except in cases of emergency, and the three mates divided the
+ watches among them. Armstrong had the middle watch, which ends at four in
+ the morning, and he was relieved by Allardyce. For my part I have always
+ been one of the soundest of sleepers, and it is rare for anything less
+ than a hand upon my shoulder to arouse me.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And yet I was aroused that night, or rather in the early grey of the
+ morning. It was just half-past four by my chronometer when something
+ caused me to sit up in my berth wide awake and with every nerve tingling.
+ It was a sound of some sort, a crash with a human cry at the end of it,
+ which still jarred on my ears. I sat listening, but all was now silent.
+ And yet it could not have been imagination, that hideous cry, for the echo
+ of it still rang in my head, and it seemed to have come from some place
+ quite close to me. I sprang from my bunk, and, pulling on some clothes, I
+ made my way into the cabin. At first I saw nothing unusual there. In the
+ cold, grey light I made out the red-clothed table, the six rotating
+ chairs, the walnut lockers, the swinging barometer, and there, at the end,
+ the big striped chest. I was turning away, with the intention of going
+ upon deck and asking the second mate if he had heard anything, when my
+ eyes fell suddenly upon something which projected from under the table. It
+ was the leg of a man&mdash;a leg with a long sea-boot upon it. I stooped,
+ and there was a figure sprawling upon his face, his arms thrown forward
+ and his body twisted. One glance told me that it was Armstrong, the first
+ officer, and a second that he was a dead man. For a few moments I stood
+ gasping. Then I rushed on to the deck, called Allardyce to my assistance,
+ and came back with him into the cabin.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Together we pulled the unfortunate fellow from under the table, and as we
+ looked at his dripping head we exchanged glances, and I do not know which
+ was the paler of the two.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The same as the Spanish sailor," said I.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The very same. God preserve us! It's that infernal chest! Look at
+ Armstrong's hand!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He held up the mate's right hand, and there was the screwdriver which he
+ had wished to use the night before.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He's been at the chest, sir. He knew that I was on deck and you were
+ asleep. He knelt down in front of it, and he pushed the lock back with
+ that tool. Then something happened to him, and he cried out so that you
+ heard him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Allardyce," I whispered, "what <i>could</i> have happened to him?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The second mate put his hand upon my sleeve and drew me into his cabin.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We can talk here, sir, and we don't know who may be listening to us in
+ there. What do you suppose is in that box, Captain Barclay?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I give you my word, Allardyce, that I have no idea."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I can only find one theory which will fit all the facts. Look at
+ the size of the box. Look at all the carving and metal-work which may
+ conceal any number of holes. Look at the weight of it; it took four men to
+ carry it. On top of that, remember that two men have tried to open it, and
+ both have come to their end through it. Now, sir, what can it mean except
+ one thing?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You mean there is a man in it?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Of course there is a man in it. You know how it is in these South
+ American States, sir. A man may be president one week and hunted like a
+ dog the next&mdash;they are for ever flying for their lives. My idea is
+ that there is some fellow in hiding there, who is armed and desperate, and
+ who will fight to the death before he is taken."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But his food and drink?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's a roomy chest, sir, and he may have some provisions stowed away. As
+ to his drink, he had a friend among the crew upon the brig who saw that he
+ had what he needed."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You think, then, that the label asking people not to open the box was
+ simply written in his interest?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir, that is my idea. Have you any other way of explaining the
+ facts?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ I had to confess that I had not.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The question is what we are to do?" I asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The man's a dangerous ruffian, who sticks at nothing. I'm thinking it
+ wouldn't be a bad thing to put a rope round the chest and tow it alongside
+ for half an hour; then we could open it at our ease. Or if we just tied
+ the box up and kept him from getting any water maybe that would do as
+ well. Or the carpenter could put a coat of varnish over it and stop all
+ the blow-holes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Come, Allardyce," said I, angrily. "You don't seriously mean to say that
+ a whole ship's company are going to be terrorised by a single man in a
+ box. If he's there, I'll engage to fetch him out!" I went to my room and
+ came back with my revolver in my hand. "Now, Allardyce," said I, "do you
+ open the lock, and I'll stand on guard."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "For God's sake, think what you are doing, sir!" cried the mate. "Two men
+ have lost their lives over it, and the blood of one not yet dry upon the
+ carpet."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The more reason why we should revenge him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, sir, at least let me call the carpenter. Three are better than two,
+ and he is a good stout man."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He went off in search of him, and I was left alone with the striped chest
+ in the cabin. I don't think that I'm a nervous man, but I kept the table
+ between me and this solid old relic of the Spanish Main. In the growing
+ light of morning the red and white striping was beginning to appear, and
+ the curious scrolls and wreaths of metal and carving which showed the
+ loving pains which cunning craftsmen had expended upon it. Presently the
+ carpenter and the mate came back together, the former with a hammer in his
+ hand.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's a bad business, this, sir," said he, shaking his head, as he looked
+ at the body of the mate. "And you think there's someone hiding in the
+ box?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There's no doubt about it," said Allardyce, picking up the screwdriver
+ and setting his jaw like a man who needs to brace his courage. "I'll drive
+ the lock back if you will both stand by. If he rises let him have it on
+ the head with your hammer, carpenter. Shoot at once, sir, if he raises his
+ hand. Now!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He had knelt down in front of the striped chest, and passed the blade of
+ the tool under the lid. With a sharp snick the lock flew back. "Stand by!"
+ yelled the mate, and with a heave he threw open the massive top of the
+ box. As it swung up we all three sprang back, I with my pistol levelled,
+ and the carpenter with the hammer above his head. Then, as nothing
+ happened, we each took a step forward and peeped in. The box was empty.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Not quite empty either, for in one corner was lying an old yellow
+ candlestick, elaborately engraved, which appeared to be as old as the box
+ itself. Its rich yellow tone and artistic shape suggested that it was an
+ object of value. For the rest there was nothing more weighty or valuable
+ than dust in the old striped treasure-chest.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I'm blessed!" cried Allardyce, staring blankly into it. "Where does
+ the weight come in, then?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Look at the thickness of the sides, and look at the lid. Why, it's five
+ inches through. And see that great metal spring across it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's for holding the lid up," said the mate. "You see, it won't lean
+ back. What's that German printing on the inside?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It means that it was made by Johann Rothstein of Augsburg, in 1606."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And a solid bit of work, too. But it doesn't throw much light on what has
+ passed, does it, Captain Barclay? That candlestick looks like gold. We
+ shall have something for our trouble after all."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He leant forward to grasp it, and from that moment I have never doubted as
+ to the reality of inspiration, for on the instant I caught him by the
+ collar and pulled him straight again. It may have been some story of the
+ Middle Ages which had come back to my mind, or it may have been that my
+ eye had caught some red which was not that of rust upon the upper part of
+ the lock, but to him and to me it will always seem an inspiration, so
+ prompt and sudden was my action.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There's devilry here," said I. "Give me the crooked stick from the
+ corner."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was an ordinary walking-cane with a hooked top. I passed it over the
+ candlestick and gave it a pull. With a flash a row of polished steel fangs
+ shot out from below the upper lip, and the great striped chest snapped at
+ us like a wild animal. Clang came the huge lid into its place, and the
+ glasses on the swinging rack sang and tinkled with the shock. The mate sat
+ down on the edge of the table and shivered like a frightened horse.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You've saved my life, Captain Barclay!" said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So this was the secret of the striped treasure-chest of old Don Ramirez di
+ Leyra, and this was how he preserved his ill-gotten gains from the Terra
+ Firma and the Province of Veraquas. Be the thief ever so cunning he could
+ not tell that golden candlestick from the other articles of value, and the
+ instant that he laid hand upon it the terrible spring was unloosed and the
+ murderous steel pikes were driven into his brain, while the shock of the
+ blow sent the victim backward and enabled the chest to automatically close
+ itself. How many, I wondered, had fallen victims to the ingenuity of the
+ mechanic of Ausgburg? And as I thought of the possible history of that
+ grim striped chest my resolution was very quickly taken.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Carpenter, bring three men, and carry this on deck."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Going to throw it overboard, sir?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, Mr. Allardyce. I'm not superstitious as a rule, but there are some
+ things which are more than a sailor can be called upon to stand."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No wonder that brig made heavy weather, Captain Barclay, with such a
+ thing on board. The glass is dropping fast, sir, and we are only just in
+ time."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So we did not even wait for the three sailors, but we carried it out, the
+ mate, the carpenter, and I, and we pushed it with our own hands over the
+ bulwarks. There was a white spout of water, and it was gone. There it
+ lies, the striped chest, a thousand fathoms deep, and if, as they say, the
+ sea will some day be dry land, I grieve for the man who finds that old box
+ and tries to penetrate into its secret.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ A SHADOW BEFORE
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ The 15th of July, 1870, found John Worlington Dodds a ruined gamester of
+ the Stock Exchange. Upon the 17th he was a very opulent man. And yet he
+ had effected the change without leaving the penurious little Irish townlet
+ of Dunsloe, which could have been bought outright for a quarter of the sum
+ which he had earned during the single day that he was within its walls.
+ There is a romance of finance yet to be written, a story of huge forces
+ which are for ever waxing and waning, of bold operations, of breathless
+ suspense, of agonised failure, of deep combinations which are baffled by
+ others still more subtle. The mighty debts of each great European Power
+ stand like so many columns of mercury, for ever rising and falling to
+ indicate the pressure upon each. He who can see far enough into the future
+ to tell how that ever-varying column will stand to-morrow is the man who
+ has fortune within his grasp.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ John Worlington Dodds had many of the gifts which lead a speculator to
+ success. He was quick in observing, just in estimating, prompt and
+ fearless in acting. But in finance there is always the element of luck,
+ which, however one may eliminate it, still remains, like the blank at
+ roulette, a constantly present handicap upon the operator. And so it was
+ that Worlington Dodds had come to grief. On the best advices he had
+ dabbled in the funds of a South American Republic in the days before South
+ American Republics had been found out. The Republic defaulted, and Dodds
+ lost his money. He had bulled the shares of a Scotch railway, and a four
+ months' strike had hit him hard. He had helped to underwrite a coffee
+ company in the hope that the public would come along upon the feed and
+ gradually nibble away some of his holding, but the political sky had been
+ clouded and the public had refused to invest. Everything which he had
+ touched had gone wrong, and now, on the eve of his marriage, young,
+ clear-headed, and energetic, he was actually a bankrupt had his creditors
+ chosen to make him one. But the Stock Exchange is an indulgent body. What
+ is the case of one to-day may be that of another to-morrow, and everyone
+ is interested in seeing that the stricken man is given time to rise again.
+ So the burden of Worlington Dodds was lightened for him; many shoulders
+ helped to bear it, and he was able to go for a little summer tour into
+ Ireland, for the doctors had ordered him rest and change of air to restore
+ his shaken nervous system. Thus it was that upon the 15th of July, 1870,
+ he found himself at his breakfast in the fly-blown coffee-room of the
+ "George Hotel" in the market square of Dunsloe. It is a dull and
+ depressing coffee-room, and one which is usually empty, but on this
+ particular day it was as crowded and noisy as that of any London hotel.
+ Every table was occupied, and a thick smell of fried bacon and of fish
+ hung in the air. Heavily booted men clattered in and out, spurs jingled,
+ riding-crops were stacked in corners, and there was a general atmosphere
+ of horse. The conversation, too, was of nothing else. From every side
+ Worlington Dodds heard of yearlings, of windgalls, of roarers, of spavins,
+ of cribsuckers, of a hundred other terms which were as unintelligible to
+ him as his own Stock Exchange jargon would have been to the company. He
+ asked the waiter for the reason of it all, and the waiter was an
+ astonished man that there should be any man in this world who did not know
+ it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Shure it's the Dunsloe horse fair, your honour&mdash;the greatest
+ horse-fair in all Oireland. It lasts for a wake, and the folk come from
+ far an' near&mdash;from England an' Scotland an' iverywhere. If you look
+ out of the winder, your honour, you'll see the horses, and it's asy your
+ honour's conscience must be, or you wouldn't slape so sound that the
+ creatures didn't rouse you with their clatter."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Dodds had a recollection that he had heard a confused murmur, which had
+ interwoven itself with his dreams&mdash;a sort of steady rhythmic beating
+ and clanking&mdash;and now, when he looked through the window, he saw the
+ cause of it. The square was packed with horses from end to end&mdash;greys,
+ bays, browns, blacks, chestnuts&mdash;young ones and old, fine ones and
+ coarse, horses of every conceivable sort and size. It seemed a huge
+ function for so small a town, and he remarked as much to the waiter.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, you see, your honour, the horses don't live in the town, an' they
+ don't vex their heads how small it is. But it's in the very centre of the
+ horse-bradin' districts of Oireland, so where should they come to be sould
+ if it wasn't to Dunsloe?" The waiter had a telegram in his hand, and he
+ turned the address to Worlington Dodds. "Shure I niver heard such a name,
+ sorr. Maybe you could tell me who owns it?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Dodds looked at the envelope. Strellenhaus was the name. "No, I don't
+ know," said he. "I never heard it before. It's a foreign name. Perhaps if
+ you were&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But at that moment a little round-faced, ruddy-cheeked gentleman, who was
+ breakfasting at the next table, leaned forward and interrupted him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Did you say a foreign name, sir?" said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Strellenhaus is the name."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am Mr. Strellenhaus&mdash;Mr. Julius Strellenhaus, of Liverpool. I was
+ expecting a telegram. Thank you very much."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He sat so near that Dodds, without any wish to play the spy, could not
+ help to some extent overlooking him as he opened the envelope. The message
+ was a very long one. Quite a wad of melon-tinted paper came out from the
+ tawny envelope. Mr. Strellenhaus arranged the sheets methodically upon the
+ table-cloth in front of him, so that no eye but his own could see them.
+ Then he took out a note-book, and, with an anxious face, he began to make
+ entries in it, glancing first at the telegram and then at the book, and
+ writing apparently one letter or figure at a time. Dodds was interested,
+ for he knew exactly what the man was doing. He was working out a cipher.
+ Dodds had often done it himself. And then suddenly the little man turned
+ very pale, as if the full purport of the message had been a shock to him.
+ Dodds had done that also, and his sympathies were all with his neighbors.
+ Then the stranger rose, and, leaving his breakfast untasted, he walked out
+ of the room.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'm thinkin' that the gintleman has had bad news, sorr," said the
+ confidential waiter.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Looks like it," Dodds answered; and at that moment his thoughts were
+ suddenly drawn off into another direction.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The boots had entered the room with a telegram in his hand. "Where's Mr.
+ Mancune?" said he to the waiter.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, there are some quare names about. What was it you said?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Mr. Mancune," said the boots, glancing round him. "Ah, there he is!" and
+ he handed the telegram to a gentleman who was sitting reading the paper in
+ a corner.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Dodds's eyes had already fallen upon this man, and he had wondered vaguely
+ what he was doing in such company. He was a tall, white-haired,
+ eagle-nosed gentleman, with a waxed moustache and a carefully pointed
+ beard&mdash;an aristocratic type which seemed out of its element among the
+ rough, hearty, noisy dealers who surrounded him. This, then, was Mr.
+ Mancune, for whom the second telegram was intended.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ As he opened it, tearing it open with a feverish haste, Dodds could
+ perceive that it was as bulky as the first one. He observed also, from the
+ delay in reading it, that it was also in some sort of cipher. The
+ gentleman did not write down any translation of it, but he sat for some
+ time with his nervous, thin fingers twitching amongst the hairs of his
+ white beard, and his shaggy brows bent in the deepest and most absorbed
+ attention whilst he mastered the meaning of it. Then he sprang suddenly to
+ his feet, his eyes flashed, his cheeks flushed, and in his excitement he
+ crumpled the message up in his hand. With an effort he mastered his
+ emotion, put the paper into his pocket, and walked out of the room.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ This was enough to excite a less astute and imaginative man than
+ Worlington Dodds. Was there any connection between these two messages, or
+ was it merely a coincidence? Two men with strange names receive two
+ telegrams within a few minutes of each other, each of considerable length,
+ each in cipher, and each causing keen emotion to the man who received it.
+ One turned pale. The other sprang excitedly to his feet. It might be a
+ coincidence, but it was a very curious one. If it was not a coincidence,
+ then what could it mean? Were they confederates who pretended to work
+ apart, but who each received identical orders from some person at a
+ distance? That was possible, and yet there were difficulties in the way.
+ He puzzled and puzzled, but could find no satisfactory solution to the
+ problem. All breakfast he was turning it over in his mind.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ When breakfast was over he sauntered out into the market square, where the
+ horse sale was already in progress. The yearlings were being sold first&mdash;tall,
+ long-legged, skittish, wild-eyed creatures, who had run free upon the
+ upland pastures, with ragged hair and towsie manes, but hardy, inured to
+ all weathers, and with the makings of splendid hunters and steeplechasers
+ when corn and time had brought them to maturity. They were largely of
+ thoroughbred blood, and were being bought by English dealers, who would
+ invest a few pounds now on what they might sell for fifty guineas in a
+ year, if all went well. It was legitimate speculation, for the horse is a
+ delicate creature, he is afflicted with many ailments, the least accident
+ may destroy his value, he is a certain expense and an uncertain profit,
+ and for one who comes safely to maturity several may bring no return at
+ all. So the English horse-dealers took their risks as they bought up the
+ shaggy Irish yearlings. One man with a ruddy face and a yellow overcoat
+ took them by the dozen, with as much <i>sang froid</i> as if they had been
+ oranges, entering each bargain in a bloated note-book. He bought forty or
+ fifty during the time that Dodds was watching him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Who is that?" he asked his neighbour, whose spurs and gaiters showed that
+ he was likely to know.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The man stared in astonishment at the stranger's ignorance. "Why, that's
+ Jim Holloway, the great Jim Holloway," said he; then, seeing by the blank
+ look upon Dodds's face that even this information had not helped him much,
+ he went into details. "Sure he's the head of Holloway &amp; Morland, of
+ London," said he. "He's the buying partner, and he buys cheap; and the
+ other stays at home and sells, and he sells dear. He owns more horses than
+ any man in the world, and asks the best money for them. I dare say you'll
+ find that half of what are sold at the Dunsloe fair this day will go to
+ him, and he's got such a purse that there's not a man who can bid against
+ him."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Worlington Dodds watched the doings of the great dealer with interest. He
+ had passed on now to the two-year-olds and three-year-olds, full-grown
+ horses, but still a little loose in the limb and weak in the bone. The
+ London buyer was choosing his animals carefully, but having chosen them,
+ the vigour of his competition drove all other bidders out of it. With a
+ careless nod he would run the figure up five pounds at a time, until he
+ was left in possession of the field. At the same time he was a shrewd
+ observer, and when, as happened more than once, he believed that someone
+ was bidding against him simply in order to run him up, the head would
+ cease suddenly to nod, the note-book would be closed with a snap, and the
+ intruder would be left with a purchase which he did not desire upon his
+ hands. All Dodds's business instincts were aroused by the tactics of this
+ great operator, and he stood in the crowd watching with the utmost
+ interest all that occurred.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It is not to buy young horses, however, that the great dealers come to
+ Ireland, and the real business of the fair commenced when the four and
+ five-year-olds were reached; the full-grown, perfect horses, at their
+ prime, and ready for any work or any fatigue. Seventy magnificent
+ creatures had been brought down by a single breeder, a comfortable-looking, keen-eyed,
+ ruddy-cheeked gentleman who stood beside the salesman
+ and whispered cautions and precepts into his ear.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's Flynn of Kildare," said Dodds's informant. "Jack Flynn has brought
+ down that string of horses, and the other large string over yonder belongs
+ to Tom Flynn, his brother. The two of them together are the two first
+ breeders in Ireland." A crowd had gathered in front of the horses. By
+ common consent a place had been made for Mr. Holloway, and Dodds could
+ catch a glimpse of his florid face and yellow covert-coat in the front
+ rank. He had opened his note-book, and was tapping his teeth reflectively
+ with his pencil as he eyed the horses.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You'll see a fight now between the first seller and the first buyer in
+ the country," said Dodds's acquaintance. "They are a beautiful string,
+ anyhow. I shouldn't be surprised if he didn't average five-and-thirty
+ pound apiece for the lot as they stand."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The salesman had mounted upon a chair, and his keen, clean-shaven face
+ overlooked the crowd. Mr. Jack Flynn's grey whiskers were at his elbow,
+ and Mr. Holloway immediately in front.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You've seen these horses, gentlemen," said the salesman, with a backward
+ sweep of his hand towards the line of tossing heads and streaming manes.
+ "When you know that they are bred by Mr. Jack Flynn, at his place in
+ Kildare, you will have a guarantee of their quality. They are the best
+ that Ireland can produce, and in this class of horse the best that Ireland
+ can produce are the best in the world, as every riding man knows well.
+ Hunters or carriage horses, all warranted sound, and bred from the best
+ stock. There are seventy in Mr. Jack Flynn's string, and he bids me say
+ that if any wholesale dealer would make one bid for the whole lot, to save
+ time, he would have the preference over any purchaser."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was a pause and a whisper from the crowd in front, with some
+ expressions of discontent. By a single sweep all the small dealers had
+ been put out of it. It was only a long purse which could buy on such a
+ scale as that. The salesman looked round him inquiringly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Come, Mr. Holloway," said he, at last. "You didn't come over here for the
+ sake of the scenery. You may travel the country and not see such another
+ string of horses. Give us a starting bid."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The great dealer was still rattling his pencil upon his front teeth.
+ "Well," said he, at last, "they <i>are</i> a fine lot of horses, and I
+ won't deny it. They do you credit, Mr. Flynn, I am sure. All the same I
+ didn't mean to fill a ship at a single bid in this fashion. I like to pick
+ and choose my horses."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In that case Mr. Flynn is quite prepared to sell them in smaller lots,"
+ said the salesman. "It was rather for the convenience of a wholesale
+ customer that he was prepared to put them all up together. But if no
+ gentleman wishes to bid&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Wait a minute," said a voice. "They are very fine horses, these, and I
+ will give you a bid to start you. I will give you twenty pounds each for
+ the string of seventy."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was a rustle as the crowd all swayed their heads to catch a glimpse
+ of the speaker. The salesman leaned forward. "May I ask your name, sir?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Strellenhaus&mdash;Mr. Strellenhaus of Liverpool."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's a new firm," said Dodds's neighbour. "I thought I knew them all, but
+ I never heard of him before."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The salesman's head had disappeared, for he was whispering with the
+ breeder. Now he suddenly straightened himself again. "Thank you for giving
+ us a lead, sir," said he. "Now, gentlemen, you have heard the offer of Mr.
+ Strellenhaus of Liverpool. It will give us a base to start from. Mr.
+ Strellenhaus has offered twenty pounds a head."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Guineas," said Holloway.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Bravo, Mr. Holloway! I knew that you would take a hand. You are not the
+ man to let such a string of horses pass away from you. The bid is twenty
+ guineas a head."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Twenty-five pounds," said Mr. Strellenhaus.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Twenty-six."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was London against Liverpool, and it was the head of the trade against
+ an outsider. Still, the one man had increased his bids by fives and the
+ other only by ones. Those fives meant determination and also wealth.
+ Holloway had ruled the market so long that the crowd was delighted at
+ finding someone who would stand up to him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The bid now stands at thirty pounds a head," said the salesman. "The word
+ lies with you, Mr. Holloway."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The London dealer was glancing keenly at his unknown opponent, and he was
+ asking himself whether this was a genuine rival, or whether it was a
+ device of some sort&mdash;an agent of Flynn's perhaps&mdash;for running up
+ the price. Little Mr. Strellenhaus, the same apple-faced gentleman whom
+ Dodds had noticed in the coffee-room, stood looking at the horses with the
+ sharp, quick glances of a man who knows what he is looking for.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty-one," said Holloway, with the air of a man who has gone to his
+ extreme limit.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty-two," said Strellenhaus, promptly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Holloway grew angry at this persistent opposition. His red face flushed
+ redder still.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty-three!" he shouted.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty-four," said Strellenhaus.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Holloway became thoughtful, and entered a few figures in his note-book.
+ There were seventy horses. He knew that Flynn's stock was always of the
+ highest quality. With the hunting season coming on he might rely upon
+ selling them at an average of from forty-five to fifty. Some of them might
+ carry a heavy weight, and would run to three figures. On the other hand,
+ there was the feed and keep of them for three months, the danger of the
+ voyage, the chance of influenza or some of those other complaints which
+ run through an entire stable as measles go through a nursery. Deducting
+ all this, it was a question whether at the present price any profit would
+ be left upon the transaction. Every pound that he bid meant seventy out of
+ his pocket. And yet he could not submit to be beaten by this stranger
+ without a struggle. As a business matter it was important to him to be
+ recognised as the head of his profession. He would make one more effort,
+ if he sacrificed his profit by doing so.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "At the end of your rope, Mr. Holloway?" asked the salesman, with the
+ suspicion of a sneer.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty-five," cried Holloway gruffly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty-six," said Strellenhaus.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then I wish you joy of your bargain," said Holloway. "I don't buy at that
+ price, but I should be glad to sell you some."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Strellenhaus took no notice of the irony. He was still looking
+ critically at the horses. The salesman glanced round him in a perfunctory
+ way.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thirty-six pounds bid," said he. "Mr. Jack Flynn's lot is going to Mr.
+ Strellenhaus of Liverpool, at thirty-six pounds a head. Going&mdash;going&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Forty!" cried a high, thin, clear voice.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A buzz rose from the crowd, and they were all on tiptoe again, trying to
+ catch a glimpse of this reckless buyer. Being a tall man, Dodds could see
+ over the others, and there, at the side of Holloway, he saw the masterful
+ nose and aristocratic beard of the second stranger in the coffee-room. A
+ sudden personal interest added itself to the scene. He felt that he was on
+ the verge of something&mdash;something dimly seen&mdash; which he could
+ himself turn to account. The two men with strange names, the telegrams,
+ the horses&mdash;what was underlying it all? The salesman was all
+ animation again, and Mr. Jack Flynn was sitting up with his white whiskers
+ bristling and his eyes twinkling. It was the best deal which he had ever
+ made in his fifty years of experience.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What name, sir?" asked the salesman.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Mr. Mancune."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Address?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Mr. Mancune of Glasgow."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Thank you for your bid, sir. Forty pounds a head has been bid by Mr.
+ Mancune of Glasgow. Any advance upon forty?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Forty-one," said Strellenhaus.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Forty-five," said Mancune.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The tactics had changed, and it was the turn of Strellenhaus now to
+ advance by ones, while his rival sprang up by fives. But the former was as
+ dogged as ever.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Forty-six," said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Fifty!" cried Mancune.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was unheard of. The most that the horses could possibly average at a
+ retail price was as much as these men were willing to pay wholesale.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Two lunatics from Bedlam," whispered the angry Holloway. "If I was Flynn
+ I would see the colour of their money before I went any further."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The same thought had occurred to the salesman. "As a mere matter of
+ business, gentlemen," said he, "it is usual in such cases to put down a
+ small deposit as a guarantee of <i>bona fides</i>. You will understand how
+ I am placed, and that I have not had the pleasure of doing business with
+ either of you before."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How much?" asked Strellenhaus, briefly.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Should we say five hundred?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Here is a note for a thousand pounds."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And here is another," said Mancune.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Nothing could be more handsome, gentlemen," said the salesman. "It's a
+ treat to see such a spirited competition. The last bid was fifty pounds a
+ head from Mancune. The word lies with you, Mr. Strellenhaus."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Jack Flynn whispered something to the salesman. "Quite so! Mr. Flynn
+ suggests, gentlemen, that as you are both large buyers, it would, perhaps,
+ be a convenience to you if he was to add the string of Mr. Tom Flynn,
+ which consists of seventy animals of precisely the same quality, making
+ one hundred and forty in all. Have you any objection, Mr. Mancune?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And you, Mr. Strellenhaus?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should prefer it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Very handsome! Very handsome indeed!" murmured the salesman. "Then I
+ understand, Mr. Mancune, that your offer of fifty pounds a head extends to
+ the whole of these horses?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A long breath went up from the crowd. Seven thousand pounds at one deal.
+ It was a record for Dunsloe.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Any advance, Mr. Strellenhaus?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Fifty-one."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Fifty-five."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Fifty-six."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sixty."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They could hardly believe their ears. Holloway stood with his mouth open,
+ staring blankly in front of him. The salesman tried hard to look as if
+ such bidding and such prices were nothing unusual. Jack Flynn of Kildare
+ smiled benignly and rubbed his hands together. The crowd listened in dead
+ silence.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sixty-one," said Strellenhaus. From the beginning he had stood without a
+ trace of emotion upon his round face, like a little automatic figure which
+ bid by clockwork. His rival was of a more excitable nature. His eyes were
+ shining, and he was for ever twitching at his beard.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sixty-five," he cried.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sixty-six."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Seventy."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the clockwork had run down. No answering bid came from Mr.
+ Strellenhaus.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Seventy bid, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Strellenhaus shrugged his shoulders.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am buying for another, and I have reached his limit," said he. "If you
+ will permit me to send for instructions&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am afraid, sir, that the sale must proceed."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then the horses belong to this gentleman." For the first time he turned
+ towards his rival, and their glances crossed like sword-blades. "It is
+ possible that I may see the horses again."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I hope so," said Mr. Mancune; and his white, waxed moustache gave a
+ feline upward bristle.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ So, with a bow, they separated. Mr. Strellenhaus walked, down to the
+ telegraph-office, where his message was delayed because Mr. Worlington
+ Dodds was already at the end of the wires, for, after dim guesses and
+ vague conjecture, he had suddenly caught a clear view of this coming event
+ which had cast so curious a shadow before it in this little Irish town.
+ Political rumours, names, appearances, telegrams, seasoned horses at any
+ price, there could only be one meaning to it. He held a secret, and he
+ meant to use it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mr. Warner, who was the partner of Mr. Worlington Dodds, and who was
+ suffering from the same eclipse, had gone down to the Stock Exchange, but
+ had found little consolation there, for the European system was in a
+ ferment, and rumours of peace and of war were succeeding each other with
+ such rapidity and assurance that it was impossible to know which to trust.
+ It was obvious that a fortune lay either way, for every rumour set the
+ funds fluctuating; but without special information it was impossible to
+ act, and no one dared to plunge heavily upon the strength of newspaper
+ surmise and the gossip of the street. Warner knew that an hour's work
+ might resuscitate the fallen fortunes of himself and his partner, and yet
+ he could not afford to make a mistake. He returned to his office in the
+ afternoon, half inclined to back the chances of peace, for of all war
+ scares not one in ten comes to pass. As he entered the office a telegram
+ lay upon the table. It was from Dunsloe, a place of which he had never
+ heard, and was signed by his absent partner. The message was in cipher,
+ but he soon translated it, for it was short and crisp.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am a bear of everything German and French. Sell, sell, sell, keep on
+ selling."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ For a moment Warner hesitated. What could Worlington Dodds know at Dunsloe
+ which was not known in Throgmorton Street? But he remembered the quickness
+ and decision of his partner. He would not have sent such a message without
+ very good grounds. If he was to act at all he must act at once, so,
+ hardening his heart, he went down to the house, and, dealing upon that
+ curious system by which a man can sell what he has not got, and what he
+ could not pay for if he had it, he disposed of heavy parcels of French and
+ German securities. He had caught the market in one of its little spasms of
+ hope, and there was no lack of buying until his own persistent selling
+ caused others to follow his lead, and so brought about a reaction. When
+ Warner returned to his offices it took him some hours to work out his
+ accounts, and he emerged into the streets in the evening with the absolute
+ certainty that the next settling-day would leave him either hopelessly
+ bankrupt or exceedingly prosperous.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It all depended upon Worlington Dodds's information. What could he
+ possibly have found out at Dunsloe?
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And then suddenly he saw a newspaper boy fasten a poster upon a lamp-post,
+ and a little crowd had gathered round it in an instant. One of them waved
+ his hat in the air; another shouted to a friend across the street. Warner
+ hurried up and caught a glimpse of the poster between two craning heads&mdash;
+ </p>
+<p class="center">
+ "FRANCE DECLARES WAR ON GERMANY."
+</p>
+ <p>
+ "By Jove!" cried Warner. "Old Dodds was right, after all."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE KING OF THE FOXES
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ It was after a hunting dinner, and there were as many scarlet coats as
+ black ones round the table. The conversation over the cigars had turned,
+ therefore, in the direction of horses and horsemen, with reminiscences of
+ phenomenal runs where foxes had led the pack from end to end of a county,
+ and been overtaken at last by two or three limping hounds and a huntsman
+ on foot, while every rider in the field had been pounded. As the port
+ circulated the runs became longer and more apocryphal, until we had the
+ whips inquiring their way and failing to understand the dialect of the
+ people who answered them. The foxes, too, became more eccentric, and we
+ had foxes up pollard willows, foxes which were dragged by the tail out of
+ horses' mangers, and foxes which had raced through an open front door and
+ gone to ground in a lady's bonnet-box. The master had told one or two tall
+ reminiscences, and when he cleared his throat for another we were all
+ curious, for he was a bit of an artist in his way, and produced his
+ effects in a <i>crescendo</i> fashion. His face wore the earnest,
+ practical, severely accurate expression which heralded some of his finest
+ efforts.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It was before I was master," said he. "Sir Charles Adair had the hounds
+ at that time, and then afterwards they passed to old Lathom, and then to
+ me. It may possibly have been just after Lathom took them over, but my
+ strong impression is that it was in Adair's time. That would be early in
+ the seventies&mdash;about seventy-two, I should say.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The man I mean has moved to another part of the country, but I daresay
+ that some of you can remember him. Danbury was the name&mdash;Walter
+ Danbury, or Wat Danbury, as the people used to call him. He was the son of
+ old Joe Danbury, of High Ascombe, and when his father died he came into a
+ very good thing, for his only brother was drowned when the <i>Magna Charta</i>
+ foundered, so he inherited the whole estate. It was but a few hundred
+ acres, but it was good arable land, and those were the great days of
+ farming. Besides, it was freehold, and a yeoman farmer without a mortgage
+ was a warmish man before the great fall in wheat came. Foreign wheat and
+ barbed wire&mdash;those are the two curses of this country, for the one
+ spoils the farmer's work and the other spoils his play.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This young Wat Danbury was a very fine fellow, a keen rider, and a
+ thorough sportsman, but his head was a little turned at having come, when
+ so young, into a comfortable fortune, and he went the pace for a year or
+ two. The lad had no vice in him, but there was a hard-drinking set in the
+ neighbourhood at that time, and Danbury got drawn in among them; and,
+ being an amiable fellow who liked to do what his friends were doing, he
+ very soon took to drinking a great deal more than was good for him. As a
+ rule, a man who takes his exercise may drink as much as he likes in the
+ evening, and do himself no very great harm, if he will leave it alone
+ during the day. Danbury had too many friends for that, however, and it
+ really looked as if the poor chap was going to the bad, when a very
+ curious thing happened which pulled him up with such a sudden jerk that he
+ never put his hand upon the neck of a whisky bottle again.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He had a peculiarity which I have noticed in a good many other men, that
+ though he was always playing tricks with his own health, he was none the
+ less very anxious about it, and was extremely fidgety if ever he had any
+ trivial symptom. Being a tough, open-air fellow, who was always as hard as
+ a nail, it was seldom that there was anything amiss with him; but at last
+ the drink began to tell, and he woke one morning with his hands shaking
+ and all his nerves tingling like over-stretched fiddle-strings. He had
+ been dining at some very wet house the night before, and the wine had,
+ perhaps, been more plentiful than choice; at any rate, there he was, with
+ a tongue like a bath towel and a head that ticked like an eight-day clock.
+ He was very alarmed at his own condition, and he sent for Doctor
+ Middleton, of Ascombe, the father of the man who practises there now.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Middleton had been a great friend of old Danbury's, and he was very sorry
+ to see his son going to the devil; so he improved the occasion by taking
+ his case very seriously, and lecturing him upon the danger of his ways. He
+ shook his head and talked about the possibility of <i>delirium tremens</i>,
+ or even of mania, if he continued to lead such a life. Wat Danbury was
+ horribly frightened.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Do you think I am going to get anything of the sort?' he wailed.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Well, really, I don't know,' said the doctor gravely. 'I cannot
+ undertake to say that you are out of danger. Your system is very much out
+ of order. At any time during the day you might have those grave symptoms
+ of which I warn you.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'You think I shall be safe by evening?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'If you drink nothing during the day, and have no nervous symptoms before
+ evening, I think you may consider yourself safe,' the doctor answered. A
+ little fright would, he thought, do his patient good, so he made the most
+ of the matter.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'What symptoms may I expect?' asked Danbury.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'It generally takes the form of optical delusions.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I see specks floating all about.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'That is mere biliousness,' said the doctor soothingly, for he saw that
+ the lad was highly strung, and he did not wish to overdo it. 'I daresay
+ that you will have no symptoms of the kind, but when they do come they
+ usually take the shape of insects, or reptiles, or curious animals.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'And if I see anything of the kind?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'If you do, you will at once send for me;' and so, with a promise of
+ medicine, the doctor departed.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Young Wat Danbury rose and dressed and moped about the room feeling very
+ miserable and unstrung, with a vision of the County Asylum for ever in his
+ mind. He had the doctor's word for it that if he could get through to
+ evening in safety he would be all right; but it is not very exhilarating
+ to be waiting for symptoms, and to keep on glancing at your bootjack to
+ see whether it is still a bootjack or whether it has begun to develop
+ antennae and legs. At last he could stand it no longer, and an
+ overpowering longing for the fresh air and the green grass came over him.
+ Why should he stay indoors when the Ascombe Hunt was meeting within half a
+ mile of him? If he was going to have these delusions which the doctor
+ talked of, he would not have them the sooner nor the worse because he was
+ on horseback in the open. He was sure, too, it would ease his aching head.
+ And so it came about that in ten minutes he was in his hunting-kit, and in
+ ten more he was riding out of his stable-yard with his roan mare 'Matilda'
+ between his knees. He was a little unsteady in his saddle just at first,
+ but the farther he went the better he felt, until by the time he reached
+ the meet his head was almost clear, and there was nothing troubling him
+ except those haunting words of the doctor's about the possibility of
+ delusions any time before nightfall.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But soon he forgot that also, for as he came up the hounds were thrown
+ off, and they drew the Gravel Hanger, and afterwards the Hickory Copse. It
+ was just the morning for a scent&mdash;no wind to blow it away, no water
+ to wash it out, and just damp enough to make it cling. There was a field
+ of forty, all keen men and good riders, so when they came to the Black
+ Hanger they knew that there would be some sport, for that's a cover which
+ never draws blank. The woods were thicker in those days than now, and the
+ foxes were thicker also, and that great dark oak-grove was swarming with
+ them. The only difficulty was to make them break, for it is, as you know,
+ a very close country, and you must coax them out into the open before you
+ can hope for a run.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "When they came to the Black Hanger the field took their positions along
+ the cover-side wherever they thought that they were most likely to get a
+ good start. Some went in with the hounds, some clustered at the ends of
+ the drives, and some kept outside in the hope of the fox breaking in that
+ direction. Young Wat Danbury knew the country like the palm of his hand,
+ so he made for a place where several drives intersected, and there he
+ waited. He had a feeling that the faster and the farther he galloped the
+ better he should be, and so he was chafing to be off. His mare, too, was
+ in the height of fettle and one of the fastest goers in the county. Wat
+ was a splendid lightweight rider&mdash;under ten stone with his saddle&mdash;and
+ the mare was a powerful creature, all quarters and shoulders, fit to carry
+ a lifeguardsman; and so it was no wonder that there was hardly a man in
+ the field who could hope to stay with him. There he waited and listened to
+ the shouting of the huntsman and the whips, catching a glimpse now and
+ then in the darkness of the wood of a whisking tail, or the gleam of a
+ white-and-tan side amongst the underwood. It was a well-trained pack, and
+ there was not so much as a whine to tell you that forty hounds were
+ working all round you.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And then suddenly there came one long-drawn yell from one of them, and it
+ was taken up by another, and another, until within a few seconds the whole
+ pack was giving tongue together and running on a hot scent. Danbury saw
+ them stream across one of the drives and disappear upon the other side,
+ and an instant later the three red coats of the hunt servants flashed
+ after them upon the same line. He might have made a shorter cut down one
+ of the other drives, but he was afraid of heading the fox, so he followed
+ the lead of the huntsman. Right through the wood they went in a bee-line,
+ galloping with their faces brushed by their horses' manes as they stooped
+ under the branches.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's ugly going, as you know, with the roots all wriggling about in the
+ darkness, but you can take a risk when you catch an occasional glimpse of
+ the pack running with a breast-high scent; so in and out they dodged until
+ the wood began to thin at the edges, and they found themselves in the long
+ bottom where the river runs. It is clear going there upon grassland, and
+ the hounds were running very strong about two hundred yards ahead, keeping
+ parallel with the stream. The field, who had come round the wood instead
+ of going through, were coming hard over the fields upon the left; but
+ Danbury, with the hunt servants, had a clear lead, and they never lost it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Two of the field got on terms with them&mdash;Parson Geddes on a big
+ seventeen-hand bay which he used to ride in those days, and Squire Foley,
+ who rode as a feather-weight, and made his hunters out of cast
+ thoroughbreds from the Newmarket sales; but the others never had a look-in
+ from start to finish, for there was no check and no pulling, and it was
+ clear cross-country racing from start to finish. If you had drawn a line
+ right across the map with a pencil you couldn't go straighter than that
+ fox ran, heading for the South Downs and the sea, and the hounds ran as
+ surely as if they were running to view, and yet from the beginning no one
+ ever saw the fox, and there was never a hallo forrard to tell them that he
+ had been spied. This, however, is not so surprising, for if you've been
+ over that line of country you will know that there are not very many
+ people about.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There were six of them then in the front row&mdash;Parson Geddes, Squire
+ Foley, the huntsman, two whips, and Wat Danbury, who had forgotten all
+ about his head and the doctor by this time, and had not a thought for
+ anything but the run. All six were galloping just as hard as they could
+ lay hoofs to the ground. One of the whips dropped back, however, as some
+ of the hounds were tailing off, and that brought them down to five. Then
+ Foley's thoroughbred strained herself, as these slim-legged,
+ dainty-fetlocked thoroughbreds will do when the going is rough, and he had
+ to take a back seat. But the other four were still going strong, and they
+ did four or five miles down the river flat at a rasping pace. It had been
+ a wet winter, and the waters had been out a little time before, so there
+ was a deal of sliding and splashing; but by the time they came to the
+ bridge the whole field was out of sight, and these four had the hunt to
+ themselves.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The fox had crossed the bridge&mdash;for foxes do not care to swim a
+ chilly river any more than humans do&mdash;and from that point he had
+ streaked away southward as hard as he could tear. It is broken country,
+ rolling heaths, down one slope and up another, and it's hard to say
+ whether the up or the down is the more trying for the horses. This sort of
+ switchback work is all right for a cobby, short-backed, short-legged
+ little horse, but it is killing work for a big, long-striding hunter such
+ as one wants in the Midlands. Anyhow, it was too much for Parson Geddes'
+ seventeen-hand bay, and though he tried the Irish trick&mdash;for he was a
+ rare keen sportsman&mdash;of running up the hills by his horse's head, it
+ was all to no use, and he had to give it up. So then there were only the
+ huntsman, the whip, and Wat Danbury&mdash;all going strong.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But the country got worse and worse and the hills were steeper and more
+ thickly covered in heather and bracken. The horses were over their hocks
+ all the time, and the place was pitted with rabbit-holes; but the hounds
+ were still streaming along, and the riders could not afford to pick their
+ steps. As they raced down one slope, the hounds were always flowing up the
+ opposite one, until it looked like that game where the one figure in
+ falling makes the other one rise.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But never a glimpse did they get of the fox, although they knew very well
+ that he must be only a very short way ahead for the scent to be so strong.
+ And then Wat Danbury heard a crash and a thud at his elbow, and looking
+ round he saw a pair of white cords and top-boots kicking out of a tussock
+ of brambles. The whip's horse had stumbled, and the whip was out of the
+ running. Danbury and the huntsman eased down for an instant; and then,
+ seeing the man staggering to his feet all right, they turned and settled
+ into their saddles once more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Joe Clarke, the huntsman, was a famous old rider, known for five counties
+ round; but he reckoned upon his second horse, and the second horses had
+ all been left many miles behind. However, the one he was riding was good
+ enough for anything with such a horseman upon his back, and he was going
+ as well as when he started. As to Wat Danbury, he was going better. With
+ every stride his own feelings improved, and the mind of the rider had its
+ influence upon the mind of the horse. The stout little roan was gathering
+ its muscular limbs under it, and stretching to the gallop as if it were
+ steel and whale-bone instead of flesh and blood. Wat had never come to the
+ end of its powers yet, and to-day he had such a chance of testing them as
+ he had never had before.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There was a pasture country beyond the heather slopes, and for several
+ miles the two riders were either losing ground as they fumbled with their
+ crop-handles at the bars of gates, or gaining it again as they galloped
+ over the fields. Those were the days before this accursed wire came into
+ the country, and you could generally break a hedge where you could not fly
+ it, so they did not trouble the gates more than they could help. Then they
+ were down in a hard lane, where they had to slacken their pace, and
+ through a farm where a man came shouting excitedly after them; but they
+ had no time to stop and listen to him, for the hounds were on some
+ ploughland, only two fields ahead. It was sloping upwards, that
+ ploughland, and the horses were over their fetlocks in the red, soft soil.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "When they reached the top they were blowing badly, but a grand valley
+ sloped before them, leading up to the open country of the South Downs.
+ Between, there lay a belt of pine-woods, into which the hounds were
+ streaming, running now in a long, straggling line, and shedding one here
+ and one there as they ran. You could see the white-and-tan dots here and
+ there where the limpers were tailing away. But half the pack were still
+ going well, though the pace and distance had both been tremendous&mdash;two
+ clear hours now without a check.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There was a drive through the pine-wood&mdash;one of those green,
+ slightly rutted drives where a horse can get the last yard out of itself,
+ for the ground is hard enough to give him clean going and yet springy
+ enough to help him. Wat Danbury got alongside of the huntsman and they
+ galloped together with their stirrup-irons touching, and the hounds within
+ a hundred yards of them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'We have it all to ourselves,' said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Yes, sir, we've shook on the lot of 'em this time,' said old Joe Clarke.
+ 'If we get this fox it's worth while 'aving 'im skinned an' stuffed, for
+ 'e's a curiosity 'e is.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'It's the fastest run I ever had in my life!' cried Danbury.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'And the fastest that ever I 'ad, an' that means more,' said the old
+ huntsman. 'But what licks me is that we've never 'ad a look at the beast.
+ 'E must leave an amazin' scent be'ind 'im when these 'ounds can follow 'im
+ like this, and yet none of us have seen 'im when we've 'ad a clear 'alf
+ mile view in front of us.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I expect we'll have a view of him presently,' said Danbury; and in his
+ mind he added, 'at least, I shall,' for the huntsman's horse was gasping
+ as it ran, and the white foam was pouring down it like the side of a
+ washing-tub.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They had followed the hounds on to one of the side tracks which led out
+ of the main drive, and that divided into a smaller track still, where the
+ branches switched across their faces as they went, and there was barely
+ room for one horse at a time. Wat Danbury took the lead, and he heard the
+ huntsman's horse clumping along heavily behind him, while his own mare was
+ going with less spring than when she had started. She answered to a touch
+ of his crop or spur, however, and he felt that there was something still
+ left to draw upon. And then he looked up, and there was a heavy wooden
+ stile at the end of the narrow track, with a lane of stiff young saplings
+ leading down to it, which was far too thick to break through. The hounds
+ were running clear upon the grassland on the other side, and you were
+ bound either to get over that stile or lose sight of them, for the pace
+ was too hot to let you go round.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, Wat Danbury was not the lad to flinch, and at it he went full
+ split, like a man who means what he is doing. She rose gallantly to it,
+ rapped it hard with her front hoof, shook him on to her withers, recovered
+ herself, and was over. Wat had hardly got back into his saddle when there
+ was a clatter behind him like the fall of a woodstack, and there was the
+ top bar in splinters, the horse on its belly, and the huntsman on hands
+ and knees half a dozen yards in front of him. Wat pulled up for an
+ instant, for the fall was a smasher; but he saw old Joe spring to his feet
+ and get to his horse's bridle. The horse staggered up, but the moment it
+ put one foot in front of the other, Wat saw that it was hopelessly lame&mdash;a
+ slipped shoulder and a six weeks' job. There was nothing he could do, and
+ Joe was shouting to him not to lose the hounds, so off he went again, the
+ one solitary survivor of the whole hunt. When a man finds himself there,
+ he can retire from fox-hunting, for he has tasted the highest which it has
+ to offer. I remember once when I was out with the Royal Surrey&mdash;but
+ I'll tell you that story afterwards.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The pack, or what was left of them, had got a bit ahead during this time;
+ but he had a clear view of them on the downland, and the mare seemed full
+ of pride at being the only one left, for she was stepping out rarely and
+ tossing her head as she went. They were two miles over the green shoulder
+ of a hill, a rattle down a stony, deep-rutted country lane, where the mare
+ stumbled and nearly came down, a jump over a 5ft. brook, a cut through a
+ hazel copse, another dose of heavy ploughland, a couple of gates to open,
+ and then the green, unbroken Downs beyond.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Well,' said Wat Danbury to himself, 'I'll see this fox run into or I
+ shall see it drowned, for it's all clear going now between this and the
+ chalk cliffs which line the sea.' But he was wrong in that, as he speedily
+ discovered. In all the little hollows of the downs at that part there are
+ plantations of fir-woods, some of which have grown to a good size. You do
+ not see them until you come upon the edge of the valleys in which they
+ lie. Danbury was galloping hard over the short, springy turf when he came
+ over the lip of one of these depressions, and there was the dark clump of
+ wood lying in front of and beneath him. There were only a dozen hounds
+ still running, and they were just disappearing among the trees. The
+ sunlight was shining straight upon the long olive-green slopes which
+ curved down towards this wood, and Danbury, who had the eyes of a hawk,
+ swept them over this great expanse; but there was nothing moving upon it.
+ A few sheep were grazing far up on the right, but there was no other sight
+ of any living creature. He was certain then that he was very near to the
+ end, for either the fox must have gone to ground in the wood or the
+ hounds' noses must be at his very brush. The mare seemed to know also what
+ that great empty sweep of countryside meant, for she quickened her stride,
+ and a few minutes afterwards Danbury was galloping into the fir-wood.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He had come from bright sunshine, but the wood was very closely planted,
+ and so dim that he could hardly see to right or to left out of the narrow
+ path down which he was riding. You know what a solemn, churchyardy sort of
+ place a fir-wood is. I suppose it is the absence of any undergrowth, and
+ the fact that the trees never move at all. At any rate a kind of chill
+ suddenly struck Wat Danbury, and it flashed through his mind that there
+ had been some very singular points about this run&mdash; its length and
+ its straightness, and the fact that from the first find no one had ever
+ caught a glimpse of the creature. Some silly talk which had been going
+ round the country about the king of the foxes&mdash;a sort of demon fox,
+ so fast that it could outrun any pack, and so fierce that they could do
+ nothing with it if they overtook it&mdash;suddenly came back into his
+ mind, and it did not seem so laughable now in the dim fir-wood as it had
+ done when the story had been told over the wine and cigars. The
+ nervousness which had been on him in the morning, and which he had hoped
+ that he had shaken off, swept over him again in an overpowering wave. He
+ had been so proud of being alone, and yet he would have given 10 pounds
+ now to have had Joe Clarke's homely face beside him. And then, just at
+ that moment, there broke out from the thickest part of the wood the most
+ frantic hullabaloo that ever he had heard in his life. The hounds had run
+ into their fox.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, you know, or you ought to know, what your duty is in such a case.
+ You have to be whip, huntsman, and everything else if you are the first
+ man up. You get in among the hounds, lash them off, and keep the brush and
+ pads from being destroyed. Of course, Wat Danbury knew all about that, and
+ he tried to force his mare through the trees to the place where all this
+ hideous screaming and howling came from, but the wood was so thick that it
+ was impossible to ride it. He sprang off, therefore, left the mare
+ standing, and broke his way through as best he could with his hunting-lash
+ ready over his shoulder.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But as he ran forward he felt his flesh go cold and creepy all over. He
+ had heard hounds run into foxes many times before, but he had never heard
+ such sounds as these. They were not the cries of triumph, but of fear.
+ Every now and then came a shrill yelp of mortal agony. Holding his breath,
+ he ran on until he broke through the interlacing branches, and found
+ himself in a little clearing with the hounds all crowding round a patch
+ of tangled bramble at the further end.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "When he first caught sight of them the hounds were standing in a
+ half-circle round this bramble patch, with their backs bristling and their
+ jaws gaping. In front of the brambles lay one of them with his throat torn
+ out, all crimson and white-and-tan. Wat came running out into the
+ clearing, and at the sight of him the hounds took heart again, and one of
+ them sprang with a growl into the bushes. At the same instant, a creature
+ the size of a donkey jumped on to its feet, a huge grey head, with
+ monstrous glistening fangs and tapering fox jaws, shot out from among the
+ branches, and the hound was thrown several feet into the air, and fell
+ howling among the cover. Then there was a clashing snap, like a rat-trap
+ closing, and the howls sharpened into a scream and then were still.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Danbury had been on the look-out for symptoms all day, and now he had
+ found them. He looked once more at the thicket, saw a pair of savage red
+ eyes fixed upon him, and fairly took to his heels. It might only be a
+ passing delusion, or it might be the permanent mania of which the doctor
+ had spoken, but anyhow, the thing to do was to get back to bed and to
+ quiet, and to hope for the best.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He forgot the hounds, the hunt, and everything else in his desperate
+ fears for his own reason. He sprang upon his mare, galloped her madly over
+ the downs, and only stopped when he found himself at a country station.
+ There he left his mare at the inn, and made back for home as quickly as
+ steam would take him. It was evening before he got there, shivering with
+ apprehension, and seeing those red eyes and savage teeth at every turn. He
+ went straight to bed and sent for Dr. Middleton.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I've got 'em, doctor,' said he. 'It came about exactly as you said&mdash;
+ strange creatures, optical delusions, and everything. All I ask you now is
+ to save my reason.' The doctor listened to his story, and was shocked as
+ he heard it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'It appears to be a very clear case,' said he. 'This must be a lesson to
+ you for life.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Never a drop again if I only come safely through this,' cried Wat
+ Danbury.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Well, my dear boy, if you will stick to that it may prove a blessing in
+ disguise. But the difficulty in this case is to know where fact ends and
+ fancy begins. You see, it is not as if there was only one delusion. There
+ have been several. The dead dogs, for example, must have been one as well
+ as the creature in the bush.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I saw it all as clearly as I see you.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'One of the characteristics of this form of delirium is that what you see
+ is even clearer than reality. I was wondering whether the whole run was
+ not a delusion also.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Wat Danbury pointed to his hunting boots still lying upon the floor,
+ necked with the splashings of two counties.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Hum! that looks very real, certainly. No doubt, in your weak state, you
+ over-exerted yourself and so brought this attack upon yourself. Well,
+ whatever the cause, our treatment is clear. You will take the soothing
+ mixture which I will send to you, and we shall put two leeches upon your
+ temples to-night to relieve any congestion of the brain.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So Wat Danbury spent the night in tossing about and reflecting what a
+ sensitive thing this machinery of ours is, and how very foolish it is to
+ play tricks with what is so easily put out of gear and so difficult to
+ mend. And so he repeated and repeated his oath that this first lesson
+ should be his last, and that from that time forward he would be a sober,
+ hard-working yeoman as his father had been before him. So he lay, tossing
+ and still repentant, when his door flew open in the morning and in rushed
+ the doctor with a newspaper crumpled up in his hand.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'My dear boy,' he cried, 'I owe you a thousand apologies. You're the most
+ ill-used lad and I the greatest numskull in the county. Listen to this!'
+ And he sat down upon the side of the bed, flattened out his paper upon his
+ knee, and began to read.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The paragraph was headed, 'Disaster to the Ascombe Hounds,' and it went
+ on to say that four of the hounds, shockingly torn and mangled, had been
+ found in Winton Fir Wood upon the South Downs. The run had been so severe
+ that half the pack were lamed; but the four found in the wood were
+ actually dead, although the cause of their extraordinary injuries was
+ still unknown.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'So, you see,' said the doctor, looking up, 'that I was wrong when I put
+ the dead hounds among the delusions.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'But the cause?' cried Wat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Well, I think we may guess the cause from an item which has been
+ inserted just as the paper went to press:&mdash;
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ "Late last night, Mr. Brown, of Smither's Farm, to the
+ east of Hastings, perceived what he imagined to be an enormous
+ dog worrying one of his sheep. He shot the creature, which
+ proves to be a grey Siberian wolf of the variety known as
+ <i>Lupus Giganticus</i>. It is supposed to have escaped from some
+ travelling menagerie.
+</p>
+ <p>
+ "That's the story, gentlemen, and Wat Danbury stuck to his good
+ resolutions, for the fright which he had cured him of all wish to run such
+ a risk again; and he never touches anything stronger than lime-juice&mdash;at
+ least, he hadn't before he left this part of the country, five years ago
+ next Lady Day."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE THREE CORRESPONDENTS
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ There was only the one little feathery clump of dom palms in all that
+ great wilderness of black rocks and orange sand. It stood high on the
+ bank, and below it the brown Nile swirled swiftly towards the Ambigole
+ Cataract, fitting a little frill of foam round each of the boulders which
+ studded its surface. Above, out of a naked blue sky, the sun was beating
+ down upon the sand, and up again from the sand under the brims of the
+ pith-hats of the horsemen with the scorching glare of a blast-furnace. It
+ had risen so high that the shadows of the horses were no larger than
+ themselves.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Whew!" cried Mortimer, mopping his forehead, "you'd pay five shillings
+ for this at the hummums."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Precisely," said Scott. "But you are not asked to ride twenty miles in a
+ Turkish bath with a field-glass and a revolver, and a water-bottle and a
+ whole Christmas-treeful of things dangling from you. The hot-house at Kew
+ is excellent as a conservatory, but not adapted for exhibitions upon the
+ horizontal bar. I vote for a camp in the palm-grove and a halt until
+ evening."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mortimer rose on his stirrups and looked hard to the southward. Everywhere
+ were the same black burned rocks and deep orange sand. At one spot only an
+ intermittent line appeared to have been cut through the rugged spurs which
+ ran down to the river. It was the bed of the old railway, long destroyed
+ by the Arabs, but now in process of reconstruction by the advancing
+ Egyptians. There was no other sign of man's handiwork in all that desolate
+ scene.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's palm trees or nothing," said Scott.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I suppose we must; and yet I grudge every hour until we catch the
+ force up. What <i>would</i> our editors say if we were late for the
+ action?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My dear chap, an old bird like you doesn't need to be told that no sane
+ modern general would ever attack until the Press is up."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You don't mean that?" said young Anerley. "I thought we were looked upon
+ as an unmitigated nuisance."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Newspaper correspondents and travelling gentlemen, and all that tribe of
+ useless drones'&mdash;being an extract from Lord Wolseley's 'Soldier's
+ Pocket-Book,'" cried Scott. "We know all about <i>that</i>, Anerley;" and
+ he winked behind his blue spectacles. "If there was going to be a battle
+ we should very soon have an escort of cavalry to hurry us up. I've been in
+ fifteen, and I never saw one where they had not arranged for a reporter's
+ table."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's very well; but the enemy may be less considerate," said Mortimer.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They are not strong enough to force a battle."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A skirmish, then?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Much more likely to be a raid upon the rear. In that case we are just
+ where we should be."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So we are! What a score over Reuter's man up with the advance! Well,
+ we'll outspan and have our tiffin under the palms."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There were three of them, and they stood for three great London dailies.
+ Reuter's was thirty miles ahead; two evening pennies upon camels were
+ twenty miles behind. And among them they represented the eyes and ears of
+ the public&mdash;the great silent millions and millions who had paid for
+ everything, and who waited so patiently to know the result of their
+ outlay.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They were remarkable men these body-servants of the Press; two of them
+ already veterans in camps, the other setting out upon his first campaign,
+ and full of deference for his famous comrades.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ This first one, who had just dismounted from his bay polo-pony, was
+ Mortimer, of the <i>Intelligence</i>&mdash;tall, straight, and hawk-faced,
+ with khaki tunic and riding-breeches, drab putties, a scarlet cummerbund,
+ and a skin tanned to the red of a Scotch fir by sun and wind, and mottled
+ by the mosquito and the sand-fly. The other&mdash;small, quick, mercurial,
+ with blue-black, curling beard and hair, a fly-switch for ever flicking in
+ his left hand&mdash;was Scott, of the <i>Courier</i>, who had come through
+ more dangers and brought off more brilliant <i>coups</i> than any man in
+ the profession, save the eminent Chandler, now no longer in a condition to
+ take the field. They were a singular contrast, Mortimer and Scott, and it
+ was in their differences that the secret of their close friendship lay.
+ Each dovetailed into the other. The strength of each was in the other's
+ weakness. Together they formed a perfect unit. Mortimer was Saxon&mdash;slow,
+ conscientious, and deliberate; Scott was Celtic&mdash;quick,
+ happy-go-lucky, and brilliant. Mortimer was the more solid, Scott the more
+ attractive. Mortimer was the deeper thinker, Scott the brighter talker. By
+ a curious coincidence, though each had seen much of warfare, their
+ campaigns had never coincided. Together they covered all recent military
+ history. Scott had done Plevna, the Shipka, the Zulus, Egypt, Suakim;
+ Mortimer had seen the Boer War, the Chilian, the Bulgaria and Servian, the
+ Gordon relief, the Indian frontier, Brazilian rebellion, and Madagascar.
+ This intimate personal knowledge gave a peculiar flavour to their talk.
+ There was none of the second-hand surmise and conjecture which form so
+ much of our conversation; it was all concrete and final. The speaker had
+ been there, had seen it, and there was an end of it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ In spite of their friendship there was the keenest professional rivalry
+ between the two men. Either would have sacrificed himself to help his
+ companion, but either would also have sacrificed his companion to help his
+ paper. Never did a jockey yearn for a winning mount as keenly as each of
+ them longed to have a full column in a morning edition whilst every other
+ daily was blank. They were perfectly frank about the matter. Each
+ professed himself ready to steal a march on his neighbour, and each
+ recognised that the other's duty to his employer was far higher than any
+ personal consideration.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The third man was Anerley, of the <i>Gazette</i>&mdash;young,
+ inexperienced, and rather simple-looking. He had a droop of the lip, which
+ some of his more intimate friends regarded as a libel upon his character,
+ and his eyes were so slow and so sleepy that they suggested an
+ affectation. A leaning towards soldiering had sent him twice to autumn
+ manoeuvres, and a touch of colour in his descriptions had induced the
+ proprietors of the <i>Gazette</i> to give him a trial as a war-special.
+ There was a pleasing diffidence about his bearing which recommended him to
+ his experienced companions, and if they had a smile sometimes at his
+ guileless ways, it was soothing to them to have a comrade from whom
+ nothing was to be feared. From the day that they left the telegraph-wire
+ behind them at Sarras, the man who was mounted upon a 15-guinea 13-4
+ Syrian was delivered over into the hands of the owners of the two fastest
+ polo-ponies that ever shot down the Ghezireh ground. The three had
+ dismounted and led their beasts under the welcome shade. In the brassy,
+ yellow glare every branch above threw so black and solid a shadow that the
+ men involuntarily raised their feet to step over them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The palm makes an excellent hat-rack," said Scott, slinging his revolver
+ and his water-bottle over the little upward-pointing pegs which bristle
+ from the trunk. "As a shade tree, however, it isn't an unqualified
+ success. Curious that in the universal adaptation of means to ends
+ something a little less flimsy could not have been devised for the
+ tropics."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Like the banyan in India."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Or the fine hardwood trees in Ashantee, where a whole regiment could
+ picnic under the shade."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The teak tree isn't bad in Burmah, either. By Jove, the baccy has all
+ come loose in the saddle-bag! That long-cut mixture smokes rather hot for
+ this climate. How about the baggles, Anerley?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They'll be here in five minutes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Down the winding path which curved among the rocks the little train of
+ baggage-camels was daintily picking its way. They came mincing and
+ undulating along, turning their heads slowly from side to side with the
+ air of a self-conscious woman. In front rode the three Berberee
+ body-servants upon donkeys, and behind walked the Arab camel-boys. They
+ had been travelling for nine long hours, ever since the first rising of
+ the moon, at the weary camel-drag of two and a half miles an hour, but now
+ they brightened, both beasts and men, at the sight of the grove and the
+ riderless horses. In a few minutes the loads were unstrapped, the animals
+ tethered, a fire lighted, fresh water carried up from the river, and each
+ camel-boy provided with his own little heap of tibbin laid in the centre
+ of the table-cloth, without which no well-bred Arabian will condescend to
+ feed. The dazzling light without, the subdued half-tones within, the green
+ palm-fronds outlined against the deep blue sky, the flitting,
+ silent-footed Arab servants, the crackling of sticks, the reek of a
+ lighting fire, the placid supercilious heads of the camels, they all come
+ back in their dreams to those who have known them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Scott was breaking eggs into a pan and rolling out a love-song in his
+ rich, deep voice. Anerley, with his head and arms buried in a deal
+ packing-case, was working his way through strata of tinned soups, bully
+ beef, potted chicken, and sardines to reach the jams which lay beneath.
+ The conscientious Mortimer, with his notebook upon his knee, was jotting
+ down what the railway engineer had told him at the line-end the day
+ before. Suddenly he raised his eyes and saw the man himself on his
+ chestnut pony, dipping and rising over the broken ground.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Hullo! Here's Merryweather!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A pretty lather his pony is in! He's had her at that hand-gallop for
+ hours, by the look of her. Hullo, Merryweather, hullo!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The engineer, a small, compact man with a pointed red beard, had made as
+ though he would ride past their camp without word or halt. Now he swerved,
+ and easing his pony down to a canter, he headed her towards them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "For God's sake, a drink!" he croaked. "My tongue is stuck to the roof of
+ my mouth."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mortimer ran with the water-bottle, Scott with the whisky-flask, and
+ Anerley with the tin pannikin. The engineer drank until his breath failed
+ him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I must be off," said he, striking the drops from his red moustache.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Any news?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A hitch in the railway construction. I must see the general. It's the
+ devil not having a telegraph."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Anything we can report?" Out came three notebooks.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll tell you after I've seen the general."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Any dervishes?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The usual shaves. Hud-up, Jinny! Good-bye!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ With a soft thudding upon the sand, and a clatter among the stones the
+ weary pony was off upon her journey once more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Nothing serious, I suppose?" said Mortimer, staring after him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Deuced serious," cried Scott. "The ham and eggs are burned! No&mdash;it's
+ all right&mdash;saved, and done to a turn! Pull the box up, Anerley. Come
+ on, Mortimer, stow that notebook! The fork is mightier than the pen just
+ at present. What's the matter with you, Anerley?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I was wondering whether what we have just seen was worth a telegram."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, it's for the proprietors to say if it's worth it. Sordid money
+ considerations are not for us. We must wire about something just to
+ justify our khaki coats and our putties."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But what is there to say?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mortimer's long, austere face broke into a smile over the youngster's
+ innocence. "It's not quite usual in our profession to give each other
+ tips," said he. "However, as my telegram is written, I've no objection to
+ your reading it. You may be sure that I would not show it to you if it
+ were of the slightest importance."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Anerley took up the slip of paper and read:&mdash;
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ Merryweather obstacles stop journey confer general stop nature
+ difficulties later stop rumours dervishes.
+</p>
+ <p>
+ "This is very condensed," said Anerley, with wrinkled brows.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Condensed!" cried Scott. "Why, it's sinfully garrulous. If my old man got
+ a wire like that his language would crack the lamp-shades. I'd cut out
+ half this; for example, I'd have out 'journey,' and 'nature,' and
+ 'rumours.' But my old man would make a ten-line paragraph of it for all
+ that."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I'll do it myself just to show you. Lend me that stylo." He
+ scribbled for a minute in his notebook. "It works out somewhat on these
+ lines":&mdash;
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ Mr. Charles H. Merryweather, the eminent railway engineer,
+ who is at present engaged in superintending the construction
+ of the line from Sarras to the front, has met with considerable
+ obstacles to the rapid completion of his important task&mdash;
+</p>
+ <p>
+ "Of course the old man knows who Merryweather is, and what he is about, so
+ the word 'obstacles' would suggest all that to him."
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ He has to-day been compelled to make a journey of forty
+ miles to the front, in order to confer with the general upon
+ the steps which are necessary in order to facilitate the work.
+ Further particulars of the exact nature of the difficulties
+ met with will be made public at a later date. All is quiet
+ upon the line of communications, though the usual persistent
+ rumours of the presence of dervishes in the Eastern desert
+ continue to circulate.&mdash;<i>Our own correspondent</i>.
+</p>
+ <p>
+ "How's that?" cried Scott, triumphantly, and his white teeth gleamed
+ suddenly through his black beard. "That's the sort of flapdoodle for the
+ dear old public."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Will it interest them?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, everything interests them. They want to know all about it; and they
+ like to think that there is a man who is getting a hundred a month simply
+ in order to tell it to them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's very kind of you to teach me all this."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, it is a little unconventional, for, after all, we are here to score
+ over each other if we can. There are no more eggs, and you must take it
+ out in jam. Of course, as Mortimer says, such a telegram as this is of no
+ importance one way or another, except to prove to the office that we <i>are</i>
+ in the Soudan, and not at Monte Carlo. But when it comes to serious work
+ it must be every man for himself."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Is that quite necessary?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why, of course it is."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should have thought if three men were to combine and to share their
+ news, they would do better than if they were each to act for himself, and
+ they would have a much pleasanter time of it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The two older men sat with their bread-and-jam in their hands, and an
+ expression of genuine disgust upon their faces.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We are not here to have a pleasant time," said Mortimer, with a flash
+ through his glasses. "We are here to do our best for our papers. How can
+ they score over each other if we do not do the same? If we all combine we
+ might as well amalgamate with Reuter at once."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why, it would take away the whole glory of the profession!" cried Scott.
+ "At present the smartest man gets his stuff first on the wires. What
+ inducement is there to be smart if we all share and share alike?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And at present the man with the best equipment has the best chance,"
+ remarked Mortimer, glancing across at the shot-silk polo ponies and the
+ cheap little Syrian grey. "That is the fair reward of foresight and
+ enterprise. Every man for himself, and let the best man win."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's the way to find who the best man is. Look at Chandler. He would
+ never have got his chance if he had not played always off his own bat.
+ You've heard how he pretended to break his leg, sent his
+ fellow-correspondent off for the doctor, and so got a fair start for the
+ telegraph-office."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Do you mean to say that was legitimate?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Everything is legitimate. It's your wits against my wits."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should call it dishonourable."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You may call it what you like. Chandler's paper got the battle and the
+ other's didn't. It made Chandler's name."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Or take Westlake," said Mortimer, cramming the tobacco into his pipe.
+ "Hi, Abdul, you may have the dishes! Westlake brought his stuff down by
+ pretending to be the Government courier, and using the relays of
+ Government horses. Westlake's paper sold half a million."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Is that legitimate also?" asked Anerley, thoughtfully.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why not?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, it looks a little like horse-stealing and lying."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, <i>I</i> think I should do a little horse-stealing and lying if I
+ could have a column to myself in a London daily. What do you say, Scott?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Anything short of manslaughter."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And I'm not sure that I'd trust you there."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I don't think I should be guilty of newspaper-man-slaughter. That I
+ regard as a distinct breach of professional etiquette. But if any outsider
+ comes between a highly charged correspondent and an electric wire, he does
+ it at his peril. My dear Anerley, I tell you frankly that if you are going
+ to handicap yourself with scruple you may just as well be in Fleet Street
+ as in the Soudan. Our life is irregular. Our work has never been
+ systematised. No doubt it will be some day, but the time is not yet. Do
+ what you can and how you can, and be first on the wires; that's my advice
+ to you; and also, that when next you come upon a campaign you bring with
+ you the best horse that money can buy. Mortimer may beat me or I may beat
+ Mortimer, but at least we know that between us we have the fastest ponies
+ in the country. We have neglected no chance."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am not so certain of that," said Mortimer, slowly. "You are aware, of
+ course, that though a horse beats a camel on twenty miles, a camel beats a
+ horse on thirty."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What, one of those camels?" cried Anerley in astonishment. The two
+ seniors burst out laughing.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, no, the real high-bred trotter&mdash;the kind of beast the dervishes
+ ride when they make their lightning raids."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Faster than a galloping horse?" "Well, it tires a horse down. It goes the
+ same gait all the way, and it wants neither halt nor drink, and it takes
+ rough ground much better than a horse. They used to have long distance
+ races at Halfa, and the camel always won at thirty."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Still, we need not reproach ourselves, Scott, for we are not very likely
+ to have to carry a thirty-mile message. They will have the field telegraph
+ next week."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Quite so. But at the present moment&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I know, my dear chap; but there is no motion of urgency before the house.
+ Load baggles at five o'clock; so you have just three hours clear. Any sign
+ of the evening pennies?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Mortimer swept the northern horizon with his binoculars. "Not in sight
+ yet."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They are quite capable of travelling during the heat of the day. Just the
+ sort of thing evening pennies <i>would</i> do. Take care of your match,
+ Anerley. These palm groves go up like a powder magazine if you set them
+ alight. Bye-bye." The two men crawled under their mosquito-nets and sank
+ instantly into the easy sleep of those whose lives are spent in the open.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Young Anerley stood with his back against a palm tree and his briar
+ between his lips, thinking over the advice which he had received. After
+ all, they were the heads of the profession, these men, and it was not for
+ him, the newcomer, to reform their methods. If they served their papers in
+ this fashion, then he must do the same. They had at least been frank and
+ generous in teaching him the rules of the game. If it was good enough for
+ them it was good enough for him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a broiling afternoon, and those thin frills of foam round the
+ black, glistening necks of the Nile boulders looked delightfully cool and
+ alluring. But it would not be safe to bathe for some hours to come. The
+ air shimmered and vibrated over the baking stretch of sand and rock. There
+ was not a breath of wind, and the droning and piping of the insects
+ inclined one for sleep. Somewhere above a hoopoe was calling. Anerley
+ knocked out his ashes, and was turning towards his couch, when his eye
+ caught something moving in the desert to the south. It was a horseman
+ riding towards them as swiftly as the broken ground would permit. A
+ messenger from the army, thought Anerley; and then, as he watched, the sun
+ suddenly struck the man on the side of the head, and his chin flamed into
+ gold. There could not be two horsemen with beards of such a colour. It was
+ Merryweather, the engineer, and he was returning. What on earth was he
+ returning for? He had been so keen to see the general, and yet he was
+ coming back with his mission unaccomplished. Was it that his pony was
+ hopelessly foundered? It seemed to be moving well. Anerley picked up
+ Mortimer's binoculars, and a foam-bespattered horse and a weary
+ koorbash-cracking man came cantering up the centre of the field. But there
+ was nothing in his appearance to explain the mystery of his return. Then
+ as he watched them they dipped into a hollow and disappeared. He could see
+ that it was one of those narrow khors which led to the river, and he
+ waited, glass in hand, for their immediate reappearance. But minute passed
+ after minute and there was no sign of them. That narrow gully appeared to
+ have swallowed them up. And then with a curious gulp and start he saw a
+ little grey cloud wreathe itself slowly from among the rocks and drift in
+ a long, hazy shred over the desert. In an instant he had torn Scott and
+ Mortimer from their slumbers.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Get up, you chaps!" he cried. "I believe Merryweather has been shot by
+ dervishes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And Reuter not here!" cried the two veterans, exultantly clutching at
+ their notebooks. "Merryweather shot! Where? When? How?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ In a few words Anerley explained what he had seen.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You heard nothing?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Nothing."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, a shot loses itself very easily among rocks. By George, look at the
+ buzzards!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Two large brown birds were soaring in the deep blue heaven. As Scott spoke
+ they circled down and dropped into the little khor.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's good enough," said Mortimer, with his nose between the leaves of
+ his book. "'Merryweather headed dervishes stop return stop shot mutilated
+ stop raid communications.' How's that?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You think he was headed off?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why else should he return?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "In that case, if they were out in front of him and others cut him off,
+ there must be several small raiding parties."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I should judge so."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How about the 'mutilated'?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I've fought against Arabs before."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where are you off to?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sarras."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I think I'll race you in," said Scott.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Anerley stared in astonishment at the absolutely impersonal way in which
+ these men regarded the situation. In their zeal for news it had apparently
+ never struck them that they, their camp, and their servants were all in
+ the lion's mouth. But even as they talked there came the harsh,
+ importunate rat-tat-tat of an irregular volley from among the rocks, and
+ the high, keening whistle of bullets over their heads. A palm spray
+ fluttered down amongst them. At the same instant the six frightened
+ servants came running wildly in for protection.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was the cool-headed Mortimer who organised the defence, for Scott's
+ Celtic soul was so aflame at all this "copy" in hand and more to come that
+ he was too exuberantly boisterous for a commander. The other, with his
+ spectacles and his stern face, soon had the servants in hand. "<i>Tali
+ henna! Egri!</i> What the deuce are you frightened about? Put the camels
+ between the palm trunks. That's right. Now get the knee-tethers on them.
+ <i>Quies</i>! Did you never hear bullets before? Now put the donkeys here.
+ Not much&mdash;you don't get my polo-pony to make a zareba with. Picket
+ the ponies between the grove and the river out of danger's way. These
+ fellows seem to fire even higher than they did in '85."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's got home, anyhow," said Scott, as they heard a soft, splashing
+ thud like a stone in a mud-bank.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Who's hit, then?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The brown camel that's chewing the cud." As he spoke the creature, its
+ jaw still working, laid its long neck along the ground and closed its
+ large dark eyes.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That shot cost me 15 pounds," said Mortimer, ruefully. "How many of them
+ do you make?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Four, I think."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Only four Bezingers, at any rate; there may be some spearmen."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I think not; it is a little raiding-party of rifle-men. By the way,
+ Anerley, you've never been under fire before, have you?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Never," said the young pressman, who was conscious of a curious feeling
+ of nervous elation.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Love and poverty and war, they are all experiences necessary to make a
+ complete life. Pass over those cartridges. This is a very mild baptism
+ that you are undergoing, for behind these camels you are as safe as if you
+ were sitting in the back room of the Authors' Club."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "As safe, but hardly as comfortable," said Scott. "A long glass of hock
+ and seltzer would be exceedingly acceptable. But oh, Mortimer, what a
+ chance! Think of the general's feelings when he hears that the first
+ action of the war has been fought by the Press column. Think of Reuter,
+ who has been stewing at the front for a week! Think of the evening pennies
+ just too late for the fun. By George, that slug brushed a mosquito off
+ me!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And one of the donkeys is hit."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This is sinful. It will end in our having to carry our own kits to
+ Khartoum."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Never mind, my boy, it all goes to make copy. I can see the headlines&mdash;'Raid
+ on Communications': 'Murder of British Engineer': 'Press Column Attacked.'
+ Won't it be ripping?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I wonder what the next line will be," said Anerley.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Our Special Wounded'!" cried Scott, rolling over on to his back. "No
+ harm done," he added, gathering himself up again; "only a chip off my
+ knee. This is getting sultry. I confess that the idea of that back room at
+ the Authors' Club begins to grow upon me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have some diachylon."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Afterwards will do. We're having a 'appy day with Fuzzy on the rush. I
+ wish he <i>would</i> rush."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They're coming nearer."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This is an excellent revolver of mine if it didn't throw so devilish
+ high. I always aim at a man's toes if I want to stimulate his digestion. O
+ Lord, there's our kettle gone!" With a boom like a dinner-gong a Remington
+ bullet had passed through the kettle, and a cloud of steam hissed up from
+ the fire. A wild shout came from the rocks above.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The idiots think that they have blown us up. They'll rush us now, as sure
+ as fate; then it will be our turn to lead. Got your revolver, Anerley?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have this double-barrelled fowling-piece."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sensible man! It's the best weapon in the world at this sort of
+ rough-and-tumble work. What cartridges?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Swan-shot."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That will do all right. I carry this big bore double-barrelled pistol
+ loaded with slugs. You might as well try to stop one of these fellows with
+ a pea-shooter as with a service revolver."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "There are ways and means," said Scott. "The Geneva Convention does not
+ hold south of the first cataract. It's easy to make a bullet mushroom by a
+ little manipulation of the tip of it. When I was in the broken square at
+ Tamai&mdash;"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Wait a bit," cried Mortimer, adjusting his glasses. "I think they are
+ coming now."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The time," said Scott, snapping up his watch, "being exactly seventeen
+ minutes past four."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Anerley had been lying behind a camel staring with an interest which
+ bordered upon fascination at the rocks opposite. Here was a little woolly
+ puff of smoke, and there was another one, but never once had they caught a
+ glimpse of the attackers. To him there was something weird and awesome in
+ these unseen, persistent men who, minute by minute, were drawing closer to
+ them. He had heard them cry out when the kettle was broken, and once,
+ immediately afterwards, an enormously strong voice had roared something
+ which had set Scott shrugging his shoulders.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They've got to take us first," said he, and Anerley thought his nerve
+ might be better if he did not ask for a translation.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The firing had begun at a distance of some 100 yards, which put it out of
+ the question for them, with their lighter weapons, to make any reply to
+ it. Had their antagonists continued to keep that range the defenders must
+ either have made a hopeless sally or tried to shelter themselves behind
+ their zareba as best they might on the chance that the sound might bring
+ up help. But, luckily for them, the African has never taken kindly to the
+ rifle, and his primitive instinct to close with his enemy is always too
+ strong for his sense of strategy. They were drawing in, therefore, and
+ now, for the first time, Anerley caught sight of a face looking at them
+ from over a rock. It was a huge, virile, strong-jawed head of a pure negro
+ type, with silver trinkets gleaming in the ears. The man raised a great
+ arm from behind the rock, and shook his Remington at them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Shall I fire?" asked Anerley.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, no; it is too far. Your shot would scatter all over the place."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's a picturesque ruffian," said Scott. "Couldn't you kodak him,
+ Mortimer? There's another!" A fine-featured brown Arab, with a black,
+ pointed beard, was peeping from behind another boulder. He wore the green
+ turban which proclaimed him hadji, and his face showed the keen, nervous
+ exultation of the religious fanatic.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They seem a piebald crowd," said Scott.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That last is one of the real fighting Baggara," remarked Mortimer. "He's
+ a dangerous man."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He looks pretty vicious. There's another negro!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Two more! Dingas, by the look of them. Just the same chaps we get our own
+ black battalions from. As long as they get a fight they don't mind who
+ it's for; but if the idiots had only sense enough to understand, they
+ would know that the Arab is their hereditary enemy, and we their
+ hereditary friends. Look at the silly juggins, gnashing his teeth at the
+ very men who put down the slave trade!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Couldn't you explain?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I'll explain with this pistol when he comes a little nearer. Now sit
+ tight, Anerley. They're off!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ They were indeed. It was the brown man with the green turban who headed
+ the rush. Close at his heels was the negro with the silver ear-rings&mdash;
+ a giant of a man, and the other two were only a little behind. As they
+ sprang over the rocks one after the other, it took Anerley back to the
+ school sports when he held the tape for the hurdle-race. It was
+ magnificent, the wild spirit and abandon of it, the flutter of the
+ chequered galabeeahs, the gleam of steel, the wave of black arms, the
+ frenzied faces, the quick pitter-patter of the rushing feet. The
+ law-abiding Briton is so imbued with the idea of the sanctity of human
+ life that it was hard for the young pressman to realise that these men had
+ every intention of killing him, and that he was at perfect liberty to do
+ as much for them. He lay staring as if this were a show and he a
+ spectator.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Now, Anerley, now! Take the Arab!" cried somebody.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He put up the gun and saw the brown fierce face at the other end of the
+ barrel. He tugged at the trigger, but the face grew larger and fiercer
+ with every stride. Again and again he tugged. A revolver-shot rang out at
+ his elbow, then another one, and he saw a red spot spring out on the
+ Arab's brown breast. But he was still coming on.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Shoot, you ass, shoot!" screamed Scott.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Again he strained unavailingly at the trigger. There were two more
+ pistol-shots, and the big negro had fallen and risen and fallen again.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Cock it, you fool!" shouted a furious voice; and at the same instant,
+ with a rush and flutter, the Arab bounded over the prostrate camel and
+ came down with his bare feet upon Anerley's chest. In a dream he seemed to
+ be struggling frantically with someone upon the ground, then he was
+ conscious of a tremendous explosion in his very face, and so ended for him
+ the first action of the war.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good-bye, old chap. You'll be all right. Give yourself time." It was
+ Mortimer's voice, and he became dimly conscious of a long, spectacled
+ face, and of a heavy hand upon his shoulder.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sorry to leave you. We'll be lucky now if we are in time for the morning
+ editions." Scott was tightening his girth as he spoke.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We'll put in our wire that you have been hurt, so your people will know
+ why they don't hear from you. If Reuter or the evening pennies come up,
+ don't give the thing away. Abbas will look after you, and we'll be back
+ to-morrow afternoon. Bye-bye!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Anerley heard it all, though he did not feel energy enough to answer.
+ Then, as he watched two sleek, brown ponies with their yellow-clad riders
+ dwindling among the rocks, his memory cleared suddenly, and he realised
+ that the first great journalistic chance of his life was slipping away
+ from him. It was a small fight, but it was the first of the war, and the
+ great public at home were all athirst for news. They would have it in the
+ <i>Courier</i>; they would have it in the <i>Intelligence</i>, and not a
+ word in the <i>Gazette</i>. The thought brought him to his feet, though he
+ had to throw his arm round the stem of the palm tree to steady his
+ swimming head. There was a big black man lying where he had fallen, his
+ huge chest pocked with bullet-marks, every wound rosetted with its circle
+ of flies. The Arab was stretched out within a few yards of him, with two
+ hands clasped over the dreadful thing which had been his head. Across him
+ was lying Anerley's fowling-piece, one barrel discharged, the other at
+ half cock.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Scott effendi shoot him your gun," said a voice. It was Abbas, his
+ English-speaking body-servant.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Anerley groaned at the disgrace of it. He had lost his head so completely
+ that he had forgotten to cock his gun; and yet he knew that it was not
+ fear but interest which had so absorbed him. He put his hand up to his
+ head and felt that a wet handkerchief was bound round his forehead.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where are the two other dervishes?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "They ran away. One got shot in arm."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What's happened to me?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Effendi got cut on head. Effendi catch bad man by arms, and Scott effendi
+ shot him. Face burn very bad."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Anerley became conscious suddenly that there was a pringling about his
+ skin and an overpowering smell of burned hair under his nostrils. He put
+ his hand to his moustache. It was gone. His eyebrows too? He could not
+ find them. His head, no doubt, was very near to the dervish's when they
+ were rolling upon the ground together, and this was the effect of the
+ explosion of his own gun. Well, he would have time to grow some more hair
+ before he saw Fleet Street again. But the cut, perhaps, was a more serious
+ matter. Was it enough to prevent him getting to the telegraph-office at
+ Sarras? The only way was to try and see. But there was only that poor
+ little Syrian grey of his. There it stood in the evening sunshine, with a
+ sunk head and a bent knee, as if its morning's work was still heavy upon
+ it. What hope was there of being able to do thirty-five miles of heavy
+ going upon that? It would be a strain upon the splendid ponies of his
+ companions&mdash;and they were the swiftest and most enduring in the
+ country. The most enduring? There was one creature more enduring, and that
+ was a real trotting camel. If he had had one he might have got to the
+ wires first after all, for Mortimer had said that over thirty miles they
+ have the better of any horse. Yes, if he had only had a real trotting
+ camel! And then like a flash came Mortimer's words, "It is the kind of
+ beast that the dervishes ride when they make their lightning raids."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The beasts the dervishes ride! What had these dead dervishes ridden? In an
+ instant he was clambering up the rocks, with Abbas protesting at his
+ heels. Had the two fugitives carried away all the camels, or had they been
+ content to save themselves? The brass gleam from a litter of empty
+ Remington cases caught his eye, and showed where the enemy had been
+ crouching. And then he could have shouted for joy, for there, in the
+ hollow, some little distance off, rose the high, graceful white neck and
+ the elegant head of such a camel as he had never set eyes upon before&mdash;a
+ swanlike, beautiful creature, as far from the rough, clumsy baggles as the
+ cart-horse is from the racer.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The beast was kneeling under the shelter of the rocks with its waterskin
+ and bag of doora slung over its shoulders, and its forelegs tethered Arab
+ fashion with a rope around the knees. Anerley threw his leg over the front
+ pommel while Abbas slipped off the cord. Forward flew Anerley towards the
+ creature's neck, then violently backwards, clawing madly at anything which
+ might save him, and then, with a jerk which nearly snapped his loins, he
+ was thrown forward again. But the camel was on its legs now, and the young
+ pressman was safely seated upon one of the fliers of the desert. It was as
+ gentle as it was swift, and it stood oscillating its long neck and gazing
+ round with its large brown eyes, whilst Anerley coiled his legs round the
+ peg and grasped the curved camel-stick which Abbas had handed up to him.
+ There were two bridle-cords, one from the nostril and one from the neck,
+ but he remembered that Scott had said that it was the servant's and not
+ the house-bell which had to be pulled, so he kept his grasp upon the
+ lower. Then he touched the long, vibrating neck with his stick, and in an
+ instant Abbas' farewell seemed to come from far behind him, and the black
+ rocks and yellow sand were dancing past on either side.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was his first experience of a trotting camel, and at first the motion,
+ although irregular and abrupt, was not unpleasant. Having no stirrup or
+ fixed point of any kind, he could not rise to it, but he gripped as
+ tightly as he could with his knee, and he tried to sway backwards and
+ forwards as he had seen the Arabs do. It was a large, very concave
+ Makloofa saddle, and he was conscious that he was bouncing about on it
+ with as little power of adhesion as a billiard-ball upon a tea-tray. He
+ gripped the two sides with his hands to hold himself steady. The creature
+ had got into its long, swinging, stealthy trot, its sponge-like feet
+ making no sound upon the hard sand. Anerley leaned back with his two hands
+ gripping hard behind him, and he whooped the creature on. The sun had
+ already sunk behind the line of black volcanic peaks, which look like huge
+ slag-heaps at the mouth of a mine. The western sky had taken that lovely
+ light green and pale pink tint which makes evening beautiful upon the
+ Nile, and the old brown river itself, swirling down amongst the black
+ rocks, caught some shimmer of the colours above. The glare, the heat, and
+ the piping of the insects had all ceased together. In spite of his aching
+ head, Anerley could have cried out for pure physical joy as the swift
+ creature beneath him flew along with him through that cool, invigorating
+ air, with the virile north wind soothing his pringling face.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ He had looked at his watch, and now he made a swift calculation of times
+ and distances. It was past six when he had left the camp. Over broken
+ ground it was impossible that he could hope to do more than seven miles an
+ hour&mdash;less on bad parts, more on the smooth. His recollection of the
+ track was that there were few smooth and many bad. He would be lucky,
+ then, if he reached Sarras anywhere from twelve to one. Then the messages
+ took a good two hours to go through, for they had to be transcribed at
+ Cairo. At the best he could only hope to have told his story in Fleet
+ Street at two or three in the morning. It was possible that he might
+ manage it, but the chances seemed enormously against him. About three the
+ morning edition would be made up, and his chance gone for ever. The one
+ thing clear was that only the first man at the wires would have any chance
+ at all, and Anerley meant to be first if hard riding could do it. So he
+ tapped away at the bird-like neck, and the creature's long, loose limbs
+ went faster and faster at every tap. Where the rocky spurs ran down to the
+ river, horses would have to go round, while camels might get across, so
+ that Anerley felt that he was always gaining upon his companions.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But there was a price to be paid for the feeling. He had heard of men who
+ had burst when on camel journeys, and he knew that the Arabs swathe their
+ bodies tightly in broad cloth bandages when they prepare for a long march.
+ It had seemed unnecessary and ridiculous when he first began to speed over
+ the level track, but now, when he got on the rocky paths, he understood
+ what it meant. Never for an instant was he at the same angle. Backwards,
+ forwards he swung, with a tingling jar at the end of each sway, until he
+ ached from his neck to his knees. It caught him across the shoulders, it
+ caught him down the spine, it gripped him over the loins, it marked the
+ lower line of his ribs with one heavy, dull throb. He clutched here and
+ there with his hand to try and ease the strain upon his muscles. He drew
+ up his knees, altered his seat, and set his teeth with a grim
+ determination to go through with it should it kill him. His head was
+ splitting, his flayed face smarting, and every joint in his body aching as
+ if it were dislocated. But he forgot all that when, with the rising of the
+ moon, he heard the clinking of horses' hoofs down upon the track by the
+ river, and knew that, unseen by them, he had already got well abreast of
+ his companions. But he was hardly halfway, and the time already eleven.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ All day the needles had been ticking away without intermission in the
+ little corrugated iron hut which served as a telegraph station at Sarras.
+ With its bare walls and its packing-case seats, it was none the less for
+ the moment one of the vital spots upon the earth's surface, and the crisp,
+ importunate ticking might have come from the world-old clock of Destiny.
+ Many august people had been at the other end of those wires, and had
+ communed with the moist-faced military clerk. A French Premier had
+ demanded a pledge, and an English marquis had passed on the request to the
+ General in command, with a question as to how it would affect the
+ situation. Cipher telegrams had nearly driven the clerk out of his wits,
+ for of all crazy occupations the taking of a cipher message, when you are
+ without the key to the cipher, is the worst. Much high diplomacy had been
+ going on all day in the innermost chambers of European chancellories, and
+ the results of it had been whispered into this little corrugated-iron hut.
+ About two in the morning an enormous despatch had come at last to an end,
+ and the weary operator had opened the door, and was lighting his pipe in
+ the cool, fresh air, when he saw a camel plump down in the dust, and a
+ man, who seemed to be in the last stage of drunkenness, come rolling
+ towards him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What's the time?" he cried, in a voice which appeared to be the only
+ sober thing about him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was on the clerk's lips to say that it was time that the questioner was
+ in his bed, but it is not safe upon a campaign to be ironical at the
+ expense of khaki-clad men. He contented himself, therefore, with the bald
+ statement that it was after two. But no retort that he could have devised
+ could have had a more crushing effect. The voice turned drunken also, and
+ the man caught at the door-post to uphold him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Two o'clock! I'm done after all!" said he. His head was tied up in a
+ bloody handkerchief, his face was crimson, and he stood with his legs
+ crooked as if the pith had all gone out of his back. The clerk began to
+ realise that something out of the ordinary was in the wind.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How long does it take to get a wire to London?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "About two hours."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And it's two now. I could not get it there before four."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Before three."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Four."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, three."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But you said two hours."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, but there's more than an hour's difference in longitude."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "By Heaven, I'll do it yet!" cried Anerley, and staggering to a
+ packing-case, he began the dictation of his famous despatch.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And so it came about that the <i>Gazette</i> had a long column, with
+ headlines like an epitaph, when the sheets of the <i>Intelligence</i> and
+ the <i>Courier</i> were as blank as the faces of their editors. And so,
+ too, it happened that when two weary men, upon two foundered horses,
+ arrived about four in the morning at the Sarras post-office, they looked
+ at each other in silence and departed noiselessly, with the conviction
+ that there are some situations with which the English language is not
+ capable of dealing.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE NEW CATACOMB
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ "Look here, Burger," said Kennedy, "I do wish that you would confide in
+ me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The two famous students of Roman remains sat together in Kennedy's
+ comfortable room overlooking the Corso. The night was cold, and they had
+ both pulled up their chairs to the unsatisfactory Italian stove which
+ threw out a zone of stuffiness rather than of warmth.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Outside under the bright winter stars lay the modern Rome, the long,
+ double chain of the electric lamps, the brilliantly lighted <i>cafes</i>,
+ the rushing carriages, and the dense throng upon the footpaths. But
+ inside, in the sumptuous chamber of the rich young English archaeologist,
+ there was only old Rome to be seen. Cracked and time-worn friezes hung
+ upon the walls, grey old busts of senators and soldiers with their
+ fighting heads and their hard, cruel faces peered out from the corners. On
+ the centre table, amidst a litter of inscriptions, fragments, and
+ ornaments, there stood the famous reconstruction by Kennedy of the Baths
+ of Caracalla, which excited such interest and admiration when it was
+ exhibited in Berlin.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Amphorae hung from the ceiling, and a litter of curiosities strewed the
+ rich red Turkey carpet. And of them all there was not one which was not of
+ the most unimpeachable authenticity, and of the utmost rarity and value;
+ for Kennedy, though little more than thirty, had a European reputation in
+ this particular branch of research, and was, moreover, provided with that
+ long purse which either proves to be a fatal handicap to the student's
+ energies, or, if his mind is still true to its purpose, gives him an
+ enormous advantage in the race for fame. Kennedy had often been seduced by
+ whim and pleasure from his studies, but his mind was an incisive one,
+ capable of long and concentrated efforts which ended in sharp reactions of
+ sensuous languor. His handsome face, with its high, white forehead, its
+ aggressive nose, and its somewhat loose and sensuous mouth, was a fair
+ index of the compromise between strength and weakness in his nature.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Of a very different type was his companion, Julius Burger. He came of a
+ curious blend, a German father and an Italian mother, with the robust
+ qualities of the North mingling strangely with the softer graces of the
+ South. Blue Teutonic eyes lightened his sun-browned face, and above them
+ rose a square, massive forehead, with a fringe of close yellow curls lying
+ round it. His strong, firm jaw was clean-shaven, and his companion had
+ frequently remarked how much it suggested those old Roman busts which
+ peered out from the shadows in the corners of his chamber. Under its bluff
+ German strength there lay always a suggestion of Italian subtlety, but the
+ smile was so honest, and the eyes so frank, that one understood that this
+ was only an indication of his ancestry, with no actual bearing upon his
+ character.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ In age and in reputation he was on the same level as his English
+ companion, but his life and his work had both been far more arduous.
+ Twelve years before he had come as a poor student to Rome, and had lived
+ ever since upon some small endowment for research which had been awarded
+ to him by the University of Bonn.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Painfully, slowly, and doggedly, with extraordinary tenacity and
+ singlemindedness, he had climbed from rung to rung of the ladder of fame,
+ until now he was a member of the Berlin Academy, and there was every
+ reason to believe that he would shortly be promoted to the Chair of the
+ greatest of German Universities. But the singleness of purpose which had
+ brought him to the same high level as the rich and brilliant Englishman,
+ had caused him in everything outside their work to stand infinitely below
+ him. He had never found a pause in his studies in which to cultivate the
+ social graces. It was only when he spoke of his own subject that his face
+ was filled with life and soul. At other times he was silent and
+ embarrassed, too conscious of his own limitations in larger subjects, and
+ impatient of that small talk which is the conventional refuge of those who
+ have no thoughts to express.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ And yet for some years there had been an acquaintanceship which appeared
+ to be slowly ripening into a friendship between these two very different
+ rivals. The base and origin of this lay in the fact that in their own
+ studies each was the only one of the younger men who had knowledge and
+ enthusiasm enough to properly appreciate the other. Their common interests
+ and pursuits had brought them together, and each had been attracted by the
+ other's knowledge. And then gradually something had been added to this.
+ Kennedy had been amused by the frankness and simplicity of his rival,
+ while Burger in turn had been fascinated by the brilliancy and vivacity
+ which had made Kennedy such a favourite in Roman society. I say "had,"
+ because just at the moment the young Englishman was somewhat under a
+ cloud.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A love affair, the details of which had never quite come out, had
+ indicated a heartlessness and callousness upon his part which shocked many
+ of his friends. But in the bachelor circles of students and artists in
+ which he preferred to move there is no very rigid code of honour in such
+ matters, and though a head might be shaken or a pair of shoulders shrugged
+ over the flight of two and the return of one, the general sentiment was
+ probably one of curiosity and perhaps of envy rather than of reprobation.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Look here, Burger," said Kennedy, looking hard at the placid face of his
+ companion, "I do wish that you would confide in me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ As he spoke he waved his hand in the direction of a rug which lay upon the
+ floor.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ On the rug stood a long, shallow fruit-basket of the light wicker-work
+ which is used in the Campagna, and this was heaped with a litter of
+ objects, inscribed tiles, broken inscriptions, cracked mosaics, torn
+ papyri, rusty metal ornaments, which to the uninitiated might have seemed
+ to have come straight from a dustman's bin, but which a specialist would
+ have speedily recognized as unique of their kind.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The pile of odds and ends in the flat wicker-work basket supplied exactly
+ one of those missing links of social development which are of such
+ interest to the student. It was the German who had brought them in, and
+ the Englishman's eyes were hungry as he looked at them.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I won't interfere with your treasure-trove, but I should very much like
+ to hear about it," he continued, while Burger very deliberately lit a
+ cigar. "It is evidently a discovery of the first importance. These
+ inscriptions will make a sensation throughout Europe."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "For every one here there are a million there!" said the German. "There
+ are so many that a dozen savants might spend a lifetime over them, and
+ build up a reputation as solid as the Castle of St. Angelo."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Kennedy was thinking with his fine forehead wrinkled and his fingers
+ playing with his long, fair moustache.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You have given yourself away, Burger!" said he at last. "Your words can
+ only apply to one thing. You have discovered a new catacomb."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I had no doubt that you had already come to that conclusion from an
+ examination of these objects."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, they certainly appeared to indicate it, but your last remarks make
+ it certain. There is no place except a catacomb which could contain so
+ vast a store of relics as you describe."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Quite so. There is no mystery about that. I <i>have</i> discovered a new
+ catacomb."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah, that is my secret, my dear Kennedy! Suffice it that it is so situated
+ that there is not one chance in a million of anyone else coming upon it.
+ Its date is different from that of any known catacomb, and it has been
+ reserved for the burial of the highest Christians, so that the remains and
+ the relics are quite different from anything which has ever been seen
+ before. If I was not aware of your knowledge and of your energy, my
+ friend, I would not hesitate, under the pledge of secrecy, to tell you
+ everything about it. But as it is I think that I must certainly prepare my
+ own report of the matter before I expose myself to such formidable
+ competition."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Kennedy loved his subject with a love which was almost a mania&mdash;a
+ love which held him true to it, amidst all the distractions which come to
+ a wealthy and dissipated young man. He had ambition, but his ambition was
+ secondary to his mere abstract joy and interest in everything which
+ concerned the old life and history of the city. He yearned to see this new
+ underworld which his companion had discovered.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Look here, Burger," said he, earnestly, "I assure you that you can trust
+ me most implicitly in the matter. Nothing would induce me to put pen to
+ paper about anything which I see until I have your express permission. I
+ quite understand your feeling, and I think it is most natural, but you
+ have really nothing whatever to fear from me. On the other hand, if you
+ don't tell me I shall make a systematic search, and I shall most certainly
+ discover it. In that case, of course, I should make what use I liked of
+ it, since I should be under no obligation to you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Burger smiled thoughtfully over his cigar.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have noticed, friend Kennedy," said he, "that when I want information
+ over any point you are not always so ready to supply it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "When did you ever ask me anything that I did not tell you? You remember,
+ for example, my giving you the material for your paper about the temple of
+ the Vestals."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah, well, that was not a matter of much importance. If I were to question
+ you upon some intimate thing, would you give me an answer, I wonder! This
+ new catacomb is a very intimate thing to me, and I should certainly expect
+ some sign of confidence in return."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What you are driving at I cannot imagine," said the Englishman, "but if
+ you mean that you will answer my question about the catacomb if I answer
+ any question which you may put to me, I can assure you that I will
+ certainly do so."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, then," said Burger, leaning luxuriously back in his settee, and
+ puffing a blue tree of cigar-smoke into the air, "tell me all about your
+ relations with Miss Mary Saunderson."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Kennedy sprang up in his chair and glared angrily at his impassive
+ companion.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What the devil do you mean?" he cried. "What sort of a question is this?
+ You may mean it as a joke, but you never made a worse one."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, I don't mean it as a joke," said Burger, simply. "I am really rather
+ interested in the details of the matter. I don't know much about the world
+ and women and social life and that sort of thing, and such an incident has
+ the fascination of the unknown for me. I know you, and I knew her by sight&mdash;I
+ had even spoken to her once or twice. I should very much like to hear from
+ your own lips exactly what it was which occurred between you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I won't tell you a word."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That's all right. It was only my whim to see if you would give up a
+ secret as easily as you expected me to give up my secret of the new
+ catacomb. You wouldn't, and I didn't expect you to. But why should you
+ expect otherwise of me? There's St. John's clock striking ten. It is quite
+ time that I was going home."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, wait a bit, Burger," said Kennedy; "this is really a ridiculous
+ caprice of yours to wish to know about an old love affair which has burned
+ out months ago. You know we look upon a man who kisses and tells as the
+ greatest coward and villain possible."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Certainly," said the German, gathering up his basket of curiosities,
+ "when he tells anything about a girl which is previously unknown, he must
+ be so. But in this case, as you must be aware, it was a public matter
+ which was the common talk of Rome, so that you are not really doing Miss
+ Mary Saunderson any injury by discussing her case with me. But still, I
+ respect your scruples; and so good night!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Wait a bit, Burger," said Kennedy, laying his hand upon the other's arm;
+ "I am very keen upon this catacomb business, and I can't let it drop quite
+ so easily. Would you mind asking me something else in return&mdash;something
+ not quite so eccentric this time?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, no; you have refused, and there is an end of it," said Burger, with
+ his basket on his arm. "No doubt you are quite right not to answer, and no
+ doubt I am quite right also&mdash;and so again, my dear Kennedy, good
+ night!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Englishman watched Burger cross the room, and he had his hand on the
+ handle of the door before his host sprang up with the air of a man who is
+ making the best of that which cannot be helped. "Hold on, old fellow,"
+ said he. "I think you are behaving in a most ridiculous fashion, but
+ still, if this is your condition, I suppose that I must submit to it. I
+ hate saying anything about a girl, but, as you say, it is all over Rome,
+ and I don't suppose I can tell you anything which you do not know already.
+ What was it you wanted to know?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The German came back to the stove, and, laying down his basket, he sank
+ into his chair once more. "May I have another cigar?" said he. "Thank you
+ very much! I never smoke when I work, but I enjoy a chat much more when I
+ am under the influence of tobacco. Now, as regards this young lady, with
+ whom you had this little adventure. What in the world has become of her?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "She is at home with her own people."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, really&mdash;in England?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What part of England&mdash;London?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, Twickenham."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You must excuse my curiosity, my dear Kennedy, and you must put it down
+ to my ignorance of the world. No doubt it is quite a simple thing to
+ persuade a young lady to go off with you for three weeks or so, and then
+ to hand her over to her own family at&mdash;what did you call the place?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Twickenham."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Quite so&mdash;at Twickenham. But it is something so entirely outside my
+ own experience that I cannot even imagine how you set about it. For
+ example, if you had loved this girl your love could hardly disappear in
+ three weeks, so I presume that you could not have loved her at all. But if
+ you did not love her why should you make this great scandal which has
+ damaged you and ruined her?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Kennedy looked moodily into the red eye of the stove. "That's a logical
+ way of looking at it, certainly," said he. "Love is a big word, and it
+ represents a good many different shades of feeling. I liked her, and&mdash;
+ well, you say you've seen her&mdash;you know how charming she can look.
+ But still I am willing to admit, looking back, that I could never have
+ really loved her."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then, my dear Kennedy, why did you do it?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The adventure of the thing had a great deal to do with it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What! You are so fond of adventures!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Where would the variety of life be without them? It was for an adventure
+ that I first began to pay my attentions to her. I've chased a good deal of
+ game in my time, but there's no chase like that of a pretty woman. There
+ was the piquant difficulty of it also, for, as she was the companion of
+ Lady Emily Rood it was almost impossible to see her alone. On the top of
+ all the other obstacles which attracted me, I learned from her own lips
+ very early in the proceedings that she was engaged."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Mein Gott! To whom?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "She mentioned no names."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I do not think that anyone knows that. So that made the adventure more
+ alluring, did it?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, it did certainly give a spice to it. Don't you think so?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I tell you that I am very ignorant about these things."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My dear fellow, you can remember that the apple you stole from your
+ neighbour's tree was always sweeter than that which fell from your own.
+ And then I found that she cared for me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What&mdash;at once?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, no, it took about three months of sapping and mining. But at last I
+ won her over. She understood that my judicial separation from my wife made
+ it impossible for me to do the right thing by her&mdash;but she came all
+ the same, and we had a delightful time, as long as it lasted."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But how about the other man?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Kennedy shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose it is the survival of the
+ fittest," said he. "If he had been the better man she would not have
+ deserted him. Let's drop the subject, for I have had enough of it!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Only one other thing. How did you get rid of her in three weeks?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, we had both cooled down a bit, you understand. She absolutely
+ refused, under any circumstances, to come back to face the people she had
+ known in Rome. Now, of course, Rome is necessary to me, and I was already
+ pining to be back at my work&mdash;so there was one obvious cause of
+ separation. Then, again, her old father turned up at the hotel in London,
+ and there was a scene, and the whole thing became so unpleasant that
+ really&mdash;though I missed her dreadfully at first&mdash;I was very glad
+ to slip out of it. Now, I rely upon you not to repeat anything of what I
+ have said."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My dear Kennedy, I should not dream of repeating it. But all that you say
+ interests me very much, for it gives me an insight into your way of
+ looking at things, which is entirely different from mine, for I have seen
+ so little of life. And now you want to know about my new catacomb. There's
+ no use my trying to describe it, for you would never find it by that.
+ There is only one thing, and that is for me to take you there."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "That would be splendid."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "When would you like to come?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The sooner the better. I am all impatience to see it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, it is a beautiful night&mdash;though a trifle cold. Suppose we
+ start in an hour. We must be very careful to keep the matter to ourselves.
+ If anyone saw us hunting in couples they would suspect that there was
+ something going on."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We can't be too cautious," said Kennedy. "Is it far?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Some miles."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Not too far to walk?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, no, we could walk there easily."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We had better do so, then. A cabman's suspicions would be aroused if he
+ dropped us both at some lonely spot in the dead of the night."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Quite so. I think it would be best for us to meet at the Gate of the
+ Appian Way at midnight. I must go back to my lodgings for the matches and
+ candles and things."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "All right, Burger! I think it is very kind of you to let me into this
+ secret, and I promise you that I will write nothing about it until you
+ have published your report. Good-bye for the present! You will find me at
+ the Gate at twelve."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The cold, clear air was filled with the musical chimes from that city of
+ clocks as Burger, wrapped in an Italian overcoat, with a lantern hanging
+ from his hand, walked up to the rendezvous. Kennedy stepped out of the
+ shadow to meet him.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You are ardent in work as well as in love!" said the German, laughing.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes; I have been waiting here for nearly half an hour."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I hope you left no clue as to where we were going."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Not such a fool! By Jove, I am chilled to the bone! Come on, Burger, let
+ us warm ourselves by a spurt of hard walking."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Their footsteps sounded loud and crisp upon the rough stone paving of the
+ disappointing road which is all that is left of the most famous highway of
+ the world. A peasant or two going home from the wine-shop, and a few carts
+ of country produce coming up to Rome, were the only things which they met.
+ They swung along, with the huge tombs looming up through the darkness upon
+ each side of them, until they had come as far as the Catacombs of St.
+ Calixtus, and saw against a rising moon the great circular bastion of
+ Cecilia Metella in front of them. Then Burger stopped with his hand to his
+ side. "Your legs are longer than mine, and you are more accustomed to
+ walking," said he, laughing. "I think that the place where we turn off is
+ somewhere here. Yes, this is it, round the corner of the trattoria. Now,
+ it is a very narrow path, so perhaps I had better go in front, and you can
+ follow." He had lit his lantern, and by its light they were enabled to
+ follow a narrow and devious track which wound across the marshes of the
+ Campagna. The great Aqueduct of old Rome lay like a monstrous caterpillar
+ across the moonlit landscape, and their road led them under one of its
+ huge arches, and past the circle of crumbling bricks which marks the old
+ arena. At last Burger stopped at a solitary wooden cowhouse, and he drew a
+ key from his pocket.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Surely your catacomb is not inside a house!" cried Kennedy.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The entrance to it is. That is just the safeguard which we have against
+ anyone else discovering it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Does the proprietor know of it?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Not he. He had found one or two objects which made me almost certain that
+ his house was built on the entrance to such a place. So I rented it from
+ him, and did my excavations for myself. Come in, and shut the door behind
+ you."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It was a long, empty building, with the mangers of the cows along one
+ wall. Burger put his lantern down on the ground, and shaded its light in
+ all directions save one by draping his overcoat round it. "It might excite
+ remark if anyone saw a light in this lonely place," said he. "Just help me
+ to move this boarding." The flooring was loose in the corner, and plank by
+ plank the two savants raised it and leaned it against the wall. Below
+ there was a square aperture and a stair of old stone steps which led away
+ down into the bowels of the earth.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Be careful!" cried Burger, as Kennedy, in his impatience, hurried down
+ them. "It is a perfect rabbits'-warren below, and if you were once to lose
+ your way there, the chances would be a hundred to one against your ever
+ coming out again. Wait until I bring the light."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How do you find your own way if it is so complicated?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I had some very narrow escapes at first, but I have gradually learned to
+ go about. There is a certain system to it, but it is one which a lost man,
+ if he were in the dark, could not possibly find out. Even now I always
+ spin out a ball of string behind me when I am going far into the catacomb.
+ You can see for yourself that it is difficult, but every one of these
+ passages divides and subdivides a dozen times before you go a hundred
+ yards." They had descended some twenty feet from the level of the byre,
+ and they were standing now in a square chamber cut out of the soft tufa.
+ The lantern cast a flickering light, bright below and dim above, over the
+ cracked brown walls. In every direction were the black openings of
+ passages which radiated from this common centre.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I want you to follow me closely, my friend," said Burger. "Do not loiter
+ to look at anything upon the way, for the place to which I will take you
+ contains all that you can see, and more. It will save time for us to go
+ there direct." He led the way down one of the corridors, and the
+ Englishman followed closely at his heels. Every now and then the passage
+ bifurcated, but Burger was evidently following some secret marks of his
+ own, for he neither stopped nor hesitated. Everywhere along the walls,
+ packed like the berths upon an emigrant ship, lay the Christians of old
+ Rome. The yellow light flickered over the shrivelled features of the
+ mummies, and gleamed upon rounded skulls and long, white arm-bones crossed
+ over fleshless chests. And everywhere as he passed Kennedy looked with
+ wistful eyes upon inscriptions, funeral vessels, pictures, vestments,
+ utensils, all lying as pious hands had placed them so many centuries ago.
+ It was apparent to him, even in those hurried, passing glances, that this
+ was the earliest and finest of the catacombs, containing such a storehouse
+ of Roman remains as had never before come at one time under the
+ observation of the student. "What would happen if the light went out?" he
+ asked, as they hurried on.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have a spare candle and a box of matches in my pocket. By the way,
+ Kennedy, have you any matches?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No; you had better give me some."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, that is all right. There is no chance of our separating."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How far are we going? It seems to me that we have walked at least a
+ quarter of a mile."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "More than that, I think. There is really no limit to the tombs&mdash;at
+ least, I have never been able to find any. This is a very difficult place,
+ so I think that I will use our ball of string." He fastened one end of it
+ to a projecting stone and he carried the coil in the breast of his coat,
+ paying it out as he advanced. Kennedy saw that it was no unnecessary
+ precaution, for the passages had become more complexed and tortuous than
+ ever, with a perfect network of intersecting corridors. But these all
+ ended in one large circular hall with a square pedestal of tufa topped
+ with a slab of marble at one end of it. "By Jove!" cried Kennedy in an
+ ecstasy, as Burger swung his lantern over the marble. "It is a Christian
+ altar&mdash;probably the first one in existence. Here is the little
+ consecration cross cut upon the corner of it. No doubt this circular space
+ was used as a church."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Precisely," said Burger. "If I had more time I should like to show you
+ all the bodies which are buried in these niches upon the walls, for they
+ are the early popes and bishops of the Church, with their mitres, their
+ croziers, and full canonicals. Go over to that one and look at it!"
+ Kennedy went across, and stared at the ghastly head which lay loosely on
+ the shredded and mouldering mitre.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "This is most interesting," said he, and his voice seemed to boom against
+ the concave vault. "As far as my experience goes, it is unique. Bring the
+ lantern over, Burger, for I want to see them all." But the German had
+ strolled away, and was standing in the middle of a yellow circle of light
+ at the other side of the hall.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Do you know how many wrong turnings there are between this and the
+ stairs?" he asked. "There are over two thousand. No doubt it was one of
+ the means of protection which the Christians adopted. The odds are two
+ thousand to one against a man getting out, even if he had a light; but if
+ he were in the dark it would, of course, be far more difficult."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So I should think."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And the darkness is something dreadful. I tried it once for an
+ experiment. Let us try it again!" He stooped to the lantern, and in an
+ instant it was as if an invisible hand was squeezed tightly over each of
+ Kennedy's eyes. Never had he known what such darkness was. It seemed to
+ press upon him and to smother him. It was a solid obstacle against which
+ the body shrank from advancing. He put his hands out to push it back from
+ him. "That will do, Burger," said he, "let's have the light again."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But his companion began to laugh, and in that circular room the sound
+ seemed to come from every side at once. "You seem uneasy, friend Kennedy,"
+ said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Go on, man, light the candle!" said Kennedy, impatiently.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It's very strange, Kennedy, but I could not in the least tell by the
+ sound in which direction you stand. Could you tell where I am?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No; you seem to be on every side of me."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "If it were not for this string which I hold in my hand I should not have
+ a notion which way to go."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I dare say not. Strike a light, man, and have an end of this nonsense."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, Kennedy, there are two things which I understand that you are very
+ fond of. The one is adventure, and the other is an obstacle to surmount.
+ The adventure must be the finding of your way out of this catacomb. The
+ obstacle will be the darkness and the two thousand wrong turns which make
+ the way a little difficult to find. But you need not hurry, for you have
+ plenty of time, and when you halt for a rest now and then, I should like
+ you just to think of Miss Mary Saunderson, and whether you treated her
+ quite fairly."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You devil, what do you mean?" roared Kennedy. He was running about in
+ little circles and clasping at the solid blackness with both hands.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good-bye," said the mocking voice, and it was already at some distance.
+ "I really do not think, Kennedy, even by your own showing that you did the
+ right thing by that girl. There was only one little thing which you
+ appeared not to know, and I can supply it. Miss Saunderson was engaged to
+ a poor, ungainly devil of a student, and his name was Julius Burger."
+ There was a rustle somewhere&mdash;the vague sound of a foot striking a
+ stone&mdash;and then there fell silence upon that old Christian church&mdash;a
+ stagnant heavy silence which closed round Kennedy and shut him in like
+ water round a drowning man.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Some two months afterwards the following paragraph made the round of the
+ European Press:&mdash;
+ </p>
+<p class="bq">
+ One of the most interesting discoveries of recent years is
+ that of the new catacomb in Rome, which lies some distance to the
+ east of the well-known vaults of St. Calixtus. The finding of this
+ important burial-place, which is exceedingly rich in most
+ interesting early Christian remains, is due to the energy and
+ sagacity of Dr. Julius Burger, the young German specialist, who is
+ rapidly taking the first place as an authority upon ancient Rome.
+ Although the first to publish his discovery, it appears that a less
+ fortunate adventurer had anticipated Dr. Burger. Some months ago
+ Mr. Kennedy, the well-known English student, disappeared suddenly
+ from his rooms in the "Corso", and it was conjectured that his
+ association with a recent scandal had driven him to leave Rome. It
+ appears now that he had in reality fallen a victim to that fervid
+ love of archaeology which had raised him to a distinguished place
+ among living scholars. His body was discovered in the heart of the
+ new catacomb, and it was evident from the condition of his feet and
+ boots that he had tramped for days through the tortuous corridors
+ which make these subterranean tombs so dangerous to explorers. The
+ deceased gentleman had, with inexplicable rashness, made his way
+ into this labyrinth without, as far as can be discovered, taking
+ with him either candles or matches, so that his sad fate was the
+ natural result of his own temerity. What makes the matter more
+ painful is that Dr. Julius Burger was an intimate friend of the
+ deceased. His joy at the extraordinary find which he has been so
+ fortunate as to make has been greatly marred by the terrible fate
+ of his comrade and fellow-worker.
+</p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ THE DEBUT OF BIMBASHI JOYCE
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ It was in the days when the tide of Mahdism, which had swept in such a
+ flood from the great Lakes and Darfur to the confines of Egypt, had at
+ last come to its full, and even begun, as some hoped, to show signs of a
+ turn. At its outset it had been terrible. It had engulfed Hicks's army,
+ swept over Gordon and Khartoum, rolled behind the British forces as they
+ retired down the river, and finally cast up a spray of raiding parties as
+ far north as Assouan. Then it found other channels to east and west, to
+ Central Africa and to Abyssinia, and retired a little on the side of
+ Egypt. For ten years there ensued a lull, during which the frontier
+ garrisons looked out upon those distant blue hills of Dongola. Behind the
+ violet mists which draped them lay a land of blood and horror. From time
+ to time some adventurer went south towards those haze-girt mountains,
+ tempted by stories of gum and ivory, but none ever returned. Once a
+ mutilated Egyptian and once a Greek woman, mad with thirst and fear, made
+ their way to the lines. They were the only exports of that country of
+ darkness. Sometimes the sunset would turn those distant mists into a bank
+ of crimson, and the dark mountains would rise from that sinister reek like
+ islands in a sea of blood. It seemed a grim symbol in the southern heaven
+ when seen from the fort-capped hills by Wady Halfa. Ten years of lust in
+ Khartoum, ten years of silent work in Cairo, and then all was ready, and
+ it was time for civilisation to take a trip south once more, travelling as
+ her wont is in an armoured train. Everything was ready, down to the last
+ pack-saddle of the last camel, and yet no one suspected it, for an
+ unconstitutional Government has its advantage. A great administrator had
+ argued, and managed, and cajoled; a great soldier had organised and
+ planned, and made piastres do the work of pounds. And then one night these
+ two master spirits met and clasped hands, and the soldier vanished away
+ upon some business of his own. And just at that very time, Bimbashi Hilary
+ Joyce, seconded from the Royal Mallow Fusiliers, and temporarily attached
+ to the Ninth Soudanese, made his first appearance in Cairo.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Napoleon had said, and Hilary Joyce had noted, that great reputations are
+ only to be made in the East. Here he was in the East with four tin cases
+ of baggage, a Wilkinson sword, a Bond's slug-throwing pistol, and a copy
+ of "Green's Introduction to the Study of Arabic." With such a start, and
+ the blood of youth running hot in his veins, everything seemed easy. He
+ was a little frightened of the general; he had heard stories of his
+ sternness to young officers, but with tact and suavity he hoped for the
+ best. So, leaving his effects at "Shepherd's Hotel," he reported himself
+ at headquarters. It was not the general, but the head of the Intelligence
+ Department who received him, the chief being still absent upon that
+ business which had called him. Hilary Joyce found himself in the presence
+ of a short, thick-set officer, with a gentle voice and a placid expression
+ which covered a remarkably acute and energetic spirit. With that quiet
+ smile and guileless manner he had undercut and outwitted the most cunning
+ of Orientals. He stood, a cigarette between his fingers, looking at the
+ newcomer. "I heard that you had come. Sorry the chief isn't here to see
+ you. Gone up to the frontier, you know."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "My regiment is at Wady Halfa. I suppose, sir, that I should report myself
+ there at once?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No; I was to give you your orders." He led the way to a map upon the
+ wall, and pointed with the end of his cigarette. "You see this place. It's
+ the Oasis of Kurkur&mdash;a little quiet, I am afraid, but excellent air.
+ You are to get out there as quick as possible. You'll find a company of
+ the Ninth, and half a squadron of cavalry. You will be in command."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Hilary Joyce looked at the name, printed at the intersection of two black
+ lines without another dot upon the map for several inches around it. "A
+ village, sir?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, a well. Not very good water, I'm afraid, but you soon get accustomed
+ to natron. It's an important post, as being at the junction of two caravan
+ routes. All routes are closed now, of course, but still you never know who
+ <i>might</i> come along them."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We are there, I presume, to prevent raiding?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, between you and me, there's really nothing to raid. You are there
+ to intercept messengers. They must call at the wells. Of course you have
+ only just come out, but you probably understand already enough about the
+ conditions of this country to know that there is a great deal of
+ disaffection about, and that the Khalifa is likely to try and keep in
+ touch with his adherents. Then, again, Senoussi lives up that way"&mdash;he
+ waved his cigarette to the westward&mdash;"the Khalifa might send a
+ message to him along that route. Anyhow, your duty is to arrest everyone
+ coming along, and get some account of him before you let him go. You don't
+ talk Arabic, I suppose?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am learning, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, well, you'll have time enough for study there. And you'll have a
+ native officer, Ali something or other, who speaks English, and can
+ interpret for you. Well, good-bye&mdash;I'll tell the chief that you
+ reported yourself. Get on to your post now as quickly as you can."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Railway to Baliani, the post-boat to Assouan, and then two days on a camel
+ in the Libyan desert, with an Ababdeh guide, and three baggage-camels to
+ tie one down to their own exasperating pace. However, even two and a half
+ miles an hour mount up in time, and at last, on the third evening, from
+ the blackened slag-heap of a hill which is called the Jebel Kurkur, Hilary
+ Joyce looked down upon a distant clump of palms, and thought that this
+ cool patch of green in the midst of the merciless blacks and yellows was
+ the fairest colour effect that he had ever seen. An hour later he had
+ ridden into the little camp, the guard had turned out to salute him, his
+ native subordinate had greeted him in excellent English, and he had fairly
+ entered into his own. It was not an exhilarating place for a lengthy
+ residence. There was one large, bowl-shaped, grassy depression sloping
+ down to the three pits of brown and brackish water. There was the grove of
+ palm trees also, beautiful to look upon, but exasperating in view of the
+ fact that Nature has provided her least shady trees on the very spot where
+ shade is needed most. A single wide-spread acacia did something to restore
+ the balance. Here Hilary Joyce slumbered in the heat, and in the cool he
+ inspected his square-shouldered, spindle-shanked Soudanese, with their
+ cheery black faces and their funny little pork-pie forage caps. Joyce was
+ a martinet at drill, and the blacks loved being drilled, so the Bimbashi
+ was soon popular among them. But one day was exactly like another. The
+ weather, the view, the employment, the food&mdash;everything was the same.
+ At the end of three weeks he felt that he had been there for interminable
+ years. And then at last there came something to break the monotony.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ One evening, as the sun was sinking, Hilary Joyce rode slowly down the old
+ caravan road. It had a fascination for him, this narrow track, winding
+ among the boulders and curving up the nullahs, for he remembered how in
+ the map it had gone on and on, stretching away into the unknown heart of
+ Africa. The countless pads of innumerable camels through many centuries
+ had beaten it smooth, so that now, unused and deserted, it still wound
+ away, the strangest of roads, a foot broad, and perhaps two thousand miles
+ in length. Joyce wondered as he rode how long it was since any traveller
+ had journeyed up it from the south, and then he raised his eyes, and there
+ was a man coming along the path. For an instant Joyce thought that it
+ might be one of his own men, but a second glance assured him that this
+ could not be so. The stranger was dressed in the flowing robes of an Arab,
+ and not in the close-fitting khaki of a soldier. He was very tall, and a
+ high turban made him seem gigantic. He strode swiftly along, with head
+ erect, and the bearing of a man who knows no fear.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Who could he be, this formidable giant coming out of the unknown? The
+ precursor possibly of a horde of savage spearmen. And where could he have
+ walked from? The nearest well was a long hundred miles down the track. At
+ any rate the frontier post of Kurkur could not afford to receive casual
+ visitors. Hilary Joyce whisked round his horse, galloped into camp, and
+ gave the alarm. Then, with twenty horsemen at his back, he rode out again
+ to reconnoitre. The man was still coming on in spite of these hostile
+ preparations. For an instant he hesitated when first he saw the cavalry,
+ but escape was out of the question, and he advanced with the air of one
+ who makes the best of a bad job. He made no resistance, and said nothing
+ when the hands of two troopers clutched at his shoulders, but walked
+ quietly between their horses into camp. Shortly afterwards the patrol came
+ in again. There were no signs of any dervishes. The man was alone. A
+ splendid trotting camel had been found lying dead a little way down the
+ track. The mystery of the stranger's arrival was explained. But why, and
+ whence, and whither?&mdash;these were questions for which a zealous
+ officer must find an answer.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Hilary Joyce was disappointed that there were no dervishes. It would have
+ been a great start for him in the Egyptian army had he fought a little
+ action on his own account. But even as it was, he had a rare chance of
+ impressing the authorities. He would love to show his capacity to the head
+ of the Intelligence, and even more to that grim Chief who never forgot
+ what was smart, or forgave what was slack. The prisoner's dress and
+ bearing showed that he was of importance. Mean men do not ride pure-bred
+ trotting camels. Joyce sponged his head with cold water, drank a cup of
+ strong coffee, put on an imposing official tarboosh instead of his
+ sun-helmet, and formed himself into a court of inquiry and judgment under
+ the acacia tree. He would have liked his people to have seen him now, with
+ his two black orderlies in waiting, and his Egyptian native officer at his
+ side. He sat behind a camp-table, and the prisoner, strongly guarded, was
+ led up to him. The man was a handsome fellow, with bold grey eyes and a
+ long black beard.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Why!" cried Joyce, "the rascal is making faces at me." A curious
+ contraction had passed over the man's features, but so swiftly that it
+ might have been a nervous twitch. He was now a model of Oriental gravity.
+ "Ask him who he is, and what he wants?" The native officer did so, but the
+ stranger made no reply, save that the same sharp spasm passed once more
+ over his face. "Well, I'm blessed!" cried Hilary Joyce. "Of all the
+ impudent scoundrels! He keeps on winking at me. Who are you, you rascal?
+ Give an account of yourself! D'ye hear?" But the tall Arab was as
+ impervious to English as to Arabic. The Egyptian tried again and again.
+ The prisoner looked at Joyce with his inscrutable eyes, and occasionally
+ twitched his face at him, but never opened his mouth. The Bimbashi
+ scratched his head in bewilderment.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Look here, Mahomet Ali, we've got to get some sense out of this fellow.
+ You say there are no papers on him?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir; we found no papers."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No clue of any kind?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He has come far, sir. A trotting camel does not die easily. He has come
+ from Dongola, at least."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, we must get him to talk."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It is possible that he is deaf and dumb."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Not he. I never saw a man look more all there in my life."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You might send him across to Assouan."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "And give someone else the credit? No, thank you. This is my bird. But how
+ are we going to get him to find his tongue?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Egyptian's dark eyes skirted the encampment and rested on the cook's
+ fire. "Perhaps," said he, "if the Bimbashi thought fit&mdash;" He looked
+ at the prisoner and then at the burning wood.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, no; it wouldn't do. No, by Jove, that's going too far."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A very little might do it."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, no. It's all very well here, but it would sound just awful if ever it
+ got as far as Fleet Street. But, I say," he whispered, "we might frighten
+ him a bit. There's no harm in that."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Tell them to undo the man's galabeeah. Order them to put a horseshoe in
+ the fire and make it red-hot." The prisoner watched the proceedings with
+ an air which had more of amusement than of uneasiness. He never winced as
+ the black sergeant approached with the glowing shoe held upon two
+ bayonets.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Will you speak now?" asked the Bimbashi, savagely. The prisoner smiled
+ gently and stroked his beard.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Oh, chuck the infernal thing away!" cried Joyce, jumping up in a passion.
+ "There's no use trying to bluff the fellow. He knows we won't do it. But I
+ <i>can</i> and I <i>will</i> flog him, and you can tell him from me that
+ if he hasn't found his tongue by to-morrow morning I'll take the skin off
+ his back as sure as my name's Joyce. Have you said all that?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, you can sleep upon it, you beauty, and a good night's rest may it
+ give you!" He adjourned the Court, and the prisoner, as imperturbable as
+ ever, was led away by the guard to his supper of rice and water. Hilary
+ Joyce was a kind-hearted man, and his own sleep was considerably disturbed
+ by the prospect of the punishment which he must inflict next day. He had
+ hopes that the mere sight of the koorbash and the thongs might prevail
+ over his prisoner's obstinacy. And then, again, he thought how shocking it
+ would be if the man proved to be really dumb after all. The possibility
+ shook him so that he had almost determined by daybreak that he would send
+ the stranger on unhurt to Assouan. And yet what a tame conclusion it would
+ be to the incident! He lay upon his angareeb still debating it when the
+ question suddenly and effectively settled itself. Ali Mahomet rushed into
+ his tent.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Sir," he cried, "the prisoner is gone!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Gone!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir, and your own best riding camel as well. There is a slit cut in
+ the tent, and he got away unseen in the early morning."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The Bimbashi acted with all energy. Cavalry rode along every track; scouts
+ examined the soft sand of the wadys for signs of the fugitive, but no
+ trace was discovered. The man had utterly disappeared. With a heavy heart,
+ Hilary Joyce wrote an official report of the matter and forwarded it to
+ Assouan. Five days later there came a curt order from the chief that he
+ should report himself there. He feared the worst from the stern soldier,
+ who spared others as little as he spared himself. And his worst
+ forebodings were realised. Travel-stained and weary, he reported himself
+ one night at the general's quarters. Behind a table piled with papers and
+ strewn with maps the famous soldier and his Chief of Intelligence were
+ deep in plans and figures. Their greeting was a cold one.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I understand, Captain Joyce," said the general, "that you have allowed a
+ very important prisoner to slip through your fingers."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I am sorry, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No doubt. But that will not mend matters. Did you ascertain anything
+ about him before you lost him?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "No, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "How was that?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I could get nothing out of him, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Did you try?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir; I did what I could."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What did you do?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, sir, I threatened to use physical force."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What did he say?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He said nothing."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "What was he like?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A tall man, sir. Rather a desperate character, I should think."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Any way by which we could identify him?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "A long black beard, sir. Grey eyes. And a nervous way of twitching his
+ face."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, Captain Joyce," said the general, in his stern, inflexible voice,
+ "I cannot congratulate you upon your first exploit in the Egyptian army.
+ You are aware that every English officer in this force is a picked man. I
+ have the whole British army from which to draw. It is necessary,
+ therefore, that I should insist upon the very highest efficiency. It would
+ be unfair upon the others to pass over any obvious want of zeal or
+ intelligence. You are seconded from the Royal Mallows, I understand?"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, sir."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I have no doubt that your colonel will be glad to see you fulfilling your
+ regimental duties again." Hilary Joyce's heart was too heavy for words. He
+ was silent. "I will let you know my final decision to-morrow morning."
+ Joyce saluted and turned upon his heel."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You can sleep upon that, you beauty, and a good night's rest may it give
+ you!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Joyce turned in bewilderment. Where had those words been used before? Who
+ was it who had used them? The general was standing erect. Both he and the
+ Chief of the Intelligence were laughing. Joyce stared at the tall figure,
+ the erect bearing, the inscrutable grey eyes.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Good Lord!" he gasped.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, well, Captain Joyce, we are quits!" said the general, holding out
+ his hand. "You gave me a bad ten minutes with that infernal red-hot
+ horseshoe of yours. I've done as much for you. I don't think we can spare
+ you for the Royal Mallows just yet awhile."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But, sir; but&mdash;!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The fewer questions the better, perhaps. But of course it must seem
+ rather amazing. I had a little private business with the Kabbabish. It
+ must be done in person. I did it, and came to your post in my return. I
+ kept on winking at you as a sign that I wanted a word with you alone."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Yes, yes. I begin to understand."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I couldn't give it away before all those blacks, or where should I have
+ been the next time I used my false beard and Arab dress? You put me in a
+ very awkward position. But at last I had a word alone with your Egyptian
+ officer, who managed my escape all right."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He! Mahomet Ali!"
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I ordered him to say nothing. I had a score to settle with you. But we
+ dine at eight, Captain Joyce. We live plainly here, but I think I can do
+ you a little better than you did me at Kurkur."
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ <br><br>
+ </p>
+ <hr>
+ <p>
+ <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> </a>
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 4em;">
+ <br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+ <h2>
+ A FOREIGN OFFICE ROMANCE
+ </h2>
+ <p>
+ There are many folk who knew Alphonse Lacour in his old age. From about
+ the time of the Revolution of '48 until he died in the second year of the
+ Crimean War he was always to be found in the same corner of the Cafe de
+ Provence, at the end of the Rue St. Honore, coming down about nine in the
+ evening, and going when he could find no one to talk with. It took some
+ self-restraint to listen to the old diplomatist, for his stories were
+ beyond all belief, and yet he was quick at detecting the shadow of a smile
+ or the slightest little raising of the eyebrows. Then his huge, rounded
+ back would straighten itself, his bulldog chin would project, and his r's
+ would burr like a kettledrum. When he got as far as, "Ah, monsieur
+ r-r-r-rit!" or "Vous ne me cr-r-r-royez pas donc!" it was quite time to
+ remember that you had a ticket for the opera.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ There was his story of Talleyrand and the five oyster-shells, and there
+ was his utterly absurd account of Napoleon's second visit to Ajaccio. Then
+ there was that most circumstantial romance (which he never ventured upon
+ until his second bottle had been uncorked) of the Emperor's escape from
+ St. Helena&mdash;how he lived for a whole year in Philadelphia, while
+ Count Herbert de Bertrand, who was his living image, personated him at
+ Longwood. But of all his stories there was none which was more notorious
+ than that of the Koran and the Foreign Office messenger. And yet when
+ Monsieur Otto's memoirs were written it was found that there really was
+ some foundation for old Lacour's incredible statement.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You must know, monsieur," he would say, "that I left Egypt after Kleber's
+ assassination. I would gladly have stayed on, for I was engaged in a
+ translation of the Koran, and between ourselves I had thoughts at the time
+ of embracing Mahometanism, for I was deeply struck by the wisdom of their
+ views about marriage. They had made an incredible mistake, however, upon
+ the subject of wine, and this was what the Mufti who attempted to convert
+ me could never get over. Then when old Kleber died and Menou came to the
+ top, I felt that it was time for me to go. It is not for me to speak of my
+ own capacities, monsieur, but you will readily understand that the man
+ does not care to be ridden by the mule. I carried my Koran and my papers
+ to London, where Monsieur Otto had been sent by the First Consul to
+ arrange a treaty of peace; for both nations were very weary of the war,
+ which had already lasted ten years. Here I was most useful to Monsieur
+ Otto on account of my knowledge of the English tongue, and also, if I may
+ say so, on account of my natural capacity. They were happy days during
+ which I lived in the square of Bloomsbury. The climate of monsieur's
+ country is, it must be confessed, detestable. But then what would you
+ have? Flowers grow best in the rain. One has but to point to monsieur's
+ fellow country-women to prove it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, Monsieur Otto, our Ambassador, was kept terribly busy over that
+ treaty, and all of his staff were worked to death. We had not Pitt to deal
+ with, which was, perhaps, as well for us. He was a terrible man that Pitt,
+ and wherever half a dozen enemies of France were plotting together, there
+ was his sharp-pointed nose right in the middle of them. The nation,
+ however, had been thoughtful enough to put him out of office, and we had
+ to do with Monsieur Addington. But Milord Hawkesbury was the Foreign
+ Minister, and it was with him that we were obliged to do our bargaining.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "You can understand that it was no child's play. After ten years of war
+ each nation had got hold of a great deal which had belonged to the other,
+ or to the other's allies. What was to be given back, and what was to be
+ kept? Is this island worth that peninsula? If we do this at Venice, will
+ you do that at Sierra Leone? If we give up Egypt to the Sultan, will you
+ restore the Cape of Good Hope, which you have taken from our allies the
+ Dutch? So we wrangled and wrestled, and I have seen Monsieur Otto come
+ back to the Embassy so exhausted that his secretary and I had to help him
+ from his carriage to his sofa. But at last things adjusted themselves, and
+ the night came round when the treaty was to be finally signed. Now, you
+ must know that the one great card which we held, and which we played,
+ played, played at every point of the game, was that we had Egypt. The
+ English were very nervous about our being there. It gave us a foot at each
+ end of the Mediterranean, you see. And they were not sure that that
+ wonderful little Napoleon of ours might not make it the base of an advance
+ against India. So whenever Lord Hawkesbury proposed to retain anything, we
+ had only to reply, 'In <i>that</i> case, of course, we cannot consent to
+ evacuate Egypt,' and in this way we quickly brought him to reason. It was
+ by the help of Egypt that we gained terms which were remarkably
+ favourable, and especially that we caused the English to consent to give
+ up the Cape of Good Hope. We did not wish your people, monsieur, to have
+ any foothold in South Africa, for history has taught us that the British
+ foothold of one half-century is the British Empire of the next. It is not
+ your army or your navy against which we have to guard, but it is your
+ terrible younger son and your man in search of a career. When we French
+ have a possession across the seas, we like to sit in Paris and to
+ felicitate ourselves upon it. With you it is different. You take your
+ wives and your children, and you run away to see what kind of place this
+ may be, and after that we might as well try to take that old Square of
+ Bloomsbury away from you.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, it was upon the first of October that the treaty was finally to be
+ signed. In the morning I was congratulating Monsieur Otto upon the happy
+ conclusion of his labours. He was a little pale shrimp of a man, very
+ quick and nervous, and he was so delighted now at his own success that he
+ could not sit still, but ran about the room chattering and laughing, while
+ I sat on a cushion in the corner, as I had learned to do in the East.
+ Suddenly, in came a messenger with a letter which had been forwarded from
+ Paris. Monsieur Otto cast his eye upon it, and then, without a word, his
+ knees gave way, and he fell senseless upon the floor. I ran to him, as did
+ the courier, and between us we carried him to the sofa. He might have been
+ dead from his appearance, but I could still feel his heart thrilling
+ beneath my palm. 'What is this, then?' I asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I do not know,' answered the messenger. 'Monsieur Talleyrand told me to
+ hurry as never man hurried before, and to put this letter into the hands
+ of Monsieur Otto. I was in Paris at midday yesterday.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I know that I am to blame, but I could not help glancing at the letter,
+ picking it out of the senseless hand of Monsieur Otto. My God! the
+ thunderbolt that it was! I did not faint, but I sat down beside my chief
+ and I burst into tears. It was but a few words, but they told us that
+ Egypt had been evacuated by our troops a month before. All our treaty was
+ undone then, and the one consideration which had induced our enemies to
+ give us good terms had vanished. In twelve hours it would not have
+ mattered. But now the treaty was not yet signed. We should have to give up
+ the Cape. We should have to let England have Malta. Now that Egypt was
+ gone we had nothing left to offer in exchange.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But we are not so easily beaten, we Frenchmen. You English misjudge us
+ when you think that because we show emotions which you conceal, that we
+ are therefore of a weak and womanly nature. You cannot read your histories
+ and believe that. Monsieur Otto recovered his senses presently, and we
+ took counsel what we should do.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'It is useless to go on, Alphonse,' said he. 'This Englishman will laugh
+ at me when I ask him to sign.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Courage!' I cried; and then a sudden thought coming into my head&mdash;'How
+ do we know that the English will have news of this? Perhaps they may sign
+ the treaty before they know of it.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Monsieur Otto sprang from the sofa and flung himself into my arms.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Alphonse,' he cried, 'you have saved me! Why should they know about it?
+ Our news has come from Toulon to Paris, and thence straight to London.
+ Theirs will come by sea through the Straits of Gibraltar. At this moment
+ it is unlikely that anyone in Paris knows of it, save only Talleyrand and
+ the First Consul. If we keep our secret, we may still get our treaty
+ signed.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah! monsieur, you can imagine the horrible uncertainty in which we spent
+ the day. Never, never shall I forget those slow hours during which we sat
+ together, starting at every distant shout, lest it should be the first
+ sign of the rejoicing which this news would cause in London. Monsieur Otto
+ passed from youth to age in a day. As for me, I find it easier to go out
+ and meet danger than to wait for it. I set forth, therefore, towards
+ evening. I wandered here, and wandered there. I was in the fencing-rooms
+ of Monsieur Angelo, and in the salon-de-boxe of Monsieur Jackson, and in
+ the club of Brooks, and in the lobby of the Chamber of Deputies, but
+ nowhere did I hear any news. Still, it was possible that Milord Hawkesbury
+ had received it himself just as we had. He lived in Harley Street, and
+ there it was that the treaty was to be finally signed that night at eight.
+ I entreated Monsieur Otto to drink two glasses of Burgundy before he went,
+ for I feared lest his haggard face and trembling hands should rouse
+ suspicion in the English minister.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, we went round together in one of the Embassy's carriages about
+ half-past seven. Monsieur Otto went in alone; but presently, on excuse of
+ getting his portfolio, he came out again, with his cheeks flushed with
+ joy, to tell me that all was well.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'He knows nothing,' he whispered. 'Ah, if the next half-hour were over!'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Give me a sign when it is settled,' said I.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'For what reason?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Because until then no messenger shall interrupt you. I give you my
+ promise&mdash;I, Alphonse Lacour.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He clasped my hand in both of his.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I shall make an excuse to move one of the candles on to the table in the
+ window,' said he, and hurried into the house, whilst I was left waiting
+ beside the carriage.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, if we could but secure ourselves from interruption for a single
+ half-hour the day would be our own. I had hardly begun to form my plans
+ when I saw the lights of a carriage coming swiftly from the direction of
+ Oxford Street. Ah! if it should be the messenger! What could I do? I was
+ prepared to kill him&mdash;yes, even to kill him&mdash;rather than at this
+ last moment allow our work to be undone. Thousands die to make a glorious
+ war. Why should not one die to make a glorious peace? What though they
+ hurried me to the scaffold? I should have sacrificed myself for my
+ country. I had a little curved Turkish knife strapped to my waist. My hand
+ was on the hilt of it when the carriage which had alarmed me so rattled
+ safely past me.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "But another might come. I must be prepared. Above all, I must not
+ compromise the Embassy. I ordered our carriage to move on, and I engaged
+ what you call a hackney coach. Then I spoke to the driver, and gave him a
+ guinea. He understood that it was a special service.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'You shall have another guinea if you do what you are told,' said I.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'All right, master,' said he, turning his slow eyes upon me without a
+ trace of excitement or curiosity.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "' If I enter your coach with another gentleman, you will drive up and
+ down Harley Street, and take no orders from anyone but me. When I get out,
+ you will carry the other gentleman to Watier's Club, in Bruton Street.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'All right, master,' said he again.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "So I stood outside Milord Hawkesbury's house, and you can think how often
+ my eyes went up to that window in the hope of seeing the candle twinkle in
+ it. Five minutes passed, and another five. Oh, how slowly they crept
+ along! It was a true October night, raw and cold, with a white fog
+ crawling over the wet, shining cobblestones, and blurring the dim
+ oil-lamps. I could not see fifty paces in either direction, but my ears
+ were straining, straining, to catch the rattle of hoofs or the rumble of
+ wheels. It is not a cheering place, monsieur, that street of Harley, even
+ upon a sunny day. The houses are solid and very respectable over yonder,
+ but there is nothing of the feminine about them. It is a city to be
+ inhabited by males. But on that raw night, amid the damp and the fog, with
+ the anxiety gnawing at my heart, it seemed the saddest, weariest spot in
+ the whole wide world. I paced up and down slapping my hands to keep them
+ warm, and still straining my ears. And then suddenly out of the dull hum
+ of the traffic down in Oxford Street I heard a sound detach itself, and
+ grow louder and louder, and clearer and clearer with every instant, until
+ two yellow lights came flashing through the fog, and a light cabriolet
+ whirled up to the door of the Foreign Minister. It had not stopped before
+ a young fellow sprang out of it and hurried to the steps, while the driver
+ turned his horse and rattled off into the fog once more.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Ah, it is in the moment of action that I am best, monsieur. You, who only
+ see me when I am drinking my wine in the Cafe de Provence, cannot conceive
+ the heights to which I rise. At that moment, when I knew that the fruits
+ of a ten years' war were at stake, I was magnificent. It was the last
+ French campaign and I the general and army in one.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Sir," said I, touching him upon the arm, 'are you the messenger for Lord
+ Hawkesbury?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Yes,' said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I have been waiting for you half an hour,' said I. 'You are to follow me
+ at once. He is with the French Ambassador.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I spoke with such assurance that he never hesitated for an instant. When
+ he entered the hackney coach and I followed him in, my heart gave such a
+ thrill of joy that I could hardly keep from shouting aloud. He was a poor
+ little creature, this Foreign Office messenger, not much bigger than
+ Monsieur Otto, and I&mdash;monsieur can see my hands now, and imagine what
+ they were like when I was seven-and-twenty years of age.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, now that I had him in my coach, the question was what I should do
+ with him. I did not wish to hurt him if I could help it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'This is a pressing business,' said he. 'I have a despatch which I must
+ deliver instantly.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Our coach had rattled down Harley Street now, in accordance with my
+ instruction, it turned and began to go up again.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Hullo!' he cried. 'What's this?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'What then? 'I asked.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'We are driving back. Where is Lord Hawkesbury?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'We shall see him presently.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Let me out!' he shouted. 'There's some trickery in this. Coachman, stop
+ the coach! Let me out, I say!'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I dashed him back into his seat as he tried to turn the handle of the
+ door. He roared for help. I clapped my palm across his mouth. He made his
+ teeth meet through the side of it. I seized his own cravat and bound it
+ over his lips. He still mumbled and gurgled, but the noise was covered by
+ the rattle of our wheels. We were passing the minister's house, and there
+ was no candle in the window.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "The messenger sat quiet for a little, and I could see the glint of his
+ eyes as he stared at me through the gloom. He was partly stunned, I think,
+ by the force with which I had hurled him into his seat. And also he was
+ pondering, perhaps, what he should do next. Presently he got his mouth
+ partly free from the cravat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'You shall have my watch and my purse if you will let me go,' said he.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Sir,' said I, 'I am as honourable a man as you are yourself.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Who are you, then?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'My name is of no importance.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'What do you want with me?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'It is a bet.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'A bet? What d'you mean? Do you understand that I am on the Government
+ service, and that you will see the inside of a gaol for this?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'That is the bet. That is the sport, said I.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'You may find it poor sport before you finish,' he cried. 'What is this
+ insane bet of yours then?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'I have bet,' I answered, 'that I will recite a chapter of the Koran to
+ the first gentleman whom I should meet in the street.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I do not know what made me think of it, save that my translation was
+ always running in my head. He clutched at the door-handle, and again I had
+ to hurl him back into his seat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'How long will it take?' he gasped.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'It depends on the chapter,' I answered.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'A short one, then, and let me go!'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'But is it fair?' I argued. 'When I say a chapter, I do not mean the
+ shortest chapter, but rather one which should be of average length.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Help! help! help!' he squealed, and I was compelled again to adjust his
+ cravat.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'A little patience,' said I, 'and it will soon be over. I should like to
+ recite the chapter which would be of most interest to yourself. You will
+ confess that I am trying to make things as pleasant as I can for you?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "He slipped his mouth free again.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Quick, then, quick!' he groaned.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'The Chapter of the Camel?' I suggested.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Yes, yes.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Or that of the Fleet Stallion?'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Yes, yes. Only proceed!'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "We had passed the window and there was no candle. I settled down to
+ recite the Chapter of the Stallion to him. Perhaps you do not know your
+ Koran very well, monsieur? Well, I knew it by heart then, as I know it by
+ heart now. The style is a little exasperating for anyone who is in a
+ hurry. But, then, what would you have? The people in the East are never in
+ a hurry, and it was written for them. I repeated it all with the dignity
+ and solemnity which a sacred book demands, and the young Englishman he
+ wriggled and groaned.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'When the horses, standing on three feet and placing the tip of their
+ fourth foot upon the ground, were mustered in front of him in the evening,
+ he said, I have loved the love of earthly good above the remembrance of
+ things on high, and have spent the time in viewing these horses. Bring the
+ horses back to me. And when they were brought back he began to cut off
+ their legs and&mdash;'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "It was at this moment that the young Englishman sprang at me. My God! how
+ little can I remember of the next few minutes! He was a boxer, this shred
+ of a man. He had been trained to strike. I tried to catch him by the
+ hands. Pac, pac, he came upon my nose and upon my eye. I put down my head
+ and thrust at him with it. Pac, he came from below. But ah! I was too much
+ for him. I hurled myself upon him, and he had no place where he could
+ escape from my weight. He fell flat upon the cushions and I seated myself
+ upon him with such conviction that the wind flew from him as from a burst
+ bellows.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Then I searched to see what there was with which I could tie him. I drew
+ the strings from my shoes, and with one I secured his wrists, and with
+ another his ankles. Then I tied the cravat round his mouth again, so that
+ he could only lie and glare at me. When I had done all this, and had
+ stopped the bleeding of my own nose, I looked out of the coach and ah,
+ monsieur, the very first thing which caught my eyes was that candle&mdash;that
+ dear little candle&mdash;glimmering in the window of the minister. Alone,
+ with these two hands, I had retrieved the capitulation of an army and the
+ loss of a province. Yes, monsieur, what Abercrombie and 5,000 men had done
+ upon the beach at Aboukir was undone by me, single-handed, in a hackney
+ coach in Harley Street.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Well, I had no time to lose, for at any moment Monsieur Otto might be
+ down. I shouted to my driver, gave him his second guinea, and allowed him
+ to proceed to Watier's. For myself, I sprang into our Embassy's carriage,
+ and a moment later the door of the minister opened. He had himself
+ escorted Monsieur Otto downstairs, and now so deep was he in talk that he
+ walked out bareheaded as far as the carriage. As he stood there by the
+ open door, there came the rattle of wheels, and a man rushed down the
+ pavement.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'A despatch of great importance for Milord Hawkesbury!' he cried.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "I could see that it was not my messenger, but a second one. Milord
+ Hawkesbury caught the paper from his hand, and read it by the light of the
+ carriage lamp. His face, monsieur, was as white as this plate, before he
+ had finished.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Monsieur Otto,' he cried, 'we have signed this treaty upon a false
+ understanding. Egypt is in our hands.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'What!' cried Monsieur Otto. 'Impossible!'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'It is certain. It fell to Abercrombie last month.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'In that case,' said Monsieur Otto, 'it is very fortunate that the treaty
+ is signed.'
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "'Very fortunate for you, sir,' cried Milord Hawkesbury, as he turned back
+ to the house.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ "Next day, monsieur, what they call the Bow Street runners were after me,
+ but they could not run across salt water, and Alphonse Lacour was
+ receiving the congratulations of Monsieur Talleyrand and the First Consul
+ before ever his pursuers had got as far as Dover."
+ </p>
+ <div style="height: 6em;">
+ <br><br><br><br><br><br>
+ </div>
+<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10446 ***</div>
+ </body>
+</html>
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